Date: Sun, 08 Feb 2026 21:05:07 +0900 From: vimanuelt <vimanuelt@fastmail.fm> To: hackee <h4ckee@proton.me> Cc: "freebsd-pkgbase@freebsd.org" <freebsd-pkgbase@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: FreBSD pkgbase vs distsets. Message-ID: <7ed57840-2d6e-4032-a012-e36081223c16@app.fastmail.com> In-Reply-To: <WFkn7NioPAhffYIBeSuI0bHdizp8iE1c_LwENv_RNb3_5staGojcZHE1sdbWbunA13-Qx1DY3nuWVo3g3a2PPWXBZ2Mo8zSiNJK2G0UYfwM=@proton.me> References: <CRIyUTXuehXBE99lRe33_6IfZ5sZmIsIh9v1TOeBVHIXwSuoZ0522ZJUbZHSfnxcljiLFtruM-lnRY1CufB2szqP21hiGHvugZIBQxE2dzA=@proton.me> <2e96a48c-b4e7-47d9-b1b7-bfc3ce789664@app.fastmail.com> <WFkn7NioPAhffYIBeSuI0bHdizp8iE1c_LwENv_RNb3_5staGojcZHE1sdbWbunA13-Qx1DY3nuWVo3g3a2PPWXBZ2Mo8zSiNJK2G0UYfwM=@proton.me>
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Hi Sergei, Thank you for the clarification. That helps a lot, and I think your concern is entirely reasonable. I do not know what others think about it yet, but I believe a third option is important to consider carefully. My work in this area is independent of the FreeBSD Core Team and the FreeBSD Foundation. I believe the community wants a future where FreeBSD is reproducible and can be fully independent of FreeBSD project infrastructure in practice. I agree that building distsets from source is not just a historical path, but a valid architectural choice. In your case, the distset build logic is already integrated into your project. It produces staged filesystems that are then wrapped into an ISO. Removing this path does not simply encourage a different workflow. It forces downstream builders to redesign their systems and absorb significant rework. There is also an important environmental distinction. A distset based build is self contained. It relies only on the FreeBSD source tree and build system. A pkgbase build, by contrast, introduces a dependency on pkg tooling and ports infrastructure just to manufacture base artifacts, even when ports are otherwise unused. For clean, minimal build environments, that added surface area is a real cost. >From a tooling perspective, there is room for higher level systems to coexist with distsets rather than replace them. For example, an artifact oriented builder can drive the FreeBSD source build, stage the results deterministically, and emit distsets as outputs. In that model, distsets remain the stable interface, while tooling sits above them as an optional orchestration layer. This preserves existing pipelines while allowing experimentation and evolution. So my request is not to reject pkgbase, but to keep the distsets from source path viable and supported. It serves builders who value minimalism, determinism, and self contained pipelines, and it avoids imposing unnecessary dependencies on projects that already have working systems built around distsets. Best regards, Vester “Vic” Thacker On Sat, Feb 7, 2026, at 20:58, hackee wrote: > Hi Vester. > > Thanks for your reply. Please consider at least the possibility > building dissets from source, as the packages only provide default > options that you will have to use whether you want to or not. > At the moment I'm using the code present in Makefiles which allows > dissets to be assembled and packaged and placed into a filesystem which > is then wrapped into an ISO image. If this code is removed, I will have > to spend a lot of time redoing much of my project's code. Additionally > distsets building scenario is self-contained, while building base with > pkgbase requires ports, e.i. /usr/ports/ports-mgmt/pkg (with thousands > of files) which I don't need/use, at least in my building environment. > BR, > Sergei. > > > суббота, 7 февраля 2026 г., 1:40 ДП, vimanuelt <vimanuelt@fastmail.fm> написал: > >> As an aside, as FreeBSD moves away from packagesets and toward pkgbase, it may be useful to consider whether there are other directions that could complement this transition without committing the base system to a single distribution model. >> >> Packagesets were introduced to help administrators reason about the base system as a coherent whole, to control upgrade scope, and to avoid partial or inconsistent updates. The underlying issue they addressed was not packaging itself, but the difficulty of maintaining a clear and stable system boundary in a mutable environment. >> >> One possible alternative is to treat the base system as a set of immutable, versioned artifacts rather than as a mutable collection of packages. In such a model, the base OS would be built, published, and consumed as a coherent unit with a stable identity. Updates would involve switching between known system states instead of incrementally modifying a live environment. This shifts consistency checks to build and publication time rather than upgrade time, and largely avoids the class of problems that packagesets were designed to mitigate. >> >> This approach aligns with several long-standing FreeBSD values, including reproducibility, explicit interfaces, and administrative clarity. It may also reduce upgrade risk and make rollback and recovery easier to reason about. Importantly, it would not replace pkg or ports. Instead, it would clarify their role by keeping them outside the base system boundary, where flexibility and change are expected and acceptable. >> >> Pkgbase already moves toward better base system lifecycle management within a package-oriented framework. An artifact-oriented perspective could be seen as a further step, changing the upgrade semantics rather than refining them. It does not recreate packagesets, but it may make their original purpose largely unnecessary by eliminating partial base system updates altogether. >> >> Whether this is desirable is an open question. It depends on whether FreeBSD wishes to continue supporting fine-grained, in-place mutation of the base system, or whether it is worth exploring a model where the base system is something you select, verify, and replace as a whole. >> >> These are questions I am exploring and evaluating using prototypes. >> >> Best regards, >> Vester "Vic" Thacker >> >> >> On Fri, Feb 6, 2026, at 19:22, hackee wrote: >> >> > Hello guys! >> > >> > As far as I understand, FreeBSD 16 is planned to drop distsets support >> > and move entirely to pkgbase. I am writing to ask you to reconsider >> > this decision. >> > I maintain a small FreeBSD-based project for my own hardware ( for >> > amd64 platform, code can be seen here: >> > https://github.com/h4ckee/CoreBSD ), that depends heavily on distsets, >> > and migrating it to a pkgbase-only model would be highly inconvenient. >> > I build custom compact ISO image based on that code. My equipment is >> > for personal use, laptops and a server, but I'm hoping to create a >> > small storage solution based on the compact FreeBSD distribution and >> > may use it on my employer's equipment. There are also other companies >> > and projects that use FreeBSD to build their own distributions—such as >> > appliances and embedded systems—that similarly rely on distsets. I >> > would like to propose keeping distsets intact while continuing to offer >> > pkgbase as an alternative for those who wish to use it, in the same way >> > it is done in the FreeBSD 15 release. I hope you will consider this >> > request favorably. >> > >> > Best regards, >> > Tech. Eng. Sergei Praskovin.home | help
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