On 7/5/05, Sean Davis <dive-nb@endersgame.net> wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 05, 2005 at 01:28:23AM -0700, Aaron J. Grier wrote:
> > apparently those "totally unrelated packages" _ARE_ related.  have you
> > figured out why, yet?
>=20
> No, because I shouldn't have to.=20

Large desktop environments like Kde and Gnome have many dependencies.
The problem is the complexity of the desktop, not a failing in pkgsrc.
In FreeBSD to correctly update you should do:

  # portupgrade -arR=20
the -a says update all the existing packages
the -r says update all the packages that depend on the given package.
the -R updates all the packages required by the given package.

Why do you have to use -r -R when -a is given? Because there may be
new dependencies that  have to included.
  The point is that if FreeBSD packages (ports)  are updated properly
you will indeed run up against the same problem. With a large set of
software, such as Kde or Gnome, you end up reinstalling a lot.

> pkgsrc should follow the POLA and *warn the
> user* if it's going to delete a whole bunch of crap just to update one
> package that has, in the past, almost always updated just itself when
> getting hit with the update target.

  Portupgrade in FreeBSD does avoid this but running the (required)
pkgdb -F afterwards can produce truly inscrutable messages such as
this:

# pkgdb -F
--->  Checking the package registry database
[Updating the pkgdb <format:bdb1_btree> in /var/db/pkg ... - 659 packages f=
ound
(-0 +2) .. done]
Stale origin: 'textproc/dixit': perhaps moved or obsoleted.
Stale dependency: kdeaddons-kate-plugins-3.4.0 -> libusb-0.1.7_1 (devel/lib=
usb):
libunicode-0.4_4 (score:22%) ? ([y]es/[n]o/[a]ll) [no]
New dependency? (? to help):
Skip this? ([y]es/[n]o/[a]ll) [yes]
Skipped.
  <long list deleted>

What does score 22% mean ?  It's not explained in the man page for pkgdb.

  In the end it's the complexity of the software being installed and
not completely the fault of pkgsrc (or FreeBSD ports for that matter).


> And the problem of backing up the packages if they're all going to be
> deleted prior to building so that they can be reinstalled if they don't
> build still needs to be addressed, for those of us who can't afford a
> seperate build machine.
>=20
  OpenBSD does this but you have to manually add the packages.=20

--=20
Kind regards,
Jonathan