newbie netbsd questions

I've just installed NetBSD and I'm grokking it, but I still have a few questions about using pkgsrc that I couldn't find answers to in the official docs.

1. are you generally supposed to change to csh when installing stuff? root's default shell is sh, but the .cshrc file had a nice comment in it for setting the PKG_PATH variable.

2. how do the cool netbsd kids browse packages and install them? Right now, I'm index browsing ftp.netbsd.org with firefox to see what packages are available, then I use pkg_add to install what I want. So, if i wanted to install emacs-23.3nb14.tgz, I would do something like: "pkg_add emacs-23.3n*". This is annoying when there are multiple versions of a package because I don't know which one is recommended and I have to type more. There's got to be an easier way to do this, right?

150 views and no replies... i guess netbsd really is dead.

Originally Posted by twelvenine 150 views and no replies... i guess netbsd really is dead.

You might have better luck trying some BSD forums or pkgsrc mailing list.
netbsd.org/community/

IIRC, I always built my packages from pkgsrc, so I can't help with question 1, and I've used primarily linux recently so memory is rusty, though I hope to get back to NetBSD soon again.

I've browsed packages with help of both pkgsrc.se and pkgsrc tree.

Edit:
Question 1: Reading another forum jogged my memory and quick check on my NetBSD box confirmed it, you can find PKG_PATH in your .profile too, so it should work also with ksh.

Wish I could help. I ran NetBSD on an ancient notebook a couple years back, and freakin' loved it. I believe I knew the answer to your question then, but it's long been overwritten by new data.

I'll second the recommendation for using NetBSD's mailing list. I got quick support there several times.

http://www.netbsd.org/mailinglists/

As mentioned, you probably want pkgsrc-users or netbsd-users.

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One other idea: there's a forum I was active on some time ago that has a small (but very sharp) membership:

http://www.daemonforums.org/

There seemed to be a couple heavy-duty NetBSD guys around (at least while I was there).

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Finally, NetBSD is certainly not dead. It just doesn't enjoy the same level of advocacy or activity as some other OSes. (I'm glad to see you are giving it a try.)