NAME¶
XStow, replacement for GNU Stow
SYNOPSIS¶
xstow [OPTION ...] PACKAGE
DESCRIPTION¶
XStow is a replacement of GNU Stow (
stow) written in C++. It supports
all features of Stow with some extensions.
XStow as GNU Stow, are programs for managing the installation of software
packages, keeping them separate (/usr/local/stow/emacs vs.
/usr/local/stow/perl, for example) while making them appear to be installed in
the same place (/usr/local).
USAGE¶
xstow [OPTION ...] PACKAGE
Install a package
xstow foobar
Uninstall package
xstow -D foobar
OPTIONS¶
- -dl -debug-level INT
- Set's the debug level. An unsigned integer is accepted. The
default value is 0.
- -dm -debug-module [ALL|ARG|MAIN|TREE|CPPDIR]
- Filter messages from a specific module.
- -h -help
- Shows a help screen.
- -V -Version
- Displays XStows version number and supported features.
- -n -no
- Do not actually make changes
- -c -conflicts
- Scan for conflicts, implies -n.
- -s -simulate
- Simulate installation. If this option is set permission
problems will be ignored and -verbose will be set to 1.
- -d -dir DIR
- Set stow dir to DIR. The default is the current
directory.
- -d -target DIR
- Set target to DIR. The default is the parent of the stow
directory.
- -v -verbose [0|1|2|3]
- Increase verboseness. Possible levels are 0,1,2 or 3.
Simple setting -v or -verbose adds 1.
- -D -delete
- Unstow instead of stow. Deinstall the package.
- -R -restow
- The same like -delete followed by an reinstall.
- -ap -absolute-path
- Create symlinks with absolute path names. XStow can always
handle packages which were installed with this option. Installing one
package with absolute path names and one without is no problem. Only the
creation of the symlinks will be affected by this option. This will cause
that if one package is installed with this option and one without, some of
the symlinks of the first package, when they have to be recreated will be
recreated as relative ones. It is not good idea doing this, even XStow
does not have any problems with it. Warning: Breaks compatibility
with Stow!
- -tr -traversable LINKS
- A list of links pointing to directories, that can be
ignored. eg.: /usr/local/man is a link to /usr/local/share/man
Warning: Breaks compatibility with Stow!
- -tkt -tr-keep-targets
- Add the list of traversable links also to the keep targets
list. This prevents the targets of the links from beeing removed by XStow,
which would cause that the traversable link becomes a dead link.
- -tre -tr-auto PATTERN
- Automatically add links which target matches this
pattern.
- -tre -tr-auto-regex REGEX
- Automatically add links which target matches this
pattern.
- -kd -keep-dirs DIR
- A list of directories, that should not be removed when a
package will be removed. Warning: Breaks compatibility with
Stow!
- -i -ignore PATTERN
- Ignore files that matches this pattern.
- -ire -ignore-regex REGEX
- Ignore files that matches this expression.
- -ni -nignore PATTERN
- Ignore everything except file and directories matching this
expression. eg: "systree/bintree systree/headertree". For using
nignore support fnmatch and configration file support has to be enabled.
For more details see xstow.ini(5).
- -cp -copy PATTERN
- Copy files or directories that matching this pattern.
- -cre -copy-regex REGEX
- Copy files or directories that matching this
expression.
- -ifd -i-file-in-dir DIR/FILE
- Ignore this file in this directory. (Relative to the
package dir.)
- -cfd -c-file-in-dir DIR/FILE
- Copy this file in this directory. (Relative to the package
dir.)
- -sd -stow-dirs DIR
- A list of other stow dirs, that xstow is allowed
change
- -sda -sd-auto PATTERN
- Automatically add directories to the list when matching
this expression.
- -sde -sd-auto-regex REGEX
- Automatically add directories to the list when matching
this expression.
- -pd -protect-dirs DIR
- A list of other dirs, that xstow is not allowed change
- -pda -pd-auto PATTERN
- Automatically add directories to the list when matching
this expression.
