RPM's or source? (was: Can I upgrade with RPMs?)

[Shawn Coomey]

This actually brings up a larger issue (at least in my pea 
brain) about Linux in general, I think. I pose the 
following question for you Linux gurus out there:

On my system, I have MANY pieces of software installed 
that I compiled from source (not RPM'd or apt-get'ted). I 
know many folks, especially in the YDL world do the same 
thing due to the relative dirth of PPC RPM's out there. 
Back a few months ago, I wanted to upgrade to 2.2, so I 
basically wiped the drives and started fresh. That was OK 
for then, as I didn't have much necessary data to save. 
What if I had tons of critical data and a clean wipe and 
install wasn't an option?

Philosophically speaking and from an OS upgrade 
standpoint, is the use of RPM's an all-or-nothing 
prospect?

Shawn




On Wed, 19 Jun 2002 15:53:40 -0400
  R Shapiro <rshapiro@bbn.com> wrote:
>John Nelson writes:
>  > I tried to upgrade my YDL 2.1 system using the 
>instructions on the YDL web
>  > site and the result was a total disaster.
>
>This is pretty hopeless.  I tried this and eventually 
>gave up and
>reinstalled 2.1 (the 2.2 installer doesn't work on my 
>Quicksilver
>867).