I think one advantage a package management system has is unified updates. The down side is that could cause problems when configuration file formats change. Gentoo tries to handle this by managing all config files in CVS, so you can diff different versions and merge them. Luckily, in reality, config file formats don't change all that often.
> Gentoo tries to handle this by managing all config files in CVS, so you can diff different versions and merge them.
Am I missing something? I wish it did this, but unless something has changed recently it just gives you a tool for merging updates in (and doesn't store old revisions).
Oops, I keep forgeting this is not part of portage. This is done so often that it should really be made a sensible default for any mainstream distribution.
I think one advantage a package management system has is unified updates. The down side is that could cause problems when configuration file formats change. Gentoo tries to handle this by managing all config files in CVS, so you can diff different versions and merge them. Luckily, in reality, config file formats don't change all that often.