[stinos]

is that still a thing?

come on, you make it sound like Windows is the only OS that has prerequisites for software?

Last time I checked, yesterday, I wanted to get a file server running on my Debian machine and I had to apt-get install 5 different packages I didn't yet have.

So, yes, that's still a thing, and it always will be. Although afaik since Windows 7 .Net 4 or at least 3.5 should always be there, and 4.5 on Windows 8.

[fooqux]

One of the main differences is that apt will do that for you. You made it sound like you had to manually research and ask apt to download each library, when actually you probably just typed 'apt-get install samba' and it took care of researching and downloading all that crap for you.

In Windows, that doesn't exist. The installer either bundles it for you (which can be bad if you weren't expecting it, although is usually fine) or it leaves it in your hands to find and download the correct version yourself.

So yes, not exactly the worse thing ever (still an improvement over the old DLL-HELL) but it's nowhere near how friendly a decent package manager is, either.

[seandougall]

Comparing to Debian isn't exactly setting the highest bar for usability. FWIW, OS X manages to support native code without requiring runtime downloads or other manual dependency management.