Hi Magnus,
Sure, but that brings back the biggest of issues with the binary-packages-plan: online storage.
from past experience, I expect a hosting site to materialize eventually. We could start out providing a *small* repository that includes, say haskell-platform. Once people start using that and find it useful, some interested party will show up and offer to host it. We just need to generate enough momentum to get the whole thing started. In order to do that, we need to set up a process that builds and maintains such a repository. This is the first step, and before we have accomplished that, there's no need to worry about disk space or bandwidth, IMHO. The same process that would maintain a binary repository can be used to maintain AUR, so any effort we put into that task pays off. Right now, the biggest problem we ought to solve is that a lot of our packages don't build because the version constraints cannot be satisfied. The following solutions to this problem have been proposed: 1) Generate a consistent package set computationally. 2) Maintain the package set manually, and use automated test builds to verify that all constraints are satisfied. In the long run, we should have both, but (2) is a must-have if we aim to provide a binary repository. So I wonder whether anyone is working on an implementation of either approach? And if, then what is the state of those efforts? Take care, Peter