[Fedora-packaging] PHP packaging policy notes

[Christopher Stone]

On 7/8/06, Enrico Scholz <enrico.scholz at informatik.tu-chemnitz.de> wrote:
> chris.stone at gmail.com ("Christopher Stone") writes:
>
> > pear packages have a line in the spec file of the form:
> > Provides: php-pear(Foo) = %{version}-%{release}
> >
> > This provides the upstream software version, not the package version.
> > This is what we use on our requires line.  So for example we do not
> > have:
> > Requires: php-pear >= ..  we have:
> > Requires: php-pear(PEAR) >= ...
>
> Such virtual provides are ok but you should keep in mind, that there is
> no ordering during installation; e.g. it is undefined whether
>
> | %package -n module
> | Provides: php-pear(MODULE) = 1.0
>
> or
>
> | %package -n module-ng
> | Provides: php-pear(MODULE) = 2.0
>
> will be installed by
>
> | Requires: php-pear(MODULE) >= 1.0
>
> (because of the shortest-package-name-wins rule, 'module' will be the
> candidate for 'rpm')

This should never happen, there are some cases where you may want a
stable and an alpha version in which case you would Provide
php-pear(MODULE-alpha).

See:
http://tkmame.retrogames.com/fedora-extras/php-pear-PHPUnit2.spec
http://tkmame.retrogames.com/fedora-extras/php-pear-PHPUnit2-alpha.spec

I think something like this should be mentioned in the guidelines.

In other cases the pear module name itself changes, for example:
PHPUnit (php4) and PHPUnit2 (php5)


> When you enforce such declarations for php-pear packages; should not
> every (non-pear) package have similar Provides:? Or, what would make
> php-pear an exception here? Have php-pear modules such an unstable API
> that missing version information would cause problems with a significant
> amount of packages?

Yes, the pear libraries are still relatively new, and many many pear
modules are under active development.  There are quite a few which are
widely used and still not even out of alpha development stage yet.