# Statistics in determining # of downloads for given port/package



## rayne (Feb 27, 2012)

Do such statistics (for determining popularity) exist?


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## DutchDaemon (Feb 28, 2012)

For packages "maybe" (they're hosted by FreeBSD, but there are several mirrors and statistics may not be integrated, let alone be made public), for ports certainly not (the tarballs are hosted on hundreds of different servers, owned by hundreds of different people and organizations).


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## jb_fvwm2 (Feb 28, 2012)

Once upon a time, the bsdstats.org "ports" (link) worked.  One could see, for example, how many machines reported running x11-clocks/glclock...


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## DutchDaemon (Feb 28, 2012)

Yeah, but since only a fraction of FreeBSD users run bsdstats, those statistics are hard to extrapolate to any meaningful number. Having said that, package and port tarball downloads say nothing about actual usage. E.g. I remove build-only dependencies right after every port run, and I download them in package form for the brief period of time they're needed. That will surely skewer results.


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## rayne (Feb 28, 2012)

Thanks for the info. 

Being new to FreeBSD, was looking for quick-and-dirty ways to figure out what the experienced users were using--kind of like the way firefox does with their addons site.

Looked around came across:

The bsdstats.org "ports" link jb_fvwm2 mentioned, too bad doesn't work.
FreshPorts has a "Most watched ports": http://www.freshports.org/graphs.php?id=7


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