Date: Tue, 7 May 2002 20:33:04 -0400 (EDT) From: Robert Watson <rwatson@freebsd.org> To: Mark Murray <mark@grondar.za> Cc: current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: The future of perl on FreeBSD Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.3.96L.1020507202743.83455K-100000@fledge.watson.org> In-Reply-To: <200205072241.g47Mf0jV002339@grimreaper.grondar.org>
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I tend to be a fan of option #3 because it reduces maintenance load with much the same result as having the maintenance cost. I have some questions about compatibility. First question is -- people are going to be upgrading FreeBSD. Having a stale /usr/bin/perl is going to muck stuff up royally. Likewise, many existing scripts use /usr/bin/perl at that location. Can we simply have a symlink that points /usr/bin/perl at /usr/local/bin/perl (and any related pseudo-programs such as suidperl, etc) as part of the normal install along with the perl package. Likewise, it would be good to clear out the lib stuff if we can to prevent the inevitable breakage there during the upgrade. If we hook symlink creation into the build, that would also force us buildworld/installworld'ers to install the package, which would improve exposure. Do Perl applications typically hard code paths, or just rely on Perl to "know where to look"? Second -- are you volunteering to clean up the applications that are as-yet unclaimed? DES has started on sockstat, and there's been an on-going effort to fix the build to not need perl (now completed). Or at least, can you coordinate the effort via a task list, etc? Third -- is this something you envision hitting RELENG_4, or just 5.0? Is any magic needed to reflect that? It's certainly not happening by 4.6 in the -STABLE branch, but 4.7 could be a reality if we can be sure the breakage will be low. However, for -STABLE trackers, we'll need a serious heads up, updating entry, etc. They'll want to install the perl package before they upgrade the system so as not to lose functionality. Robert N M Watson FreeBSD Core Team, TrustedBSD Project robert@fledge.watson.org NAI Labs, Safeport Network Services To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-current" in the body of the message
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