Le Tue, Jun 05, 2007 at 10:09:07AM +0200, Michael Hanke a écrit : > > My question is now: Is it reasonable to provide this rather huge amount > of data in a package in the archive? > > An alternative to a dedicated package would be to provide a > download/install script for the data (like the msttcorefonts package) > that is called at package postinst.
Hi Michael, many thanks for bringing this crucial question on -devel. In my field, I wish that it would be possible to apt-get install the human genome for instance. I recently had a heretic idea that I did not dare to submit yet: we could port fink to Debian, and use it to build .debs from info files shipped in Debian packages in main, and sources downloaded from upstream's FTP sites. This way, we would not exponentialy inflate the size of the Debian mirrors, while benefiting of the full strengh of Debian's package management system. The Fink project: http://finkproject.org An example of info file : http://bindist.finkmirrors.net/bindist/dists/10.4/release/main/finkinfo/sci/emboss.info Bug reporting could be done on the Debian package containing the info files. In the case of scientific databases, the "sources" are hosted on FTP sites which usually have more bandwith than the internal network of the lab I am working in. I understand the opinion that duplicating this would be a waste. The use of the fink system would permit to depend on the correct Debian packages to post-process the databases and install them where expected. Have a nice day, -- Charles Plessy http://charles.plessy.org Wako, Saitama, Japan -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
