list of package names, versions[, descriptions]

[Greg Minshall]

Mark,

thanks.  if i understand correctly, if i do an RPC "search", i will get
back pretty much the entire "database" entry for a given package.  and,
if i do an "info", i will likely get that plus more information for the
given package.

i think this means that, given a list of packages (from packages.gz), in
order to find out what has changed i would need to issue a search for
each of the packages.  i.e., i'd have to download the entire database,
at a cost of some 55,000 RPC calls -- which i worry would be a heavier
load on the server than downloading a file with the same information.

if there were something like a packages-vers.gz file, then one could
keep track of which package entries one currently had and which were
changed, and only do RPC calls for the changed ones.  (assuming, by the
way, that when a packages database entry, it's *version* also changes.)

or, maybe i'm missing something?

cheers, Greg