{"thread":{"id":"2921","subject":"Possibility of a MinGW version?","startedAt":"2005-12-24T02:34:12Z","lastAt":"2006-01-01T05:25:33Z","messageCount":16,"participants":["Rob McDonald","Andreas Ericsson","Sven Verdoolaege","David Brown","Junio C Hamano","Johannes Schindelin","Christopher Faylor","H. Peter Anvin"],"isPatch":false,"patchVersion":null,"patchTotal":null},"messages":[{"id":"13993","messageId":"006c01c60832$86f92620$6900a8c0@sps","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":null,"subject":"Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Rob McDonald","fromEmail":"robm@asdl.gatech.edu","sentAt":"2005-12-24T02:34:12Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T02:34:12Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"robm@asdl.gatech.edu","avatar":null},"body":"1.0 is out the door, with support (to some degree or another) for Cygwin,\nBSD, MacOS X, Solaris, and who knows what else, good job all.\n\nWhat possibility is there of getting git (& assorted tools) to run natively\non Windows (sacrilege I know) using MinGW?  What truly Unixy-only things\ndoes the code do?  Unfortunately, Windows is a reality for many of us.\n\nI'd like to begin experimenting using git to track all of my data files\nacting as a synchronization mechanism.  Have all your files up-to-date\neverywhere, revision tracking, & redundancy too...  Dedicated Linux\nrepository at home, dual boot laptop on the road, Windows machine at work,\netc...\n\nThoughts?  Suggestions?\n\n            Rob\n\nPlease CC me, I track the archive closely, but am not subscribed.\n"},{"id":"14002","messageId":"43AD1E63.4040103@op5.se","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"006c01c60832$86f92620$6900a8c0@sps","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Andreas Ericsson","fromEmail":"ae@op5.se","sentAt":"2005-12-24T10:09:39Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T10:09:39Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"ae@op5.se","avatar":"https://gravatar.com/avatar/426e89595c75a8f5252dd0c989e5fabe5bcac616e68557427ad9aef6b0ca342a?d=mp&s=160"},"body":"Rob McDonald wrote:\n> 1.0 is out the door, with support (to some degree or another) for Cygwin,\n> BSD, MacOS X, Solaris, and who knows what else, good job all.\n> \n> What possibility is there of getting git (& assorted tools) to run natively\n> on Windows (sacrilege I know) using MinGW?  What truly Unixy-only things\n> does the code do?  Unfortunately, Windows is a reality for many of us.\n> \n> I'd like to begin experimenting using git to track all of my data files\n> acting as a synchronization mechanism.  Have all your files up-to-date\n> everywhere, revision tracking, & redundancy too...  Dedicated Linux\n> repository at home, dual boot laptop on the road, Windows machine at work,\n> etc...\n> \n> Thoughts?  Suggestions?\n> \n\nThe worst trouble you're likely to run into is all the hardcoded paths. \nThey are everywhere and ofcourse use the / for path entity separation.\n\nThe fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to help a \nnative port, and although they can be fairly easily replaced by \"real\" \nprograms it still means quite a bit of work with little real value for \nthe unix-version, so I'm guessing you'll have to write those up for \nyourself.\n\nIs there some reason you can't install Cygwin, which effectively \novercomes both those problems?\n\n-- \nAndreas Ericsson                   andreas.ericsson@op5.se\nOP5 AB                             www.op5.se\nTel: +46 8-230225                  Fax: +46 8-230231\n"},{"id":"14004","messageId":"20051224101849.GY1279MdfPADPa@greensroom.kotnet.org","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"43AD1E63.4040103@op5.se","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Sven Verdoolaege","fromEmail":"skimo@kotnet.org","sentAt":"2005-12-24T10:18:49Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T10:18:49Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"skimo@kotnet.org","avatar":null},"body":"On Sat, Dec 24, 2005 at 11:09:39AM +0100, Andreas Ericsson wrote:\n> The worst trouble you're likely to run into is all the hardcoded paths. \n> They are everywhere and ofcourse use the / for path entity separation.\n\nAFAIR, '/' is a valid path separator on Windows.\nIt's just command.com (does that still exist?) that insisted on '\\\\'\nseparators.