213 lines
8.7 KiB
HTML
213 lines
8.7 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
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<head>
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<title>PackageKit</title>
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<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"/>
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<link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css" type="text/css" media="screen"/>
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</head>
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<body>
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<table align="center" class="title">
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<tr>
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<td><center><img src="img/packagekit.png" alt="[img]"/></center></td>
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<td width="95%" valign="middle"><p class="title">Frequently asked questions</p></td>
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<td><center><img src="img/packagekit.png" alt="[img]"/></center></td>
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</tr>
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</table>
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<p>Back to the <a href="index.html">main page</a></p>
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<h1>Frequently asked questions</h1>
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<h3>How complete are the backends?</h3>
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<h4>Methods</h4>
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<pre>
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| conary | yum | apt | box | alpm | smart | pisi | zypp |
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---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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resolve | X | X | | X | | X | X | X |
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refresh-cache | X | X | X | X | | X | X | |
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\--force | | | | | | | | |
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get-updates | X | X | | X | | X | X | |
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update-system | X | X | | X | | X | X | |
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search-name | X | X | X | X | X | X | X | |
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search-details | | X | X | X | | X | X | |
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search-file | | X | | X | | | X | |
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search-group | | X | | | | | X | |
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install-package | X | X | | X | X | X | X | X |
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install-file | | X | | X | | X | X | |
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remove-package | X | X | | X | X | X | X | |
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update-package | X | X | | X | | X | X | |
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get-depends | | X | | X | | X | X | |
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\--recursive | | | | | | | | |
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get-requires | X | X | | X | | | X | |
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\--recursive | | | | | | | | |
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get-description | X | X | X | X | | X | X | |
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get-files | X | X | | X | | X | X | |
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get-update-detail | | X | | | | | | |
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get-repo-list | | X | | X | X | X | X | X |
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repo-enable | | X | | X | | X | | X |
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repo-set-data | | X | | X | | | X | |
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cancel-transaction| X | X | | | | | X | |
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</pre>
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<h4>Filters</h4>
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<pre>
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| conary | yum | apt | box | alpm | smart | pisi | zypp |
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---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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installed | X | X | X | X | X | X | X | |
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development | | X | X | X | | | | |
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gui | | X | X | X | | | X | |
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free | | | | | | | | |
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</pre>
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<h3>Why doesn't PackageKit work with SELinux?</h3>
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<p>
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<code>packagekitd</code> is not recognized by SELinux yet.
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Until the policy is fixed to handle system activation, you'll have
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to run in permissive mode, rather than enforcing.
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</p>
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<h3>What if the backend package manager doesn't support percentage updates?</h3>
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<p>
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You don't have to have a backend that supports percentage updates.
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If you don't know the progress, just emit NoPercentageUpdates and then the UI
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should just do the right thing and spin backwards and forwards.
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</p>
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<h3>Why are the remaining times sometimes not present or wildly wrong?</h3>
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<p>
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The remaining time to completion of the transaction is calculated using an
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average time of the time between percentage updates points, extrapolated to 100%.
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This means that backends that give accurate and frequent percentage-changed
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signals will get accurate times.
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</p>
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<p>
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If a backend updates the percentage using very course updates
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(e.g. 20%, 40%, 60%, 80%, 100%) then the remaining time algorithm will not
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perform well.
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Similarly, if the duration of 0% to 50% takes 2 minutes and 50% to 100% takes
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10 minutes then at first the time will be reported under the true time to
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completion.
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It is up to the backends to map the transaction progress to fine-granularity
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accurate percentage updates, at least as best as possible.
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</p>
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<h3>With all the differences between backends, how will PackageKit support all the different options?</h3>
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<p>
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Backends don't have to support all options of all methods.
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Just set an error and return false if not implemented.
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</p>
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<h3>But error codes are different on each backend?</h3>
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<p>
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Error codes have to be standardized so they can be localized.
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The error detail field can just be the untranslatable output.
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If you are creating a backend and you need another error enum, mention it
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and we can add it to the supported list.
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</p>
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<h3>How will PackageKit handle installation an application that needs user interaction?</h3>
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<p>
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Upgrading, installing or removing packages <b>has to be 100% silent</b>.
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</p>
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<p>
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The user cannot be prompted for questions "set applet setuid?" as these will
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not be handled in PackageKit.
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The backend should do the right thing, as these messages mean very little to
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the average user and cannot be translated.
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</p>
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<h3>Does PackageKit replace up2date?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit does not replace up2date.
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PackageKit is a way for users to interact with the packaging system, not for an
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administrator to install software on remote machines.
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</p>
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<h3>Is PackageKit a system daemon, always running and using resources?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit is not yet another system daemon.
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It quits when not doing anything, and only starts when something wants
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information or a task completed.
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</p>
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<h3>How does PackageKit handle dependencies?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit <b>does not do</b> dependency resolution.
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This problem has already been solved by the backend systems and we don't really
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want to re-invent the wheel.
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</p>
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<p>
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PackageKit does not have the fine-grained API to do everything.
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For instance, synaptic should still use libapt as can do much more than can be
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provided by PackageKit.
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</p>
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<h3>Does PackageKit replace the Red Carpet service?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit is not a replacement to red carpet.
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Red carpet was really great and years ahead of it's time, but tried to do
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everything package related on the system, and moved onto the enterprise
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centralized management model.
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Although cool, this latter point made things too political in my opinion.
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</p>
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<h3>How fast is PackageKit?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit is really fast.
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It takes about 1 second to search for installed and available packages
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with "power" in the description - no blocking of the UI happens at all as it's
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all asynchronous.
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All the applications start instantly with no root password needed at startup.
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</p>
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<h3>How does PackageKit work with multiple users?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit is designed from the ground up to work with fast user switching and
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logging in and out of sessions during upgrades.
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You can start a system upgrade, log out, log in as another user, and be notified
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when the upgrade is complete, all without risking your rpmdb.
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</p>
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<h3>Can users still use their normal package managers and backends, such as Yum, APT or Conary?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit does not stop you using the low level tools yourself.
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You can use rpm and yum or dpkg and apt when PK is inactive (99.999% of the time)
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when you really need some command line love.
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No more fighting over <code>yum</code>, <code>yum-updatesd</code>,
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<code>pup</code> and <code>pirut</code>.
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</p>
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<h3>What is Hughsie's law?</h3>
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<p>
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A joke that started on IRC late one night in '07.
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Put formally it is: <i>Authentication or license prompts can only be done before the
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transaction has started, and messages or notices about the transaction
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can only be shown after the transaction has completed.</i>
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</p>
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<h3>How do I translate gnome-packagekit?</h3>
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<p>
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Please see the <a href="http://l10n.gnome.org/teams">GNOME Translation Team</a>
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web pages for how to contribute to GNOME localisation.
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</p>
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<h3>Is there an organization or corporation sponsoring development of PackageKit?</h3>
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<p>
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PackageKit is not sponsored by anyone.
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Whilst interning at Red Hat I spent a few days on the API and some UI designs,
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but all the coding is done in my free time.
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</p>
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<p>Back to the <a href="index.html">main page</a></p>
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<p class="footer">
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Copyright <a href="mailto:richard@hughsie.com">Richard Hughes 2007</a><br/>
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<a href="http://validator.w3.org/check/referer">Optimized</a>
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for <a href="http://www.w3.org/">standards</a>.
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</p>
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</body>
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</html>
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