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On Tuesday 23 December 2008 00:07:40 Stroller wrote: |
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> On 22 Dec 2008, at 17:51, Alan McKinnon wrote: |
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> >> ... |
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> >> I would prefer it if Portage handled this without USE flag masking |
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> >> being necessary. If the required package is masked, or needs some |
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> >> other keyword, then IMO `emerge -p mplayer` should simply give an |
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> >> "unable to fulfil this USE - packages may be masked or keyworded" |
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> >> error. IMO `emerge mplayer` should simply install the package without |
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> >> fulfilling the USE. But clearly there are reasons why this is |
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> >> impractical. |
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> > |
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> > ... |
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> > The machine will do what the admin said it must do. It will do no |
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> > more and no |
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> > less. |
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> > |
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> > An active USE means that the admin wants packages built with that |
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> > support. The |
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> > admin's wishes are very explicit in this regard, there is nothing |
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> > implied |
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> > about it. So if the USE cannot be fulfilled, the only appropriate |
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> > answer |
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> > is "I'm sorry, I cannot do that" and end with an error code. |
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> |
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> But the masking tells Portage to ignore what the admin says, anyway. |
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> So what's the difference? |
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The difference is that when the flag is masked, some dev has determined that |
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the flag cannot work so will not be used by default. That's OK, a human has |
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directed that it be so and the software did not try and make a decision - it |
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just followed instructions. If YOU unmask a masked item, that means that you |
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want it done anyway and the software should comply. |
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Some cases are obviously impossible to fulfil - such as installing proprietary |
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nvidia video drivers on a ppc machine. The driver doesn't exist so it would |
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be valid in that case to always fail despite what the admin says. |
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The thread is more about the case where the devs said one thing, the admin |
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asked for another thing, something needs to be unmasked to fulfil the |
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instructions and the software decided "stuff it, I'm just going to go right |
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ahead and merge it anyway with the support I was explicitly asked to |
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provide". That proposal is ludicrous and completely counter to the Unix way |
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of doing things. |
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|
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-- |
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alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com> |
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> Stroller. |
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