\n\n> The fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to help a \n> native port, and although they can be fairly easily replaced by \"real\" \n> programs it still means quite a bit of work with little real value for \n> the unix-version, so I'm guessing you'll have to write those up for \n> yourself.\n\nOr just use MinGW's bash.\n\nskimo\n"},{"id":"14005","messageId":"43AD21D7.5060306@op5.se","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"20051224101849.GY1279MdfPADPa@greensroom.kotnet.org","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Andreas Ericsson","fromEmail":"ae@op5.se","sentAt":"2005-12-24T10:24:23Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T10:24:23Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"ae@op5.se","avatar":"https://gravatar.com/avatar/426e89595c75a8f5252dd0c989e5fabe5bcac616e68557427ad9aef6b0ca342a?d=mp&s=160"},"body":"Sven Verdoolaege wrote:\n> On Sat, Dec 24, 2005 at 11:09:39AM +0100, Andreas Ericsson wrote:\n> \n>>The worst trouble you're likely to run into is all the hardcoded paths. \n>>They are everywhere and ofcourse use the / for path entity separation.\n> \n> \n> AFAIR, '/' is a valid path separator on Windows.\n> It's just command.com (does that still exist?) that insisted on '\\\\'\n> separators.\n> \n\nAre you sure? I've seen lots of porting patches that transliterate those \nto '\\\\'. Perhaps those who wrote those patches just took for granted \nthat it was needed, the same as I did.\n\n> \n>>The fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to help a \n>>native port, and although they can be fairly easily replaced by \"real\" \n>>programs it still means quite a bit of work with little real value for \n>>the unix-version, so I'm guessing you'll have to write those up for \n>>yourself.\n> \n> \n> Or just use MinGW's bash.\n> \n\nDidn't know it had one. Live and learn, I suppose. Good to know though.\n\n-- \nAndreas Ericsson                   andreas.ericsson@op5.se\nOP5 AB                             www.op5.se\nTel: +46 8-230225                  Fax: +46 8-230231\n"},{"id":"14035","messageId":"Pine.LNX.4.63.0512241250520.27703@wbgn013.biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"43AD21D7.5060306@op5.se","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Johannes Schindelin","fromEmail":"johannes.schindelin@gmx.de","sentAt":"2005-12-24T12:07:41Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T12:07:41Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"johannes.schindelin@gmx.de","avatar":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/127790?v=4"},"body":"Hi,\n\nOn Sat, 24 Dec 2005, Andreas Ericsson wrote:\n\n> Sven Verdoolaege wrote:\n> > On Sat, Dec 24, 2005 at 11:09:39AM +0100, Andreas Ericsson wrote:\n> > \n> > > The worst trouble you're likely to run into is all the hardcoded paths.\n> > > They are everywhere and ofcourse use the / for path entity separation.\n> > \n> > \n> > AFAIR, '/' is a valid path separator on Windows.\n> > It's just command.com (does that still exist?) that insisted on '\\\\'\n> > separators.\n>\n> Are you sure? I've seen lots of porting patches that transliterate those to\n> '\\\\'. Perhaps those who wrote those patches just took for granted that it was\n> needed, the same as I did.\n\nI tried it (IIRC even on Win98) and it worked with '/'. If not, it is \nrelatively easy to introduce compat_mkdir and compat_open.\n\n(We need compat_mkdir anyway, because the good MinGW people thought it a \ngood idea to change the signature from standard mkdir(path, mode) to \nmkdir(path); a major annoyance when porting things to MinGW).\n\nA bigger obstacle is the ubiquitous \"c:/blabla\". While you can make sure \nthat git internally never uses such a rubbish (would be \"/c/blabla\" in \nMinGW), there are always the users.\n\n> > > The fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to help a\n> > > native port, and although they can be fairly easily replaced by \"real\"\n> > > programs it still means quite a bit of work with little real value for the\n> > > unix-version, so I'm guessing you'll have to write those up for yourself.\n> > \n> > \n> > Or just use MinGW's bash.\n\nThat is correct. MinGW comes with a current bash.\n\nThe biggest stoppers, however, are the absence of fork() and of ssh.