[p2-dev] Managing categoryIUs in the metadata generator and mirroring ap

[Terry Parker <tparker@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Question #1

I apply the metadata generator to a location containing features and plugins (using the -source argument). I'd like to generate a category IU grouping for all the features that I am pushing.  

If I use the "-root" argument when invoking the metadata generator I get both a category IU and a group with the same name:

<unit id='My Category.categoryIU' version='0.0.0'>
  <properties size='2'>
    <property name='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.name' value='My Category'/>
    <property name='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.type.category' value='true'/>
  </properties>
  <provides size='1'>
    <provided namespace='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.iu' name='My Category.categoryIU' version='0.0.0'/>
  </provides>
  <requires size='2'>
    <required namespace='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.iu' name='com.google.A1.feature.group' range='0.0.0'/>
    <required namespace='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.iu' name='com.google.A2.feature.group' range='0.0.0'/>
    <required namespace='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.iu' name='My Category' range='0.0.0'/>
  </requires>
  <touchpoint id='null' version='0.0.0'/>
</unit>

<unit id='My Category' version='0.0.0'>
  <update id='My Category' range='0.0.0' severity='0'/>
  <properties size='3'>
    <property name='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.name' value='My Category'/>
    <property name='lineUp' value='true'/>
    <property name='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.type.group' value='true'/>
  </properties>
  <provides size='1'>
    <provided namespace='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.iu' name='My Category' version='0.0.0'/>
   </provides>
  <requires size='11'>
    <!-- ... <required> tags for all the pieces -->
  </requires>
  <touchpoint id='org.eclipse.equinox.p2.osgi' version='1.0.0'/>
  <touchpointData size='1'>
     <!-- ... -->
  </touchpointData>
</unit>

When I point at this repository through the p2 UI, the "My Category" category contains a "My Category" item along with the individual items it groups, which is redundant and confusing.  

Is there a way to get the metadata generator to skip generating the group and only generate the category?  Can this be done by configuring the feature.xml files in the sources in some way?  Or is this a good feature request for a "-category" flag?

Question #2

I want to mirror/append the repositories like the one above into a common repository.  The first time I do this (creating the destination repository), I get a "My Category" category with items "A1" and "A2" under it.  If I perform the same command with repository "B" that has the same categoryIU and categoryVersion fields grouping featrues "B1" and "B2", those features do not get listed under "My Category", but under "Uncategorized".

I know some work was done recently in this area.  Has this particular issue been addressed, or should I raise a bug?

Thanks,
Terry