[Buildroot] Github URL used to fetch packages

[Arnout Vandecappelle <arnout@mind.be>]

On 30/10/13 10:53, Maxime Hadjinlian wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> Buildroot is currently using this method to get packages from Github:
> http://buildroot.uclibc.org/downloads/manual/manual.html#github-download-url
>
> As you may know, Github released a feature called "Release" which
> basically, create a tag for you and associate that tag with a zip and
> a tarball, example:
> https://github.com/nandra/libiqrf/releases
>
> This doesn't change much with the URL we use to grab the package.
>
> Current : http://github.com/<user>/<package>/tarball/$(FOO_VERSION)
> Release: http://github.com/<user>/<package>/archive/$(FOO_VERSION)
>
> With the second one, FOO_VERSION is the tag name (which can be
> anything, it's a string, that's all the constraints on it).
>
> Github supports both way so everything is great, nothing is broken.
> But if they stop allowing the uses of our current way, we would have
> to change one bit of the URL for ALL the packages. Which is a pain.
>
> Github has already changed the way to fetch package in the past and
> deprecated the old method, and this might happen over and over.
>
> What about a way to standardize the way to grab package from github, like:
> github://<user>/<package>/$(FOO_VERSION)
>
> We could then expand the URL to whatever is the best way of fetching
> the packages.
>
> This would be a good way for Buildroot to prevent breakage would a
> provider such as Github changes the way to fetch data.

  I like the idea. We would typically do this with some auxiliary 
variables instead of a new download method, but maybe the download method 
isn't such a bad idea. It would add even more complexity to the horrible 
pkg-download.mk, though...

  Bottom line: the idea is good, but let's see if the implementation can 
be acceptable.

  Regards,
  Arnout


-- 
Arnout Vandecappelle                          arnout at mind be
Senior Embedded Software Architect            +32-16-286500
Essensium/Mind                                http://www.mind.be
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