milanuk
12-07-2000, 10:43 AM
Hello,
I apologize if this has been beat to death; I didn't find much directly tied to it, but then I didn't spend all night digging either http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/wink.gif Mainly I'm looking for confirmation or correction of what I think I've figured out.
Lets say that a user has a Debian 2.2r2 system, running nicely, and it works well, lasts long time, and all that. But the user wants either a more up-to-date version of a package than what is in the stable tree, or even for that matter than the unstable tree. Or software that isn't available in debian packages at all.
This leaves the user w/ a few options:
a) Change the /etc/apt/sources.list file to point to the unstable tree and do an 'apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade'. This has the drawbacks of a potentially hosed system, if unstable is having a particularly bad day, and it still doesn't address the issue of
unstable not always having the latest and most up-to-date version of a given package. I'm not pointing fingers here, but two examples would be apcupsd and postgresql, last time I looked at them. (Note- Yes, postgresql has been updated recently to the latest version.) Plus, if a person has a really slow connection (broadband isn't that widespread yet), this could take a really long time, like days. Plus, any future package adds will have to take place via the same slow connection.
b) Change the /etc/apt/sources.list like above, do an 'apt-get update' and then try 'apt-get install <package-name>' This may allow a user to retain a mostly 'stable' system, w/ a few 'unstable packages, which is good. But it still has the same problems as a).
c) I saw it mentioned in passing about grabbing the source deb's from 'unstable' and compiling them on 'stable'? Does this work? Aren't those packages going to 'want' the same things they need in unstable, and barf upon compiling? Could someone please give some examples? Anyway, this still has the problem of maybe not being the most up-to-date, but it would be manageable, maybe.
d) The user could download the source tarballs and compile from scratch. This would alleviate the problem of up-to-date-ness (nice word, huh? http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/wink.gif ), but might cause problems integrating into the package management system. Plus, it would likely be a major PITA for more than just a few applications. I've seen references to 'equivs' or some such for telling the package management system that such & such dependencies are filled by locally installed software; is this right?
I know this is fairly long, but these are really the only major issues I've got w/ Debian as a system, and I'd like to get them
resolved/cleared up, at least for my own peace of mind.
TIA,
Monte
--
[This message has been edited by milanuk (edited 07 December 2000).]
I apologize if this has been beat to death; I didn't find much directly tied to it, but then I didn't spend all night digging either http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/wink.gif Mainly I'm looking for confirmation or correction of what I think I've figured out.
Lets say that a user has a Debian 2.2r2 system, running nicely, and it works well, lasts long time, and all that. But the user wants either a more up-to-date version of a package than what is in the stable tree, or even for that matter than the unstable tree. Or software that isn't available in debian packages at all.
This leaves the user w/ a few options:
a) Change the /etc/apt/sources.list file to point to the unstable tree and do an 'apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade'. This has the drawbacks of a potentially hosed system, if unstable is having a particularly bad day, and it still doesn't address the issue of
unstable not always having the latest and most up-to-date version of a given package. I'm not pointing fingers here, but two examples would be apcupsd and postgresql, last time I looked at them. (Note- Yes, postgresql has been updated recently to the latest version.) Plus, if a person has a really slow connection (broadband isn't that widespread yet), this could take a really long time, like days. Plus, any future package adds will have to take place via the same slow connection.
b) Change the /etc/apt/sources.list like above, do an 'apt-get update' and then try 'apt-get install <package-name>' This may allow a user to retain a mostly 'stable' system, w/ a few 'unstable packages, which is good. But it still has the same problems as a).
c) I saw it mentioned in passing about grabbing the source deb's from 'unstable' and compiling them on 'stable'? Does this work? Aren't those packages going to 'want' the same things they need in unstable, and barf upon compiling? Could someone please give some examples? Anyway, this still has the problem of maybe not being the most up-to-date, but it would be manageable, maybe.
d) The user could download the source tarballs and compile from scratch. This would alleviate the problem of up-to-date-ness (nice word, huh? http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/wink.gif ), but might cause problems integrating into the package management system. Plus, it would likely be a major PITA for more than just a few applications. I've seen references to 'equivs' or some such for telling the package management system that such & such dependencies are filled by locally installed software; is this right?
I know this is fairly long, but these are really the only major issues I've got w/ Debian as a system, and I'd like to get them
resolved/cleared up, at least for my own peace of mind.
TIA,
Monte
--
[This message has been edited by milanuk (edited 07 December 2000).]