[Rpm-maint] LSB Package API

Denis Washington dwashington at gmx.net
Sat Jun 21 08:32:32 UTC 2008


Hi,

Some time ago, it was discussed on an LSB face-to-face meeting that an
API should be developed that allows ISVs to install sotware packages
which integrate into the package manager - the "Berlin Packaging API".
While the idea seemed to be well received, there didn't seem much
progress since then, except for a wiki page with a rundimentary proposal
[1]. Considering that third-party software installation is an undeniably
important weak spot of the Linux infrastructure, I found this was a
shame.

To reignite the the initiative, I decided to design and develop a
prototype implementation of the Berlin API, most creatively named the
"LSB Package API". It is designed as a simple D-Bus interface
accompanied with an XML-based package description format. A detailed
description and the source code can be found on this page:

 http://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/LSB_Package_API

The implementation currently supports integration into RPM and dpkg; due
to its modular nature, support for more package managers could be added
later on.

I hope this implementation will act as a starting point for resurrecting
the Berlin API process. Let us overcome the "Third-party software
installation on Linux sucks" problem and strive to a brave new world of
easily distributable Linux software! ;)

Best regards,
Denis Washington

[1] http://www.linuxfoundation.org/en/Berlin_Packaging_API




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