Thread: [Split] ...maybe we should start another thread about package managers
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reinob is offline reinob
2015-01-08 , 12:26
Posts: 1,808 | Thanked: 4,272 times | Joined on Feb 2011 @ Germany
#31
Originally Posted by Mentalist Traceur View Post
There's legitimate reasons to not run R&D mode. Honestly the only reason I've found in the long term to run it is when hardware bugs (the little internal capacity/batter doesn't charge, so if you let the battery discharge it starts to boot loop instead of actually charging when it gets bad enough - turning on R&D mode avoids that), or software bugs (on my first N900 it seemed that the watchdogs or the lifeguard reset killed stuff).

But besides that I happily ran without R&D mode on my N900s for a long while - I used to say everyone should be running it too, but honestly I don't really have strong reasons to advocate either way... but I kinda mellowed out with regard to that position over time.
It may well be the case that when everything works OK R&D is not needed. However Maemo is a very delicate system where minor fvck-ups in the boot process will lead to a boot loop unless R&D is on (watchdogs).

So my advice is to leave it on. No disadvantages, but (potential) advantages if something goes seriously wrong.

Did you forget my rdmod utility? That'll turn your R&D mode on for you right on-device.
I wrote "if USB breaks AND you brick it". I assume you cannot run your tool from a bricked device

Funny enough lots of people do, actually. You know, they're not exactly app stores, but they use the distro-provided GUI wrapper around the actual package managing stack.
Fine. If you take Debian as an example: you can do autoremove and dist-upgrade until you get bored, because the dependencies are done right (it *is* bloated, but at least coherent). So you can use, say, synaptic, and play with it without fear that suddenly your kernel will be installed but not the modules (which, judging from the problems people around here have, seems to be one of the main causes).

In Maemo, I submit, you only remove/upgrade/install if you are able to:
(1) see EXACTLY what's gonna happen. Which packages are going to be removed, upgraded or new-installed; and preferably:

(2) you actually understand the consequences of (1).

With HAM or FAM you don't get this level of detail. With apt-get you do.

Like 'fkdep', perhaps?
Yup. or equivs (this is something I used to use in Ubuntu to remove plymouth).

How did this end up going?
In the end I didn't continue this because having HAM per se doesn't bother me that much. It still gives me a bit of an itch but I tend to not think about this unless I'm really bored

In a way, having fiasco-image-update-ask is a safety measure which can actually alert you if you're not fully awake.

Perhaps Pali could tell why this depends on HAM?
 

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