Packages within a package

[John D. Ramsdell]

Duncan Coutts <duncan.coutts at worc.ox.ac.uk> writes:

> I think I'm claiming that developers want support for developing
> systems as a unit but distribution can be as a collection of
> components rather than as a unit.

Do you believe it is a bad idea to expect that Cabal be the
appropriate tool for developing systems as a unit?  Maybe Cabal should
do just one thing, and one thing well, package components of systems
into the smallest units available for distribution.

I had been thinking of Cabal as a development tool as well as a
packaging tool, similar to autoconf/automake, but perhaps Cabal is
really meant to be similar to rpmbuild and dpkg-buildpackage.  Maybe
thinking of it as a development tool was an error on my part.

For my application, I suppose I could use autoconf/automake to develop
the software, install the executables, build a Cabal package
description, and then use it with Cabal to make the library available
as a package.  Is this usage more inline with your intentions?

John