On 3/4/06, Robert Snyder <robertsnyder@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 3/4/06, Paul M Foster <paulf@quillandmouse.com> wrote:
> > Tarballs, .debs and .rpms are "similar" only in the barest sense. And
> > .deb files are "ar" archive files which may *contain* tarballs. RPM
> > files use a format which can only be unpacked using several tools at
> > once (assuming you're not using rpm itself to unpack them).
Small nit, but at what number does something become "several"? Two?
rpm2cpio | cpio
Effectively an rpm package is a lead/header, signiature, and payload.
When it comes down to it, it's not horrendously different from other
archive formats, so not sure where you are getting this several tools
idea. Except maybe that there is more than one way to do it...
Slackers might prefer, rpm2targz | tar (Slack's alien is basically an
rpm2targz | maketgz).
As for a deb "may *contain* tarballs", doesn't the deb file standard
_require_ the ar to have the data/files packed in a tgz within the ar,
and any control information in an additional tgz? Otherwise it's not
a valid deb. So with deb you are also looking at two tools to get at
the packaged files... ar | tar.
> This is where you are wrong. There is built in dependcy checking with since
> 10.0 packages ( you simply add a dependency file )
Paul, this is now the case (though it didn't use to be). And it's
more than just checking at install/upgrade time. Slack keeps a track
of dependency information within its /var/log/packages/ tree. For
example, PackageA requires PackageB. Both are installed. Now
removing PackageB with rpm or dpkg will let you know that PackageB
depends on PackageA. And removepkg does that too.
Not knocking deb or exalting Slack tgz's, just showing that they
aren't quite as different as you make them out to be. They do things
differently because the package systems each had slightly different
goals once you got past the basic "hold a bunch of files."
~ Daniel
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