Subject: [bug#44785] [PATCH v2 00/22] Update sequoia to 0.20.0 - version 2

From: Hartmut Goebel <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 28 Nov 2020 13:51:38 +0100

Hi Christopher,
> Thanks Hartmut. I haven't been following the Rust packaging very well,
> but my interpretation of #:skip-build would be that's it's like #:tests?
> #f, so if it's present, ideally there should be a comment there with
> some information about why this package isn't being built.

For those rust packages (aka creates) which are "libraries" it does not 
make sense at all to build the packages, since rust has no means of 
sharing pre-compiled objectfiles. Each and every program using a library 
builds it from source. This is why the new importer sets "#:skip-build 
#t" for all crates except of the ones listed on the command line.

I'm not the one who came up with this idea, but, after being skeptical 
first, I fully agree to this decision.

The only reason for *not* setting "#:skip-build #t" for these packages 
would be to have the tests run. But here again rust performs badly - 
adding a lot of overhead: Each package would be build *twice*: once for 
"release" (which then will just be dropped) and once for "test". And 
this will be repeated for every package on every system if substitutes 
are not available.

> Also, I think there could be some conflicts with a few of the patches
> you sent, the addition of rust-base64-0.13 for example.

Sorry, I don't understand this remark. Why should adding a package cause 
any conflict?

-- 
Regards
Hartmut Goebel

| Hartmut Goebel          | [email-masked]               |
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