Re: Depends vs. Recommends
Frank Küster wrote:
Jens Peter Secher <jps@debian.org> wrote:
To ease upgrades, transitions, etc., dependencies
(Depends) should be kept to the absolute minimum.
There's always a tradeoff: The easiest system to upgrade is one that
runs, but is barely usable for anything...
'usable' - yes, it's a usability problem.
In aptitude you can use the command line options
-R, --without-recommends
-r, --with-recommends
but I am missing
--without-suggests
--with-suggests
IMHO these options give you the choice. I disagree to change
'recommends' to 'depends', because it should be the users choice to
install 'minimal' or 'full', but this choice should be as convenient as
possible.
Nowadays it is more or less a standard in 'other' (package or OS)
installers, e.g. Win, Office, Suse, Fedora, to let the user choose between
- minimum ~ 'depends'
- standard ~ 'recommends'
- full ~ 'suggests'
Also a mode called 'expert' or 'customized' is provided, which allows
navigation through package/feature relationships.
I am missing this very useful, commonly understandable standard in d-i,
g-i, tasksel etc.
Helmut Wllmersdorfer
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