[Boxbackup-dev] Switch from BDB to QDBM (was re: COMMIT r2631)

Stewart Adam maillist at diffingo.com
Wed Mar 3 03:30:55 GMT 2010


On 2010/03/01 9:12 PM, Martin Ebourne wrote:
> We really do need to support use of the system QDBM since distributions
> such as Fedora and Debian simply will not allow the use of bundled
> libraries. It would be a shame if after changing the licence to be fully
> free to enable Box Backup in Fedora we then managed to block it again on
> a technical issue.
>
> http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:No_Bundled_Libraries
FWIW though I'll be maintaining the Box Backup builds for Fedora, so I don't 
mind doing a bit of hacking/patching to get it working with the system 
libraries even if using the system QDBM is not an option by default (or an 
option at all). I'll provide those patches on my fedorapeople site so they 
can be submitted to distros with similar policies.

However, in order to make the above possible we would need to keep system 
libs in mind when designing the build procedure so that it can be easily 
patched... I can think of some projects that make it excessively hard to 
remove the bundled library dependencies, and as a result they're either not 
packaged or not included in distributions like Fedora & its 3rd-party 
repositories (HandBrake is a good example, which is a shame since it's an 
excellent product IMO).

> I think the reasoning is sound even though as you say Chris BDB
> versioning is hell. I think really that's the fault of BDB. I can't find
> any information on backwards compatibility of QDBM so don't know how
> that will fare.
I've never dealt with BDB extensively, but my general perception of this 
issue is that it's mostly BDB specific as well.

Regards,
Stewart



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