[tz] [PROPOSED PATCH 2/2] Use lz format for new tarball
Deborah Goldsmith
goldsmit at apple.com
Tue Sep 20 16:02:49 UTC 2016
> Seems like it creates a bit of a chicken-and-egg
> dilemma towards ever migrating anyone to new formats.
I would argue that distribution of core internet data should never *drive* the adoption of new formats. Once a new format is widespread for other reasons, it makes perfect sense to adopt it.
Important data that everyone needs to use should be as widely available as possible, which means using widely-adopted data formats.
Debbie
> On Sep 20, 2016, at 8:56 AM, Random832 <random832 at fastmail.com> wrote:
>
> On Tue, Sep 20, 2016, at 11:24, Deborah Goldsmith wrote:
>> As far as I can tell, lzip is only used on Linux. There are no tools that
>> ship with macOS or Windows (out of the box) that can decode it.
>
> Doesn't ship with "Linux" out of the box, either. At least, on my
> machine it's not present and I've done nothing special to exclude it...
> Ubuntu has a half dozen packages for different versions of it (most of
> which seem to be in "universe" rather than the main distribution), with
> no clear guidance on which one I should want to install. [It's clear
> enough, to be fair, what the actual differences between them *are*, but
> it's not clear if these differences have any impact on performance or
> not, and overall I'm completely mystified at the decision to *package*
> them.]
>
>> Adopting lzip as the primary format at this point seems like a statement
>> that only Linux matters.
>
> While it seems to be a bit bleeding-edge, I don't see how it's less so
> for Linux than for other operating systems. Also I don't see why a
> "primary" format means that only platforms supporting that format, 'out
> of the box' or otherwise, matter, while other distribution formats are
> still fully supported. Seems like it creates a bit of a chicken-and-egg
> dilemma towards ever migrating anyone to new formats.
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