On Fri, Jul 21, 2006 at 06:45:52PM +1000, Damien Miller wrote: > On Fri, 21 Jul 2006, Bernd Schoeller wrote: > > > On Thu, Jul 20, 2006 at 06:12:54PM +0200, Christian Weisgerber wrote: > > > We need some sort of policy how to deal with software written in > > > Java. We have a number of ports that are basically just wrappers > > > that install pre-compiled Java byte code. > > > > Please have the java source in the ports tree, and the .class/.jar > > stuff in the packages. Without going into the political details, this > > is just what I would expect as a user. > > This is all very nice, but someone has to do the work. Kurt, who does > do the work, says that maintaining source-based ports is too much hassle > for him on slower platforms. So if people really want this approach then > you need to be prepared to help out more than happens now.
Somebody explain to me how slower platforms are a hastle for java-based ports. Isn't the jvm code supposed to be platform-independent ? There is completely no reason to build platform-independent stuff on slow arches, you can just copy over the packages from the fast arch... as far as I know, the big issue with java and slow architectures is that java isn't as portable as it is supposed to be, and need arch-dependent shit to work... There are probably mixed ports out there, for which it would be feasible to have `mixed' builds. Just grab the bytecode from the fast arch. In my opinion, there are *two* distinct points, and you need to make sure you understand both. - open software. We have to encourage build from source, so that source stays available. This is about feasible for every java port, and at least the fast architectures should take that route, all the time. I fully agree with Theo on that one: when in doubt, take the source. (and for Nikolay, we still have a few binary-only packages. There are reasons for these, such as commercial apps/semi-commercial apps like opera, but in general, if source is available, then source should be used) - practicality. Building anything on fast machines is reasonable, in the developer's world. End-users shouldn't care. End-users can use packages. If they whine about compilation times, that means they use the ports. If they use the ports, they want to tinker and tweak, hence they need the source. (we're not gentoo, `tweaking' is a bit more than hacking at obscure compiler options to try to get one extra percent of performance out of a program at the cost of extra bugs). When building everything isn't reasonable, package stuff so that slow machines can use the fast machines packages. End of story...
