pkg

[Charles Swiger]

On Jun 22, 2015, at 1:12 PM, john.haraden--- via freebsd-questions <freebsd-questions at freebsd.org> wrote:
> (1). I have a work station with two Xeon processors.
> (2) I have installed FreeBSD 10.1
> (3). I have no internet connection.
> (4)   When I tried to use pkg to make my system fully functional, the system declared pkg was not in the base system, I would need to fetch it over the Internet.  That is impossible since I do not have internet capability.

You get a fully functioning FreeBSD system from the .iso images.  If you want to install external / third-party software, then using ports or pkg via the Internet is a good solution, but it is not the only option.

> (5)  Is there some other way for me to get pkg?

Sure.  You can download pkg and the packages you want to have it install onto
a USB drive, burn them to a CD/DVD, etc.  Note that the FreeBSD project
provides a larger image with some common packages included as a DVD image, ie:

   FreeBSD-10.1-RELEASE-amd64-dvd1.iso

> (6)   Why was something as basic as pkg not included in the base system?

Packages and ports are not part of the base system by definition.

I've got production firewalls based upon FreeBSD still running at clients which
never needed or had any additional third-party software installed on them,
for example....

> After all, the system is supposed to be self-contained?

It is.  FreeBSD is self-hosting and can be bootstrapped from source via
the included compiler toolchain.

> (7) I tried to install my old version 5.3, but the hardware would not accept it.

Good.  You'd be missing a decade worth of security fixes, if nothing else.

> (8)   Do I have any alternative to discarding the new hardware and FreeBSD?

You have many alternatives, but feel free to select the most melodramatic option if doing so pleases you.

Regards,
-- 
-Chuck