> From: Sacha Chua <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > I love dependency checks. ;) > > I care about a few packages on my system - emacs, mainly - and I build > them from CVS. Haven't found a nice way to get CVS Emacs to play nice > with Debian yet, although I have a fake equivs so that I can still > install most Emacs packages in Debian. > > Dependency checks are really nice when I just want to get a program > and not have to run down and configure all its dependencies. =) > And I love waking up to an apt-get update with lots of new packages... |)
If a package requires the presence of lots of nonstandard dependencies, then a ports system might indeed be of help. However, I'm very leery of not having control over what dependencies get brought in. If the dependencies are not set up right - that's a whole new mess you have to futz around with and untangle. This was exactly my problem before trying to roll an XFree86 rpm under RH. I recall reading about buggy dependencies under Gentoo before. That turned me off Gentoo pretty quickly. ;) For subjective reasons (i.e. gut feel), I feel a lot more confident about FreeBSD's ports system and on that platform have no qualms using it. Another reason would also probably be because I have no other choice. :-) On both my Slackware systems, I managed to get SDL and its roughly 6-8 dependencies (it was about 2 or at most 3 deep) loaded in with little to no pain. Plus because I made all the packages myself I have a very good idea of what those packages do and can use them independently of SDL. _ Philippine Linux Users Group. Web site and archives at http://plug.linux.org.ph To leave: send "unsubscribe" in the body to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fully Searchable Archives With Friendly Web Interface at http://marc.free.net.ph To subscribe to the Linux Newbies' List: send "subscribe" in the body to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
