Re: port selfupdate, rsync, and tight firewalls

On Sep 6, 2006, at 9:10 AM, Joe Auty wrote:

> On Sep 6, 2006, at 6:08 AM, Ryan Schmidt wrote:
>
>> On Sep 5, 2006, at 22:31, Joe Auty wrote:
>>
>>>> Well, that would be the collective "we", or, perhaps, those with  
>>>> commit rights to base. Personally, I'm very interested in  
>>>> getting away from rsync. Factors that might argue against doing  
>>>> that might be:
>>>>
>>>> 	- Server load of a subversion "update" operation vs rsync.
>>>> 	- Network I/O efficiency differential between the two methods

Subversion's use of the DeltaV protcol should minimize data  
transmission via its binary differential algorithm.

>>>> As a potential work-around for you in the short-term, note that  
>>>> our ports tree _is_ presently available via subversion, over  
>>>> http, so you could just use subversion to keep up to date,  
>>>> instead of "port sync".
>>>
>>> Just speaking in terms of usability, while technically it might  
>>> make sense to go to Subversion, by doing so you put yourself in a  
>>> chicken/egg situation where people need to compile subversion  
>>> before they can use the software properly.
>>
>> Not a problem if you provide the Subversion port (and its  
>> dependencies) in the MacPorts dmg download so that it's already  
>> there from the first moment you install MacPorts.
>
> If we are free to include Subversion in this fashion, problem solved.

Unless the dmg includes an outdated (or insecure) subversion binary.

Might there be something else that could access the server using the  
WebDAV protocol? I just tested sucking my own subversion repository  
using wget. Apple doesn't include wget with Mac OS X anymore, but  
there are wrapper scripts for curl that could do the same thing.  
Perhaps one could fetch the updates for the subversion port and its  
dependencies before compiling it? That approach could ensure an  
updated subversion port without requiring a complete fetch of the  
ports tree. Another consideration is the fact that any subversion  
checkout requires double the space--one for a working copy and one  
for a pristine copy of the original.

WebDAV access with DeltaV support might be an alternative to  
installing the full subversion package.

Chris