Automatix?

[Darryl Clarke]

Since we're bringing up genuine concerns about this script here's a
couple I have:

1. It doesn't work on AMD64 - will it abort from running on an AMD64 machine?

2. It doesn't work with Warty, Hoary, Dapper - will it abort from
running on those?

3. It doesn't ask the user to acknowledge the J2RE User Agreement,
which is required by Sun's distribution rules.

4. It works using the users home directory as a holding ground for
downloads, etc.

5. Packages are unsigned, and come from various locations which can
seem questionable suck as 'fuckbirdflu.com' - not to discriminate
against a fun domain name, it's just not what a sysadmin would like to
see in log files in relation to a user downloading files.  We hammer
it in to our users to not download from unknown sites, and then
there's this.

6. The initial instructions (on the forum) states "PLEASE DO NOT
INSTALL (24) IF YOU ARE IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. IT IS ILLEGAL
TO DO SO."  That warning is not clear enough and easily skipped by.
One should be presented during install and abort installing those
non-free codecs if needed.

Overall, I'm more concerned with the legality of it.  Although,
security of the script itself isn't an issue with me this is:

What about the maintainability of these foreign packages? What happens
if there's a serious bug in any one of the foreign packages?  Who
fixes them? How are users to know and update their packages? They
certainly can't re-run Automatix to get new versions since all the
versions are hard-coded.  They'd have to also know enough to go update
Automatix, assuming it was updated to reflect changes.

And don't worry, I'll look at easyUbuntu in the same light.

--
~ Darryl  ~ smartssa at gmail.com
~ http://darrylclarke.com