add documentation of MSYS variable settings

[jeremyd2019]

This is a proposal of something I want to add somewhere, but haven't figured out exactly how/where. I want to make documentation of the MSYS environment variable options that differ from upstream's https://cygwin.com/cygwin-ug-net/using-cygwinenv.html. I'm responsible for two of them now ☹️ (winjitdebug which I went into detail about using on #116, and now nonativeinnerlinks which doesn't really merit its own page). I'd almost want to patch the docs in msys2-runtime to document new flags, but as far as I know nothing's done with that to put it anywhere a user's likely to find it.

/cc @dscho as Git for Windows either already has something like this or would benefit from it also.

[dscho]

I'd almost want to patch the docs in msys2-runtime to document new flags, but as far as I know nothing's done with that to put it anywhere a user's likely to find it.

Indeed:

$ pacman -Ql msys2-runtime
msys2-runtime /usr/
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/chattr.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/cygcheck.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/cygpath.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/cygwin-console-helper.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/dumper.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/gencat.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/getconf.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/getfacl.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/kill.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/ldd.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/ldh.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/locale.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/lsattr.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/minidumper.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/mkgroup.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/mkpasswd.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/mount.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/msys-2.0.dll
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/passwd.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/pldd.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/ps.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/regtool.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/setfacl.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/setmetamode.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/ssp.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/strace.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/tzset.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/bin/umount.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/libexec/
msys2-runtime /usr/libexec/getprocaddr32.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/libexec/getprocaddr64.exe
msys2-runtime /usr/share/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/cygwin/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/cygwin/cygwin.ldif
msys2-runtime /usr/share/doc/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/doc/Msys/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/doc/Msys/COPYING
msys2-runtime /usr/share/doc/Msys/cygserver.README
msys2-runtime /usr/share/doc/Msys/CYGWIN_LICENSE
msys2-runtime /usr/share/man/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/man/man2/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/man/man3/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/man/man3/regex.3.gz
msys2-runtime /usr/share/man/man5/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/man/man7/
msys2-runtime /usr/share/man/man7/regex.7.gz

There is only documentation about regex.

FWIW I would be in favor of putting the documentation somewhere on https://www.msys2.org/, maybe next to https://www.msys2.org/docs/ci/, i.e. somewhere around here:

[jeremyd2019]

I notice the docs are now being built in msys2-runtime. Regardless, would it be acceptable to "copy and paste" the env variable docs and do some editing on them for the website, or is there some copyright concern where I should try to document them without lifting anything from the existing doc?

[dscho]

I notice the docs are now being built in msys2-runtime.

Yes!

would it be acceptable to "copy and paste" the env variable docs

We first have to add patches to reflect that it is not CYGWIN but MSYS. Which means that we probably have to not only patch https://github.com/msys2/msys2-runtime/blob/msys2-3_3_2-release/winsup/doc/cygwinenv.xml, but also to rename it.

is there some copyright concern

I do not see anything in the file, or in https://github.com/msys2/msys2-runtime/blob/msys2-3_3_2-release/winsup/doc/README, regarding a license, so I assume it is under the same license as https://cygwin.com/cygwin-ug-net/cygwin-ug-net.html, which is also documented in https://github.com/msys2/msys2-runtime/blob/msys2-3_3_2-release/winsup/doc/legal.xml:

Copyright © Cygwin authors

Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this documentation provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this documentation under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission notice identical to this one.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this documentation into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions, except that this permission notice may be stated in a translation approved by the Free Software Foundation.

We do not plan on "copying or distributing" the entire documentation on the website, though, so I think that you might want to copy that notice to the top of whatever version of cygwinenv we end up reproducing on https://www.msys2.org/.

[lazka]

We first have to add patches to reflect that it is not CYGWIN but MSYS.

I wonder if we could adjust msys2-runtime to allow both names everywhere instead, so we are closer to cygwin again.

In our meetup in April we decided to try moving closer to cygwin where possible.

(unless there are any downsides...)

[dscho]

In our meetup in April we decided to try moving closer to cygwin where possible.

I wasn't part of that meetup, but FWIW I like that goal very much.

We first have to add patches to reflect that it is not CYGWIN but MSYS.

I wonder if we could adjust msys2-runtime to allow both names everywhere instead, so we are closer to cygwin again.

I think that would make a ton of sense, especially when one defines the precedence MSYS > CYGWIN. That way, users who use both MSYS2 and Cygwin need define their preferences only via CYGWIN, and users who require different settings still have a chance to add MSYS2-specific overrides via MSYS.