Re: Things Havoc needs..

[Havoc Pennington <rhpennin@midway.uchicago.edu>]

Hmm... well, I need cash... a 6-CPU SparcStation... ;-)

On Mon, 28 Dec 1998, Jason Gunthorpe wrote:
> 
> I'd like to compose a list of what is needed for gnome-apt. I know some
> generalities, but could I have something more specific?
> 

You mean what is needed in libapt-pkg, right?

Here are some things I can come up with quickly, in no particular order:

 - Internationalization. gnome-apt strings are translated by gettext,
   we already have a French translation from Vincent Renardias, but
   strings from apt-pkg are not translated. Possible solutions 
   include using gettext in libapt-pkg, or having the apt-pkg strings
   be "replaceable" somehow.

 - Machine editing of sources.list

 - "Cancel" feature for download dialog

 - Fix for LongDesc() and that parser bug I reported earlier (if you
   haven't, I've been gone for a week)

 - For the Import/Export package list items, I'm not really sure what
   the implementation involves. Maybe it will involve apt-pkg. 
   I haven't thought about it.

 - I still haven't written the "extract list of sections" function,
   perhaps this should be part of the cache?

 - gnome-apt is kind of a mess on handling multiple available versions.
   I was noticing this with apt-get too - not sure how to downgrade 
   a package, or install a variant version.

   I want to fix this, but I don't feel that I know the Right Solution
   yet. I have a vague sense that something is missing in the library;
   perhaps I can't set the current Available Version? I would like 
   to be able to say "use this version as the available one" and 
   have all the other information update (Upgradeable(), etc.)

 - I kind of feel that "Package Status" should be a library thing.
   I randomly invented some status categories, but I think it would 
   make sense for apt-get and any future frontends to use the same ones.
   This code (along with lots of other dubious code, often I don't 
   know what the hell I'm doing when I move out of gnome-land :-) can be
   found in pkgutil.cc. 

I'm sort of tired and out of it but that's all I can think of for now.
The TODO list for gnome-apt itself is much longer of course - yikes!
It's been incredibly fun to write this app because the library underneath
is so powerful, and all I have to do is stick on chrome. Complicated
chrome, but mere chrome nonetheless. :-)

Havoc