Date: Fri, 3 Jul 1998 14:02:02 +0200 (MET DST) From: Nick Hibma <nick.hibma@jrc.it> To: chat@FreeBSD.ORG, current@FreeBSD.ORG, stable@FreeBSD.ORG, newbies@FreeBSD.ORG, questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: PKGINFO statistics Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.95q.980703140008.16968z-100000@elect8>
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In short, it would be appreciated if you could execute the command below
on your FreeBSD box. It is harmless.
/usr/sbin/pkg_info -aI | \
/usr/bin/mail -s "PKGINFO `hostname`" \
nick.hibma@jrc.it
(this command should be all on one line, like:
/usr/bin/pkg_info -aI | mail -s "PKGINFO `hostname`" nick.hibma@jrc.it
The `hostname` in the subject is there to be able to filter out
duplicates but is not required at all, in case you want to send it
anonymously.
It sends me a list of all the packages you have installed on the machine
you execute the command on.
Reason to do this:
In a discussion the idea came up to see if profiles for the usage of
packages could be found. If a large number of these pkg_info lists are
retrieved we can try to find relations between each two installed
packages.
This could be used to offer predefined profiles to the user when
installing packages. This avoids the user to having to wade through the
entire list of packages when deciding what to install. The directory
structure present in the /usr/ports directory already provides a means
to do this but this could be improved upon.
See for a more elaborate discussion the message below.
Thanks for your help and my apologies for the cross posting.
Please note that I am not subscribed to any of the mailing lists (except
hackers) and any flames should be sent to my personal address only. I
will collect all the flames and post a digest. :-)
Nick Hibma
========
>From nick.hibma@jrc.it Fri Jul 3 13:34:37 1998
Date: Wed, 17 Jun 1998 19:01:14 +0200 (MET DST)
From: Nick Hibma <nick.hibma@jrc.it>
To: Garance A Drosihn <drosih@rpi.edu>
Cc: FreeBSD hackers mailing list <hackers@freebsd.org>
Subject: Re: 2.2.6 CD-ROM : Package dependencies up the creek ?
> > That is true, but the idea of profiles and a more copious choice of
> > what you might want to install is not a bad idea either I think.
>
> I think it is a "slippery slope", as each of us has a different
> collection of packages which we feel are important for machines
> once we have them setup as a production service. If we start down
> this path, we will probably end up just reorganizing the ports list,
> whereas what I'm hoping for is a very short list of packages which
> are displayed during the initial install time.
Let's separate between two different issues. One, the more important and
urgent one: your point of creating a list of packages which should be
optional but most probably necessary on a newly installed system. You
mention bash as an example, perl5 is another one. Add a tick box in one
of the installation menus and add the packages to the CD and you are
done. The more room on the CD the more packages you can add to that
list if you like.
The idea of profiles is the other one and as you say, it is a slippery
slope. Most people install the operating system for the first time to
try and if they have the feeling that they are being coached through the
process and been given choices that they can easily understand, they'll
probably have a better feeling about what is happening to them.
Profiles you can see as different views on the database of packages
available. You can already see this if you look at the way the packages
are structured now. The point is that you can select a number of
profiles that suite you. They might overlap, for example web, mail and
software development, but you have a preselection of packages which
should fullfill most your intended uses.
Enhancing the profiles with relations makes it even more sexy. For
example, installing MSQL on a development system that also has perl
installed could trigger the adding perl5-msql. Having selected X and
ghostscript makes it invitable to install ghostview as well. An idea is
to collect a lot of pkg_info -aI lists and see if you can use statistics
to guess what someone might want to install as well.
Taking into account the available disk space and using the statistical
analysis to rank the automatically added packages would keep the thing
from installing too many things.
REQUEST:
I hereby post a request for pkg_info -aI listings of FBSD machines.
Please add in the subject PKGINFO. That makes the message more of an
object that _just_knows_ which mail folder to go to. The following
should do:
pkg_info -aI | mail -s "PKGINFO `hostname`" nick.hibma@jrc.it
should do the trick.
And, someone has said this (I cannot remember his name), there should be
a step in between the installation of the base system (O sys and basic
functionality /usr/bin and packages) and the installation of the
packages through selection/profiles/whatever. In contrast to MicroDollar
there is a difference between the operating system and the user
interface. A remark about the fact that the operating system and base
functionality (including the item above, the packages on CD 1) has been
completely installed and that he now can continue with the installation
of added functionality if he wishes to do so, should be added.
To avoid the problem Garance had when installing FreeBSD (supposedly
nuking his fresh installation during the installation of XFree) maybe
some consolidation stage should be added (reboot) after dumping a README
on what to do next to the screen/to more. Shouldn't we force a reboot to
make sure we run off a decent medium (common guys, one reboot is not the
end of the world! :-) Is it at all possible to install XFree at that
stage, because of the lack of swap and RO /usr partition?
> I would expect most shells will be on this "short list". As part of the
> install process the user going to be asked to create some personal ID's,
Account creation is a good one as well for the initial setup phase. At
least you can log in as user root with a password or as someone else. It
makes it feel more like home instead of a black hole.
> shell I "need". Obviously I can get by using other shells, but it
> only takes about five minutes before I start missing shell features
> which I'm pretty used to.
The cursor jumping all over the place when pressing tab, very annoying,
yes. :-) Someone who has the CD1 handy should tell us how much space is
left there before we embark on listing all our favourite toys.
Nick Hibma
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