7

I've recently heard of tasksel, a tool that "installs multiple related packages as a co-ordinated "task" onto your system". What is the difference between using tasksel and installing meta packages via apt-get? What does it do that meta packages can't accomplish?

alt text

3 Answers 3

5

tasksel is ancient, ancient history, and is there mainly for historical reasons. Better just to forget about it.

1
  • Then how come this tasksel screen pops up whenever you install ubuntu server if its now defunct? Nov 11, 2012 at 15:47
5

Tasksel can't really express complex dependencies that include version comparisons, optional dependencies, alternative packages, conflicts, etc.

To give a simple example: the tasksel task dns-server installs bind9, while a meta-package could depend on bind9|pdns-server (and a bunch of other DNS servers, but this is just an example), which means installing one of the 2 listed packages fulfils the dependency.

1

one of the reason for using tasksel is that you don't need tu know the name of installed package (for example SSH Server vs package openssh-server)

3
  • 1
    Couldn't the same be said of Software Center then? Nov 20, 2010 at 12:05
  • Software Center isn't available via command line, so it would be useless in server environment
    – Praweł
    Nov 20, 2010 at 12:16
  • 2
    Tasksel pre-dates software center by some considerable margin.
    – popey
    Nov 20, 2010 at 12:39

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .