From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Tom Tromey Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: document package.el Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2010 12:22:56 -0600 Message-ID: References: <83bp9ex3ro.fsf@gnu.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1282414991 9517 80.91.229.12 (21 Aug 2010 18:23:11 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 21 Aug 2010 18:23:11 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Eli Zaretskii Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sat Aug 21 20:23:10 2010 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1Omsij-0007YO-92 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 20:23:09 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:35151 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1Omsii-0006VB-79 for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 14:23:08 -0400 Original-Received: from [140.186.70.92] (port=37649 helo=eggs.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1Omsic-0006SB-2r for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 14:23:03 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1Omsia-0002Vv-Tl for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 14:23:01 -0400 Original-Received: from mx1.redhat.com ([209.132.183.28]:9475) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1Omsia-0002Vi-Nt; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 14:23:00 -0400 Original-Received: from int-mx08.intmail.prod.int.phx2.redhat.com (int-mx08.intmail.prod.int.phx2.redhat.com [10.5.11.21]) by mx1.redhat.com (8.13.8/8.13.8) with ESMTP id o7LIMwss006858 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=OK); Sat, 21 Aug 2010 14:22:58 -0400 Original-Received: from ns3.rdu.redhat.com (ns3.rdu.redhat.com [10.11.255.199]) by int-mx08.intmail.prod.int.phx2.redhat.com (8.13.8/8.13.8) with ESMTP id o7LIMwiE031993; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 14:22:58 -0400 Original-Received: from opsy.redhat.com (ovpn01.gateway.prod.ext.phx2.redhat.com [10.5.9.1]) by ns3.rdu.redhat.com (8.13.8/8.13.8) with ESMTP id o7LIMv4c025126; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 14:22:57 -0400 Original-Received: by opsy.redhat.com (Postfix, from userid 500) id 34AD437897B; Sat, 21 Aug 2010 12:22:57 -0600 (MDT) X-Attribution: Tom In-Reply-To: <83bp9ex3ro.fsf@gnu.org> (Eli Zaretskii's message of "Sat, 07 Aug 2010 10:47:55 +0300") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.2 (gnu/linux) X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.67 on 10.5.11.21 X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:128985 Archived-At: >>>>> "Eli" == Eli Zaretskii writes: Tom> I finally found a little time to write some documentation for Tom> package.el. [...] Eli> At this point I wondered why nothing is done with the Author and Eli> Maintainer headers. They weren't needed by the package manager. Tom> + A multi-file package is just a @file{.tar} file. Eli> Does package.el really support only .tar files? That sounds like an Eli> unnecessary limitation, since Emacs supports much more. Emacs doesn't have built-in support for anything else. It relies on external programs. Since I think it is best not to rely on the environment this way, I purposely limited package.el. I still think this was a good decision, because it only affects packagers, not users. I don't know of any gain to be had by expanding this. In any case I wrote the documentation to describe what exists now. Eli> If this means a multi-file package cannot have a long description in Eli> the form of "Commentary", then this sounds like an inconvenience, Eli> e.g., if a package starts as a single file and then develops into a Eli> multi-file one. The problem is knowing which file to extract this information from. It is not uncommon for several files to have comment headers. Tom> + If the package has an info manual, you should distribute the needed Tom> +info files, plus a @file{dir} file made with @command{install-info}. Eli> Not clear why the `dir' file is needed. Are you trying to support Eli> users that don't have install-info on their systems? Yes. Tom