Re: conflicts in Debian Distributions
lance@cat4.ncsa.uiuc.edu (Lance Arsenault) writes:
> I just would like to know if Debian 2.0 has conflicting software
> in it like Debian 1.3.1 .
>
> Background: Debian 1.3.1 would not let you install all the software
> in the release. Installing all the software in the release saves a
> lot of time, and hard drive space is cheeper than time.
Yes, Debian 2.0 also has this feature. No, it is NOT a problem.
While it may cause (a very small amount of) extra thought at install
time, this is really a benefit to the user. Besides, the 2.0 setup is
streamlined so that common configurations can be selected easily at
install time.
> I have used Debian 1.3.1 in the past but I think that having
> packages that confict is a bad thing. I think that making all the
> packages in Debian compatable would be a big plus. In Debian 1.3.1
> this is not the cast. For example you cannot install emacs and
> xemacs in Debian 1.3.1 . I'm guessing some of the filenames in
> these two packages are the same. To get rid of this confict you can
> just install them in different directories or something like that.
Well, what do you mean by making all the packages in Debian
compatible? We would end up with a totally unuseable system. What do
you propose we do with, say, the multiple mail delivery programs?
Should I be able to install sendmail, exim, smail, qmail, etc. and
have my machine magically know which one is in charge of getting mail?
Better to have the packages conflict, so that I can make the choice
through the install program, rather than hunting down and disabling
the programs I don't need.
> It's a pain to have to pick through 1000 + packages to install. I
> prefer to just install all of them without picking through them.
> Hard disk space is now cheep, and time is not.
But by installing everything at once you just move the time burden
around; you don't eliminate it. You still will have to make decisions
about which package you use for which task.
Now, perhaps your complaint about install time has to do with the
incredible slowness of the dpkg-cd access method. This I can
sympathize with - hunting through all the packages to find new ones is
potentially more reliable, but much too slow. Try adding your CD
drive to /etc/fstab and using the dpkg-mountable method - it is much
faster.
The basic "problem" of conflicting packages is a direct consequence of
the choice Debian offers to users by providing all these
alternatives. I would rather have a choice than not.
What Debian should do is have a standard list of packages which comes
preselected right after the install, and which the user could tweak
before the first install run in case they wanted to add something
initially. This standard set shouldn't have any internal conflicts,
so that people can just install the standard set right away. But
wait! We already _do_ do this. What might be nice is having some
help during installation that forced users to realize that "install
everything" is not a sensible option. This is not spelled out as
loudly as it should be.
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