Packaging and installation

[Jeffrey Watts]

On Tue, 24 Oct 2000, Evan Leibovitch wrote:

> The problem is not that the RPM approach doesn't (or, more correctly,
> can't be made to) work. It's that this group has never reached a
> formal consensus/vote/decree/whatever on a packaging architecture.

Seems to me we've had a consensus for a long time.  It's always been RPM.  
The only reason that the issue ever comes up is that someone new to the
mailing lists jumps in and starts dragging the issue up again.

Note that Nicholas Petreley, when he started the current thread,
acknowledged that we have agreed on RPM -- he just was wondering if there
might be a better way, something that no package manager has done before.  
Others pointed out that changing our package standard isn't really
productive at this point.  Note that none of this implies that we haven't
decided on something.

Put it this way: RPM's the starting quarterback here.  The LSB isn't going
to consider some new proposal unless it's completely fleshed out and
addresses ALL of the issues involved (which are considerable).  Note that
packaging systems like RPM and DEB didn't get coded overnight.

Also, we've all pretty much decided that it's not worth our time to pursue
an alternative solution, as RPM does 99% of what we want it to.  So that
pretty much means that if anyone wants to see this done, they have to do
it themselves.

Remember, the LSB isn't here to pursue technical perfection.  It's a
_practical_ standard.  RPM is the path of least resistance.  Folks can
argue its technical merits until they're blue in the face, but the fact is
that RPM has the largest installed base, it does what we want it to do,
and there are tools that allow us to use RPM on non-RPM based systems.  
This is a fait accompli.

Jeffrey.

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| Jeffrey Watts                     |
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