FreeBSD 7.2 Released 204
An anonymous reader writes "The FreeBSD Release Engineering Team is pleased to announce the availability of FreeBSD 7.2-RELEASE. This is the third release from the 7-STABLE branch which improves on the functionality of FreeBSD 7.1 and introduces some new features. Some of the highlights: Support for fully transparent use of superpages for application memory; Support for multiple IPv4 and IPv6 addresses for jails; csup(1) now supports CVSMode to fetch a complete CVS repository; Gnome updated to 2.26, KDE updated to 4.2.2; Sparc64 now supports UltraSparc-III processors. For a complete list of new features and known problems, please see the online release notes and errata list."
Adds another anonymous reader, "You can grab the latest version from FreeBSD from the mirrors or via BitTorrent. There is also a quick review of the new features and upgrade instructions."
Re:I really wish BSD would take off. (Score:1, Interesting)
There's been a load of BSD's getting released. OpenBSD and NetBSD have had new releases two. Do they have similar developers?
Re:Yaaaaay! (Score:5, Interesting)
ZFS + Ports, take that Ubuntu!
I dunno about ZFS, but I've recently been playing with a freebsd install (7.1 I think), and ports, while a cool idea, seems pretty creaky in practice.
My main beefs were not with the infrastructure, which seemed OK, but that the package maintenance seemed pretty spotty: many many packages (even fairly "major" ones) were pretty out-of-date, even compared to e.g. debian stable, and in many cases they were installed as monolithic chunks where a bit of judicious splitting would have been very helpful -- for example, an otherwise fairly dependency-free library that happens to come with some demo apps that drag in all of OpenGL and X (it would have been better to put the apps with their heavy dependencies in a separate package, or make their inclusion easily configurable)!
Sadly, the ports collection felt kind of like a 2nd-class add-on (and I gather, that's essentially what it is). Even though there are many packages in debian where the maintainer should probably be doing a better job, on average debian's package collection feels a lot more solid to me that what freebsd has in ports...
Re:Yaaaaay! (Score:3, Interesting)
You can usually configure most ports, try doing a "make config" on the port dir... You should be able to turn those X11/OpenGL demo apps off if the port is well written.
What i hate about binary packages, and debian suffers from this greatly, is when a feature is optional to compile in (as opposed to comprising solely of separate files as in your example).. a binary package will typically be compiled with all the options turned on, thus necessitating dependencies you may not want or use.
Re:KDE updated to 4.2.2 (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Yaaaaay! (Score:1, Interesting)
Well, if you are building from source debian will happily support you.
apt-get source package, customize it to fit your needs, let it build a package and install that.
Not more of a hassle than using ports.
Re:Includes ZFS and DTrace production ready ! (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:I really wish BSD would take off. (Score:3, Interesting)
http://freebsd-image-gallery.netcode.pl/_daemonette/111143969_35533831ab.jpg [netcode.pl]
http://freebsd-image-gallery.netcode.pl/_daemonette/freebsd-002.jpg [netcode.pl]
http://freebsd-image-gallery.netcode.pl/_daemonette/freebsd-003.jpg [netcode.pl]
http://media.photobucket.com/image/penguin%20mascot%20girl/twistedliza/signature%20pics/blog/DSC00767e.jpg [photobucket.com]
http://images.celebrateexpress.com/mgen/merchandiser/38199.jpg [celebrateexpress.com]
http://z.about.com/d/raleighdurham/1/0/u/8/-/-/Fat-Penguin-Clowns-at-Ringling-Bros-Circus.jpg [about.com]
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Who sponsors FreeBSD? (Score:3, Interesting)
First of all, I'm not trolling.
Most successful open source projects have some kind of corporate backing, whether it be developers, funding or both. Linux has IBM, HP, RedHat, etc. Sun sponsors and manages a number of open source projects.
The community behind FreeBSD have put together what seems to be (I've never used it for more than a few minutes at a time) a solid server operating system whose command-line code forms part of the basis of what is IMO the best consumer operating system (OS X). From what I understand, this is due to a small but devoted group of developers.
Still, not to bemoan the FreeBSD community's efforts, but I'm wondering if there's some kind of corporate backing, seeing as I'm certain several companies use it in critical production situations.
There was nothing about this in the Wikipedia entry.
FBSD on the desktop . . . (Score:2, Interesting)
. . . is a bit like driving an automobile with a manual stick transmission, while also being a bit like driving one with an automatic, and yet not exactly like the modern compromise, "manu-matic".
(Manu-matic is supposed to give the driver a sense of the control of the stick, while simultaneously incorporating the no-brainer-ness of an automatic.)
The ports system is an undeniably good idea, but only really shines if it is supported by a full-time, high-speed connection.
