Subject: Re: Installing symlink from /usr/pkg/bin/python to preferred version...
To: Michal Pasternak <michal@pasternak.w.lub.pl>
From: Luke Mewburn <lukem@NetBSD.org>
List: tech-pkg
Date: 01/23/2004 00:30:49
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On Thu, Jan 22, 2004 at 01:23:37PM +0100, Michal Pasternak wrote:
  | Luke Mewburn [Fri, Jan 23, 2004 at 12:04:12AM +1100]:
  | > An annoying side effect of the way that we support multiple versions
  | > of python is that "/usr/pkg/bin/python" doesn't exist, so scripts
  | > can't use the usual
  | > 	#!/usr/bin/env python
  | > trick to startup.  It's a hassle to have to edit your scripts to
  | > contain "python2p3" (or whatever).
  |=20
  | You can use PYTHON_PATCH_SCRIPTS (lang/python/application.mk) in pkgsrc
  | Makefiles.

How does this help my own local scripts that I don't install as part
of pkgsrc?
In short, it doesn't.


  | > I have implemented a "meta package" in lang/Makefile which installs a
  | > symlink from /usr/pkg/bin/python to ${PYTHONBIN}.
  | > I've attached the files (to go into lang/python).
  |=20
  | It won't work as a binary package (except I want the Python version that
  | build machine uses, which might not be exactly the one).=20
  |=20
  | When installed, it doesn't allow me to change the version I choosed dur=
ing
  | "compile" time (I must have pkgsrc installed).
  |=20
  | So, I don't think it's worth to import that Makefile to pkgsrc. It does=
n't
  | fix anything, really.

Of course it does; see above.

I could potentially have a bunch of python programs that have
	#!/usr/bin/env python
in them.  These are ~/bin, which is shared amongst many systems.
I don't see why I have to edit those scripts depending upon which
python package a particular pkgsrc-using system has installed.=20
That is _lame_.


  | Such functionality (provide one, common name for one or more different
  | versions of single package) should be provided by some lower layer of
  | pkgsrc, in a generalised way, available for all packages.
  |=20
  | Check Debian's "alternatives" system to see one of possible solutions.

I really don't care how the problem is solved, except that it should
be intrinsic to pkgsrc and not something that I have to rely upon the
local sysadmin to setup in /usr/pkg/bin/python as a symlink to
whichever version that pkgsrc has decided to install by default.

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