Re: Hello all

["Robert Collins" <robert.collins@itdomain.com.au>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "A Mennucc1" <debian@Tonelli.sns.it>
> On Thu, Nov 15, 2001 at 09:58:59AM +1100, Robert Collins wrote:
> > Some of you here may recognise me - among other things I have just
taken
> > on maintenance of cygwin's setup.exe, and have been a cygwin net
> > contributor for a while now. (Chris - how long exactly ?).
> >
>
> wow thanks for joining
>
> > 1) Replacing open files. Say that setup uses berkley db3 as a .dll.
> > Setup can not replace that .dll itself - and any dpkg/rpm style port
> > will assume that it can replace that .dll. I've made a beta release
of
> > setup.exe that *can* do this, but it needs testing and work.
>
> disclaimer: I have never used cygwin inside windows; my experience
> with cygwin has been: I have cross compiled 'gtkmorph' , compiling
> it in Debian/GNU/Linux to work in win32 (and it works, although
buggy);
> so I am not sure of what I am saying

Ok, so will not flame :].

> so here is a quick idea for the above: is it possible to rename an
open file?

Under win9x, often yes. Under NT no. So perhaps as an 'advanced'
technique on 9x we could do this, but as the XP user base grows the
return for doing this will diminish. Also, bad things may happen to
running programs when you do this - its recommended against.

> > I think it would be a shame for users to have to bootstrap cygwin
from
> > cygwin.com, and then grab a *different* installer for debian-w32.
IMO
> > setup.exe should be a direct bootstrap. Also I think that
maintaining a
> > separate tree of binaries and source does not make sense for Cygwin
> > today. There simply are not enough kernel developers or package
> > maintainers at this point. It would be great to see some of the
debian
> > features and capabilities brought to the existing environment IMO.
>
> my vision of Debian/w32 is different
>
> in the future, when Debian/w32 will be a reality, there will be a file
> called Deboostrap.exe in the debian archive; the user will download
this
> file and execute it: this file will ask where the user wishes to
install
> Debian/w32, and then will selfextract from inside (more or less
> as the selfextracting archives do) a  version base.tgz (Debian people
> know what it is) inside the above-asked directory; it will then
> setup virtual mounts, and proceed with normal Debian installation

Ok, there are several issues here that would make this a less effective
proposition than setup.exe is today.
1) base.tgz is non trivial for a modem user to download.
2) base.tgz will need to be recreated every time the dpkg in it gets
bugfixed.
3) I've always considered debian's bootstrap to be rather ugly. It
works, sure, but it could be smoother. (Consider running a bootstrap
under windows, that partedits your disk, creates ext2fs partition(s) and
then downloads and installs (chrooted) into those partitions, finally
installing grub for you. That would be an *easy* install. And under
debian you can do something similar (I forget the tool name), but you
can't do that from under another OS. Well setup *does that* now, for
cygwin, and I think it's much more user friendly to download 200k, and
then have it download with resume, from multiple mirrors, everything
else you need.
4) Dselect is a wonderful thing. GUI's are even better for this. Adding
a single package - apt get install foo. Running a pre-selected install -
dselect install - great. Selecting which pacakges from the 1000's
available - give me a _good_ gui every time.

> idem est: Deboostrap.exe will substitute the Debian boot diskettes,
> and the Debian/w32 installation will be the same as Debian/i386
> after that

See 4) above, I don't think that this is an end in itself. That debian
tools should be available - yes - that the existing interfaces are the
only way to drive system maintenance - no.

...
> Debian/w32 base system will be functional, and the package
installation
> will be done from dselect (or whatever replacement we like more)

As soon as debootstrap has a helper program, deboostrap has to be able
to download that, or you place a barrier to entry. What I'm saying is
that setup does all this and more now, why not leverage that instead of
starting over.

>
> > (Can you tell I'm walking a thin line here ?)
>
> (my english fails me...)

As cygwin setup.exe maintainer, I have a responsibility to honour the
wishes of the setup.exe creators - Mainly Chris Faylor and DJ Delorie
IIRC. On the other hand, I find the debian model a compelling example of
how to run a distributed, community driven and organised distribution
with stunning success and reliability. There are issues in there that I
feel RPM as a package system was never designed to handle, as it was
designed with a single point of control - the distribution vendor - and
they can manage much of the process 'internally'. I.e. individual
developer signing of deb's is great. But it doesn't make much sense for
the Redhat/Suse of the world - they are a single 'developer' in that
sense, so a simply CRC is good enough.

Rob