[gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Petteri Räty]

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As per glep 42 (http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0042.html) here 
is the required email for a new news item. This news item is important
because otherwise users will be missing updates to the system set if 
they continue updating their system with the usual emerge --update 
--deep world. Unless objections come out the new news item will be 
committed at the same time as rc8 (rc8 will have an update man portage 
page describing world_sets).

Title: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2
Author: Petteri Räty <betelgeuse@gentoo.org>
Author: Zac Medico <zmedico@gentoo.org>
Content-Type: text/plain
Posted: 2008-XX-XX
Revision: 1
News-Item-Format: 1.0
Display-If-Installed: >sys-apps/portage-2.2_rc8

As of Portage 2.2 the world set does not include the system
set any more. If you want emerge --update --deep @world to
update the system set too, you need to add @system to the new
world_sets file in /var/lib/portage/. For more information on
world_sets see man portage.


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Re: [gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[William Hubbs]

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On Sat, Aug 16, 2008 at 10:39:41PM +0300, Petteri R??ty wrote:
> Title: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2
> Author: Petteri R??ty <betelgeuse@gentoo.org>
> Author: Zac Medico <zmedico@gentoo.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain
> Posted: 2008-XX-XX
> Revision: 1
> News-Item-Format: 1.0
> Display-If-Installed: >sys-apps/portage-2.2_rc8
>
> As of Portage 2.2 the world set does not include the system
> set any more. If you want emerge --update --deep @world to
> update the system set too, you need to add @system to the new
> world_sets file in /var/lib/portage/. For more information on
> world_sets see man portage.

This brings up a question.  I have been doing updates this way:

emerge -NDu @installed

Does that do the same thing?

Thanks,

- -- 
William Hubbs
gentoo accessibility team lead
williamh@gentoo.org
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Re: [gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Arfrever Frehtes Taifersar Arahesis]

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2008-08-17 03:46:11 William Hubbs napisał(a):
> On Sat, Aug 16, 2008 at 10:39:41PM +0300, Petteri R??ty wrote:
> > Title: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2
> > Author: Petteri R??ty <betelgeuse@gentoo.org>
> > Author: Zac Medico <zmedico@gentoo.org>
> > Content-Type: text/plain
> > Posted: 2008-XX-XX
> > Revision: 1
> > News-Item-Format: 1.0
> > Display-If-Installed: >sys-apps/portage-2.2_rc8
> >
> > As of Portage 2.2 the world set does not include the system
> > set any more. If you want emerge --update --deep @world to
> > update the system set too, you need to add @system to the new
> > world_sets file in /var/lib/portage/. For more information on
> > world_sets see man portage.
> 
> This brings up a question.  I have been doing updates this way:
> 
> emerge -NDu @installed
> 
> Does that do the same thing?

No. @installed set contains all installed packages.

-- 
Arfrever Frehtes Taifersar Arahesis

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Re: [gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Zac Medico]

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William Hubbs wrote:
>> As of Portage 2.2 the world set does not include the system
>> set any more. If you want emerge --update --deep @world to
>> update the system set too, you need to add @system to the new
>> world_sets file in /var/lib/portage/. For more information on
>> world_sets see man portage.
> 
> This brings up a question.  I have been doing updates this way:
> 
> emerge -NDu @installed
> 
> Does that do the same thing?

It's mostly the same, except for things that are eligible for
removal by emerge --depclean. I advise people to use @world and
@system instead of @installed whenever possible since @installed
makes it impossible for emerge to solve blockers by automatic
uninstallation of blocked packages [1]. I've recently updated the
documentation to warn about this undesirable side-effect [2].

[1]
http://planet.gentoo.org/developers/zmedico/2008/05/09/blocking_package_file_collisions
[2] http://sources.gentoo.org/viewcvs.py/portage?view=rev&rev=11318
- --
Thanks,
Zac
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[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Duncan]

William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> posted 20080817014611.GA6309@linux1,
excerpted below, on  Sat, 16 Aug 2008 20:46:11 -0500:

> On Sat, Aug 16, 2008 at 10:39:41PM +0300, Petteri R??ty wrote:
>> Title: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2 
>> Author: Petteri R??ty <betelgeuse@gentoo.org>
>> Author: Zac Medico <zmedico@gentoo.org>
>> Content-Type: text/plain
>> Posted: 2008-XX-XX
>> Revision: 1
>> News-Item-Format: 1.0
>> Display-If-Installed: >sys-apps/portage-2.2_rc8
>>
>> As of Portage 2.2 the world set does not include the system set any
>> more. If you want emerge --update --deep @world to update the system
>> set too, you need to add @system to the new world_sets file in
>> /var/lib/portage/. For more information on world_sets see man portage.
> 
> This brings up a question.

I've a question as well, but a different one.

Running portage-2.2_rc8 (the latest as of this morning's update), every 
time I try to emerge -NuD system, it tries to add @system to /var/lib/
portage/world_sets (saying recording it in world favorites file, but it 
goes in world_sets not in world), regardless of the fact that I don't 
WANT system included in world and in spite of all the einfos and posts 
here and etc to the contrary.

I like world NOT including system, but it seems at present, portage is 
trying to FORCE it to include it anyway, despite the einfo and all the 
messages I've read here to the contrary.  I was /wondering/ why despite 
all the messages to the contrary, it seemed world still included system.  
After reading this thread, I took another look at the above fine and 
decided I must have put it there when I first upgraded, and forgotten 
about it.  So I removed it.  Next thing I know, it's back!  Then I look 
and sure enough, portage keeps putting it back every time I remove it!  
That's not nice!

