Re: [gentoo-osx] The road ahead?

[Nathan]

On 10/31/05, dirk.schoenberger@×××××××××.de
<dirk.schoenberger@×××××××××.de> wrote:
> Just wanted to put my 2cent into the discussion.
> I suppose I am currently just a pure Gentoo-OSX user, and while I see the
> point of the prefix project, I am not really convinced by it. I like the
> way Gentoo integrates into the system, or at least the part accessible by
> a console.

(Foreward:  I'm not trying to be offensive or attack Dirk.  Please
read the following as having being written with a 'thoughtful' or
'didactic' tone, because it is)

Hmm.  I would have to put my vote firmly in the opposite camp.  If
Gentoo can't keep itself separate from OS X, it's useless to me, as I
depend on a fully-functioning OS X system for my day job.  Anyone who
needs a working OS X system needs prefixed installs with gentoo-osx. 
Path collisions != "integrat[ing] into the system".

> I see this as an advantage above e.g. Fink, with its own namespace. The
> namespace variant implies that I have to fudge around with PATH variables
> and other CLI stuff, in order to get the apps working. I still have no
> real MacOSX integration, with App folder and GUI starter elements (which
> would be my biggest feature request)

I see not trashing the existing system software as far more important
than the minor configuration of your path.  This is Gentoo!  What "App
folder" are you expecting?  KDE menus, Gnome menus, etc. are basically
fancy widgets that execute CLI commands when you click on them.  If
you need something to click on for your own sanity, the logical thing
for you to do would be to create some scripts in /Applications that
call the X apps you use when you click on them, assuming you got the X
apps installed in the first place. I wouldn't be surprised if someone
came up with a fink-commander-like project for OS X (to install and
run stuff) if the prefixed-installs-hurdle ever gets passed.

> From what I see as a user, the Gentoo packages divide into 4 categories
>
> 1) packages which integrate nicely into the system (no dependencies, or
> dependencies which are properly provided by MacOS)

No collisions and no dependencies?  No reason to wait for gentoo-osx then.

> 2) packages which clash with MacOS provided packages, things like python
> or automake spring to mind

And bash, ls, grep, emacs, vi, vim, gcc, perl, python, tcl/tk, apache,
etc. etc. etc.
I would guess this is a _lot_ of packages, including most of the stuff
that just having a gentoo system depends on.

> 3) packages which depend on 2)

This wold be the rest of the packages.

> 4) misc packages which are otherwise problematic. This means most of the
> package.masked packages, where I cannot really speak about.

Not really a separate category.  Any of the above can belong to your
category 4 as well.

> The biggest problem is obiously the packages in 2)

Which prefixed installs will solve.  When portage fully supports
prefixed installs, then:
(1) A base system gets created by devs by whatever means (hopefully
the only step with mandatory dependencies on Apple tools)
(2) Regular users install the prefix-enabled base system into a prefix
(and add $PREFIX/bin, $PREFIX/sbin, etc. to .bashrc)
(3) 'emerge mypackage' uses the gentoo system in $PREFIX to build
'mypackage' and install in into
$PREFIX/regular/gentoo/path/for/the/package
(4) USERS REJOICE!
(5) At this point, I'm sure someone will start a 'fink-commander'-like
project for people who aren't comfortable with the command-line

> My private idea in order to emerge packages in 3) would currently be to
> manually install the needed packages in places like /usr/local (instead of
> Gentoos /usr) and put these packages into package.provided. It would be
> really nice if I could use this way while still being able to use the
> emerge functionaltiy. Perhaps this could be handled by a special USE flag?

Manually "install" packages whose dependencies won't install?  I think
you have missed the concept that the dependencies are necessary to
both compile and run the package.

Anyway, not trying to be disagreeable or mean--no offense meant to
Dirk in any way.

I'm excited to hear kito/ferringb's news about prefixed install
progress.  I've been a Gentoo user for 3 years and currently have over
a dozen rack-mounted Gentoo Linux (x86) servers (and more coming every
month).  I've got four other developers at my work and myself using
100% Apple hardware on the desktop (powerbooks mostly), and soon 100%
Gentoo Linux on the servers.  We're all currently using fink and
darwinports for our OSS currently--just waiting for prefixed
installs...

Man, that took too long.  I had better get to work.  :-)

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