[Xastir] So, a question on all this building...

[Lee Bengston]

On 2/5/10, Bob Nielsen <n7xy at clearwire.net> wrote:
>
> On Feb 5, 2010, at 10:04 AM, Tom Russo wrote:
>
>> Because the Ubuntu repositories routinely stick at old versions.  As I
>> understand it, the package maintainer is neither an Xastir user nor a
>> subscriber to any Xastir list.  In fact, I thought I read recently
>> that the
>> package maintainer was no longer actively maintaining it, and they
>> were
>> looking for a new one.
>>
>> If you want point-and-click installation, you are at the mercy of
>> the binary
>> maintainer.  If you want current code, you need to roll your own.
>>
>> I believe the last time I checked, it was still 1.9.4.  We're on
>> 1.9.8 now.
>> It is possible that they are at 1.9.6 -- if so, they bumped it
>> shortly before
>> the 1.9.8 release.
>
> The version of Xastir in the latest (9.10) Ubuntu is actually a
> recompilation of the version contained in the Debian testing
> repository (the released version of Debian has 1.9.2).  This is the
> case for many of the Ubuntu packages.  If 1.9.8 gets into Debian
> testing soon, it might make it into the next release of Ubuntu (10.4
> in April).

Based on user feedback, the Xastir binary package in Ubuntu 9.10
appears to be a very functional version.  That hasn't been the case
with the binaries provided with 2 or 3 Ubuntu versions prior to 9.10,
and the same problems encountered by users of earlier Ubuntu versions
have been seen in other Debian based distributions like Mepis.

While binaries are great for getting up and running quickly (when they
have been built properly by the package manager!), the beauty of
compiling Xastir from source is that when a developer submits a bug
fix or new feature and notifies the list, the user can update his
build of Xastir within minutes.

Lee - K5DAT
Murphy, TX