NUGET Packages for Embedded Server

[TonyValenti]

Hi Firebird team,
Our company makes software that moves data between lots of different database systems.
We would like to add support for firebird embedded so our customers can work directly with FDB databases.

We are interested in funding the creation of .NET nuget packages which can easily include the necessary binaries, similar to how SQLITE binaries are easily addable to .NET via a Nuget package.

Is there anyone with FirebirdSQL we can work with to make this possible?

[JakeSays]

@TonyValenti I am working on creating a nuget pacakage for .net/firebird embedded for my own needs. I'd be interested in discussing it with you.

[TonyValenti]

Would you grab a time with me to discuss?

https://calendly.com/d/cmv7-9rs-6dc

[cincuranet]

I'm assigning "nuget" label, although this is not directly related to provider(s) NuGet packages.

[JakeSays]

@cincuranet So I have created a series of packages that are currently named FirebirdSql.Embedded.V(3|4|5).NativeAssets.(Linux|Windows).(<arch>), but I just realized that the FirebirdSql prefix is reserved (which makes sense). I was wondering if it would be possible to get permission to use the same suffix?

[TonyValenti]

@cincuranet

[cincuranet]

@JakeSays Where are the sources for these packages?

[JakeSays]

@cincuranet Well, I don't have them on github yet, but the package contents are literally nothing but the unmodified binaries extracted from the firebird install .zip/tarballs, and the nuget package metadata (.nuspec, etc.). The only source will be the tool I wrote to generate them, which won't be packaged, and a simple class that provides the path to the packaged fbclient.dll. This class will be in its own package, separate from the binary only packages. The whole thing is designed to work seamlessly with the firebird .net provider.

[cincuranet]

Once the sources are available, we can discuss it more. You can, obviously, publish under different prefix than FirebirdSql. In fact there's quite a few packages with Firebird Embedded that do so.

[JakeSays]

@cincuranet Sounds good. I should have the source on github by tomorrow afternoon, but I'll let you know.

[asfernandes]

IMO, outside packages (from github FirebirdSQL org) should not use same prefix as official Firebird ones.

[cincuranet]

Absolutely. To onboard these we should first see that it's worth it, has some quality and has good maintenance plan going forward. Would be also good to evaluate existing ones.

[JakeSays]

I would ultimately like to contribute this work back to firebird. I will have it set up (via github actions) to automatically generate new packages every time a firebird release is made. Going forward I'm also willing to maintain the packaging tool and fix any packaging bugs that should arise.