ipkg questions

> If the JRE is no long
> there, by resetting the ipaq, then the script invokes a call to reload
> the ipk back over the wireless LAN. But then if the ipk is still
> installed (even if the contents aren't there) wouldn't I need to
> uninstall the package and then reinstall, or is there someway of
> overriding the package install regardless?

You can install the ipkg into ramfs using a command like:

        ipkg -d ram install jre_1.3.1_arm.ipk

with the following line in your /etc/ipkg.conf:

        dest ram /mnt/ramfs

That way, if you reset the iPAQ and lose the ipkg, then you will also
lose the meta-data stored for this package. Meaning, ipkg will have
forgotten that the package was ever installed and will reinstall it
without a problem[*].

> Question: Does the ipkg system handle decompression and installation in
> the same step so that the files can be extracted to their locations
> without writing the ipk archive to the filesystem first? If not, is this
> possible (i.e. extracting files directly from the incoming stream)?

Unfortunately, the current "nested archive" scheme inherited from
Debian prevents doing streaming installation of packages. So,
currently, ipkg extracts into /tmp before installing the package into
its final location, (which is not such a good fit when /tmp and the
final location are both /mnt/ramfs).

Obviously streaming installation would be useful. Maybe the package
repository could store and transfer the package-control archive and
package-data archive separately? I'm open to ideas here.

-Carl

[*] Incidentally, as things currently stand, any "ipkg install"
command will do a complete reinstall of the package even if it is
already installed. But, this will probably change in the future, so
you shouldn't rely on it.

-- 
Carl Worth                                        
USC Information Sciences Institute                  cworth_at_eastisi.edu
3811 N. Fairfax Dr. #200, Arlington VA 22203		  703-812-3725