Does any one know what pkgtool was written in. I am looking around the net and I still have not found any leads. Things some times are right in front of my face and I am blind... but I am not being lazy...

I want to examine how pkgtool was written. If for example I wanted to modify it or something.

less /sbin/pkgtool
Succes.

It is shell script. Open it with any text editor.

The file command tells you about a file's type and the which command will search the paths for it so try this :

wow pkgtool was written as a shell script. The shell is indeed powerful. I know for example that Gentoo's package manager was written in python. I wounder if there would be an advantage if one rewrote pkgtool in C. That was my idea. See I am trying to learn how to program and I have gone through books on it and I get the Idea... but non of those books inspired me to do anything so I forget most of what is in there. I was thinking of a project that would be challenging but not so challenging something that like a project that would teach me.. so I though what if I just rewrote something it would teach me a lot about things.

So I though lets rewrite pkgtool.

Thank you you showed me ware to find it locally. But I thought it was cool that you gave me a script to use to figure all that stuff out. So I typed in the command line... never mind as I was writing this I just thought maybe I should type in the command as root and sure enough when I did it worked thanks a lot.

If you want to programm something in C, why not try a graphical (gtk or qt lib) front end for a command tool program ?
(I myself did a graphical front end for 'at' command as a learning project first with motif then with gtk )
re-write pkgtool in C as a learning programming experience could be dangerous I think, if you make an error, you risk some serious damage for your system as pkgtool is rather a critical slackware program...

I see your point. O okay at first when I sat down to write my next question I was going to ask why would I want to do Graphics when I am trying to program and then I got it.I think I figured out what your were saying reasoning it out as I typed. Your suggesting a graphics front end for the command line. That is cool. e.g. pkgtool is a graphics front end in the command line.. something of that nature of GUI


Just out of interest I do realize that pkgtool could bring it all down if I messed up but do you think there would be an advantage to having it written in C?

I think someone allready done that.

What about to write a front-end / program for pccard tools? I think there is no GUI for that. (but, I think it's too simple task )

Oops - sorry I should have told you that - nice one for figuring it out ! Of course /sbin is part of root's path but not a normal user.

I don't see any advantage, only drawbacks
The major drawback: after each official pkgtool update, you have to rebuild your program to include the change
Other drawback: Heavy string manipulations, deal with system permissions, run as root etc..
For system admin tools like this, I think shell scripts are better suited
You don't need really need memory/CPU performances here, just reliability

http://spkg.megous.com/ is one.

But
will work as any user.

This is pointless and there won't be any advantage. Using C makes sense only for CPU-intensive tasks, for large programs or for projects that can't be done using scripts. Script allow high flexibility and very high development speed (script will work right after you modify it). So by doing rewrite into C you'll waste your time. So my advice: try something else.

>> empcrono

Pkgtool is merely a front-end. Most, if not all the scripts it calls up can be run directly from the command line.

You may find the "Advanced Bash Scripting" documentation useful if you need a more thorough explanation than you get from "man bash"

http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/