FBSD edonkey-gui-gtk-port

[Peter Pentchev]

On Sat, Nov 13, 2004 at 07:37:34PM -0200, H Matik wrote:
> about edonkey-gui-gtk-0.6.2_1

Now, a couple of points here right from the start :)

You seem to have an issue with a port, a part of the FreeBSD Ports
Collection.  While it is great that you want to report this issue to the
FreeBSD Project - this is the only way we can actually find out what
users like and dislike, and the only way we can fix it in the next
releases - please note that neither the freebsd-doc list nor the Board
of Directors of the FreeBSD Foundation is a suitable place to complain
about it.  The best person to contact would have been the
net/edonkey-gui-gtk port maintainer, Mario Sergio Fujikawa Ferreira
<lioux at FreeBSD.org>, as you have already done; apart from the
maintainer, the best, if not to say only, place to report port issues
should be the freebsd-ports mailing list.  There is absolutely no reason
for CC'ing the -doc list, and about CC'ing the FreeBSD Foundation BoD -
well, I dunno what to say :)

Now, about your complaint, see below...

> I could have gotten a realy bad impression about freebsd after 
> installing the edonkey-gui-gtk-0.6.2_1 port.
> 
> I think it is really not developer's issue WHO runs a programm.
> 
> So may be it may be usefull to give a security advice but not a 
> stupid message box as yours saying to run with 
>  
>    --noob-wants-to-run-as-root
> 
> First I thought that FreeBSD's level was real higher and still 
> believe in this and not in such kind of childish flame comments.
> 
> So please make professional valuable comments but do not offend or 
> humiliate people. 

This particular problem - that the GTK interface to edonkey displays a
message box when you try to run it as root unless you also specify that
command-line option - is not the "fault" of the FreeBSD port in any way
:)  This is the way the program itself behaves - the ChangeLog in the
source tarball says that this was added back in December 2003.  If the
author of a program has decided that for any reason, security or
otherwise, his program should not be run as root, or should be run as
root only in special circumstances, it is *not* for the FreeBSD port
maintainer to decide to remove that obstacle.  The point of the FreeBSD
Ports Collection is to take third-party programs and get them to run on
FreeBSD, so the users can actually use them; the point is NOT to modify
the programs, ignoring the intent of their original author.

G'luck,
Peter

-- 
Peter Pentchev	roam at ringlet.net    roam at cnsys.bg    roam at FreeBSD.org
PGP key:	http://people.FreeBSD.org/~roam/roam.key.asc
Key fingerprint	FDBA FD79 C26F 3C51 C95E  DF9E ED18 B68D 1619 4553
This sentence contradicts itself - or rather - well, no, actually it doesn't!
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