On Fri, 6 Jun 2003, Peter W. Draper wrote:
> Hi Steve,
>
> for this first release of the Java software, which I thought we were
> describing as a "beta release". My assumption (which I probably haven't
> voiced) is that we'd have a voluntary opt-in by some new pseudo "init"
> package that is separate from the classic system. So the obvious thing to
> do this time around is create some scripts:
>
> source /star/starjava/etc/login
> source /star/starjava/etc/cshrc
>
> (or should that be /starjava or /star/java?), that define all the
> variables, aliases etc. needed to get this up and running.
I don't see much point in making it 'voluntary', it just means that
users/admins who don't read the release docs carefully will never
get round to working out how to use these. By all means have
separate scripts as above, but I'd say invoke them *by default* from
/star/etc/{login,cshrc}.
> Clearly in the longer term we need to resolve the issue of how to control
> package access. Personally, as I've said from time to time, I think we
> should seriously consider breaking with C-shell aliases as our primary way
> of defining commands, using a PATH system would be more natural and shell
> neutral.
I agree. As I've said earlier, I'm inclined to favour a single bin
directory, unless there is some reason this would be impractical,
e.g. many executables with potential/likely namespace clashes;
I don't forsee this being the case in the near future.
For non-unix OSs (in which we won't be supplying startup scripts, so
package startup will have to be done by invoking jar files direct) it
would probably make life easier for the same reasons to have the
package jar files all in a single lib directory rather than in
lib/package/package.jar. There are namespace/3rd party versioning
issues here, but I can think of ways round.
> or a standard system for adding, removing & promoting packages on the PATH
> (which is complicated as a system like this needs to be shell-specific
> anyway).
exactly, I'm not sure it buys you much.
Mark
--
Mark Taylor Starlink Programmer Physics, Bristol University, UK
[log in to unmask] 0117 928 8776 http://www.star.bris.ac.uk/~mbt/
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