Change location of alire/ directory

[dinkelk]

By default alr stores dependencies and other configuration in an alire/ directory, created at the top of a user's repository. Is there a way to change the name and location of this directory, maybe via command line argument? If not, is this a feature you would consider adding?

Use case: I often develop in docker containers with my source repository bind mounted to the container, so code can be edited on the host, but compiled in the container. On many host machines, the more files that exist in this bind mount, the slower compilation and other operations on the bind mount become. If the alire/ directory could live somewhere else on the container, and not in the bind mount, then all those dependency files would not slow down the container.

[mosteo]

Dependency files won't be stored under alire/ after the 2.0 release, only a few files will remain by default, so that should alleviate the problem.

If you use pins that's another matter, these will continue living under alire/.

If you move the alire/ folder and softlink it, is it still available inside the container?

[dinkelk]

This is great info about the 2.0 release. And your symlink suggestion does indeed work. Thank you!

[mgrojo]

Use case: I often develop in docker containers with my source repository bind mounted to the container, so code can be edited on the host, but compiled in the container. On many host machines, the more files that exist in this bind mount, the slower compilation and other operations on the bind mount become. If the alire/ directory could live somewhere else on the container, and not in the bind mount, then all those dependency files would not slow down the container.

To alleviate this in any case, you can use the .dockerignore file.