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Cool.

Do you have any documentation of a strict pkgsrc Linux install?

I was looking to use Open Packages, but that project seems to have stalled. I will give this a try instead. Thank you for the pointer.

There is a group out there that has been working on unifying the packaging system across all the *BSDs out there. Open Packages has already been working on this, and much of the work has been to implement something that sort of a cross between FreeBSD's ports system and Debian's apt.

At first I thought that this was an announcement of that, but now I know that this is a seperate project with different goals.

Well, how about looking at the thingie's homepage? The guys running it should know.

Go to Openpackages.org and see a standard that supports:
* FreeBSD
* NetBSD
* OpenBSD
* BSD/OS
* Darwin
* Solaris
* RedHat Linux
* BeOs
AIX, HP-UX and Debian have support also.

I don't know how many times I wanted to do this, but always got bogged down in the details. The OpenPackages project has had their system working on Linux for a while now. However, OpenPackages departs from the FreeBSD ports collection and takes a lot from OpenBSD and NetBSD as well. And it's not finished yet. Work seems to have slowed down on it too, unfortunately.

The biggest hamper that keeps most of the "mainstream x86 BSD" users on FreeBSD is ports versus pkgsrc- pkgsrc is engineered well, but has fewer packages. Hopefully openpackages will change this.

MacOS X has been a target from the very beginning, as have been all other BSDs (NetBSD, FreeBSD, OpenBSD and Darwin). On top of it, Apple one of the sponsors of this project and has some of it's engineers working on it. The official policy is "anybody is welcome to do a port to any other platform".

Oh - and openpackages contain source, not binary. The project aims to produce standardized "make(1) and pkg_*(1) tools". It occured to me some previous posters understood it the other way...

http://www.openpackages.org/

Check out http://www.openpackages.org/ (hope this link prints correctly this time). There's already a project to unify the ports/packages collections across the various BSDs. Note that by ports/packages I mean FreeBSD-style ports and NetBSD-style packages (which are the same things, different names).

If openpackages becomes a defacto standard for *BSD, would your company consider switching from RPM to it, in order to allow the holy grail of "one package for all free/open (definition may vary) systems" ?

This of course presuming that upon reaching that status, it has features that are comparable or better than rpm. (Which the current FreeBSD ports/pkg system CERTAINLY has acheived -- wouldnt you agree?)

Further, have you considered switching to the apt-get/deb system? It is the number one reason most people seem to switch to debian, and in every way I know of seems to be superior technically to rpm.

Not exactly the answer you want... anyway. Open Packages aims at unifying the {Free,Net,Open}BSD, BSDi and [Apple] Darwin package systems. So, when (if?) this gets functional, Unixy software will be nicely packaged.

What I still dont understand is why linux keeps reinventing the wheel. Why not simply use the ports/package tree from the bsd's?

Its a solid system, ALL of the BSD's use it in some form or another, it allows source installs, it saves the install info as TEXT, its been tested and proven by years of experience.

It seems to me that ports is really the best system. I noticed that gentoo linux is using it now, although slightly modified.

I would *love* to see one package standard for all of the bsd's AND all the distro's of linux!

Openpackages all the way baby!

I'd have to assume that Apple will wait for The Unified BSD Package Collection to be implemented before including any packaging scheme.

There have been reoccuring discussions among ports-people of how to deal with this, but to my knowledge nobody has produced any good solution to it yet. Of course, the Open Packages project looks promising -- uniting package maintaining between BSDs (including Darwin) and incorporating the various enhancements into one single base packaging system. It might even provide a good solution to the upgrading hassle.

What's the difference with OpenPackages.org?

--

How does this relate to Open Packages?

I know that Open Packages is a Unified BSD Package Collection, but how do these compare?

If you actually look at Darwin source, you'll see that there's also a lot of the userland taken from NetBSD.

Anyhow, Apple has definetly been a good neighbor to the open source world. Look at Darwin- people can take work from there back to FreeBSD or any other OS. They've also taken an interest in OpenPackages and it'll be interesting to see where, if anywhere, they go with that.

This is being worked on at www.openpackages.org

What's your opinion on the Open Packages project? Even though I'm not currently a *BSD user, it sounds great on the surface--there's even been interest expressed in patches for Linux!--but I've got to wonder what sort of complexities need to be worked out to maintain a set of packages for FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Darwin...

BTW, nice troll. Is that from some sort of Web-based marketing-speak script? It's so devoid of content. It's hilarious. :-)

Very interesting article on the state of the BSD community. I jumped into the BSDs (and unix in general) with BSD/OS when I took over the SysAdmin duties at the ISP where I work. Because of this I tend to lean on the side of the BSDs over Linux.

That said, I think it's good for everyone involved to cooperate on one level or another. As a community, the BSD users are beginning to see beyond Free, Open and Net to BSD as a whole. Most users I see are looking past the animosity that was stirred up between core members of the different BSDs and are trying to work together to promote BSD in general. Take a look at the Open Packages Project that is attempting to create a unified package system for the BSD (and Solaris and Linux).

