Menu-spec update (Was: [Patch] Update 'How to' to clarify computation of datadir)

[Joerg Barfurth]

Rodney Dawes wrote:

> For packages such as RPM and DPKG, you should be installing in a
> specific location, compliant with the packaging policies of the
> distribution you are targetting the packages for. 

As independent software author you don't want to create different 
packages for each distribution. It is bad enough that you have to create 
different packages for each packaging system.

FWIW, RPM is even part of LSB, so you should be able to create RPMs for 
use on any LSB-compliant system.

For example, OpenOffice.org has several RPMs for the actual application, 
which are distro-neutral. And the DEB-version installs the same files 
into the same places as the RPM. That is all fine.

And then there are multiple desktop-integration packages, which take 
care of menu and MIME integration. And the onus is on the user to find 
out which of those packages (select only one) to install for their 
distro. That is what should not happen.

- Joerg

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