#39 Subpackage terminology is misleading
Opened 2 years ago by abitrolly. Modified 2 years ago

Package page links to source package as "Subpackage" concept.

python3-hawkey Subpackage of libdnf

"source package" is probably better, but I already know what is it, and for new users this might be confusing. This inspired me to write this rant https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/t/rfc-what-you-dont-like-about-rpm-packaging/567/23?u=abitrolly

I would prefer the name "sourcepack" which identified by contenthash in addition to name.


I'm using "source package" and "subpackage" since it mirrors the language in https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/packaging-guidelines/ and keeps the terminology consistent across all of Fedora. As I understand the "sourcepack" concept, you seem to be referring to an SRPM in a zip format? I think this would be a good idea to bring up with the docs team to either rename terms or put up a glossary of packaging terms.

As I understand the "sourcepack" concept, you seem to be referring to an SRPM in a zip format?

No. SRPM is a binary format that needs special tools and RPM-fu to work with. "sourcepack" is all files necessary to build an RPM (.spec etc.). When they are checksummed, this checksum can be used to identify sourcepack. Sourcepack can be zipped by any tool for convenience. It will also be named sourcepack.

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