Re: [gentoo-dev] New Portage fork: sys-apps/portage-mgorny

[Zac Medico]

On 03/24/2018 07:26 PM, Kent Fredric wrote:
> On Sat, 24 Mar 2018 13:44:49 -0700
> Zac Medico <zmedico@g.o> wrote:
>
>> That only happens when dependency satisfaction fails by normal means.
>
> And when that happens, it is better to bail and go "Uh oh, something bad",
> not "oh, right, lets install something that will likely make things
> worse and additional work to fix"

I don't think it's possible to have defaults that satisfy everyone. My
hope that the --autounmask default will be helpful to some people, and I
advise people to use --autounmask=n if it's not helpful.

> Its a regular occurrence that we have to tell people about this on #gentoo.

Normally, it emerge shows a message like the following when it creates
package.mask or ** keywords changes:

NOTE: The --autounmask-keep-masks option will prevent emerge
      from creating package.unmask or ** keyword changes.

>>> That default gets people using broken openssl and experimental
>>> packages blindly without them ever having intended on getting into
>>> experimental waters.
>>
>> If people can't be bothered to understand the meaning of package.mask
>> and keywords changes, should they really be using Gentoo?
>
> And its not *entirely* true that this is the case. Toralf used to
> complain portage couldn't find a resoultion and would try unmasking
> insane stuff in the process of tinderboxing.
>
> But lo and behold, by removing the ability to unmask ** and
> package.mask, he reported a significant improvement in the ability to
> test.

That's great. I really don't expect the default to work well in every
situation.

> "RTFM?" is a terrible response to "you have bad defaults that make
> things break" because that default is *only* useful to people who would
> consider using things that have *zero* expectation that they would work.

The --autounmask behavior only triggers when a dependency is encountered
that cannot be satisfied by normal means. So, it means that the user is
already using masked packages, or they have expressed a desire to
install a masked package.

> And that is not any majority demographic of the Gentoo user base.
>
> Its not a useless feature, but its a feature that should only be
> enabled after reading the documentation.
But if the majority demographic is as you describe, then they shouldn't
be using anything having dependencies that require package.unmask or **
keywords changes.
-- 
Thanks,
Zac