proposal/a825.html

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><A
NAME="AEN825"
>B. Related Systems</A
></H1
><P
>I will try to outline interesting points in a variety of systems
that we can learn from.  These systems may be intended for building or
installing packages, or repositories for packages.  I am not deeply
familiar with all of the tools here, and would be interested in
hearing more relevant points from someone with more knowledge.
Another weakness of mine is that I don't know much about Microsoft
Windows, so some good examples for Windows systems would be
helpful.</P
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><A
NAME="LIP-APPENDIX-DEBIAN"
>B.1. Debian</A
></H1
><P
>The <A
HREF="http://www.debian.org"
TARGET="_top"
>Debian GNU/Linux system</A
>
is a good example of a <SPAN
CLASS="emphasis"
><I
CLASS="EMPHASIS"
>binary</I
></SPAN
> distribution
(meaning that packages are distributed in binary, as opposed to source
code form), and its packaging system (<SPAN
CLASS="APPLICATION"
>dpkg</SPAN
>)
is somewhat similar to the more famous <SPAN
CLASS="APPLICATION"
>RPM</SPAN
>.
Debian has several other tools to help the user to install packages,
most notably, <B
CLASS="COMMAND"
>apt</B
>.  The Debian toolset is
interesting for several reasons:

<P
></P
><UL
><LI
><P
>It handles dependencies extremely well.  A single
  command can download and install a package, as well as downloading
  and installing all of its dependencies.</P
></LI
><LI
><P
>It handles updates extremely well.  One command
  (<B
CLASS="COMMAND"
>apt-get update</B
>) checks for new versions of
  packages and updates a local database.  Another command
  (<B
CLASS="COMMAND"
>apt-get dist-upgrade</B
>) downloads and installs all
  new versions of installed packages and any new
  dependencies.</P
></LI
><LI
><P
>There are standard commands for downloading and
  building packages from source.  If I'm interested in hacking on a
  package, I can run <B
CLASS="COMMAND"
>apt-get source packagename</B
>
  which will download and unpack the source code for the package.  The
  source can then be built with the standard command
  <B
CLASS="COMMAND"
>debuild</B
>.</P
></LI
><LI
><P
>The Debian Project maintains a central repository
  for packages, and the packaging tools offer support for using
  unofficial repositories as well.  The central repositories include a
  set of servers, the <SPAN
CLASS="emphasis"
><I
CLASS="EMPHASIS"
>autobuilders</I
></SPAN
>, which compile
  uploaded source packages for a variety of hardware architectures
  (see below) and make them available as binary packages.  As a
  packager, I merely upload the source code to my package, and the
  autobuilders do the rest.</P
></LI
><LI
><P
>Currently the hardware architectures supported by
  Debian are Intel x86, Motorola 68k, Sun SPARC, Alpha, PowerPC, ARM,
  MIPS, HP PA-RISC, IA-64, S/390.  Debian also runs on non-Linux
  systems, including GNU/Hurd, GNU/NetBSD, and GNU/FreeBSD.  The
  package management tools also run on MacOS X under the name of the
  <SPAN
CLASS="APPLICATION"
>Fink</SPAN
> project.</P
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