I often hear that installing new software in MS Windows is so easy that I almost cannot be improved. And there is actually some truth in it. In order to install almost any additional application in Windows it is enough to download a software package from the Internet, double-click on the downloaded file, press “Next” a bazillion times and click “Finish”, eventually. The new app is installed and ready to use. How could this process be ever simplified?

Well, this method is fine if we know exactly what piece of software we want to install. We can search Google for the official website of the project (e.g. skype.com), and visit it, go to the download section and there we are. However, it gets a bit more complicated if we need “any DVD player”, “a simple CD ripper” or “some good ID3 tag editor”. In such case, we need to go through many different websites and services (usually provided by Google Search) looking for an app we need. This can be a real headache even for a very experienced Windows user, especially if we want to make sure the program we’re going to install will not cause any side effects like viruses, adware, spyware or other types of malware in our system.

Imagine that you don’t have to do this research, that you have just one place where all the applications are stored. Wouldn’t it be nice if all software packages were available from one single repository, where we could search for, read about and install the apps we need? Well (paraphrasing Jack Sparrow)… Welcome to GNU/Linux, babe!

Software managers and repositories

Pic 7. Software installation in
Ubuntu Breezy

It’s the producer (distributor) of the operating system and not the user who should take care of the quality of the installed software - this is the approach chosen by the majority of GNU/Linux and BSD systems. For example, in Ubuntu, in order to install an additional software package (e.g. Gimp), it’s enough to run the applet Add/remove software or more advanced Synaptic Package Manager, choose the app from the list (which is nicely divided into categories, making it easy to find stuff) and confirm the choice. The program is then automatically downloaded from a repository and installed in our system. After a few seconds, we are informed where can we find it in the menus (e.g. Applications->Graphics->Gimp Image Editor). Quite easy, right?

Central repositories, apart from the convenience, provide another important benefit. For software infected with malware it’s much harder (in practice almost impossible) to get into the official repositories. The malware plague caused that I personally am afraid of installing any unknown software in MS Windows since the likelihood of infecting my system with malware is just too high. Central repositories decrease the feasibility of getting the OS infected dramatically and this is one of the reasons many professionals believe it is the superior way of installing software.

OK, but how many programs are there in those repositories? What about the apps we cannot find in them? Well, in Debian (and Ubuntu) the official repositories hold over 10 thousands of packages (programs, tools, libraries), all available for instant installation with a few mouse clicks. It’s really hard to find an open source program which is not available in the repositories (either official or additional unofficial ones). The exception are non-free apps like Acrobat Reader, Java or Real Player. Most of them can be installed from unofficial repos (which need to be added to the repo list) as well, but the alternative way is it to use the binary installers provided with them (this is the Windows-like way).

There has never been an app like software manager in MS Windows with a large repository of open source applications. Not sure what the reason for this situation is. Perhaps most people use commercial software (either legally or not) and do not care for alternatives (and for the malware they get when installing other software from unknown sources). I actually do care and the unavailability of such tool in one of the main reasons I am unable to use MS Windows XP in a normal way.

C:> win-get install vplayer gimp cygwin xvid vlc

Looks nice. I hope even Microsoft finally realizes that central repositories are not so evil, even though they ten to provide a lot of non-proprietary software for users. And perhaps this is the reason - why make alternative software installation easy? The harder it is, the more people will buy MS Office to save the trouble…