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From: ludo@gnu.org (Ludovic Courtès)
To: Chris Marusich <cmmarusich@gmail.com>
Cc: Andy Wingo <wingo@igalia.com>, guix-devel@gnu.org, guile-devel@gnu.org
Subject: Re: "guix potluck", a moveable feast
Date: Sun, 02 Apr 2017 11:24:40 +0200	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <87shlrb1rb.fsf@gnu.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <87shlrim8m.fsf@gmail.com> (Chris Marusich's message of "Sat, 01 Apr 2017 19:20:25 -0700")

Chris Marusich <cmmarusich@gmail.com> skribis:

> ludo@gnu.org (Ludovic Courtès) writes:
>
>> Beside, related to Chris’ comment, I’m a bit concerned about versioning
>> in such a widely distributed repo.  The package graph in Guix has zero
>> degrees of liberty: every package is connected to other packages; every
>> Guix user sees the exact same graph.
>>
>> Here, we’d have to be more flexible and allow potluck.scm files to just
>> say “import guile” or “import guile@2.0”; “import guile” might provide
>> 2.0 on a machine running an older Guix, and it might give 2.2.9 on an
>> up-to-date machine.
>>
>> IOW, we’re no longer describing one specific graph, but instead
>> describing a family of graphs with some constraints.  The benefits are
>> decentralization, but the main drawback is non-reproducibility: the
>> result would depend on the user machine’s initial state.
>>
>> To work around that, I think the server should resolve package
>> specifications when the potluck.scm file is submitted, and insert each
>> package in the Guix package graph of the moment.  Does that make sense?
>> Maybe that’s what you were describing when you talk about rewriting
>> potluck.scm files so?
>
> When you say "insert each package in the Guix package graph," do you
> mean, "add the package definition to the Guix source tree"?

No no, it’s a separate source tree.  I mean add the potluck packages to
the graph as per GUIX_PACKAGE_PATH.

> What if "the potluck" maintained a pointer to the version (i.e., the
> commit) of the Guix package definitions that it uses as its "base"?
> From time to time, the potluck could update its pointer to point to a
> more recent version of Guix's package definitions.  In this way, every
> version of the potluck would precisely specify the dependencies of all
> the packages in that version of the potluck, including any transitive
> dependencies that ultimately come from the official Guix package
> definitions (as defined in the "base" version); there would be no
> surprising version drift.  I wonder if that would work?

Then there’s the problem that Mark pointed out earlier, which is that it
would force users to use a specific set of dependencies, possibly not
current, when using the potluck.

I think it’s nicer if both repos are decoupled, although that means we
have to pay attention to version issues when the potluck is referring to
packages provided by Guix.

> What if someone wants to add a package definition to the Guix source
> tree which depends on a package that is defined in the potluck?

I guess we wouldn’t allow that in the Guix repo proper.

Ludo’.

  reply	other threads:[~2017-04-02  9:24 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 10+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2017-03-31 14:44 "guix potluck", a moveable feast Andy Wingo
2017-04-01 14:50 ` Christopher Allan Webber
2017-04-01 16:01   ` ng0
2017-04-01 23:05 ` Ludovic Courtès
2017-04-02  2:20   ` Chris Marusich
2017-04-02  9:24     ` Ludovic Courtès [this message]
2017-04-04  2:20       ` Chris Marusich
2017-04-02 10:52   ` Andy Wingo
2017-04-02 14:45     ` Christopher Allan Webber
2017-04-04 12:01     ` Ludovic Courtès

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