On 05/19/2012 09:26 AM, Jeremy Huntwork wrote: > I've been holding back bringing this up on-list for a while because I > intended to do the bulk of the work and then present a working system to > the community for comment and review. I still intend to do that, but > given some recent discussions, I think the time is right to bring this > up and see where it goes. > > (Sorry for the cross posting, but since it involves both projects, I > wanted to make sure all saw it - if possible, please reply on lfs-dev.) > > Proposal: > > 1. Adjust LFS/BLFS to auto-generate build recipes for individual > packages that a packaging tool can use to create binary packages with > meta information included such as dependency tracking. > > 2. Store 'official' copies of those binary packages in a developer > package repository so that when developing (primarily BLFS) a dev can > automatically pull and install into a build environment the dependencies > he needs to build and create an individual package. > > 3. Create a standard workflow and tools whereby a developer can > accomplish #2 and edit the book accordingly in an efficient, reliable way. > > Rationale: > > (B)LFS-style development by hand becomes a huge undertaking. BLFS _is_ a > huge undertaking - and it's a difficult beast to maintain. In order to > create a stable reference page in BLFS an editor has to have spent the > time to build all of LFS, tweak it, go through current BLFS, manually > install dependency packages and then carefully document the package he > builds. No two developers are guaranteed to have the same environment, > either, so accuracy and stability becomes an issue. > > The same is true of the LiveCD project, and is the main reason why it > sits dead today. It is difficult to maintain when there are no packaged > binaries to draw from and the entire thing is a scripted source build. > > Let me just say now that because (B)LFS is primarily (and probably > should always be) about educating, I don't think we should require > end-users to use package management. Mainly the proposal is intended to > assist in development. However, if we have taken the time to incorporate > PM in our dev workflow, we can make the option of building via PM tools > available to readers if they wish to use it for themselves and build > their own package repository. > > Details: > > (The following details assume pacman is the package manager chosen, but > it could conceivably be another, such as rpm5.) > > 1. The end of LFS chapter 5 is modified to (optionally) build the > packaging tool and any dependencies it has. > > 2. LFS chapter 6 is modified so that for each package a build recipe > (e.g. PKGBUILD file) is generated from the book's source. A reader is > given the option of carrying out the build manually or via the packaging > tool. > > 3. LFS devs create official copies of the binary packages and install > them to a semi-public package repository > > 4. BLFS is modified to also generate build recipes (PKGBUILD files) from > its source > > 5. As BLFS devs work on individual packages, they can use the defined > workflow and tools to generate a chroot environment with only the > packages they need for build-time dependencies - they can then both > produce a binary version of the package as well as document what they've > done, the end product being a BLFS page which will generate/correspond > to the PKGBUILD file. > > 6. BLFS dev updates the BLFS binary package repository with the > 'official' package and other devs can now draw from and use those when > working on their respective package. > > There are, I'm sure, both positives and negatives to this proposal, and > I'd like to hear everyone's thoughts. > > I intended to do all the development in the jh branch, but if there are > more parties interested in helping this development, then I'm also open > to sharing the workload and perhaps creating an environment where this > can be done together. > > JH
I have in the past worked on LFS-6.8 and have a completed pacman build for it. I wanted to build a desktop system from LFS/BLFS but it was too much work for me. I have not gone further because BLFS is a beast as you say. I completed a server using LFS/BLFS that handles mail web and news services. Sharing the work using pacman would be great, maybe we can exchange notes? -- http://linuxfromscratch.org/mailman/listinfo/lfs-dev FAQ: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/faq/ Unsubscribe: See the above information page
