[gentoo-dev-announce] Deprecation of virtual/libmysqlclient and virtual/mysql as providers for libmysqlclient.so

[Brian Evans]

With the current state of the forks of MySQL diverging, the client
libraries are no longer compatible.

Since virtual packages cannot handle rebuilds of subscribed packages
when a consumer changes, the following action is to be taken by all
developers:

If you need libmysqlclient.so, please depend on dev-db/mysql-connector-c.
If you need or can use libmariadb.so, please depend on
dev-db/mariadb-connector-c.

(Yes the above packages coexist just fine.)

Please remove references to virtual/libmysqlclient as it does not work
as I intended (and explained above). This virtual will be last-rites
once nothing depends on it.

Please remove all DEPEND on virtual/mysql where it is used for libraries.
virtual/mysql is the client and server tools *only*.
It is not correct to rely on this for libraries any longer.
A good example for DEPEND is tests where the client/server binaries are run.
RDEPEND for the purpose of running client/server is fine for virtual/mysql.

Almost all of the consumers of virtual/mysql have already been updated
(save mysql-cluster).  Some are already stable.

At a point in the future, likely in 2019, the compatibility DEPEND that
exist in the consumers will be removed and may break packages which are
not updated.

In the coming months, I will try my best to test and report bugs on
packages which I can find.

I welcome any discussion on the details, but this is the only sane move
for Gentoo and the ABI incompatibilities that exist on the client libraries.

Thank you,

Brian Evans