\n\nI don't know how many times fork() is used just to call another program, \nand then return the the original program. I believe there are some other \ncases, where there is bidirectional communication between the two. This is \nnot so easy.\n\nWithout ssh, you have only http-push left to do the push, which in turn \nneeds a WebServer set up with DAV. Furthermore, you can only fetch via \nHTTP or the git protocol, which both means setting up a server, i.e. you \nhave no way to move your data directly between two private repositories.\n\nYes, there are other SSH's out there. But in order to communicate with the \nother side, MinGW would have to fork() with bidirectional communication. \nBummer.\n\nI can understand that people would prefer a MinGW version to a cygwin one, \nbecause of the performance hit, but unfortunately it is probably not worth \nthe trouble. I, for one, would not do the work without getting paid very \nwell for the job.\n\nCiao,\nDscho\n"},{"id":"14013","messageId":"009701c60891$50893fd0$6900a8c0@sps","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"43AD1E63.4040103@op5.se","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Rob McDonald","fromEmail":"robm@asdl.gatech.edu","sentAt":"2005-12-24T13:51:53Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T13:51:53Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"robm@asdl.gatech.edu","avatar":null},"body":"> The worst trouble you're likely to run into is all the hardcoded paths.\n> They are everywhere and ofcourse use the / for path entity separation.\n>\n> The fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to help a\n> native port, and although they can be fairly easily replaced by \"real\"\n> programs it still means quite a bit of work with little real value for\n> the unix-version, so I'm guessing you'll have to write those up for\n> yourself.\n\nMSYS is a minimal system that includes ports of all build-chain tools you\nneed to get Makefiles to work.  I would envision using it along with native\nports of Perl, Tk/Tcl, etc.\n\n> Is there some reason you can't install Cygwin, which effectively\n> overcomes both those problems?\n\nI've had consistently lousy luck with Cygwin which has left a bad taste in\nmy mouth.  Cygwin is generally a lot slower than Mingw, although that is\nmost noticeable when you're making extensive use of math.h.  Also, it seems\nthat every time I install some package in Cygwin, something else I've\ninstalled gets messed up.  It just seems to me that there isn't any reason\nfor an efficient command-line tool like git to depend on a large\nunmaintained project like Cygwin.\n\nOf course, one could use -mno-cygwin (or whatever it is) to use the MinGW\nheaders when compiling in Cygwin as an intermediate step.  That would give\nany speed advantages.\n\nHowever, I've had great luck porting Linux apps using the gcc toolchain to\nWindows using MinGW.  All these programs 'just worked'.  However, none of\nthem really did things outside the realm of simple, portable C and Fortran.\nMost of them have been old engineering analysis codes which have been ported\na dozen times in their life anyway.\n\nThanks for the comments.  The best idea may be to just try it....\n\n            Rob\n"},{"id":"14034","messageId":"Pine.LNX.4.63.0512241509240.24308@wbgn013.biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"009701c60891$50893fd0$6900a8c0@sps","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Johannes Schindelin","fromEmail":"johannes.schindelin@gmx.de","sentAt":"2005-12-24T14:16:42Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T14:16:42Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"johannes.schindelin@gmx.de","avatar":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/127790?v=4"},"body":"Hi,\n\nOn Sat, 24 Dec 2005, Rob McDonald wrote:\n\n> > Is there some reason you can't install Cygwin, which effectively\n> > overcomes both those problems?\n> \n> I've had consistently lousy luck with Cygwin which has left a bad taste in\n> my mouth.  Cygwin is generally a lot slower than Mingw, although that is\n> most noticeable when you're making extensive use of math.h.  Also, it seems\n> that every time I install some package in Cygwin, something else I've\n> installed gets messed up.  It just seems to me that there isn't any reason\n> for an efficient command-line tool like git to depend on a large\n> unmaintained project like Cygwin.