- -pde -pd-auto-regex REGEX
- Automatically add directories to the list when matching
this expression.
- -pdt -pd-targets DIRS
- A list of dirs, xstow is allowed to change.
- -pta -pdt-add-traversable DIRS
- Automatically add the targets of traversable links to the
targets list.
- -f -force
- Skip conflicts if possible.
- -F file
- Read this configuration file too.
RETURN VALUES¶
- 0
- On success.
- 1
- On a missspelled call of xstow.
- 2
- If an internal error occoured.
- 3
- Installing the package failed of some reason. All the
prechecking was ok, but the execution of the exec list failed.
- 4
- Installing a package failed.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES¶
Since the debugging of the command line parsing can be hard if the debugging
level is set by the command line there are two evironment variables:
- XSTOW_DEBUG_LEVEL
- Same as the -debug-level option.
- XSTOW_DEBUG_MODULE
- Same as the -debug-module option.
Both values will be overwritten by the settings of the command line, after
the command line was parsed.
- XSTOW_USE_CURSES
- Same as the -no-curses option.
In later versions xstow tried detecting the terminal width and height, by
default at the startup routine. Even if this value is only used by the
help screen. The result was:
$ TERM="" xstow
Error opening terminal: unknown.
The error message is reported by the ncurses lib. This can cause problems if
you wan't start xstow as a cron job. Now xstow tries detecting the
terminal width not in it's startup, but when the help screen is printed
out. As an extra option you can set the environment variable
XSTOW_USE_CURSES="0" this will tell xstow not using
curses anyway.
COFIGURATION FILES¶
The configuration file xstow.ini can be located in /etc and/or in the current
stow directory. For possible settings and syntax of this file see
xstow.ini(5)
In this manpage there are some detailed informations of some special settings of
XStow too. Please read it!
EXAMPLES¶
Common Usage¶
As an example we install the ixlib library into the /usr/local/ tree.
tar xvfz ixlib-0.96.2.tar.gz
cd ixlib-0.96.2
./configure
make
So far, this was business as usual.
Note: by default the configure script prepares the application for beeing
installed into /usr/local/. Have a look at configure --help for more info.
Now installation is done by not installing ixlib directly into /usr/local/, we
install it into /usr/local/stow/ixlib-0.96.2/.
make install prefix=/usr/local/stow/ixlib-0.96.2/
The last point is creating all necessare symlinks so that ixlib's include files
can be found by the compiler in /usr/local/include. Therefore we are using
xstow.
cd /usr/local/stow
xstow ixlib-0.96.2
And all symlinks will be created.
Installing XStow by using XStow¶
After calling the configure script and make, XStow is installed into the stow
directory as I showed it in the upper example.
make install prefix=/usr/local/stow/xstow-0.1.0
Then you switch to the stow directory and call XStow
cd /usr/local/stow
xstow-0.1.0/bin/xstow xstow-0.1.0
That is it.
COMPATIBLE¶
Link Creation¶
By default XStow is fully Stow compatible. The usage of some of the advanced
features can cause that Stow cannot handle the tree any more.
Command Line Options¶
XStow supports all command line options of Stow. Even it's format.
Eg.: xstow --verbose=2 foobar
BUGS¶
There are some nitty gritty cases, but no known bugs.
WHY¶
Stow requires Perl. But what's on systems where no Perl is available, or not yet
installed? I tried compiling Stow with
perlcc, but it failed.
AUTHORS¶
XStow was written by Martin Oberzalek <kingleo@gmx.at>.
COPYING¶
XStow a replacement of GNU Stow written in C++.
Copyright (C) 2002-2005 by Martin Oberzalek <kingleo@gmx.at>
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software
Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later
version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY
WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR
A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with
this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass
Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.
SEE ALSO¶
xstow.ini(5) merge-info(1) stow(1)
GNU Stow has an excelent documentation. Have a look at the manual.
http://www.gnu.org/software/stow/