Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: Packages that explicitly DEPEND on sys-apps/sed

[Mike Frysinger]

On Thursday, June 16, 2011 22:13:48 Duncan wrote:
> Mike Frysinger posted on Thu, 16 Jun 2011 20:51:36 -0400 as excerpted:
> > these are mostly done already via the autotools eclass, so these should
> > get dropped from system:
> > 	sys-devel/autoconf sys-devel/automake sys-devel/libtool sys-devel/m4
>
> That last comment, on the autotools eclass, suggests a solution, a
> basedeps eclass, which most ebuilds could simply inherit.

that's not what i was suggesting at all, nor do i think it feasible

> The eclass could handle most archiving dependencies automatically, using
> source URL extensions to determine type.  Similarly with stuff like make
> by scanning for calls to it or emake.

the automatic code scanning wouldnt work as it would need to consider the 
default implementation of functions (which really only the PM knows), and even 
then it cant handle code which is dynamic (like the default PM funcs).
	if [ -e Makefile ] ; then emake ; fi

how do you automatically detect utilities that only the package executes ?

> Bash and baselayout would be mandatory, and variables could be used for
> quick-list adds and overrides.

gee, that sounds exactly like the system set we already have, except this 
solution generates a lot more overhead (all the execution/caching required to 
process this new eclass), and more pains.  the system set is in the profile 
which other profiles can easily override (by design).  much harder to pull 
that off with eclasses.

> It'd take a LOT of work and testing and may even then not be workable
> unless implemented as an arbitrary list that pretty much simply moves the
> @system list from its current location into an eclass, but the idea's
> interesting.  Possible/practical or wishful thinking?

impractical wishful thinking

further, many of these deps themselves depend on their own existence.  
coreutils needs expr/touch/tail/head/...... which coreutils provides.  bash 
needs a shell which bash provides.  sed needs sed which sed provides.  gawk 
needs gawk which gawk provides.  make needs make which make provides.

friends also need their friends.  make/bash/sed/grep/coreutils pretty much all 
need each other.  which is another reason why they're in the system set.
-mike