Software distribution
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A software distribution is an installer of a specific software (or a collection of multiple, even an entire operating system) , already compiled and configured.
It is generally the closest thing to a turnkey form of a usually GPL or open source source code for a software.
It usually takes the form of either rpm, deb, tgz, msi, exe etc. installer and is downloadable from the Internet.
Examples range from whole operating system distributions to server and interpreter distributions (for example WAMP installers).
They can be either official distributions by the makers of the software, or 3rd party distributions.
Notable is the fact that one using such 3rd party distributions will have to turn to the distribution maker for support, the developers of the actual software being distributed usually do not provide support for 3rd party distributions of their software.
Vendors of such software distributions systems include:
- Altiris with Deployment Solution
- CapaSystems with CapaInstaller
- HP with [Radia]
- IBM with [Tivoli Configuration Manager]
- LANDesk [with Management Suite]
- Matrix42 with Empirum
- M23 software distribution system: m23 is an OpenSource and GPL'd solution for installation of Debian and Ubuntu systems.
- Symantec with iCommand
- BMC Software with Marimba
- [ManageSoft Corporation]
- Novell ZENworks
- Microsoft SMS (Systems Management Server)
- [Vector Networks]PC-Duo Enterprise Desktop Management and Support
- [Snow Software] Enterprise Software Management
- [SSI] Operating systems and software deployment from SoftService.
Open Source Distribution Tools
Autotools are widely used for distributions comprised of source files written in C++ and the C programming language, but are not limited to these.The Python programming language offers a distribution utility called [distutils], which requires the creation of a setup.py configuration file.
Standard Files
Open source projects typically contain a few standard files that live in the root of the distribution extraction. These files are most commonly named:- README - top level documentation overview
- Changelog - list of changes spanning the life of the project
- INSTALL - instructions on how to install
- LICENSE - AKA COPYING (by GNU)
- CREDITS - AKA AUTHORS, attribution for project contributors
- FAQ - frequently asked questions (and answers)
- BUGS - list of software bugs
- HACKING - development guide for new participants
- NEWS - interesting project informations, sometimes used in place of the Changelog
See also
Software distribution can also refer to commercial distribution methods such as Careware and Donateware.
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