[Tfug] [dmarti at zgp.org: [linux-elitists] Antipackages and surveys]

[erich]

I don't use Debian,

            But I see exactly where he's coming from. How about 
no-Tex/Texlive
or no-QT?. Like Perl, Python is so pervasive that it is hard to see how
defeating it would buy you anything however.

                                                                                                          
Erich

Claude Rubinson wrote:
> Thought the following might be of interest to some.
>
> C.
>
> ----- Forwarded message from Don Marti <dmarti at zgp.org> -----
>
> From: Don Marti <dmarti at zgp.org>
> Date: Sat, 12 Sep 2009 07:03:50 -0700
> Subject: [linux-elitists] Antipackages and surveys
> To: linux-elitists at zgp.org
>
> Quite a while ago, some of us discussed the idea of
> "antipackages" -- deb packages with _just conflicts_,
> no actual software.
>
> Here's an initial batch:
>
>   http://gitorious.org/antipackages
>   git clone git://gitorious.org/antipackages/antipackages.git   
>
> So far there are: no-java, no-mono, no-python, and
> no-wesnoth.  I'm sure there are other categories of
> stuff that people don't want to have dragged onto
> their systems by mistake.
>
> I'm starting to suspect that straightforward
> "popularity contest" package checks might overstate
> the popularity of large software runtimes -- if you
> try one little doo-dad that depends on a monster
> software package, you get listed as a user of same,
> so what the heck, every developer might as well depend
> on it because so many users have it.
>
> Antipackages could help give a voice to the
> constituency that just wants less software on the
> system. 
>
> Yes, I know, they should be a proper apt-gettable
> package repository.
>
>