Actually this should be simple and handy.

For NetBSD, when u've done install, setup your network, +dns+gateway and internet is working, it's time to install additional packages@apps@program u like via internet.. the simplest method is using pkg_add where it's download a precompiled binary from ftp repository and install it to your system. If the packages need some other packages and dependencies, it'll download it too from the repo site. In my case, I'm using NetBSD 5.0.2-Release

# uname -a
NetBSD  5.0.2 NetBSD 5.0.2 (GENERIC) #0: Sat Feb  6 17:53:27 UTC 2010  builds@b7.netbsd.org:/home/builds/ab/netbsd-5-0-2-RELEASE/i386/201002061851Z-obj/home/builds/ab/netbsd-5-0-2-RELEASE/src/sys/arch/i386/compile/GENERIC i386

check the packages that u want is not listed/installed yet:

# pkg_info
bitchx-1.1nb4       IRC client based on ircII
cvsup-16.1.hnb2     cvsup daemon and client
nano-2.2.4          Small and friendly text editor (a free replacement for Pico)
 digest-20080510     Message digest wrapper utility
perl-5.10.1nb2      Practical Extraction and Report Language
readline-6.1        GNU library that can recall and edit previous input
popt-1.15           Command line option parsing library
samba-3.0.37nb3     SMB/CIFS protocol server suite

so then we proceed to install the packages. In this case, alpine email client

So first u need to set the PKG_PATH:

# export PKG_PATH="ftp://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/pkgsrc/packages/NetBSD/i386/5.0.2_2010Q2/All"

then  u can use pkg_add to install

# pkg_add -v alpine-2.00nb3
bin/alpine
man/man1/alpine.1
Package alpine-2.00nb3 registered in /var/db/pkg/alpine-2.00nb3

test your alpine apps installed just now..

# alpine

                    ?     HELP               -  Get help using Alpine

                    C     COMPOSE MESSAGE    -  Compose and send a message

                    I     MESSAGE INDEX      -  View messages in current folder

                    L     FOLDER LIST        -  Select a folder to view

                    A     ADDRESS BOOK       -  Update address book

                    S     SETUP              -  Configure Alpine Options

                    Q     QUIT               -  Leave the Alpine program

                            Copyright 2006-2008 University of Washington
                              [Folder "INBOX" opened with 0 messages]
? Help                           P PrevCmd                        R RelNotes
O OTHER CMDS    > [ListFldrs]    N NextCmd                        K KBLock

That's it!!! abd  can start install lots of packages from small packages like cucipop to huge apps like KDE...

ENJOY!!!!

for more details, u can check this official pages from NetBSD

http://www.netbsd.org/docs/pkgsrc/using.html

Written on Tuesday 27 July 2010 23:50pm