Re: Annoying package dependence concept
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Hasler) writes: Guy Maor writes: See the Programmer's Manual, section 8.2. I don't have anything identifying itself as the Programmer's Manual. Where is it found? Look on the Web site, under Documentation. For a direct URL, try http://www.debian.org/Documentation/programmer.html/ It's also contained in recent (i.e. from the unstable tree) versions of dpkg-dev, which installs it in /usr/doc/dpkg/programmer.html/. Warwick Warwick Harveyemail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Department of Computer Sciencephone: +61-3-9287-9171 University of Melbourne fax: +61-3-9348-1184 Parkville, Victoria, AUSTRALIA 3052 web: http://www.cs.mu.OZ.AU/~warwick -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
On Sat, 26 Oct 1996, Joe Emenaker wrote: But as it is currently, maintaining a Debian system by using deselect is a real pain ... Actually, it's really nice for me. It automatically notes new packages that have been updated and lets me download and install them with less than 10 or so keypresses whether there are 2 upgraded packages or 200. Yes, dselect is at least supposed to be nice but sometimes just isn't at all. I like the idea of upgrading my Debian installation via FTP a lot too. But i once experienced unforeseen consequences out of the use of dselect and have therefore chosen to avoid it's usage whenever possible. I once deinstalled all newsreaders in my system because i'm used to read news with a selfcompiled 'knews' installed under /usr/local for this matter, not wanting to have unused software taking up disk space. And without being really aware of what was happening dselect deinstalled my complete news setup which i painfully configured. My error was to be so faithful to believe that dselect deinstalls only what i wanted to be deinstalled and nothing more. I just hate programs that are trying to be more clever than i. Why is it not possible to let dselect do only the things it is directly told to do in a more transparent way without trying to do a complex second guess!? Even dpkg is lots more transparent and straightforward compared to dselect and in this regard lots more userfriendly than dselect is actually supposed to be. Regards, Paul *8^) -- Paul Seelig [EMAIL PROTECTED] African Music Archive - Institute for Ethnology and Africa Studies Johannes Gutenberg-University - Forum 6 - 55099 Mainz/Germany Our AMA Homepage in the WWW at http://www.uni-mainz.de/~bender/ -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
Johannes Plass: and xdvi (why actually does xdvi depend on ghostscript ?) Xdvi can show Postscript graphics included in a TeX document. It needs ghostscript to do so. Recommends: ghostscript might be too strong for xdvi; Suggests: ghostscript would be much better, since xdvi works well enough even without ghostscript. -- Please read http://www.iki.fi/liw/mail-to-lasu.html before mailing me. Please don't Cc: me when replying to my message on a mailing list. pgph12W0DBmNY.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
From: Johannes Plass [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Annoying package dependence concept Joe Emenaker [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes it does. You can hit Q to force dselect to accept things as you have chosen. Pressing Q causes dselect to momentarily forget about dependency conflicts. When installing the packages the user will certainly get lots of error messages related to unresolved dependencies. Uh... not necessarily. When I installed mgetty, dselect wanted to include ghostscript because mgetty suggests it or something. Ghostscript, of course, wanted to bring along about 5 friends as well: libraries, fonts, etc. etc. Since my reason for getting mgetty wasn't for faxing, I had little use for ghostscript, so I deselected it and it's libraries, used 'Q' to force dselect to accept it, and then I installed just mgetty. Works like a charm - Joe -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
From: Johannes Plass [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian's realization of package dependencies is, in my opinion, too tight. Two (out of many possible) examples may illustrate my point: [ snip ] The basic problem is that deselect doesn't allow to override any dependencies specified by package maintainers. Yes it does. You can hit Q to force dselect to accept things as you have chosen. Also, as someone else mentioned, you can always use dpkg. dpkg is the tool that apparently handles maintaining the list of installed packages, removing and installing of packages, etc. dpkg *does* seem to sometimes enforce some package dependencies, but that has only happened to me once. dselect, aside from being a more 'friendly' front end to dpkg, seems to do the following: - automatically retrieve names versions of currently available packages. - point out packages that have been updated. - automatically retrieve the package files via ftp, cdrom, etc. - half-heartedly attempt to enforce dependencies. But as it is currently, maintaining a Debian system by using deselect is a real pain ... Actually, it's really nice for me. It automatically notes new packages that have been updated and lets me download and install them with less than 10 or so keypresses whether there are 2 upgraded packages or 200. - Joe -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
Joe Emenaker [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: dpkg *does* seem to sometimes enforce some package dependencies, but that has only happened to me once. That's because dselect treats recommendations as dependencies, but dpkg only treats them as suggestions. See Programmer's Manul 8.2. Guy -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
