Re: Why do packages disappear?

On 11/21/23 09:21, Guido Falsi wrote:
> On 21/11/23 16:39, Richard Childers wrote:
>>
>> I was using ungoogled-chromium and I had 60+ tabs that I can now not 
>> get back because ungoogled-chromium has been withdrawn from circulation.
>>
>>
>> why are these packages appearing and disappearing? If it's a package, 
>> it's supposed to be good enough to public use. The experimental stuff 
>> is supposed to stay in the ports section, not be promoted to packages.
>>
> 
> Can you explain what you mean by "disappear"?
> 
> If the problem is that from time to time the package is not present in 
> the set of official packages, that is most probably due to the package 
> failing to build in the last run, which could be due to many many 
> reasons (*). If you track quarterly it should happen less frequently.
> 
> If by disappear you mean that pkg unexpectedly removed it from your 
> system, pkg should have stated that it wanted to do that and why, and 
> maybe some investigation is required.

It should always be listed that it will be removed but in my experience 
it does not state 'why'. Usually it is the result of dependency updates 
need a new version of the package and the new version isn't in the 
repository; to complete the update of what is installed and in the 
repository, the package will be removed instead of left installed+broken.

I do wish it said why and I also wish there was a way to say to perform 
upgrades but not upgrade things if they relate to a specified port; 
locking the port that would be removed would leave it, but also would 
still permit its dependencies to upgrade even if the locked port broke 
last I tested it.

> Or maybe I've misunderstood what you tried to convey.
> 
> 
> (*) for example the port itself could be broken, a dependency could have 
> been broken, or the builder could have simply had an hiccup. Chromium 
> and derivatives are really heavy ports to build and do have hiccups from 
> time to time.
> 
>>
>> FreeBSD used to hold itself to a higher standard than Linux; it stood 
>> for STABILITY. Linux stood for EXPERIMENTATION.
>>
> 
> Even if I would tend to agree, this is just an opinion and not a rule.
> 
>>
>> What happened? Is FreeBSD being run by college kids now?
>>
> 
> Are you aware the B in FreeBSD stands for University of California, 
> Berkeley? So, in a sense, BSDs have always been run by college kids.
> 
>>
>> The quality of FreeBSD needs to be detached from the class projects 
>> you're working on to graduate. That's what Linux is for, in my opinion.
>>
> 
> really no need to descend in class attacks, it is not going to help you 
> get support any faster.
>