From owner-freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Mar 15 21:58:12 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 744BC106564A for ; Tue, 15 Mar 2011 21:58:12 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from corky1951@comcast.net) Received: from qmta05.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net (qmta05.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net [76.96.62.48]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 220E18FC13 for ; Tue, 15 Mar 2011 21:58:11 +0000 (UTC) Received: from omta23.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net ([76.96.62.74]) by qmta05.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net with comcast id KWvy1g0091c6gX855ZyCaF; Tue, 15 Mar 2011 21:58:12 +0000 Received: from comcast.net ([98.203.142.76]) by omta23.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net with comcast id KZy31g0021f6R9u3jZy8kR; Tue, 15 Mar 2011 21:58:10 +0000 Received: by comcast.net (sSMTP sendmail emulation); Tue, 15 Mar 2011 14:58:01 -0700 Date: Tue, 15 Mar 2011 14:58:01 -0700 From: Charlie Kester To: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org Message-ID: <20110315215801.GD5349@comcast.net> Mail-Followup-To: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.2.3i X-Mailer: Mutt 1.4.2.3i X-Composer: Vim 7.3 Subject: deprecated ports X-BeenThere: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Porting software to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 15 Mar 2011 21:58:12 -0000 I see there's been another few batch commits deprecating some unmaintained ports where "upstream is gone and/or distfile is no longer available." Maintainers and prospective maintainers should be sure to look at the ports listed in these commits. I don't think much effort was made to check the availability of the distfiles. Instead, it seems that all that was done was to try the MASTER_SITES, etc. from the port Makefiles, and if the fetch failed, onto the list they went. NOTE: I'm NOT saying the committers' procedure was too lazy or anything like that. There are a lot of these broken ports in the tree, and deprecation seems like a reasonable step to take -- especially if the result is to trigger some action from people who want to see these ports retained. I just rescued one of these, sysutils/lookat, that was deprecated a few days ago. I followed the WWW link in the pkg-descr, found that the author's website was still up and that the distfile could still be downloaded -- but the download url had changed. So all the port needed was a tweak to the MASTER_SITES. Today I see that the fairly popular graphics/gimpshop has also been deprecated. Here the WWW link from pkg-descr also fails, but a quick websearch found the new (?) official website for this app: http://www.gimpshop.com, where the distfile is available for download. So here's another one that can be easily rescued. And I'll bet there are more.