[Aptitude-devel] Bug#894332: Bug#894332: aptitude fails to follow free desktop basedir specifications

[shirish शिरीष]

Reply in-line :-

On 29/03/2018, Axel Beckert <abe at debian.org> wrote:
> Control: severity -1 wishlist
> Control: retitle -1 aptitude: Please adhere to the full free desktop basedir
> specifications and support $XDG_CONFIG_HOME
>
> Hi shirish,
>
> shirish शिरीष wrote:
>> Thank you for maintaining aptitude for as long as you have. For
>> reasons unknown, aptitude hasn't used free desktop basedir
>> specifications
>
> That's not completely true. Aptitude already cares about
> $XDG_CACHE_HOME.
>
> A cache is easy to throw away and rebuilt, so changing that directory
> was easy.
>

True, didn't think about that part.

> Moving around config files is way more difficult to do right. And we're
> not developers of a desktop environment who don't care if the user's
> configuration from the last release still works with our next release.
> So I'm rather reluctant to change anything on the configuration paths.
>
>> I can understand that there exists a possibility of breakage if the
>> change is introduced in the next release or something.
>
> Yes.
>
>> $XDG_CONFIG_HOME defines the base directory relative to which user
>> specific configuration files should be stored. If $XDG_CONFIG_HOME is
>> either not set or empty, a default equal to $HOME/.config should be
>> used.
>
> Yes. aptitude currently does not use $XDG_CONFIG_HOME, just
> $XDG_CACHE_HOME.
>
>> FILES
>>        /var/lib/aptitude/pkgstates
>>            The file in which stored package states and some package
>> flags are stored.
>
> Please note that this is not a user-specific file but a
> system-specific file and has nothing to do with user settings.
>
>>        /etc/apt/apt.conf, /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/*,
>
> These are APT's system-wide configuration files. The same applies here.
>
>> ~/.aptitude/config
>>            The configuration files for aptitude.  ~/.aptitude/config
>> overrides /etc/apt/apt.conf. See apt.conf(5) for documentation of the
>> format and contents of these files.
>
> That's the only file affected and changing it means:
>
> * to adapt code to look for aptitude's configuration file in more than
>   one location.
> * to decide to which file aptitude writes its configuration when the
>   user changes something inside aptitude and multiple files exist.
> * to potentially have code inside aptitude which _reliably_ moves
>   $HOME/.aptitude/config to $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/aptitude/config.
> * to potentially remove $HOME/.aptitude/ if empty.
> * to educate users about that change.
>
> I'm not sure if that's really worth the effort.
>
> IIRC we discussed that already once in the past when $XDG_CACHE_HOME
> got implemented and decided against it at least back then.

True as well,  The only problem is every time I do a new installation
for someone or even myself I do tend to look for aptitude config file
in ~/.config/aptitude rather than ~/.aptitude/config.

Also from what I can gather or understand and correct me if I'm wrong -

 ~/.aptitude/config is also a user created file . I double checked by
removing aptitude and installing aptitude .

That conversation probably happened in 2015 as that is when I was
trying to get some info. on why apt, aptitude are the way they are -

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/308567/how-do-i-find-out-where-the-configuration-file-for-apt-is-located

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/235667/till-what-depth-can-aptitude-v-verbose-work

I do understand where you are coming from.  I wish I had more data
points, the only other culprit I know is .mozilla which also tends to
have its own configuration file rather than being  in ~/.config/$PKG
as most are doing irrespective of whether or not they are part of
desktop environments or not.

Even mpv (a shell based media player)  has changed its configuration
file from ~/.mpv/config to ~/.config/mpv but as shared by you aptitude
has its own users and its own history.

The only way forward is maybe to have baby steps moving in that
direction goading people to move to ~/.config/aptitude but both as
upstream contributor and a packager it's really your call.  You could
use NEWS to share that upcoming change if you so wish.

I probably will open a thread on debian-devel just to have a feel of
what people think.  I'm sure there will be backlash but who knows,
let's see.

>
> 		Regards, Axel
> --
>  ,''`.  |  Axel Beckert <abe at debian.org>, https://people.debian.org/~abe/
> : :' :  |  Debian Developer, ftp.ch.debian.org Admin
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>

-- 
          Regards,
          Shirish Agarwal  शिरीष अग्रवाल
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