Indiana IPS (Image Packaging System)

Boldly forward with minimal reading of the docs.

I can't obviously find where I would be downloading additional packages from. I feel like I am running in circles. It would seem that nearly the first thing I should be able to find would be download the rest from HERE. The single CD installer rocks, but we are up to 1 DVD for the normal full install.

I want the Firefox default home to prominently show me:
"Now that you have completed the Slim install get the rest of the packages. Use pkg list/status/something someargs"

The Preview includes the Image Packaging System. With IPS, you can select versioned builds of components to manage or create your own custom OpenSolaris distribution.

IPS packages that are not included in the Slim Install installation image, such as developer tools, can be downloaded after the installation. This prototype uses new IPS commands to access packages from the network repositories. Both IPS packages and SVR4 packages are supported.

The OpenSolaris Project: Image Packaging System project page contains man pages for the new IPS commands and a link to the IPS download site.

OK, pkg(5) has some indications of a repository (or authority) pkg://opensolaris.org. No examples, is pkg://opensolaris.org actually a valid and running authority? OK http://opensolaris.org/os/project/pkg/documents/ says pkg.opensolaris.org. Looking at the list of available packages I now see that they are basically ALL installed. (maybe pkg(5) should reference pkg.opensolaris.org)


I can also see that when I pkg uninstall SUNWbind and pkg install SUNWbind the counters on the site increment. When I drop ni0 the install fails and with it enabled and snoop running there is http traffic downloading the package. Clearly I am hitting the remote authority. Somewhere I think I should be able to see what the default authority is or where to find it (without digging in /var/pkg and guessing that cfg_cache should be the source, or looking at snoop to see where my traffic is going)


pkg install/uninstall is fast and also easy (somewhat dependent on network bandwidth I would guess). It wouldn't suffer from the some sort of optional feedback that work is progressing.


Errors from pkg are quite ugly and straight out of python.

At this point I call the install a success simple, easy, fast. The post install experience is still missing something. The packages that are not included on the live CD, how did they get installed on my instance when I had no net during the install.




So we are down to

1. Is pkg.opensolaris.org the only authority?
2. are all the packages that are available installed by default?
3. If pkgadd can't add packages (or is this a bug) how do I add standard SYSV packages now

In the end this was fun and interesting, I have a much better understanding of where we are going but it doesn't look like Indiana is going to be my everyday system for a while yet,