apt-class WAS: fai next level

[Jens Ruehmkorf]

On Wed, 14 Nov 2001, Chad Walstrom wrote:

> > * there really isn't any error handling of packages not being in the
> >   archive.
>
> Exactly.  One of those reasons I think a state-based install would
> benefit us greatly.
>
> > I was thinking of writing it in either C++ or Python, any preferences?
>
> Bash,

I'd agree if you want to have wide portability and mean ash or any other
(almost) posix compliant shell.

> unless you're willing to commit us to installing Python on our systems
> as well, or porting your C++ tools to a number of architectures.

Hm. I really don't see any problems with porting tools written in C to
other architectures. And you have small size and speed.

> Currently, we can't get a working install without Perl. This is
> unfortunate.  I know there are developers working on tools to make
> Python a necessity as well.  Again, unfortunate.

Well, either you use a scripting language because of maintainability.
Then use perl/python (boot-floppies used python for example and still has
some python code for the build process). bash is not considerably smaller
and way slower, some of its extensions are not posix-compliant.

To make myself clear: I myself use bash-scripts and will continue to do
so, but simply because sometimes they are easier to write or maintain than
perl/python scripts.

--
Jens