\n\nWell, cygwin is everything but unmaintained. It's unfair to blaim the good \nwork of the cygwin folks if you can't get it to work. I have *never* had a \nproblem I could not solve with cygwin. In particular, *no* package got \nmessed up when I installed/upgraded another package. Before you ask: I use \ncygwin extensively.\n\n> Of course, one could use -mno-cygwin (or whatever it is) to use the MinGW\n> headers when compiling in Cygwin as an intermediate step.  That would give\n> any speed advantages.\n\nAs I already stated, there are two *big* showstoppers when it comes to \nport git to MinGW.\n\n> However, I've had great luck porting Linux apps using the gcc toolchain to\n> Windows using MinGW.  All these programs 'just worked'.\n\nOkay, I'll bite. Could you please port python to MinGW?\n\n> Thanks for the comments.  The best idea may be to just try it....\n\nYou're welcome. Just be sure to tackle the hard problems first, else you \nend up having wasted lots of valuable time for nothing.\n\nHth,\nDscho\n"},{"id":"14015","messageId":"20051224164011.GA6737@old.davidb.org","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"43AD21D7.5060306@op5.se","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"David Brown","fromEmail":"git@davidb.org","sentAt":"2005-12-24T16:40:12Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T16:40:12Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"git@davidb.org","avatar":"https://gravatar.com/avatar/94c86a2938470a74c2eac5e2b69afc0871f79a660295c02219597aba8cb101c1?d=mp&s=160"},"body":"On Sat, Dec 24, 2005 at 11:24:23AM +0100, Andreas Ericsson wrote:\n> Sven Verdoolaege wrote:\n> >On Sat, Dec 24, 2005 at 11:09:39AM +0100, Andreas Ericsson wrote:\n> >\n> >>The worst trouble you're likely to run into is all the hardcoded paths. \n> >>They are everywhere and ofcourse use the / for path entity separation.\n> >\n> >\n> >AFAIR, '/' is a valid path separator on Windows.\n> >It's just command.com (does that still exist?) that insisted on '\\\\'\n> >separators.\n> \n> Are you sure? I've seen lots of porting patches that transliterate those \n> to '\\\\'. Perhaps those who wrote those patches just took for granted \n> that it was needed, the same as I did.\n\nAFAIK all of the Win32 APIs accept either forward or backward slash as a\nseparator.  It has been this way since when they added directories to DOS.\n\nWhat doesn't always accept forward slashes are commandline utilities that\nare using '/' as an option separator.  Most of them these days will accept\nthe '/', at least in many circumstances.\n\nDave\n"},{"id":"14016","messageId":"7vwthus7gr.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"43AD1E63.4040103@op5.se","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Junio C Hamano","fromEmail":"junkio@cox.net","sentAt":"2005-12-24T17:58:12Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T17:58:12Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"gitster@pobox.com","avatar":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/54884?v=4"},"body":"Andreas Ericsson <ae@op5.se> writes:\n\n> The fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to help a \n> native port...\n\nCan you defend that \"bash'ism\" comment for all 39?  The one I\nknow of and would want to get rid of its bashism by rewriting is\ngit-grep, but most of them I thought was plain POSIX.\n"},{"id":"14028","messageId":"43ADDD6F.7010502@op5.se","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"7vwthus7gr.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Andreas Ericsson","fromEmail":"ae@op5.se","sentAt":"2005-12-24T23:44:47Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-24T23:44:47Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"ae@op5.se","avatar":"https://gravatar.com/avatar/426e89595c75a8f5252dd0c989e5fabe5bcac616e68557427ad9aef6b0ca342a?d=mp&s=160"},"body":"Junio C Hamano wrote:\n> Andreas Ericsson <ae@op5.se> writes:\n> \n> \n>>The fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to help a \n>>native port...\n> \n> \n> Can you defend that \"bash'ism\" comment for all 39?  The one I\n> know of and would want to get rid of its bashism by rewriting is\n> git-grep, but most of them I thought was plain POSIX.\n> \n\nNot really, no. I meant \"there are 39 shell-scripts known to work with \nbash but not necessarily known to fail with any other shell\", which \nusually means \"it will break with some shell or other, although the \nshell that breaks is unusual enough for everyone not to have tested it \nyet\". I'm probably being a bit super-anal and anti-MS biased.