# PKG Repository Changed to Quarterly in 10.2?



## 4S4K4N (Aug 17, 2015)

In 10.1 the default pkg repository was "latest", but after running mergemaster it was changed to "quarterly"

I normally do all of my package management from ports, so this doesn't really affect me. I was just wondering if the various ports teams are now recommending the use of the quarterly snapshots over the latest trees? Won't this cause some grief for users who are already running packages newer than what's available in the quarterly snapshots?


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## kpa (Aug 17, 2015)

The change is to bring some stability to the packages. The ports/packages have been rolling release so far and that has resulted in many broken ports when a single change that hasn't been tested well enough has broken a large amount of other ports. As for the "grief", you can't have everything. Changing from the latest to the quarterly requires a full reinstall anyway with `pkg upgrade -f`. Same for the other direction.


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## obsigna (Aug 18, 2015)

I just upgraded to 10.2-RELEASE and without any doubt, I would like to stay with the "latest" pkg repository.



			
				FreeBSD 10.2-RELEASE Release Notes -- 12.1 Integration Changes said:
			
		

> The default pkg(8) repository set in /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf now defaults to the quarterly package set. To use the latest branch (as was the previous default), the comment at the top of /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf explains how to disable the default repository and specify an alternative repository. [r285830].



Unfortunately, _"the comment at the top of /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf explains how to disable the default repository"_ ONLY, but it does not explain how to specify the "latest" pkg repository as the alternative one. I know, I could simply edit /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf, however, I want to do it the canonical way. How?


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## kpa (Aug 18, 2015)

obsigna said:


> I just upgraded to 10.2-RELEASE and without any doubt, I would like to stay with the "latest" pkg repository.
> 
> 
> 
> Unfortunately, _"the comment at the top of /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf explains how to disable the default repository"_ ONLY, but it does not explain how to specify the "latest" pkg repository as the alternative one. I know, I could simply edit /etc/pkg/FreeBSD.conf, however, I want to do it the canonical way. How?



Create the file /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos/FreeBSD.conf as noted but override the URL instead of disabling the repository:


```
FreeBSD: {
  url: "pkg+http://pkg.FreeBSD.org/${ABI}/latest"
}
```

I don't think you want to use both the quarterly and the latest repositories at the same time, the multirepo support in pkg in still kind of sketchy.


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## obsigna (Aug 18, 2015)

kpa said:


> Create the file /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos/FreeBSD.conf as noted but override the URL instead of disabling the repository: ...



Thank you, that worked fine.



kpa said:


> I don't think you want to use both the quarterly and the latest repositories at the same time, the multirepo support in pkg in still kind of sketchy.



No, I only want to stay with the latest pkg repository, since the "quarterly" (that means 3 months doesn't it?) may be a tad old for my purposes. I have some public services running on my machine, and I guess, I want security fixes immediately when they bubble up, and not 3 months later. In emergency cases, I am ready to use portmaster instead of pkg, however, "quarterly" turns the emergency situation to normal, and would render binary upgrades almost useless for me.


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## junovitch@ (Aug 19, 2015)

obsigna said:


> ...
> No, I only want to stay with the latest pkg repository, since the "quarterly" (that means 3 months doesn't it?) may be a tad old for my purposes. I have some public services running on my machine, and I guess, I want security fixes immediately when they bubble up, and not 3 months later
> ...



The quarterly branch should get security fixes right after the head branch.  That's part of the goal to get critical security fixes along with stability.  If you ever see something fixed in the head branch but not the quarterly then please bring it up.


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## kpa (Aug 19, 2015)

Keep in mind that the support period of the quarterly branch is only three months at a time. After the period is over the quarterly SVN branch gets recreated from head and you'll notice a big jump ahead in its contents when the quarterly packages are rebuilt the first time from the recreated SVN branch.


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## key_112 (Sep 26, 2015)

I have a new install of FreeBSD 10-STABLE using the quarterly packages.
There are now, in multimedia/mplayer, multimedia/ffmepg, and www/firefox, multiple vulnerabilities. Switching to latest without reinstalling everything breaks things up, i.e. I get unresolvable resolver issues.

From above, I understood it is save to use the quarterly branches. However, it is not.
Any comments please ?


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## talsamon (Sep 26, 2015)

Yesterday there was an update of ports-mgmt/pkg to 1.6. If you can't update it with `pkg update`, update ports-mgmt/pkg in the port. Maybe, this could solve this.


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## protocelt (Sep 26, 2015)

talsamon said:


> Yesterday there was an update of ports-mgmt/pkg to 1.6. If you can't update it with `pkg update`, update ports-mgmt/pkg in the port. Maybe, this could solve this.


Or a PR could be filed against the issue if there is one instead so users don't have mysterious issues down the line from mixing ports and packages.


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## rliegh (Oct 28, 2015)

kpa -My VPS was installed with an empty pkg repository; making the change to /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos allowed me to repopulate it and configure what I needed to -- thank you very much!


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## grahamperrin@ (Oct 17, 2021)

2015: 



kpa said:


> … Changing from the latest to the quarterly requires a full reinstall anyway with `pkg upgrade -f`. Same for the other direction.



Anyone, please, is it still true that (the other direction): 

a switch from quarterly to latest *must* be followed by a forced upgrade of all packages?
If not a _requirement_, is it _good practice_? I suspect so …


<https://docs.freebsd.org/en/books/handbook/ports/#quarterly-latest-branch> does not go beyond `pkg update -f`.


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## Alexander88207 (Oct 17, 2021)

grahamperrin said:


> a switch from quarterly to latest *must* be followed by a forced upgrade of all packages?



Yes, if you now install for example a program then it could depend on newer versions of libraries that your system does not have.


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## grahamperrin@ (Oct 17, 2021)

Thank you, 



Alexander88207 said:


> … if you now install for example a program then it could depend on newer versions of libraries that your system does not have.



I should expect the Makefile for the program to express the dependencies. If so, pkg-install(8) should suffice – true?


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## Alexander88207 (Oct 17, 2021)

grahamperrin said:


> I should expect the Makefile for the program to express the dependencies. If so, pkg-install(8) should suffice – true?


Yes


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## grahamperrin@ (Oct 17, 2021)

Thanks for confirming.

Still, today, I can't shake the _suspicion_ that a forced upgrade of all packages is _good practice_ following a switch from quarterly to latest.

Am I unnecessarily cautious/suspicious, or are there edge cases that justify the practice?


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## Alexander88207 (Oct 17, 2021)

grahamperrin said:


> Thanks for confirming.
> 
> Still, today, I can't shake the _suspicion_ that a forced upgrade of all packages is _good practice_ following a switch from quarterly to latest.



If you know what you are doing and how your things are setup you can also use a normal pkg upgrade.

But for a downgrade it is necessary.


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