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Date: Sun, 17 Mar 2002 14:10:54 -0500
From: Christopher Faylor <cgf AT redhat DOT com>
To: cygwin-apps AT cygwin DOT com
Subject: Re: Link for MORE
Message-ID: <20020317191054.GB27779@redhat.com>
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On Sun, Mar 17, 2002 at 01:59:21PM -0500, Charles Wilson wrote:
>Christopher Faylor wrote:
>>If someone wants to contribute, I think it should just be a standard
>>package.
>>
>>Chuck, I hate to say this, but I don't see a real reason for growing
>>cygutils.  The more packages we add to cygutils, the more we go back to
>>the old way of installing cygwin packages -- with less fine-grained
>>control.
>
>A very good point.  This is why both of the latest additions to
>cygutils were 'vetted' on the list before I added them:
>
>mkshortcut: recall the big discussion about whether it should be added
>to winsup/utils or cygutils...
>
>cygstart: this was also thrashed out on the list...although discussion
>centered on whether it should be called 'start' or 'cygstart' -- but
>the idea that it should be added to cygutils was part of the ongoing
>discussion (nobody objected, so...)

Yes, I watched the discussion and wondered if someone would raise
my above "objection".

I'm trying to scale back my cygwin activities as much as possible since
I've just been bumped up a notch in job responsibilities (14 people
reporting to me -- gcc+sim+gdb).  So, I am trying very hard not to
jump in with an opinion or even a response in some cases.

I've actually drafted a couple "I don't think I can contribute to
cygwin anymore" messages but I couldn't bring myself to actually
send them because I couldn't make myself believe that I could go
cold turkey.

So, as evidence, I'm responding to this thread since I thought I was
seeing a trend here that needed commenting on.

>However, perusing the code it appears that "more" is fairly complex
>(even if it is all contained in a single file).  For some reason, it
>offends my sensibilities to create a giant autotool'ed project with all
>the overhead (INSTALL, configure.ac, configure, Makefile.am,
>mkinstalldirs, ...) for just a single-file program.  OTOH, turning
>cygutils into full.exe isn't a good idea, either.

It's funny but I thought that 'more' was part of the original Cygwin CD,
released in 1999, that was the inspiration for the cygwin net release.
I thought we moved everything from the CD into our net distribution but
I'm finding out, three years later, that that was not the case.

>It makes more sense to answer the "Where's more?" question with "In the
>'more' package" than "In the cygutils package".  So, in this case I
>think you are right.

Good.

>>Maybe there is a good reason to have a general purpose utils package
>>that I'm missing.  It just seems to me that this is adding a focus for
>>the cygwin package release on you -- a single point of contact.
>>Theoretically, we could be sharing the load if the contributed pieces
>>of cygutils were made into true cygwin packages.
>
>I have no objection if the original contributors want to take the
>cygutils source package, rip out everything that isn't (for instance)
>'mkshortcut'-related, and release a standalone autotool'ed mkshortcut.
>(However, I'm not pushing for that.)

Me neither, although I think it would actually make sense to do that.

>Tell you what, Chris: unless it is a single-source-file program that I
>personally wrote or ported, I won't add anything else to cygutils
>unless it meets with list approval (heck, that was pretty much my modus
>operandi, anyway).

Sounds like a plan.

cgf