[simpits-chat] Tech...

[Roy Coates]

On Mon, 24 Feb 2003, Brian Sikkema wrote:

> Problem is half the time that doesn't work, you have to screw around with
> the makefile to get it to work for your specific system, or track down
> dependencies you don't have and get THEM installed in the right place. And
> don't get me started on trying to get things working on a system where you
> dont HAVE SU. RPMs make things nicer, but aren't 100%, either. That's
> another one of my problems that I forgot to mention, about how
> system-dependent everything is. There are so many distros out there and so
> many programs need adjustments to work on one they aren't coded specifically
> for, and most people (including myself) just dont want to screw with it,
> they want to install their program and run it. The only time that should be
> taken is the time it takes for the install program to copy the files over,
> IMHO. But I've never seen a program with so much as an install script, even.
> It seems like such a simple concept, make a small program to install
> software. But noone in the *nix world seems to want to do that for their
> software. Probably because they know it wouldnt work 90% of the time,
> because there would be some adjustment to make.
>

These days I find most software happily follows the now almost standard
./configure
make
make install

It can be a bitch when one package depends on another, which needs another
and so on - pain in the ass.

Unix is still too complicated to get folks to switch from windows. Crappy
installers and a directory tree that is ridiculously outdated and over
complicated. One day, maybe one day it'll finally get reworked.

Another 2c please.

Roy.