From: Johannes Plass [EMAIL PROTECTED] Debian's realization of package dependencies is, in my opinion, too tight. Two (out of many possible) examples may illustrate my point: [ snip ] The basic problem is that deselect doesn't allow to override any dependencies specified by package maintainers. Yes it does. You can hit Q to force dselect to accept things as you have chosen. Also, as someone else mentioned, you can always use dpkg. dpkg is the tool that apparently handles maintaining the list of installed packages, removing and installing of packages, etc. dpkg *does* seem to sometimes enforce some package dependencies, but that has only happened to me once. dselect, aside from being a more 'friendly' front end to dpkg, seems to do the following: - automatically retrieve names versions of currently available packages. - point out packages that have been updated. - automatically retrieve the package files via ftp, cdrom, etc. - half-heartedly attempt to enforce dependencies. But as it is currently, maintaining a Debian system by using deselect is a real pain ... Actually, it's really nice for me. It automatically notes new packages that have been updated and lets me download and install them with less than 10 or so keypresses whether there are 2 upgraded packages or 200. - Joe -- -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
I agree wholeheartedly! I am a beta-tester for XFree86 and update by distribution about twice a week with new alpha releases. Every time I run make Everythingl make install, I overwrite debian libraries and binaries. I am going to have to d/load XFree86 3.2 in debian form, even though I have 70+ MB of source and binaries on my machine. After 3.2, I think I'll just install XFree86 in /usr/local/X11R6. -- Stephen Pitts [EMAIL PROTECTED] Proudly running Debian GNU/Linux 1.1 on an Intel Pentium 150 Send a message with Send PGP Key in the subject to get my PGP key. If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants. -- Isaac Newton In the sciences, we are now uniquely privileged to sit side by side with the giants on whose shoulders we stand. -- Gerald Holton If I have not seen as far as others, it is because giants were standing on my shoulders. -- Hal Abelson In computer science, we stand on each other's feet. -- Brian K. Reid pgpkEEshBNkc7.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
Actually, it's really nice for me. It automatically notes new packages that have been updated and lets me download and install them with less than 10 or so keypresses whether there are 2 upgraded packages or 200. Sorry, I've been away for a while. Dselect is nice, but I really think the interface needs a facelift. I may be wrong and it may be great, but I remember it being very confusing when I first got Linux and started working with it. It's even occurred to me to see about getting its source code and giving it the old workover. I have some changes in mind for the interface that I might try to implement. Sound like a worthy project? Or am I the only one who'd like to see it? If you think it would be good, let me know either via the list or by E-mail and I might see what I can do. Tim O'Brien - I am Pentium of Borg. Division is futile. You will be APPROXIMATED! - Please direct Email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
Joe Emenaker [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes it does. You can hit Q to force dselect to accept things as you have chosen. Pressing Q causes dselect to momentarily forget about dependency conflicts. When installing the packages the user will certainly get lots of error messages related to unresolved dependencies. Furthermore packages which caused dependency problems are left unconfigured and the user can not configure them later using dselect. Furthermore, when using dselect in the future the user can not check for dependencies of other packages by pressing Return before leaving the selection mode of dselect since this will cause to pop up all the unresolved dependencies which he tried to override in the previous session, forcing him to override them now again in a lengthy process. In my opinion, pressing Q is not the way to go. Also, as someone else mentioned, you can always use dpkg. Yes, dpkg allows to override dependencies. But the suggestion to use dpkg instead of dselect to handle hundreds of Debian packages is not worth to discuss. dselect, aside from being a more 'friendly' front end to dpkg, seems to do the following: [...] - half-heartedly attempt to enforce dependencies. The dependencies itself are half-heartedly. The package maintainer thinks that ghostscript requires the ghostscript fonts, so he defines a recommend dependency between these two. But the user thinks the fonts are not needed since he only wants to view pictures, so he wants the dependency to be at most a suggest. The basic problem is that package maintainers and users may disagree when it comes to defining dependencies between packages. And dselect doesn't provide a decent way to handle this situation. Regards, Johannes Plass -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
Guy Maor writes: That's because dselect treats recommendations as dependencies,... Why? John Hasler [EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Hasler) Dancing Horse Hill Elmwood, WI -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Hasler) writes: Guy Maor writes: That's because dselect treats recommendations as dependencies,... Why? See the Programmer's Manual, section 8.2. Guy -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
Guy Maor writes: That's because dselect treats recommendations as dependencies,... I wrote: Why? Guy Maor writes: See the Programmer's Manual, section 8.2. I don't have anything identifying itself as the Programmer's Manual. Where is it found? John Hasler [EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Hasler) Dancing Horse Hill Elmwood, WI -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
