[Pkg-javascript-devel] packaging node applications in Debian

[Florian Brandes]

Am Dienstag, den 04.10.2011, 13:41 +0200 schrieb Jérémy Lal:
> On 04/10/2011 13:28, Florian Brandes wrote:
> > Am Dienstag, den 04.10.2011, 11:29 +0200 schrieb Jonas Smedegaard:
> > 
> >> On 11-10-04 at 11:18am, Florian Brandes wrote:
> >>> Forever depends on 12 other packages. I really wouldn't want to pack 
> >>> 12 other packages (and possibly there dependencies as well).
> >>
> >> Then you really are not trying to debianize a Node package, as you wrote 
> >> initially.
> > 
> > Maybe you're right, but I thought creating a working .deb file, which
> > installs correctly on a debian (-derived) system would be called
> > "debianize". I am sorry if I have incorrectly used it. 
> > 
> >>> I read about the npm bundle command. Could I use that to "bundle" all 
> >>> what is required by forever and pack that?
> >>
> >> You can do many things, and maybe that one too.  But if you want to 
> >> package Debian packages, then avoid npm!
> >>
> > 
> > If I understood correctly, to "debianize" forever, I would have to
> > "debianize" all of its dependencies, right? Therefore I would replace
> > node package management by debian package management. 
> > 
> > It would probably be best to have npm installed and get those packages
> > installed through it and not through debian package management. 
> > 
> > I looked at other libnode* packages and they appear to have less (or
> > none) dependencies. Packaging 12 packages for only one package to work
> > seems rather...cumbersome.
> 
> This is troublesome for me, too.
> Hell, even npm itself has its dozen dependencies...
> I feel there is something wrong with blindly making debian packages out of those.
> 
> I'm trying to find good arguments against that practice :
> * too small packages - sometimes even only a few lines of code
> * most of the time, only one dependency
> * anyone can make a package in npm repository. Even if it's a package
>   nobody but its author will ever use. There is no quality checks.

I agree :-) 

> 
> An example :
> http://groups.google.com/group/nodejs/msg/42947c291c5f31f3
> Isaac states he doesn't really want people to use its "slide" package.
> Does it really make sense to do a debian package out of that small, single,
> probably unmaintained, file ?
> 
> A tool that might help tracking dependencies and packages of interest :)
> https://github.com/substack/npmdep
> 
That does look interesting. It also looks very scary if you look at the
example dependency graphs. Would it make sense for normal Debian
(Ubuntu) users to have and install node packages? If so, would maybe a
GUI to npm do the job?

Florian