From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Jul 2 18:51:49 2008 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id F0CC81065674 for ; Wed, 2 Jul 2008 18:51:49 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from jan6146@gmail.com) Received: from yx-out-2324.google.com (yx-out-2324.google.com [74.125.44.30]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 9ADC68FC1B for ; Wed, 2 Jul 2008 18:51:49 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from jan6146@gmail.com) Received: by yx-out-2324.google.com with SMTP id 8so140064yxb.13 for ; Wed, 02 Jul 2008 11:51:48 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:received:received:message-id:date:from:to :subject:mime-version:content-type; bh=neSnrLcMoy+UCGVS9M2Lb0uv3cGjDzlELQS5qgIjp9I=; b=VvKcroxmp032D0vL3DIkFNYQJigCF7aMXGxdgHOhF7Crl40Fo3PKexq+7bi22YYpfv irUS35a+4nq+nbWDk+QEuUb828Z4mJM4AItSHE2xzgm5T155Js7K6BpEEMIQ87WnNNdo zJnAOlvKhfLLPJ6hmymRK+xiC5vRW2RExC0MQ= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=message-id:date:from:to:subject:mime-version:content-type; b=L6OyeG+m7X6K4zAYOsxVH6PwbuyEoy1gJ09cBgUNazbTY/9Rr5nU4ujMFJS9lpWBuy ruqpB3h+Yqk+7KgcDCKOA31YG3UvBg9eqL1P9CKyRPEzNsXieOFG6Dsmp6tjqKy9+gqq tKgP7NARaFHm+3Aax5Hcsw0UYlzs0zCIGceSc= Received: by 10.142.177.7 with SMTP id z7mr3183663wfe.88.1215023028088; Wed, 02 Jul 2008 11:23:48 -0700 (PDT) Received: by 10.142.107.20 with HTTP; Wed, 2 Jul 2008 11:23:48 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <784966050807021123l267aa20en39eb513c12c90ad2@mail.gmail.com> Date: Wed, 2 Jul 2008 11:23:48 -0700 From: "Rob Lytle" To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org, freebsd-current@freebsd.org MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailman-Approved-At: Wed, 02 Jul 2008 19:30:13 +0000 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline X-Content-Filtered-By: Mailman/MimeDel 2.1.5 Cc: Subject: Sysinstall is still inadequate after all of these years X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 02 Jul 2008 18:51:50 -0000 Hi All, My depressing analysis- YMMV. I've used FreeBSD since 1998. 1..Installing the packages off of the menu on the 3 CDROMs is an incredibly tedious miserable process. I had to switch out the CD's around 40 times. If you don't believe me, just mark a whole bunch of random packages after obtaining the 7.0 release CD's, ad then install. Its frustrating and almost like Windows, except its a bit faster as replacing CD's is faster than reboots. 2. When installing any given package, if a dependency is already there , the package aborts and then goes though some loop where you have to press OK half a dozen times. Thats insane. I think the CD switching problem would be to install all the packages at once from CD1, then CD2, then CD3. As for the second case, I don't know enough about the infrastructure to suggest any thing except to perhaps comment that code in its entirety or put in switch to bypass already installed dependencies. I wish I knew more about your infrastructure to fix this myself. Is it written in Python? Thats the only language I'm not so rusty at. I've programmed in 5 languages, but that was long ago. I'm old. But someone who knows the system could probably fix it fast. I think this is such an inherent infrastructure problem that has existed so long that a bug report would be futile. Food for thought. Thanks, Rob -- ---------------------------------------------------------- http://www.youtube.com/user/whiteflluffyclouds (Ham radio videos)