Is there a Factory branch of the PackMan repo? 
I use Factory to get the bleeding-edge software but I also use PackMan to get codecs etc, is there no way?
Livna (Fedora’s PackMan) does offer a Rawhide (Fedora’s Factory) version.
Debian Unstable and Mandriva Cooker include codecs.
This leaves openSUSE lacking…
No.
And what exactly is lacking.
Packman often contains versions which might be considered ‘Factory’ in that they are up front sometimes beta ver.
Packman is not part of Novell - Suse who maintain Factory
This makes the openSUSE Experience as a whole lacking, but I know it’s not Novell’s mistake, as they can’t ship patented software.
The problem is that using a 11.0 PackMan with Factory results in a lot of package conflicts, because they might include latest or even later than latest software but link against the “old” stuff in 11.0.
Basically PackMan is lacking, I have other gripes about it too when it tries to replace perfectly good stuff from the main SUSE repo.
Is there a different addon repo for openSUSE, then? One with codecs and the like but that doesn’t replace packages and also offers a branch for every branch of the main repo (Livna style addon repo for SuSE?)
I think this a bit of a rant really.
If you want to run development you should really do it aside from your main OS, it common sense.
If you really must run a development packages/repos with a Primary OS - expect issues. Or if you love Fedora so much - use it ( I would agree it’s a great OS).
It’s not like you are running the development OS.
I’m running Factory repo’s without any real issues. Along with Packman.
OK, thanks.
I used to use Fedora but it has different issues, I wasn’t satisfied with it. Just Livna is better than PackMan but I like SUSE more than Fedora.
My main issue is that RedHat, rightfully, uses Fedora as a testbed for their not-quite-ready programs that might never see the light at all. Things like prelink or frysk, SELinux, etc are only included because RedHat wants people to test them, not because they are any useful. In fact all of these caused major issues over the time and gave no real benefit so far. Giving the user a good OS is not theit primary focus…
I haven’t really found any OS I liked so far… I stuck with FreeBSD for the longest time but I really prefer to use binary packages now… and their package build servers are always out-of-date.
Well I will try something new but no idea what yet… SUSE was probably the best so far, though, except when it comes to codec packages.
grfgguvf wrote:
>
> OK, thanks.
>
> I used to use Fedora but it has different issues, I wasn’t satisfied
> with it. Just Livna is better than PackMan but I like SUSE more than
> Fedora.
>
> My main issue is that RedHat, rightfully, uses Fedora as a testbed for
> their not-quite-ready programs that might never see the light at all.
> Things like prelink or frysk, SELinux, etc are only included because
> RedHat wants people to test them, not because they are any useful. In
> fact all of these caused major issues over the time and gave no real
> benefit so far. Giving the user a good OS is not theit primary focus…
>
> I haven’t really found any OS I liked so far… I stuck with FreeBSD
> for the longest time but I really prefer to use binary packages now…
> and their package build servers are always out-of-date.
>
> Well I will try something new but no idea what yet… SUSE was probably
> the best so far, though, except when it comes to codec packages.
>
>
You can probably take the source rpms for Suse 11.0 from Packman and compile them yourself.
Fyi - last release the Packman repo’s came online with 11.0 rc3 (iirc)
–
Suse 11.0 x64, Kde 4.1beta (factory repo), Opera 9.x weekly
Hmm…?
Anyways, I added Fedora and Livna repositories and now doing an in place dist-upgrade from SUSE to Fedora, we’ll see how that works >:) No big hopes though :sarcastic:
He was saying you could compile the software yourself and get it to work as a work around that packman doesn’t have an active repo, He also pointed out when Pacman starts his repo’s for the next distro up, which is around when the RC clients are out, or about 2-3 weeks before release of the upgrade.
I am resuscitating an old thread, sorry about that, but because I found this thread while googling, I don’t want to start a new one.
I feel exactly like the OP.
1)Running an unstable distro/OS is nothing new. People have been doing it for years with Debian Sid and with all sort of operating systems.
