Re: [gentoo-user] Collecting USE variables

[Holly Bostick]

Jorge Almeida schreef:
> I would like to know how the current USE variables are set.

Afaik, they are set by /etc/make/profile/make.defaults, and
overridden/added to
globally by /etc/make.conf, and individually by /etc/portage/package.use.

> I know that "emerge --info" displays a list of all of them, but it
> doesn't discriminate where they come from. I couldn't find clear
> documentation about it, but of course I may have missed something. In
> the same line, I find /etc/make.profile/make.defaults _very strange_.
>  "perl"? Sure. "fortran"? Well, who knows... But "emboss"?! (In case
> it doesn't ring a bell immediately: emboss - Adds support for the
> European Molecular Biology Open Software Suite) Could this be a joke?
>
Ah, home users, always thinking the universe revolves around them :-).

Linux is quite popular in the scientific community, you know-- I'm sure
the admins at (oh, I dunno, let's just make up something) at Berkely
(where the Seti @Home project is based) or any random lab at MIT feels
the same way when they see +kde as a default USE flag.

The default USE flags represent 'sane defaults' for the broadest range
of the Gentoo userbase (which I assume the devs know more about than you
or I-- certainly I, at least).

So if they feel that a significant enough portion of that userbase
values the emboss flag, who am I to argue? The whole point of Gentoo is
customization, so half of the default USE flags that do apply to me I
disable, and then add another quarter-set of ones that aren't in the
defaults at all-- I spend an hour or two, when installing, just going
through USE flags and setting them up to my personal tastes.

I admit, I've never disabled emboss, because I don't use any programs
that require that USE flag, so I'm happy to let it be.

> I'm writing "-*" at the beginning of the USE declaration in
> /etc/make.conf, but I can't avoid the feeling that this may be a Bad
> Thing.

Some say it is, some say it's the only way to go. Never done it myself,
so I don't know one way or another. I eventually have to set my USE
flags anyway (going through them to see what they are if I don't know),
so I don't really see the point in not just getting that over with, but
it's possible that I've missed some hidden benefit of this procedure.

Holly
-- 
gentoo-user@g.o mailing list