BTW., how does osx do installs (just bringing up the meta-file
installer thingy again. Feel free not to answer)?
their package system, umm, err, sucks.
As an OS X user since Server 1.0, I feel the need to step out of the
lurker shadow.
OS X does not _have_ a package management system.
One of its greatest weaknesses IMHO.
99.9% of users seem to disagree with you, judging by how often "Linux
should use appfolders like Macs do" is heard on various forums and
mailing
lists.
Installing applications is easy on OS X, by design. One of the trade
offs is there are many apps that could share libraries but don't. Most
are statically linked ( except for OS-provided frameworks ). Some
people bitch about high RAM usage in Fedora, I think OS X is worse.
So no one uses fink anymore to get applications? I guess i should go
tell them to close the project down.
Fink is a third-party application that fills a void in the base OS. It
is not included in the OS, like rpm. It can't install _any_
application, only those it knows about.
There is no way on OS X to ask the system what is the version of app
foo, or ask it if app foo is even installed. You could look in the
"Applications" Directory, but apps don't have to live there, so you
can't be sure. From a single user perspective that may not be a big
issue. As a system admin, that is a pain. Keeping users from installing
random applications can be a _good_ thing.
The a OS X .pkg format an installer depend on frail scripts to
accomplish many things rpm does in an enforced, consistent way.
And it uses a freakish .bom format as storage. OK, maybe the storage
format isn't a big problem.
There was talk on the Darwin devel list about adding a package
management system, but inaction is the decision. It is a hard problem
to solve. The application installation/management needs of a
single-user desktop are almost opposite of a server, or a
company-managed desktop.
As for ease of use, users here are experienced in both OS X and
Winders. Since we use Fedora too, when I show anyone "sudo yum update
foo," they say, "That's it? It's that easy?"
You can look to OS X for ease-of-use with installers, but it isn't as
good as rpm/dpkg/ports in many ways, and some OS X users suffer because
of that.
At least I do.
Charles Dostale
System Admin - Silver Oaks Communications
http://www.silveroaks.com/
824 17th Street, Moline IL 61265
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