[Catalyst] RFC: no make install on catalyst apps

[John Napiorkowski]

----- Original Message ----
> From: Zbigniew Lukasiak <zzbbyy at gmail.com>
> To: The elegant MVC web framework <catalyst at lists.scsys.co.uk>
> Sent: Sunday, August 2, 2009 1:42:14 PM
> Subject: Re: [Catalyst] RFC: no make install on catalyst apps
> 
> On Sun, Aug 2, 2009 at 1:32 PM, John Napiorkowskiwrote:
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message ----
> >> From: Tomas Doran 
> >> To: The elegant MVC web framework 
> >> Sent: Tuesday, July 28, 2009 8:28:08 PM
> >> Subject: Re: [Catalyst] RFC: no make install on catalyst apps
> >>
> >>
> >> On 28 Jul 2009, at 14:14, Marcus Ramberg wrote:
> >>
> >> > I see catalyst apps being complete CPAN packages as a real advantage.
> >> > Taking away the make install option seems very limiting
> >>
> >> +1
> >>
> >> I would very much support moving to a 'real' sharedir for templates / config
> >> etc, rather than the current hacks (given appropriate back compat) however.
> >>
> >> Cheers
> >> t0m
> >>
> >
> > I am vaguely planning something roughly based on the XDG directory 
> specification:
> >
> > http://standards.freedesktop.org/basedir-spec/basedir-spec-latest.html
> >
> > for localizing configs and related.  Something like this would make is much 
> easier to have multiply versions of the same catalyst application running. 
>  Like, if I had MojoMojo installed and wanted to run two seperate wikis with 
> different configs.  You can do that now but requires playing with %ENV and 
> copying some configs around.
> >
> > In my mind the way this would work is that you'd have the config and other 
> share data stuff as templates inside your dist, and than at install time we'd 
> copy to all the correct places.  Then we'd merge configurations in the following 
> order.
> >
> > $cpan/config/myapp.conf
> > $home/.config/myapp.conf
> > /etc/myapp.conf
> >
> > Where $cpan is where cpan stuff is installed globally, $home is your home 
> directory.  Maybe we could move around the order a bit, but this way we'd set 
> all the 'no moving parts here' config in the $cpan (stuff like when the app was 
> installed, some paths).  Then whatever user started the app, we'd read from her 
> local configuration (we'd probably need some sort of 'first time' script if it's 
> not present, which would copy from a template and prompt for required values) 
> and last we'd merge in any globally set up stuff.
> >
> > Maybe with more people using local lib this is not as important, although I 
> see local lib most as a developer tool or as a workaround for people that are on 
> shared servers.
> >
> > That's just for config, but could work as well for search paths for templates
> 
> So config is supposed to move into a 'config' subdir  (and later be
> merged with the configs in home and etc)?  Am I reading that right?
> Maybe we could call it 'etc' instead of config?  And now templates -
> can we also move them into a 'templates' subdir?
> 

I was thinking 'config' since that is from the XDG specification, but obviously we'd
want to be confortable with it.  I actually blogged about this and my detailed 
thoughts over at:

http://jjnapiorkowski.vox.com/library/post/rfc-non-code-data-directories-and-standards-for-catalyst.html

but the basic idea is that most of the installed 'non code data' (such as configuration
files, user changable templates, etc') go into ~/.config and ~/.local/share

alternatively, we could do what seems to be a very common thing for a lot of desktop
applications, which is to create a ~/.myapp directory and put everything in that that you
want locally controllable by the end user (the person who installs the app).

Something like that would help people with shared installation.  However
if it appears that it becomes more normal to use the local::lib installation 
approach, well, that also solves a lot of similar problems.  I guess it's a matter
of what approach to installing catalyst application is going to be the best way.

john

> 
> -- 
> Zbigniew Lukasiak
> http://brudnopis.blogspot.com/
> http://perlalchemy.blogspot.com/
> 
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