From owner-freebsd-ports Wed Aug 21 13:45:59 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.FreeBSD.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id AF10937B400 for ; Wed, 21 Aug 2002 13:45:53 -0700 (PDT) Received: from CRWdog.demon.co.uk (ppp-209-232-55-88.dialup.snfc21.pacbell.net [209.232.55.88]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id ACEBD43E70 for ; Wed, 21 Aug 2002 13:45:51 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from spadger@best.com) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by CRWdog.demon.co.uk (Postfix) with ESMTP id A58C7477; Wed, 21 Aug 2002 16:45:47 -0400 (EDT) X-Mailer: exmh version 2.5 07/13/2001 with nmh-1.0.4 To: Ken McGlothlen Cc: ports@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: RFC: Automated Port Rebuilding (was Re: using "dialog" in ports is for bitches) In-Reply-To: Message from Ken McGlothlen of "19 Aug 2002 17:16:49 PDT." <86k7mmo03y.fsf@ralf.artlogix.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/signed; boundary="==_Exmh_354358921P"; micalg=pgp-sha1; protocol="application/pgp-signature" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Wed, 21 Aug 2002 16:45:47 -0400 From: Andy Sparrow Message-Id: <20020821204547.A58C7477@CRWdog.demon.co.uk> Sender: owner-freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.org --==_Exmh_354358921P Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii > Suddenly, I'm just not inclined to helpfully answer any of his questions > anymore. I can see why that might be. Unfortunately, I personally heartily concur with the substance of the original mail, if not the manner in which it was expressed. Other (including me) have expressed similar opinions recently, but they don't seem to have been taken into account. I think that the best statement of what I'm talking about, is that, following an upgrade/reinstall of world, at least some proportion of the userbase would like to automatically rebuild all the ports (with their original options) against the new world. Portupgrade goes a long way to providing this, but the last pieces aren't there yet. I think that the problem is adequately expressed: * People want to provide custom settings to certain ports, which they've found work well with their systems, configurations, preferences etc. * People don't necessarily want to sit there and be forced to interact with portupgrade in some hours time. Custom Settings --------------- It seems to me that we have a couple of mechanisms of providing arguments/options and other local settings to automated port builds, which is desirable for upgrading the entire machine, following an upgrade of world etc. This would seem to be particularly useful when tracking -STABLE, or -CURRENT for that matter. AFAIK, the two mechanisms (if there's more, please let me know) are as follows: i) Frobbing stuff into /usr/local/etc/pkgtools.conf ii) Frobbing stuff into ${PORT}/Makefile.local I happen to prefer the latter approach, as I'd generally prefer that port options not be global, e.g. I might prefer to build some ports with, and some without, the same options. Non-Interactivity ----------------- Neither approach addresses the propensity of certain ports to bang up a dialog, and thus halt the entire portupgrade process until there is operator input. Sadly, in a typical scenario, said operator is busy having a life or sleeping at this point, having got the world rebuilt/reinstalled and just wants the ports rebuilt. Yes, I'm aware of the BATCH=yes setting. This, IMHO, doesn't entirely address the situation - because it merely ignores ports which are marked as "interactive". In the case of the 'postfix' port (which changes quite frequently, thanks to whomever is working so diligently on keeping this up-to-date ;-) for example, this "interactivity" consists of asking you which options you require. It's the same for the Ghostscript port, and a similar situation exists with the various SNMP ports (which don't use dialog, but still prompt for their installation defaults). This is just off the top of my head - there must be dozens more ports that I don't use, but which cause their userbase the same pain. Whilst this is acceptable for an initial install of the port, I think that it's not ideal for an automated port rebuild run - nor is it really acceptable to not rebuild all the ports, but ignore what might be the primary mail system (it is here) or an integral part of the printing system. What I'd personally like to see if dialog prompt an operator IF IT NEEDS TO. In other words, if appropriate settings are already provided via either pkgtools.conf or Makefile.local, then I think that dialog should not pop up, and the build should just proceed without human intervention. Does anyone have any problems with the above suggestion? I really would like to see this (or anything that provides equivalent functionality) formalized, e.g. adopted and written up into the Porters Handbook. I'm certainly prepared to provide patches (at least for those ports which bite me every two weeks or so) - but there's little point if no-one agrees that this is a good idea, particularly those with commit privs.. What we need is a constructive interchange and some concensus. Regards, AS --==_Exmh_354358921P Content-Type: application/pgp-signature -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.0.7 (FreeBSD) Comment: Exmh version 2.5 07/13/2001 iD8DBQE9Y/v7PHh895bDXeQRAqJHAJ9xxZyiWEt7zolN2x53yuxbAA636gCdFxG7 rsp0zjD2wJ2JYR3Dc4Y1/q0= =88PT -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --==_Exmh_354358921P-- To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-ports" in the body of the message