[aur-general] AUR and unsuported architectures

[Hugo Osvaldo Barrera]

On 2012-06-01 03:17, Jelle van der Waa wrote:
> On 01/06/12 02:31, Loui Chang wrote:
>> On Thu 31 May 2012 09:56 -0300, Hugo Osvaldo Barrera wrote:
>>> On 2012-05-31 08:10, Phillip Smith wrote:
>>>> On 31 May 2012 17:38, Jelle van der Waa <jelle at vdwaa.nl> wrote:
>>>>> When I first though about it, I wanted to say "why not", it doesn't hurt
>>>>> the functioning of the normal i686,x86_64 packages.
>>>>
>>>> I thought the same, but after thinking more... While AUR is
>>>> "unsupported", the project/site is still an official item.

I agree, this is quite true, and I actually must agree that ppc/arm
would be out-of-place because of this.

>>>>
>>>> In my mind, it doesn't make sense to include unofficial platforms in
>>>> official infrastructure, supported or not.
>>>>
>>>> We don't encourage documentation of other platforms in our wiki (do we?)

I don't know if it's allowed, but I should point that this article
exists in the wiki:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Official_Install_Guide_on_a_PowerPC

I don't think it should say "official".  Or it should at least mention
it's unsupported by arch, BTW.

>>>
>>> While I'd wish this weren't true, your argument does make perfect sense,
>>> so I guess it's best to keep AUR clear of these architectures.
>>
>> I'm not a TU, but I actually think allowing other architectures in the
>> PKGBUILDs is a Good Thing. The AUR is supposed be be a place of
>> less-restricted user contribution - where packages (and/or
>> architectures?) that developers are not interested in can be submitted.
>>
> Sure it's not a problem or against the rules. I'm just afraid that ARM
> users will use the AUR and then complain that stuff doesn't work.

I've seen people complaining that pacman can't install stuff from AUR
too.  We can't let out-of-place users become an impediment to move forward.

> 
> As I have seen with for example archbang and archlinuxarm questions on
> #archlinux.

I've seen Ubuntu and Fedora users asking stuff in #debian.  Stupid
people will always be stupid, you can't stop that!

The other reasons mentioned are valid (and I had actually backed down
because of them), but I don't think this one should really have as much
weight.

> 
> 
>>> It may be a bit of chicken-and-egg, though.  The ppc/arm userbase might
>>> grow if arch is seen stable enough and seems to have sufficient
>>> packages, possibly making it worth being supported, but the lack of
>>> infrastructure won't make that so possible.
>>
>> Yes, I also see it as a way of welcoming the ppc/arm/etc userbase into
>> the main Arch collective, and adding their technological distinctiveness
>> to our own.
>>
> 
> 

Given that this question ("is arm/ppc allowed in AUR?") has had a bit of
mixed responses, can I expect a bit more of discussion on this, or
should I consider the "no" final?

Thanks,

-- 
Hugo Osvaldo Barrera