Re: [gentoo-user] Re: --depclean wants to remove openrc. Yikes!

[Alan Mackenzie]

Hello, Rich.

On Sun, Jul 25, 2021 at 15:54:25 -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 25, 2021 at 2:05 PM Alan Mackenzie <acm@×××.de> wrote:

> > OK, so you're clever and you know this.  You know to do the
> > couter-intuitive thing of putting @system packages into @world.  Less
> > clever people like me follow the handbook, and assume that packages in
> > @system are protected.  Putting init-systems into @world is an unnatural
> > thing to do, and must be construed as a workaround for deficiencies in
> > portage.

> I think you're really conflating the package manager with how some
> virtuals/ebuilds are configured.  Portage shouldn't have
> service-manager-specific functionality.  Nor should it do things like
> never uninstall things that packages say aren't needed just in case
> you might still be using them, when you run it with --depclean which
> basically is supposed to have it remove the stuff that isn't needed.

I don't think portage should ever uninstall the active init system, or
other crucial parts of the system, unless explicitly requested by the
user.  I think that would be poor design if it were deliberate.  People
make mistakes, and systems should take that into account.

> All protage does is follow the dependencies.

> I think there is room for discussing whether daemontools should be
> treated as a service manager by default.  I've never used it and can't
> speak to how it is typically used.  You might want to talk to the
> maintainers of it to get their thoughts.

How would I track down the Gentoo maintainer?

> > No, I did not make that mistake.  I simply assumed, not entirely
> > consciously, that Gentoo would not destroy my system without me
> > specifically asking it to.

> It isn't like uninstalling openrc is going to "destroy your system".
> Worst case you could always just pass init=/bin/bash or whatever to
> the kernel and just reinstall it.  Granted, it wouldn't really be
> welcome behavior.

> > It would be saner still to be kept in the system file (whatever that
> > might be).

> I suppose you might not care to hear that I've advocated a few times
> that the "system file" should disappear entirely and no packages
> should get special treatment.  :)  Granted, that has more to do with
> how assumed dependencies work in the repository.  I don't really have
> a problem with confirmation before removing certain packages because
> reinstalling them can be quite painful.  The service manager actually
> is one of the easier ones to fix.  If you break the ability to
> bootstrap gcc/etc that can be a real bugger to fix.

:-)  I suppose I'd be in favour of some sort of "are you really sure?"
protections for things like gcc and python, too.

> Really though posting on this list and successfully winning every
> argument with everybody who replies ....

It's clear that that's not going to happen.  ;-)

> .... is going to do zero to change this behavior, because it is
> unlikely that anybody involved in this particular issue reads this
> list.  It would make more sense to chat with the daemontools
> maintainer and get their thoughts on how the virtual ought to be
> configured as a starting point.  You could always try for a second
> opinion/etc if that doesn't work.  Plus the conversation would
> probably help you understand what their thinking was.

That's an excellent idea.  This feature is not going to hurt me any
more, because I know about it now.  I'm concerned it could hurt other
people in the future.

> --
> Rich

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).