On Wed, 2 Dec 1998, Tim Clark wrote:

> tclark@cs.cornell.edu (Tim Clark) sent the following
> comment about The NetBSD Project's WWW server:
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> I have been extremely disappointed in trying to download the 
> packages. First I tried binaries, without success - instead
> of asking for a file destination, they just send the code
> directly to my browser window!  I have tried to download emacs,
> tcsh, and nslookup for a fellow researcher.  None of them
> are available or download properly.

	If you are using netscape you should bring up a menu on the
	link and select 'Save link as' (or shift left button click
	the link). 

	Note to package system maintainers: Maybe this could be mentioned
	on the README.html files on ftp.netbsd.org?

>					 So I tried downloading
> the pkgsrc.  It downloaded OK, but when I tried to make tcsh
> it failed due to a malformed line in mk/bsd.pkg.mk - line 
> 676, can't put a newline char in a define!  I fixed that only
> to find that none of the source is REALLY provided, but you
> have to go get everything from external ftp sites.  That also
> did not work properly, so in effect, (for me at least) these
> packages are completely unavailable/unusable.
> 
	From where di you download the pkgsrc, and on what version of
	NetBSD and machine type are you trying to use it. I've used it
	without problems on several NetBSD 1.3.2 systems (i386, sparc,
	and arm32).

> I tried looking for a place to report these bugs, but the
> mailing list appears only concerned with bugs in the netbsd
> OS, not the pkgs.  Further, I found the gnats bug reporting
> process difficult to use.  So I am reporting this stuff here.
> 
	What problems did you find? Did you make it through to
	http://www.NetBSD.org/cgi-bin/sendpr.cgi?gndb=netbsd

> All in all, a very frustrating experience...

	We're sorry to hear that - I'm cc-ing this to tech-pkg@netbsd.org
	so the package system maintainers can also respond.


		David/absolute

	Abandoning a syncing disk... or syncing an abandoned disk?