Running FreeBSD from a set of CD's, on the other hand, can be really frustrating in my experience; while running Ubuntu, (Open-)Suse, and even Slackware from a CD-, or DVD installation--the way most desktop users are accustomed to--is much more doable at this point.
Still, if you yearn for the feel of cranky stick-shifts and the quirks of normal aspiration--some things that would seem likely to appeal to those drawn to open-source--then put on your goggles, fire up your broadband and pop that boot-only 7.2 RELEASE CD into the tray.
Flash is for sissies anyway, no?
Re:Yaaaaay! (Score:3, Interesting)
What about removal of packages?
One of the things I like about Debian source packages, is that they can be compiled, installed, played with, upgraded, etc and finally removed - all that without a hustle.
Impression I had that ports is just a nice front-end for "./configure && make && make install". And as usually "make uninstall" is largely missing (as only few source packages provide the functionality).
That means over time system gets loaded with orphaned files.
Actually the thing which impressed me most first time I installed the Debian was that during upgrades/install of custom packages, it can also remove conflicting packages. E.g. during library migration, Debian would properly install/remove library needed by particular package version. Apps like aptitude, which can also automatically remove unused automatically installed packages, saves heck a lot of time in long run.
Ports in a way nice simple system and I like it more than e.g. Gentoo. Yet, for stable maintainable in long run system, I'd still go with Debian Stable, as it's thorough package management was more than once saving my servers from me.
Re:Yaaaaay! (Score:3, Interesting)
What about removal of packages?
This is a really basic "RTFM." It's not "make uninstall" like you wrote in your post, but "make deinstall"
Alternatively, you use the "pkg_delete" or "pkg_deinstall" command to delete any installed package. (again, to find out potential options etc, RTFM)
Very simple.
One of the things I like about Debian source packages, is that they can be compiled, installed, played with, upgraded, etc and finally removed - all that without a hustle.
Yes, those would be fundamentals of any packaging systems.
Impression I had that ports is just a nice front-end for "./configure && make && make install". And as usually "make uninstall" is largely missing (as only few source packages provide the functionality).
Your impression is somewhat correct. Again, this is something expected of ANY source packaging system. I'm not sure how else you would want it to operate?
That means over time system gets loaded with orphaned files.
I may have missed something...why are files getting orphaned?
If you're confused about what files belong to what packages in FreeBSD, try the "pkg_which" command.
Actually the thing which impressed me most first time I installed the Debian was that during upgrades/install of custom packages, it can also remove conflicting packages. E.g. during library migration, Debian would properly install/remove library needed by particular package version. Apps like aptitude, which can also automatically remove unused automatically installed packages, saves heck a lot of time in long run.
Yes, this is a weakness of the base ports system. Fortunately pretty much everyone who runs FreeBSD runs either portupgrade or portmaster. These programs essentially take the place of apt, etc, and work completely within the structure of the ports system.
Reason I favor Gentoo Over Debian (Score:3, Interesting)
Revolves around those optional features that are compiled into the damn package, pulling in all those extra dependencies. Portage and the Use flags are very good for that. I can specify on a per package basis what optional features I want, which helps keep my system much leaner.
Another issue I've got with many other distros is the continual insistence of starting so many services at boot. To me it's reaching the point that most distros look like a damn windows installation with all the services running. Personally and Professionally, I like the Slackware/OpenBSD thinking that as little as possible starts at system boot. Let the damn Sys-Op/Admin decide what needs to run to provide the functionality the system is supposed to. In my case, the system is a desktop so the only thing that needs to be running is sound, apcupsd, cups, basic networking - ntp client and firewall. I don't even have X running at startup as I'm fairly comfortable working on the CLI having used computers since the Dos 5 days.
Re:Includes ZFS and DTrace production ready ! (Score:4, Interesting)
In 7,2, you still get the "ZFS is cosidered to be experimental" message when you boot. As mentioned, elsewhere, the 7.x branch retains the ZFS v6 code, and v13 will be in 8.0.
That said, I've put ZFS through its paces on the amd64 platform, and it works great (at least w/ the 2- and 4-GB RAM configurations I've had on my workstation). I don't think I've ever had a ZFS-caused panic on amd64. However, I couldn't find a stable config under i386 to save my life, but I don't really feel that's a problem because ZFS is truly a 64-bit subsystem and should be treated as such. If you're competent to administer large data sets to begin with, you'll be competent enough to take care of any tweaking ZFS may need (which is minimal under amd64, if needed at all).
Re:Includes ZFS and DTrace production ready ! (Score:2, Interesting)
Read the Release Notes, the ZFS memory problem was fixed on FreeBSD 7.2 (for amd64).