Re: Fresh packaging ideas

From	"David Holden" <SpamBin@apdl.co.uk>
Newsgroups	comp.sys.acorn.apps, comp.sys.acorn.programmer
Subject	Re: Fresh packaging ideas
Date	2012-01-19 08:03 +0000
Organization	APDL
Message-ID	<9nq11pFf5gU1@mid.individual.net> (permalink)
References	<fUj*KgmXt@news.chiark.greenend.org.uk> <5d11035a-08bc-449d-afe8-78409267623c@k6g2000vbz.googlegroups.com> <ba56ac5352.martin@blueyonder.co.uk>

Cross-posted to 2 groups.

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On 18-Jan-2012, Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:

> While I am sure it's theoretically possible to morph libpkg/PackMan into
> a proper package manager for RISC OS, I believe it would be a long and
> tortuous process, and we could get much better results much more quickly
> by simply starting with a clean slate and, this time, taking account of
> user comments *before* it's laid down in code.

> My instinct is to view RiscPkg as a first pass and an experience to be
> learned from, not the absolute end of the story (even in a modified
> form).

ISTR saying almost exactly that a very, very long time ago and you agreed
with me and then the whole thing got forgotten about in the pro/anti debate.
None of the people engaged in that seemed to understand that the ONLY reason
people were arguing against is because the current offering just don't do
what they want and, IMO, would take more work to 'fix' than starting out
from scratch.

> What I'd really love would be for the absolute minimum specification of
> a valid package to match up perfectly with the currently accepted
> practice of distributing manually-installed software - that is to say, a
> zip file containing an application, maybe a couple of preliminary text
> files, possibly some extras/helper apps/resource files, and a skeleton
> !Boot structure containing anything which should go in Resources,
> !System, Choices, !Fonts, etc.  (That's assuming the presence of a
> universal command-line boot merge utility, something currently lacking.)
> Then everyone could transition to a package manager with the minimum of
> effort, albeit obviously with all the bits which make package management
> worthwhile missing (and 'malformed' zip files in the strange zoo of RISC
> OS software could be problematic).

I agree. It would fairly simple for each zip file to contain a text file
with a commonly agreed upon name which would contain the information
required by the package manager *but* in clearly human readable (and
understandable) form so people who wanted to install manually would know
where to put stuff and whether to merge or replace, etc. This would just
require a few mutually agreed keywords.

With all due respect to the people who've already started the projects IMO
the real problem is that they're programmers and have looked at the whole
thing from that POV. What is needed is for the programmers to back off until
the 'rest of the world' has come up with some sort of idea of what they
want. After all, they are the ones who will have to use it [1] and if it
doesn't suit (no matter how 'wonderful') it will fail.

To create a successful program that will be widely used first you decide
what you want it to do, which requires 'market research'. Next you decide
how you're going to do it; you 'design' the program and, very important, the
user interface. Then, and only then, do you start writing code. For obvious
reasons most people whose expertise is in programming tend to truncate the
first two stages somewhat and then end up having to re-design and re-write a
lot of stuff, which is the state we're in now.

[1] I suppose I would have to include me in this as well. As I own and
distribute more RISC OS software titles than anyone else anything that wants
to be 'universally accepted' ideally should work with my stuff.

