It seems to me there needs to be a uniformed way to install software for all linux distros, after many many many many many many many (you get the idea?) hours of trying differnt things it seems the only soloution is to have a gui based program that takes the source tarball that you download from the software makers site and open it up in this thing, then, like almost like a windows installer, it asks you a bunch of stuff, then, hey presto, you have a working program!

Is this just a dream? Could you imagine how fast people would switch to linux of this was possible?

It would beg the question asked many times by m$

Where do you want to go today? We want to go to Linux, Bill.

yea linux does need a standard installer/uninstaller but there are great package managers out there for one apt-get

If you use a standard way of installing software, eg you always use rpms, then you could uninstall easily.

For example, if you always use rpms, then
to install and erase programs.

I hope this helps
--Ian

Actually, I just found kconfigure seems good, if only I could get it working, its another tarball, catch22 or what!!!

There already is a standard way of installing software, the great thing is that it works on any distro: Done!

That assumes every Linux user installs the GNU development package, which is not (and should not be) the case.

Maybe, but what's the real problem here, is it that "linux" needs a uniform package management system or that users of distro's that have a package management system ( which was the intended way to get software for that distribution) try to compile things without knowing how to go about it?

Personally, (keep in mind this is completely an opinion) I could care less about a uniform package management system. Bottom line in my opinion, if you want to compile things, you need to use a distro that meets your needs (whether that means compiling with it, just using it, or whatever).

My take on this issue is, there is a pretty good package management system so why not use it as the basis? The Debian folks may not like the idea of adopting the RPM system, but there's gotta be some groundwork. Of course, my own assumption is that such a uniform system would be beneficial for the Linux community as a whole, which may be different than your view.

I see your point, but if every distribution used the same package management system, it would eliminate the number of choices you have ( which could be good or bad depending on your point of view). Me, I NEED lots of choices. Some days i feel like gnome-2.8, others gnome-1.4, or enlightenment, fluxbox, etc... but my point was these boards are filled with people not being able to compile apps with rpm based distro's due to the way these distro's split their packages or trying to compile things the wrong way ( this includes me, 4 years ago, when i started using linux, I couldn't compile anything to save my life )

it will make life easier for newbies, if they followed a standard.
n maybe also include all files needed 2 run a program,

example 4 acidrip i had 2 get lsdvd n libdvdread to get it working
oh n mplayer, that mencoder supports mp3.

My personal take on this is that, Linux doesn't really need a unified package manager. What it needs are users who understand how to manage software on their chosen distributions. The philosophy behind most opensource projects is that, what one user may like is not necessarily what another prefers, hence the numerous distros out there. Whats lacking is good documentation about package managment on most distros. I used Mandrake since 6.5 (Redhat 5.x) and I never heard of urpmi until Mandrake 8.2/9.x even though it existed and worked fine in some of the previous releases. I had a love, hate relationship with Linux coz I liked the fact that I never got any viruses but I thought package management was awful, even compiling anything from source used to be a tedious task. Once I read a lot of online tutorials and got a Linux book, things changed and soon, Linux was my platform of choice over other OS'es.

If users learn to use the tools provided by their distros, then I believe that things would be a lot easier for them. How many times a day do we refer people to use apt, yum, urpmi, ports, or other package managers, on this site. The simple fact is that most newbies just don't know these things exist. Even compiling from source is easy if you know how your distro manages it's packages regardless of whether it uses debs, rpm or something else as default package management system. This is just my and I know and respect that others may not agree with what I have said.

I see your point. The problem with that approach is that not all the "aftermarket" software comes in the installable format recognised by the distro you use. A lot of the open-source projects come in the tarball format, which makes it necessary for the user to run the "configure, make, make install" commands. Distros like Red Hat and Fedora are in better shape because of the huge community that backs it up, but the users of the smaller distros aren't that lucky.

I believe the whole thing comes down to how important it is to make Linux easy and user-friendly. My personal opinion is that if Linux can remain an OS endorsed by a very small group of computer-savvy users, then the current situation does not need to change. OTOH, if you want Linux to become more mainstream, then ease of use is essential.

If you ever hope to see Linux displace Windows, this idea has to disappear. The fact is that the majority - actually, the vast majority - of computer users are not experts and do not wish to become experts.

It should not be necessary for them to become experts; the system should pretty much handle itself, with the user only needing to make basic decisions about exactly how the system should handle itself.

Isn't only a problem of how easy or difficult is. The actual system of different repositories for every distro has the problem that you not only need to be sure that the programmer was a "good guy"....you need to be sure that the programmer and the RPM maintainer are good guys.
And you allways have the problem of the delay between the "official" release and the RPM release for your distro. I should not need to wait to the release of Mandrake 10.2 to update a simple media player like kaffeine. I know I can obtain it now, but or compiling (from tar o SRPM) or installing a RPM from someone that I don't know nothing about.
And compile from sources has the problem of the uninstall and that sometimes you need a long time to compile a program that you only want to try, and at final the program is not usefull for you and you have lost your time.
Another thing is that binary releases would be smaller to download than sources (ok, perhaps not ever, but sometimes yes and with a great difference). And about download sizes....we need a patch system for RPMs or whatever binary relase system we use. Download all the KDE core only beccause a little patch that in source is less than 1MB isn't very efficient.

We need a uniform system that allows original programmers to release in his website a single binary that works with all distros. Is not only for newbies, is a lot more convenient for everybody. But is a complex problem and we can only wait for developers to solve it.

Then they should not be using computers. They should be using email/websurfing machines and game consoles like PS2 and XBOX.
But thats not what sells is it. So now we have a shitload of spam zombies and their idiot owners.

And the average "I don't want to be a computer expert" is going to get this information on "exactly how the system should handle itself" where exactly. They have no idea what you just said. So lets just give up on the idea of catering to the idiot masses because they will always be idiots. Why should the rest of us suffer because a majority of people are too stupid and/or lazy to learn computing. "Make something idiot-proof and they'll just make a better idiot". Perhaps the real solution would be to make it all SO complicated that you HAVE to be an expert to do anything. I bet alot of today's problems would begin to disappear. Maybe in a circular logic both ideas are so far apart they are almost the same. I mean what could be easier that having an expert do everything for you.

I don't know where people get this idea from. People/business will use what ends up being (percieved as) the best, most cost effective tool for the job. I frankly don't care what happens. And I don't ever expect Linux to take over the desktop. Not because it's not good enough to, but the power and marketing the $$$$$ allows will allways overpower even a better product. And I think Microsoft has far more to say regarding what happens here than any FOSS developer does. If they keep making software with problems, percieved or real, they will continue to lose market share. If they come out with the PC version of OSX.......

The more people use linux, the more the "majority rules mentality" will hold sway and the package management system (and file system) that is used by the most popular distro will become the defacto standard. The majority is not large enough at this time and is not stable enough to hold much power. But if some Debian varient suddenly takes off, then apt-get will become the defacto standard. If Novell/Suse does, then perhaps a YaST/Apt-get hybrid. Who knows. Majority will rule at some point and if history is any indication, it won't be the best system either.

My 5 cents


Sorry, I seem to have diarhea of the mouth today.