From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 4.0.0 (2022-12-14) on finch.gentoo.org X-Spam-Level: * X-Spam-Status: No, score=1.0 required=5.0 tests=DATE_IN_PAST_12_24, DKIM_ADSP_NXDOMAIN,DMARC_MISSING,INVALID_DATE,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=4.0.0 Received: from chiba.3jane.net ([207.170.82.202] ident=root) by cvs.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 3.30 #1) id 15O3KH-0005vs-00 for gentoo-dev@cvs.gentoo.org; Sat, 21 Jul 2001 14:26:13 -0600 Received: from chiba (damon@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by chiba.3jane.net (8.11.2/8.11.1) with ESMTP id f6LKQRu43215 for ; Sat, 21 Jul 2001 15:26:27 -0500 (CDT) (envelope-from damon@chiba.3jane.net) Message-Id: <200107212026.f6LKQRu43215@chiba.3jane.net> To: gentoo-dev@cvs.gentoo.org From: "Damon M. Conway" Subject: [gentoo-dev] Portage Organization - A User Perspective Sender: gentoo-dev-admin@cvs.gentoo.org Errors-To: gentoo-dev-admin@cvs.gentoo.org X-BeenThere: gentoo-dev@cvs.gentoo.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.0 Precedence: bulk Reply-To: gentoo-dev@cvs.gentoo.org List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Id: Gentoo Linux development list List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: Date: Sat Jul 21 14:27:02 2001 X-Original-Date: Sat, 21 Jul 2001 15:26:27 -0500 X-Archives-Salt: a36b1730-8d75-483d-abc6-46b7e7372a58 X-Archives-Hash: 5405e9ec484b1e0c43a97cca4c636c63 I just installed Gentoo, and have been playing with it all day. Most of my time on the system has been spent with the Portage system. I must say that it is an impressive packaging system, and it works great. It's why I'm switching many of my workstations from FreeBSD. However, I find navigating the tree to be cumbersome and confusing. For instance, when I didn't see Pan in net-news, I started trying to make an ebuild for it since I assumed that it wasn't already in the system. After commenting on #gentoo that I was making an ebuild for Pan, I was told that it's in gnome-apps. I found that highly confusing. This model of dependency organization doesn't hold true because galeon is in net-www instead of gnome-apps. Portage seems to have an identity crisis. It doesn't know if it's a funcionally organized or dependency organized system. I can see how organizing based on kde or gnome can be useful from a development standpoint. However, from the perspective of someone using the system it makes no sense. Instead of using gnome-apps, gnome-office, and kde-apps, how about making gnome and kde subdirs under the functionally labeled dirs? For instance, pan would move from gnome-apps/pan to net-news/gnome/pan. That achieves several things. 1. It defines a dependency for developers and users 2. It categorizes based on function for the users 3. It allows users to pick software for their environment (KDE or GNOME) BTW, I hope this is seen as constructive criticism. I really like Gentoo, and will be converting serveral of my workstations over to it. It's the first Linux distro that's felt right, and has a packaging system I like. my $0.02, Damon (aka kabau on #gentoo) -- "UNIX was not designed to stop you from doing stupid things, because that would also stop you from doing clever things." --Doug Gwyn