On Sat, 14 Jan 2012, Ingo Schwarze wrote:
>Hi Dave,
>
>Dave Anderson wrote on Sat, Jan 14, 2012 at 12:14:57PM -0500:
>
>> and then ran 'pkg_add -ui' it was unable to update those files:
>> "Couldn't find updates for uvideo-firmware-1.2p0, iwn-firmware-5.6p0".
>
>The firmwares live in a different package repository,
>that's why pkg_add(1) doesn't find them by default.
>
>If you do want to check for new firmwares, take the above
>message as a reminder to run
>
> $ sudo fw_update
>
>manually. But note that's not necessarily related to doing an
>operating system upgrade.
Thanks for the pointer; fw_update looks like it's exactly what I need.
>> I'd expect that making 'pkg_add -u' able to find these files would be
>> fairly simple (either by giving it access to the same data used by the
>> installer or by recording where it was found with any package added from
>> a source not in PKG_PATH),
>
>I'm not sure i would want pkg_add(1) to look outside the PKG_PATH.
>
>> and it would certainly make life a bit more convenient when upgrading.
>> Am I missing something important, is this on someone's TODO list,
>
>The only (potential, minor) problem i see is that people might run
>pkg_add(1), see the "couldn't find", and not know about fw_update(1).
>That's probably what happened to you.
Yes.
>I'm not sure how to improve that. Messages printed by programs
>should be terse, so i don't think pkg_add(1) should print a
>suggestion to run fw_update(1) when it sees *-firmware-* packages
>it can't update. Most people will know that anyway, and there is
>no strong reason to check for firmware updates at that particular
>time.
>
>Maybe it could be mentioned in the pkg_add(1) manual.
>Then again, that manual doesn't document the "Couldn't find updates"
>diagnostic at all, so far.
Perhaps when the 'Install non-free firmware files on first boot' option
is selected the installer should mention fw_update? And/or 'pkg_add -u'
should mention it as a possible solution if it issues the "couldn't
find" message? I probably should have tried 'apropos firmware', but was
fixated on pkg_add and didn't think to look for a different tool.
_Some_ sort of more prominent mention of fw_update appears to be
desirable.
Dave
>> do the installer and pkg_add developers not talk to each other,
>
>Actually, i have met all of krw@, halex@ and espie@ at least twice
>during hackathons, but never together; so you may have a point... :-D
>
></irony>
>But no, that's not the root cause of the issue.
>
>Yours,
> Ingo
>
--
Dave Anderson
<d...@daveanderson.com>
