fastest_pkg

Synopsis

Script to find the fastest FreeBSD.org pkg mirror near you.

Description

By default FreeBSD pkg uses DNS-based load balancing. This is achieved through an SRV query:

$ dig +short _http._tcp.pkg.all.freebsd.org srv
50 10 80 pkg0.bbt.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.bme.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.bra.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.fra.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.isc.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.kul.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.kwc.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.nyi.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.tuk.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.twn.freebsd.org.
50 10 80 pkg0.jinx.freebsd.org.

However, this method will try to choose the nearest mirror, which will not necessarily be the fastest. This script can help you to find the fastest pkg mirror by trying each one in succession. At the end of the output you'll see a sample configuration to hardcode the fastest pkg mirror leading to much higher pkg performance.

$ fastest_pkg
pkg0.bbt.freebsd.org: 587.7 kB/s
pkg0.bme.freebsd.org: 13.9 MB/s
pkg0.bra.freebsd.org: 1.4 MB/s
pkg0.fra.freebsd.org: 14.3 MB/s
pkg0.isc.freebsd.org: 0.0 B/s
pkg0.kul.freebsd.org: 1.9 MB/s
pkg0.kwc.freebsd.org: 1.5 MB/s
pkg0.nyi.freebsd.org: 4.0 MB/s
pkg0.tuk.freebsd.org: 2.6 MB/s
pkg0.twn.freebsd.org: 1.8 MB/s
pkg0.jinx.freebsd.org: 1.8 MB/s

Fastest:
pkg0.fra.freebsd.org: 14.3 MB/s


Write configuration:
mkdir -p /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos/
echo 'FreeBSD: { url: "http://pkg0.fra.freebsd.org/${ABI}/latest", mirror_type: "NONE" }' \
        > /usr/local/etc/pkg/repos/FreeBSD.conf

The following cli options are available:

$ fastest_pkg --help
usage: fastest_pkg [-h] [-j] [-v] [-t TIMEOUT]

Script for finding and configuring fastest FreeBSD pkg mirror

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -j, --json            only show basic information in JSON format
  -v, --verbose         be more verbose
  -t TIMEOUT, --timeout TIMEOUT
                        timeout in ms