| Linux software installation to improve |
Jan. 02, 2007
Installing a new application on Linux can be challenging, even for experts. Now, the LSB (Linux Standard Base) project and its parent organization, the FSG (Free Standards Group), have a plan for how to make it easier for both users and developers.
Last month, key people in the Linux software packaging world and ISVs (independent software vendors) got together in Berlin, Germany to discuss the future of Linux application packaging. The group decided to create a bridge between the various software package installment programs that the Linux distributions support and what the ISVs need to support Linux.
According to Ian Murdock, CTO of the FSG and chair of the LSB, what ISVs want is "to treat Linux as a single platform, which means they want to offer a single package for Linux, much as they do for Windows."
To give the ISVs what they wanted, the Red Hat and Novell maintainers of RPM and the authors and maintainers of APT, yum, alien, and klik quickly decided that the best real-world solution was to construct "a single API (application programming interface) that could be implemented across the various package systems, because APIs make for nice evolutionary steps and can, done right, mask underlying implementation differences," according to Murdock.
The Berlin group also decided that the API should have a limited scope, since "providing an API that spans all the functionality of, say, RPM and dpkg is overwhelming to the point of being unworkable," Murdock continued. This can work, according to Murdock, because, "Fortunately, the ISVs don't really need much. At the most basic level, an installer just needs to be able to query the system to see if it's LSB compliant, and if it is, what version of the LSB it's compliant with; and it needs to be able to 'register' with the package system, so the package system knows about it, including what files it has installed."
Then, since the assumption is that the distribution will be LSB compliant, "We don't have to worry about dependencies, because everything is covered by the single LSB dependency, and dependency management is 95% of the package systems right there. We still need minimal dependency support -- components can extend the LSB, and applications can depend on those other components being installed-but we're talking on the order of a handful of components, not the tens of thousands of components typical package systems have to deal with," added Murdock.
Given the limited duration of the meeting, the group didn't come up with a complete solution. For example, the issues associated with software un-installation were barely touched, and how applications go about changing the system configuration still needs discussion. Still, it was a start. Murdock reported that "Everyone is certainly motivated: The distros get more applications, which makes the shared platform more attractive; and ISVs get lower cost, which tilts the cost vs. benefit equation in their favor, making Linux versions more economically attractive and potentially opening new markets."
To further the development and support of this API, the FSG has created a Packaging Workgroup and is relaunching the LSB packaging mailing list. There is still, Murdock concluded, "plenty to be done."
-- Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
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