[Synaptic-devel] Re: Synaptic - wishlist

[Michael Vogt]

On Mon, Nov 17, 2003 at 07:16:37PM -0500, Nicholas Hanson wrote:
> First let me say you have an excellent little app. I do however have a 
> few suggestions/requests. The first few are for those of us with slow 
> systems (I'm running a pre-MMX P166 w/ 64MB of RAM for example).

Ok :) 

How much slower is synaptic in building the dependency cache compared
to stock apt?
 
> - Please investigate the possibility of caching the dependancy tree 
> between sessions. It takes a very long time to build and if it hasn't 
> changed it would be nice if the app could open faster. I don't know if 
> there is some date available to compare the cache to to know if it's out 
> of date but I think it might be worth looking into.

This is pretty tough, as the cache is under the control of libapt. I
only use it, I have no means to cache here (but Gustavo is the expert
here, maybe he can comment).

> - Please don't rebuild the dependancy tree after an update has run if no 
> new package lists were downloaded.

This one is tricky again. Synaptic uses libapt again for the fetching
and I know of know way how to report that there are now actually
changes to the package list (all I get is failed, or ok). We could
workaround this though (Gustavo, am I right here?).

> - Please add an option to disable the auto find as you type.

I'll consider this. Is it so slow? You can use the non-interactive
find in the "packages" menu for now. 
 
> - Please make the default filter "upgradable" or allow the user to set 
> it in preferences as the all packages tree takes a long time to build.

What do you think about saving the last filter (and selection) on exit
and restoring it when synaptic is started (with a option to turn this
off)? This would solve your problem. I was thinking about this for
quite some time, but never managed to implement it (no time).

> That's it for performance enhancements, the next is a bug?
> 
> - Programmed Changes = Queued Changes??? Why both filters?

Yes, this is a bug. Thanks. 

> And lastly some general suggestions:
> 
> - Please allow users to delete default filters and add an option to 
> restore in prefs.

This sounds sensible. I'll add it to the TODO list and see what I can
do. 

> - Please add hyperlink support in package info for example:
>       - On common tab hyperlink maintainers email address.
>       - In package descriptions hyperlink urls that often exist for 
>       packages homepage.

This is planed for the all http URIs. This is easy, because I can call
"sensible-browser" for debian and "mozilla", "konquerer" for other
systems. What how can I call mailto URIs? 

thanks for your feedback,
 Michael 

-- 
Linux is not The Answer. Yes is the answer. Linux is The Question. - Neo