Re: [aur-general] When to use optdepends (was: AUR package q -- newbie)
On 5/12/20 9:55 AM, Markus Schaaf wrote: >> It's not really clear to me when to optdepend. > > Comments welcome. My idea is to use optdepends for things the user may > want, but it's not obvious how to make them work, like a glue-library > the application needs to use another facility, e.g. gpgme to use gpg, or > ghostscript to produce PDF. I'd generally expect an optdepends for something which the program has a built-in ability to use simply by installing the optdepends. -- Eli Schwartz Bug Wrangler and Trusted User signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Re: [aur-general] When to use optdepends (was: AUR package q -- newbie)
On Tue, 12 May 2020 15:55:58 +0200 Markus Schaaf wrote: > > It's not really clear to me when to optdepend. > > Comments welcome. My idea is to use optdepends for things the user may > want, but it's not obvious how to make them work, like a glue-library > the application needs to use another facility, e.g. gpgme to use gpg, > or ghostscript to produce PDF. As a *user*, I look at an optdepends'ed package as an otherwise independent package that makes the original package better or more useful. I usually think that the original package will use the optdepends'ed package out of the box, especially if the latter is already installed when I install the former, or automatically if I install the latter later. IMO, the more I have to do to configure the main package to use the optdepends'ed package, the relationship degrades from optdepends to something lesser. https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/PKGBUILD#optdepends has some good examples. In particular, if I see that a package has an optdepends on CUPS, then I assume that that package detects and uses CUPS all by itself. The package, of course, likely does lots of other things even if it can't print. Just my 2¢. -- “Atoms are not things.” – Werner Heisenberg Dan Sommers, http://www.tombstonezero.net/dan
Re: [aur-general] When to use optdepends (was: AUR package q -- newbie)
On Tue, 12 May 2020 15:55:58 +0200 Markus Schaaf wrote: > > It's not really clear to me when to optdepend. > > Comments welcome. My idea is to use optdepends for things the user may > want, but it's not obvious how to make them work, like a glue-library > the application needs to use another facility, e.g. gpgme to use gpg, > or ghostscript to produce PDF. I always ask myself: Is the dep not required for the core functionality of the package, as in: Are there users that could use this package without it? If so, add it as optdepends and specify the functionality/feature the user might need it for. It should be the place to go when some feature doesn't work and might need another package. -- hashworks Webhttps://hashworks.net Public Key 0x4FE7F4FEAC8EBE67 pgpBoN9Dniu9U.pgp Description: OpenPGP digital signature
