Is it possible to provide binary for FreeBSD

[PeterDaveHello]

Hi there, I just want to know is it possible to provide the dist binary for FreeBSD just like linux (e.g. https://nodejs.org/dist/v5.0.0/node-v5.0.0-linux-x64.tar.xz), if the work will need contribution, how can I contribute to it? Thanks!

[bnoordhuis]

/cc @nodejs/build

[PeterDaveHello]

Thanks @bnoordhuis

[PeterDaveHello]

Is there a repo for the build info or build process?

[bnoordhuis]

Yes, it's https://github.com/nodejs/build

[PeterDaveHello]

Oops, seems I missed it, will take a look at it.

[chvostek]

The binary you require depends on the version of FreeBSD you're running, and whether you're running in 32-bit or 64-bit. The FreeBSD project makes packages available already for all the supported options, which you can install using the pkg command.

Alternately, visit http://pkg.freebsd.org/, select your ABI, go ito "latest" and "All", then find your package. For example, for FreeBSD 10, 64-bit, you could:

$ sudo pkg add http://pkg.freebsd.org/freebsd:10:x86:64/latest/All/node-4.2.1.txz

Note that you don't need to provide a full versioned URL like this. The quick way to install a bianry package of nodejs in FreeBSD would be:

# pkg install nodejs

It's generally recommended to use binary packages provided by the FreeBSD packaging ecosystem, so that it can be registered in your machine's local package database and so that dependencies are tracked properly.

[PeterDaveHello]

@chvostek thanks for reply, but as you can see, the package(also the ports) on FreeBSD is in fact out-dated v4.2.1, Debian/Ubuntu/CentOS/Fedora ... such linux distros also have their eco-system, but it'll be very great to have the official and fresh releases!

One another reason I want to have the pre-built binary is for the nvm support :)

[chvostek]

@PeterDaveHello ... Any packaging system is going to lag behind official product releases a little. The FreeBSD port for node 4.2.1 was updated 4 days after that version was released. I would recommend against increasing your technical debt by making future upgrades more difficult.

You can always check with the maintainer of the port, listed at http://www.freshports.org/www/node, and ask when they're planning to update the port to the most recent nodejs release. In my experience, most port maintainers are very responsive to polite requests like this.

As for nvm... Well, bear in mind that nvm and node are separate things, and the availability of a node binary package does not mean you have nvm available. nvm (1) has not been ported to FreeBSD and (2) won't run in FreeBSD as-is. No doubt your contributions to that project would be welcome, but unless someone has a FreeBSD-compatible fork that I haven't seen, I suspect you won't be running nvm in FreeBSD any time soon.

[mikeal]

Well, bear in mind that nvm and node are separate things, and the availability of a node binary package does not mean you have nvm available

I believe that nvm actually pulls from our json definition for releases so it should automatically have the latest binaries.

[mikeal]

Any packaging system is going to lag behind official product releases

So, I'd like to push back a little on this. We hear this a lot, especially from debian maintainers, that there's some nebulous "process" by which package managers will take some variable amount of time to update. In some cases they even credit this process with encouraging stability or security.

While in our current situation package managers lag behind, that isn't how it should be, and it means those users are inherently less stable and less secure because of it. With v4 in our LTS cycle we have a high bar for disruptive changes. The vast majority of releases in LTS will be bug fixes and security improvements.

Make no mistake, the experts on Node.js stability and security are in the LTS working group and not whoever happens to manage the Node.js package for an operating systems package manager.

In the case of Node.js the process that disconnects the LTS/Build WGs from updates to our users does nothing but decrease stability and security for those users. My hats off to the people who do the work of maintaining those packages, especially those that get in timely updates, but if we were able to bring them in to the project and make updating those resources part of the regular release process as we do with docker already we would have more stability and security in the hands of our users.

I understand that this is not how things are typically done in OS package managers but at the moment the users who enjoy the greatest level of stability and security are those who update from us directly or from docker and processes that lag behind them do a disservice to our users who depend on those systems for updates.

[PeterDaveHello]

@chvostek

Any packaging system is going to lag behind official product releases a little.

Yes I know that, and that's the reason why I hope there could be a binary package release as for linux. Hope my pool English skill didn't ambious the focus.

[mikeal]

@PeterDaveHello that's not a bad idea. We have some FreeBSD resources already that we use for running tests so perhaps this is just a matter of adding them to our build step. You should log an issue in the Build Working Group about adding pre-built packages for FreeBSD :) https://github.com/nodejs/build

[PeterDaveHello]

@chvostek

As for nvm... Well, bear in mind that nvm and node are separate things, and the availability of a node binary package does not mean you have nvm available. nvm (1) has not been ported to FreeBSD and (2) won't run in FreeBSD as-is. No doubt your contributions to that project would be welcome, but unless someone has a FreeBSD-compatible fork that I haven't seen, I suspect you won't be running nvm in FreeBSD any time soon.

In fact, nvm pulls the binary packages from node https://nodejs.org/dist/ since nodejs v4.0.0, and nvm also looks like it supports FreeBSD. (I didn't try it by myself yet because build from source is very slow)

https://github.com/creationix/nvm/blob/master/nvm.sh#L936

nvm_get_os() {
  local NVM_UNAME
  NVM_UNAME="$(uname -a)"
  local NVM_OS
  case "$NVM_UNAME" in
    Linux\ *) NVM_OS=linux ;;
    Darwin\ *) NVM_OS=darwin ;;
    SunOS\ *) NVM_OS=sunos ;;
    FreeBSD\ *) NVM_OS=freebsd ;;
  esac
  echo "$NVM_OS"
}

https://github.com/creationix/nvm/blob/master/nvm.sh#L1230-L1233

  if [ "_$NVM_OS" = "_freebsd" ]; then
    make='gmake'
    MAKE_CXX="CXX=c++"
  fi

and sorry that I may not reply a comment at once, due to English is not my mother language, I'll need to check the dictionary and I can not read so fast.