Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Mon, Oct 30, 2000 at 09:22:02AM +1100, Brian May wrote: > I can't help but think though that this indicates a bigger problem > in our reliance on maintainer scripts - it is not possible to add new > features without: > > - hard-coding the entire feature in the maintainer script > > AND/OR > >

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Mon, Oct 30, 2000 at 09:22:02AM +1100, Brian May wrote: > > "Anthony" == Anthony Towns writes: > Anthony> Which will kludge up postinsts from now to forever, be an > Anthony> extra source for bugs, and make changing things in future > Anthony> awkward. > I don't think we should

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

(Please don't Cc: me on these mails) On Mon, Oct 30, 2000 at 09:07:38AM +1100, Brian May wrote: > > "Anthony" == Anthony Towns writes: > Anthony> dpkg already knows this, and it can already be determined > Anthony> by looking for "Unpacking ..." or "Setting up ...". > >> - current

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> "Anthony" == Anthony Towns writes: Anthony> Which will kludge up postinsts from now to forever, be an Anthony> extra source for bugs, and make changing things in future Anthony> awkward. I don't think we should downgrade the capability of future debian products, either just for

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> "Anthony" == Anthony Towns writes: Anthony> dpkg already knows this, and it can already be determined Anthony> by looking for "Unpacking ..." or "Setting up ...". >> - current task for this package, as generated by dpkg-log Anthony> Which is exactly what this would be outp

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, Oct 26, 2000 at 04:03:07PM -0600, Jason Gunthorpe wrote: > On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > > I don't really see what's so "middle ground" about it; it needs much more > > significant changes to maintainer scripts [0], creates a compatability > > problem, and doesn't really seem

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Fri, Oct 27, 2000 at 07:53:06PM +1100, Brian May wrote: > > "John" == John Goerzen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > IMHO using the dpkg-log helps structure the output of the task, and > what make it easier to have a more professional looking GUI front end. > > eg such a program could have GUI

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> "John" == John Goerzen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: John> I think that works well. It's better than requiring a John> separate command, and in fact, one can redirect output of John> commands to stderr anyway for those cases in which you might John> want to log the output of a

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, Oct 26, 2000 at 02:43:32PM -0700, Joey Hess wrote: > Anthony Towns wrote: > > > dpkg-log "Recalibrating the frobnitzer" > > This means future debs can't be installed with the current dpkg. It > > means future dpkg's can never output anything. It means all debs that do > > anything important

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Anthony Towns writes: > So is there anything wrong with just consistently using stderr for these > notes? I think that works well. It's better than requiring a separate command, and in fact, one can redirect output of commands to stderr anyway for those cases in which you might want to log the

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > I don't really see what's so "middle ground" about it; it needs much more > significant changes to maintainer scripts [0], creates a compatability > problem, and doesn't really seem to buy anyone anything over the simpler > solution. Nonsense. >

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Anthony Towns wrote: > > dpkg-log "Recalibrating the frobnitzer" > > This means future debs can't be installed with the current dpkg. It > means future dpkg's can never output anything. It means all debs that do > anything important in their postinst need an --assert-somethingorother > in their pr

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, Oct 26, 2000 at 03:16:00PM -0600, Jason Gunthorpe wrote: > On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > > I find it hard to believe that this thread can reasonably go from > > "there's no need for output at all for any reason" to "there's a need > > for so much output that we must be able to

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > I find it hard to believe that this thread can reasonably go from > "there's no need for output at all for any reason" to "there's a need > for so much output that we must be able to categorise it and filter it, > and to hell with backwards compatabilit

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, Oct 26, 2000 at 02:21:06PM -0600, Jason Gunthorpe wrote: > On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > > > > This means future debs can't be installed with the current dpkg. It > > > > means future dpkg's can never output anything. It means all debs that do > > > > anything important in the

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, Oct 26, 2000 at 08:06:58PM +0200, Marcus Brinkmann wrote: > > > > Or <40 lines of garbage ralating to byte-compiling obscure emacs > > > > modules>. > > > > > > Well, yes. "Bytecompiling emacs modules: emacs19 emacs20 xemacs20" > > > would be useful output, by comparison. > > > > Anythin

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > > > This means future debs can't be installed with the current dpkg. It > > > means future dpkg's can never output anything. It means all debs that do > > > anything important in their postinst need an --assert-somethingorother > > > in their preinst.

