Questions about updating...

[C. Ulrich]

On Fri, 2003-12-05 at 11:52, rotten rottie wrote:
> I know this is probably a touchy subject but..
> 
> "... the ports tree isn't versioned, it's the equivalent of current...."
> 
> Wouldnt it be logical to have current/stable versions of the ports tree ?
> Then when you install a base system from cd it could install a stable pkg 
> version, then once the system is installed you could use a port-supfile for 
> "stable" and update all of the pkg versions that are installed instead of 
> cvs'ing /usr/src and recompiling the system ? Save the /usr/src for the core 
> os, and allow things like bind, ssh, ssl to be updated with portupgrade 
> instead of a make world or having to make the apps manually.
> 
> I am sorry if I stepped on any toes .. I dont mean to stir up any trouble .. 
> Just an outside observer trying to get started with freebsd.

I don't know if I fully understand your question, but if I'm right, it
consists of two parts, the first:

> Wouldnt it be logical to have current/stable versions of the ports
> tree ?

This has been discussed before, but the ports people maintain (and I
agree with them) that it wouldn't be feasible for a couple of reasons.

First, ports is already huge. They only reason they stay up to date is
because of a massive effort for a large number of volunteers. Creating a
second ports tree would double (or more) the amount of work for the
people running the ports tree itself and individual ports maintainers. I
have no proof to back this up, but I would guess that there are more
FreeBSD volunteers maintaining ports than any other part of the
operating system.

Second, ports exists primarily as an easy means to install software on
FreeBSD that the FreeBSD team has neither the inclination nor time to
properly maintain. Ports are by definition considered third-party
software. The idea is that the developers of the individual software
packages in ports are responsible for keeping their projects up-to-date
and bug-free. Creating a separate branch of ports goes against that
idea, to a degree. Additionally, much of the software in ports are
either considered "stable" or "development" or both or can't be easily
classified as one of the two. Once again, it's up to the developers of
the software in ports to decide what's considered stable or
in-development. The ports system currently acknowledges this situation
by maintaining two different ports of the same software (when
applicable), with the development port having a "-devel" tacked on to
the end of the port name. For example, "mozilla" and "mozilla-devel".

As for the second part, I guess I don't understand completely what
you're asking. :) Are you looking for a way to automatically upgrade
binary packages that come with FreeBSD, but are not themselves developed
or maintained by the FreeBSD team such as XFree86? The way you describe
it is how I thought it was already done. For example, if you installed
OpenSSH from the release CD and wanted to upgrade it, you just do a
pkg_delete and then go into your (updated) ports and 'make install' a
new one. (Or would just portupgrade work?) I'm still a relative newbie
to FreeBSD in some respects, so anyone feel free to clarify this and
educate me at the same time.

Charles Ulrich
-- 
http://bityard.net