Thread: version conflicts or duplicate installations

Now. many of these components that comprise the stack are also available from the software repositories of distros (OS) the developer is using, How do you take care of version conflicts or duplicate installations?

Another great question! We recognised this issue in the early stages of the project. To solve it, after considering other options, we chose simplicity, which meant installing CAFE into a dedicated directory tree. Redundant software/duplicate installations seemed the lesser of evils. Not surprisingly, the power users in the community shared their strong opinion that we should use components that are already installed, if they are present. This was not practical without significant effort at the time.

When we started the project, we wanted to enable reuse of software already present or available. Thus, CAFE would be a logical bundle based on prerequisites. Achieving the ease of use and experience we wanted to provide was not practical based on the software management technology available at the time. This is an opportune time to insert a plug for the Eclipse p2 project. p2 is the next generation plug-in/provisioning system for Eclipse. It is aimed at solving these types of issues with a consistent lo\'5k and feel across platforms. We intend to make good use of it to enable the kind of software reuse desired with the user experience we want to provide.