Xorg disaster

[Lars Eighner]

On Thu, 5 Feb 2009, Alex Goncharov wrote:

> ,--- You/Lars (Thu, 5 Feb 2009 20:20:50 -0600 (CST)) ----*
> | Xorg upgrade (gory details follow) went south.  I must have a working
> | graphics browser by Monday.  This is pretty much *vital*, as in a matter of
> | survival.
>
> Been there (last week) -- know what you mean.
>
> | What is the fastest and/or surest way to get a platform that will run
> | firefox or opera?
> |
> | a. try to get my nvidia hardware to work with a generic (vesa or vga) driver?
> | b. try to downgrade Xorg to something that worked.
>
> I tried "b" -- very successfully.
>
> The path is (roughly):
>
> 1. Find the dependencies of xproto and xextproto:
>
>   pkg_info -R xproto-\* xextproto-\* | wc -l
>
>   Prepare to remove those (new) packages from your system.
>
> 2. Before you remove them, record their names and origins -- you will
>   need them to either get their old versions from ftp.freebsd.org or
>   too build from ports source.
>
> 3. Remove the packages identified in step 1.
>
> 4. FTP-get or build the old versions.
>
>   If you are to build them, you need the old ports tree: use this tag
>   in your ports-supfile:
>
>     *default release=cvs tag=. date=2009.01.23.12.00.00

Thanks.  It was how to set the wayback machine that was the missing
piece to the puzzle.

I did this since I am on dial-up and had not deleted the old distfiles (and
did not have any of the packages.  It wasn't a bed of roses and plenty of
restoring is still ahead, but the mission critical stuff now works.


>
>  I would not recommend your own build under the circumstances:
>  FTP-getting is much faster, of course -- the whole process will take
>  you about two hours, I think.

No doubt, but having the monster distfiles still on-hand tips the balance.
This seems to make the point: never delete the last cycle distfiles.


> I use the nv driver BTW -- perfectly -- in the old (downgraded to) X.

yes xorg 7.3 seems to work perfectly.  The display would work but the mouse
wouldn't with 7.4.  I suspect the fix for the hal-moused battle does not
work nv.


-- 
Lars Eighner
http://www.larseighner.com/index.html
8800 N IH35 APT 1191 AUSTIN TX 78753-5266