Re: [gentoo-user] emerge - Tips and Tricks

[Joe <jcbjoe20166@gmail.com>]

On 9/1/24 16:56, Dale wrote:
> Joe wrote:
>> Hello,
>>
>>
>> I'm looking for some tips and tricks regarding emerge. I know there is
>> a cheat sheet on what stuff you can do. But i would like emerge
>> exclusively .
>>
>> Normally i run emerge -uavDU --with-bdeps=y @world when i don't want a
>> reinstall of everything after a emerge --sync
>>
>> I run emerge -uavDN --with-bdeps=y @world when i want to reinstall or
>> like the manual says if there is a use flag that has been changed by
>> me or the dev.
>>
>>
>> Am i doing it right or what should i do that can help me and newer people
>>
>>
>> Thanks
>>
>>
>> Joe
> 
> I been using Gentoo since 2003.  The emerge program has come a LONG way
> since then.  Over the years tho, I've refined my update process until I
> got to a point where it won't get any better.  You will still run into
> the occasional update that requires the use of a hammer but for the most
> part, this does well.  First thing.  I have a set of options in
> make.conf to cover most options.  That line looks like this.
> 
> 
> EMERGE_DEFAULT_OPTS="--with-bdeps y --backtrack=500 --keep-going -v
> --quiet-build=y -1 --unordered-display --jobs=16 --load-average 8"
> 
> 
> A couple of those are either personal preference or machine dependent.
> The bdeps option will cause extra rebuilds on occasion but it is rare
> that I get a seg fault or programs that just crash because the versions
> don't work well together.  Before that option was available, I used to
> do a emerge -e world to fix problems with programs not starting or
> crashing with a seg fault.  The bdeps options seems to have improved
> that a LOT.  The backtrack option just makes sure you only have to run
> emerge -a<whatever> once.  It takes a while sometimes but it digs deep,
> real deep.  If a update can be done, it will find a way.  Honestly, 100
> is likely more than enough in most all cases.  The keep-going option is
> good for when a packages fails, especially early on, and it stops the
> update.  On most occasions, emerge can regroup and continue on skipping
> only one or a very few packages.  It saves time in the long run if you
> start a update and don't monitor it.  The -1 option is the same as
> oneshot.  This prevents you from accidentally cluttering up the world
> file.  Something gives you problems and you are emerging by hand, if you
> forget to add the -1 as you work to fix it, it adds all those to the
> world file, including version if you specify one.  I'm not sure on the
> display option.  I added it for some reason, ages ago.  The job and load
> is different for each machine.  The line above is for a 16 core, 32
> thread CPU with 64GBs of ram.  My old 8 core with 32GBs of ram was set
> to jobs 8 and load 3 I think.  Memory is one limiting factor there.
> LOo, that qt package and a couple others can fail from lack of memory if
> set higher.
> 
> Second thing.  My usual update process.  I sync first.  I run emerge
> -auDN world and check what it plans to do.  I mostly check USE flags.
> Sometimes a USE flag will change and I have to adjust them a bit.
> Sometimes on a per package basis, sometimes global.  Once I'm happy with
> what it wants to do, I hit the 'y' key and turn her lose.
> 
> On both my old rig and new rig, I have a second install that is in a
> chroot.  When I have packages that take a long time to build, I do my
> updates in the chroot first and then copy over the binaries.  Then I
> just need to do a emerge -aukDN world to make the update faster since it
> is already compiled.  This can be handy when you have some of the qt
> packages and the software has different versions and it causes
> problems.  Some updates midway can make it so certain programs won't
> launch at all.  I've had that happen with Kwrite several times, Dolphin
> a few times.  Once the update is done and you logou and back in,
> everything works again.  You just may run into problems during the
> update when some packages are old still and some are new.  This method
> lessens the time of that problem.
> 
> Once the update is done, I then run emerge -a --depclean and see if
> anything needs to be removed or if I need to add something I want to
> keep to the world file.  Oh, if you want to emerge something and add it
> to the world file so it gets updated and saved, emerge --select y plus
> your other options will override the oneshot option.  If you run a GUI,
> you need to logout and back in.  I sometimes switch to the boot runlevel
> and check for services that need to be restarted as well.  One could
> reboot and achieve the same goal.  This is Linux tho.  ;-)
> 
> Obviously, a news item can change that process.  If there is a news item
> with a different process, follow that for sure.  Following the news item
> to the letter is the best way.  The devs work out all the kinks and bugs
> before they post the news item.
> 
> Oh, this is another good line to have in make.conf.
> 
> 
> FEATURES="-usersync userpriv usersandbox buildpkg sandbox parallel-fetch
> parallel-install"
> 
> 
> The ones I care about.  The buildpkg tells it to save binary copies.
> This is a must if done in a chroot and you want to install elsewhere as
> binaries but comes in handy if you accidentally remove something and
> need it back fast or you need to restore something you removed and broke
> portage.  The fetch option just tells it to fork the download part and
> keep downloading until it has everything it needs to update.  The
> install option I think tells it to do more than one install at a time
> instead of one at a time.  I've never had a problem with this.  If
> something is going to clash, emerge sets a lock file and waits until the
> other package is installed.  I think the others were the default when I
> installed.  Check the man page maybe????
> 
> What you just read is from about 20 years of tweaking things on half a
> dozen rigs.  It should get you off to a good start for sure.
> 
> Dale
> 

Thanks,

This is more then i could have imagined. I've used Gentoo off and on for 
about a year. Sometimes i go to another distro like Debian but i keep 
coming back because of emerge use flags everything. i just like the control.

This is my main distro from now on. The community is the best. hope this 
helps somebody else also

Thanks

Joe