On Tuesday 16 December 2003 01:09 am, Sven Luther wrote: > On Mon, Dec 15, 2003 at 01:30:01PM -0800, Michael K. Edwards wrote: > > Sven - > > > > Fabio suggested that I contact you for help with packaging the Numerix > > and Cryptokit OCaml libraries. (He and Peter are packaging the SKS > > OpenPGP > > Cool. > > Please notice that there is also the debian-ocaml-maint mailing lists, > where all the debian/ocaml maintainers and some other interested in > packaging ocaml stuff in debian gather. You should consider joining > there.
Joined now, thanks. > > keyserver, which uses these libraries, and I wound up packaging the > > libraries in the course of getting an SKS instance up.) I have attached > > the e-mail I sent to Xavier Leroy (the Cryptokit upstream) offering him > > my changes to > > And the ocaml upstream too. > > > Cryptokit to replace its use of the non-free Nat bignum library with > > Numerix. > > Mmm, Xavier did already reimplement bignum in the CVS version. I am > considering packaging it in experimental for now. Can you make use of > that ? Also the copyright is actually in HP hands, and i asked Bdale to > look into it. Sadly, he has not time, and the actual stuff seems to be > lost in huge piles of paperwork inherited from Dec and then Compaq. The port to Numerix was easy enough, and gained 10-30% performance on RSA operations on my test system; may be better on memory management scores as well, since I use in-place operations wherever feasible. I like the Numerix API much better than the original Nat, and it has a good implementation of a^b mod c (missing from Nat). I look forward to hearing from Xavier what he thinks of my work. > > Preliminary numerix and cryptokit source packages are on http:// > > www-static.sane.net/. I originally cribbed debian/rules, etc. from > > extlib, but am now rewriting them based on your pcre-ocaml source > > package. (It seems > > Well, it is more Stefano's package, but it is true that we currently > co-maintain it. Also, there is the ocaml-pkg or whatever alioth project, > which include the SVN repository where we are migrating our > co-maintained packages to. Would that be an appropriate repository for cryptokit and numerix as well? > > best to use ocaml-findlibs, and hopefully the weirdness I am having with > > I personnally don't like findlibs, but indeed it is a good tool to use. I am open to other tools as well; I am new to OCaml and guessed that findlib was the most common way of setting up shared libraries, etc. Please correct me if that's incorrect. > > bytecode compilation of the ported cryptokit will go away.) Up until a > > couple of days ago I had never used OCaml, so I could definitely use > > packaging pointers. > > Did you read the ocaml-packaging-policy ? It is in the SVN repository, > but also in /usr/lib/ocaml/3.07. I did read over it once, and will continue to consult it as I refine these packages. Review by an experienced OCaml packager would also be appreciated. > > IANADD, so I will also need an upload sponsor if these packages are to go > > into the archive. Peter and Fabio have both expressed willingness, but > > Fabio thought it would be good to have a sponsor who uses OCaml. I would > > Yep. Altough they still can sponsor the actual uploads, and we can give > you counsel on packaging and everything. That sounds like a good way of dividing it up. > > appreciate it very much if you would consider sponsoring. (My changes to > > Cryptokit will obviously need some review before they are uploaded; the > > upstream cryptokit can't go into main because it depends on non-free > > parts that have been removed from ocaml, and it would be nice if > > cryptokit and sks made it into sarge main.) > > You should have asked before. I believe that the API-identic > reimplementation that is currently in the ocaml CVS should have been > enough to not need your work, altough i don't really understand the > issues involved here. I will do a ocaml-cvs package, and you can then > try it out, and tell me more about it. The comparison will be interesting. It was a good OCaml learning exercise in any case, and didn't take me long. > BTW, is cryptokit packaged, and if so, in which package does it belong ? IMO it should wind up in libcryptokit-ocaml and libcryptokit-ocaml-dev. The upstream build doesn't seem to make shared libraries (which will be needed for libcryptokit-ocaml AIUI), so I will need to do some rework. (I'm working on the Numerix packages now, which will include libnumerix and libnumerix-dev (C interface) as well as libnumerix-ocaml and libnumerix-ocaml-dev. > Friendly, > > Sven Luther Thanks, - Michael
