Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2007 11:43:25 -0800 From: Garrett Cooper <youshi10@u.washington.edu> To: Chuck Robey <chuckr@chuckr.org> Cc: RW <fbsd06@mlists.homeunix.com>, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Ports with GUI configs Message-ID: <4738ACDD.50108@u.washington.edu> In-Reply-To: <4738A71A.6060100@chuckr.org> References: <2852884D-270A-4879-B960-C10A602E080E@ashleymoran.me.uk> <47387891.2060007@unsane.co.uk> <47387BCA.6080604@foster.cc> <20071112183502.438b44b8@gumby.homeunix.com.> <4738A71A.6060100@chuckr.org>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
Chuck Robey wrote:
> RW wrote:
>> On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 08:14:02 -0800
>> "Mark D. Foster" <mark@foster.cc> wrote:
>>
>>> Vince wrote:
>>>> Ashley Moran wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hi
>>>>>
>>>>> I was just wondering, what is the motivation behind the GUI
>>>>> configuration for some ports? Simply put, they drive me up the
>>>>> wall. I've lost count of the number of times I've come back to a
>>>>> big install to find it hanging on a config screen. Possibly I'm
>>>>> missing something.
>>>> I agree though, I often suffer the same problem, coming back after
>>>> a few hours to a build that should have finished to find its
>>>> sitting on the first dependency.
>>>>
>>> Maybe it's been suggested before (in which case I add my vote) but a
>>> timeout mechanism would solve this... give the user 10s to provide a
>>> keypress else bailout and use the "default" options.
>>>
>>
>> That would involve standing-over the build for hours or days in case
>> you miss a 10-second window - it's just not practical IMO.
>>
>>
>> Setting the menus is pretty easy to script, and you can also set BATCH
>> to take the default options
>
> A suggestion I recently made on the ports list would, as a side
> effect, make a better solution. You see, allowing a default timer
> does get things built, but then it allows no user input to let users
> avoid installing software that they either have no ise for, or do not
> want for other reasons. I have enough input now, so I'm going ahead
> and coding up the Makefile mods to allow my system, but it looks
> somewhat like the Gentoo Portage "USE" flags system. Not identical,
> and I am only proposing to use their USE flags, not the rest (I very
> much like using Makefiles as FreeBSD ports does, and wouldn't change
> that.)
>
> If you want to see what it is, go look at recent postings on ports
> list. It'll probably get changed, as I get something for folks to
> look at and discuss.
USE flags are a pain in the ass (former Gentoo user of 3 years).
Introducing that type of complexity into a ports system isn't necessary
and does unexpected things at times for end-users when developers change
variable names or behavior, which happened quite often with Gentoo.
make config-all or something similar to have people fill in their
desired config info in all of the ncurses config sections would however
be a much better idea I think..
-Garrett
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?4738ACDD.50108>