Arch Linux

jaap aarts

Member

Registered: 2017-09-04

Posts: 30

Sortof duplicate package merged?

I maintain(ed) 2 packages on the AUR.
synergy2 and synergy2-bin
synergy2 was for regular updates, but doesn't include any betas.
synergy2-bin was for the latest version available, this includes the beta and prerelease updates, and to not have people to switch between the 2 just for the prereleases I also update the bin with regular updates.
But the synergy2 package has been merged into synergy2-bin, which might be a naming rule, but most people used synergy2, not synergy2-bin.
The reason was a duplicate package, which is in part true, but what did I do wrong? Should I not have updated synergy2-bin to keep it from being updated?
And what should I do now? Should I create a synergy2-bin-bin for prerelease versions (kinda a joke, but you get the point)  when they become available?

Last edited by jaap aarts (2018-04-24 21:46:08)

Morganamilo

Package Maintainer (PM)

Registered: 2017-12-05

Posts: 77

Re: Sortof duplicate package merged?

-bin implies a precompiled binary. Sounds what you have should be named synergy2-git/-latest/-beta/-prerelease. What does upstream call them? I would just call it whatever they call it. If it's also precompiled then maybe synergy2-bin-beta.

loqs

Member

Registered: 2014-03-06

Posts: 17,378

Re: Sortof duplicate package merged?

@Morganamilo both packages are for binary builds
https://aur.archlinux.org/cgit/aur.git/ … nergy2-bin
https://aur.archlinux.org/cgit/aur.git/ … h=synergy2
at the time of merge they were packaging the same binary in the same manner.
@jaap aarts I would clarify with Eschwartz if a synergy-beta-bin that only packaged the beta versions would be acceptable before uploading such a package to AUR.

eschwartz

Fellow

Registered: 2014-08-08

Posts: 4,097

Re: Sortof duplicate package merged?

synergy2-beta-bin is totally fine and is in fact the correct way to package a beta version. It's up to the maintainer if they update the beta with stable releases as well as betas... either one would be okay.

The synergy2 package was literally identical to the synergy2-bin package, which makes sense given that -bin implies latest *stable* release, in precompiled form. This is proprietary software, so it makes no sense to ask that you build the non -bin package from source... so since we really do not need two packages for the precompiled binaries of the *stable* release, I got rid of the one without -bin in the name.

If at other times the synergy2-bin package would contain the betas, without mentioning this in the pkgdesc, then, well, I didn't exactly have a good way of detecting this. Had I known I guess I would've told you to move it to a synergy2-beta-bin package and move the synergy2 package to synergy2-bin. So I guess it's almost what happened anyway.

I hope this clarifies things.

Last edited by eschwartz (2018-04-25 02:31:11)

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Managing AUR repos The Right Way -- aurpublish (now a standalone tool)

jaap aarts

Member

Registered: 2017-09-04

Posts: 30

Re: Sortof duplicate package merged?

ok, thanks for the feedback!

As I understood it bin, git etc are sort of the same, a pre-release version of the package(why I didn't put it in the pkgdesc). I couldn't really find any guidelines(beside this) that talk about naming so I just assumed it would be fine.

this was the first time I uploaded a package to the AUR, and I've learned a lot since. Ive used arch linux for less than a year, so I didn't really make the now clearly logical link between bin and binary...

should I just set the stable remote to synergy2-bin and synergy2-beta-bin for the beta/prereleases? and should I have the -beta only have beta releases in it? ill also edit the pkgdesc to make it more clear that it is the beta of the package.

maybe someone should edit this to make this more clear.

eschwartz

Fellow

Registered: 2014-08-08

Posts: 4,097

Re: Sortof duplicate package merged?

Well, it's not a "rule" so much as it is a matter of "package names should probably, for best effect, describe their purpose". (As I said, I didn't realize this was even the case here, because I just thought it was an exact duplicate. I've seen people upload the same package under two names, simply because they wanted people to have two chances to download the same thing. It was like some horrible Google SEO gaming. )

I'll acknowledge that the "common knowledge" of what -bin, -git, etc. implies is more passed down by word of mouth than anything else... although many people find this obvious, clearly at least some people don't.

In the interest of making this more clear to some of our newer, less veteran users, please go to the Discussion page there: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php?ti … ection=new

Describe your confusion from this thread, asking the wiki admins to add clarification to the wiki page. (Note, this page is locked to prevent people from editing without first discussing it on the talk page, because we've had too many destructive edits there.)

Discussion pages are really handy especially when you think something should be changed, but don't trust your experience enough to do the best job. It's essentially like freeform forum posting, anything goes because you're just brainstorming about possible solutions and nothing is committed to just yet.

Last edited by eschwartz (2018-04-25 20:28:15)

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Managing AUR repos The Right Way -- aurpublish (now a standalone tool)