CAVE: Upgrading i386 on 10.2-RELEASE and WITHOUT_IPX in src.conf

G

getopt

␢
While upgrading from source amd64 systems without problems having in /etc/src.conf:
Code: 
WITHOUT_IPX=yes
this renders network connection on i386 systems to no use after a reboot, because ifconfig does not work any more:
# ifconfig
Code: 
Shared object "libipx.so.5" not found, required by "ifconfig"
I'm curious if you call this feature or bug?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
It's a feature. This is a side effect of direct dynamic linking as done by ld.so(1). The direct linking offers no fallback or limited functionality in case even one of the shared libraries is missing. It's all or nothing. There are many other similar pitfalls in the FreeBSD build system. For example when going back from a system built with WITHOUT_CTF to one with WITH_CTF you have to manually install the CTF libraries first or make installworld will fail.

This is one area where UNIX and UNIX-like OSes are lagging seriously behind other systems. MS Windows for example has had COM/COM+ as an integral component of the operating system for years. COM/COM+ allows an application to query an interface broker object for known interfaces and bind itself to the interface it wants to use. No direct linkage to interfaces involved and no runtime errors related to it.
 
Was a buildworld/installworld done? Because that should rebuild ifconfig correctly.

On the other hand, why is anything still depending on IPX by default?
 
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