Petteri Räty wrote:
> Let's try something new. I would like to get opinions from as many
> people as possible about GLEP 55 and alternatives listed here in order
> to get some idea what the general developer pool thinks. Everyone is
> only allowed to post a single reply to this thread in order to make it
> easy to read through. The existing thread should be used for actual
> discussion about the GLEP and the alternatives. This should be a useful
> experiment to see if we can control ourselves :)

I was talking to Alec last night in -dev (yes, I'm still alive), and I tossed 
out the idea of using metadata.xml instead of mangling the ebuild filename or 
even sticking it as the first line in the ebuild (as a hashbang or something 
gentoo-specific, for example).

It's nothing fully fleshed out, and I know parsing XML is about as much fun as 
sticking your tongue into a cross-cut paper shredder, but I figured why not toss 
it out there?

Add a tag like this to metadata.xml

<eapi pv="2.6.28.7" version="1" />

pv = Package Version (incl. revision if needed).
v = EAPI version.

Other variants:
<eapi version="1">mips-sources-2.6.28.7</eapi>
<eapi pv="2.6.28.7">1</eapi>

and such.

This allows portage or whatever to associate the chosen/desired EAPI level with 
a given ebuild version in portage (so the above examples would match 
mips-sources-2.6.28.7.ebuild)

I think there's some other magic going on after metadata is updated in portage, 
like the whole use.local.desc auto-updating.  I figure something like this could 
also be implemented, maybe even in the same way whereby a backend script parses 
this out and create a /usr/portage/profiles/eapi.list file that links package 
revisions with the set eapi level.  Then let the various package managers do 
whatever it is that they do to make use of this information.

Call it random brainstorming.  No idea on the pros & cons -- I haven't even 
looked at g55 just yet.


-- 
Joshua Kinard
Gentoo/MIPS
kumba@g.o

"The past tempts us, the present confuses us, the future frightens us.  And our 
lives slip away, moment by moment, lost in that vast, terrible in-between."

--Emperor Turhan, Centauri Republic