Other Help Topics :: HOWTO for creating .uci extensions?

I've read the HOWTO for creating .dsl extensions from Debian packages and it is easy enough. I'll be submitting a couple in the near future. Is there any documentation for creating .uci extensions? .dsl extensions from things not available as Debian packages? If so a link would be really, really helpful.

Thanks.

There is some stuff in the wiki
http://damnsmalllinux.org/wiki/index.php/Category:MyDSL

Ideally I suppose there could be more info, but writing docs is no fun =o)

So:

- .dsl is when you build from debs and .uci when you build from sources?

- can you build .uci from .debs?

- If so, why not obsolete .dsl's and promote only .uci's?

- If so, why the .uci extensions intead of .tar.gz?

- Don't you think .uci resemble, in some misterious ways, the Slackware package?

Quote (pr0f3550r @ May 04 2006,10:00)

Other people know a lot more about this than I do, so correct me if I'm wrong, but ...

- If so, why not obsolete .dsl's and promote only .uci's?

UCIs are very carefully contained under /opt by being mounted as a device. They are usually not "installed" at all. They are mostly Read-Only.

DSLs install, I believe, system wide. Or at least wider than a UCI will. They are also "installed", in the traditional sense that files are written to the system. (Is it in loading a DSL that mkwritable is run?)

- If so, why the .uci extensions intead of .tar.gz?

For the same reasons listed above: UCIs are easly loaded (mounted), contained under /opt, can be unmounted, and are Read-Only. tar.gzs are none of these things.

- .dsl is when you build from debs and .uci when you build from sources?

Although deb2dsl makes the process simple, I don't think you have to have a deb package to create a dsl package. Could be wrong.

And everything else, I don't know!

I think you're pretty much spot on. Building from source is not required of any extension type, and debs are not required to build *.dsl. The deb2dsl script uses deb because debian packages are precompiled to install into /usr, and installing a mydsl extension into /usr requires a *.dsl. However, with some tweaking you can usually make a debian package install into /opt...it will need some directory shuffling, and might need to include a wrapper script to set up the environment before the application runs. It's easier to build a *.dsl extension simply because the bin and lib directories used are in standard locations, and using a debian package the application is already built to run in those standard places. Installing an app into /opt/something/bin means that the program will need to be added to your $PATH or called with a full path, libs will usually need to be forced with the $LD_LIBRARY_PATH variable, and programs compiled to run elsewhere might be expecting their support files to be found in /usr. When compiling you can make it install where you want it, and often you can do it without needing a wrapper. Compiling usually also allows you to limit what is built into the program, so you may be able to prevent the need to include libs that are not already available in DSL.

You can also take applications from another distro and see if they will run in DSL. Some will run fine, and other may need some help.

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