Packaging Systems Comparison

Feature

pkgsrc

FreeBSD Ports

OpenBSD Ports

mports

Gentoo Portage

dpkg/rpm + apt

Used by

NetBSD, DragonflyBSD

FreeBSD

OpenBSD

MidnightBSD

Gentoo, Sabayon

Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Redhat

Source-based

(./)

(./)

(./)

(./)

(./)

{X} 1

Binary Packages

(./)

(./)

(./)

(./)

{o} 2

(./)

Primary Focus

?

src

bin

?

src

bin

Packages and ports integration

?

{o} 3

(./) 4

?

?

{X}

"One to Many" Packages

?

(./) 5

(./)

?

{X}

?

"Sub" Packages

{X}

{X}

{X}

{X}

{X}

(./) 6

Self-contained packages

?

?

?

?

?

?

Isolated Builds

(./)

(./) (Poudriere)

(./)

(./) (recently)

?

(./)

PREFIX clean

(./)

(./)

(./)

(./)

{X}

{X}

CFLAGS clean

(./)

(./)

(./)

(./)

(./)

{X}

Customizable

?

?

?

?

?

?

Rerrolled distfiles support

?

?

?

?

?

?

Differential updates (deltas)

?

?

?

?

?

?

MASTER_SITE priority/sorting

?

?

?

?

?

?

Hack collection / porting scripts

?

?

?

?

?

?

Parallel building

?

?

?

?

?

?

Multiple versions of the same app

{o} (dirs)

{o} (dirs)

?

{o} (dirs)

(./) (*.ebuild)

{o} (branches)

Multiple coexisting versions of the same app (symlink/wrapper)

?

?

?

?

?

?

Virtual ports/packages

?

{X}

?

?

(./)

(./)

Config files updating tool

?

?

?

?

?

?

Startup scripts management tool

?

?

?

?

?

?

Automatic restart of daemons

?

?

?

?

?

?

Automatic packaging list

?

?

?

?

?

?

Automatic management of users/groups

?

?

?

?

?

?

Initial configuration and integration of apps

?

?

?

?

?

?

License Framework

?

?

?

?

?

?

Track moved ports

{X}

(./)

?

?

?

?

Footnotes

  1. There are source packages, which contain both the full source code of the program and local patches, and are manually compiled and uploaded by the maintainer. (1)

  2. A Gentoo derivate called Sabayon is developing a tool called [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabayon_Linux#Features entropy], which uses binmerge for binary packages. (2)

  3. Some features are only supported by ports, like versioned dependencies. Also ports install directly, without generating packages. (3)

  4. Ports create the package and then uses the package tools to install. (4)

  5. Primary/Sub Ports and FLAVORS (5)

  6. Packages are split in -doc, -dev, -common, -data, etc. The good point is that packages which don't depend on the architecture are built only once, runtime dependencies don't require headers, and documentation is optional. However to build anything you need all the -dev versions. (6)

References

Symbol

Description

(./)

Fully supported

{o}

Partially supported, workaround used or WIP

{X}

Not supported

See also

PackageSystemsComparison for a more general discussion.

References

Notes

MarkLinimon: If updating, you may wish to start with this netbsd-users mailing list: NetBSD vs FreeBSD thread


CategoryPorts CategoryPackages CategoryStale CategoryNeedsContent

PackageSystemsFeatureComparison (last edited 2022-10-04T00:10:11+0000 by KubilayKocak)