Hi all, I just wrote "jablicator" [1], which is a tool to help novice Debian administrators leech off of more experienced administrators. Specifically in the area of picking an appropriate set of packages to install from Debian's untold thousands. I appreciate any feedback or suggestions, and particularly technical feedback or comments from those involved with the infamous "task-*" packages and their successors.
I'm sending this mail to debian-devel because this program actually creates packages, and from a certain perspective, subdistributions. This is traditionally the realm of Debian developers, so I want developer feedback first. Eventually I expect tools like this to somewhat blur the line between users and developers. 0: General reactions? Would anyone consider using this tool? 1: Does some other Debian package already have this functionality? 2: Any technical hiccups? Am I doing the right thing with the output, when creating "dists" and "pool"? 3: What's a better name? "deblicator" and "apt-share" have been suggested so far. 4: Do some gurus with well thought out or specialized package collections want to share the fruits of their labor by posting their jablicator output? Thanks, Jeff [1] It's in incoming http://incoming.debian.org or maybe already in sid by the time you read this. If you try it out, make sure to get version 1.0-3 or later.