Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2014 20:04:14 -0400 From: Allan Jude <allanjude@freebsd.org> To: Mason Loring Bliss <mason@blisses.org> Cc: freebsd-current@freebsd.org Subject: Re: HOWTO articles for migrating from Linux to FreeBSD, especially for pkg? Message-ID: <5445A2FE.8070100@freebsd.org> In-Reply-To: <20141020231526.GO6490@blisses.org> References: <20140811221043.492110d4@arch> <CAG=rPVdht0jYnpWjd0rkiy=Lv5cXUiz5e=4zvrLN9f-6sLHSow@mail.gmail.com> <20140813213718.4814f58c@arch> <53EC1214.9020505@pinyon.org> <CAG=rPVcUK3aHAVMQnd__yHGP8%2BfUFe_WN6eYi7A5UO2=SEEdOA@mail.gmail.com> <20141018121150.5aae6682@X220.alogt.com> <20141018145857.c17931841923f39c79464033@dec.sakura.ne.jp> <20141020183253.GE6490@blisses.org> <5837e41bf824926f9c49325e1817aec8@ultimatedns.net> <54458B06.5050301@freebsd.org> <20141020231526.GO6490@blisses.org>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
This is an OpenPGP/MIME signed message (RFC 4880 and 3156) --nW2jTwKO5t7sV0G3er7V6DaGa97IcWIVL Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On 2014-10-20 19:15, Mason Loring Bliss wrote: > On Mon, Oct 20, 2014 at 06:21:58PM -0400, Allan Jude wrote: >=20 >> This thread is supposed to be about how to make it easier for people t= o >> migrate to FreeBSD from Linux. Not a discussion about forums vs mailin= g >> lists vs newsgroups. >=20 > I'm going to transition from being an avid Debian user who hates web fo= ra to > an avid FreeBSD who hates web fora. >=20 > Anyway, my experience here is useful as I've got to be representative o= f a > number of people making the transition lately. It's been a relatively s= mooth > transition so far, with only a couple bugs and quirks in the way of my = doing > everything I did with Debian. >=20 > Two things would be principally useful for people coming from Linux. Thank you very much for sharing this >=20 > First, the handbook should be updated and corrected, as it's a good eno= ugh > resource that I've come to depend upon it, but I've hit snags that seem= to > not reflect the current state of FreeBSD. >=20 > For instance, the page that talks about running buildworld and buildker= nel > have some instructions that are evidently vestigal for root-on-ZFS peop= le. >=20 Which parts? Nothing about buildworld is really any different when using ZFS except maybe the way you mount /usr/obj with noatime etc. > Another example, the documentation of Poudriere is hard to follow, pres= enting > a complex and idealized set-up rather than explaining to a new user wha= t the > moving parts are and how it all works. I strongly suspect in that case = that > people who need the Handbook won't easily follow that, and people who c= an > follow it don't need the Handbook per se, or that level of instruction.= >=20 Can you be more specific? The documentation team likes to add 'quick start' sections to the often more complex sections, so that users looking to just get started can do so, and dig into the more advanced options once they have it working. > Joe Armstrong talks about this process of picking an audience in his fo= rward > to the second edition of his Erlang book: >=20 > https://joearms.github.io/2014/06/26/Background-to-programming-erla= ng.html >=20 > The second thing that would be useful would be a series of cheat sheets= for > various things. This can either be equivalent commands or equivalent sy= stems. > Let new folks know that LUKS is GELI and that md-raid1 is gmirror and s= o > forth. Show common package handling commands for various Linux flavours= and > map them to pkgng and ports. For instance, what's the equivalent of "yu= m > provides"? Or what do I do in place of "apt-cache search" or "zypper up= " or > similar. >=20 This is what this thread was originally about, creating such cheat sheets= =2E > Other things in the grab bag... It's generally said that ports and pkgs= > shouldn't mix, but there are at least a couple instances where it's > unavoidable: >=20 This was true with the old package system, since those packages were built