Hi,
>>"Joey" == Joey Hess <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Joey> Manoj Srivastava wrote:
Joey> Ok, that's a doable option, though it'll be a lot simpler to
Joey> just make a script that traverses the archive, examines every
Joey> .deb file, pulls the du infomation out of them and generates
Joey> the master file. That doesn't require modifying every package
Joey> and adding yet another file that must be uploaded
Hmm. I guess that this can be yet another task performed by
dinstall, so one wouldn't even need to run the script over all
packages (one would just cache the result to regenerate the master
file later, I guess).
Hmm. This could get time consuming, though. We need to look at
_how_ time consuming it is.
Joey> (and aren't byhand files installed by hand?)
Well, the do not need to be. dinstall can handle it.
Joey> But how is putting the info in this master file any better than
Joey> putting it in Packages? The master file needs to be kept synced
Joey> with the Packages file, so it still must be downloaded.
Three reasons:
a) Backwards compatibility: Lots of things read the Packages files,
including humans.
b) The information in these files is looked at by different programs
-- we make parsding much harder for both sets by trying to make
them ignore more information (parsing Packages files by apt takes
long enough, as it is). Separating the info simplifies parsing.
But the most important reason is:
c) Size checking can be optional. If I am not concerned about size
requirements, I can opt out of it -- and apt does not download the
size info. I think this flexibility is important
manoj
--
Any sufficiently advanced bug is indistinguishable from a
feature. Rich Kulawiec
Manoj Srivastava <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
Key C7261095 fingerprint = CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05 CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E
