This is the mail archive of the cygwin mailing list for the Cygwin project.


Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]
Other format: [Raw text]

RE: New package: makeself-2.1.5-2


> From: Eric Blake
> Sent: Wednesday, April 28, 2010 14:19
> To: cygwin@cygwin.com
> Subject: Re: New package: makeself-2.1.5-2
> 
> ...
> Perhaps unspoken, but I prefer suffix-less executables.  Then I don't
> have to care whether they are binary or interpreted scripts.  Besides,
> having a suffix makes it harder to reimplement in a different language
> (for example, suppose someone decided to rewrite makeself in C, python,
> or perl, instead of sh).  So following debian practice of stripping the
> .sh suffix as part of the packaging effort seems reasonable (and in the
> meantime, perhaps you may also want to report this upstream as a bug
> they might want to fix).
> 
> --
> Eric Blake   eblake@redhat.com    +1-801-349-2682
> Libvirt virtualization library http://libvirt.org

But doesn't Debian's practice create other problems? If I want
to write a portable script that calls one of these scripts, I 
have to call them differently whether I'm on a Debian system 
or not. (Other workarounds exist, of course, e.g., creating
sym-links so either name will work.) And, if the upstream man 
page correctly references the script with the suffix, when 
Debian strips the script's suffix, does it also make the 
corresponding change to the man page?

IMHO--but who cares?--the correct thing to do is leave the 
suffix alone as the author intended, but to lobby for a change 
in practice.

--Ken Nellis

Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]