Fink - 0.5.1

After I installed this package, the only documentation I saw (which seems to be the only thing this package contains) was about "how to install it". Found a "Usage" doc, and that was about "how to install/update" this software, too. No docs on how to actually use this thing!!! Now all I need is find out how to uninstall this unusable piece...!

I maintain a few specialized packages, but am writing (and rating) from the point of view of a user.

Fink - 0.8.1 has just been released. There are two installers. One is for intel. The other is for ppc, providing a new branch (10.4, rather than 10.4-transitional). These new branches of fink both use g++ rather than g++3.3, so the safest upgrade option is probably to move /sw out of the way and to start anew. The fink Quick Start page offers more explicit instructions, and also a conversion tool (which I have not tried) that might permit you to keep your current installation while migrating to the new branch.

I've been using the 10.4 branch on intel and on ppc and have tested it extensively in the last couple of months. It seems to be working very well, and the few minor glitches I found were fixed very quickly.

I've been using fink since OS X 10.1, and find it absolutely indispensable. More than any other thing, this has helped to make OS X a viable unix computational platform for scientific computing in my laboratory. This is due in no small part to the dedicated volunteer efforts of many extremely talented, generous and hard-working individuals.