rpm experiences [was: Backing up whole system]

[Craig White]

On Sun, 2009-05-10 at 07:58 -0400, Tom Horsley wrote:
> On Sun, 10 May 2009 00:53:52 -0400
> Gene Heskett wrote:
> 
> > That leaves both of us in the dark calling each other less than 
> > experts.  And that isn't pretty to the bystanders.
> 
> All I know about making rpms is that I searched the web for
> simple instructions and found a link to a guide all kinds of
> different pages pointed at as the simplest possible intro
> document for building an rpm: It was a 97 page long pdf file.
> I ran screaming into the night :-).
> 
> There was also my 2nd hand experience at work. The guys who
> do the packaging of our software were filled with dread at
> the prospect of making .deb packages, because they knew how
> long they fought with rpm to get all the fiddling details
> right.
> 
> With grim determination in their eyes they marched off to do
> battle with the .deb packaging tools, then with amazement,
> they emerged from their cubicles, having gotten the .deb
> building down pat in a couple of hours.
> 
> I can only conclude there is something fundamentally wrong
> with the simplicity factor in rpms :-).
----
I suppose you can find out what War and Peace was about by reading the
Cliff Notes

I find that people will endlessly search for simplified instructions
rather than invest their time on comprehensive documentation. I'm guilty
of the same behavior myself so I understand.

One of the best examples of that is samba documentation of which the
Official Samba 3 HowTo is the best documentation for open source
software I have ever seen but many people want the Cliff Notes version
and spend more time struggling than if they had actually read the
documentation. As Rosie said in "White Men Can't Jump", sometimes when
you win, you lose and when you lose, you win...

Craig


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