Re: PKGBASE Removes FreeBSD Base System Feature

Just a brief note from a new, nontechnical user.  I actually appreciate the
energetic debates because they are educating me about fbsd and its
philosophy - not to mention warning me about treacherous shoals.

David Scranton

On Sat, Aug 9, 2025, 8:10 AM Dag-Erling Smørgrav <des@freebsd.org> wrote:

> David Greenman-Lawrence <dg@dglawrence.com> writes:
> > FWIW, I do have an opinion on this: I think that "pkg delete -af" is a
> > useful thing that should not destroy your base system.
>
> If you want to delete all packages that aren't vital to the system's
> functioning, just run `pkg delete -a`.  That will leave you with
> whatever packages were locked or marked vital (normally FreeBSD-clibs
> and FreeBSD-runtime, which contain the most important libraries and
> binaries) plus pkg itself (because pkg is hardcoded to never delete
> itself unless forced to).
>
> DES
> --
> Dag-Erling Smørgrav - des@FreeBSD.org
>
>