UniPKG - a nice blend ?

CyberTron · 2005-10-23 11:50:08

Hi!

just saw this over at osnews.com : http://web.isteve.bofh.cz/unipkg/

That is a link to a packagetool, similar to pacman, apt-get and slackware's tgz and rpm packages..

it is a tool that let one use either one of these package-standards...quite cool actually, inclusive archlinux packages...in every kind of distribution..

however, I do not see any reasons to use it...yet...but I thought I wanna let people know....it might be good to have for installing rpm's (if anyone uses them anymore...) or other programs that doesn't exist in arch or for those packages that are closed source (like nero) and only come in *.deb or *.rpm..

Bralkein · 2005-10-23 12:03:04

Hmm, maybe not such a good thing! I remember when I used to use SuSE I just installed Mandrake and Red Hat RPMs in there anyway, and it kind of works sometimes but after a long period of time you can end up really making a hash of your system, it just ended up reminding me of DLL Hell from Windows. It would be cool of course if there were some utility that I wanted or an development version for which there was a .deb or .rpm or whatever and I could just install it and everything would work fine, but in my opinion introducing foreign packages just makes a mess of things. I prefer to only touch things I have compiled my self or that are specifically tailored to my distro.

IceRAM · 2005-10-23 21:21:40

Bralkein wrote:

It would be cool of course if there were some utility that I wanted or an development version for which there was a .deb or .rpm or whatever and I could just install it and everything would work fine, but in my opinion introducing foreign packages just makes a mess of things. I prefer to only touch things I have compiled my self or that are specifically tailored to my distro.

It is called klik. Download a klick package and run. The end. No install, no nothing. Runs directly from its archive.

Klik works with ArchLinux if you use a CRAMFS enabled kernel (latest kernel26 or kernel26archck both have CRAMFS enabled).

Bralkein · 2005-10-24 13:20:50

Yes, I have seen klik before. It looks quite cool, but I am not sure about it. I have read a bit through the documentation, and it seems like the klik packages are little filesystem images that are mounted using loopback. Since I only have 8 loopback device nodes (/dev/loop0 through /dev/loop7), does this mean I can only use 8 klik packages simultaneously? Also, CRAMFS uses some kind of compression, right? Does that mean that there is some extra level of overhead associated with having to decompress the files in order to read them?

Also, since Arch is not in the list of supported distros, and while you say that it works on Arch, and I believe you, it might not be the case in all situations, maybe some problems could arise with changes being made in the software that makes it incompatible with Arch in the future.

It is quite cool though, and Linux does need something at least similar to this.

phrakture · 2005-10-24 15:11:16

This looks fairly interesting, although at the moment it has no capability to download and install dependancies.

I looks interesting, but I don't see any features that pacman doesn't have, besides the installing other packages. Might be worth keeping an eye on.

CyberTron · 2005-10-24 15:24:00

i agree phrakture, it lacks some feutures, and it is not a replacement for pacman but it is a complement to it...perhaps...maybe it will be anyway...

but it is that installingg other kind of packages that makes it intressting...

Dusty · 2005-10-24 16:58:26

I can see it being potential useful in Arch PKGBUILDs -- you use it instead of rpmundpack, for example.

Dusty

CyberTron · 2005-10-24 17:27:03

Dusty wrote:

I can see it being potential useful in Arch PKGBUILDs -- you use it instead of rpmundpack, for example.
Dusty

exactly !!

IceRAM · 2005-10-25 16:30:07

Well, the thing is I've seen packages wanting to download some a list of .debs (as dependencies I think). I don't know the internals of klik much - don't know how many apps can be run at a time.

I know that people managed to get OpenOffice kik-ed. One big package. Single-click an run.

I can see klik useful only for testing the very latest packages (test/beta/rc) which haven't been updated in Arch. I don't know how klik packages can be put into PKGBUILDs. I should note that klik packages should not be considered normal packages, as in "let's decompress it and run" - they should be considered standalone applications, since you only need to start the klik file with the klik client.

Also, it is worth looking into klik for testing entire DEs - I think I've read somebody being successful in running e17 as a kik package (something with xnest.. don't know exactly).

CyberTron · 2005-10-25 17:51:11

I belive that the klik system is similar to the MacOSX compression format, since booth are being mounted and then run

if it works then it is an intressting idea...I really like macos X soo....

IceRAM · 2005-10-25 20:34:12

CyberTron wrote:

I belive that the klik system is similar to the MacOSX compression format, since booth are being mounted and then run

Oh, indeed - I forgot to mention that. I have read comments of people saying klik is similar to the .app (I think) files in MacOS.

Unfortunately, not all applications work in ArchLinux. Maybe we should create some sort of thread with working Klik applications in ArchLinux...

Benedict_White · 2005-10-25 23:33:36

Sorry to sound difficult here, and i don't want to sound a religious purist either, but I feel i am about to do both.

If some one else has built and Arch package, I go with that, if they haven't i look to see if some one has rolled their own and copy and learn.

But folks, with a build system this easy, it so a piece of cake to roll your own and then use the package manager to install it for you. Why do anything else :?:

The only time I need this kind of thing is with closed source, which increasingly I shy away from.

So if it is OS, then make a PKGBUILD and share, and if it is not, well, if you realy have to use the vendors install.

Arch Linux

#1 2005-10-23 11:50:08

UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#2 2005-10-23 12:03:04

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#3 2005-10-23 21:21:40

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#4 2005-10-24 13:20:50

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#5 2005-10-24 15:11:16

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#6 2005-10-24 15:24:00

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#7 2005-10-24 16:58:26

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#8 2005-10-24 17:27:03

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#9 2005-10-25 16:30:07

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#10 2005-10-25 17:51:11

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#11 2005-10-25 20:34:12

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

#12 2005-10-25 23:33:36

Re: UniPKG - a nice blend ?

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