Date: 06 Sep 2002 15:42:56 -0400 From: Anthony Abby <anthonyabby@aplusdata.com> To: Bsd Neophyte <bsdneophyte@yahoo.com> Cc: Jonathan Chen <jonc@chen.org.nz>, FreeBSD Questions <freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: upgrading and updating .... extremely complicated for me. Message-ID: <1031341376.23123.5.camel@laptop.aplusdata.com> In-Reply-To: <20020906190323.71502.qmail@web20108.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20020906190323.71502.qmail@web20108.mail.yahoo.com>
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Oh yes I agree 100%. To experienced people, the handbook is actually pretty good. Well, even to non-experienced people the handbook is pretty good, but not all sections. Some sections, including the one about building a new kernel (buildworld) are horrible! In fact much of it is out of order, and some of it you don't even have to do. I have only recently come to BSD... say, about three weeks ago, and only within the past 3-4 days have I begun to build my own kernels. Once I figured out the procedure from end to end it was a cinch and I've now done it three times. Have been in progress of writing a tutorial but haven't heard back from the BSD Documentation project yet. Anyway neophyte, I'll forward you a crude tutorial (an email) that I wrote up for some friends I've interested in BSD. That should help you along your way. Anthony > okay... i do read the handbook... i refer to the handbook before ask > questions. however, for me, a person who is not very technically > inclined, some things in the handbook are beyond me. > > the handbook mentions that the make.conf file needs to be editied... but > it doesn't go into any detail like it did with how to modify the > kernel.generic file. i've tried reading the small explanations in the > make.conf file itself, but most of it is beyond my comprehension. > > this is what is says: > > "Examine the files /etc/defaults/make.conf and /etc/make.conf. The first > contains some default defines - most of which are commented out. To make > use of them when you rebuild your system from source, add them to > /etc/make.conf. Keep in mind that anything you add to /etc/make.conf is > also used every time you run make, so it is a good idea to set them to > something sensible for your system. > > A typical user will probably want to copy the CFLAGS and NOPROFILE lines > found in /etc/defaults/make.conf to /etc/make.conf and uncomment them. > > Examine the other definitions (COPTFLAGS, NOPORTDOCS and so on) and decide > if they are relevant to you." > > what does this mean? make use of what? the options? how do you know > which option you need? also the format isn't explained which isn't self > explanatory. > > it then goes to talk about /etc and /etc/group and how you need to make > sure that certain groups do exist that might be required for an upgrade. > how do you determine what groups need to exist? > > it then talks about mergemaster... what's mergemaster? the man pages says > it's some tool to help update certain configuration files... but i'm still > unsure on how to use it. > > okay there is mention that one shouldn't use make world anymore... that > make buildworld is prefered... but when i try that i get the following > error codes: > [snip] > > i mean that entire process... everything on the section is beyond me. > Greg Lehey's version of updating seems much more simple, but even that's > giving these error codes. i prefer to use the handbook's version because > it's more recent. > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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