On Fri, Jan 09, 2004 at 04:32:49PM -0500, Karl DeBisschop wrote:
Do you want 35 rival competing updated copies of perl that all conflict ?
Not at all. In fact I don't really see how you read that from what I wrote, so I must be missing something or I must not have been clear.
The problem is with a lot of packages new versions are not always compatible with old ones. So you might use a new library version and find your app built with it won't run on another setup. So for that reason you want people to know there is a definitive version of a package. There might be other versions but you always want to know the definitive one.
suggesting is that if the distros work from the idea of a reference spec that is somewhat distro agnostic, then the delevopr coordinates with the .deb packaging community, the rpm packaging community, and the ports community. That way, as packagers contribute thier feedback to the devlopers, it's more focused on what make the application better.
Ah now I understand where you are going. That makes complete sense and some packages do come with reference spec files.
If packagers from different distros eschew that tpe of cooperation, then the developer either sees silence or a "do things my way because that's our policy" from 20 different camps pulling the project in all different ways.
True.
Alan