James Powell <james4591@???> escribió:
[...]
> Devuan should follow the Debian methodology, but equally it should
> forge it's own path away from Debian. It doesn't need to draw from
> any other distribution like Funtoo, CRUX, Slackware, or anything
> other distributions, other than seeing what people are using and in
> need of. The wants will be many, but what users need will matter
> most of all.
[...]

I have thought extensively (in some sort of silence, I suppose, since
you have not heard of^H read from me for a long time) in this issue of
packages and dependencies, and I have come across an idea, that of
boxes.

Everyone that has anytime been trapped in the Dependency Hell knows
about the complicated chains of dependencies in Debian. As a simple
example, today it is impossible to install LibreOffice 5 and KDE
together, since libreoffice 1:5.0.1~rc1-2 ends depending on libstdc++6
5.2.1-15 while kde-full 5:81 end depending on libkolabxml1 1.1.0-3
(the highest version available), but libstdc++6 Breaks libkolabxml1 <=
1.1.0-3

These chains of dependencies can be shortened if we use "boxes" of
packages. They are not metapackages, but a new idea, albeit somewhat
similar.

Why is LibreOffice worth a dozen packages? If I want LibreOffice, I
want it all (Thanks, Queen). So I install the LibreOffice box. The box
on its own will install the needed packages and care for the internal
dependencies, and provide a shiny dependencies inteface to the other
boxes. And of course, boxes can be inside boxes.

This way, boxes are managed as simple units, migrate from ceres to
testing as complete units, etc. They also allow for efficient
teamworking.

e.g. The LAMP box contains (and iterfaces with) the Apache box and the
MySQL box. The LAMP box controls the migration of all of Apache, PHP
and MySQL packages, to ensure they all work properly and are
coinstallable.

Just two (or maybe three) euro cents.

regards

Noel
er Envite