On Wed, 2009-01-14 at 23:15 +0100, Kevin Kofler wrote: > seth vidal wrote: > > - conditional pkgs (which provide a way of saying "install pkgX only > > if pkgY is installed) are several colors of doom b/c they aren't a > > dependency relationship and creates clutter on systems. > > But they're actually needed. We wouldn't have them if they weren't. maybe so, maybe not. > > > - users expect groups to be more persistent on their systems and to act > > more like pkgs (ie: yum update should update groups, too) > > What users? Surely not me. When did you become a yum user? :) > I don't want packages to be magically added just because they're in some group. That's the point of the groups - of them being transitioned to metapkgs - so we no longer have the ambiguity. It's like watching a bad episode of moonlighting "will they? Won't they?". > What I do want is be told of any new packages showing up in the repository. > All of them. No matter what groups, if any, they're in. Then I can decide > if I want them (by default none should be selected, of course). And viewing > that list is probably something which should have to be requested > explicitly, as I think most users will want to only install additional > stuff when they actually need it. (Installing a package to try it out > because it's new is something I do, but not something I'd expect somebody > who only uses the computer as a tool to do their job to do.) New stuff showing up in the repo is completely unrelated to the groups. > > I can't believe I'm alone with that expectation. I actually think there will > be lots of complaints about unwanted packages getting automatically added > (for a reason most users won't understand - metapackages are black magic as > far as they're concerned). and groups are worse black magic - if only b/c they have this way of rebounding on the people who do understand them. :-/ > They're actually extremely useful when installing, as you can decide what to > install. People may often want, say, KDE or GNOME, but not every single > application (or application pack) which is part of KDE or GNOME. (That's > why there's a distinction between "mandatory" (e.g. if you want KDE, you > definitely want kdelibs) and "default" (i.e. you probably want this, but > maybe not).) In addition, there are many KDE or GNOME applications which > are not directly part of KDE or GNOME. "Optional" provides a nice place to > list those. Which is why we can do groups of groups and more precisely break them down into smaller sections. so you install what you need, not the whole world. > While admittedly I haven't done any user research, I'd expect most users to > go through the comps list at least once, either while installing from the > DVD or after installing from a live CD (and noticing missing applications, > which are unavoidable for CD-sized spins). > I suspect most users never know what comps is and they do all their discovery by doing: yum search someword or yum list somepkgnametheyknow > In addition, there are plans to add soft dependencies even at package level, > which shows there is a demand for them, so IMHO dropping them from comps is > a step backwards. Really? Who is making the plans for soft deps. Doesn't seem like it at the rpm layer. -sv -- fedora-devel-list mailing list fedora-devel-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-devel-list
