Request for site-lisp-directory

Request for site-lisp-directory

[Piet van Oostrum]

I want to make a plea for a new lisp-level variable `site-lisp-directory'
similar to `data-directory' and `exec-directory'. In my AUCTeX tex-site.el
I now have:

(defvar TeX-lisp-directory
"/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/Resources/site-lisp/auctex" ...

I would prefer the location-independent:

(expand-file-name "auctex" site-lisp-directory)

Of course it is possible to say:
(defvar site-lisp-directory (expand-file-name "../site-lisp"
data-directory)) but I think it is cleaner if this is setup by the
initialization code.
-- 
Piet van Oostrum <piet@cs.uu.nl>
URL: http://www.cs.uu.nl/~piet [PGP]
Private email: piet@vanoostrum.org

Re: Request for site-lisp-directory

[David Kastrup]

Piet van Oostrum <piet@cs.uu.nl> writes:

> I want to make a plea for a new lisp-level variable
> `site-lisp-directory' similar to `data-directory' and
> `exec-directory'. In my AUCTeX tex-site.el I now have:
>
> (defvar TeX-lisp-directory
> "/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/Resources/site-lisp/auctex" ...
>
> I would prefer the location-independent:
>
> (expand-file-name "auctex" site-lisp-directory)
>
> Of course it is possible to say:
> (defvar site-lisp-directory (expand-file-name "../site-lisp"
> data-directory)) but I think it is cleaner if this is setup by the
> initialization code.

Hold your horses.  I am right now overhauling the installation
procedure of AUCTeX, and indeed it will make TeX-lisp-directory (and
other stuff) typically be set to a relative path location (namely
something like
(expand-file-name "something" (file-name-directory load-file-name))

This is more a problem of the installation procedure of AUCTeX rather
than Emacs.

And it can't be solved by Emacs, anyway: packages delivered by your OS
distribution vendor will be placed in a directory different (and later
in load-path) than packages installed per-site.  Having a
"site-lisp-directory" in the manner you envision would mean that one
could not have AUCTeX working _both_ when installed by the OS
installation procedures _as well_ as as part of the site-local
installations (probably with a newer version).

I don't think there is much within Emacs itself that can be provided
and result in consistently being of help here.

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum

Re: Request for site-lisp-directory

[Piet van Oostrum]

>>>>> David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> (DK) wrote:

>DK> Piet van Oostrum <piet@cs.uu.nl> writes:
>>> I want to make a plea for a new lisp-level variable
>>> `site-lisp-directory' similar to `data-directory' and
>>> `exec-directory'. In my AUCTeX tex-site.el I now have:
>>> 
>>> (defvar TeX-lisp-directory
>>> "/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/Resources/site-lisp/auctex" ...
>>> 
>>> I would prefer the location-independent:
>>> 
>>> (expand-file-name "auctex" site-lisp-directory)
>>> 
>>> Of course it is possible to say:
>>> (defvar site-lisp-directory (expand-file-name "../site-lisp"
>>> data-directory)) but I think it is cleaner if this is setup by the
>>> initialization code.

>DK> Hold your horses.  I am right now overhauling the installation
>DK> procedure of AUCTeX, and indeed it will make TeX-lisp-directory (and
>DK> other stuff) typically be set to a relative path location (namely
>DK> something like
>DK> (expand-file-name "something" (file-name-directory load-file-name))

>DK> This is more a problem of the installation procedure of AUCTeX rather
>DK> than Emacs.

It is not only AUCTeX; I just use that as an example. I have more packages
installed in site-lisp and some of them require a variable set to their
location or a location of one of their files. Emacs knows the site-lisp
directory because it puts it in load-path, so it could easily put it in a
variable also.
-- 
Piet van Oostrum <piet@cs.uu.nl>
URL: http://www.cs.uu.nl/~piet [PGP]
Private email: piet@vanoostrum.org

Re: Request for site-lisp-directory

[David Kastrup]

Piet van Oostrum <piet@cs.uu.nl> writes:

>>>>>> David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> (DK) wrote:
>
>>DK> Piet van Oostrum <piet@cs.uu.nl> writes:
>>>> I want to make a plea for a new lisp-level variable
>>>> `site-lisp-directory' similar to `data-directory' and
>>>> `exec-directory'. In my AUCTeX tex-site.el I now have:
>>>> 
>>>> (defvar TeX-lisp-directory
>>>> "/Applications/Emacs.app/Contents/Resources/site-lisp/auctex" ...
>>>> 
>>>> I would prefer the location-independent:
>>>> 
>>>> (expand-file-name "auctex" site-lisp-directory)
>>>> 
>>>> Of course it is possible to say:
>>>> (defvar site-lisp-directory (expand-file-name "../site-lisp"
>>>> data-directory)) but I think it is cleaner if this is setup by the
>>>> initialization code.
>
>>DK> Hold your horses.  I am right now overhauling the installation
>>DK> procedure of AUCTeX, and indeed it will make TeX-lisp-directory (and
>>DK> other stuff) typically be set to a relative path location (namely
>>DK> something like
>>DK> (expand-file-name "something" (file-name-directory load-file-name))
>
>>DK> This is more a problem of the installation procedure of AUCTeX rather
>>DK> than Emacs.
>
> It is not only AUCTeX; I just use that as an example. I have more
> packages installed in site-lisp and some of them require a variable
> set to their location or a location of one of their files. Emacs
> knows the site-lisp directory because it puts it in load-path, so it
> could easily put it in a variable also.

I just explained that it is no good to assume that there is only a
single possible directory relative to site-lisp where a package may be
installed, since some packages come in package systems delivered by
the OS vendor, some packages get installed by the site administrator,
and some packages get installed by the user himself, and in some cases
those installations are even in parallel.  The only scheme that has a
marginal chance of working is locating stuff relatively to
(file-name-directory load-file-name).

-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum

Re: Request for site-lisp-directory

[Stefan Monnier]

> It is not only AUCTeX; I just use that as an example. I have more packages
> installed in site-lisp and some of them require a variable set to their
> location or a location of one of their files. Emacs knows the site-lisp
> directory because it puts it in load-path, so it could easily put it in a
> variable also.

The reason why packages use such variables is not that they can't find the
site-lisp directory, but that they don't know whether the package will be
installed in the site-lisp directory or elsewhere.  For example, in many
cases it's installed in the user's home directory instead.


        Stefan