Re: Draft manifest

On Monday, May 6, 2002, at 12:59  PM, Johan Vromans wrote:

> Nicholas Clark <[email protected]> writes:
>
>> Is it well advertised in FreeBSD that by default although there is a
>> "/usr/bin/perl" installed with some libraries, it is not (and does not
>> claim to be) the fully featured (including cruft) perl source kit?
>
> Since the trimmed perl is for system maintenance and configuration
> only, I'd expect it in some system specific location (e.g.,
> /usr/sysconfig/tools/perl) instead of /usr/bin/perl.

I have thought about that about one minute ago, too.
Nevertheless I can think of some scenarios where that would be a major 
pain:

1) Imagine a repository of lovingly hand-crafted scripts intended for 
system
    maintenance. Suppose it has to be cross platform (at least cross-OS).
    I expect a full fledged perl (not necessarily the library!) to be in
    /usr/bin/perl. So I write #!/usr/bin/perl in all of my scripts.
    Bang. I have to go through the hassle to either install a full perl 
dist
    or to adapt all of my scripts...or to symlink...(shudder).

2) Assumption: If a perl is not capable of doing serious work it should 
not reside
    in /usr/bin/perl. (think of user-space scripts..)
    On the other hand, if it *is* is full fledged perl it should have the 
god-given
    right to stay in /usr/bin/perl.
    For pure system configuration (build/install time) I guess you need a 
*full* perl
    interpreter.

IMHO there are at least three different target groups for perl dists:

1) OS vendors (free or unfree). Most of the applications are data 
munging - some kind of
    sed-on-steroids. (Please prove me wrong !!). And of course copying 
files...
    No need for extending perl.
2) The average perl user loving the flexibility/power of perl - 
occasionally needing
    a specific module.
    Needs to be able to extend perl (library-wise). Doesn't need 
everything in the full dist.
3) Large site implementations with a very wide range of user needs.
    These kinds of installation probably need at least 95% of the full 
dist.
    Needs to able to extend the perl library. Needs almost all.

and of course:

4) Us sick puppies. We want it all. In source. Well, we've got 
rsync...so we don't count.


I think the major problem is what you call *perl*. If you have just the 
interpreter sitting there, and
you call that perl you will definitely confuse people. You will confuse 
people even more if they are
not able to get those modules they want/need (some of which even belong 
to the core dist) using
the system supplied /usr/bin/perl.

So I'm opposed to distribute a perl which is not able to pull together 
the full dist on its own.

Regards,

Kay