Re: [Caml-list] OCaml Labs

[Markus Mottl <markus.mottl@gmail.com>]

On Sat, Oct 20, 2012 at 1:31 PM, Paolo Donadeo <p.donadeo@gmail.com> wrote:
> Do we really need of yet another package manager? How can't OPAM scatter the
> community further?

Why should another package manager scatter the community?  If a new
package manager turned out to be worse than existing ones, nobody
would use it.  If it turned out to be better, why should having this
alternative be a bad thing?

I have so far been quite pleased with OPAM.  In my opinion it makes
life easier for both package users and contributors than other
existing approaches I have tried so far.  It's no surprise that it
already offers an impressive range of packages at this early stage.
My feeling is it will have a great future and has the potential to
become the standard packaging tool for managing OCaml installations.

> Now, if I write a small library and I want to make it available to OCaml
> developers, I have to care about: making the source code Debian and Red Hat
> friendly, godi friendly, oasis-db friendly and, now, OPAM. And there are
> probably other systems I don't even know.

I don't really care about specifically supporting binary
distributions, since I'm not targeting one particular platform (Linux)
anyway.  Binary packagers will contact you (the developer) if there is
any sort of awkwardness about your configure/build/install process,
which happens exceedingly rarely anyway.

The problems I had with Godi were not so much with how to distribute
my sources, but the elaborate and error-prone process required to
release Godi packages.  Being Oasis-DB friendly means, I guess, simply
using Oasis for package specification.  This specification is
generally useful, also for releasing to other package managers, and
doesn't just support Oasis-DB.

> It's not a critics or a rant, but honestly I need a compass to orient myself
> in the jungle of package managers for OCaml, and I'm using OCaml since
> years, think about a novice...

To me personally OCaml package management tools have not been
particularly satisfactory for years.  OPAM is a fresh if not to say
refreshing approach.  If OPAM had been available to me when I was a
novice, it would have made my first OCaml experience so much better.

Regards,
Markus

-- 
Markus Mottl        http://www.ocaml.info        markus.mottl@gmail.com