From release notes for FC5T3 (web)

[John DeDourek]

Rahul Sundaram wrote:

> Jeff Vian wrote:
>
>> I would agree on the wish for an option to select a group and expect all
>> within it to be installed.  As examples, mysql and postresql would be
>> nice for that. With FC4 less than half the individual packages for those
>> groups were installed by default and it was time consuming to do the
>> full groups.  However, IIRC the installer has never allowed selecting an
>> entire group with a single check mark.  Groups can be installed in
>> entirety from the command line with yum.
>>  
>>
> Both Anaconda and Pirut allows groups of packages to be installed. 
> Optional components arent selected within the groups by default but 
> the major packages including MySQL and PostgreSQL is selected within 
> the group usually.
>
>
Just a further note on comparisons with "Windows" (or whatever you
want to call it).  As far as adding components of Windows goes, it
is done by "groups", where checking a group appears to install only
the default components of the group.  To really find out what is
installed needs a lot of selecting and clicking of the "details" button.
The functionality sounds similar to what has been described for
anaconda, but perhaps with a different user interface.

But this I think misses the point.  What I described above is for
only the stuff that comes on the single Windows CD.  When I put
Microsoft Office on the system (two more CDs and much more money)
I was presented with a totally different installer with its own
scheme for selecting components.  And then the next piece of
commercial software had a different thing again.

Last I looked, FC5T3 had 5 CDs full of stuff.  Servers, office
tools, photo editors, etc. etc. etc.  All installable with one
installer.  Perhaps a few bumps.  (A project for this week is
to install a FC5T3 on a lab machine replacing an FC4 machine
that "bit the dust".  We normally don't install during a college
term unless something like this happens.)  So I'll reserve
comments on the user interface for this until I have tried it.

But I think that Fedora is breaking ground far ahead of Microsoft
to even have an installer and updater that covers such a large
collection of the applications in addition to the base OS.

And the large collection of available packages (CDs and various
repositories) does indeed create a user interface challenge that
is being tackled by the installer and updater application people.