Bug#501688: Getting dh-make-perl to use META.yml

[Gunnar Wolf]

gregor herrmann dijo [Sun, Nov 16, 2008 at 03:18:15PM +0100]:
> > Firstly, this is my first time responding to a Debian bug.  If I've missed
> > something, or misunderstood the bug process, please let me know; I'm eager
> > to be educated.
> 
> That's fine, thanks for your comments.

I also want to thank you for looking into our ugly but beloved tool ;-)

> > I'm one of the Module::Install developers, and I've also been bitten by
> > dh-make-perl via Module::Depends::Intrusive failing to parse certain
> > Makefile.PL files.  However I'm a little confused as to why we'd want to,
> > since all modern CPAN modules should have a META.yml file.
> 
> I looked at the code, and it's a bit strange:
> dh-make-perl uses the META.yml file -- but not for calculating the
> dependencies. extract_depends() is even passed the meta hash but it's
> never used then.
> Don't ask my why, probably a phenomenon of "organically grown" :/

Organically... I hope the onions I have in my garden are not as dirty
as dh-make-perl's internals ;-)

I cannot recall the exact details... But I do recall there was a
reason for using M::D::I instead of META - I am just guessing, but I
think it is related to Paul's statement, «all modern CPAN modules
should have a META.yml file». Very often, we need -or are requested
to- package _very_ old modules. And CPAN is full of
perfectly-functioning but no-longer-maintained modules. Which lack a
META file, or whose META file is incomplete/outdated.

Of course, a sensible behaviour would be to parse META if it is
available (for dependencies), and only use M::D::I if it is not - or
if specified via a command-line switch or so.

I do believe Paul's comment should be addressed. But, yes, I'd love
for someone else (with better grasp of real reasons, not just my "I
believe" stuff ;-) ) can comment on this.

OTOH, as we have some upstream Perl people with more proper CPAN
participation: How would it go regarding CPAN customs to update those
stale distributions I mention? Making a new, minor-version upload of
CPAN packages bringing them to updated standards, even if they authors
are no longer active? Something akin to Debian's NMUs - with the added
bonus that it can help spot distributions which need to be adopted by
somebody else...

Greetings,

-- 
Gunnar Wolf - gwolf at gwolf.org - (+52-55)5623-0154 / 1451-2244
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