From owner-freebsd-questions  Tue May 21 17:10:48 1996
Return-Path: owner-questions
Received: (from root@localhost)
          by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) id RAA16950
          for questions-outgoing; Tue, 21 May 1996 17:10:48 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from who.cdrom.com (who.cdrom.com [204.216.27.3])
          by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id RAA16944
          for <questions@freebsd.org>; Tue, 21 May 1996 17:10:45 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from tulpi.interconnect.com.au (root@tulpi.interconnect.com.au [192.189.54.18])
          by who.cdrom.com (8.6.12/8.6.11) with ESMTP id RAA20667
          for <questions@freebsd.org>; Tue, 21 May 1996 17:10:32 -0700
Received: (from ahill@localhost) by tulpi.interconnect.com.au id KAA18343
  (8.7.4/IDA-1.6); Wed, 22 May 1996 10:07:54 +1000 (EST)
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 10:07:52 +1000 (EST)
From: Anthony Hill <ahill@interconnect.com.au>
To: John Clark <jrclark@felix.iupui.edu>
cc: questions@freebsd.org
Subject: Re: Ports Collection -- up-to-date
In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19960520203115.002f4f78@felix.iupui.edu>
Message-ID: <Pine.BSI.3.91.960522095404.17090A-100000@tulpi.interconnect.com.au>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Sender: owner-questions@freebsd.org
X-Loop: FreeBSD.org
Precedence: bulk

> It is not at all obvious how the ports collection works.  I have read the
> handbook chapter several times, and I am battled at how the whole process
> works.  I understand the ports collection to be a collection of software
> tweaked to run with FreeBSD.  I ftp'ed to
> "ftp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD/distfiles" and picked-up apache_1.0.5.tar.gz.
> I unpacked the file into /usr/ports (I had to make the "ports" directory).
> Upon looking through the Makefile, I saw that it was configured for Sun OS.
> This does not seem very "tweaked" to me.  I must be missing something, I can
> download apache myself (from apache) and do the manual configuration.  I was
> lead to believe that someone had already config'ed the files to run under
> FreeBSD, I must be missing something.

John,

To use the ports collection you download the files from the ports directorys.
Take apache for example.

ftp ftp.au.FreeBSD.ORG		(you would choose the site closest to you)

	cd /pub/FreeBSD/FreeBSD-current/ports/www

	lcd /usr/ports/www

	bin

	get apache.tar.gz	(wuftpd will tar and gzip the direcory 
				tree under apache with this command)

	bye

su				(you dont have to be root for many of the 
				ports to work, but some insist)

cd /usr/ports/www

cat apache.tar.gz | tar xvzf

cd apache

make install


#At this point your machine will check in /usr/ports/distfiles for the 
#sources etc that it needs, it will also check to see if any other ports 
#that it depends on are present. If the sources it needs are present, it 
#will unpack, patch, compile and install them, if they are not present, it 
#will try and ftp them from somewhere.

#It is a very good idea to grab the whole ports tree. (its only a few MB) 
#This means that if one port depends on another (many do), the other can 
#be automatically built as part of the process.

cool ?