From:	 Patrick K Notz <notz@purdue.edu>
To:	 mjhammel@lwn.net
Subject: Re: "apt" versus "Red Carpet"
Date:	 Thu, 17 May 2001 10:36:10 -0500

Michael,

I fully agree.  I don't mean to lobby for this software or that.  I
just wanted to make sure I'm not missing the boat -- 
there are too many alternatives to try them all.  With that
in mind, here are a few tid-bits about apt 

1. apt has recently been modified to work with RPM packages.
   Technically, apt and the Debian 'dpkg' format are orthogonal
   beasts with dpkg the counterpart to RPM and apt the counterpart to
   Red Carpet or RHN (AFAIK).

2. apt allows you to do simple upgrades without knowledge of package
   names or even Internet locations.  For example "apt-get update"
   would find all the latest packages and "apt-get upgrade" would
   download and install new versions of any software on your system
   (including dependencies).  (Naturally, the list of software
   repositories used is configurable.)

3. apt has a family of tools such as apt-get (for downloading and
   updatign), apt-cache (for searching and working with package
   databases) and others like apt-cdrom and apt-ftp.

Best Regards - pat