Re: Is it better with fewer packages than a minimum of dependencies?
Hi, Jörgen Hägg wrote:
> What is the opinion about this, minimize the number of packages
> or the number of dependencies?
Example: The monitor system can watch a web server, a news server and an
mail server.
So if I only want to monitor my email server, should I also install INN
(i.e. a news server) just to make the script happy? IMHO: No, and
neither will Joe Random User be happy about that. So in that case you
should definitely create a monitor-inn package.
Different example: The monitor system can watch these servers. To do so
it requires libhtml.so, libnntp.so and libsmtp.so. Is installing these
support libraries a problem for anybody? IMHO: No; they're reasonably
small and apt(itude) will delete them automagically when no longer needed.
For borderline examples (libkerberos.so, which requires a bunch of
configuration and will confuse people if they don't have a Kerberos
server; libldap.so might be another example) I'd either create a separate
package, or I'd put the library in Recommends: and dynamically decide at
runtime whether Kerberos/LDAP is monitorable.
--
Matthias Urlichs | {M:U} IT Design @ m-u-it.de | smurf@smurf.noris.de
Disclaimer: The quote was selected randomly. Really. | http://smurf.noris.de
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"I had so often sung 'Deutschland u:ber Alles' and shouted 'Heil' at
the top of my lungs, that it seemed to me almost a belated act of grace
to be allowed to stand as a witness in the divine court of the eternal
judge and proclaim the sincerity of this conviction."
[Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf", Vol. 1, Chapter 5]
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