From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon May 5 05:36:26 2008 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D8F861065679 for ; Mon, 5 May 2008 05:36:26 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from sonicy@otenet.gr) Received: from aiolos.otenet.gr (aiolos.otenet.gr [195.170.0.93]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id DB6028FC2A for ; Mon, 5 May 2008 05:36:25 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from sonicy@otenet.gr) Received: from [192.168.0.1] (athedsl-295837.home.otenet.gr [85.73.203.59]) by aiolos.otenet.gr (8.13.8/8.13.8/Debian-3) with ESMTP id m455aMXE013460; Mon, 5 May 2008 08:36:23 +0300 Message-ID: <481E9CCD.1030702@otenet.gr> Date: Mon, 05 May 2008 08:36:13 +0300 From: Manolis Kiagias User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.12 (X11/20080227) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: prad References: <20080504221223.20b5827e@gom.home> In-Reply-To: <20080504221223.20b5827e@gom.home> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: living with freebsd X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 05 May 2008 05:36:26 -0000 prad wrote: > i'd like to know how people live with freebsd. > > do you use only ports or only packages or a mixture? > do you upgrade from version to version using freebsd tools or do it > manually? > do you have a different approach regarding the above depending on > whether it is for a server or a desktop? > > the handbook tells you what you can do, but i'd like to know what is > actually done and why. > > You will probably get too many different views - it is a flexible system after all. For example, I rarely mix ports and packages. On my small home server (which also doubles as a workstation for light use) everything is compiled from ports. This includes openoffice.org which took more than a day to download and compile. I doubt I'll ever upgrade it the same way... On this machine I am using the XFCE desktop, which I start manually from the command line when used as a desktop. But on a real dedicated desktop, I would use Gnome (or KDE). As for versions, I always run -RELEASE. I would go to STABLE if I desperately needed a feature not present in RELEASE, but this hasn't happened yet. I am using freebsd-update to get security updates / patches and then recompile my kernel when needed. I also used freebsd-update to get to 7.0-RELEASE from 7.0-RC1. Quite painless. For desktop machines, especially when I need to get them up and running quickly, I use packages. You can either use the stable packages from the site (by setting the PACKAGESITE env variable) or use another machine to compile your own (have a look at http://tinderbox.marcuscom.com/ ). I almost never use the CD packages (except maybe for demonstration purposes) since they get outdated really quickly.