On Sun, Jul 24, 2022, at 11:17 PM, Maxime Devos wrote:

 * Patches must not be used to remove non-free files, because a patch by construction contains the non-free file itself so the patch would be non-free, which would not be acceptable to Guix. Likewise, patches should not be used to remove bundled libraries, to avoid large space usage, but this is not an absolute rule unlike as for non-free files.

It is possible to create patches that do not contain the deleted file, e.g. with `git format-patch --irreversible-delete`. That said, I don't know if the version of `patch` we use to patch origins is able to apply such patches—but maybe it would be a useful feature?

-Philip

Right, this is possible though it would have to be checked whether it is supported, so that statement should be weakened a bit -- to allow deleting non-free files with a patch, but noting that you'll have to set the right options to avoid including the deleted file in the patch.

I would recommend a (delete-file-recursively ".") over a patch here though, to avoid having to remember the --irreversible-delete option and in case there is not a git repo.

Greetings,
Maxime.