Re: Specifying package patches in a more convenient form

[ludo@gnu.org (Ludovic Courtès)]

Alex Kost <alezost@gmail.com> skribis:

> Eric Bavier (2016-04-06 17:57 +0300) wrote:
>
>> On Wed, 06 Apr 2016 15:13:47 +0300
>> Alex Kost <alezost@gmail.com> wrote:
> [...]
>>> > +         "1lgghck46p33z3hg8dnl76jryig4fh6d8rhzms837zp7x4hyfkv4"))
>>> > +       (patches (map search-patch '("ttfautohint-source-date-epoch.patch")))))
>>>
>>> Since it's just a single patch, I don't see a reason to use 'map' here.
>>
>> Just that it's less to change if more patches are added later.  The
>> same has been used in other packages.
>
> I strongly disagree with this policy.

I think “strongly” and “policy” are a bit… too strong.  ;-)

> More patches may never be added, but mapping through a list of a
> single element looks redundant for me.
>
> Talking about how we specify package patches currently, I think it would
> be better to do it in a more clean and general way.  What about adding
> the following macro to (gnu packages)?
>
>   (define-syntax-rule (search-patches file-name ...)
>     "Return a list of patches for each FILE-NAME."
>     (list (search-patch file-name) ...))
>
> So instead of things like this:
>
>   (list (search-patch "foo.patch")
>         (search-patch "bar.patch"))
>
> or this:
>
>   (map search-patch '("foo.patch"
>                       "bar.patch"))
>
> we'll have:
>
>   (search-patches "foo.patch"
>                   "bar.patch")

I like it!

> P.S.  Actually, I don't like 'search-patches' name.  Better ideas?

No!  I like it.

Andy Wingo <wingo@igalia.com> skribis:

> What if the "patches" field just applied `search-path' to each of the
> items in the list if the path is not absolute?  Use
> `absolute-file-name?' to check if this is needed or not.

FWIW I have a preference for keeping things explicit.

Thanks!

Ludo’.