[maemo-developers] [maemo-developers] ipkg vs dpkg

[From: Matthew Allum]

Hi;

On 11/29/05, Russell Nelson <nelson at crynwr.com> wrote:
> Matthew Allum writes:
>  > Surely this isn't a fair comparison as the packages in Debian 2.2
>  > arn't 'tuned' to embedded use ( i.e include docs, .la files etc etc ).
>  > You'd be better comparing udebs that make up D-I or something.
>
> I'm only talking about the overhead of the package manager, not the
> contents of the packages themselves.
>

Okey, but surely some of the metadata you've measured is dependant on
whats actually in the package ?

>  > Also I dont know how you make numbers out of ipkg's lack of any real
>  > maintainership, constant instability ( likely due to former ), wierd
>  > versioning scheme, memory issues and horrific 'UI' ( see ipkg -h ).
>
> Those are problems with ipkg, to be sure, but dpkg has its own
> usability issues, and needs a front-end (apt-get) to have ipkg's
> functionality.
>

Agreed.

> There is no really great package manager for a small-storage system.

Agreed.

> How do we get there from here?
>

Somebody writes something new that kicks arse and addresses the issues
with dpkg and ipkg.

>  > PS; note; Im not saying dpkg is ideal for embedded systems here, just
>  > that ipkg is not ideal either ( maybe it used to be but not so much
>  > nowadays ).
>
> Repeat after me: "the 770 is not an embedded system".  It is a small
> computer with neither a qwerty keyboard nor a big hard drive, nor a
> really fast processor.
>

"the 770 is not an embedded system" - OK :) You understand my point
though - we could argue all week on if my digitial watch for example
was a small computer or an embedded system.

  -- Matthew