Subject: custom system build experience.
To: None <current-users@netbsd.org>
From: Leo Ngatia <leongatia@yahoo.co.uk>
List: current-users
Date: 10/20/2003 15:44:48
Hello.
I've used NetBSD for some time now and like it a lot. I decided to build a
personal custom NetBSD system with optimized flags and after a few
frustrating retries, I found out a few things. These are probably known here,
just thought I'd share my experiences.
I realised that building a distribution with MANZ=YES set in mk.conf causes
the kernel build to fail at checkflist since the listings in the
distrib/lists do not have a .gz extension for the man pages. Is there a way
around this?
Mozilla refuses to install, even from sources. It builds everything and
crashes at moz-install. Mozilla-bin refuses to work (segmentation fault) same
with Netscape 7. Communicator, Opera and Quake work well, so I know linux
emulation works.
Blender sources make references to old C++ standard strstream instead of
gcc-3.3.1 stringstream. I had to edit 2 files (can't remember which, though
*slaps self*).
How do you set optimize flags for X sources? I tried adding them to NetBSD.cf
in the config directry as documented, but it just wouldn't work, yet the
compile kept echoing flags from the same file (NBSD_THREADS in particular).
Is there a different file?
Kde arts is not very stable. Maybe the optimization was the problem, but I've
had problems with it before. xmms refuses to work well with it (crashes on
"play another file") and gmplayer crashes often too. Also, setting Netscape
plugins support to kde fails to build libkcm_nsplugins library. I searched
the net and the problem reported was supposedly corrected (looking at the
PLIST), however, the library does not exist in the build directory...it's not
being built.
I've enjoyed exploring the customization of my personal system. Since I don't
have a powerful graphics card, I can only tell it's faster due to faster
booting, kde's seemingly quicker response, maybe a little faster file
manipulation (tar and cp).
I liked the quick install of NetBSD since I could reformat and reinstall base
system in under 15 minutes if I did something wrong. I've found it very
consistent in design and easy to configure. I intend to have a lot of
productive work and play on my "brand new" system.
Thanks.