From owner-freebsd-arch Sun Jul 7 9: 0:11 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.FreeBSD.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8809437B406; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 09:00:05 -0700 (PDT) Received: from spqr.osg.gov.bc.ca (spqr.osg.gov.bc.ca [142.32.102.24]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1530F43E4A; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 09:00:05 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from Cy.Schubert@osg.gov.bc.ca) Received: from passer.osg.gov.bc.ca (passer.osg.gov.bc.ca [142.32.110.29]) by spqr.osg.gov.bc.ca (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8F8129EF16; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 09:00:04 -0700 (PDT) Received: from cwsys.cwsent.com (cwsys2 [10.1.2.1]) by passer.osg.gov.bc.ca (8.12.5/8.12.3) with ESMTP id g67G03OX023822; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 09:00:04 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from cy@cwsent.com) Received: from cwsys (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by cwsys.cwsent.com (8.12.5/8.12.3) with ESMTP id g67G03fP014193; Sun, 7 Jul 2002 09:00:03 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from cy@cwsys.cwsent.com) Message-Id: <200207071600.g67G03fP014193@cwsys.cwsent.com> X-Mailer: exmh version 2.5 07/13/2001 with nmh-1.0.4 Reply-To: Cy Schubert - CITS Open Systems Group From: Cy Schubert - CITS Open Systems Group X-os: FreeBSD X-Sender: cy@cwsent.com To: Dan Moschuk Cc: arch@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Package system flaws? In-Reply-To: Message from Dan Moschuk of "Sat, 06 Jul 2002 18:05:11 EDT." <20020706220511.GA88651@scoobysnax.jaded.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Date: Sun, 07 Jul 2002 09:00:03 -0700 Sender: owner-freebsd-arch@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG In message <20020706220511.GA88651@scoobysnax.jaded.net>, Dan Moschuk writes: > > I've been doing some thinking lately about our ports system versus what > other systems have adopted and was curious as to what people think on > the subject? What does FreeBSD do well? Where can we improve? How does it > rate against the umpteen Linux flavours? Comparing our package system with others, such as RH's RPM. Sun's pkg*, and DEC's... er Compaq's... er HP's setld, the FreeBSD pkg_* utilities are one of the better package applications in the industry. Actually I like our package system better than Suns. However, I have been spoiled by 19 years of using IBM's SMP/E (and it's predecessor SMP) for the MVS (mainframe) operating system prior to my 10 years in the UNIX world. Unfortunately I don't think we have enough people on the project to build the Cadillac (some might argue monstrosity), with all of its bells, whistles, prereq's, coreq's, functions, dependent functions, PTF's, APARFIXES, USERMODS, zones, recovery, and other handy features that IBM has built for MVS over the past 40 years. Interestingly IBM has not ported SMP/E to AIX, probably because it would take them an ice age to port and SMP/E isn't the easiest application to understand -- most people hated it while the few of us who fully understood it loved it. Excluding the IBM "anomaly," I think we probably have the best package system in the market. Can we improve our package system? Yes. Can I think of any? Well, if we want to keep it simple, I cannot think of any enhancements that would improve our lives, except for possibly a GUI front end. -- Cheers, Phone: 250-387-8437 Cy Schubert Fax: 250-387-5766 Team Leader, Sun/Alpha Team Email: Cy.Schubert@osg.gov.bc.ca Open Systems Group, CITS Ministry of Management Services Province of BC FreeBSD UNIX: cy@FreeBSD.org To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-arch" in the body of the message