FHS, zopectl, #925, Re: [Zope-dev] 2.7 installation

[Adrian van den Dries]

On June 18, Chris McDonough wrote:
> These files needn't be here really.  There are two scripts: zopectl and
> runzope.  They are convenience shell scripts that run zopectl.py or
> runzope.py scripts that live in a software home after setting certain
> envvars.  

Whether you run "/path/to/zope/instance/zopectl.py start" or
"zopectl.py start /path/to/zope/instance" is a 6/half-dozen affair
really.  Agreed.  But see below.

> Your system is a perfect example of a value-added frontend for zope.
...
> I'd love to see your zopectl system work with Zope 2.7, and though I
> likely wouldn't want to package it with Zope, I'd love to see it be able
> to operate as a front end controller for multiple Zope 2.7 instances. 

Agreed; we can have a separate zopectl package that is dedicated to
managing instances.

> [Zope]
> Config-File: /path/to/instance/etc/zope.conf
> 
> [Instance2]
> Config-File: /path/to/instance2/etc/zope.conf

Thank you, Chris, you answered your own question!  This is a nice
simple front-end to a multi-instance zope setup.

> I'd advise against installing Zope library files into site-packages
> unless you put them in a site-packages subdirectory (like
> site-packages/zope270 or site-packages/zope271).  Otherwise there will
> be no way to run multiple Zope versions on the same machine sanely
> because different Zope versions have different libraries.

May I respectfully ask why there is so much concern with such
complicated setups?  Surely a production environment (which is what
any Zope distribution should aim for) will standardise on a software
version?

If the concern is because *developers* want to run multiple Zope
instances on multiple Zope versions with multiple Python versions,
then I would suggest writing an *alternative* mechanism for developers
to mangle their PYTHONPATHs and whatever.

> That said, if you always manage upgrades via your package
> distribution mechanism, and you only allowed one version of Zope to
> be package-installed on the machine at once, perhaps putting the
> files in site-packages wouldn't be such a big deal.

This is doubtless the most common scenario (or it should be).

> I'm afraid you're going to need to change a lot of things to support
> Zope 2.7.  Please let me know if I can help.

Should we move this to debian-python?

> Servicing the many goals of installation and configuration is very
> difficult, but I'm pretty confident we can make your life a little
> easier in the long term given that I understand your requirements.  It
> will also make Zope that much more "debian-friendly" in the long run.

As long as we can distinguish those parts of this exercise that will
apply to the Zope distribution from those that should be specific to
Debian's package, this shouldn't be too hard.

a.

-- 
 Adrian van den Dries                           avdd@flow.com.au
 Development team                               www.dev.flow.com.au
 FLOW Communications Pty. Ltd.                  www.flow.com.au