Date: Tue, 9 Feb 2016 07:54:22 -0900 From: Royce Williams <royce@tycho.org> To: FreeBSD Ports ML <freebsd-ports@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Removing documentation Message-ID: <CA%2BE3k90yVoDDOdBUhepj7fdpQ9Go%2BEFjLay=nM1kXXPifb_BMQ@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <CA%2BE3k922a91bsx1gh=pcx4S7q_L%2BeR=ezbdWZ6HaimmGqjX=BA@mail.gmail.com> References: <E1aT6jw-000MGn-1T@pandora.amnic.net> <56B9D609.6030407@marino.st> <56B9EDC7.1010403@ohlste.in> <56B9F2D6.1090107@marino.st> <56BA01ED.7000504@ohlste.in> <CA%2BE3k922a91bsx1gh=pcx4S7q_L%2BeR=ezbdWZ6HaimmGqjX=BA@mail.gmail.com>
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On Tue, Feb 9, 2016 at 6:50 AM, Royce Williams <royce@tycho.org> wrote: > IMO, this entire thread is masking a deeper symptom: FreeBSD > ports/packages management is fragmented. [snip] > We need to capture users' reasons for preferring specific frameworks, > and build a roadmap to how they could be unified. Anticipating the two perennial objections: 1. "If it's a problem, go ahead and fix it yourself." There is a spectrum of things that OSes need to do. Software management is at the "should be managed closely by the core team" end of the spectrum. There are some medical emergencies so urgent that the doctors should stop saying "go to medical school and treat it yourself" and help the patient. 2. "It's working fine the way it is." I couldn't disagree more. Debian/Ubuntu took off because Ian Murdoch realized that the Linux distros were reinventing the software management wheel poorly -- and he fixed it. He did this by building a way to cache and distribute the dependency wisdom that developers already had in their heads. In other words, he automated /usr/ports/UPDATING. Imagine if we could do this. imagine the power of building on the great work already done with pkg, and extending and merging it with portmaster/portupgrade/etc and poudriere. Imagine how many thousands of developer and users hours -- including our own -- would be freed up to grow FreeBSD in other ways. The longer we go without bringing software management into the core, the harder it's going to get. But if we cooperate now to combine binary package management (pkg) with local configuration options (ports), FreeBSD could take off like Debian did. People would beat a path to our door. I have believed for years that this is the single most important project that the FreeBSD Foundation could sponsor. It is the largest force multiplier we can apply. Royce
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