\n\nI wrote the first mail being terribly hung over and this one being \nslightly tipsy. I now get the feeling that everything will work out for \nthe best. Happy christmas everyone.\n\n-- \nAndreas Ericsson                   andreas.ericsson@op5.se\nOP5 AB                             www.op5.se\nTel: +46 8-230225                  Fax: +46 8-230231\n"},{"id":"14030","messageId":"7vr782osm1.fsf@assigned-by-dhcp.cox.net","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"43ADDD6F.7010502@op5.se","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Junio C Hamano","fromEmail":"junkio@cox.net","sentAt":"2005-12-25T01:47:18Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-25T01:47:18Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"gitster@pobox.com","avatar":"https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/54884?v=4"},"body":"Andreas Ericsson <ae@op5.se> writes:\n\n> Junio C Hamano wrote:\n>> Andreas Ericsson <ae@op5.se> writes:\n>>\n>>> The fact that there are 39 bash'ish shell-scripts does little to\n>>> help a native port...\n>> Can you defend that \"bash'ism\" comment for all 39?  The one I\n>> know of and would want to get rid of its bashism by rewriting is\n>> git-grep, but most of them I thought was plain POSIX.\n>\n> Not really, no. I meant \"there are 39 shell-scripts known to work with \n> bash but not necessarily known to fail with any other shell\",...\n\nI am not a Windows person (once I thought heard one particular\nversion of NT was POSIX compliant but I did not believe it), but\nI suspect bash or not they may have trouble with POSIXism (iow\nUNIX heritage), and if the port is done the right way by adding\ncompatibility layer they would end up reinventing Cygwin or\nsomething close to it...\n"},{"id":"14037","messageId":"003101c60976$f2912ff0$6900a8c0@sps","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"Pine.LNX.4.63.0512241509240.24308@wbgn013.biozentrum.uni-wuerzburg.de","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Rob McDonald","fromEmail":"robm@asdl.gatech.edu","sentAt":"2005-12-25T17:16:29Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-25T17:16:29Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"robm@asdl.gatech.edu","avatar":null},"body":"> Well, cygwin is everything but unmaintained. It's unfair to blaim the good\n> work of the cygwin folks if you can't get it to work. I have *never* had a\n> problem I could not solve with cygwin. In particular, *no* package got\n> messed up when I installed/upgraded another package. Before you ask: I use\n> cygwin extensively.\n\nI'm sorry to have seemed harsh in my criticism.  I have not used Cygwin\nseriously in a couple years.  At the time, as a user, I saw no noticable\nprogress.  The project seemed dead.  I always had trouble with their package\nmanagement program.  I'm glad you've never had similar problems.\n\n> As I already stated, there are two *big* showstoppers when it comes to\n> port git to MinGW.\n\nThanks very much for those comments, that is exactly the kind of information\nI was hoping to get out of this thread.\n\n> Okay, I'll bite. Could you please port python to MinGW?\n\nAs I said, my experience porting apps to MinGW has been very limited in\nscope.  Essentially limited to programs that don't use any unixisms.  I see\nno need to port Python, they already have a native version.  And, you could\nalways use Jython if they didn't.\n\n> You're welcome. Just be sure to tackle the hard problems first, else you\n> end up having wasted lots of valuable time for nothing.\n\nThanks for the insight.  I didn't think the shell and / vs \\ were going to\nbe the real issues.\n\n                 Rob\n"},{"id":"14111","messageId":"20051231163952.GA29284@trixie.casa.cgf.cx","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"003101c60976$f2912ff0$6900a8c0@sps","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Christopher Faylor","fromEmail":"me@cgf.cx","sentAt":"2005-12-31T16:39:52Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-31T16:39:52Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"me@cgf.cx","avatar":null},"body":"On Sun, Dec 25, 2005 at 12:16:29PM -0500, Rob McDonald wrote:\n>>Well, cygwin is everything but unmaintained.  