Hi!

After looking at Gentoo last week I have to say it's really a cool
distribution. I've some suggestions (some that might already be in
there but I've missed them).


* Wouldn't it be better for /etc/make.* to be named /etc/ebuild.* or
  something. I guess /etc/make.* comes from *BSD? If so renaming to
  ebuild (or portage.*) would better reflect the package system used
  in Gentoo.

* Possibility to specify own mirrors for certain packages, like for 
  example all GNOME/KDE/X packages. Could look like: 

  in /etc/make.conf:
  GNOME_MIRROR="ftp://.../" 
  X_MIRROR="ftp://.../"

  then the package maintainers use 
  SRC_URI="${GNOME_MIRROR}/${A}"

* Possibility to specify own prefixes for certain packages

  in /etc/make.conf:
  GNOME_PREFIX="/usr/local/gnome"

  in a package use:

  try ./configure --prefix=${GNOME_PREFIX}

* A really great feature would be to be able to override certain
  ebuilds in the portage tree without corrupting the original portage
  tree. I was thinking that perhaps one could specify a path to your
  own portage tree and packages in that tree would override the
  packages in /usr/portage. An example.

  in /etc/make.conf:
  LOCAL_PORTAGE="/usr/local/portage"

  emerge /usr/portage/x11-libs/gtk+/gtk+-1.2.10-r1.ebuild (which
  depends on >= dev-libs/glib-1.2.10.

  Now portage looks in ${LOCAL_PORTAGE}/dev-libs/glib/ to see if it
  finds a package fullfilling the dependency. If it does it uses that
  ebuild-script instead (perhaps we can add a possibility to be asked
  if you really want that, like:

  Found a matching ebuild in ${LOCAL_PORTAGE}... do you want to use
  that instead [y/n]. This can be configured in /etc/make.conf (with
  ASK_LOCAL="yes/no".

  This feature would really make Gentoo a superior developer platform
  since it'll enable a developer to use there own versions (or as me,
  use a local cvs copy of a package) of certain packages without
  corrupting the original portage tree.

  It will also be transparent for the ordinary user, since if you
  haven't specified a LOCAL_PORTAGE there isn't any changes in
  behaviour from now.

If you want to discuss these suggestions with me I'm Hallski on IRC.

Regards,
Mikael Hallendal

-- 
Mikael Hallendal                micke@...
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