drew Roberts wrote:
If I write two programs which I know cannot coexist
and I set it so that the
newer one checks for the existence of the older one and pitches a hissy fit
if a person tries to install both, is it really a problem. (I am not saying
that I think this would be the ideal solution by the way.)
Knowing that even experienced programmers like Fons and experienced
packagers like the one responsible for the unnamed "reputable"
distribution, couldn't make it work in absence of this kind of checks,
I'd definitely say anti-foot-gun measures are a good thing.
I have done some pretty odd things in my time for my
own reasons and have been
quite happy with the results, all things considered.
If you know what you're doing (or if you at least think you know),
there's always the source. Nobody is going to hide it in
Palladium-protected RSA-encrypted double-obfuscated layer of code.
Or... hey, that's a great idea! At least that makes it more likely that
the people who try to change it *really* know what they're doing ;)
Krzysztof