Livecheck for master_sites of "gnome:" format is incomplete

[rmstonecipher@…]

Gnome's hosted projects tend to have the following directory tree and distname for releases:

gnome:sources/${name}/${branch}/${name}-${version}.${extension}

Odd-numbered branches are used for unstable versions, while even-numbered branches are used for stable/release versions.
The above-described organizational structure and odd/even versioning complicates a livecheck operation:

1. A two-step evaluation is necessary, first checking the project's directory to see if a new branch is available, then checking in the branch directory to see if a new version is available.
2. Using vercomp alone may determine that an odd-numbered branch has the highest available version, potentially influencing a MacPorts developer to upgrade to an unstable version.

I would propose the following procedures for the default livecheck for ports with master_sites of the "gnome:" format:

• Parse gnome:sources/${name} for a list of numbered branch directories and identify the highest even-numbered branch ${foo} and the highest odd-numbered branch ${bar}
  1. Run livecheck in gnome:sources/${name}/${foo} to identify the current release version
  2. Run livecheck again in gnome:sources/${name}/${bar} to identify the current unstable version, noting in the output that this may be an unstable/bleeding-edge version

Dave - would this be something you would take interest in improving, or is it more of a portmgr kind of change?

[ryandesign (Ryan Carsten Schmidt)]

portmgr is only an administrative group; code changes are welcome from all. You're right, this URL organization that gnome uses makes it difficult to use the current livecheck implementation which expects the current version number of be found on a single page whose URL does not change. So far, we've handled this by either accepting this limitation (that gnome livecheck will only notify you of new point releases, not new branches), and relying on other means to discover new branches, or else using a different URL for the livecheck, for example the project's homepage, or freecode.

As for odd/even numbering, that's easy enough to handle with the right regex, such as is already used by many gnome ports.

[ryandesign (Ryan Carsten Schmidt)]

Cc Me!

[mf2k (Frank Schima)]

A "request" is for a new port only.