From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Oct 6 15:25:16 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 909151065693 for ; Wed, 6 Oct 2010 15:25:16 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Received: from mx02.qsc.de (mx02.qsc.de [213.148.130.14]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 38C978FC1A for ; Wed, 6 Oct 2010 15:25:15 +0000 (UTC) Received: from r55.edvax.de (port-92-195-73-80.dynamic.qsc.de [92.195.73.80]) by mx02.qsc.de (Postfix) with ESMTP id EEE831DC97; Wed, 6 Oct 2010 17:25:14 +0200 (CEST) Received: from r55.edvax.de (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by r55.edvax.de (8.14.2/8.14.2) with SMTP id o96FPE3n002252; Wed, 6 Oct 2010 17:25:14 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from freebsd@edvax.de) Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2010 17:25:13 +0200 From: Polytropon To: Michel Talon Message-Id: <20101006172513.a424aad3.freebsd@edvax.de> In-Reply-To: <20101006164240.GA15467@lpthe.jussieu.fr> References: <20101006164240.GA15467@lpthe.jussieu.fr> Organization: EDVAX X-Mailer: Sylpheed 2.4.7 (GTK+ 2.12.1; i386-portbld-freebsd7.0) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Which OS for notebook X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list Reply-To: Polytropon List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 06 Oct 2010 15:25:16 -0000 On Wed, 6 Oct 2010 16:42:40 +0000, Michel Talon wrote: > I mean that the concept of maintaining a full set of binary packages > which has been verified by the distribution maintainers and remain > usable for an extended period of time, combined with an effective > binary upgrader (apt-get, aptitude), is light years ahead, for ease of > use and convenience, to a rolling release style "bazar" like FreeBSD > ports, combined with tools like portupgrade, which sort of work only > when you spend all your time running them daily, after having sacrificed > a young virgin to the gods. Erm... no. First of all, I have better uses for virgins, and then, portupgrade -p is a very useful mechanism for binary updating of installed applications. Sadly, not all applications CAN be installed by or upgraded from binary packages, as those don't exist due to the amount of available options that have to be set at compile time. A well-known example is OpenOffice. The times when you could run "pkg_add -r de-openoffice" to get a precompiled OpenOffice including german localisation and dictionaries are over. There are also restrictions that have their roots in laws, such as the prohibition of codec distribution (yes, I know, that's totally idiotic from a user's point of view), requiring programs like mplayer to be compiled with certain options if you want the "illegal" (bah!) codecs that make mplayer play everything. Oh, and another example might be X if you want to run it the "traditional" way without HAL and DBUS. > I concede that the FreeBSD way allows to have > very up to date ports, and to be in control of compilation options and > so on. Personnally i don't have much use for these benefits. I do share this opinion in many regards and settings. Binary installation is a big advantage especially if you're low on resources. But sometimes, you can't avoid it. > Even more, > there are ports freezes, during the preparation of these releases, > allowing to get a relatively coherent set of packages for the release. VERY important for offline installations. You don't want bleeding-edge broken programs there. > One may imagine this is the first step in a similar strategy for the > ports as for the base system. Tools like portupgrade allow using the precompiled packages from the Latest/ subtree as a means of upgrading without compiling. > But in this very thread, most competent > ports folks explain us that the first thing to do is throw away the > ports tree which has been used in the release and consequently the > packages which have been compiled with it, and preferably indulge in the > daily ritual of running csup, and invoking the manes of portupgrade > or portmaster, of course after having carefully read UPDATING. Oh, this HEAVILY depends on your setting, on your requirements. For a system where "install once, then keep using" is the prime directive, the approach you mentioned does not fit well. For a system that you want to test the latest software, where you INTENDEDLY want beeding-edge, it's the best way. You could make up the following associations: RELEASE system - pkg_add from RELEASE/ - ports tree from CD STABLE system - pkg_add from Latest/ - ports updated per portsnap CURRENT system - no pkg_add - ports updated per csup Please don't see this list as a mandatory ruleset. Mixed approaches may be the best solution in different settings. > Beleive it or not, i click on an icon of my Ubuntu laptop, and get the > same result without any further interaction. Which *may* cause your system to break. Don not understand this as an insult or claim. I have limited experience with Linux, but those that I have, especially as a supporter of "newbies" and "average users" show that Linux holds other kinds of confusion that I don't want to describe here in detail. FreeBSD is a system that always goes the SAFE ROUTE, because that is what its users expect - and often REQUIRE. -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...