[gentoo-dev] VDB access

[Ciaran McCreesh <ciaran.mccreesh@blueyonder.co.uk>]

The following things access VDB by hand:

* gnome2-utils.eclass. Will be fixed once a portage with proper
env saving goes stable, which isn't too far off. Bug 155993.

* net-misc/l7-filter. This can be fixed as soon as portage with proper
env saving goes stable.

* kde.eclass, for slot_rebuild. This seems like it's a really dumb hack
to cater for users who don't know how to use revdep-rebuild (there
seems to be a lot of that going around, making elog worthless, but
that's a different issue...), and should probably just be removed.

* pcmcia.eclass. Supposedly deprecated. Bug 140289.

* eutils.eclass. For built_with_use.

Of these, only the last appears to be of any use. So how about the
following?

* Modify built_with_use so that it calls native_built_with_use if such
a function exists, and falls back to its own implementation otherwise.

* Allow package managers that implement native_built_with_use to sandbox
off vdb completely, and ban all ebuild access to vdb.

This will let package managers use a format other than VDB. A well
designed replacement can shave a minute off cold cache command times.

-- 
Ciaran McCreesh
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