On 2007-12-18, Christian Walther <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On the freebsd-ports mailing list I stated that I can understand some > of Tuomos opinions,
Wow. There's at least one person. > Packaging was done by extracting tarballs in the root directory. > In these days people dreamed about replacing Windows. They were happy > that their Linux installation was smaller than any Windows setup. Back in the DOS days, packages were installed by extracting software in their own directories, where ever you wanted it, and removed by deleting that directory. Simple, modular, and efficient. Even the old days' Linux package management was a huge degradation compared to that. Of course, there were little in the way of dependencies in the DOS world (and still in the Windows world, although not completely non-existent). Fortunately, there are now some packaging systems based on relocatable binaries and application directories (such as ZeroInstall), but these are still far from being widely used and accepted, and still do need some work. > Package maintainers have to deal with every single of these issues. > They have to take care of dependencies, versions and stuff. This is > why I have some sympathy with them and wouldn't label them as > "dickheads". It seems very easy to cross the line of simply packaging software, into working on a silent fork. > You can't just include every newest version of a piece of software as long > as you don't know the consequences. You is known, I do provide a <http://iki.fi/tuomov/dl/ion-3-latest.tar.gz> redirection, that distros could easily provide, to keep up-to-date. It is true that there are some problems, such as the set of files installed being modified, but these could be solved if the distros more cooperative (and build systems better, so e.g. package management programs obtain information by a structural build file). But presently the distros are totally onconstructive. They don't want to give in an inch from their position of power and control. > Yes, there is a "FOSS herd", and most of the time it makes me want to > cry. For me switching over to Windows is not an option, most windows > users are even less educated than OSS users. Someone who knows they don't know is, however, less likely to be arrogant and hold Views, and therefore more easy for someone with Views to work with, than someone with opposite Views. -- Tuomo
