From owner-freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Sep 1 14:39:26 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: ports@FreeBSD.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 04687106566C for ; Thu, 1 Sep 2011 14:39:26 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from talon@lpthe.jussieu.fr) Received: from shiva.jussieu.fr (shiva.jussieu.fr [134.157.0.129]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 98D028FC0C for ; Thu, 1 Sep 2011 14:39:25 +0000 (UTC) Received: from parthe.lpthe.jussieu.fr (parthe.lpthe.jussieu.fr [134.157.10.1]) by shiva.jussieu.fr (8.14.4/jtpda-5.4) with ESMTP id p81EcNL5081041 for ; Thu, 1 Sep 2011 16:38:36 +0200 (CEST) X-Ids: 168 Received: from asmodee.lpthe.jussieu.fr (asmodee.lpthe.jussieu.fr [134.157.10.34]) by parthe.lpthe.jussieu.fr (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8B30521C7D for ; Thu, 1 Sep 2011 16:38:57 +0200 (CEST) Received: by asmodee.lpthe.jussieu.fr (Postfix, from userid 2005) id 73D2B33C35; Thu, 1 Sep 2011 16:38:57 +0200 (CEST) Date: Thu, 1 Sep 2011 16:38:57 +0200 From: Michel TALON To: ports@FreeBSD.org Message-ID: <20110901143857.GB56708@lpthe.jussieu.fr> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.2.3i X-Miltered: at jchkmail.jussieu.fr with ID 4E5F9902.003 by Joe's j-chkmail (http : // j-chkmail dot ensmp dot fr)! X-j-chkmail-Enveloppe: 4E5F9902.003/134.157.10.1/parthe.lpthe.jussieu.fr/parthe.lpthe.jussieu.fr/ Cc: Subject: Re: suggestion for pkgdb from ports-mgmt/portupgrade: add more explanation X-BeenThere: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Porting software to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 01 Sep 2011 14:39:26 -0000 Julian H. Stacey wrote: > Suggestion: pkgdb is too cryptic even with -v, > it needs more explanation what it is up to & > particularly what decisions it asks from user > ..... This is a point i have studied a long time, notably i have read the ruby code doing that. There are a lot of heuristics doing automatic choices, when they fail they ask the end user. The whole stuff is quite complicated, and asking questions to the user is certainly not the solution, since he has no business knowing the necessary details. In practice he does arbitrary (usually bad) choices and the system degrades. In general one should always be able to make these decisions automatically using the MOVED file, which is what portmaster does (barring some exceptions which occur from time to time and are supposed to be documented in UPDATING - which is an offense to the automaticity of the system). I thing that portupgrade should be modified to remove all those heuristics and use MOVED, but the code is not so obvious to understand, and ruby (as far as i am concerned) doesn't help. Finally the file UPDATING should be forcefully removed from the system, and ports maintainers should get at the same effect through means which don't prevent automatisation (for example upping the revision levels of all appropriate ports, even if they are very numerous). At the end of the day, portupgrade is so awfully slow that i think moving away from ruby could also help in this respect. -- Michel TALON