work a ports tree snapshot from the date of the release. With the new binary packages being rebuild weekly, it is much less of an issues. One goal is to actually have the version of the ports tree that the most recent binary packages were built with available, so that users who use that would have 0 complications from mixing. Also, there have been some proposed features for pkg to make it aware of which packages were installed from ports, and when 'pkg upgrade' runs, to rebuild those packages from ports with the same options, instead of installing the 'wrong' version from the binary packages, requiring the user to 'pkg lock' or 'pkg annotate' to avoid that. > I bet roughly no one who installs Subversion wants the FreeBSD bug repo= rt > headers baked in by default, but there they are unless you rebuild from= ports > with a non-default configuration. >=20 > If you want to watch DVDs on your FreeBSD workstation, it's necessary t= o > install libdvdcss, but you can't get it from pkgng because it's not the= re. > Again, you must build from ports. >=20 Binary packages of libdvdcss are not built for legal reasons > I have nothing against ports, but people are warned off of mixing packa= ges > and ports when clearly it's necessary sometimes. >=20 It may be time to revisit this warning, as it may no longer be required. > Oh, here's one. I *was* horrified by ports at first, until someone told= me > about "make config-recursive". It really makes me wonder why this isn't= the > default. I remember giving up on FreeBSD when 9.x was new because I had= to > build X from ports after the FreeBSD breach, and it seemed like the pro= cess > was going to take a couple days of stuttering stops and starts as rando= m > packages I didn't want in some cases popped up between compiles. I lear= ned > some mechanism for saying "just take the defaults" but what I know now = is > that what I really wanted was "make config-recursive". Why, out of curi= osity, > is it not the default? That would seem better than documenting it harde= r. >=20 Making config-recursive the default is infact a good idea, unless someone knows a reason it should not be. > Ah, and one more for the grab bag. I strongly suspect that many folks c= oming > from Linux are going to bristle at the notion of using Sendmail. I used= to > run it so I wasn't terribly bothered by it, but maybe pre-populating rc= =2Econf > with obvious bits that people can see and turn off would be nice. OpenB= SD has > a nice model of populating rc.conf and sysctl.conf fully, and it ends u= p > being a pleasant tool. Those awash in wonder, coming from Linux, can sa= y, > "Look, it's all right here!" >=20 The pre-populated with every option version of rc.conf is /etc/defaults/rc.conf There was a project to better document the sysctl tunabled, but it seems to have stalled. --=20 Allan Jude --nW2jTwKO5t7sV0G3er7V6DaGa97IcWIVL Content-Type: application/pgp-signature; name="signature.asc" Content-Description: OpenPGP digital signature Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="signature.asc" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.22 (MingW32) iQIcBAEBAgAGBQJURaMBAAoJEJrBFpNRJZKfZrIP/21n5ovHAetNdxgYeqC9m9gb qxWTpznUX9bwJUNhX1khUBOFkYmlKGAJbvbEYWH0l7yD85icSyIFjHhUk4Ad0BE7 iT8UwfhS7lfh/6rmNqWlMNCHyL/ESGZcSYZihpI4SOTGCOtwMx+nIkTwXDw9bwls ZZEfbomDe8dgBdJYEC3mHMRrkH7Zd0SCESmKBo1/EFNLlXLNzwbijyTV9I4Js2Dq 09ahAI3gphPV9nN/qHRGPWst9vtERoijzF53aacpXiTr5vGXNZdcxXJgmmkCSpSN HoFM0O1VrAqyArGNXqmp+UnmxSLLtuL/eVAqfLodbjuuX+AjXz6S6Z5oi0SAUbzv v1+BMJWCygH+/JFY0l+N8honBA4RYk/6D7cJf/s5di4mAouVmakCAKNrFJIKjPZb tJ5JjgFzvyBWqEikSNCdoh9etCFnWZcUDqxJGNoeHWIzELINnLd7vTAC1q/9sXS0 ZYphHi3djHkU/EHgi9URLdgY/2Wh8zehnhOMxfMpiqX1z4/OVl4GQJqzme4SmptV 9mAAqsOYvQfpcjOQjEULzbSuIx3oFm1htFYHKBDjT6fTVRLdGSxgC12HS4xrp3U6 heQy2Om1j9A+HMftD0g7DQOKl5dhIXmJC99TfCGOGugeIPX/mpUNZHY7VOjkjYeG VhGqx0a+oFyhoMJ82IpS =zZPa -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --nW2jTwKO5t7sV0G3er7V6DaGa97IcWIVL--
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?5445A2FE.8070100>