Re: dselect oddities
This is a somewhat incredulous discussion!
On Sun, May 17, 1998 at 12:26:47AM -0700, Steve Lamb wrote:
> > Yes, if you want to do it with dselect. No, if you do it with dpkg,
> > which is far easier.
> According to whose standards? To me dselect is far easier because I
> don't have to wade through ~50 command line switches.
This is nonsense. You need exactly one switch: -i. The command line is:
dpkg -i <filename.deb>
I do not think it could possibly be any simpler.
> being fixed. That is the best I can do. But to offer "fixing it yourself"
> as a viable option to one and all is just arrogant.
I think this goes back to my original comment -- we are all volunteers here.
It is arrogant to expect it to be fixed by reporting it more than once.
As I have said, a simple rephrase of your request (eg a bug fix) will
get you support for your cause. With a suitably crafted request, I suspect
you can get a Debian volunteer to code almost anything for you! With
a poorly worded request, you might be able to ensure things never get done.
> Awww, your house got blown away in a twister. Nevermind, you can
> rebuild it yourself! That is about what it sounds like to me.
Completely inappropriate analogy. If your house is blown away in a twister,
then you can (a) rebuild it yourself, or (b) pay someone to rebuild it.
With Debian, you can (a) do it yourself, (b) pay someone, or (c) ask
nicely. You might find a volunteer to rebuild your house, but you certainly
won't get anywhere demanding it.
> As I mentioned, sc is now broken because of the libraries in slink.
> That would not have happened if it weren't for the mindless autoupdate.
The behaviour is well known and consistent!
> Would *YOU* autoupdate on the unstable tree for every update out there or
> would you pick and choose depending on what your needs are and let the rest
> of the packages sit at what you *KNOW* are stable levels?
I do the former. I have never been bitten badly enough to discourage this.
I regularly run "apt-get install" to get my system to the latest levels
of everything. unstable is generally of high enough quality that this
works fine. You found one package where this wasn't true. That is why
we have development and stable branches.
> Except that it automatically installs unless I tell it otherwise. DIY
This would be true if there was some cron job installed by default which
upgraded your system each night. However, there isn't; upgrades occur
when you run dselect and ask for them to happen.
> No, incorrect. I want a default of *NOT* auto updating. What would be
Then, as someone (Manoj?) has suggested, send this email to
submit@bugs.debian.org:
Package: dpkg
Version: 1.4.0.22
Severity: wishlist
<your text>
> better is that dselect knew the difference between the "stable" tree and the
> "unstable" tree. It allowed autoupdating in one and pick and choose in the
> other. The goals are certainly not incompatible as anyone who has done a
> DIY Slackware system for longer than a few months can attest to. It is just
> PITA as dselect stands right now.
I ran DIY Slackware 2.3 for one year, including doing the by-hand ELF
upgrade using the ELF-HOWTO. Debian's system is exactly what I want and is
a godsend.
> Tell me, what is so hard to understand with this simple concept: No
> autoupdating.
There is nothing hard to understand about it. You have the right to request
it. But I do not feel you have the right to demand it or to call me
arrogant.
Hamish
--
Hamish Moffatt, hamish@debian.org, hamish@rising.com.au, hmoffatt@mail.com
Latest Debian packages at ftp://ftp.rising.com.au/pub/hamish. PGP#EFA6B9D5
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