On Fri, 2006-03-17 at 00:16 +0000, Darren Austin wrote:
On Fri, 17 Mar 2006, Chris Fordham (chris@xhost.com.au) wrote:
This would be mad. A generic RPM would be great!
Just as long as there is a standard .tar.gz for all us people who don't use RPM.
And can someone clarify what no arch is? Does that mean no architecture ie. there are no binaries in the package?
Please correct me if i'm wrong, but doesn't an RPM have a pre-defined structure for where the files go?
How exactly could you produce an RPM to put RC in a webroot if you don't know where that webroot is when you built the RPM?
And if is there is a standard webroot for RPM based distributions, what about the people who don't install RC system wide? Or in a virtual hosted domain?
I could be wrong in my assumptions about RPM (given that I tend to avoid anything RPM related like the plague), but I just can't see how it would work.
The answer is installation is divided into two parts. The first part is the use the standard GNU autotools which produce a "configure" script. Many people are already familar with the following drill:
% ./configure [optional args] % make install
The production of the configure script is 90% of the installation support work and is completely INDEPENDENT of RPM. If you want to install in a different location (e.g. /myWebRoot) its as simple as:
% ./configure --with-pkgdir=/myWebRoot % make install
RPM's are for distributions which want to enforce standard locations for consistency within the distribution (and to perform some additional installation steps). In essence an RPM just "wraps" the configure script with specific arguments to "configure" (O.K., thats a bit simplified but essentially true).
If you're using a distribution an RPM usually is the path of least resistence to getting a working installation. If you have other needs by all means skip the RPM and just use "configure" directly. The proposed solution serves both needs well.
BTW, almost done with the work ...