openshot.developers team mailing list archive

[TJ <ubuntu@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 2009-08-25 at 12:35 -0500, Jonathan Thomas wrote:
>         
>         1. What version(s) of Python are required (i.e; >= 2.2,
>         >=2.4) ?
>         I've only tested on Python 2.5 and greater.  It might work
>         with older version too, but that's a bit of an unknown.

OK. I suppose once we've got the packages sorted out it'll be trivial to
test against the different Python versions in chroot or virtual
environments.

>         2. install/postinst.py is trying to copy MLT python bindings
>         (mlt.py,
>         _mlt.so, mlt_wrap.o) which don't exist (at least the source
>         doesn't) -
>         are these no longer required?
>         These 3 files are installed by my custom MLT .deb installer.
>         After building MLT, I ran the following commands to generate
>         the swig Python bindings:  
>  
>         $ cd ~/mlt/src/swig/python
>         $ sudo bash build
> 
>         Then these 3 files need to be copied into the Python path
>         (i.e. the site-packages or dist-packages folders, or any other
>         folder in the Python path).  Ideally, the MLT Python bindings
>         would be packaged separately (i.e. something like
>         mlt-python-bindings, or what ever).  If done correctly, you
>         can open up the Python shell, and type "import mlt", and it
>         will not throw an error.  This has always been one of the more
>         difficult steps to automate in my build wizard and in the
>         packaging I've attempted so far. =)

Ahh thanks! I have the dependency .deb files unpacked from the archive
but when I looked through the list of files I missed these three - I've
just looked again and seen them.

Here's my initial ideas (which might change in the testing):

Your idea for a "python-mlt-bindings" package is ideal. In the "mlt"
source package's "debian/rules" file "swig/python/build" can be executed
and then the new binary package "python-mlt-bindings" in
"debian/control" will install the resulting files.

I'm not a great Python expert but I'd guess as these are public
interfaces to system libraries they should be installed as site-packages
so they are available to all python apps that want them?

>         3. install/openshot.dpm isn't installed - should it be, or is
>         it not
>         required?
>         This file can be ignored.  I'm going to delete it from the
>         trunk. 

Thanks, one less to worry about.

>         5. install/openshot.desktop contains absolute paths for icons
>         to /usr/local/share/* locations which need to be become
>         agnostic. The
>         icon should be installed in the system icons directory. If the
>         logo icon
>         is referenced from the program code that will need updating to
>         detect
>         the system path location and concatenate it with the filename.
>         This is the only path in OpenShot that is hard-coded.
>         Everywhere inside OpenShot we do exactly like you suggest, and
>         concatenate the system path with the filename.  I just didn't
>         know where to install this icon, and how to refer to it's path
>         on the .desktop file.   

I seem to recall seeing how to obtain the system's pixmap/icon path in
the distant past but can't remember the specifics. I'll explore this one
and get back to you unless you figure it out first :)

>         
>         6. Two directories (thumbnail/ and queue/) appear to be
>         per-user
>         'runtime' rather than 'build-time' requirements. This suggests
>         they
>         should be created in the user's home directory:
>         ~/.openshot/thumbnail/
>         and ~/.openshot/queue/.
>         The primary reason for this would be user permissions to the
>         applications' installation directory are restricted to read
>         +execute.
>         This requires programs changes so we'll need to liaise on this
>         since the
>         program would need to ensure the directories are created at
>         each launch
>         - the Debian package wouldn't have anything to do with them.
>         I will go ahead and move these folders into the home
>         directory.  This should be a fairly easy change.  OpenShot
>         will create these folders at runtime, so there shouldn't be
>         any problems.
> 

Thanks, that has removed another potential headache.

Another question on Python packaging:

7. Based on Debian recommendations I'm attempting to use the
"python-support" package to automate creation of a
python-version-agnostic .deb. It uses the Python "distutils" setup.py
services to build the target installation image.

This appears to be built successfully in that all the files I'm
expecting to see are included.

I'm currently confused though, since the files are installed to
"/usr/lib/python-support/openshot/". This makes sense based on the
purpose of python-support, but I cannot figure out how, at install time,
the files are built and installed to their final resting place, which I
assume will be /usr/lib/openshot/ or something similar.

Anyone having encountered the Python distutils and python-support please
shout out - you might save me some frustration!