| 1 |
Hi, Alan. |
| 2 |
|
| 3 |
On Sat, May 14, 2011 at 12:51:14PM +0200, Alan McKinnon wrote: |
| 4 |
> Apparently, though unproven, at 12:31 on Saturday 14 May 2011, Alan Mackenzie |
| 5 |
> did opine thusly: |
| 6 |
|
| 7 |
> > 1. Where is it specified what is in "system" in the same way that |
| 8 |
> > "world" is in the file /var/lib/portage/world? |
| 9 |
|
| 10 |
> That is defined in your system profile, not by you. |
| 11 |
|
| 12 |
> /etc/make.profile is a symlink to something in $PORTDIR/profiles/ and that |
| 13 |
> defines the profile you are using. A profile is nothing more than a bunch of |
| 14 |
> files that define what your basic system consists of - things like minimum |
| 15 |
> packages to install, things that must not be installed, starting point for USE |
| 16 |
> flags, etc etc. |
| 17 |
|
| 18 |
> Profiles are cascading, meaning that more specific profiles can include other |
| 19 |
> more general ones, defined in files called "parent". These contain paths to |
| 20 |
> other directories (which themselves can have parents), and the whole lots os |
| 21 |
> recursively traversed from the bottom up till all the branches dead-end. The |
| 22 |
> full complete set of data you get out of all that is your complete profile. |
| 23 |
|
| 24 |
> The specific files that define the system set are called "packages" |
| 25 |
|
| 26 |
OK. Some of these directories have got three parents. ;-) The people |
| 27 |
deciding what goes into the "packages"es must have very steady hands. |
| 28 |
|
| 29 |
> > 2. How does emerge know which mutt to build when I do "emerge mutt"? |
| 30 |
> > There are three candidate files in /usr/portage/mail-client/mutt, e.g. |
| 31 |
> > mutt-1.5.21-r1.ebuild. |
| 32 |
|
| 33 |
> It will pick the ebuild with the highest version number, modified by your |
| 34 |
> rules concerning ACCEPT_KEYWORDS=, unmasked and masked packages. |
| 35 |
|
| 36 |
> If your system is set to stable (ACCEPT_KEYOWRDS=amd64 for example), it will |
| 37 |
> pick between mutt-1.5.20-r18 and mutt-1.5.21-r1 as those are both stable. |
| 38 |
> Usually it will be 1.5.21-r1 as that is the most recent version. Normally you |
| 39 |
> will find two or more stable versions for most packages. This is by design so |
| 40 |
> that if an update on a stable system by chance breaks something, you still |
| 41 |
> have an earlier version to fall back on should the need arise. |
| 42 |
|
| 43 |
OK, I get it. |
| 44 |
|
| 45 |
> If your system is set to unstable (ACCEPT_KEYOWRDS=~amd64 for example), it |
| 46 |
> will pick mutt-1.5.21-r2 as that version is unstable (displayed with a |
| 47 |
> ~ symbol next to it in output). |
| 48 |
|
| 49 |
I think I'll leave the unstable stuff alone. |
| 50 |
|
| 51 |
> Sometimes you get packages that are masked, indicated with [m] or [M]. These |
| 52 |
> are for lunatics to test, and there are rules concerning masking that you can |
| 53 |
> use to free these up for use (it's all in the man pages). Mutt does not have |
| 54 |
> any such packages but nvidia-drivers for example does. You must take explicit |
| 55 |
> steps to obtain the latest version. This is so that the odds of validly being |
| 56 |
> able to blame anyone at all when nvidia trashes your system are reduced to |
| 57 |
> exactly zero. |
| 58 |
|
| 59 |
> Do you have eix installed? You should, great tool, and makes figuring all this |
| 60 |
> out a whole lot easier. |
| 61 |
|
| 62 |
I've got it now. I'll go and have a look at it's /usr/share/doc / man |
| 63 |
page. |
| 64 |
|
| 65 |
Thanks! |
| 66 |
|
| 67 |
> -- |
| 68 |
> alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com |
| 69 |
|
| 70 |
-- |
| 71 |
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany). |
Archives