why is the PHP stuff line "off" by default in ports/lang/php5?

[Rob Farmer]

On Sun, Sep 19, 2010 at 04:47, Ian Smith <smithi at nimnet.asn.au> wrote:
> In freebsd-questions Digest, Vol 3, Issue 9, Message: 21
> On Fri, 17 Sep 2010 20:03:46 -0700 patrick <gibblertron at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  > I don't for sure, but I'd say it's off by default because not everyone
>  > runs PHP with Apache, and mod_php5/libphp5.so is strictly for Apache.
>
> No, not everyone installs PHP to use with Apache, but I guess that maybe
> half do.  This comes up many times in the last 5 or so years since you
> could last install the module from a package rather than only the port.
>
> It's also one of those ports that takes a good while to build on slower
> hardware (which of course developers don't tend to run :) but no amount
> of requesting a version with '"Build Apache module" on' helped so far.
>
>  > Lots of people use PHP with FastCGI or other purposes.
>
> True, yet those people probably also tend to be less likely to want to
> install from packages (when available) anyway.  Sure, adding libphp5.so
> to the (or one different?) package would add maybe 3MB to it.  I'd be
> happy to spend an extra few MB and minutes to save likely an hour.
>
>  > If you always want it to be on, add the option to /etc/make.conf. Or,
>  > if you're using portupgrade or some other port management utility for
>  > upgrades, there are ways to set the default options for the ports you
>  > use.
>
> Not a problem when you have the horsepower and time to build it, but a
> significant loss of ability to install apache+php from packages, as you
> once could from the CDs .. guess I just got spoiled back there in the
> olden days :)


Adding a slave port would probably be a good solution and shouldn't be
too difficult.

-- 
Rob Farmer