[Pkg-javascript-devel] Small Node.js packages in NEW

[Dominique Dumont]

Hello Thorsten

Here's some food for thought...

On Saturday 04 April 2015 15:12:14 Thorsten Alteholz wrote:
> While installing/updating a package all of them have to download the 
> complete package information and parse it over and over again. This is not 
> a problem for high end computers with good network connectivity, but low 
> end computers might have a problem.

Well, here's a testimony: I run at home a OLinuXino board (arm A20 512 MB ram) 
with Debian 7.8. For various reason, I need to pick packages from testing, 
unstable and experimental. update and upgrade are slow, but it works.

So I agree with you that low end ARM users might have a problem. But I'd like 
to have concrete numbers and reports before deciding on altering packaging 
strategies.

> As we have seen in the past there are memory constraints or the whole 
> process just consumes too much time. I admit that there is lots of room 
> for improvement in Debians package handling, but at the moment we just 
> have what we have.

Indeed. My other concern is that imposing package bundling will only delay 
the inevitable: package handling needs to be improved.

> So I would say the overhead of those nodejs users that need to install 
> a few kB of superfluous code is not as bad as the resource consumption of 
> all other users.

Agreed. But that's not the main issue.

> I don't have a better solution for small packages, but as long as there is 
> no improvement in package handling, I think there should be no exception. 
> I would still prefer the bundling of several small packages into bigger 
> chunks. Isn't git able to handle several upstreams in one repository?

Here's the main problem of bundling: it will (not might) require more work 
from packaging teams: improve tools, and more complex and frequent work to 
upgrade packages, more difficulties to handle dependencies, breakages...
Unfortunately, packaging teams are all understaffed and we all must strive 
to make these teams more efficient in the quality and quantity of packages they
can deliver.

In my opinion, optimising upgrade performance by bundling packages transfer work 
from machines to people. We all know which ones scale better.

Hope this helps

[1] https://www.olimex.com/Products/OLinuXino/A20/A20-OLinuXino-LIME/open-source-hardware

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