Re: new dependencies in gvfs

[BJörn Lindqvist <bjourne gmail com>]

2009/5/2 Matthias Clasen <matthias clasen gmail com>:
> David just merged the DeviceKit backend into gvfs, which means that
> gvfs will now depend on gnome-disk-utility and DeviceKit-disks.
>
> David will hopefully post something about some of the cool
> things we get with this. This mail is more about the dry bureaucratic
> aspects of this change...
>
> The new dependencies are only conditional. The hal backend is still
> there, so nobody will be rushed to switch to DeviceKit. Currently, the
> new backend is built automatically when configure finds the necessary
> dependencies, but there is a --en/disable-gdu option to force things.
>
> I'd like to add the new dependencies to our list of external deps (and
> to the jhbuild external-deps moduleset).

> Comments ?

It is very hard to build gnome-disk-utility. It directly depends on
DeviceKit, DeviceKit-disks and trunk version of PolicyKit. Those three
packages in turn depends on eggdbus, libparted, libdevmapper,
libselinux, libatasmart, libuuid and a recent libudev. Many of those
packages are not packaged in Ubuntu Intrepid and at least and some of
them haven't had any real releases yet.

There are at least two build bugs related to gdu (583704, 582096).

In short, IMHO it is premature to include gdu in jhbuild because the
project is not batch buildable which is the point of jhbuild.

I also hope that there will more documentation available about gdu
before it becomes a blessed external dependency because there is very
little of that available atm, especially why HAL is being replaced and
what advantages that brings.

Also shouldn't the gui parts be split from the backend? The repository
seem to mix both the backend library with frontend tools.


-- 
mvh Björn