More updated package systems that are are independent of ubuntu versions

[Patrick Asselman]

On 2012-11-06 05:03, Peng Yu wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 5, 2012 at 5:10 PM, Avi Greenbury <lists at avi.co> wrote:
>> Peng Yu wrote:
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> macports on mac seem to be fairly updated, and the latest version
>>> available does not depend on which version of the OS is. But many
>>> packages on ubuntu are outdated. Even the lastest release of ubuntu
>>> may not have the most updated packages, and many updated packages
>>> available in a later version ubuntu is not available to an older
>>> version ubuntu. I'm wondering if there is something similar to
>>> macports on ubuntu that can give me consistent updated packages 
>>> across
>>> different version of ubuntu OS. Thanks!
>>
>> Not really. The common way of doing that is to use a PPA for any
>> software you wish to run a particularly newer version of. This does
>> depend on someone having set up a PPA for your particular app, 
>> though.
>>
>> There's a subtle but important difference here between the way OSX 
>> and
>> Ubuntu work; there is a well-defined Operating System in OSX and any
>> apps running on it do so outside of it, and interace with a pretty
>> solid 'edge' of the OS. On Ubuntu, the full contents of the
>> repositories are part of the operating system, so updating 
>> individual
>> packages on their own is modifying the OS slightly, and perhaps 
>> making
>> it no longer live up to the expectations of some other component.
>
> In that sense, shouldn't a core set of essential packages be defined
> for ubuntu as the core OS. Other non essential packages as add-ons, 
> so
> that they can be independently updated non matter what version the
> core OS is. If there were anything that the should be improved on
> ubuntu, this probably should be an important aspect to be improved.
> I'm not sure who is directly in charge of this issue so that I can
> send the suggestion to.
>
> --
> Regards,
> Peng

I think what you describe is (very) roughly the difference between BSD 
and Linux.
Macs run BSD at their core. Ubuntu is a Linux variant.

Best regards,
Patrick Asselman