Package management in GNU/Emacs?

Emacs-fu:

but the one thing I remember that it still somewhat missing in GNU/Emacs, is package management. XEmacs has a nice system where you can mark packages for installation, and then get them from a website; much easier than the GNU/Emacs way, where you need to manually download things, maybe compile them, and update your .emacs - at least for things that your OS or distribution does not provide.

This has changed now with ELPA, the Emacs Lisp Package Archive. It's Tom Tromey's answer to the XEmacs package manager

Need to give this a try. Update: Tried it - works fine; some concerns on inadvertently getting rogue software but otherwise great strart.