securitybreach Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 For Mageia - the RPM based distro which I know best - the equivalent package managers are: rpm=dpkg urpmi=apt-get rpmdrake=synaptic Since PCLOS has the same origins as Mageia (namely Mandrake/Mandriva) I don't know why Texstar went away from the Mandriva package management model. I do know he wasn't the biggest fan of the way Mandrake/Mandriva ran its operations. Yeah, now that you mention it.. I think this was not how PcLinuxOS was back when I tried it out.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raymac46 Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 Barry B is a long time member here and he uses RPM distros. Maybe he knows. I did a search for "PCLOS Synaptic" and didn't find much. I was hoping maybe Bruno posted about it back in the day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 Barry B is a long time member here and he uses RPM distros. Maybe he knows. I did a search for "PCLOS Synaptic" and didn't find much. I was hoping maybe Bruno posted about it back in the day. Well I am familiar with RPMs and Debs but not mixed together.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hedon James Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 I was curious enough to do some googling and ended up in a rabbit hole. There is nothing definitive to explain why Texstar went that route, but you can kind of/sort of connect the dots. The most helpful info was here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APT-RPM The rest of the pieces look like this: - PCLOS is derived from Mandrake/Mandriva, an RPM distro that used urpmi package manager - Texstar (Bill Reynolds) was a Mandrake/Mandriva developer - Tex didn't like the way Mandrake/Mandriva was run (a prescient observation, eh?) and forked it into PCLOS, cloning RPM repo packages for his PCLOS repos - Tex also didn't like "limitations" of urpmi package manager (no indications of what those "limitations" were), although he liked the flexibility of RPM "flags" - Tex admired the Debian-based Advanced Packaging Tool (APT) and found it to be superior to any RPM package managers available in the early years of his fork (which appears to be circa 2003) - early versions of PCLOS were nearly cloned forks of Mandriva, but at some point he crossed paths with Connectiva Linux developers (perhaps disgruntled developers commiserated with him after Mandriva's acquisition of Connective?) - the apt-rpm fusion into a package manager had already been fused/created by Connectiva developers - Tex didn't create apt-rpm, he just adopted it and continues to use it (along with 4-5 other smaller distros; PCLOS is the most well-known user of apt-rpm) So there's the disjointed history that I've been able to piece together. While it makes perfect sense to me that a former Mandrake/Mandriva developer would stick with his RPM roots while forking a distro, there is no "smoking gun" evidence of what feature(s) Tex was after when he discovered apt-rpm and wrapped the Synaptic GUI around it. Even though we know he admired the flexibility of the Debian APT tool (no indications of what "flexibility" features he admired), we still don't know the specifics of what he was trying to achieve...only the generalities of it. Whatever it was, he was apparently successful, as he has had ample opportunity to switch back to an RPM-based package manager, or to have commissioned development of a new/custom package manager for PCLOS; but instead continues to utilize & refine apt-rpm. So now we know everything about the process, but still don't know the actual reason. Anyone else able to put the finishing touches on this story? I'm not even a PCLOS user and I'm dying to know the answer to this one! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
securitybreach Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 Well I had previously know about everything but the apt-rpm fusion part which must of happened after I used PCLos. Interesting, thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raymac46 Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 @HJ I think you probably have the kernel of the apt-rpm issue. I know as a "first learned- still speaking" apt user I have always appreciated the apt way of doing things. Only pacman comes close to apt in my view - and the apt based GUIs are still better. My first encounter with PCLOS was when I decided to try something other than Ubuntu back around 2007. I found the fact that it had a familiar update method quite comforting. What killed PCLOS for me was there were often long periods of time without a new release and then you got massive updates and somehow my system didn't like that and so I was borked. I came here, Bruno supported me as I learned Mandriva and I used it for a long time until the company crashed and burned. During this time I got used to the rpm way of doing things and to be honest Mandriva had the best set of GUI tools I'd seen up to then. The updates seemed clunkier than I remembered from Ubuntu days but everything worked. Now I'm back in the Debian universe with Linux Mint and the latest apt technology is great. I don't use Synaptic much - the LM Update Manager and Software Center suit me fine. I do use apt itself to update my MX-16 VM. It has been fun taking a look at PCLOS again - something I probably would not have done without the need to help out here. But I still find the apt-rpm way to be strangely inconsistent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onederer Posted February 24, 2017 Author Share Posted February 24, 2017 HEY! I really enjoy all your inputs. I guess I never put much thought to whether it is apt, Debian, or whatever. I just kept on shopping 'till I found an OS that just kept on working. Especially when PCLinuxOS became a semi-auto rolling system, I thought that this was great! For a number of years now, I've been using this OS, and found that all the applications just seemed to run flawlessly. And I love the wide selection of available applications, just ready for usage. Before, I had mentioned that I was tired of being a Linux mechanic, and wanted to just be a user. This OS has made that possible. Which accounts why I've not had the reason to come to web sites such as this one