Re: PackageKit cleanup: Do you use these functions?
Hi,
Steve Langasek:
> I understand that software (especially desktop software) not coping with
> online updates is an existing problem.
Not only that. What _do_ you do when version 2 of $SUPPORTING_PACKAGE
implements a broken/superseded API or protocol? You limp along; you either
cannot start any new $DEPENDING_PROGRAMs or, when the supporter has been
restarted, all the dependants instantly break. Unless you restart them too.
We do some restarting for libc updates, but in a haphazard way (we don't
shut them down _while_ updating, only for some daemons) and for no other
package.
> The question is whether we - collectively - think moving to offline
> updates is an acceptable way to address this problem.
The problem is that an offline updater is an attractive nuisance.
It solves a specific problem which is now rare, precisely because we don't
solve it and therefore spend time and effort to prevent the "offline
update" non-solution from spreading.
> raise that question is now, /before/
> it becomes an entrenched assumption and leaves our users with no choice but
> to use it because their desktops become unusably broken if you apply package
> updates while they're running.
>
The problem is that some already do.
Tried updating firefox ^W iceweasel lately?
The irony here is that firefox already has a perfectly capable method of
realising that there's a newer version available, and of re-exec'ing itself
without any data loss.
--
-- Matthias Urlichs
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