On Wed, 10 Jul 1996, Michael L. Kornegay wrote:

> I am new to NetBSD for the Mac.  I am interested in the following
> (all from the perspective of a user that is not interested in doing
> kernel builds unless absolutely necessary):

Note:  it is wise to _not_ use the GENERIC kernels, except to get things
started.  Building kernels, however, isn't particularly difficult,
fortunately.

>   o How often are the official releases of NetBSD?  

There was a 13 month gap between 1.0 and 1.1; the latter was quite
overdue.  The 1.2 release is imminent, just about 8 months after the 1.1
release.  I'd expect 1.3 to be 6-8 months, as well (but of course, nothing
is set in stone).

>   o How stable are the snapshot releases of NetBSD (like the 1.2b
>     mentioned above)?

You mean 1.2_BETA, which is a beta release before 1.2; 1.2B will (might)
be a -current version after 1.2 but before 1.3.  I know, I know; that's
picking nits.

At any rate, the snapshots are built from -current source, in general.
Every effort is made to have a working system, but naturally there is some
amount of risk associated with having the latest code on your system.

>   o What is the recommended upgrade strategy for a system that has
>     been substantially configured (sendmail, uucp, inetd, ...)?

Update the kernel and binaries at the same time, but don't install the
`etc' package.  It's easiest to unpack the distribution from the NetBSD
side; from the root directory,

	tar --unlink -xzpf base.tar.gz

Do this for each distribution file.  The --unlink and -p options, in
particular, are very important.  Once that's accomplished and you have the
kernel copied into place[*], unpack etc.tar.gz somewhere safe -- like /tmp
-- and work through the files and make any local modifications that you
need to before copying them into the real /etc directory.  This is a bit
tedious but generally isn't too bad.  Also, note that the UUCP
configuration won't need to be changed, and the sendmail configuration
might be able to run unchanged.  However, it would be a good idea to
generate a new .cf file if you are using the m4-style configuration.

[*] You might consider booting the new kernel from MacOS, single user
mode, just to make sure that it recognizes your hardware properly.  Taking
the plunge can sometimes be scary.

>   o NetBSD sounds and looks like a real nice solution for the 68K
>     Macs.  What is the outlook for NetBSD given Apple's work on
>     MkLinux for the PPC?  

I can't comment on this, unfortunately.  The PowerMacs are a completely
separate porting effort (well, almost completely).

>   o Is there a feature set FAQ for 1.2?  

Not yet; watch http://www.netbsd.org/ for more info.

--scott