xemacs vs emacs

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

David Kastrup writes:

 > Oh puleeze!  The _only_ party that is _objecting_ to AUCTeX trying
 > to support XEmacs are the XEmacs core team.  They don't accept our
 > package in distribution.

That last is true, but it is precisely the same policy that we face
with respect to Debian (and I assume every other distribution).  They
will not distribute our tarballs; they insist that they must build the
SUMOs themselves and wrap them up in .debs themselves, according to
their procedures.  There's nothing unusual or unreasonable about this,
and I do not understand why you think it should be any other way.

 > They demand that we have to scrap our own package build and
 > directory structure and adapt the XEmacs style of installing
 > packages

No one has ever made such a suggestion, let alone demanded it.  If
there is no support for the XEmacs package system, though, it's not an
XEmacs package.  The point of the XEmacs package system is not merely
producing tarballs of a specified format.

The point of our package system is building each package in the
environment in which it will be used, and verifying that it is happy
to build and run in that environment, that other packages don't cause
any problems for it, and that it doesn't cause any problems for other
packages.  We automatically do a *full* build of the whole tree for
*every* change committed to the packages.[1]  Why should AUCTeX be an
exception to that practice?

 > (never mind that this is much less versatile)

But we don't care about versatility; we care that it work in the
context of our package system.  This is the whole point, the only
point.  We don't tell you how to run your project, and we don't demand
effort from you.  We *offer* CVS access and *request* that you do as
much of the integration work as you will, because that is the cheapest
way for the community to get an updated AUCTeX as an XEmacs package.
This obviously means extra work all around, with most of the burden
falling on you if you will accept it.  Nobody says you are under any
obligation, though.

 > What I get in return is ostracization of the package we produce and
 > tirades on the XEmacs list what a bad person I am for objecting to
 > supporting XEmacs and similar crap.

*chuckle* David, we have our differences, but that doesn't make you a
bad person.  Still, we'd all get along a lot better if you'd admit
that we just have goals that differ, and that getting everybody
satisfied is going to take more effort than what it takes to satisfy
*you* that *you* have done everything *you* think is necessary.

Sincere regards,

Footnotes: 
[1]  See http://labb.contactor.se/~matsl/smoketest/logs for status.