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, Oct 26, 2000 at 01:33:34PM -0600, Jason Gunthorpe wrote: > On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > > This means future debs can't be installed with the current dpkg. It > > means future dpkg's can never output anything. It means all debs that do > > anything important in their postinst

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Anthony Towns wrote: > This means future debs can't be installed with the current dpkg. It > means future dpkg's can never output anything. It means all debs that do > anything important in their postinst need an --assert-somethingorother > in their preinst. Seems like needl

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, Oct 26, 2000 at 10:12:50AM -0700, Joey Hess wrote: > So an alternative that has occurred to me is that we could introduce a > command like dpkg-log and require that all output goes through it. > > dpkg-log "Recalibrating the frobnitzer" This means future debs can't be installed with the c

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Jason Gunthorpe wrote: > Yes, a unix domain socket, or pre-opened file FD, some mechanism passed in > through an environment variable. We can set a reasonable format so we can > tag messages w/ priority. The absense of such a variable would just echo > to stdout. That would work. > Randolph was w

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Tue, Oct 24, 2000 at 03:28:09PM -0700, Joey Hess wrote: > Anthony Towns wrote: > > > > The sorts of information which currently get displayed, but which don't > > > > get prompted for, are things like "Restarting internet superserver: > > > > inetd", or "Updating /etc/network/interfaces: succeed

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, 26 Oct 2000, Joey Hess wrote: > Jason Gunthorpe wrote: > > The standard version would simply have to use a technique like I > > described, you wouldn't want to be replacing programs basked on what front > > end is being used, that is messy. > > Oh, you mean make dpkg-log write to a fifo

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Jason Gunthorpe wrote: > The standard version would simply have to use a technique like I > described, you wouldn't want to be replacing programs basked on what front > end is being used, that is messy. Oh, you mean make dpkg-log write to a fifo or something? -- see shy jo

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Thu, 26 Oct 2000, Joey Hess wrote: > Then dpkg-log could be replaced/coopted by these apt frontends you apeak > of, and by debconf, so their dpkg-log versions actually handle the > logging however they prefer to handle it. I'm not sure how things like > apt-frontends could temporarily make the

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Anthony Towns wrote: > Using stdout is current practice and quite convenient, but apt frontends > then can't distinguish between random prompty stuff, and these note things. > > In the longer term, it may well interfere with the debconf worldview > as well. > > So I can't see any way of making th

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Anthony Towns wrote: > > > > > So, how about something like: > > > > > Packages should briefly report the main tasks as they undertake > > > > may > > > Policy's about ensuring consistency amongst packages. "should" seems > > > appropriate here, just as it does for the manpag

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Wed, Oct 25, 2000 at 07:41:24AM -0700, Sean 'Shaleh' Perry wrote: > > This would require lots of changes to packages. > so we change lots of packages. Sure. But if anyone can think of a solution that gives the same results but doesn't require changes to lots of packages, that'd be better. So

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> > This would require lots of changes to packages. > so we change lots of packages. Debian is being used by IS more and more these days. At VA alone we have some 100+ Debian machines now. The current package setup makes this a headache for updates. Being able to log output and ensure that t

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Joey Hess) wrote on 24.10.00 in <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > Brian May wrote: > > How about something like this: > > > > Messages should only be displayed on the console if: > > > > - it represents a slow task, eg compiling modules (emacs) or compiling > > ls-R files (latex). Of cour

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> The sorts of information which currently get displayed, but which don't > get prompted for, are things like "Restarting internet superserver: > inetd", or "Updating /etc/network/interfaces: succeeded". > > To me, those sorts of outputs seem useful and helpful, so I think policy > should probably

