Lifetime of FreeBSD branches

[Jon Dama]

It might be beneficial (pipe-dream perhaps) if the all the BSDs coalesced
around one port/packaging system.  I hear that netbsd's port system has
the metadata necessary to support different OSs and different OS versions
within one coherent system.

What do you think about the relative strengths of pkgsrc and the FreeBSD
ports system?

-Jon

On Mon, 23 May 2005, Kris Kennaway wrote:

> On Tue, May 24, 2005 at 10:45:48AM +0900, Joel wrote:
> > Random comment from the peanut gallery, but ...
> >
> > > >> Thanks for the info guys. Does this "security support" also mean that
> > > >> current ports will be compatible with the release?
> > > >
> > > > No, there are no guarantees about that.  The ports/ people generally
> > > > try to make things work with older releases, but there are no gurantees
> > > > there.  It's simply too much work to make such guarantees, and this is
> > > > after all an volunteer project (for most parts anyway). See also
> > > > http://www.freebsd.org/ports/ for the "official" statement.
> > >
> > > Right, i didnt think so. Debian is a volunteer project too, and their
> > > packaging system supports all of their branches. I guess i should look
> > > into rolling my own packages, to be sure. And yes, i realize that we just
> > > dont have an infrastructure for something like this.
> >
> > I'm thinking that, if a company really doesn't have the infrastructure,
> > there are several good options. You mention Linux. MacOSX is closer to
> > the BSDs than Linux in many ways, tends to have relatively long-term
> > stability, and you can pay Apple for a rather high level of support if
> > you join their developer's program.
> >
> > The best option, however, may be to invest in the infrastructure -- a
> > long term relationship with a qualified contractor, or even an employee
> > whose primary duty would be to (learn how to) do the heavy lifting on
> > backporting and upgrading. That way, the OS itself becomes more a part
> > of the company's resources.
>
> Didn't someone announce a few months ago that they were going to work
> on supporting ports with older releases?  I'm sure they'd welcome
> support, whether financial, material or otherwise.
>
> Kris
>