There are some great comments in that LWN article, and I encourage everyone here to read them. For reference, here are a couple of relevant links to some simil

There are some great comments in that LWN article, and I encourage everyone here to read them. For reference, here are a couple of relevant links to some similar package and configuration managers: vesta: http://www.vestasys.org http://www.vestasys.org store: http://www.pvv.ntnu.no/~arnej/store/storedoc.html http://www.pvv.ntnu.no/~arnej/store/storedoc.html