making packages

[Oliver Eikemeier]

Sven Esbjerg wrote:

> I'm playing around with the ports system and decided to use make package
> feature to create my own package repository for use on several machines.
> I'm using RELEASE-5.2.1 on all machines.
> 
> I have a central building machine where I build all packages. So far I'm
> having lots of problems. 
> 
> make package-recursive doesn't allways build all the dependant packages

It should. Examples?

> pkg_add has a problem with ' in filenames (fixed in STABLE and HEAD) - I
> patched my own pkg_add and now this works :)

Either that or you can install sysutils/pkg_install-devel with
PREFIX=/usr, which will replace your base system tools.

> when making a package from gettext it only includes the man pages even though
> plist specifies the correct files??? make install installs all the files
> though.
> 
> something is fuxed with xml
> when I try to install gnome packages they allmost allways depend on docbook
> stuff - xmlcatmgr complains about corrupted xml-files and missing files and
> the exits.
> 
> so my question is - are packages something that should be working from a
> current portstree or? 
> is it worth taking the time to hunt the bugs down an report them?

It is, actually a lot of people are working to keep the ports tree running
and building packages. We are thankful for qualified bug reports and patch,
you might want to have the FreeBSD Porters Handbook ready as a reference:
  <http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/porters-handbook/>
Especially 3.4, Testing the port. Also you want to make yourself familiar
with the bento package building cluster:
  <http://bento.freebsd.org/errorlogs/>
and the ports monitoring system:
  <http://portsmon.firepipe.net/>

Essentially bento is building packages for all ports, portsmon associates
the results with GNATS, so if something doesn't work, you may want to check:

- If there is an update available
- If there is already a PR filed against the port
- If the port builds on bento, if not you could submit a patch that fixes
  the port
- Otherwise find out why the port compiles on bento, but not *your* configuration,
  and file a bug against the port if you believe your configuration is supported
  and should work. A patch would be appreciated here, too.

Normally people here and on trhe gnome mailing list are quite helpful, so you
can come back with any problems you encounter.

Cheers,
-Oliver