LinkBack URL
About LinkBacks
But there is absolutely no standard for those things and no guarantee that an uninstall works. Part of the purpose of distro package management is to correct such errors by individual developers. The distro's also keep track of security risks and other problems -- they are contributing a very significant oversight layer.Originally Posted by lpaulgib
Anyway, I consider this:
apt-cache search some_package
apt-get install package
easier than:
- finding a website
- downloading a package
- playing with some wonky GUI interface that may be different each time.
So you have skipped a few steps that have to occur before you get to the apparently easy point and click, which you can save yourself all that trouble with one quick powerful command. Or two. Especially if you are working over a network via ssh, in which case you get no GUI.
Then, subsequent to all that, you can use the standard interface offered the package manager (by which I mean, yum or apt) to query stuff like what files a package installed, where they are located, etc.
yum:
repoquery --list package
apt:
dpkg-query -L package
Ba-boom, done. And like I said, one of those two works on EVERY linux system. Any and all distros.
Seriously: learn to love the command line. You will thank yourself for it later. You're a programmer, that tish shouldn't scare you. Also it's a great way to understand the fundamental elements of the system. You're a programmer: you should do that.
Now I will grant that things are a lot better these days, (I even know a 60+ year old lady who got Ubuntu working for herself) but there is still a lot to know to make the Linux experience pleasant. This knowledge typically presents a steep learning curve and for those who don't care to learn what it takes, it is an insurmountable obstacle. So I don't recommend it. I figure if someone wants to learn all the little things it takes to get a Linux system up an running, they will, they will stick with it, and they will get there under their own steam. For those who are happy without it, that's great. 
(actually you could probably afford me, but get the picture). This is what "not free as in beer means". Recently GNU and the FSF have dropped the term "open source" and gone with the more specific "free software". Sometimes the term "libre" is used because I believe in the romance languages there are two words for "free", with slightly different connotations. One of them is where we get liberated. So free as in "out of jail" and not necessarily "cost $0". The jail here AFAICT has to do with intellectual property laws, which GNU is dead set against particularly as it has come to be applied to software. The goal nothing has whether or not a distro wants to charge money. That's totally permissible.
