CPAN functionality for python - requirements

[Sean Reifschneider]

On Tue, Feb 27, 2001 at 09:03:43PM -0500, Doug Hellmann wrote:
>> > That decision is up to the client.  If the client has the smarts to turn
>> > a distutils package into an RPM, then the client would list it's preferred
>> > format as a distutils package and it would handle the rest.  If it can't,
>> > you can either select an RPM, or fall back to a distutils package.
>> 
>> Why should the client need to "list" anything.

If you mean "why would it need to send the list of preferred package
formats to the server", it would do that so that the server could return
the list of specific entries that the client wants.  Currently, the
implementation is that the client can ask for a specific package format,
and can ask again if there isn't one available, or it can ask the server
to list all of them that it has, and then discard the ones it does't want.

If this is a privacy concern, don't use it, eh?  We can only do so much
if you want to be tight-lipped:  "I want a package, but I don't want to
say what it is."  "Ok."

>I'm not sure why the "what do you have" question is needed.  The "send me
>that(mandrake.rpm)" interaction is what we want.

If you know exactly the versions, package formats, etc which are available?
One could say that if you expect the client to know all this, then you might
as well expect them to know where to get the thing...

>The server is likely to be a cgi, which by its nature means requests may be
>written to a log file.  Should that be disallowed?

A user is more than welcome to use an anonimizer for connecting to the
archive.

Sean
-- 
 A computer is like an Old Testament god, with a lot of rules and no mercy.
                -- Joseph Campbell
Sean Reifschneider, Inimitably Superfluous <jafo at tummy.com>
tummy.com - Linux Consulting since 1995. Qmail, KRUD, Firewalls, Python