[Lispweb] Re: TBNL via asdf-install fails

[Edi Weitz]

On Tue, 18 Oct 2005 09:06:01 +0100, Christophe Rhodes <csr21 at cam.ac.uk> wrote:

> OK, so the asdf-install you're using isn't the one distributed with
> SBCL.  In the version from <http://weitz.de/asdf-install/>, I see no
> code which attempts to deal with character encoding issues with
> SBCL, so the results you get will depend on the locale you are
> running in.  This is not a bug in SBCL, but should be taken up with
> the maintainer of the code at that location.  Bugs in Debian
> packaging should similarly go to the debian bug tracking system; if
> (require :asdf-install) is giving you the asdf-install that doesn't
> go with SBCL, that's wrong too, and if sbcl is uninstallable because
> of the age of the kernel, that's an obvious nonsense.
>
> (If I'm sounding a bit short at this point, it's because this is the
> third time in as many days that I have had to diagnose the same bug
> in the same third-party software for which SBCL distributes its own,
> working, version.)

Well, isn't that the curse of open source?  If SBCL's license were a
bit more restrictive then you could probably prevent Debian and the
likes to distribute it and a lot of your support problems with pesky
users would be history.  Or maybe just ignore them on the mailing
list?

As far as the ASDF-INSTALL version from the above-mentioned address is
concerned, it's the same one that's also in CCLAN.  I've always said
that I have no plans to be its long-time maintainer but I've commited
patches sent by various users nevertheless.

If someone has changed the ASDF-INSTALL version that comes bundled
with SBCL to make it work with Unicode SBCL and there are no plans to
integrate these changes with the CCLAN repository then maybe it's
better to have the CCLAN version just emit an error message like
"please use the bundled version" for SBCL?

Cheers,
Edi.

PS: Also note that my ASDF-INSTALL tutorial advises users to use the
    bundled version if they're using SBCL.  However, SBCL's REQUIRE
    (at least on Debian) seems to honor the user's settings for ASDF's
    registry and in this particular case prefers to install a
    third-party version instead of the bundled library.  This is
    obviously what caused the initial confusion.  Why the OP had the
    third-party version installed although he uses SBCL is something I
    don't know.