On Thu, 7 Feb 2002, John Indra wrote:

> Hmmm... quite a difference with FreeBSD eh. FreeBSD has daily snapshot build
> for both -STABLE and -CURRENT. But probably I like NetBSD approach better.
>
	NetBSD will likely move across to daily snapshots, its just we want
	to automate it for quite a few more arches than FreeBSD :) I'd hope
	we see this before 1.6, but I'm not the one working on it, so its
	not my call to say :)

> >Since a 'port' in NetBSD, has been an architecture, since 1993 - the
> >packaged software system is called 'pkgsrc'. You will find it similar to
> >the FreeBSD ports system, on a basic level. There are lots of
> >differences under the hood though.
>
	Its a little more portable for a start - I use it on a bunch of Linux
	boxes I have to admin, which does make them fseel surprisingly sane...

> - I've heard that postfix is in the base system. Is it the main mailer? Or
>   and alternative to sendmail? What version is in the -CURRENT anyway? Oh,
>   does NetBSD has FreeBSD /etc/mail/mailer.conf or its analogous function?

	sendmail is still the default, and we call it /etc/mailer.conf,
	otherwise yes...

> - Does NetBSD has this FreeBSD -CURRENT goodies? To name a few of them: KSE,
>   SMPng, jail, and such? What's the current hottest goodies in NetBSD
>   anyway. Where can I read about them?

	NetBSD is still in the process of moving to SMP(not-ng :). Its in
	the main tree on alpha and vax, in a branch for i386, and still
	under development for sparc and others. Other post-1.5 changes
	include UBC (a unified buffer cache), kevents and LWP (on branches),
	bridging, hardware assisted IP checksums, LFS2, to name a few.
	The changes page on the website includes references to those
	completed, otherwise its a case of watching the various tech-*
	mailing lists...

> - Oh yeah. On FreeBSD, after I got the latest source in /usr/src, all I have
>   to do is: cd /usr/src; make world; make buildkernel KERNCONF=MYKERNEL;
>   make installkernel KERNCONF=MYKERNEL; /usr/sbin/mergemaster and... finished,
>   I have a fresh FreeBSD -CURRENT world, kernel, and /etc after I reboot.
>   How to do things in NetBSD -CURRENT?

	We have a new build system that is intended to allow any NetBSD
	port to be built from any system with an ANSI C compiler (including
	Windows with gcc, Solaris or Linux, as well as a NetBSD box running
	a slightly earlier current or different arch :) Look for BUILDING
	in the source root.  Its this feature that should allow us to cross
	build snapshots for all architectures nightly from a big NetBSD box.
	Some ports are still transitioning install media building across to
	being cross-compilable, and one port (pc532) has serious toolchain
	issues with gcc, but its still pretty cool :)
-- 
		David/absolute		-- www.netbsd.org: No hype required --