From owner-freebsd-arm@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Nov 5 02:36:58 2012 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-arm@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [69.147.83.52]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 46DD9BF5 for ; Mon, 5 Nov 2012 02:36:58 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from dave@jetcafe.org) Received: from nahkohe.jetcafe.org (nahkohe.jetcafe.org [205.147.26.32]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 20B0F8FC08 for ; Mon, 5 Nov 2012 02:36:57 +0000 (UTC) X-Envelope-To: freebsd-arm@freebsd.org Received: from [205.147.26.5] (hokkshideh4.jetcafe.org [205.147.26.5]) by nahkohe.jetcafe.org (8.14.2/8.14.2) with ESMTP id qA52amm9021330 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO); Sun, 4 Nov 2012 18:36:48 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: <5097263F.5090802@jetcafe.org> Date: Sun, 04 Nov 2012 18:36:47 -0800 From: Dave Hayes User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; FreeBSD amd64; rv:13.0) Gecko/20120612 Thunderbird/13.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Ian Lepore Subject: Re: announcing the availability of packages for the Arm architecture References: <1351606727.1120.17.camel@revolution.hippie.lan> In-Reply-To: <1351606727.1120.17.camel@revolution.hippie.lan> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-arm@freebsd.org X-BeenThere: freebsd-arm@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.14 Precedence: list List-Id: Porting FreeBSD to the StrongARM Processor List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 05 Nov 2012 02:36:58 -0000 On 10/30/12 07:18, Ian Lepore wrote: > All in all, I have the impression that not many people "use" freebsd on > arm at all. Just getting to the point of "using" it is quite time intensive. I ran out of time trying to get my dreamplug to where I want it. These issues were in my way (this was some time ago, check the list for dates): - install requires non-trivial patches and kernel config - building ports on the device itself is dog slow (I likely need to put a swap partition on a usb stick to do that since the machine has no swap in the first place) - no qemu support to use faster machines to emulate arm to build ports - cross compiling ports is too dangerous I'm not an average user, but I had to stash this idea just the same due to time constraints. Also, as you point out, most developers here seem to be on -current (I believe this is version 10), I can't justify moving to 10 since most of my supported base is at 8. I compromised already and went to 9 since getting the dreamplug to work with 8 was even more daunting. I'm not saying anyone must work on these things, I know how open source is. I'm just saying there's a huge barrier to entry for "users" of these boards. Maybe the Raspberry PI estrus will change that? I hope so, I like this dreamplug since it seems to be the only inexpensive ARM machine that has dual gigabit ethernet interfaces. I just need a man-month to get it to where it's usable... :) -- Dave Hayes - Consultant - Altadena CA, USA - dave@jetcafe.org >>>> *The opinions expressed above are entirely my own* <<<< The only person who needs a contract is one who cannot be trusted.