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Rich Freeman posted on Tue, 22 Jan 2013 07:12:06 -0500 as excerpted: |
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> Should we therefore list all the flags on the system and which ones are |
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> enabled and disabled? |
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> |
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> I guess we could, but it is a REALLY long list. |
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> |
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> In practice I find that the way I tend to use USE flags is that I just |
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> ignore them until something unexpected happens, and then change them. |
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|
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The one thing I wish the handbook had taught, way back when I started |
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(and I read the handbook well enough that even before I had a system up |
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and running on gentoo... 2004.0/amd64 wasn't quite ready for NPTL and I |
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blocked on it, but 2004.1 worked... I was helping others who apparently |
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had /not/ read it so well! this wasn't there and AFAIK still isn't), |
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was... |
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|
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>>>>> |
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|
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"If in doubt, leave it out. Remember, because gentoo is build-from- |
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source, every package installed has a much higher cost in terms of |
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continuing upgrades over time, than on a binary distro. If you aren't |
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sure you're going to use it, or will only use it maybe a couple times a |
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year, strongly consider omitting it, thus avoiding the upgrade cost. You |
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can always install it later if you find you REALLY need it. |
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|
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"That applies to both packages and USE flags (which often bring in extra |
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packages) on your system." |
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|
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<<<<< |
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One of the first things I realized out of the gate was that keeping both |
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gnome and kde installed wasn't going to be practical for me, and I |
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preferred the better configurability of kde so I quickly dropped gnome. |
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|
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But over the years my system has gotten progressively leaner as I trimmed |
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this and that, one thing at a time, because there really IS a continuing |
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maintenance cost to every single package installed, ESPECIALLY on the |
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~arch systems I run where the package churn is much higher, even MORE so |
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for those (like me) that like to run stuff like kde prereleases from the |
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overlays. KDE for example has two feature releases a year and updates |
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every month, basically 12 releases a year. For those running the pre- |
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releases, it's 16, as for the couple months before a feature release |
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they're on a two-week update cycle. For those running its pre-releases, |
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KDE *BY* *ITSELF* is thus several hundred package upgrade builds 16 times |
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a year (plus -rX bumps if any). |
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|
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I've trimmed my kde to ~170 packages at last upgrade (and just trimmed a |
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couple more after that, deciding with dolphin as my GUI fileman and |
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firefox as my default browser I no longer needed konqueror or its addons, |
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so I think I'm down to 168 per kde upgrade here, now). With my six-core |
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bulldozer and PORTAGE_TMPDIR in tmpfs, that's actually reasonable. |
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|
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|
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I wouldn't expect ordinary gentooers to go to the lengths I have to |
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reduce system bloat while keeping functionality I actually use, as the |
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system set I've negated is there fore a reason and USE=-* is discouraged |
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for a reason -- it TAKES someone with quite some experience and knowledge |
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to properly navigate those sorts of things. |
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|
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But if anything, that's all the MORE reason there should be a minimal |
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profile available, for those who want as lean an installation as |
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possible. The more stuff turned on the worse it gets, especially for USE |
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flags on system set packages and the packages they in turn drag in, |
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multiple levels down. |
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|
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That's actually why I eventually killed my system set, too much |
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(including xorg-server and kdelibs) was being pulled into it by the USE |
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flags, and for safety reasons, portage puts much stronger parallel-emerge- |
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jobs limitations on @system and its deps, many packages of which are |
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piddly little things that kept portage running alone at <1.00 load |
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average on a six-core! |
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|
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So the smaller the set of profile-enabled USE flags and the smaller the |
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@system set, the better, and a minimal profile that people can add what |
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they need to, would ideally be the recommended profile for most users. |
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|
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-- |
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Duncan - List replies preferred. No HTML msgs. |
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"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master -- |
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and if you use the program, he is your master." Richard Stallman |