[Mono-list] getting started

[Jonathan Pryor]

On Mon, 2004-05-24 at 19:22, Darren Crotchett wrote:
> I'm trying to give mono a try.  My questions in a nutshell is, "Where should I 
> start?"  

Red Carpet.  Please, for the love of $DEITY, start with Red Carpet.

If your distro isn't supported, get one that is.  It will greatly
simplify life (both yours and ours), and will automagically handle RPM
dependency tracking, which would immediately solve the problems you
elude to below...

> Is there a page for Mono newbies?

At one point, the Mono Handbook would have been the "Mono Newbies"
resource.  Alas, the Handbook has become stale, though there is an
effort to bring it up to date.

<snip/>

> <rant>
> No offense to anyone, but in my opinion, the web page is a horrible mess.  
> Everything seems to be thrown together with no thought as to how someone new 
> to mono might approach learning it.

This has been noted on multiple occasions.  Last I knew, someone had
volunteered to re-write the site, but that was over a month ago and I
haven't heard anything since.

<snip/>

> Sometimes the state of Linux and Open Source in general seems so advanced.  
> And, at other times, it's like in its infancy.  Stuff like the following 
> really gets on my nerves:
> 
> [root@localhost src]# rpm -ivh ifolder-0.8.20040521-1.i686.rpm
> error: Failed dependencies:
>         addressbook = 0.8.20040521 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
>         simias = 0.8.20040521 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
>         mono-core >= 0.91 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
>         mono-data >= 0.91 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
>         mono-posix >= 0.91 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
>         mono-remoting >= 0.91 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
>         mono-nunit >= 0.91 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
>         gtk-sharp >= 0.91 is needed by ifolder-0.8.20040521-1
> </rant>

This is why you use Red Carpet.  Or Apt.  Or Yum.  Or Up2date.  Or any
number of other existing package management programs.  You shouldn't be
manually dealing with packages anymore, not when virtually every distro
includes such tools by default.  They will find and install all required
dependencies for you, thus promoting the "really advanced" feelings. :-)

 - Jon