Re: 6.0 post-install questions

Begin <e5s6sj$2khn$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
On 2006-06-03, Michel Talon <talon@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Philip Paeps <philip+usenet@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
I can't even see the slightest relationship or overlap in the way
FreeBSD does package management (ports, pkg_* tools) and Microsoft
does (it doesn't).

Let me rephrase it other way. The way Microsoft does it works. The way
the *BSD and Linux do it, in general does not work.

IME, the FreeBSD package management works quite well, in that packages
installed are listed with name and version and can be de/installed by
hand. The database used to keep track of all that can be amended by hand
if necessairy, too. This was the original question. The answer is a
clear yes: On FreeBSD, installed packages are very deletable.

This simply is not the case with windows. Yes, somewhere well after w98
it came up with something that redid without discernible improvement
what third party vendors had already come up with, because again
they didn't come up with it first themselves, and it offers no ways
whatsoever to fix things when, not if, they go wrong. I've had my
share of installed programs suddenly stop working, and in trying to
deinstall-before-reinstalling, take the whole OS with it. And I don't
even use redmondian crap all that often.

Yes, theirs is shiny and has icons. FreeBSD's doesn't. FreeBSD's is
fixable, theirs isn't. Of course, you would fall for the shiny.


Only with a huge infrastructure with thousand developpers, Debian
achieves something barely usable, by building every package and
checking it really works. However this takes ages and gets really
usable when a commercial entity, Canonical adds its polish to the
game.

And yet, and yet... you are still here? I mean, if you really like their
stuff that much better, you *can* vote with your money, you know.


OpenBSD has something really working by restricting to a
drastically small set of ports and checking them carefully.

OpenBSD doesn't have much truck with running general production, as
their focus is very tightly on security. They can decide to kick out 90%
of the packages they offer just because. Which is fine for their market.


FreeBSD has the great virtue of providing a gigantic set of ports, like
Debian, but they may work or not, you may upgrade them or the upgrade may
break, etc.

FreeBSD is much more about making it work well even if the world isn't
entirely ideal. It's pretty good at it, too. Need I remind you that it
also is a volunteer effort, and that you are welcome to help try and
iron the wrinkles out?

Also, you're forgetting there is a difference between the individual
ports, and the framework or infrastructure that supports it. The latter
is pretty well developed and works quite well, thank you. This means
that even if ports don't work well themselves, they can be deinstalled
with relative ease, for anything that was listed in the package was
installed, and can be deinstalled, too. You can even ask it what exactly
it has installed, down to the individual files. Can windows do that,
easily? At all? Without 3rd party tools?


This is very nice if you like to live dangerously. The conclusion
i draw from these *facts*

I have a really hard time finding facts in your wild and unbacked
accusations, especially when you choose to gloss over everything that
doesn't quite fit with whatever you're saying, once you get on your
hobby-horse du jour.

I would be interested if you had any facts with suitable backing to
offer, maybe with discussion on merits and reflections on ways to
improve shortcomings, possibly with an attempt at objectivity thrown in
for good measure. But since apparently you do have a problem separating
sayings with your opinion from sayings with, you know, any factual and
therefore demonstratable relation to the big blue room, I'm afraid we'll
stay deprived of them.

You are, of course, welcome to rectify this oversight, even if you can't
quite keep that pre-set opinion oozing through the cracks, which would
be nice for a change.


is that the idea of a huge set of ports and libraries with almost
infinite interactions which has been thought as a wonderful
achievement of the free software world is far less robust

I agree that there's too damn many little silly libraries. Much of it,
however, isn't due to FreeBSD, `linux', OpenBSD, whatever, but due to
the applications and widget-set people: gnome, kde, and so on. Often
enough, the package maintainers have less freedom to fix this than you
are trying to make us believe here.

I don't have a universal solve-all for the problem either, but I am
interested in hearing opinions on how to solve it. So, how would you go
about it, and what are the sacrifices you're willing to make for it?
Would those sacrifices be acceptable to the rest of us, too, and why?


that the simple techniques that people use in the Microsoft of Apple
world. Throw everything in a directory and erase it when you want to
get rid of the package.

``registry''.


I'd leave it at that, but the stuff in /win{dows,nt}/system32 can
get pretty crowded too. Both have very nasty drawbacks, opening up a
considerable 3rd party market for various tools and things that in the
end also don't really fix the problems with that ``system''.

FreeBSD doesn't have that big a 3rd party market to try and fix what
it doesn't fix itself, for it tries to fix and support fixing itself.
I'll gladly report or fix the occasional broken package, filing PRs
with problem descriptions and patches if I can. Yes, you need to be
``savvy'' to be able to do that meaningfully. I am, I can, I do. And
FreeBSD allows me to, which is more than I can say of certain
commercial vendors.

As long as it's not too broken and it not only is fixable, but also
supports fixing it, --and incidentally, FreeBSD passes all of the above
with flying colours especially considering it really is an unpaid
volunteer effort--, then in my opinion, your vitriol is not warranted.


--
j p d (at) d s b (dot) t u d e l f t (dot) n l .
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