code.delx.au - gnu-emacs-elpa/blob - README

   1 Copyright (C) 2010-2011 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
   2 See the end of the file for license conditions.
   3
   4
   5 This branch contains the sources, deployment scripts, and auxilliary
   6 files for the Emacs Lisp package archive (elpa.gnu.org).
   7
   8 This file explains the branch layout, how to add and edit packages,
   9 and how to deploy the archive (either on elpa.gnu.org, or a local copy
  10 for testing purposes).
  11
  12
  13 * DIRECTORY LAYOUT
  14
  15 ** admin/    -- scripts for deploying the package archive.
  16                 See the DEPLOYMENT section for details.
  17 ** html/     -- HTML for the elp.gnu.org website.
  18 ** packages/ -- source code for the packages.
  19
  20
  21 * PACKAGES
  22
  23 ** Contents of the packages/ directory:
  24
  25 This directory holds the package sources.  Unlike the deployed package
  26 archive, multi-file packages are present here as directories, not tar
  27 files.  So, edits to the sources can be easily managed by Bzr.
  28
  29 *** archive-contents
  30 This file contains a Lisp form recording the hosted package names and
  31 their attributes.  Once the archive is deployed, Emacs learns the
  32 archive contents by reading this file (normally via HTTP).
  33
  34 In the future, we'll remove this file from the repository, and
  35 generate it automatically during deployment.
  36
  37 *** Package sources
  38 In the form of *.el files for simple (1-file) packages, or
  39 subdirectories for multi-file packages.
  40
  41 *** Readme files
  42 When the archive is deployed, Emacs retrieves the package descriptions
  43 by reading these files (normally via HTTP).
  44
  45 In the future, we'll remove these files from the repository, and
  46 generate them during deployment.
  47
  48 ** To add a package:
  49
  50 *** Add a simple (1-file) package as packages/NAME-VERSION.el.
  51
  52 *** Add a multi-file package a directory, packages/NAME-VERSION.
  53
  54 *** Add a readme file, packages/NAME-readme.txt.  This should be a
  55 copy of the commentary section for a simple package, or the README
  56 file for a multi-file package.
  57
  58 *** Edit archive-contents and add an entry for the new package.
  59
  60 *** Commit your changes
  61 This is done the usual way ("bzr add", "bzr commit", etc).
  62
  63 Changes in the Bzr repository do not immediately propagate to the
  64 user-facing archive (what users see when they do `M-x list-packages').
  65 That is done by deploying the archive (see below).
  66
  67
  68 * DEPLOYMENT
  69
  70 ** The package-update.sh script
  71
  72 Use the script admin/package-update.sh to deploy a partial or full
  73 copy of the package archive.  To run a partial deployment:
  74
  75   /PATH/TO/admin/package-update.sh DEST
  76
  77 This deploys the packages in packages/ to DEST/packages.
  78
  79 To run a full deployment:
  80
  81   /PATH/TO/admin/package-update.sh DEST 1
  82
  83 A full deployment additionally copies the admin scripts to DEST/admin,
  84 creates a full tarball in DEST/packages/emacs-packages-latest.tgz, and
  85 fetches externally hosted packages (currently, the Org daily builds)
  86 and adds them to the archive.
  87
  88 The package-update.sh script only works if it lives in a bzr
  89 repository.  It uses `bzr export' to deploy from the repository to the
  90 destination directory.  If you have uncommitted changes in the working
  91 copy, those changes are not deployed.
  92
  93 You can view the deployment log at DEST/update-log.
  94
  95 The other scripts in the admin/ subdirectory are used for fetching the
  96 Org dailies.
  97
  98 ** Accessing a deployed archive
  99
 100 To access the archive via HTPP, have a symlink (say) /var/www/packages
 101 pointing to DEST/packages, and set up Emacs with
 102
 103   (setq package-archives '(("new-elpa" . "http://foo.com/packages")))
 104
 105 You can also access the archive via normal file access.  Such "local
 106 archives" are useful for debugging:
 107
 108   (setq package-archives '(("local-elpa" . "DEST/packages")))
 109
 110 ** Notes specific to elpa.gnu.org
 111
 112 The way things are set up on this machine, we refresh the archive by
 113 logging in (login access set up by FSF admins), and
 114
 115 su elpa
 116 cd ~elpa/elpa
 117 bzr up
 118 ./admin/package-update /home/elpa/staging/ 1
 119
 120 The symlink /var/www/packages points to /home/elpa/staging/packages.
 121
 122 The Org mode dailies are fetched and added by the script
 123 admin/org-synch.sh, which is run as a cron job (we also run this
 124 script during deployment).
 125
 126 \f
 127 This file is part of GNU Emacs.
 128
 129 GNU Emacs is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
 130 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
 131 the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
 132 (at your option) any later version.
 133
 134 GNU Emacs is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 135 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 136 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
 137 GNU General Public License for more details.
 138
 139 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
 140 along with GNU Emacs.  If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
 141
 142 \f
 143 Local variables:
 144 mode: outline
 145 paragraph-separate: "[  \f]*$"
 146 end: