From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.1.3 (2006-06-01) on yquem.inria.fr X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=0.0 required=5.0 tests=AWL autolearn=disabled version=3.1.3 Received: from mail1-relais-roc.national.inria.fr (mail1-relais-roc.national.inria.fr [192.134.164.82]) by yquem.inria.fr (Postfix) with ESMTP id 171E1BC69 for ; Wed, 21 Nov 2007 22:12:33 +0100 (CET) X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: AgAAAO8tREfAXQImh2dsb2JhbACPMwEBAQgKKQ X-IronPort-AV: E=Sophos;i="4.21,448,1188770400"; d="scan'208";a="4762802" Received: from discorde.inria.fr ([192.93.2.38]) by mail1-smtp-roc.national.inria.fr with ESMTP; 21 Nov 2007 22:12:33 +0100 Received: from mail2-relais-roc.national.inria.fr (mail2-relais-roc.national.inria.fr [192.134.164.83]) by discorde.inria.fr (8.13.6/8.13.6) with ESMTP id lALLCWwh000418 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=RC4-SHA bits=128 verify=OK) for ; Wed, 21 Nov 2007 22:12:32 +0100 X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Filtered: true X-IronPort-Anti-Spam-Result: Ao8CAKQuREdQRFuw/2dsb2JhbAA X-IronPort-AV: E=Sophos;i="4.21,448,1188770400"; d="scan'208";a="4486091" Received: from furbychan.cocan.org ([80.68.91.176]) by mail2-smtp-roc.national.inria.fr with ESMTP; 21 Nov 2007 22:12:31 +0100 Received: from rich by furbychan.cocan.org with local (Exim 3.35 #1 (Debian)) id 1Iuws2-0005Da-00 for ; Wed, 21 Nov 2007 21:12:30 +0000 Date: Wed, 21 Nov 2007 21:12:30 +0000 To: caml-list@inria.fr Subject: Re: [Caml-list] Camlp5 release 5.03 Message-ID: <20071121211230.GA9006@furbychan.cocan.org> References: <20071120095222.GA12460@yquem.inria.fr> <200711211801.08746.jon@ffconsultancy.com> <20071121191006.GA31390@furbychan.cocan.org> <200711212010.13529.jon@ffconsultancy.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <200711212010.13529.jon@ffconsultancy.com> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.13 (2006-08-11) From: Richard Jones X-Miltered: at discorde with ID 47449F40.000 by Joe's j-chkmail (http://j-chkmail . ensmp . fr)! X-Spam: no; 0.00; camlp:01 camlp:01 ocamllibdir:01 ocaml:01 findlib:01 makefile:01 distros:01 ocaml:01 stdlib:01 stdlib:01 compiler:01 ocaml's:01 wiki:01 ocaml's:01 5.03:98 On Wed, Nov 21, 2007 at 08:10:13PM +0000, Jon Harrop wrote: > On Wednesday 21 November 2007 19:10, Richard Jones wrote: > > The camlp5 package installs in $OCAMLLIBDIR/camlp5 so it doesn't > > conflict with camlp4 from the base OCaml package, with an appropriate > > findlib META file. You need to make some adjustments to your Makefile > > but those are usually very minor compared to rejigging your source to > > be compatible with the new camlp4. > > For me, this begs the obvious question: can the distros split off the OCaml > stdlib into a separate package so the community can improve it and > Debian/Ubuntu/Red Hat/Mac OS X/.. users can benefit from an improved version? They could do this but I'm not sure they would do this. There are a few reasons I can think why Fedora wouldn't do it anyway: (a) No program I know of can be compiled without stdlib, so splitting compiler and stdlib is almost never a saving (from a pure packaging point of view, ignoring, for now, possible enhancements). (b) Fedora policy is not to diverge from upstream. For example we don't carry any patches in our packages except where those patches are about to go upstream. So making Fedora-specific enhancements to OCaml's stdlib is against policy, and wouldn't be productive because it would "lock in" to Fedora (in as much as open source can ever lock you in). http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/PackageMaintainers/WhyUpstream (c) I tend to think that the Extlib project has been successful enhancing OCaml's stdlib without intruding on the stdlib. Extlib replaces stdlib modules and functions, but in a way which can be carefully controlled and opted out from by the programmer. http://ocaml-lib.sourceforge.net/ Rich. -- Richard Jones Red Hat