Re: [gentoo-user] Need coaching with emerge failure logs (Understanting the problem)

[Neil Bothwick]

On Mon, 27 Feb 2017 07:31:22 +0000, Thomas Mueller wrote:

> > On Sat, 25 Feb 2017 21:58:05 +0100, Miroslav Rovis wrote:
>
> > > On 170225-09:19-0500, Harry Putnam wrote:
> > > > Setup: VBox vm running gentoo(amd64) guest on a win-10 (64bit)
> > > > host Hardware: HP xw8600 - 2x Xeon  CPU X5450 @ 3.00GHz - 32 GB
> > > > ram
>
> > >  [ some cca. 80k text cut here ]
>
> > > Go for the guides, in which you will find that sending 5.5M log in
> > > an email is plain wrong.
>
> > On this list, it is preferred to attach logs rather than post them
> > elsewhere with a link. That way all the information stays together.
>
> > However, as Stroller mentioned, the escape codes make a bit of a mess.
> > Logs this large could be gzipped before attaching.

> A 5.5M log is too much for most people, myself included, to read.

Reading it is a separate issue from how you provide it, but this
particular log was unusually large.
 
> Gzipping has two disadvantages: can not be read directly, one being
> that the attachment must be extracted to a separate file for reading
> outside the mail client.

The same is true of providing a link to a file stored elsewhere.
 
> Other downside is that a gzipped file must then be base64-encoded for
> email.  Base64 encoding multiplies the attachment size by 4/3
> (four-thirds), negating most of the reason for gzipping.

In the case of logfiles, you can often achieve 90% compression, so it is
one of the few cases where this does still save a lot of space. But the
real solution here would be to strip the escape codes first as they add a
lot of bloat and make the logs more difficult to read.

It's all about making the information as accessible as possible, if you
put barriers in the way of reading it, people won't bother, including
some that know the answer.


-- 
Neil Bothwick

What did the first man to discover you can get milk from cows think he
was doing? - anon.