Archives of last quarterly package builds?

[grarpamp]

> I've asked for this but the answer is
> "no we don't do that..  and have no plans to".

What is the rationale? Or is another model of pkg build,
distribution, and archiving coming?

It seems no more would be needed than
- an update to release / handbook / mirror info noting their status
as "final, to be removed [to archives] on date + timeframe", say 1 year.
- simple sysadmin on pkg / web side as part of each quarter activity.
- some storage space.
- obviously they are the final builds of the branch, thus frozen.

Anything else / prereqs missing to doing that?

In addition to the earlier reasons...
'packages /latest' trails 'repo HEAD' so it's a fairly linear turnover.
Yet /quarterly gets a massive bump when the branches swap out
from underneath it.
So one could also see where enterprise and other pkg users might
be expecting a similar progression in /quarterly, and to manually
cutforward, not automatic large whack at once. Those production
bumps can hurt. So they might choose to track repo_conf /yyyyQn
and trial the new quarter before moving to it.

It just seems that the final builds on those quarterly branches
should be left online for a while, instead of just ...poof...GONE.

ie: with pkg, this should work for a year or so...
/.../repo_conf:  url: "pkg+https://pkg.FreeBSD.org/${ABI}/2018Q2"

Some labels could also be added for use in pkg's repo_conf...
/last_quarter - simpler than dealing with the date, alternately: /prev_quarter
/this_quarter - same as today's /quarterly
/head - unlikely due to build / mirror times and other factors
/yyyyQn - expose these for manual tracking and cutforward,
and the validation purposes below

[bcc for thread ref]


On Sun, Jul 22, 2018 at 4:44 AM, Julian Elischer <julian at freebsd.org> wrote:
> On 22/7/18 5:59 am, grarpamp wrote:
>>
>> Packages are delivered via a single quarterly label here
>>
>> https://pkg.freebsd.org/FreeBSD:11:amd64/quarterly/
>>
>> which corresponds to the latest quarterly branch label here
>>
>> https://svnweb.freebsd.org/ports/branches/?sortby=date#dirlist
>>
>>
>> However, similar to how the tags here
>>
>> https://svnweb.freebsd.org/ports/tags/?sortby=date#dirlist
>>
>> are archived here
>>
>> https://pkg.freebsd.org/FreeBSD:11:amd64/
>> as these
>> https://pkg.freebsd.org/FreeBSD:11:amd64/release_[n]
>>
>>
>> The last "ie: final" builds of each quarterly branch before they
>> roll over should also be moved off into their own archived
>> quarterly directories as
>
>
> I've asked for this but the answer is "no we don't do that..  and have no
> plans to".
> Which is a putty as it means you need to make your own snapshots if you want
> to have any reproducability.
> It no linger matters to me as we now roll all our own packages from source
> (we have private OS changes
> that make this a requirement), but it was a sore point for many years.
>
>
>>
>> https://pkg.freebsd.org/FreeBSD:11:amd64/yyyyQ[n]
>>
>> For example /quarterly/ should be repointed from 2018Q2
>> to 2018Q3, leaving 2018Q2 as a live "pkg" accessible archive.
>>
>>
>> Eventually all such archives could be moved to historical
>> archive server under typical release support expiry periods.
>>
>>
>> This would also serve critical purpose as an independant
>> original remote repository for validating local package / file
>> signatures against compromise, corruption, loss.
>>
>>
>> For example, does the last 2018Q2 (or older ones) still exist
>> anywhere for users to reference and use?
>
> no.