On Wed, 2003-01-29 at 14:03, Fernando Pablo Lopez-Lezcano wrote:
> Could you explain in more detail what would be the difference between a
> "generic" and a more distribution specialized rpm?
> Regarding dynamic linking, I don't quite see what the problem might be.
> Maybe you are not aware that Planet CCRMA rpms currently come in three
> "flavors", 7.2, 7,3 and 8.0, each one being a separate repository. Each
> program has three versions of the binary rpm(s), one for each distro
> version, each one compiled under the proper version of the distribution,
> with all current updates. As long as RH itself does not break backwards
> compatibility within a given revision with its updates there should not
> be any problems whatsoever with dynamic linking.
You are correct that spec files are rarely a problem, as they are
(mostly) universal.
I wasn't saying that dynamic linking is bad. However, the fact that you
need to post three versions of each rpm simply restates the fact that no
binary package can be universal. There are different versions of rpm
itself, files are placed in different locations from distro to distro
and version to version, different versions of required libraries (not
always backward compatible), etc.
Also as far as Mandrake goes, urpmi can only resolve dependencies if you
use rpms built for your version number. For example, if you do:
# urpmi audacity
on Mandrake 9.0, it will install wxGTK2.3 automatically. But if you
tried to install the cooker rpm on 9.0, it would look for wxGTK2.4 which
it obviously would not find.
PlanetCCRMA is a really great tool, and most of its rpms should run on
most distros. However, Mandrake users shouldn't need them, since we
(volunteers) spend countless hours providing current rpms that work
flawlessly (almost) because they are specifically designed for the
current version of Mandrake, and include goodies like extra
documentation, menu entries, MIME types, and easy rebuilding.
Austin
--
Austin Acton Hon.B.Sc.
Synthetic Organic Chemist, Teaching Assistant
Department of Chemistry, York University, Toronto
MandrakeClub Volunteer (www.mandrakeclub.com)
homepage: www.groundstate.ca
