# How long does it take you to set up your system(s)?



## sossego (Jul 15, 2010)

Another curiosity thread.....

For me:
Laptops take a week total of time.
Desktops take about two weeks.
Projects take about a month.


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## richardpl (Jul 16, 2010)

For me it is always less than 1 minute.


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## fronclynne (Jul 16, 2010)

*I don't really know, since I always do something wrong and have to start over*

If I'm not trying to build openoffice from source, maybe 5 or 6 hours, about 40 minutes of which is actual poking at keys, the rest is waiting for stuff to finish compiling.


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## loop (Jul 16, 2010)

sossego said:
			
		

> Another curiosity thread.....
> 
> For me:
> Laptops take a week total of time.
> ...



You should add "... and why does it take this amount of time?"

Would be interesting to see the different reasons between the 1-minute setups and the longer ones.


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## sossego (Jul 16, 2010)

Why does it take that amount of time?
I'm setting up a DE. Recently, it was kde4. When I wasn't busy, I would look at the configure options. Something crashes? Go back through the output and find the problem. User permissions on CD/DVD drives. Old posts are searched through for exact instructions. It was been a little over five days before I rebooted. I haven't set up jails, ssh, other accounts, or started with kernel variables. Since I don't like a single desktop environment, configuring options and then see reference above.

The laptop gets hot and I have to let it cool. Besides that- and the age of it- it's easier to setup.


The project is just that: a continuing project. See the other hardware section in here.

I'm including the total up-time, whether I am asleep or awake, rebooting or restarting services, et al.


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## sk8harddiefast (Jul 16, 2010)

Nice question  Well. The base system about a week. I mean a usable system that i can see a video on youtube, listen music, see a photo etc. To make everything works (wifi, LCD displays, from ufs to zfs etc) i am still trying


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## klanger (Jul 16, 2010)

With all major config files backed up (& copied to freshly installed system),it takes about 1-2h to setup BSD on my little eeepc (with OOo, mediaplayer, window manager - i3, gimp, comix, gnome-commangder and samba).
Most of that is used to download & compile programs.

I've on my eeepc (& more then happy with that choice) DFBSD with hammerfs. It is very easy to install&setup.  

Last weekend I've tried to install FreeBSD 8.1 RC on the same computer & it was easy&fun as always (ports are big plus for FBSD over pkgsrc). Tried gnome2-lite (just to have a look, since I'm not a fan of DE) and have to say that gnome2 is a nice DE but heavy for a low power netbook (takes ages to boot to fully useful desktop).


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## sk8harddiefast (Jul 16, 2010)

> maybe 5 or 6 hours, about 40 minutes of which is actual poking at keys, the rest is waiting for stuff to finish compiling


I think you use server with 2 x quad core CPU!


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## klanger (Jul 16, 2010)

sk8harddiefast said:
			
		

> Nice question  Well. The base system about a week. I mean a usable system that i can see a video on youtube, listen music, see a photo etc. To make everything works (wifi, LCD displays, from ufs to zfs etc) i am still trying



Why don't you copy on usb-stick some most needed config files (xorg.conf, rc.conf, loader.conf, profile, wpa_supplicant.conf, smb.conf etc and also DE/WM config files) and a list of apps that you use (and a way how you set then up last time/correctly) so every time you will need to reinstall your system you can just copy those to their folders. 
It saves a lot of time.

Same is with apps - list them in to columns. One - those apps that you can simply 
	
	



```
pkg_add -r
```
 and the other that you need to use ports to build.
Then after fresh install you'll just have to list all apps after one command 
	
	



```
pkg_add -r
```
 and have a big cup off coffee.


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## sk8harddiefast (Jul 16, 2010)

Well. This with the usb stick, i already done it. In fact in my second hdd 
I dont know. I build everything from ports. Because i can choose my flags and because i use pkg_add -r when i have port-build issue.


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## Alt (Jul 16, 2010)

About 2hours to install(kde4) from usb+pkg_add -r
About 2days to install(kde4) from usb+compile all
And somewhat like 0.5-1hour to install router xD


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## kpedersen (Jul 16, 2010)

I tend to backup my installed ports into packages before I reinstall, so then it takes very little time to get stuff up and running again.

I also tend to be pretty light on software anyway (i.e no overly fat DE like gnome or KDE)

The largest software I have is probably openjdk and I certainly do not want to try rebuilding that again


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## nekoexmachina (Jul 21, 2010)

basic install - about 10-20 mins,
all used stuff - may be 2-3 hours (~10 mins i'm actually doing something with machine, all the other time stuff compiles/downloads/etc)


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## Crooksey (Jul 22, 2010)

A vanilla install for a server with all the ruby packages takes about 1/2 a day.

Then another half day starting a firewall from scratch and configuring ssh and securing it!


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## avkhatri (Jul 23, 2010)

Started using fbsd two weeks ago. It took me roughly two days to setup my freebsd "media center" with a DWM, ports etc..


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## dbi (Jul 23, 2010)

The installation of the base system takes me about 5 min. (not including the editing of config files afterwards).
If I need a driver or a feature not present in GENERIC then and only then I'd rebuild the kernel.

Then I install the needed software from ports using portmaster. This is the time consuming step that depends on the number of programs I need and how big they are.

Seriously, guys, why do you waste your time rebuilding the base OS? I come from Gentoo. Believe me, the speed gain isn't worth the compile time on a recent hardware. Optimising made sense some years ago, but now... What's the point to speed-up greping in a 10MB file with 3 miliseconds risking the stability of your OS?
Not to mention that all the stable optimisation options are enabled by default.

BTW if I'm not wrong there is an ongoing effort to enable binary updating of the FreeBSD packages like one can update the base OS with "freebsd-update". Guess what I would be using if/when it's done.


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## vermaden (Jul 23, 2010)

dbi said:
			
		

> Seriously, guys, why do you waste your time rebuilding the base OS?



... but earlier ...


			
				dbi said:
			
		

> Then I install the needed software from ports using portmaster. This is the time consuming step that depends on the number of programs I need and how big they are.



Why do You waste time compiling ports instead of just adding packages?


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## Crooksey (Jul 23, 2010)

vermaden said:
			
		

> ... but earlier ...
> 
> 
> Why do You waste time compiling ports instead of just adding packages?



Probably because they are never uptodate


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## dbi (Jul 23, 2010)

vermaden said:
			
		

> ... but earlier ...
> 
> 
> Why do You waste time compiling ports instead of just adding packages?



For 2 reasons:

- Ports often have options that I want and are not included by default 
- Packages are not up-todate and sometimes have unpatched security holes

BTW these days I conducted an experiment with an entirely different purpose, but it included installing xorg and gnome2 in a jail. I did that step using packages, because the jail was going to live just for the test. Running 
[cmd=""]portaudit -Fda[/cmd]

in that jail produced an extremely long output. So, be careful when using packages.


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## avkhatri (Jul 23, 2010)

When i installed fbsd the first time I installed everything I wanted via packages during the install proces. It was much faster than compiling, but i had numerous problems with installed packages breaking when I upgraded certain dependencies to install other apps. I've been using the ports now mainly because i don't compile huge DE like gnome or K
DE


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