Matej Kosik <kosik at fiit.stuba.sk> has been working on Ubuntu/Debian
packaging, and a number of other people are either involved or interested.
See the thread "Ubuntu package maintainers help" at
http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2009-April/135720.html

Bert provides an overview of the packaging situation in "Linux package
maintainers need help" thread at
http://lists.squeakfoundation.org/pipermail/squeak-dev/2009-April/135551.html

This might be a good topic for a board discussion. Bert is the most
knowledgeable person in this area and can probably summarize the
current state.

I would suggest focusing on one or at most two distributions
of general interest, preferably aligned with the EToys user base.
That serves the large base of users who really need an easy
installation, if there is good support for one distribution,
the others will readily follow that example.

Dave

On Mon, Dec 14, 2009 at 08:14:10PM -0700, Ken Causey wrote:
> The details I don't have right off-hand but this has been done at least
> for Debian now at least twice.  First for at least a couple of years Lex
> Spoon maintained a repository, then more recently someone whose name I
> just can't remember right now, but whose username is kosik, has
> maintained a Debian repository at
> 
> http://ftp.squeak.org/debian/
> 
> and anyone that wished to download from it simply added this to their
> apt configuration.  I assume the difficulty is on the same order of
> difficulty if not simpler for rpm-based distributions.
> 
> The problem is not getting started on this sort of project, it is
> maintaining momentum.  The current repository is over 2 years out of
> date.
> 
> Part of the problem is that the potential user-base of any particular
> repository is probably not that large.  I myself have been a Debian user
> for a decade or more and while I used the available repository a couple
> of times, inevitably for one reason or another I always built my own VMs
> and used a wide range of images and as such the repository was of little
> use to me.  While I'm sure there are some users, certainly it would be
> useful to newcomers, the reality is that the more hardcore users find it
> more limiting than useful.
> 
> Ken
> 
> > -------- Original Message --------
> > Subject: [squeak-dev] Re: A 1 million bucks question :)
> > From: Andreas Raab <andreas.raab at gmx.de>
> > Date: Mon, December 14, 2009 8:30 pm
> > To: The general-purpose Squeak developers list
> > <squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org>
> > 
> > 
> > That is a Really Good Question (tm). I have never really understood the 
> > way software distribution works on Linux. I'd *love* to have some distro 
> > or other pull "squeak-blabla[.dep|.rpm|.whatchamacallit]" directly from 
> > squeak.org. Anyone having an insight whether that is even feasible? And 
> > if so, what loops one needs to go through to make this happen?
> > 
> > Cheers,
> >    - Andreas
> > 
> > Igor Stasenko wrote:
> > > Hello guys,
> > > 
> > > i used squeak on linux couple of times and installed it using
> > > 'official' way - from repositories.
> > > The problem with it, that VM & image loaded in that way is years old.
> > > I remember, there was a bit of tension between linux distro
> > > maintainers and the way how squeak distributing itself(image, not
> > > sources).
> > > So, i guess its hopeless to expect it up-to-date in linux distros.
> > > What should i do to get latest & hottest prebuilt VM available, can
> > > anyone direct me to the right place?
> > > And yes, I could build it myself, but i looking for binaries.
> > > Is there a pre-built package(s) which i can download by myself and install?
> > > 
> > > P.S. sorry for my ignorant questions.
> > > P.P.S. Sorry for trollish topic name, i'm in a good mood. ;)
> > >
>