PEAR Channel why do I need one?

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+2 Q:

PEAR Channel why do I need one?

So I guess a PEAR channel is like a server that lets you distribute your own PEAR packages? I was under the impression PEAR was sort of dead, until I started looking at Symfony (is it dead? I haven't used it in the past so maybe someone with more experience in PHP can comment on its state and whether it makes sense to invest any time in it)

Anyway my question. Why do I need to set up my own PEAR channel? There's a page here maintained by the PEAR project http://pear.php.net/channels/ but it looks like it may be just a list of PEAR channels as opposed to a public PEAR channel. Are there easier alternatives than setting up my own PEAR channel?

+3 A:

PEAR is not dead. Symfony is not dead either.

A PEAR channel is just like a package repository for your favorite linux distribution.

If you are distributing a PHP library that others will find useful, you can set up your own PEAR channel and your users can use that to install/update/uninstall your library, using the pear tool they're already acquainted with.

You do not need to set up your own PEAR channel -- you distribute your own code however you like.

That said, if you're distributing library code for others to use, setting up your own channel is a nice way to do it.

timdev 2010-09-20 01:43:05

Oh, misread that, since your parenthetical looks like it applies to Symfony. But in any case, neither is dead, but you don't need to worry about your own channel unless you want to distribute your code to the world.

timdev 2010-09-20 20:24:41

+2 A:

You don't have to. It might be useful to set up your own PEAR server if you have lots of libraries or want to facilate some distribution / update automatism.

There is a simpler method now to set such a channel up: http://www.pirum-project.org/

It's supposed to make installation as simple as pear channel-discover ... and pear install ....
Packaging files as PEAR archives is still tiresome however.

mario 2010-09-20 01:43:14

If you are installing your own pear packages on more than one server, having a pear channel can make things a bit more manageable.

You could set up your own channel with pirum or the chiara server ( http://pear.chiaraquartet.net/ ) but you could also look into getting an account on http://pearfarm.org and hosting your packages there (or on http://pearhub.org).

kguest 2010-09-20 12:33:12

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PEAR Channel why do I need one?

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