Subject: Re: dsp device
To: Jordan K. Hubbard <jkh@time.cdrom.com>
From: John F. Woods <jfw@jfwhome.funhouse.com>
List: port-i386
Date: 10/11/1996 08:33:06
> > FreeBSD has a similar collection, but my ports colllection is
> > different for various reasons:
> > 
> > 1.  For various reasons, I needed something I wrote completely myself,
> > from scratch.

> Well, then you've just guaranteed that the NetBSD ports collection
> will be forever divergent as we've far too much invested in ours to
> switch (not to mention the fact that it would violate the "if it ain't
> broke, don't fix it" rule).
> Too bad. :-(

Well, I would suspect that the NetBSD ports mechanism would have to be at
least somewhat different from the FreeBSD version, owing to the desire to
support so many architectures.

However, if this is to become the NetBSD standard mechanism, I think the
NetBSD community deserves a better explanation of point 1 than "for various
reasons".  In particular, why do all NetBSD users need something written
from scratch?  If it's not predestined to be the NetBSD standard, then it
can sink or swim on its own merits, but it's still something that I think
merits further elaboration.