petsc-dev directory structure questions

[Barry Smith]

    Currently petsc-dev has the subdirectories

      bin include src conf config ...

$PETSC_ARCH has the subdirectories

    bin include conf lib ...

conf has

    adic.init		adicmf.init		base			test
    adicmastercontrol	adicmfb.init		rules			variables

config has

    PETSc BuildSystem configure.py   +tons of sample configure.py  
files for different systems

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  I find that having both a conf and a config directory is confusing  
and unneeded and propose:

1) merging the config and conf directory
2) putting the ons of sample configure.py files for different systems  
into a subdirectory called samples

Questions:

1) Does this make sense?

2) What should the directory be called? conf or config? Are there any  
standards that dictate/suggest
     one over the other? If we use config then I would like to change  
the $PETSC_ARCH/conf directory
     to match it, but would that violate some standard? I'm inclined  
to go with conf even though that breaks
     our long standing config/configure.py script to become conf/ 
configure.py

3) This is perhaps also a good time to reopen the question of PETSc  
"installs": currently they go into
     (system independent) prefix/bin prefix/include prefix/conf and  
the system dependent prefix/$PETSC_ARCH/conf
     prefix/$PETSC_ARCH/include prefix/$PETSC_ARCH/lib If one selects  
a PETSC_ARCH of "" then
     everything ends up in prefix/bin prefix/include prefix/conf  
prefix/lib.

    The reason for this design is so that the same makefiles with  
includes based on PETSC_DIR and
    PETSC_ARCH will work in all three cases: no install of PETSc,  
install with PETSC_ARCH and install with
    PETSC_ARCH ""

    I know we will never get full agreement on everything, but what  
are the concerns with this layout?


    Thanks

      Barry

Remember if I don't get comments I may do some crazy thing :-(