This year I expect more people than ever wanting to run Factory, as there is almost one year gap between 11.1 and 11.2, first time since I started using SUSE/openSUSE.
2)Running an unstable OS should only mean dealing with the bugs, and many people are willing to take that chance.
But it shouldn’t mean being unable to accomplish a multitude of tasks, which in the case of openSUSE are “enabled” by Packman, like in Debian, for instance, they are made possible by debian-multimedia.org, but including testing or Sid.
Thus this is clearly an openSUSE shortcoming, IMO: you can’t really use the development branch if you so wish.
And now that releases are further apart, that is particularly bad, IMHO.
the packman rpms’s for 11.1 work fine for 11.2 - so I can’t see that there is a problem!
Exactly. There is some breakage, but they mostly work.
I definitely disagree with those who complain about an alpha or beta release not having 3rd party multimedia available.
Also, an openSUSE alpha/beta does NOT correspond to the Debian Sid. There is a world of difference in philosophy.
And if their complaint is the openSUSE policy wrt multimedia in general, then they likely know the answer already. Simply put, Novell/SuSE-GmbH follow the openSource free software philosophy a LOT closer than most other distributions.
Thanks for the advice. I’ll give it a go. In the past there have always been dependency issues.
Not any closer than Debian, oldcpu.
I have practically given up on Debian because their “free software obsession” is close to lunacy. And yet they have debian-multimedia.org (a third-party repo, of course, as we all know).
As far as I know there are still things that don’t work though. Such as vlc2 packages (I use vlc with firefox as well). Games are another thing that need dependencies that aren’t in the packman repository. The Battle for Wesnoth as one of the games off the top of my head. I had to hunt down dependencies on rpmfind because either openSUSE software search can’t find some or they aren’t in webpin, although some of the packages are.
But the factory versions are unstable (can be stable but and aren’t meant to be used as your main OS). I do agree it’s annoying not having some multimedia but the lack of proprietary multimedia doesn’t seem like a very high priority problem compared to making the system stable and implementing new features.
Take Care,
Ian
Hasn’t packman got enough to do providing reliable packages for three openSUSE releases already? Packman has a pretty good track record for stability, so we wouldn’t wish to rock that boat by overloading it, would we now… 
To be more precise I am using the following 11.1 packages from packman with 11.2
k3b
k9copy
ffmpeg
vlc
mplayer
kaffeine
xine
kdenlive
kplayer
audacity
mad
audiokonverter
And there is
developers vlc:
Index of /pub/videolan/vlc/SuSE/11.2/
I patrly agree with both of opinion.
IMHO if intent of OS producer is share Beta OS for wide specturm of users and for good testing of pre-release than he should prepare enough conditions to use it by this wide spectrum and good testing.
If pre-released system will have support of 3rd party components which is very important for users than they would like to use it because Beta OS will be able to do tasks that they want to do. In result people would like to spend a lot of more time in Beta OS or even set it up as primary OS what mean better testing.
Makes enough conditions (3rd party support etc.) to use Beta OS as Primary OS will comes benefits for producer. More people will try Beta OS, that means: more various hardware platform, more system configurations, more hours spend on testing, more issues discoverd before stable release.
But other hand beacuse of limited resources of development producer can’t focus on making good condition for wide spectrum of users making them happy with e.g. 3rd party support. OS Producer must focus on primary task - Operating Sysstem development.
So it seems to be balancing between put resources for development of testing ecosystem (various support at beta stage) for community and development system as a primary aim.
As a bottom line: PackMan for 11.2 may result more testers and more hours of testing.
Am I wrong?
In the past, the people from Packman have managed to have all essential multimedia (and other) packages ready in a new repo at the release of a new openSUSE.
From experience I can tell that 11.1 packages work most of the time for 11.2 Mx, as 11.0 packages did for 11.1 RC’s.
I have my doubts about a Packman Factory repo. Example: if an unstable libxine was added to a test version of Amarok, what would I be testing?. But then again, beta versions of games?
I’m afraid the self chosen instability will flood the forums.