[q3k]

Right, but that still doesn't solve the problem of actually distributing the library in the first place.

As a library author you basically have to wait for distributions to start shipping it, or make users manually install dependencies (and then make the build work with libraries installed into /usr/local).

[bfrog]

Right, this is an extraordinary pain point as a library author which writes libraries in C or C++.

That's assuming the distro even does package it up. Because beyond Archlinux packaging, packaging up a DEB is painful. RPM is somewhat less painful, but you still need to contend with N distros. Your lib depends on lets say 4 other libraries, perhaps some of the GTK ecosystem of libraries. Good Luck!