make tag and %{?dist}

[Michael Schwendt]

On Wed, 4 May 2005 07:09:33 -0500, Josh Boyer wrote:

> I don't think what I'm proposing would change the spec file.  If you have a
> %{?dist} in your Release field, then it would evaluate to the correct value.
> If a spec file didn't use %{dist} at all, then nothing happens anyway...

No, but in an environment where %dist is defined, e.g. because the
corresponding rpm macros are included in the redhat-rpm-config package
(useful!), you do want the tag creation script to ignore the value and
create one from the CVS branch directory name instead, don't you?

> > A bigger pain for package developers is that they want to do mass-upgrades
> > for multiple distributions first. Only due to that comes their apparent
> > need to release a single src.rpm for multiple distribution versions. If
> > it's just the "Release" field that should be different, it takes only a
> > second to alter it prior to cvs commit.
> 
> Yeah, it only takes a second.  But it's non-intuitive to me, and it could be
> automated so I don't have to do that.

How often do you have to? With current CVS setup, you would need to copy
your external working copy of a package into the individual branch
directories first, anyway.

> What's the point of using %{dist} at all
> if I have to manually define it every single time?  Seems silly.

See fedora-packaging list. Talk to the proponents of dist tags.  If and
only if %dist comes predefined for every of our supported distributions,
dist tags can be beneficial. A conflict between current usage of cvs tags,
package NEVR, and directory based branches is something else to discuss,

> > > Are you sure tags aren't currently needed?  Take a look at the tobuild
> > > file.  I certainly see tags listed there...  And if they aren't needed,
> > > how does the build system (aka Seth) know what to build?
> > 
> > Yes, I'm sure. We have not needed tags for building so far, since we
> > haven't used the tobuild file yet. It's only Seth who experiments with
> > it so far. We have requested builds via the Wiki. And it was me who
> > added the note about "make tag" to the documentation. ;)
> 
> Ok, but how does the builder know what to build today?  Is it simply taken from
> CVS HEAD in each branch?

Yes.