[gentoo-dev] Danger unmerging old python (fchksum problem)

[gentoo-dev] Danger unmerging old python (fchksum problem)

[Paul]

	Hi;

	Im running the default-1.0 profile, and keeping current
near daily.
	After upgrading to python-2.2-r6, I unmerged an older
version (probably -r5).
	This had the unfortunate effect of breaking portage.
(The symptom was that it complained about importing the module
'output' when you ran emerge.)
	I had just also upgraded portage, and unmerged the old
one in the same operation (using pkg-clean), so I initially
suspected portage was the problem. I installed the rescue portage
as described in /usr/portage/sys-apps/portage/files/README.RESCUE
But that didnt fix it. However it gave me a more informative
traceback-- instead of just complaining about 'output' module,
it went deeper and ended up unable to find 'fchksum'.
	After looking at -r5 and -r6 python ebuilds, I noticed that
-r5 installed python-fchksum on its build, which -r6 doesnt (its
now in a separate ebuild: dev-python/python-fchksum )
	I assume this has something to do with the problem,
though emerge shouldnt harm newer versions of something it
is umerging... I wish I could provide an explaination, but
most of the evidence was destroyed in my efforts.
	So, long story short, I untarred python-fchksum-1.6.1.tar.gz
which was still in /usr/portage/distfiles, otherwise available
from:

http://www.azstarnet.com/~donut/programs/fchksum/python-fchksum-1.6.1.tar.gz

and following the README, built and installed it manually. After that,
emerge worked again, and I was back in business...

Paul
set@pobox.com