Standards for packing programs in linux

[dmcfarland]

Ive noticed Linux programs come in many different flavors IE rpm's, source, binarys, dpkg, and others. Is the linux/Unix community ever going to come out wiht an easy to use package format that makes it simple for an user to install a program without worrying about installing a bunch of libraries first and getting failed dependancy messeges. Windows has the whole setup.exe command and a set of files that make it run. I hate windows, but I am curious to know if the Linux community can agree on one standard thats relatively easy to use and easier to manage than what is currently availible?

[H_TeXMeX_H]

Well, I dunno too much about other package managers, but yum (the Fedora Core package manager ... rpm based) is capable of resolving dependencies as long as they are included in the repo. I'm pretty sure apt-get has something like this too, although I've never used it. I'd say that things should improve in the future as Linux evolves. I personally don't have a problem with the current methods of package distribution, they work 98 % of the time.

[Refalm]

People should start to use apt-get more. It's the ultimate package system.

[WMD]

The problem with the Windows "setup.exe" installs is that rather than track and resolve dependencies, it ignores them.  And I don't mean ignore in the Slackware sense that they are simply not included, I mean that everything is usually bundled with and the files (DLLs, mostly) get thrown around into system32 and such without version checking.  Ever hear of "DLL hell?"  Yeah.  It can kill you by simply installing a bunch of software in order from newest to oldest.  With XP, MS tried to put some of this in, but so far it only includes DLLs shipped with Windows.

The Linux package managers keep full track of installed libraries and the compatible versions.  They may be less straightforward, but they are a MUCH better installation method because they keep the system cleaner.  That is, assuming the distro team doesn't fuck it up *takes quick glance at Red Hat*.

[dmcfarland]

Ive been in DLL hell and TSR hell as well. :thumbup: I feel that there can be a way a universal standard for linux thats not full of bugs but makes it easy for someone thats not a technical genius to install software without having to know about libaries and dependancies. I hate setup and I hate all the stupid autorun crappola.

I think that would help make linux a better alternative to Microsoft. Im not saying make it exactly like that but come up something where everyone is on the same page, and make it a bit more freindly to the average joe six pack computer user.

[mobrien_12]

Ive been in DLL hell and TSR hell as well. :thumbup: I feel that there can be a way a universal standard for linux thats not full of bugs but makes it easy for someone thats not a technical genius to install software without having to know about libaries and dependancies. I hate setup and I hate all the stupid autorun crappola.

Libraries and dependencies are, unfortunately, necessary evils.  

Managing dependencies can be done easily with debian's dpkg system or rpm when an additional framework like  apt-get or yum is put on top of it, provided such dependencies are in the repository.  For many popular packages, they are.

[Master of Reality]

People should start to use apt-get more. It's the ultimate package system.

Although apt-get is amazing, it doesnt define the package system (unless your strictly talking debian).

There is still apt-get for rpm, tgz, rpm, et al.

But these different packages are necessary for the different distrobutions. You can install rpm and install rpms in other distros than redhat/fedora but because its a different distro there is different places the files should go, which will result in an application not working.

The packages can not be standardized across all distrobutions. Well... they could, but then we would have to have rpm-slackware, rpm-suse, rpm-redhat (example if they were all rpm), because of the differences in the distros and so really it would defeat the purpose by having to build a separate package for each distro.

Apt-get is really the way to go with repositories for each distrobution. And it could be made better if it could automatically convert packages from some other packages systems to use other distros repos and provide even more application opportunities.

For example RPMs can usually be made a slack pack with rpm2tgz, but there is some packages that cant be easily converted. If it can be converted, then theres another package that you could use.

[worker201]

Standardization is not the way to go.  The reason there are 50 different ways to do things is because 50 different people thought the other ways sucked.  And you're going to tell them they are wrong?  The truth is that each method works rather well most of the time.  You just have to figure out which one is right for your system.

And if you don't know how to build just about any application from source, you need to learn that right away.  The source always works.

[dmcfarland]

I know how to build from src. I was reffering for a user friendly way for people to install apps. I have some technical knowledge, hardware, M$ and little bit of some other stuff.

[H_TeXMeX_H]

I think the best idea for a distro-independent, user friendly package manager is probably a source-package manager as suggested by piratePenguin.

[piratePenguin]

I think the best idea for a distro-independent, user friendly package manager is probably a source-package manager as suggested by piratePenguin.

That idea, once implemented, won't be a whole load different to the *BSD's and Gentoo's ports collections. Probably cleaner, and it'd be easier (actually, after really thinking about it, probably not 'easier', but...) to make really good frontends. And most likely it'll be distro-independent too.

[Pathos]

I know how to build from src. I was reffering for a user friendly way for people to install apps. I have some technical knowledge, hardware, M$ and little bit of some other stuff.

If you want easy, go for a distro like debian, or ubuntu.

slackware doesn't do things that way because thats the way they like it. But you can just use gslapt and install everything from the ftp repositories very easily.

[Calum]

People should start to use apt-get more. It's the ultimate package system.

it should become the default method of package management on any *nix system in my opinion.

regardless of the different package formats for different unices (which i think you will never get rid of) i do think there needs to be one singular interface to manage packages with. apt has that, it's virtually identical between RH/fedora and debian and other similar projects like urpmi, slapt and yum just need to form up in some standardly specified way (perhaps they could all become compatible with the same repositories as each other) and they do need to put dependency checking AND fixing into it. apt is great at this, but slapt-get is not! urpmi is pretty good in my opinion, but last time i used it it did get a little confused.