[pacman-dev] [PATCH] makepkg: Add '--nocompress' syntactic sugar

[Eli Schwartz]

On 5/21/19 5:42 PM, Eli Schwartz wrote:
> On 5/21/19 4:30 AM, Jouke Witteveen wrote:
>> On Sun, May 19, 2019 at 10:01 PM Eli Schwartz <eschwartz at archlinux.org> wrote:
>>> On 5/19/19 3:52 PM, Jouke Witteveen wrote:
>>>> However, I do now think that it would maybe have been good to make
>>>> PKGEXT=.pkg.tar
>>>> the default in makepkg.conf, since local installation of AUR packages
>>>> is probably the most common usecase of makepkg.
>>>>
>>>> Changing it now makes no sense as it will probably be too disruptive.
>>>> The comment ("Do not modify unless [etc.]") could be improved to
>>>> something more helpful, though.
>>>
>>> That is a very interesting point. Would you like to submit a patch
>>> modifying the manpage to suggest using .pkg.tar "if you want to disable
>>> compression"?
>>
>> Sure, but it is not clear to me what it should say exactly.
>>
>> Currently it says:
>>
>> ----
>>        PKGEXT=".pkg.tar.gz", SRCEXT=".src.tar.gz"
>>            Sets the compression used when making compiled or source packages.
>>            Valid suffixes are .tar, .tar.gz, .tar.bz2, .tar.xz, .tar.lzo,
>>            .tar.lrz, and .tar.Z. Do not touch these unless you know what you
>>            are doing.
>> ----
>>
>> The first line is likely wrong, since it suggests .gz may be the
>> default compression. This was not even the case when the line was
>> added, nine years ago [1]!
>> Then there is the last sentence. It is a bit weird to end this
>> paragraph with "Use .tar to disable compression. Do not touch these
>> unless you know what you are doing." Perhaps something like "Use .tar
>> if you want to disable compression. Do not set these to a compression
>> method other than the default unless you know what you are doing." is
>> better. On the other hand, maybe the whole "...unless you know what
>> you are doing." is a bit too strong anyway, and can simply be dropped.
>>
>> I think it is best to mirror whatever the manpage is going to say in
>> /etc/makepkg.conf.
>>
>> Sorry to make this a bigger fuzz than it deserves. Feel free to simply
>> change the text as you see fit if you think that is easier than
>> waiting for a patch from me.
>>
>> Regards,
>> - Jouke
>>
>> [1] https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/21302
> 
> Actually, the default pacman/makepkg configuration is indeed gz, at
> least in the sense that that is what etc/makepkg.conf.in will be
> configured with unless you define your own:
> ./configure --with-pkg-ext --with-src-ext
> 
> Arch Linux does not ship with the stock pacman.conf and makepkg.conf,
> though. We set distribution defaults independent of the distro-agnostic
> pacman.git sources; these distribution defaults include the use of xz
> over gzip for compression.
> 
> I'm not sure what would make an appropriate default, since unlike many
> other makepkg.conf settings the fallback when unspecified is to carry on
> as if '' is a plausible answer when it isn't, and it *should* raise a
> fatal error I guess. I'll write a lint check for that...

https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/pacman-dev/2019-May/023404.html
for the lint check

> Perhaps it would make sense to have the manpage depend on how
> --with-pkg-ext --with-src-ext were used. Although Arch Linux would still
> then be calling out gz.

Done and with a transition from scariness to "this is how you disable
compression":
https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/pacman-dev/2019-May/023405.html

-- 
Eli Schwartz
Bug Wrangler and Trusted User

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