It certainly does sound interesting, and I haven't tried it yet, but I think perhaps the reason that there is little interest is that it doesn't seems to be in debian at this time, and a lot of people can't be bothered to install something that's not apt-getable (yes its laziness :). If you need help packaging it, or a sponsor I certainly volunteer, since it seems more than worthwhile. * Joe Wreschnig (piman@sacredchao.net) wrote: > > Maybe aptitude is better. Maybe someone has to write a better command-line > > tool to do a superset of apt-get's current capabilities. But that won't be > > me, I don't have the time, and I suspect I don't have the skills (right now) > > either :( > > This is exactly why I wrote Feta[1]. Unfortunately, so far, help from > actual Debian Developers has been far between and usually unresponsive > (I won't name names, but if you're reading this, you told me "up to a > week" before it appears on mirrors, after I sent you a release to > package on November 18th). > > Feta has support for suggests and recommends (currently in the plugins > tarball; the plugins are included with the program in the CVS version), > support for the "console-like readline functionality" mentioned in a > reply to this post), and things like a 'hold' command, as well as a way > to teach users how to use the underlying APT infrastructure directly; > unlike Aptitude or Deity, Feta only uses existing dpkg/apt programs to > do its work (20% the complexity for 80% of the functionality ;). > > If I sound slightly bitter, yes I am. This is probably caused by the > fact that I see people reimplementing parts of Feta in an inferior > manner[3], because I tried to avoid tooting my own horn and letting the > word spread by itself after an initial announcement[2]. Instead, I got > let down by Debian developers not returning contact, and not showing > interest in a tool that: > > - Solves a (many) problem(s) that come up frequently on Debian > discussion boards and mailing lists (e.g. this one, right now). > - Allows users to extend it to perform any other packaging tricks they > want in a simple manner (just by using a shell script, if they want). > - Does so using existing Debian tools, but providing a simpler, more > consistent, and more powerful interface. > - Teaches users directly, without a "RTFM" (although, CVS Feta[4] has > RTFFetaM, RTFM, and the teaching mode. Honestly, the only major thing > holding up a 1.3.0 release is the lack of documentation; please read the > Savannah page[5] to see how you can help.) > - Has existed in a mostly stable (and always useful) state since July, > and had a public announcement (through debian-devel and DWN) at that > time. > > So, yes. Someone does have to write such a command line tool. Someone > has done so. Now the question is, why isn't Debian (the organization) > interested in it? > > References: > 1. http://www.sacredchao.net/software/feta/index.shtml > > 2. http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2001/debian-devel-200107/msg01614.html > > 3. http://www.debianplanet.org/article.php?sid=608 but I'm sure there > are others as well. This is no slam to the author (who sent me a nice > Feta patch just 3 days later :), but rather a specific observation of > the general problem that third party Debian packaging tools are not > usually packaged or made easily available for Debian (the exception I > can think of, Wajig, is similar to Feta, but is more a swiss army knife > of Debian stuff, where Feta is a swiss army chainsaw of Debian > packaging). > > 4. http://savannah.gnu.org/cgi-bin/viewcvs/feta/ > > 5. http://savannah.gnu.org/projects/feta/ -- Eric Dorland <dorland@lords.com> ICQ: #61138586, Jabber: hooty@jabber.com 1024D/16D970C6 097C 4861 9934 27A0 8E1C 2B0A 61E9 8ECF 16D9 70C6 -----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK----- Version: 3.12 GCS d- s++: a-- C+++ UL+++ P++ L++ E++ W++ N+ o K- w+ O? M++ V-- PS+ PE Y+ PGP++ t++ 5++ X+ R tv++ b+++ DI+ D+ G e h! r- y+ ------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------
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