[mono-packagers] -devel packages for mono libraries

[Andrew Jorgensen]

This email applies to SUSE packaging but may also apply to Fedora? but probably not to Debian ('cause they already got this one covered).

We sometimes run into a problem where, for instance, we want to package a new version of Boo but Banshee depends on the old version of Boo.  This would be fairly easy to get around if we split them into a library package and a -devel package (or sometimes a -tools package).  The library package would contain only the gac'd assemblies (these should be the real thing, not symlinks) and the name would need to contain the version number so that multiple versions could be installed in parallel.  The other package would contain any /usr/lib/<package> and pkg-config files.

This kind of thing is already done successfully with native applications and most distros have good policies for managing them (including SUSE).  Since we generally use the mono(Library) = VERSION provides / requires (in RPM-based distros at least) a transition to this policy should not break existing applications.

One thing we will probably have to do for now is have Provides on the -devel packages for backward compatibility for packages using the old names in their BuildRequires.  And the -devel packages would of course depend on their lib package.

Please let me know if you see a problem with this approach.  I am interested in your feedback.