Kaixo!
On Mon, Jun 19, 2000 at 04:42:38PM -0500, Bryan Paxton wrote:
> 1). deb yes just a tar.bz2
Not tar but ar (and I think it is gzip and not bzip2; but that last should
be easily configurable I suppose).
> with shell scripts for install and uninstall. But
> what's wrong with this ? Look at FreeBSD ports.
Nothing wrong; rpm is also just a cpio.gz and some info.
The difference is not much there, but on the goals of each format.
The deb format targets the packager/mantainer, and the hacker-user, with
lots of interesting things, but usable only after the package is opened
(the data is inside it).
RPM on the other side targets the end user, with a format easy to query
and install, with a lot of itneresting data available without installing
the package (the data is out side of the archive, in the header of the file).
Then there are the third party programs: comercial games etc are most likely
to be available in rpm than in deb format.
>From the above I think the choice is obvious.
Also, I never saw the equivalent of src.rpm for deb format; that is one
of the most important advantages of the RPM format, and what makes it truly
independent of any distribution and even of the OS.
There is one thing that is nice on Debian: apt-get.
But then MandrakeUpdates (or something similar) can do just about the same.
(it is planned anyway)
> Now let's look at this from a end-user perspective.
> Different scenario, same feelings. mdk is aimed at the desktop user, hence
> convience and friendlyness. Do the above and mentioned options of upgrading
> sound appealing ? Especially to someone likely coming from windows.
In Windows the package system doesn't have dependencies, indeed.
But don't forget the result of that: any install of a new thing can break
some other ones that stop working, and you will never know why nor which
file is responsable of the problem.
--
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Pablo Saratxaga
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