On Thu, Dec 07, 2000 at 05:21:09PM -0800, Joey Hess wrote:
> Fast forward 8 months to the present, and I'm seeing a huge number of
> people who don't have the slightest clue about task packages. Did they
> forget so soon? Did they not pay attention last winter? I don't know..
Well, existing practice isn't _that_ consistent even with itself, just
looking at the task- packages in potato.
Currently we've only had two real excuses for using empty packages:
for handling splits, and for tasks. It seems a little like people want a
third sort, just as a collection of related packages that you generally
want to install at once. This might be just an artifact of "recommends"
not doing anything anymore, or it might be a real valid use.
> Task Packages
> -------------
>
> Any package whose name begins with `task-' is known as a "task
> package". Task packages are intended to help a new user install a set of
> packages which they need to perform a specific task. Since a list of all
> task packages is presented during new Debian installations, task packages
> should only exist for common tasks for which a user may plausibly want to
> use a newly installed Debian system.
>
> Before a new task package is added to Debian, the new package must
> be discussed on the debian-devel mailing list to ensure that it meets
> these guidelines. The current list of approved task packages follows:
Along with all the other stuff, I think I'd second this.
It might be a good idea to make the list look something like:
I want this system to act as a...
DNS server -- task-server-dns
Email server -- task-server-email (exim, imap, pop,...?)
Database server -- task-server-psql
News server -- task-server-news
Web server -- task-server-http
SMB server -- task-server-samba
Beowulf node -- task-server-beowulf
I want to use this system to develop...
C/C++ programs -- task-devel-c
Java programs -- task-devel-java
Python scripts -- task-devel-python
Perl scripts -- task-devel-perl
Debian packages -- task-devel-debian
I want to write and edit documents written in...
TeX -- task-documents-tex
SGML -- task-documents-sgml
I want to do standard productivity stuff
-- task-office
I want to play games
-- task-games
I want to do sciency stuff
-- task-science
..to let people have some sort of idea what sort of questions are
reasonable and what aren't.
All of the above are easy, general, "I'm buying this computer
and installing Debian on it specifically so I can <foo>" sorts of
statements. There are a couple of other things tasks are also used for
at the moment:
I want a pleasant graphical desktop environment...
from GNOME -- task-gnome-desktop
from KDE -- task-kde-desktop
I want to interact with the computer in...
polish -- task-polish
chinese -- task-chinese
japanese -- task-japanese
spanish -- task-spanish
I want to attach ... to this computer
a modem -- task-dialup
ISDN -- task-dialup-isdn
a printer -- magicfilter?
a sound card -- ?
PCMCIA cards -- handled explicitly by the install
a video card -- task-x-window-system-core?
These aren't really things that you do, per se, though; they're more
related to the way in which you do things, perhaps. Is tasksel the best
way to handle these?
Cheers,
aj
--
Anthony Towns <aj@humbug.org.au> <http://azure.humbug.org.au/~aj/>
I don't speak for anyone save myself. GPG signed mail preferred.
``Thanks to all avid pokers out there''
-- linux.conf.au, 17-20 January 2001
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