[gentoo-user] Re: Trouble decrypting message from firefox ebuild

[Grant Edwards]

On 2009-01-19, Paul Hartman <paul.hartman+gentoo@×××××.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Jan 18, 2009 at 10:32 PM, Grant Edwards <grante@××××.com> wrote:
>> On 2009-01-18, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@×××××.com> wrote:
>>
>>>>>>      All the packages built against mozilla-firefox won't
>>>>>>      compile, if after installing firefox 3.0 you get some
>>>>>>      blockers, please add 'xulrunner' to your USE-flags.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Does anybody have idea what the above sentence is trying to say?
>>>>>
>>>>> It's saying that if you use firefox -3*, then you should
>>>>> remove "firefox" from your USE and add "xulrunner" instead.
>>>>> This way, nothing in the tree will try to pull in firefox-2*
>>>>> (which obviously conflicts with firefox-3*).
>>>>
>>>> Wow.  I'm not doubting that what you say is true, but how
>>>> anybody was supposed to get that from the emerge message is
>>>> beyond me.
>>>>
>>>>> There have been 4 earlier threads on this very topic in the
>>>>> last fortnight.  For more details, please check the recent
>>>>> archives (rehashing the same thing over and over is getting
>>>>> really tedious)
>>>>
>>>> Sort of makes you wonder if the message is a bit too cryptic,
>>>> eh?
>>>
>>> If I read that message out loud, it sounds suspiciously like a
>>> babelfish translation from Japanese to English. Whatever it
>>> is, the author of the message is certainly not a native
>>> English speaker.
>>>
>>> But the intent is easy to see if you already know how it
>>> works.
>>
>> Yes, once somebody has told you the answer, it's possible to
>> make some sense of the message. But, I stand by my assertion
>> that give just the message very many people are going to figure
>> out that it means you need to replace the "firefox" use flag
>> with the "xulrunner" use flag so that apps will build against
>> firefox-3 instead of trying to build against firefox-2.
>
> Someone should file a bug to have the message changed to something clearer.

I'd be happy to do that.  Is the following correct?

  The UI and rendering libraries that were part of the
  mozilla-firefox 2.x package have been split from the mozilla
  firefox-3.x package and are now in the xulrunner package.  In
  order for ebuilds to use xulrunner instead of mozilla-firefox
  2.x, the "firefox" USE flag must be replaced by the
  "xulrunner" USE flag.  Failure to replace the "firefox" USE
  flag with the "xulrunner" USE flag will result in portage
  requiring mozilla-firefox 2.x which is incompatible with
  mozilla-firefox 3.x -- this will block some packages from
  building.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow! Gee, I feel kind of
                                  at               LIGHT in the head now,
                               visi.com            knowing I can't make my
                                                   satellite dish PAYMENTS!