[Qgis-developer] Mac style linux bundle for qgis

[Tim Sutton]

Hi All

As you may realise, packaging qgis for all the different linux distros
is a near impossible task. Additionally we have the issue of older
distros not haveing qt 4.2.x and many IT depts probably wont be keen
to start deploying new versions of distros to meet qgis dependencies.
When I was promoting the move to qt4 I promised to build a staticly
compiled version of qgis or something to provide an option for folks
with no Qt4 on their machines. Compiling statically has some issues
though - it requires tweaking the build system and it can create very
large binaries.

So I've been looking at using an approach similar to MacOSX
application bundles and Frank Warmerdams FWTools. My first effort
worked only on new distros like Ubuntu Edgy. Today I rebuilt using
Ubuntu dapper as a basis and got it working. I tested ont a slax and
ubuntu dapper live cds and Aaron Racicot has tested it on Fedora Core
6.

I would like to invite more people to test. My hope is that it will
work on all the linux distros in general use. I have not yet packaged
grass into it - Ill probably do that on monday. If you are able to
test please reply to this with a one liner email in the format:

Distro, Version, Works/Partially Works/Doesnt Work. e.g.

Ubuntu, Dapper, Works
Fedora Core, 6, Works

In the case of Partial and Doesnt Work please add any diagnostics you
can to explain the issues encountered.

The test bundle can be downloaded here:

http://qgis.org/uploadfiles/testbuilds/qgis_linux_bundle.tar.bz2

The download is around 55mb. Once the bundle is completed (grass
support added), I will probably package it up using a windows style
installation wizard using BitRock.

Many thanks for any help testing  this.

Regards

Tim

-- 
-- 
Tim Sutton

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