It's unfair to blaim the\n>>good work of the cygwin folks if you can't get it to work.  I have\n>>*never* had a problem I could not solve with cygwin.  In particular,\n>>*no* package got messed up when I installed/upgraded another package.\n>>Before you ask: I use cygwin extensively.\n>\n>I'm sorry to have seemed harsh in my criticism.  I have not used Cygwin\n>seriously in a couple years.  At the time, as a user, I saw no\n>noticable progress.  The project seemed dead.  I always had trouble\n>with their package management program.  I'm glad you've never had\n>similar problems.\n\nAs was mentioned, the Cygwin project is very far from dead and has\nactually never been close to dead.  It is, however, like any open source\nproject and things like the setup program are always under slow,\nsporadic development.\n\nThe core cygwin dll is under active development and maintenance and most\nof the packages in the distribution are under active maintenance, however.\n--\nChristopher Faylor\t\t\tspammer? ->\taaaspam@sourceware.org\nCygwin Co-Project Leader\t\t\t\taaaspam@duffek.com\nTimeSys, Inc.\n"},{"id":"14112","messageId":"20051231164012.GA24402@trixie.casa.cgf.cx","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"009701c60891$50893fd0$6900a8c0@sps","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Christopher Faylor","fromEmail":"me@cgf.cx","sentAt":"2005-12-31T16:40:12Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-31T16:40:12Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"me@cgf.cx","avatar":null},"body":"On Sat, Dec 24, 2005 at 08:51:53AM -0500, Rob McDonald wrote:\n>MSYS is a minimal system that includes ports of all build-chain tools\n>you need to get Makefiles to work.  I would envision using it along\n>with native ports of Perl, Tk/Tcl, etc.\n\nMSYS is basically an unmaintained fork of Cygwin.  It uses an old\nversion of the Cygwin DLL with some hacks to handle path names\ndifferently.  It isn't intended as a platform for porting packages to\nMSYS.  It is intended to be used as an environment for porting packages\nto MinGW.\n\ncgf\n"},{"id":"14114","messageId":"43B6FDC5.6020601@zytor.com","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"20051231163952.GA29284@trixie.casa.cgf.cx","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"H. Peter Anvin","fromEmail":"hpa@zytor.com","sentAt":"2005-12-31T21:53:09Z","receivedAt":"2005-12-31T21:53:09Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"hpa@zytor.com","avatar":null},"body":"Christopher Faylor wrote:\n> \n> As was mentioned, the Cygwin project is very far from dead and has\n> actually never been close to dead.  It is, however, like any open source\n> project and things like the setup program are always under slow,\n> sporadic development.\n> \n> The core cygwin dll is under active development and maintenance and most\n> of the packages in the distribution are under active maintenance, however.\n\nCygwin probably could benefit greatly if they adopted something like \nrpm/yum for packaging, instead of reinventing the wheel.\n\n\t-hpa\n"},{"id":"14115","messageId":"20060101052533.GA31098@trixie.casa.cgf.cx","threadId":"2921","inReplyTo":"43B6FDC5.6020601@zytor.com","subject":"Re: Possibility of a MinGW version?","fromName":"Christopher Faylor","fromEmail":"me@cgf.cx","sentAt":"2006-01-01T05:25:33Z","receivedAt":"2006-01-01T05:25:33Z","isPatch":false,"sender":{"key":"me@cgf.cx","avatar":null},"body":"On Sat, Dec 31, 2005 at 01:53:09PM -0800, H. Peter Anvin wrote:\n>Christopher Faylor wrote:\n>>As was mentioned, the Cygwin project is very far from dead and has\n>>actually never been close to dead.  It is, however, like any open\n>>source project and things like the setup program are always under slow,\n>>sporadic development.\n>>\n>>The core cygwin dll is under active development and maintenance and\n>>most of the packages in the distribution are under active maintenance,\n>>however.\n>\n>Cygwin probably could benefit greatly if they adopted something like\n>rpm/yum for packaging, instead of reinventing the wheel.\n\nYes, Cygwin isn't a new project so ideas like this have been kicked\naround many times over the years.  You can't just port rpm, apt, or yum\nand then say \"We'll use this for updates now\" because there are\nchicken/egg problems.  The problems are not unsolvable but, so far, no\none has cared enough to do anything about them.\n\ncgf\n"}]}