[gentoo-dev] per-package USE documentation (from gentoo-doc)

[Jason Stubbs]

Hello all,

Below is an excerpt from a post just sent to -doc.

On Tuesday 09 December 2003 01:47, Joel Konkle-Parker wrote:
> I can't tell you how many times I've sat and wondered what effect a
> particular flag has on a particular package, and the use.desc descriptions
> are much too brief to give any kind of useful detail (and the use.local.desc
> descriptions are just for local flags, not global ones). For example:
>
> "What effect does USE="xml2" have on xfree?"
> "Why does w3m need USE="imlib"?
> "Why should I keep USE="berkdb"?
>
> Other flags change meanings from package to package. USE="java" for gcc is
> for java development. The same flag for mozilla is for java end-users.

I must admit, I've thought the same things as well. Is this something that 
anybody else worries about too? That the USE flags are too general or at 
least not well enough defined.

Taking the "java" USE flag example above, I can think of three classes of 
user:
a) People who just want java support for web-browsing
b) People who do java development but never use gcj
c) People who want to use gcj

I'd say 99% of users fit into the first two categories, yet 99% of users will 
have gcj installed (which seems to be responsible for half the build time of 
the gcc suite).

Hmmm, just looking through use.desc I couldn't really see any many other flags 
that immediately sprang to mind as being as bad as the "java" one. "mysql" is 
definately another candidate. 

Another problem along similar lines is that some flags are used when the 
function they perform is slightly different to the flags definition. An 
example is the truetype flag which by definition "Adds support for FreeType 
and/or FreeType2 fonts". Yet, with X11 it also installs fonts.

Perhaps it's time for a review? Or am I just being pedantic? If no one tells 
me I'm crazy, I might start reviewing myself because even though USE flags 
are meant to remove most of the bulk that other distros add, it seems to me 
that they are also responsible for adding it.

Regards,
Jason Stubbs

--
gentoo-dev@g.o mailing list