[maemo-developers] Application Manager and Extras-devel: Dealing with unstable software

[From: Simon Pickering]

> the unstable repository--whatever, so the user decides (perhaps with
> the encouragement of some of their peers) to dive in, add the unstable
> repository and install the application.

Use an install file to install the application in question? Assuming  
the application needs libraries which are contained in the  
extras-devel repo, you'd need to temporarily enable that repo. My  
feeling is that the repos enabled/added as part of install files  
should be disabled immediately after the app in question has been  
added in any case, so I suggest this change is made to the way  
Application Manager handles the install files.

Would that achieve the desired goal? It would require that a list of  
application install files are available (perhaps auto-generated from  
the contents of the repo, or perhaps by the author in question?)

> packages origin (color coding, a small icon) and notices might also
> help ("this package is unstable software, and may contain many
> significant bugs, are you sure you want to install it?"), or even some
> sort of apt pinning system to ignore certain updates.

I also like the idea of flagging applications that come from somewhere  
other than Extras, and I suppose it would be possible to have an  
Updates section with Stable and Unstable candidates in it (or perhaps  
allow updates to be sorted by their origin repo - and have Extras as  
the default origin). But these are still more for power users, simply  
disabling the repo immediately after use is imo a better bet for  
unskilled "users".

Cheers,


Simon