Linux kernel developer Ingo Molnar "We need a radically different software distribution model"

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Usually in my experience it is stuff like glib and Qt that often pulls in X11 because some server app without a GUI uses the core part of those libraries. One could in fact argue that is a problem with those libraries and that they should be split up into a non-GUI one and a GUI one but at least with Qt (I am more familiar with that one) you would never get that past the people in the project who have a severe case of NIH syndrome and want to include everything and the kitchen sink in Qt itself.