Subject: Re: [bug#54304] [PATCH] Don't fix git executable location during Elixir build

From: Cees de Groot <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 09 Mar 2022 17:31:37 +0000

I think changing the behaviour of a programming language just to be helpful to developers is something that one may consider for upstream, but certainly not in the context of a packaging system like Guix - that just will breed confusion.

As it is, the error message thrown by Elixir when Git is not there is very easy to interpret for developers (and _only_ at development time can this happen!), no need to go overboard here. Unless, of course, you think it is useful to submit an upstream patch, feel free to do so.

------- Original Message -------

On Tuesday, March 8th, 2022 at 17:22, Maxime Devos <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Cees de Groot schreef op di 08-03-2022 om 20:52 [+0000]:
>
> > * At run-time, Git is used by Mix if, and only if, there are any Git-based dependencies. This
> >
> >   is not the normal case, and in that sense Git is an optional dependency of Elixir - most
> >
> >   projects will work just fine without Git being present. Here, too, PATH + `git` is used
> >
> >   so if there is a need on a user's system to use Git-based dependencies, the user can just
> >
> >   add the package to the profile and things will just work.
>
> If it's optional and not used most of the time, removing
>
> it seems fine to me, though this seems useful information for the
>
> description. Also, it would be nice if 'elixir' were patched
>
> to emit a nice message when 'git' is not found. Suggestion:
>
> This project required 'git', but it is not in $PATH. It can be
>
> installed into the user profile with `guix install git`.
>
> You might want to contact whoever added the substitution originally,
>
> to see what the original reasons were.
>
> Greetings,
>
> Maxime.