On the use of Debian and APT for software package management in Sony Ericsson

Abstract: Dividing complex systems into smaller components that are easier for humans to comprehend and manage, is a wide spread method in software design. As systems grow more complex, the task of solving the different dependencies and constrictions of the various components in a system, and create a stable and valid composition naturally also gains complexity. Various tools have been constructed to manage these components, one of which is APT-get, the meta-installer used by Debian to resolve dependencies and constrictions on theDebian package. APT-get and the Debian package are used in Sony Ericsson’s composition system. The dependency-structure is starting to reach the level of complexity where APT-get’s limitations are beginning to reveal themselves. A revision of the dependency structure and the tools used for composition therefore was a necessity, to lay the ground work for changes in the composition system. This bachelor thesis handles three aspects of such a revision: ? A requirements specification of the requirements on dependency structure in the future. ? A tool for easy revision of the present dependency structure. ? An investigation into possible alternative meta-installers and/or alternative component-management-systems. The result is a requirement specification of relevant stakeholders requirements on package dependencies, with an implementation suggestion using the present package management system. An investigation of alternative meta-installers led to that Sony Ericsson is now pursuing a course set by research conducted by the consortium Mancoosi, and are creating their own resolver based on reverting the problem into a Boolean problem that can be solved by a SAT solver. A fully integrated tool for dependency structure visualization and dependency graph traversing was implemented using Java.