The comments about the GNU/Linux community are interesting as well. I dislike those who go about spouting the mantra "It's GNU so it must be better" and then bash every open source project that not GNU. (Many of them (conveiniently (sp?)) forget that Apache is not GNU.) This can drive people away from open source because they don't want to grouped with such people.

The good news is, many people from both Linux and BSD are realizing that they can work together to improve their OS. The cooperation between camps can only help. Linux and BSD will become more equal (in performance, apps, etc.) in general and admins (and users) will be able to choose the OS that fits their needs best. For example, a user won't have to pick an OS just because the app is not supported on the OS they want to use.

Did I actually get a first post?

PerlStalker

>1] First he was involved with Debian but then he quit because it wasn't getting newbie friendly and it wouldn't adopt the rpm package manager
Package uniformity is hands down one of the BIGGEST problems facing the linux distros today. Its also affecting the BSD's, but they have the balls and intelligence to do something about it.

I dont think thats a bad thing. It certainly made a point that resonated with me. However, that isnt the only reason he left from my understanding of posts at the time.

>2] He started Software in the Public Interest. But he quit.
(everything is this post is simply my understanding of the matter, btw..)
This was because he saw a bigger value proposition in OSI, from what I understood.

>3] Then he was involved with the OSI but he quit because ESR allowed O'Reilly to use the word open source at a comvention even the the rest of the OSI board voted not too.
Much as ESR is hailed for standing by his beliefs, why should you be a part of a group that doesnt stand by it's decisions. BP was doing IMHO, the moral thing, and showing the same level of integrity that ESR has.

>4] Then he started LSB but quit because it wasn't moving fast enough.
And its not. Its a laughing stock. They should already have a working standard for package management, desktop WM's, and kernels. They dont even have THAT. Its *RIDICULUS*.

>5] Then he started this venture capital group but now he's quiting that too.
Because he can make better money elsewhere, and because it has served its purpose.

>To me this represents a series of "stints."
When the cook stumbled upon chocolate chip cookies by accident, just because it took a short period of time, was that a stint?

The word has more meaning than just 'short period of time'. It has a very negative connotation, and thats what I was objecting to.

IMHO, they werent stints, they were logically concluded movements in his life, and in public life.

I stand by my statement about Mr. Perens. (Why does everyone call ANYONE in the open-source movement by their first name like they have known them for years personally?)

I'm hoping that the people at OpenPorts are successful in unifying the ports collections. OpenBSD could really benefit from a selection of ports like FreeBSD...

Will you please explain how to install over ftp? I just installed Debian, and the install disk gave me no such option. I was quite disappointed.
I ended up making a partition and dumped the base system *.tgz files onto it from FreeBSD. Then I used that to install.
I've been using it for the last couple days, and I think it has a lot of nice features. However, I prefer the out of the box feel of FreeBSD.
I'd really like to see or create a linux distro that makes the current source available via CVSup and has the ability to do "make world" to update the entire OS from source code. I love that feature of *BSD and I also love the ports collection, although it does need some work. I think OpenPackages is a very exciting project.
Yes, I am a FreeBSD zealot of sorts but I also love Linux. It's unfortunate that any BSD story on Slashdot is an almost guaranteed flame war.

I am not the most knowledgable concerning the ports systems. I have made only one port. Maybe you can try one of the macros. If you want to install elsewhere besides /usr/local, you can enter 'make install PREFIX=/usr/blotto'. I am sure there is a way to make this permanent if you desire (/etc/make.conf probably).

Also, there may be hope for you in the unification of the BSD port/package systems: Open Packages.

Good for you, give yourself a pat on the back. However, for every person like you, probably 1000 more would simply pirate it, buy either borrowing a cd or downloading and burning an iso.

The only reason Microsoft makes any money off of selling client operating systems is because they come installed on virtually every pc shipped. Apple, not having twisted the arms of OEM's for 20 years, would have no such luck.

Otherwise, they lose my business, because I'm not buying their proprietary, overpriced hardware

Troll. Name once peice of Apple hardware that is proprietary. Ummm, PCI, nope....AGP, nope....USB, Firewire, ATA, SCSI.....nope nope nope.

And Apple hardware is not overpriced, for an OEM. Of course you can get more parts for your money from www.bargainbasement.com, but the same would be true for Dell or Gateway.

Their processor is woefully underpowered, due to Apple's agreements with IBM (no 1Ghz levels of speed, even though it's possible)

Actually, those problems would be from Motorola's ownership of AltiVec. I'm sure IBM would be happy to sell 850 mhz PowerPC's to Apple, but Apple wants the chips to have AltiVec after spending the last year hyping it.

(Want a fast 3D card? Which one?)

Um, the Radeon? Its not quite as fast as a Geforce 2, but it is faster than a V5. Its a good card.

Also, in the not-too-distant future, everyone will be porting to a new hardware platform. Windows and a lot of major Unix flavors, including Linux, will be available. Will Apple be there?

What hardware platform are you speaking of? IA64?

Aside from Apple's open source site, you might cruise over to Open Packages where Apple is at the top of the list of sponsors. That must be a real sore spot with you.