Excessive package interdependency

Chris Ricker kaboom at gatech.edu
Fri Dec 19 22:20:32 UTC 2003


On Fri, 19 Dec 2003, Jeremy Katz wrote:

> On Fri, 2003-12-19 at 08:51 -0500, Chris Ricker wrote:
> > > Not really... then you have to differentiate "new" vs "there before, you
> > > just chose not to install it" which gets back to the problems I already
> > > stated :(
> > 
> > Why do you have to differentiate? On an upgrade, just show them everything
> > they don't have in a groups view and ask what they want....
> 
> Because then every time you upgrade, you see the 500 packages you don't
> have installed interspersed with the 25 or 30 new ones.  It's then kind
> of like finding a needle in a haystack...
> 
> Also, again, I never want the user to be exposed to "do you want to
> install libfoo" -- libfoo is an implementation detail that the user
> shouldn't have to care about, it should just get installed if its
> needed.  But the flip side is you should see nautilus even though
> nautilus-cd-burner depends on it.

Right, but that's why you show the groups-level view (meaning, the level
anaconda does now), not the individual package list. People who want can
drill in on the details and see the individual stuff (at least at the level
that's shown there -- not really individual, but sorta). Those who don't,
but who between original install and this upgrade, have decided they need to
do XML (for one example) can just select the whole group, and they'll get
the whatever new XML toys have been added.... Those who haven't decided they
need XML won't select that group, and won't automatically get the new 
XML toys....

later,
chris





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