apt For RedHat

Just discovered It !

[David]

I guess I haven't been paying attention but I just found the apt rpms at freshrpms.net. Once installed and with the synaptic gui this is a slick way to install, upgrade or remove programs. All dependency problems get resolved.

I had just assumed this was a debian only deal.

[seindal]

You could have had that a long time ago by using Debian :)

[bartek]

Gentoo deserves a mention here, they have solved the dependency hell very well too. Their "emerge" installs everything without a problem - you can even update your entire system with one command...

[seindal]

Isn't Gentoo a Debian derivative?

[bcc1234]

I just have to mention the ports system on FreeBSD :)

[littleman]

Gentoo is not a derivative of Debian but rather an adaption of the ports system from FreeBSD. With Gentoo most everything is compiled where with Debian most users chose to use the recompiled .debs.

Gentoo tends to be more cutting edge, Debian is as conservative as you want to make it.

Apt for redhat is cool, but I'd like to know how current they are going to keep the dependency tree. Will it slip behind as the version of redhat ages?

With Debian and Gentoo you always stay current. The only time you have to reinstall is when you get a new hard drive.

[seindal]

Gentoo tends to be more cutting edge, Debian is as conservative as you want to make it.

Is this relative to stable, testing or unstable in Debian?

René.

[littleman]

Rene, all of the above IMO. Stable is very conservative, testing is relatively moderate compared to a lot of distributions, and even Unstable tends to be conservative compared to Gentoo.

Gentoo had KDE 3 right away. Gnome 2 just got officially into Unstable about a month or so ago.

There are always the unofficial debs, but I think the Debian culture discourages users from using the latest renditions of software.

I don't think either approach is bad, just different philosophies.

[seindal]

You're right about gnome2. I think the maintainers had a lot of transition problems to cope with, because they still have to keep unstable a mostly usable system.

I myself stick mostly to testing on desktop/development machines and stable on servers. I only take selected parts from unstable by using apt preferences.

I still haven't switched to gnome2, mostly becuase I need my computers in working order to get my things done, so I have decided to wait until gnome2 enters testing.

That it exactly the thing I like about Debian. With that in mind, I don't really think Debian is for those who want the latest and greatest. It is for people (like me) who want the latest and greatest *if it works* :)

[Knowles]

I have recently went to Debian Stable, from RH after trying to install Gentoo. I like the apt for Debian it seems to work well exept when it wont allow me to upgrade a dpencency! But that has only happened when trying to get something on the bleading edge. When I was using RH it had a built in function like apt but it wouldnt allow for new software only the things it found orginally on the computer so it wasnt as good as apt.

[seindal]

If you upgrade a dependency, you are practically pulling the rug under the feet of another package, so no, you cannot always upgrade a dependency. It depends a bit on how the package has specified the dependency. Normally they just specify they need a certain version or better, but sometimes versions are tied very close together.

If some package has wrong (like too restrictive) dependencies, you should file a bug report on it.

The Debian dependency system really makes a lot of sense.

Do you know how to use apt preferences? They are important if you want to run stable and install selected parts of testing/unstable.

René