From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: wgreenhouse-sGOZH3hwPm2sTnJN9+BGXg@public.gmane.org (W. Greenhouse) Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.help Subject: Re: Could we organize all Emacs packages with a single repo system? Date: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 19:36:55 +0000 Message-ID: <87mwoh1l7s.fsf@motoko.kusanagi> References: NNTP-Posting-Host: plane.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1376681861 31217 80.91.229.3 (16 Aug 2013 19:37:41 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 16 Aug 2013 19:37:41 +0000 (UTC) To: help-gnu-emacs-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org Original-X-From: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org Fri Aug 16 21:37:42 2013 Return-path: Envelope-to: geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([208.118.235.17]) by plane.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1VAPqA-0005i4-IU for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 21:37:42 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([::1]:32902 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VAPqA-0007BN-5d for geh-help-gnu-emacs@m.gmane.org; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 15:37:42 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([2001:4830:134:3::10]:36844) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VAPpk-0006mC-90 for help-gnu-emacs-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 15:37:21 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VAPpb-0004XI-OU for help-gnu-emacs-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 15:37:16 -0400 Original-Received: from plane.gmane.org ([80.91.229.3]:35762) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1VAPpb-0004X9-Ho for help-gnu-emacs-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 15:37:07 -0400 Original-Received: from list by plane.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1VAPpZ-0005GP-Ee for help-gnu-emacs-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 21:37:05 +0200 Original-Received: from ip-static-94-242-204-74.as5577.net ([94.242.204.74]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 21:37:05 +0200 Original-Received: from wgreenhouse by ip-static-94-242-204-74.as5577.net with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Fri, 16 Aug 2013 21:37:05 +0200 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ Original-Lines: 56 Original-X-Complaints-To: usenet-dbVV3NMTNubNLxjTenLetw@public.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: ip-static-94-242-204-74.as5577.net X-Archive: encrypt User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/24.3 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:WsKTTeRyfrICaBkynVwblb+wsfk= X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-Received-From: 80.91.229.3 X-BeenThere: help-gnu-emacs-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org Original-Sender: help-gnu-emacs-bounces+geh-help-gnu-emacs=m.gmane.org-mXXj517/zsQ@public.gmane.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.help:92937 Archived-At: Hi Andrew, Andrew Pennebaker writes: > Marmalade and MELPA are really cool. I'd love to see their packages merged > into a single system (Marmalade or MELPA, doesn't matter), to reduce > confusion. > > There are some cool packages only in Marmalade, and some nifty packages > only in MELPA, so I have to instruct Emacs to check *both* repos in my > .emacs :P Yuck. > > If the repos hold different versions, you could get nasty dependency > conflicts. > > And we could finally build in support for the repo into Emacs, so users > don't have to manually insert the default repo into .emacs. I think M-x > install-package xyz should work out of the box, zero configuration required. > > Of course, configuration would still be available, should further repos > spring up, and users want to prioritize them over the default one. > > Personally, I'd prefer MELPA for its distributed, git-based approach. But > it's more important to me that Emacs get a standard package management > system akin to RubyGems, that runs out of the box with no configuration > required, to make things easier. FWIW, the `package-archives' already does come preconfigured with the official GNU ELPA repositoriy as a default: $ emacs -q M-: package-archives RET => (("gnu" . "http://elpa.gnu.org/packages/")) I think that's fine. I would encourage anyone who's willing to go through the copyright assignment process to become an Emacs contributor to put their work in the GNU ELPA (the rules for each are the same). This is difficult, ethically or practically, for some, which is why we have the alternate repositories. Marmalade and MELPA represent different valid ideas about how to package stuff for Emacs; in Marmalade the developers themselves do the packaging, while in MELPA, packages are generated programmatically from upstream sources. MELPA thus generally represents a more "bleeding edge" idea of releasing packages. A more important issue revealed by what you're saying is the fact that package.el at present lacks a system for overriding the default behavior of installing the highest-numbered version of a package (something like `apt-pinning' in Debian). package.el also lacks support for cryptographically signed packages/repositories at the moment, which is a big issue. Both of these issues are being worked on; hopefully people will also start submitting more of their stuff to GNU ELPA and helping it grow. -- Regards, WGG