On Thu, 2004-05-20 at 11:26 -0500, Joseph Booker wrote:
> foser said:
> > Relatively speaking. Sure there's always a few users using them, but is
> it worth what it adds in complexity ?
> 
> those who care to get the optional features, those interested in what the
> package can do. ebuild hacking should be a last resort to fix something
> that wouldn't compile or any such situtaution where there is an error,

Something not compiling by default is a bug (unless you have insane
CFLAGS), that has nothing todo with 'users' hacking on ebuilds (i'm a
user too).

> nothing normal users should have to do provided the ebuild is
> well-written. if you just use what you think are sensable defaults rather
> then local use flags, then you will get bug reports of the users
> submitting patchs to enable/disable these features to make the package
> 'better'. how much choice is that? the idea of using packages like
> php-with-mysql will come up, things will get less maintainable, bugs for
> people being forced to edit ebuilds and doing it wrong, or worse, the devs
> could refuse to help them as they are using modified unoffical ebuilds

Well, mysql is as global as it gets and rightfully so, so that example
wasn't chosen too well. This is not about removing obvious USE flags or
anything.

The people who tend to ask for obscure features/local use flags usually
know perfectly fine how to accomplish their goals. That is the point.
Nobody uses it, except them and they can have it on a local level just
the way they want it (and probably already have it like that at that
point).

Bugs in local scripts are not bugs that devs should be held responsible
for (as in solving them), but we have a tremendous community who usually
have most stuff ready before the upstream devs even announced the
release (thats a curse & blessing at the same time). In one way that is
a compliment to the ease of Gentoo (what I'm trying to hold onto here)
and on the other hand an indication that there is a thriving community
that can help with most issues.

> > To start : it is not equivalent, binary packaging is a mess of it's own
> and ebuilding is starting to go that same way. And it used to be
> perfectly fine to say such things ('edit it to your needs') and people
> accepted that, because it was (is?) a breeze to edit simple builds
> script for example. But somewhere along the way we moved to holding
> hands for even the most obscure of setups.
> 
> perhaps the gentoo comunity is become less and less made up of developers
> who know how ebuilds work and bash scripting, and is now more and more of
> those who can't?

I never wrote a bash script before I joined Gentoo. But you pick it up
in no-time, well... used to. Nowadays I agree it isn't as simple
anymore, but that's actually my point. Some evil voices still say I
can't do shell scripting (*cough* ciaranm *cough* ;) They're probably
right, doesn't that make a point for the easyness of Gentoo buildscripts
in itself?

Sure the userbase has changed, but that still is no reason to add
obscure options. I'm not against USE flags or anything, I'm against the
proliferation of forced dumbing down to a level where only devs in a
particular area know how to handle stuff, because it's complex mess of
distro specific scripts & options (like some well-known distros do).

- foser