Re: [boost] Modular Packages on Conan.io

Subject: Re: [boost] Modular Packages on Conan.io
From: Rene Rivera (grafikrobot_at_[hidden])
Date: 2017-09-22 17:41:03

On Fri, Sep 22, 2017 at 12:32 PM, Stefan Seefeld via Boost <
boost_at_[hidden]> wrote:

> On 22.09.2017 13:14, Rene Rivera via Boost wrote:
> > One of the most requested feature from Boost users is having a "modular"
> > distribution. I'm happy to announce that there are now modular packages
> > available when using the Conan package manager from the Bincrafters team
> <
> > http://bit.ly/2wM5AdT>[1]. Using the packages requires no prior setup
> other
> > than the Conan tool. Immediately available are all 130 libraries from the
> > 1.64.0 release. And in a few days we will follow up with the same for the
> > 1.65.1 release. For help using the packages you can bug the Bincrafters
> > team <http://bit.ly/2xWEGEX>[3] in the #conan cpplang.slack.com channel
> <
> > http://bit.ly/2hnMB3o>[4].
>
> It's great to see that effort !
> How are these packages built, and what format(s) do they use ?
>

Underneath they are built on Travis and Appveyor on various configurations
using the existing B2 build files (with some B2 magic). The binaries are
distributed through JFrom Bintray (the same provider that Boost uses for
the monolithic release). You would have to consult the Conan documentation
and source for the internal format (i.e. inside the archives it generates).

> How does this affect downstream package maintainers (debian, Fedora,
> etc.) ? Will they be able to use this infrastructure to generate
> packages themselves ?
>

It does not impact that at all, as this create packages external to Boost
releases. I.e. we make no changes to Boost itself to get this to work. As
for packaging for debian, etc.. It would be theoretically possible to
implement a conan integration that generates Linux packages (or any other
packaging system). At which point it would then be possible to use the same
infrastructure to generate modular packages for all those. But that would
be outside the scope of this effort.

-- 
-- Rene Rivera
-- Grafik - Don't Assume Anything
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