Shared libraries

[Victor Odhner]

(Was Re: a cool Opera feature that Mozilla doesn't have)

Lynn David Newton wrote:
 > Why Galeon depends on an older version of Mozilla ...
 > and can't run on its own I have no idea.

Ayyy, MEN, brother.

Bart Garst wrote:
> shared libraries. It makes sense to use code that
 > already exists instead of "re-inventing the wheel"
 > for every package.

Sorry Bart, but I'd say shared libraries make *no* sense.
Downloading a newer version of a library for a newer
program is not "re-inventing" anything.  The efficiency
is in sharing the development of libraries, not storage.
Some programs should be allowed to be newer than others.
Or older, if necessary.

Nice programs don't break each other.  Why can't they all
just get along, each with its own stuff?  Forced sharing
is the same "efficiency" that gives us DLL Hell in the
Microsoft world.

We can do better, can't we?  Fer gosh sakes, what's
$LD_LIBRARY_PATH good for, if it must be the same for
every application?  This is a big advantage Unices have
over Windows, but we're not using it to full advantage.

Compulsory sharing is a major barrier to Linux acceptance
by users whose purpose for the system is something beyond
tinkering with the system.  If you need a mixed bag of
tools, upgrading any of them risks mangling the whole
panoply.  Each time you want a new and better tool, you're
forced to take that risk.  It shouldn't be that way.

In this age of the cheap gigabyte, library sharing at the
application level is a secondary efficiency, and is only
efficient if it does no harm.  Otherwise it's a damn waste
of our invaluable time and attention.  It's a bottleneck,
like having one bathroom per floor in a hotel.

Every tool should install independently of every other
tool, bringing in new library versions as needed without
stepping on the older ones.  The installer should have a
resource online to learn about newer library versions
that are backward compatible to the tool being installed,
in case they're already available on the system.  But we
should plan on having a distinct set of libraries for
each app:  It's a bonus if some sharing is possible.

My hobby is not Linux administration, and I don't have
the time it takes to install a new package on Linux
and glue together all the broken furniture afterwards.

Give me an installer that will free me from being a
"Linux geek" so I can be a "Perl geek" or just a user.
There are just so many hours in a lifetime.

KevinO wrote:
 > urpme mozilla ...
 > urpmi --auto --auto-select --update

Talk nice, Kevin.  And oh yeah, a comprehensible
installer command language would also help.

Vic