Re: [gentoo-user] qtwebkit problem (solved)

[Philip Webb]

200105 Jack wrote:
> On 1/5/20 5:01 AM, Philip Webb wrote:
>> In order to update to the latest stable PyQt5-5.13.2 ,
>> I was required to remerge qtwebkit-5.212.0_pre20190629 ;
>> Towards the end of the latter compile, I suddenly found myself
>> looking at a completely dark screen : the whole system had crashed.
> There have been other good comments, but I'd ask what are your --jobs
> and --load-average settings?  Does it crash using -j1 ?
> I realize this may be moot, since you have already completed the emerge
> and may not want to risk another crash, but it's a thought.

Thanks for this + the other comments.

I'm not interested enough to make any further tests.
I doubt if the problem is hardware, which is  4 yr old  & very reliable ;
the usual rule-of-thumb is 'random = hardware, predictable = software'
& this phenomenon was predictable after the 1st occurence.

Since the previous emerge(s) of this version didn't fail,
the cause has to be some extra demand imposed by the new requirements
eg of the latest PyQt5.  This seems quite likely :
Python + Qt both seem to be projects with little discipline or care,
which keep on bloating & demanding more-more from users.
The Python 2/3 fiasco is a big pain in the neck
& whenever Qt needs updating, you have to delete everything first
before re-installing it, otherwise Portage refuses to handle it.

Back in the days when software had to work on an XT,
programmers had to exercise rigorous self-discipline ;
these days of unlimited memory/storage/processing have made them lazy.
On Gentoo, we get all the advantages of controlling our own systems,
but the downside is that we have to attend to some problems
which are handled by the devs on binary distros.

so back to real life ... (grin)

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