package description fields

[Ross Paterson]

On Thu, Jan 13, 2005 at 08:43:16AM -0800, Isaac Jones wrote:
> Ross Paterson <ross at soi.city.ac.uk> writes:
> > Is it sufficient to put License: BSD3 in the package description?
> > Or should License-File be mandatory, and License just an optional
> > hint?
> 
> I don't really want to force people to Do the Right Thing necessarily,
> I just want to force them to think about a license before they put
> something in Hackage.

My problem is that these two fields are currently mutually exclusive,
but I think they're both useful:
- License gives an executive summary, imprecise but a quick guide.
- License-File names a file that I can read for the details, and which
  the build system should copy into the installation directory (this
  will often be necessary to satisfy the licence).
So I think authors should be able and encouraged to provide both, and
certainly not encouraged to just provide License.

> > It doesn't seem to be very useful to have both a library and executables
> > that use it in the same package (at least with the meaning implemented
> > for GHC).  One has to list all the library modules again under each
> > executable.
> 
> Which field are you referring to here?  buildDepends?  I think I
> agree.

Not really a field but the overall structure.  I'm agreeing with what
Simon said in

http://www.haskell.org//pipermail/cvs-libraries/2005-January/003225.html