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Tue, Oct 24, 2000 at 04:16:02PM -0700, Joey Hess wrote: > Anthony Towns wrote: > If we modify policy to say this kind of thing should be done, I'd really > like to see it happen via some kind of mechanism that can easily let it > be stored in a log. I know this has been discussed in the past, >

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> "Joey" == Joey Hess <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Joey> I take your earlier point about a daemon maybe hanging as it Joey> restarts, and perhaps a emacs byte-compile can hang Joey> too. Heck, *anything* could conceivably hang. If that Joey> happens though, there are tools like

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Tue, 24 Oct 2000, Joey Hess wrote: > If we modify policy to say this kind of thing should be done, I'd really > like to see it happen via some kind of mechanism that can easily let it > be stored in a log. I know this has been discussed in the past, > inconclusively but maybe it's time to revi

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Anthony Towns wrote: > > But consider: one of these emacs packages is installing and > > it byte-compiles ok. Why should we display the message? Remember > > staving off boredom is not an answer. > > ``Policy shouldn't say packages should do such and such, because policy > says packages shouldn't

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Tue, Oct 24, 2000 at 03:28:09PM -0700, Joey Hess wrote: > Anthony Towns wrote: > > > > The sorts of information which currently get displayed, but which don't > > > > get prompted for, are things like "Restarting internet superserver: > > > > inetd", or "Updating /etc/network/interfaces: succeed

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Seth Arnold wrote: > * Joey Hess <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [001024 15:23]: > > Policy explictly says you should NOT output things to "stave off boredom > > on the part of a user". Displaying stuff for tasks that may be slow on > > my 386 clearly falls under that. > > Hmm; I myself like twizzle sticks (a

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

* Joey Hess <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [001024 15:23]: > Policy explictly says you should NOT output things to "stave off boredom > on the part of a user". Displaying stuff for tasks that may be slow on > my 386 clearly falls under that. Hmm; I myself like twizzle sticks (ala fsck) to let one know the ma

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Anthony Towns wrote: > > > The sorts of information which currently get displayed, but which don't > > > get prompted for, are things like "Restarting internet superserver: > > > inetd", or "Updating /etc/network/interfaces: succeeded". > > Or <40 lines of garbage ralating to byte-compiling obscure

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Brian May wrote: > How about something like this: > > Messages should only be displayed on the console if: > > - it represents a slow task, eg compiling modules (emacs) or compiling > ls-R files (latex). Of course, this is a subjective criteria... What > is a "slow" task? Policy explictly says y

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Wed, Oct 25, 2000 at 08:56:47AM +1100, Brian May wrote: > Any other messages probably should be done via debconf. debconf isn't suitable for policy yet, apparently. Cheers, aj -- Anthony Towns <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> I don't speak for anyone save myself. GPG sig

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> "Anthony" == Anthony Towns writes: Anthony> Well, yes. "Bytecompiling emacs modules: emacs19 emacs20 Anthony> xemacs20" would be useful output, by comparison. How about something like this: Messages should only be displayed on the console if: - it represents a slow task, eg compi

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

On Tue, Oct 24, 2000 at 10:56:50AM -0700, Joey Hess wrote: > Anthony Towns wrote: > > The first paragraph of that section states: > > ``The package installation scripts should avoid producing output > > which it (sic) is unnecessary for the user to see and should rely > > on `dpkg'

Re: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

Anthony Towns wrote: > The first paragraph of that section states: > > ``The package installation scripts should avoid producing output > which it (sic) is unnecessary for the user to see and should rely > on `dpkg' to stave off boredom on the part of a user installing >

RE: RFC: allow output from maintainer scripts

> > The sorts of information which currently get displayed, but which don't > get prompted for, are things like "Restarting internet superserver: > inetd", or "Updating /etc/network/interfaces: succeeded". > > To me, those sorts of outputs seem useful and helpful, so I think policy > should proba