Why does jdk depend on jre ?

Question

Installing jdk through pacman calls jre as a dependancy, however, the jdk packages shouldn't require jre (the functionality is included with jdk).
Note:
JDK 6 Update 2
The Java SE Development Kit (JDK) includes the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) and command-line development tools that are useful for developing applets and applications.
http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp
and
Contents of the JDK
Runtime Environment
(In the jre/ subdirectory) An implementation of the Java Runtime Environment (JRETM) for use by the JDK. The JRE includes a JavaTM Virtual Machine (JVMTM), class libraries, and other files that support the execution of programs written in the JavaTM programming language.
http://java.sun.com/javase/6/webnotes/README.html
In the past, on other distro's I've never installed JRE when I wanted JDK. Is this an error on the maintainers part or...?
Last edited by steven (2007-07-25 10:45:04)

Answer 1

Cerebral wrote:
steven wrote:
It's simple, the JDK has the runtime environment built in, so there's no need to install both the jdk and the jre. If someone is in the scenario you describe whereby, they have JRE already installed and decide to install the JDK afterwards, then pacman should be able to detect the existing jre and simply remove the runtime environment from the JDK package (which currently happens). I'm simply saying, if someone only wants JDK, don't install 2 seperate packages as the JDK includes JRE anyway.
Surely in the PKGBUILD or install files in pacman, it can make checks for a pre-existing JRE install (when installing JDK) and only remove the runtime from the JDK, but if there's no pre-existing JRE install, then ONLY install JDK, without removing the runtime.
My Internet connection is super, so I don't have a big issue with bandwidth, but surely it's better for your mirrors and users who don't have super connections. It also just makes more sense. It seems completely daft to download 60 megs of 2 packages, then delete jre from the jdk and install it seperately. It's bizarre.
I don't think you understand how our packaging system works... the jdk we provide, that users download from our repos, does not have the "included" jre - users don't download the jre twice.  In your suggestion, they would download the jre twice (once when they install jre, and once again later when they install jdk).
Besides that matter, it is not a simple thing to dynamically alter the contents of packages at install time - we provide binary packages, pre-built, and the file list of a package is essentially exactly equal to the contents of the tarball you download.
The way we have it now, only one package in our repos contains the jre, and that's the jre package.  I don't see why you'd rather your package manager sees one package instead of two - you have no duplicate files on your system, and downloaded no extra data (since the binary jdk package doesn't contain the jre at all).
Ah ok I see, I had the wrong idea.
AndyRTR wrote:check our jdk PKGBUILD and you will find a line   rm -rf linux-jdk/jre
This quote gave me the idea that it's download, but then the built in functionality is removed before it's actually installed. Are you saying that this isn't the case?
shining wrote:You're so good that you don't even need to run the programs you write
I wish