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karcher

Member

Registered: 2018-01-09

Posts: 140

[SOLVED] Why some Apache Projects are not in the official repos?

Hi all,

I've noticed that at least some packages of Apache Projects like Solr, Tika and Lucene are not in the Arch Linux package database. Instead they are in some extent in the AUR. Another thing that I find weird is that for ElasticSearch there are besides elasticsearch itself 7 related packages in the Arch Linux package database but for Solr there is none.
What's the reason behind this?

Last edited by karcher (2018-11-04 16:07:49)

mpan

Member

Registered: 2012-08-01

Posts: 1,644

Website

Re: [SOLVED] Why some Apache Projects are not in the official repos?

What's the reason behind this?

No one is interested in maintaining them in the repositories.

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Paperclips in avatars?

eschwartz

Fellow

Registered: 2014-08-08

Posts: 4,097

Re: [SOLVED] Why some Apache Projects are not in the official repos?

I've noticed that at least some packages of Apache Projects like Solr, Tika and Lucene are not in the Arch Linux package database. Instead they are in some extent in the AUR.

The fact that the AUR exists in the first place, is in fact the proof that there are things which are not in the official repositories. And that that's perfectly okay. If every package that anyone wanted was in the official repositories, we wouldn't need a way for users to submit their own things.

So let's turn the question around, and ask: why do you think they *should* be in the official repos?

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

karcher

Member

Registered: 2018-01-09

Posts: 140

Re: [SOLVED] Why some Apache Projects are not in the official repos?

First of all I have to say that I'm already satisfied with the answer of @mpan. The reason behind my question was just curiosity.

So let's turn the question around, and ask: why do you think they *should* be in the official repos?

I think most of them, if not all, should be in the official repos and here my arguments:
1. The Apache Projects belong, in my opinion, to the best software the Free Software World has to offer in terms of quality and significance and they should be even more promoted from free OS.

2. One might argue that these are projects are too technical and most users won't need them, but isn't Arch targeted at more competent Linux users? (https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=arch)

3. Software from an NPO like the Apache Software Foundation which offers these projects https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_A … n_projects for free should have higher priority in the official repos in comparison to products from commercial companies. Taking again as example Elastic and Solr, the first one comes from a commercial company and the second one from an NPO. I'm not talking about the licences which are the same and I'm not against the company and its products, for which I really think they are all great and I appreciate the fact that they are free, but I think Solr deserves at least equal attention and respect.

4. It's obvious that some packages such as a Apache HTTP Server (which exists in the official repos together with other related packages) are much more popular than others. But if someone needs such a package is really a search platform so much less important? Another example: Lucene on which both Solr and Elastic are based:
3 packages in the Arch repos:
https://www.archlinux.org/packages/?sor … =&flagged=
vs. 34 related packages in the Debian repos:
https://packages.debian.org/search?suit … rds=lucene

5. Since many of the projects are server-related and so security is even more crucial they should be in the official repos and not in the AUR.

On the other hand I would also understand counter-arguments such the limited human resources or the fact that most of the projects are for the server area where distros like Debian and CentOS are more suitable or even the package popularity.

Scimmia

Fellow

Registered: 2012-09-01

Posts: 13,729

Re: [SOLVED] Why some Apache Projects are not in the official repos?

Arch is developed by the Devs and TUs who package what they're interested in. None of your points matter.

eschwartz

Fellow

Registered: 2014-08-08

Posts: 4,097

Re: [SOLVED] Why some Apache Projects are not in the official repos?

Every one of your bullet points ties into how Arch should have some sort of duty to the community to maintain such packages purely for the sake of doing our moral duty to ensure the packages exist.

But packages are elevated to the official repos for one reason and one reason alone: because a Dev or TU is personally interested in the software enough to volunteer to maintain it.

More popular packages stand a correspondingly higher chance of acquiring a volunteer. Some things are just impossible to do without, since you need them to boot a system, other things are dependencies of software a Dev/TU *does* care about, and in some cases for server software, we actually use it on the archlinux.org servers. (This is not the case for elasticsearch, though.) And many packages, irrespective of their popularity, simply do not have the *right* people interested in them.

...

Also the number of Debian packages is not comparable to the number of Arch packages, since Debian ships separate packages for the library component, for the development headers, for the debug symbols, and for the docs -- then ships multiple versions of the whole set depending on which oldstale oldstable release you are looking at.

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

karcher

Member

Registered: 2018-01-09

Posts: 140

Re: [SOLVED] Why some Apache Projects are not in the official repos?

Every one of your bullet points ties into how Arch should have some sort of duty to the community to maintain such packages purely for the sake of doing our moral duty to ensure the packages exist.

But packages are elevated to the official repos for one reason and one reason alone: because a Dev or TU is personally interested in the software enough to volunteer to maintain it.

OK. It's what @mpan said before and it's understood. I just answered to your question. Thanks for the thorough explanation.