[arch-dev-public] Proposal: minimal base system

[Allan McRae]

On 5/2/19 9:06 pm, Bruno Pagani wrote:
> Le 22/01/2019 à 00:59, Allan McRae a écrit :
>> On 22/1/19 9:41 am, Bruno Pagani wrote:
>>> Le 22/01/2019 à 00:23, Allan McRae via arch-dev-public a écrit :
>>>> On 22/1/19 8:03 am, Levente Polyak via arch-dev-public wrote:
>>>>> Everything that won’t be part of base-system needs to be added as a
>>>>> dependency to all requiring packages; alternatively don't omit any first
>>>>> level runtime dependencies at all.
>>>>>
>>>>> This package should only depend on strictly required explicit packages
>>>>> to get a working minimal Arch Linux system.
>>>>>
>>>>> The proposed end result is:
>>>>> - base: convenient helper group for quickly getting a working system
>>>>>   when installing, must include the new base-system package
>>>>> - base-system: package defining the minimum dependencies for a working
>>>>>   base runtime
>>>> I think the proposal is OK.  I'm not comfortable with our line about
>>>> base group packages being required given how many of them I don't have
>>>> installed.
>>>>
>>>> However...  I don't like idea of the base group and base-system package
>>>> existing together.  You definition of what base-system should be is much
>>>> the same as what the base group was defined to be.  What package
>>>> justifies itself in the base group, but would not be in base-system?  It
>>>> seems we would have two very similar things where one would do.
>>>>
>>>> Allan
>>> In the proposal, base would really just be a convenient helper for e.g.
>>> beginners installing their system, so they could get all tools that are
>>> often used during install (e.g. cryptsetup, lvm2, various FS/network
>>> tools, etc.) or (POSIX) tools people coming from other distros would
>>> expect to be here by default (man pages, nano/vi…) but that are
>>> interactive ones and thus not really required for operating.
>>>
>>> Anyone knowing their stuff could just install base-system + what they
>>> actually need (e.g., I would install cryptsetup and vim, and not care
>>> about netctl, xfsprogs or lvm2).
>> "Anyone knowing their stuff" is the essentially the stated Arch target
>> audience.
> 
> So apparently we did not answer all concerns here. I don’t expect Arch
> users to know thing so well that they know exactly what tools are in
> which packages when they install Arch for the first time. I think we
> should not mistake Arch Power Users, people that have a level of
> knowledge above Arch Users, that are just generic Linux Power Users.
> 
>> So, the definitions of the sets of packages are:
>>
>> base-system - essential packages we assume everyone has installed
>> (previous definition of base...)
> 
> To be clearer, the new proposition would be to call this arch-system to
> avoid confusion with base. However, note that this “previous definition
> of base” is definitively not that clear: when I installed Arch, I read
> things as “base is a convenient helper to get almost every standard
> tools you could need to do your install”.
> 
>> base group - base-system plus other packages some people probably
>> want/expect and support packages for filesystem types most people don't
>> actually need.
> For me, base will be what it has ever been: a fast way to get started as
> an Arch beginner.
>> Maybe slightly facetious on that last one, but I don't see a clear need
>> for the base group once base-system exists.
> 
> Because, as an Arch dev, you definitively qualify as an Arch Power
> Users. I wouldn’t use base either for myself, but I firmly believe most
> Arch beginners would.
> 
> Does that make sense to you, or do you still think every new Arch User
> should already know exactly what is required to get started?
> 

If someone knows they want to set up logical volumes and drive
encryption, then they know enough to install lvm and cryptsetup.  Same
with jfsutils, xfsutils.   So I don't think they should be in the base
group (e.g. I would not call jfsutils a standard tool).

If we remove the excess from base, then we are down to a very small
difference between that and archlinux-system.  Only e2fsprogs, man, and
an editor different?

So I see the proposed archlinux-system group being essentially what base
should be.

A