[CentOS] Re: are RPMForge and EPEL compatible?

Les Mikesell lesmikesell at gmail.com
Sun Dec 9 19:15:08 UTC 2007


Axel Thimm wrote:
> On Fri, Dec 07, 2007 at 05:12:06PM -0600, Les Mikesell wrote:
>> But it would be even better if we could live with the assumption that repos 
>> will have incompatibilities, whether accidental or intentional. Then it 
>> would become a choice of which to install and things wouldn't break when 
>> somewhere else updates first.  Then you could focus on making your versions 
>> better instead of compatible - and the politics wouldn't matter.
> 
> Sorry, that's not possible. Just to give an example: For some reason
> you favour repo A and make it trump over repo B. Both repos ship
> libfoo and repo B ships also appbaz needing libfoo with a couple more
> configure options turned on.
> 
> No smart package manager in the world will detect this breakage. One
> could strat thinking about stricter dependencies etc. but there will
> always be real-world scenarios like the above spoiling your master
> plan.

How much more information would rpm/yum need to store and consider in 
order to understand that they should never overwrite a package from one 
repository with one from a different repository without explicit 
instructions? Permitting explicit repository-specific dependencies would 
be nice too, although that could be worked around given the ability to 
control the initial repo for a package and an understanding that no 
other repo's version should replace it without permission even if it has 
the same name and a higher version number.

-- 
   Les Mikesell
    lesmikesell at gmail.com



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