J.H.M.Dassen wrote: If you don't like 'dselect', you can always use 'dpkg' (the lower-level utility); 'dpkg' allows you to override dependencies. (In fact, I've used dpkg since before dselect, and only learned to use dselect lately (a SLiRP connection now allows me to keep stuff up to date; the FTP method is very handy)). Now one thing I'm wondering about is whether anybody has already developed a small script that moves the files from the dpkg-ftp inbound directory to a local debian installation directory. Right now I'm doing that manually whenever my /var fs fills up, but mv'ing all those files while checking to delete the old versions and later on recreating Packages files is surely a hassle. Ciao, -- Thomas Baetzler, [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] A HREF=http://home.pages.de/~thb/;thb's Homepage/A -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
Hi Johannes You wrote: Debian's realization of package dependencies is, in my opinion, too tight. Two (out of many possible) examples may illustrate my point: - A user doesn't want to install Debian's ghostscript since he is a ghostscript beta tester and has a newer version than Debian provides. However, since he wants to use previewers like gv, ghostview and xdvi (which depend on ghostscript) he MUST install the Debian ghostscript. Xdvi dose not depend on ghostscript but recommend it. - A user wants to install ghostscript. Due to a dependence on libpaper which doesn't seem to be available this fails. Since previewers like ghostview and xdvi (why actually does xdvi depend on ghostscript ?) depend on this package the user is left with a system on which he cannot view .ps and .dvi files. Here is where libpaper is: ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/unstable/binary-i386/text/libpaper_1.0.3-3.deb The basic problem is that deselect doesn't allow to override any dependencies specified by package maintainers. This, however, is necessary since package dependencies - may point to non-existing packages. In my experience, this has not been the problem. Most of time I just don't know Where that package is. - may not be reasonable (xdvi depends on ghostscript ?). - may already be satisfied by local software deselect doesn't know about. This might be, but most people use all debian system. In which case it works very well. It would already help a lot if deselect allowed the administrator to install a package as a ghost in the sense that: - the package counts as being installed as far as deselect is concerned. - deselect does not attempt to unpack/install the package. Hmmm...interesting idea. But what happens when a new user uses this feature and find errors when using a program. She/He would look at dselect and think it is install when the package wasn't. Still it might work. Later, David -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
[Johannes complained about dselect not allowing you to override dependencies] But as it is currently, maintaining a Debian system by using deselect is a real pain ... 'dselect' is aimed at normal users, and what you see as restrictions in at, can also be seen as preventive measures. If you don't like 'dselect', you can always use 'dpkg' (the lower-level utility); 'dpkg' allows you to override dependencies. (In fact, I've used dpkg since before dselect, and only learned to use dselect lately (a SLiRP connection now allows me to keep stuff up to date; the FTP method is very handy)). Ray -- Obsig: developing a new sig -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
David Puryear writes: Xdvi dose not depend on ghostscript but recommend it. It *says* it recommends it. It behaves as though it requires it. I perceive no functional difference between recommends and requires. Here is where libpaper is: ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/unstable/binary-i386/text/libpaper_1.0.3-3.deb It took weeks for me to discover that. It seemed reasonable to me to expect a CDROM not to contain packages which depend on stuff not on the CDROM. It does not seem reasonable to me that anything in stable should depend on anything in unstable. John Hasler [EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Hasler) Dancing Horse Hill Elmwood, WI -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Annoying package dependence concept
On Sat, 26 Oct 1996, Johannes Plass wrote: The basic problem is that deselect doesn't allow to override any dependencies specified by package maintainers. This, however, is necessary since package dependencies - may already be satisfied by local software deselect doesn't know about. It would already help a lot if deselect allowed the administrator to install a package as a ghost in the sense that: - the package counts as being installed as far as deselect is concerned. - deselect does not attempt to unpack/install the package. I was just about to make this same point. Couldn't one just create a package, say locally_provided.deb, that is a near-empty deb file that provides whatever you have manually installed, like: provides: tcl-dev, news-reader, emacs I've never built a package, but wouldn't this be simple, and wouldn't it work? In my case, I manually install several programs on my Debian system that I also install and maintain at work (on Solaris and IRIX64). This lets me gain extra familiarity with the distibution package. I do this with: emacs, tcl/tk/tix, tkman, gnats, for example. For many others, I don't bother: bash, make, gzip, minicom. ...RickM... -- TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word unsubscribe to [EMAIL PROTECTED] . Trouble? e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
