I think we are arguing past each other :) Technically, you can package all your dependencies into a .deb or .rpm file too. But that'd not what's usually done,

I think we are arguing past each other :) Technically, you can package all your dependencies into a .deb or .rpm file too. But that'd not what's usually done, just like you don't ask for your dep to be included in the base image, but bundle it yourself. This is just a workaround to stop from having to include all the same deps a gazzillion times.