Linux dist - which one? or where?

Brad Fuller brad at sonaural.com
Wed Feb 16 20:55:11 UTC 2005


Where does one dnl the correct Linux distribution?

When going to http://www.squeak.org/download/index.html I am presented 
with two links

* The "Master Squeak Unix site" at 
http://www-sor.inria.fr/~piumarta/squeak/
 This site lists 3.6 as the stable release and a version of 3.7 (3.7b-5 
-- I guess that means beta version 5).

and

* ftp://st.cs.uiuc.edu/Smalltalk/Squeak/3.7/unix-linux/
  This site contains tars for version 3.7-5989.
  (BTW: a tar file that looks like a source of version 3.6 is there 
also. don't know why)

Shouldn't there be one place to dnl? (mirrors are ok as long as they are 
identical, these don't appear identical)

I'm confused.
- Is the *nix 3.7 in beta, stable (released), or "?"
- are the 3.7 files identical at these two sites (the filenames aren't)?
- If 3.7 is the current stable release (it is according to this post at 
the swiki: http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak.388), why doesn't the 
Master Squeak Unix Site have this as a stable release?

Suggestion (and I'm sure this has been discussed before resulting in 
good recommendations):
why not provide the 3 platform-independent files for all platform 
downloads. That'll make them all consistent. Maybe at the top of the 
squeak.org site, there is a link to these 3 files (and the sources file 
couldn't be g zipped).

Then, below this selection, provide the platform dependent file for each 
specific OS?

Maybe the current way was decided because the goal was to make it easy 
for windows/mac users? -- but they are just zip/sit files, not 
auto-installers. So, I don't see that it's that much convenient.

If the reason that there are different links for each platform is 
because each VM is released at different times, then perhaps change the 
process: all final versions (stable release) are not completed until all 
VMs are completed.


brad
PS
I like RPMs (I'm running FC3 right now), but I'm happy to build if I 
know what I'm getting.
As mentioned before, I'm creating audio tools -- but I need them to run 
identically on 3 platforms: mac, win and Linux (understanding the 
current audio issues with Linux). So, maybe this helps to identify my 
particular predicament. Still - it would be nice to see clear 
distribution in general.

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