Dependencies Tool (i just don't get it)

gonzalo76 · 05-09-2004, 12:37 AM

Hi, I just don't understand why isn't a tool that can manage dependencies issues.
Swaret, pkgtool, slapt-get, are fine, but, they don't manage dependencies, or they do?
Isn't in Slackware that kind of tool ???
I'm confused about it.

Thank you

brenton · 05-09-2004, 12:52 AM

Slackware's pkgtool doesn't check dependencies. It supposed to be for more control, so you can install stuff in any order, or something.

But swaret and slapt-get do. When you install or upgrade they will do a dependency check. Or you can just run "swaret --dep" (not sure what it is for slapt-get) to check.

Linux.tar.gz · 05-10-2004, 07:58 PM

Take a look at the /etc/swaret.conf or /etc/swaret.conf.new.
You'd better install the latest version, even if it's a development version.

ringwraith · 05-10-2004, 09:00 PM

Slackware is intentionally designed by Pat V. to do no dependency checking. It would appear that the dependency checking done by swaret is sort of half assed, just look at the recent problems upgrading gnome and yes I know you were able to get around the problems. But look at past problems with elflib -> aaaelflibs and other examples. Pat and most old time Slackers look at that as a feature of Slackware though. Each user is assumed to be knowledgeable enough to manage his own system. If you have ever used other distros that position should be understandable. There is RPM Hell for the RPM based distros. The Debian based distros can run into their own broken package, unmet dependency problems. In any system, you will have apps that simply will not work on your system and no amount of dependency checking will change that. Usually when you build a package or try to run it the error messages are clear and will tell you what dependency needs to be added. You can also use ldd to check what other packages you might need.

Duffy · 05-10-2004, 09:51 PM

I have had NO problems with swaret using --update --upgrade and --dep on Slackware 9.1-current

Azmeen · 05-11-2004, 10:48 AM

I know swaret does dep checking... although probably not as "graceful" as it can be.

Slack does come with a dep checking tool (heck, it's standard on all distros) called ldd.

eg. checking ldd of bash:

Code:

me@slackbox:~$ which bash
/usr/bin/bash
me@slackbox:~$ ldd /usr/bin/bash
        libtermcap.so.2 => /lib/libtermcap.so.2 (0x40024000)
        libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x40028000)
        libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x4002b000)
        /lib/ld-linux.so.2 => /lib/ld-linux.so.2 (0x40000000)
me@slackbox:~$

Yay for ldd