Differences between version 10 and previous revision of PackageManagementTool.
Other diffs: Previous Major Revision, Previous Author, or view the Annotated Edit History
| Newer page: | version 10 | Last edited on Saturday, July 12, 2003 3:36:50 pm | by AristotlePagaltzis | Revert |
| Older page: | version 2 | Last edited on Monday, March 3, 2003 9:40:33 pm | by GreigMcGill | Revert |
@@ -1,32 +1,21 @@
-One
of the points of different between most Linux Distribution is the
PackageManagementTool they
use.
+There are several main 'flavours'
of PackageManagementTool in
use in various LinuxDistributions
. These include:
-A PackageManagementTool is a program
, or set
of programs
, that give
the system administrator (whether
that be an administrator of
a large network
of machines
, or Joe Public at his single-user Linux desktop) rapid, easy control over which packages are installed
.
+; ''[rpm]'' : Redhat Package Manager. Obviously
, RedHat uses this, but Mandrake and a handful
of others do as well.
+; ''[dpkg]'' : This is [Debian]'s package manager. [Knoppix]
, [Progeny] and other LinuxDistributions are "Debian-based"
+; ''.tgz'' : [Slackware] uses tar balls
that include pre-and post install scripts.
+; ''[ports]'' : This is
the source based PackageManagementTool
that [BSD] uses. Several LinuxDistributions use
a similar idea.
+; ''[portage]'' : [Gentoo]'s version
of source based PackageManagement
, driven by a tool called ''emerge''.
+; ''spells'' : SorcererLinux has a 'spell book' approach to source based PackageManagement
.
-Most [PackageManagementTool]s revolve around binary distributions of packages. That is, they access a repository of pre-compiled packages and installs the package best suited
to your system architecture. They can also offer source packages, so you can build the package locally, perhaps modifying it or changing its optimisations in the process. Other [PackageManagementTool]s are source-based - they either don't provide binary packages, or try really hard to avoid it. These download the original sources for a package, apply any vendor-provided patches, then compile for the local machine. Takes longer, but some people swear it gives them much better performance.
+Frontends
to these tools include:
-Some features
of a PackageManagementTool are
:
+; ''up2date'' : a front-end to [rpm] provided by RedHat. You get to use it on one machine per user free, and can pay for the right to use it on more machines. It's probably worth it for most users, as it makes installing new software and keeping up with upgrades really easy.
+; ''apt'' : one
of the best tools around that traditionally wraps [dpkg], although there is
a version that works for [rpm]. It was the first front-end to nicely handle dependencies
: ''apt-get install foo'' will automatically download and install not only ''foo'', but also any unfulfilled dependencies ''foo'' may have.
-* Provide a repository of some form, of packages which the administrator can install on their machine(s).
-* Keep track of which packages are already installed.
-* Provide an easy method of uninstalling packages
-* Provide an easy method of upgrading packages
+----
-And
so on
.
+I personally have used RedHat ([rpm]), [Debian] ([dpkg] / [apt]), and [Gentoo] ('portage' -- [emerge]). Of the three, RedHat rates worst for me, because I never really used up2date and
so started getting annoyed with dependency hell. Debian and Gentoo are about the same in terms of ease of installation of a new application / upgrading packages, however Gentoo takes an age longer due to having to compile everything from source
. --DanielLawson
-There are several main 'flavours' of PackageManagementTool in use in various Linux distributions. These include:
+----
-* rpm. Redhat Package Manager. Obviously, RedHat uses this, but Mandrake and
a handful of others do as well.
-* dpkg. This is debians package manager. Knoppix, Progeny and other linux distributions are "debian-based"
-* Whatever Caldera used. I can't remember
-* ports. This is
the source-based PackageManagementTool that BSD uses. Several Linux distributions use a similar idea -
Gentoo uses a program called portage, and Sorcerer linux has a
'spell book
' type approach to
it.
-
-As well as the tools provided by the PackageManagementTool itself
, there can be so-called
''front-ends
'' for even easier package management. For example
, rpm is a very nice tool, however its biggest problem is
that its hard to meet dependencies. That is, if you try to install xchat, a graphical IRC client, you will probably find that it needs GTK and or GNOME libraries. If you haven
't already installed these, you must step through the dependancy tree, installing all the dependencies in turn... and all of the dependencies dependencies. And so on. This can take ages.
-
-* up2date is a front-end to rpm, provided by RedHat. You get to use
it on
one machine per user free, and can pay for
the right to use it on more machines
. Its probably worth it for most users, as it makes installing new software and keeping up with upgrades really easy.
-* apt is one of the best tools I
have come across. Its a front-end for dpkg, although there is a version that works for rpm. It was the first front-end
to nicely handle dependencies: eg, you can say 'apt-get install foo' and it will download and install foo, and any dependencies foo may have
.
-
-
-Its worth noting that the source
-based distributions have good dependency management by default.
-
-
-I personally have used Redhat (rpm), Debian (dpkg / apt), and Gentoo ('portage'
-- emerge). Of the three, RedHat rates worst for me, becuase I never really used up2date and so started getting annoyed with dependency hell. Debian and Gentoo are about the same in terms of easy of installing a new application / upgrading packages, however Gentoo takes an age longer due to having to compile everything from source.
+Still that can hardly be construed as
a drawback since
the people who choose
Gentoo do so precisely ''because
'' it compiles everything from source
. Certainly
, it may have been a drawback for
''you
'', but
that doesn
't make
it
one in
the general case
. Everyone will
have to examine their needs themselves
. --AristotlePagaltzis
