Hiya, > Here here, and let's be honest, how common are deb packages vs. RPM's > (when both statically and dynamically linked types are included)?? You
Obviously RPM's are more popular, but the amount of deb packages would rise dramatically if Mandrake adopted it. Really its sorta a chicken-and-the-egg thing - you aren't going to get a lot of Desktop-friendly deb's until you have a desktop friendly distro that actually is a serious contender (i.e. not Corel). > don't see a site called deb find do you? There needs to be some sort of http://www.debian.org/distrib/packages <--- debfind, or close to it. > standard, even within the Linux community, otherwise we are all banging > our heads against the wall trying to prove our way is superior. Like it > or loath it, RPM is here to stay and is fast becoming the defacto > standard way for programs to be released for desktop oriented > distributions (which Mandrake most certainly is). Sorry, I personally > like the direction Mandrake is headed and would hate to see it change. Well, that's exactly my point. If you look at the way Mandrake is going with things like urpmi and the recent adoption of the Debian menu system, it looks like the Mandrake developers like the ideas of Debian and are working to mimick them. Rather than mimick them, why not use the original? Then the Mandrake developers could concentrate on things like adding new control panel applets, working on various open source projects, and so forth. > The only complaint I have is the whole statically linked vs. dynamically > linked RPM debate. And before the list tries to tell me why dynamically [...] > steps, download and install. Simple. In my opinion, this is the single > biggest factor that is slowing Linux uptake on the desktop. Momma bear > can even install statically linked RPM's. Well, tell me the benefit of using statically linked RPM's are better to the average user that won't download an application for a long time? Virtually none. With KDE being as slow as it is with prelink problems, I don't think it's a good idea to try to slow it down more. Also, if a new QT comes out - for example - you must recompile statically linked apps to take advantage of it... If you are having dependancy problems - then please reconsider my Debian argument. The most important thing isn't how many packages it takes to install something, but how hard it is to install. If I download "superdupertool" and it needs "foobarlib" I should be able to get that (in theory) automatically with tools such as urpmi or apt-get. Rather than simplify in a way that lowers efficiency, why not improve the tools so it can be done The Right Way(tm)? > Before the list flames me and says I don't know what I'm talking about, > trust me, I do. I know computers and can happily solve dependency > problems all day but why praytell MUST I if I don't want to?? How > difficult is it really to release 2 versions of an RPM?? Now that would > offer Mandrake users REAL choice. Maybe about 5 GB worth? Why release five gigs worth of additional everything-is-static packages? And, who, but the tech savvy people that have some kind of preference for static packages would pick that option anyway? -Tim -- ---------------------------------------------------------------- Timothy R. Butler [EMAIL PROTECTED] Universal Networks http://www.uninet.info Christian Portal and Search Tool: http://www.faithtree.com Open Source Migration Guide: http://www.ofb.biz ============= "Christian Web Services Since 1996" ==============
