gEDA-dev: Gschem and Cairo graphics library

[Igor2]

On Sun, 30 Jul 2006, Stuart Brorson wrote:

>Alas, another top post!  Sorry!
>
>What you say is fine.  I have heard from many people over the last two
>years that the install CD is brain-dead, wrong-headed, and/or just
>plain stupid.  Fair enough.  But apparently enough people have used it
>to install gEDA and become productive that it has served its purpose.
>And that's my goal, not producing an installer which conforms to the
>package-management philosophy du jour.
>
>My challenge to those who don't like the CD is this:
>
>Please produce a single download file which installs the whole set of
>gEDA tools onto the computer of a naive user.  The tools to install
>should be at least those available on my CD, if not a superset of
>those tools.  The installation method can be distro-specific (i.e. one
>for FC, one for SuSE, one for Debian, etc)  It can be something like a
>yum server bundled with all the relevant dependencies.  Make it easy
>for the naive user to get the software onto their boxen with one or a
>few clicks.  And not just the gEDA/gaf stuff, but also PCB, Icarus
>Verilog, ngspice, gnucap, gerbv, etc etc etc.

If I would make such thing using the chroot idea, would you then maintain
it long term?

It would be like this: the user gets the stuff as an ISO or as a
tarball. In either case he also gets a simple shell script he needs to
run.

The ISO/tarball would not be distribution-specific, but would depend on
chroot and X only. Of course it's only for Linux kernel and x86 (binary
distribution). 

>Don't, however, make a tool which requires an internet connection,
>knowledge of Klik, or the ability to use [apt-get, yum, etc], or
>require more than basic-level Linux ability.  Please keep in mind that
>many users are not developers, and don't feel comfortable with (or
>even know about) these package/dependency management tools.

Those who choose the ISO version would need to be able to burn a CD and
start a shell script on the cd. 

<snip>

>Getting back to my challenge: If somebody would step up and produce
>such a beast, I am 100% sure that his installer would end up in a
>prominent place on the gEDA downloads page.   It would be a great
>thing for the gEDA project!  And I'd be happy to see my CD Installer
>become just a happy memory if we got a complete set of more 
>spiffy installers.   However, unless somebody actually produces such a
>beast, all opinions on this issue are "full of sound and fury,
>signifying nothing."

Well, it wouldn't be a real installer as it wouldn't add anything to the
user's own system. This is disadvantage as in having many binaries inside
the chroot that may exist on the system anyway. However, for a beginner
who doesn't care to learn package management it would worth as there
wouldn't be any lib dependencies and would be pretty
distribution-independent. 

The only real problem is communication between the chroot and the outer
system, like when the user wants to save his stuff to be open with another
tool his system has. He wouldn't be able to access his home. Of course the
outer system still can easily 'look in' the chrooted environment.

>Stuart

bye

Igor2