Re: spatial stuff detail

[Ole Laursen <olau hardworking dk>]

John Siracusa <siracusa mindspring com> writes:

[...]

> > See http://autopackage.org/faq.html, about 3/4 of the way down, the
> > question entitled "What's wrong with NeXT style appfolders?"
> 
> I see it, but I don't agree with it.  First, Linux is no more
> "pluggable" than any Unix-ish OS, including OS X (i.e. both have
> loadable kernel modules, file system plugins, shared libraries, etc.).
> Second, dependency management is a red herring.  It can be done with
> application packages just as it is done without them. You need
> something to check/track this information whether or not you use app
> packages, so it is not an argument against them.  Ditto for
> install/uninstall logic.  App wrappers are not a panacea, but they are
> too useful not to have.   Despite the "update" at the end of that FAQ
> item, many (possibly "most") OS X applications remain simple
> drag-installs.  Giving up this feature entirely because some software
> is not well suited to drag-installs is throwing out the baby with  the
> bath water.

I fail to understand the problem. Installing RPM and Debian packages
should be very easy - much quicker and easier than the dreadful
installation wizards on Windows. At least if you make them
double-clickable (asking for the administrator password).

Debian has lots of graphical and semi-graphical package management
tools for both installing and uninstalling software. And when I was
using Red Hat there was GnoRPM. Or Red Carpet.

What is it that those "app wrappers" give you? (I've never really used
a Mac so I don't know.)

-- 
Ole Laursen
http://www.cs.auc.dk/~olau/