Historical question about INDEX-file in /usr/ports

[Matthew Seaman]

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Stevan Tiefert wrote:
| Hello list,
| 
| a small question for the expirienced users of FreeBSD:
| 
| At which time the name of "INDEX.db" to "INDEX-?.db" changed? (I suppose 
| during the creating time of FreeBSD 6) And then it was changed, was the 
| database format also been changed?

FreeBSD 4.x and earlier had just plain /usr/ports/INDEX

FreeBSD 5.x and above have /usr/ports/INDEX-N where N is the OS major version.

The INDEX.db file is created and used by programs from the portupgrade(1)
suite: other ports management applications pretty much make a point of not
referring to the INDEX at all.

There wasn't a change in the format of the INDEX coincident with the
name change -- the distinction is because many of the ports are version
number dependent so the content of the INDEX will be different on different
system versions.

There was a change in the format of the INDEX file some time before 4.11-RELEASE
(I think) which added a number of extra columns, but the file format has been
constant since then. 

	Cheers,

	Matthew

- -- 
Dr Matthew J Seaman MA, D.Phil.                       Flat 3
~                                                      7 Priory Courtyard
PGP: http://www.infracaninophile.co.uk/pgpkey         Ramsgate
~                                                      Kent, CT11 9PW, UK
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