The art of installing programs on Linux

Installing new programs on Linux, while having HUGE advantages over the Windows way of doing things, can confuse new users. Here is a list of things that could be improved...

1. Open source ... and something more

Free software allows anyone to access its source code. However, most users do not want to access the source code of the programs, but a simple binary. In that sense, developers should worry about making their applications available for all versions, or at least most of them. Luckily, they don't have to do their dirty work, as there are a large number of fans of the different distros that can help in this noble task.

2. Uh ... now what?

I just installed X application and the shortcut is not showing in the main menu. It sure ever happened to you, especially with Windows applications installed through Wine. This is unacceptable in a XNUMXst century operating system.

3. Standardize the interfaces

Let's forget for a second about the crazy idea of ​​unifying installation packages into a single format, that will never happen (in some cases, for very valid reasons). However, it could be very useful if the graphical package installation interfaces look similar and even be compatible with different package systems. This happens in some cases, but it should be done more diligently.

4. Compilation should be easier

Many times it is impossible to get the packages of a program for our favorite distro. In that case, the only option left is to download the source code and try to compile it. The bad news is that many do not include a detail of the steps to follow to be successful in this complicated task. Wouldn't it be nice if an install.sh script was included that would take care of everything, even checking for dependencies?

5. The odyssey of uninstalling a program compiled "by hand"

Uninstalling a program that has been compiled "by hand" can become a real nightmare, especially if the developers did not include instructions for make uninstall.

6. A standard meta-package?

OK, we are never ever going to agree to use a common packet format. However, wouldn't it be possible to use a meta-package inside which any of the existing package formats could be stored (in the same way that the AVI meta-package can store different video formats)? That way the same package could work on any distro. 🙂

7. Standardized package names

Why the hell do different distros give the same packages different names? To make it easier to solve package dependency problems, it would be essential to agree on a uniform and standardized method for naming packages.

8. Standardize the way packages are built

In addition to the names, it is necessary to standardize the method in which the programs are grouped to build packages. Today each distro does what it wants. Correcting this problem would make the package hierarchy more consistent and greatly reduce confusion.

9. Automatic compilation and installation of source code

Wouldn't it be nice if package managers were able to automatically download, compile, and install programs instead of having to use the current package system? Yaourt seems to go along these lines… but there should be more experiences in this regard.

10. Updates from the web browser

In Ubuntu, Apt comes with a tool to install programs directly from the web browser. Other distros should replicate this experience and it would even be interesting to develop online package managers. It would not be a security hole, as long as the programs would be downloaded from the official repositories of the distro.

11. Is it really worth having so many different package formats?

I don't know if full and absolute standardization is the best option, but let's agree that the existence of an infinite number of different package formats makes things more difficult for developers who want all Linux users to use their applications.

12. Run after install

When will the possibility of running the application that one just installed appear? It's so simple and it would be sooooo useful. Instead of showing superfluous information (or at least details that most users do not want to know), it would be interesting if we had this option.

13. Keep source builds in package database

Compiling and installing a program in Linux is not only a difficult task, in addition, the package manager will not be aware of the installation of that program or its dependencies, believing that they are still not satisfied. A package manager that allows the compilation and installation of programs from their source code would also solve this problem.

14. Remove old dependencies

This is not the case with aptitude or yum, but when we use apt-get to uninstall packages, their dependencies (which are no longer required by other packages) are not uninstalled along with them. To remedy this situation, use sudo apt-get autoremove. Gentlemen, this should be automatic ... for a long time!

Source: Techradar