Official FreeBSD Binary Packages now available for pkgng

[Dewayne Geraghty]

On 3/11/2013 9:37 AM, Lars Engels wrote:
> On Sun, Nov 03, 2013 at 12:36:54AM +0200, Kimmo Paasiala wrote:
>> On Sun, Nov 3, 2013 at 12:34 AM, Lars Engels <lars.engels at 0x20.net> wrote:
>>> On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 05:22:44PM -0500, Bryan Drewery wrote:
>>>> On 10/31/2013 4:54 PM, Freddie Cash wrote:
>>>>> On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 2:39 PM, Mehmet Erol Sanliturk <
>>>>> m.e.sanliturk at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 4:58 PM, Bryan Drewery <bdrewery at freebsd.org>
>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> At present , the packages information and themselves are available from ,
>>>>>> such as :
>>>>>>
>>>>>> ftp://ftp1.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/ports/amd64/
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It seems that new pkg compatible packages will not be exposed to the
>>>>>> Internet such as
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> http://avalon.dragonflybsd.org/dports/
>>>>>> http://pkg.wolfpond.org/
>>>>>> http://mirror.exonetric.net/pub/pkgng/
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> This will be a very significant inconvenience for the possible users
>>>>>> because without an installed FreeBSD , they will not be able to see what
>>>>>> are the available packages there .
>>>>>>
>>>>> ???From the original message:
>>>>> Mirrors you may use instead of the global
>>>>> pkg.FreeBSD.org<http://pkg.freebsd.org/>
>>>>> :
>>>>>
>>>>>     pkg.eu.FreeBSD.org <http://pkg.eu.freebsd.org/>
>>>>>     pkg.us-east.FreeBSD.org <http://pkg.us-east.freebsd.org/>
>>>>>     pkg.us-west.FreeBSD.org <http://pkg.us-west.freebsd.org/>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> pkg.freebsd.org is, basically, an alias for the above (and any other
>>>>> mirrors that come online) and the pkg(1) tool will pick a "local" mirror
>>>>> based on the DNS response for pkg.freebsd.org.
>>>>>
>>>>> However, you are free to manually enter any of the above mirrors into your
>>>>> pkg.conf.
>>>>>
>>>>> And, you are free to browse any of the above mirrors via HTTP in any web
>>>>> browser.
>>>>>
>>>>> It's not nearly as convenient as just browsing pkg.freebsd.org, but it's
>>>>> still possible to do so.
>>>> These are still SRV hosts as well. The real hosts can be found with
>>>>
>>>> dig SRV _http._tcp.HOST HOST being the host from above lists.
>>>>
>>> Please add this to pkg.conf(5) as this it not intuitive and the syntax
>>> is a bit cumbersome.
>>
>> You will never have to know that syntax unless you're one of the few
>> that are behind a very restrictive firewall/proxy. The pkg client does
>> all this SRV record magic internally to find out a suitable mirror.
>>
> Right, but I actually happen to fall into that group at work. ;-)
+1
Unless you track the mailing list, and know to use

dig SRV _http._tcp.pkg.freebsd.org

the inevitable questions will be asked - "Why can't I ...."

Particularly as the availability of prebuilt packages is targeted at
relatively new FreeBSD folk, or those that don't customise their ports.
Thank-you.