Re: decision on moving core packages to ELPA; also move to obsolete?

[Stefan Monnier]

>> What I'm suggesting is the following:
>> - the tarball we build will include the same file as before in
>>   `emacs/lisp`.
>> - it will additionally contain a new directory `emacs/elpa` in which
>>   each bundled package has its own directory (all in the normal format
>>   of installed packages in ~/.emacs.d/elpa).
> So we will have 2 copies of each package's Lisp files in the tarball?

No, just one, the one in the `emacs/elpa` directory.

>> So until `package-activate-all` is called, the bundled packages will
>> just sit there on your file system but Emacs won't "see" them.
> This already happens, right? we already call package-activate-all at
> startup, right?

Yes, between `early-init.el` and `init.el`.

>> We could also place some or all of the bundled packages directly inside
>> `lisp`
> Now I'm confused: how 'lisp/' is different from 'emacs/lisp' you
> mentioned above?

It's the same thing.  I just omitted to write the "emacs/" prefix that time.

> What are the pros and cons of each of these 2 alternatives?  I think
> we should carefully consider them before deciding which one we prefer.

Basically, the question is whether the autoloads of those ELPA packages
are processed once and for all when we dump Emacs (like we do for all
the packages that come with Emacs), or whether that's done during
`package-activate-all` (i.e. between `early-init.el` and `init.el`).

Doing it at dump time gives better startup times, at the cost of making
it impossible for the end-user to prevent activation of a package (they
can still undo the activation after the fact, of course, but that needs
to be done in ad-hoc ways).

I think as a first step we should keep those bundled ELPA packages more
like normal ELPA packages (i.e. activate them from
`package-activate-all` rather than when dumping Emacs).  We can later
revise this (even on a per-package basis) once we have more experience.


        Stefan