[GSoC] Inquiries regarding manifest format and implementation strategy

[Sri Lasya Prathipati]

Hi Gao and the EROFS Community,

As I am finalizing my GSoC 2026 proposal for the project "Support
generating filesystems from manifests," I have been researching the
various manifest formats mentioned in the project ideas.

To ensure my proposal aligns with the community's vision for
erofs-utils, I have two specific questions:

Format Priority: Should the initial focus be on implementing a parser
for Unix-style proto files (similar to genext2fs), or is there a
stronger preference for supporting composefs-dump style manifests from
the start?

Integration Path: In mkfs.erofs, do you envision the manifest parser
acting as a "virtual source" that replaces the standard directory
crawling logic, or should it coexist as a hybrid approach?

I believe clarifying these points will help me provide a more accurate
and realistic timeline in my application. I've already begun looking
into the mkfs source to see where the insertion point for a new input
frontend would be most efficient.

Looking forward to your guidance!

Best regards,
Sri Lasya prathipati