NSBD: Not-So-Bad Distribution

Documentation

NSBD is updated frequently. The patchlevel is always changed whenever there is an update and the version number is only changed rarely. The current version and patchlevel is

NSBD version 1.6 patchlevel 2006/05/19 16:55:04

Here is the chronological log of changes.

NSBD, Not-So-Bad Distribution, is an automated distribution system that is designed for distributing open source software on the internet, where users cannot trust the network and cannot entirely trust the maintainers of software. NSBD authenticates packages with GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG) or "Pretty Good(Tm) Privacy" (PGP(Tm)) digital signatures so users can be assured that packages have not been tampered with, and it limits the maintainer to only update selected files and directories on the user's computer. NSBD's focus is on security, leaving as much control as is practical in the users' hands.

To accomplish the automated updates, NSBD supplies a means of checking for updates to packages and automatically downloading and installing the updates. This "automated pull" style of distribution has the same effect as the "push" style of distribution that is being given press lately, but gives more control to the user. A direct "push" style is also supported which is not used as frequently but which is especially appropriate for situations where there are multiple contributors to a shared server (for example, a shared web-page server). NSBD can "pull" directly over http or by using rsync to minimize network usage.

By using the included program breloc, NSBD can also relocate binary packages so they can be installed at a location of the user's choice, if the binary packages are configured with a "prefix" that has a sufficient number of trailing slashes to accomodate the user's chosen location.

NSBD is open source software, released under the terms of the GNU General Public License. Binaries are also available for a variety of Unix platforms and for Cygwin, the popular Unix-like environment for Microsoft Windows. It is written in TCL/TK and C.

Documentation

This original paper that was submitted to Dr. Dobb's Journal and published in the September 1998 issue has a good explanation of why to use NSBD and an overview of how to use NSBD.

Most of the NSBD documentation is in the manual page, and the same information is available in the help system built-in to the nsbd program.

Getting NSBD

Since NSBD is the ideal open software distribution system, of course it is set up to distribute itself. But to get started, you need to bootstrap by another means. After bootstrapping, you should register for updates to NSBD.

NSBD mailing list

If you're interested in discussions about NSBD and getting announcements about NSBD upgrades, please join the NSBD mailing list. Recently archived messages are there and older messages are in the old archives.

Packages distributed with NSBD

World-Wide Exptools has some packages distributed by NSBD. If you make any others, please send mail to exptools@lucent.com to get your packages advertised here.

Other software deployment systems

If you'd like to find out about other distribution and software deployment systems, check out the Software Deployment Information Clearinghouse.

Thanks to Philip R. Zimmermann and Garrison Keillor for inspiration for the Not-So-Bad name. Thanks to Neal McBurnett, George Otto, and John Ellson for technical discussions and many suggestions for improvements. Also thanks to all of you who participate on the NSBD mailing list.

Contact the Lucent Central Exptools Administrator with any comments or questions about nsbd.