[CoLoCo] Standardized Repositories

[David L. Willson]

F(L)OSS Zealot #4379 ringing in:

The picture is relatively simple.  There is rpm and deb and source-code.  There is no
"and so on and so forth."  The beauty of the thing is that if you see problems with
RPM/DEB and you think you have a better idea, you can make the "so on and so forth"
package management system (PMS).  If enough of the rest of us think your PMS is better
than the existing PMS's, we'll switch to it.  And Bill Gates won't say, "No, Add/Remove
Programs is good enough for you.  It's more important to have a standard than to get
that feature you want."  If you want a standard, choose a distro.  Ubuntu is a very good
one.  Linux/F(L)OSS is about freedom of choice.

Should there be only one desktop environment?  Only one office suite?  Only one mail
transfer agent?  How about only one command shell, HTTP server, file-server, or
whatever?  No...

If we only need one, who decides which one?  How about Microsoft?  They could decide it
real good.  :-)


On Thu, 6 Mar 2008 23:27:38 -0700, David Overcash wrote
> Careful..  if you talk about standardization too much the F/OSS zealots will
> yell at you for not wanting to provide choices...  RMS stuff, ya know  : )
> 
> But I totally agree!
> 
> On Thu, Mar 6, 2008 at 11:08 PM, Michael TheZorch Haney <thezorch at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
> > I saw an article some time ago that basically pointed out that the
> > number one thing that was really holding Linux back from becoming fully
> > mainstream was a lock of Standardization in Linux when it comes to
> > package management.  I responded with saying that Windows had no package
> > management system at all, and that uninstall programs often leave many
> > thing behind including registry keys, folders, and .DLL files which only
> > caught Windows to slow down, but the argument had a good point.  Linux
> > needs a Standardized system of Package Management across all
> > distributions.  Ubuntu and many others use the Debian package managment
> > system, Red Hat and distros based on it use RPMs, and so on and so
> > forth.  If you want to install an app on Ubuntu that's in an RPM you
> > can't use Aptitude and need a separate piece of software to do the
> > install.  This starts to make Linux more like Windows with every piece
> > of software using different types of installers.  There should be a
> > universally accepted package management system adopted by all distros
> > regardless if they are Debian based, Red Hat based or Slackware based
> > instead of all of these different competing package management formats.
> > It starts to get as confusing as the different versions of Windows Vista
> > for your Average Joe computer user.  Thus, the argument is in a way
> > correct, there are too many different competing types of distros out
> > there and a single package management format must be chosen if Linux is
> > going to make further headway.
> >
> > --
> > Michael "TheZorch" Haney
> > thezorch at gmail.com
> > http://thezorch.googlepages.com/home
> > AIM: thezorch at gmail.com
> > Yahoo IM: zorchhaney
> > ICQ: 343230252
> > GoogleTalk: thezorch
> > MSN Messeger: haneymichael at hotmail.com:
> >
> >
> > --
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> >


David L. Willson
Trainer/Engineer/Consultant
MCT, MCSE, Linux+
(720) 333-LANS