-- 
David Holden  -  APDL  -  <http://www.apdl.co.uk>

Thread

Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-15 17:02 +0000
  Re: Fresh packaging ideas Jim Nagel <jimnewsm10d@abbeypress.co.uk> - 2012-01-16 11:39 +0000
  Re: Fresh packaging ideas wpb <w.blatchley@yahoo.com> - 2012-01-16 05:49 -0800
    Re: Fresh packaging ideas Steve Fryatt <news@stevefryatt.org.uk> - 2012-01-16 19:01 +0000
    Re: Fresh packaging ideas Chris Evans <chris@cjemicros.co.uk> - 2012-01-17 13:04 +0000
      Re: Fresh packaging ideas wpb <w.blatchley@yahoo.com> - 2012-01-17 23:01 -0800
        Re: Fresh packaging ideas Chris Evans <chris@cjemicros.co.uk> - 2012-01-18 15:16 +0000
    Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-17 22:32 +0000
      Re: Fresh packaging ideas Matthew Phillips <spam2011m@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-18 07:37 +0000
  Re: Fresh packaging ideas News Poster <workstuff@mail.com> - 2012-01-16 11:46 -0800
  Re: Fresh packaging ideas Alan <alan_baa@hotmail.com> - 2012-01-16 14:39 -0800
    Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-17 22:23 +0000
      Re: Fresh packaging ideas Alan <alan_baa@hotmail.com> - 2012-01-18 05:04 -0800
        Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-18 21:33 +0000
          Re: Fresh packaging ideas "David Holden" <SpamBin@apdl.co.uk> - 2012-01-19 08:03 +0000
            Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-19 11:46 +0000
            Re: Fresh packaging ideas Alan <alan_baa@hotmail.com> - 2012-01-19 05:45 -0800
              Re: Fresh packaging ideas News poster <news@mistymornings.net> - 2012-01-19 19:35 +0100
          Re: Fresh packaging ideas Matthew Phillips <spam2011m@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-19 08:09 +0000
            Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-19 19:36 +0000
              Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-19 20:27 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-19 21:18 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Matthew Phillips <spam2011m@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-19 23:01 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-20 20:22 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-20 09:02 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-20 09:04 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Jess Hampshire <jesshampshire@googlemail.com> - 2012-01-23 19:43 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas wpb <w.blatchley@yahoo.com> - 2012-01-23 21:30 -0800
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-25 16:18 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-25 18:15 +0100
              Re: Fresh packaging ideas Matthew Phillips <spam2011m@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-19 21:55 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-19 23:02 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-20 19:48 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Matthew Phillips <spam2011m@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-20 20:44 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-20 21:10 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 00:51 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 04:39 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-21 15:34 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 04:32 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 04:44 +0100
          Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-19 13:53 +0000
            Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-19 20:56 +0000
              Re: Fresh packaging ideas Chris Evans <chris@cjemicros.co.uk> - 2012-01-20 13:32 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Patric@invalid.com - 2012-01-20 16:16 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas druck <news@druck.org.uk> - 2012-01-21 09:55 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Fred Bambrough <fred@[127.0.0.1]> - 2012-01-21 11:00 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 19:04 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Dave Symes <dave@triffid.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 19:09 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Ron Briscoe <ron.briscoe@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 20:18 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Patric@invalid.com - 2012-01-21 23:21 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Stuart <Spambin@argonet.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 23:28 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-21 04:18 +0100
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Alan <alan_baa@hotmail.com> - 2012-01-22 07:51 -0800
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Frank de Bruijn <zuiderduin@hotmail.com> - 2012-01-23 08:13 +0100
              Re: Fresh packaging ideas Alan <alan_baa@hotmail.com> - 2012-01-23 05:06 -0800
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Martin Bazley <martin.bazley@blueyonder.co.uk> - 2012-01-23 21:32 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Alan <alan_baa@hotmail.com> - 2012-01-24 05:05 -0800
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-25 22:41 +0000
                Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-26 15:33 +0100
  Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-17 06:39 +0100
    Re: Fresh packaging ideas druck <news@druck.org.uk> - 2012-01-17 23:10 +0000
      Re: Fresh packaging ideas Rick Murray <heyrickmail-usenet@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-01-18 09:26 +0100
    Re: Fresh packaging ideas Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> - 2012-01-17 23:10 +0000
  Re: Fresh packaging ideas Stuart <Spambin@argonet.co.uk> - 2012-01-17 15:20 +0000
    Re: Fresh packaging ideas Gavin Wraith <gavin@wra1th.plus.com> - 2012-01-17 16:33 +0000
      Re: Fresh packaging ideas Chris Johnson <chrisjohnson+news@spamcop.net> - 2012-01-17 17:02 +0000
        Re: Fresh packaging ideas Tim Hill <tim@invalid.org.uk> - 2012-01-21 15:12 +0000
  Re: Fresh packaging ideas  <news@iank.org.uk> - 2012-01-28 12:19 +0000

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