User Based PkgTools

What is that?

This is a way of creating and managing packages for software not included in the Slackware distribution. The theory comes from the LFS hint called More Control and Package Management using Package Users, by Matthias S. Benkmann.

The basic idea is to create a new user for every software you have to install, and then perform the installation using this user instead of being root! This comes with many advantages, the main ones being:

• You can track files installed by the software just by looking at the uid and/or gid of files;
• You do not give full root access to unknow pieces of software;
• Packages won't overwrite files from other packages without your consent.

For more motivations on why this is such a brilliant idea in general and you should really consider using it, see the original LFS hint.

More specifically, from the Slackware usage point of view, it lets you easily install, update or remove pieces of software not included in the distribution, with the added guarantee that the installation scripts you execute will not do anything nasty as you don't grant them full root rights, but only a very restricted access to your system and your system files. It also beats some more traditionnal tools like checkinstall, which cannot be used for instance when the installation is not performed using make install.

How does it work?

Get it