for help, for quite a long time. This OS just gave me no reason to seek any help. I had become a simple user all that time. Don't get me wrong, I love the people here, and their willingness to offer their knowledge when someone needs help. I'm just a low key social website user. You will ever barely find me on a social website. For you that want to get technical about the apt usage, that's fine. But perhaps some of you may just want to again use a very reliable OS that just keeps on ticking, and is very well maintained. Bells and whistles included, and no "systemd" that's a constarnation for many people. This OS simply sits on a steady and solid platform. It was all of you that helped me to sort out something that I didn't understand. Now I know better. The OS is fine, it was me who lacked the proper knowledge to understand the under-pinnings of the apt-get saga. Everything is fine! Cheers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hedon James Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 Glad we could help onederer, but now we're on to solving this problem of finding out WHY the developer of PCLOS decided to use a Debian-based APT tool to manage his RPM packages. Of the hundreds, if not thousands, of linux distros, PCLOS is the most well-known of about 4-5 distros that have chosen this most unusual pairing. Anyone who walks alone, or against the grain, is reasoning enough for me to consider Bill Reynolds (Texstar) a person of interest. If it turns out he is some kind of unheralded genius for this pioneering ways, he will be immediately promoted to the upper echelon of that list of interesting people. JMO... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raymac46 Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 @onederer ii never hurts to check in here now and again. As you may have noted we don't have an actual user of PCLOS who comes by, so it takes us a while to spool up and figure things out. If someone else comes along with a PCLOS problem it's nice to have someone who knows the ropes to help out. I know we have Debian, Arch, Slackware, SUSE and Mageia folks here most days. We are just noodling a bit and I suppose we could have another thread on this apt-rpm stuff but bear with us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onederer Posted February 24, 2017 Author Share Posted February 24, 2017 I came across Texstar (Bill Reynolds) across another venue. It was with Google +. Bill loves the ladies, and was sending me a variety of female pictures and other pictures with captions on the bottom (or we could add our own caption). Something happened and I lost the link. I've not been able to find it again (actually, not made a high effort to find it). He does have quite a good sense of humor! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunrat Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 Texstar G+ home page - https://plus.google....592840042386425 I notice PCLos Magazine is still going. Great effort! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hedon James Posted February 24, 2017 Share Posted February 24, 2017 Texstar G+ home page - https://plus.google....592840042386425 Sense of humor is correct...hahaha! I used to think Tuesdays were the second Monday of every week. Now I wish every day was Tuesday! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onederer Posted February 25, 2017 Author Share Posted February 25, 2017 You guys going to visit Bill, and say hello? He might send you some cute girly pictures with quotes on the bottom! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
saturnian Posted February 25, 2017 Share Posted February 25, 2017 I've been away from PCLinuxOS for a few years, but I ran it off and on in the past, going back to around 2006. I still have the PCLOS 0.92 CD, but I think I ran 0.91, too. I was using dial-up back then, not the ideal situation for running a rolling-release distro! My most recent PCLOS installation was done from the 2010.07 release (I still have that disk, too!); I kept that running for a couple of years, upgrading through PCLOS 2012.02 or 2012.08 or something like that. I think that PCLOS was doing the apt-rpm thing from the start. Check out the package management info in their chart at Distrowatch: https://www.distrowa...ution=pclinuxos Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onederer Posted February 25, 2017 Author Share Posted February 25, 2017 RU going to try it again? Just use the live mode as a refresher. And if you like it, that same disk can install it on your hard drive, or on a USB memory drive. When you've setup the system to your preference, you can make a new live disk, which can be used to overcome a crash. Personally, as long as the OS is reliable, and simply works, I'll accept the way that it was designed. You may think that it's a kluge, and maybe it is. However, it's a successful setup. The maintenance is great, And it's not lacking for a variety of applications. One that I like is the computer recipes for homebrew beer. Cheers! Cheers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
saturnian Posted February 25, 2017 Share Posted February 25, 2017 RU going to try it again? Just use the live mode as a refresher. Probably won't, although because of this thread, I considered trying a live session to take a look at things. Aw, snap, I just remembered that Tex had something against man pages, or he didn't like to include man pages in the default installation, I guess. I wonder if that has changed. I know that one can view online man pages but I like them on the system, too, so I didn't like that part. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
onederer Posted February 25, 2017 Author Share Posted February 25, 2017 I didn't use anything to install PCLOS. However, I've used manpages once in a while to try to get a better understaning of something. The instructions are pretty clear to install the OS. Never had that problem. And I do believe that manpages would be available in Synaptic for installation? One thing to remember, kernels don't automatically installed. Symantic is needed to pick the latest one and have Symantic install it. Cheers! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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