Current workaround: Since I don't have anything else I need to list in 
world_sets I simply symlinked it to /dev/null, so portage writes @system 
into /dev/null and system and world continue to be separate as they're  
supposed to be!  Now it can write @system into world_sets all day, and it 
won't change anything.

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Duncan]

Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@cox.net> posted pan.2008.08.17.10.33.09@cox.net,
excerpted below, on  Sun, 17 Aug 2008 10:33:10 +0000:

> Current workaround: Since I don't have anything else I need to list in
> world_sets I simply symlinked it to /dev/null, so portage writes @system
> into /dev/null and system and world continue to be separate as they're
> supposed to be!  Now it can write @system into world_sets all day, and
> it won't change anything.

Harumph!  That workaround doesn't seem to work either.  I guess I have to 
resort to putting an emerge previous to portage's emerge in the path, 
that deletes the file portage keeps putting back, before calling the 
portage emerge.

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Duncan]

Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@cox.net> posted pan.2008.08.17.10.42.18@cox.net,
excerpted below, on  Sun, 17 Aug 2008 10:42:19 +0000:

> Duncan <1i5t5.duncan@cox.net> posted pan.2008.08.17.10.33.09@cox.net,
> excerpted below, on  Sun, 17 Aug 2008 10:33:10 +0000:
> 
>> Current workaround: Since I don't have anything else I need to list in
>> world_sets I simply symlinked it to /dev/null, so portage writes
>> @system into /dev/null and system and world continue to be separate as
>> they're supposed to be!  Now it can write @system into world_sets all
>> day, and it won't change anything.
> 
> Harumph!  That workaround doesn't seem to work either.  I guess I have
> to resort to putting an emerge previous to portage's emerge in the path,
> that deletes the file portage keeps putting back, before calling the
> portage emerge.

Duh!  Guess I had to ask in ordered to figure it out myself. =:^S

Maybe this should be mentioned in the upgrade documentation as it sure 
confused me.  @system isn't part of world, but with the new sets 
functionality, as of portage-2.2, system is treated as any other set, 
and /just/ as with any other set, it will be added to world if found on 
the command line unless --oneshot/-1 is set as well.

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Benedikt Morbach]

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To avoid having @system added to world_sets, you could add
[system]
world-candidate = false
to your /etc/portage/sets.conf

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[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Duncan]

"Benedikt Morbach" <benedikt.morbach@googlemail.com> posted
6faa67950808171039i371d457fxd77d97cf3407bfb3@mail.gmail.com, excerpted
below, on  Sun, 17 Aug 2008 19:39:34 +0200:

> To avoid having @system added to world_sets, you could add [system]
> world-candidate = false
> to your /etc/portage/sets.conf

Thanks.  

(FWIW, someone reminded me that this isn't a portage support forum, too.  
Still, thanks.)

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Steve Long]

Duncan wrote:

>every time I try to emerge -NuD system

I think there's a good case for system and world without the set specifier
working the way they always have. I for one am very aware if I type in
@world (ie not system, useful for -e) vs world. I don't see any benefit to
the user in jettisoning the existing metaphor. What do others think?

[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Duncan]

Steve Long <slong@rathaus.eclipse.co.uk> posted
g8dvro$ld1$1@ger.gmane.org, excerpted below, on  Tue, 19 Aug 2008 09:20:00
+0100:

> I think there's a good case for system and world without the set
> specifier working the way they always have. I for one am very aware if I
> type in @world (ie not system, useful for -e) vs world. I don't see any
> benefit to the user in jettisoning the existing metaphor. What do others
> think?

That's an interesting idea.  I don't personally care either way, as long 
as @world continues to /not/ include system/@system, but having world 
(without the @) continue to include system /would/ be useful for backward 
compatibility.  I think it'd be much better in terms of ease of educating 
the vast majority of stable users, as the @ is new anyway, so it can have 
new behaviour without a problem, but having new behaviour for world does 
present a significant re-education/retraining issue.

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Joe Peterson]

Duncan wrote:
> That's an interesting idea.  I don't personally care either way, as long 
> as @world continues to /not/ include system/@system, but having world 
> (without the @) continue to include system /would/ be useful for backward 
> compatibility.  I think it'd be much better in terms of ease of educating 
> the vast majority of stable users, as the @ is new anyway, so it can have 
> new behaviour without a problem, but having new behaviour for world does 
> present a significant re-education/retraining issue.

The only drawback I see is that we would then have the following:

@system == system
...but...
@world != world

This, I would think, could cause confusion too - and we'd have to live
with and document this "quirk".

How about issuing a warning when portage starts if the user specifies
"world" (with no "@" sign) as the only specified target *and* @system is
not in world_sets?

It would warn that the world set no longer automatically includes system
 (i.e., @system) and also that it is better, from now on, to explicitly
use the "@" sign for all sets like world and system (since these two are
special cases grandfathered in).

					-Joe

[gentoo-dev] Re: Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Steve Long]

Joe Peterson wrote:

> Duncan wrote:
>> That's an interesting idea.  I don't personally care either way, as long
>> as @world continues to /not/ include system/@system, but having world
>> (without the @) continue to include system /would/ be useful for backward
>> compatibility.  I think it'd be much better in terms of ease of educating
>> the vast majority of stable users, as the @ is new anyway, so it can have
>> new behaviour without a problem, but having new behaviour for world does
>> present a significant re-education/retraining issue.

Yeah that was my thinking (only better expressed ;)

> The only drawback I see is that we would then have the following:
> 
> @system == system
> ...but...
> @world != world
> 
> This, I would think, could cause confusion too - and we'd have to live
> with and document this "quirk".
>
I don't see that as major from a user pov; as soon as you see @ you're in
set territory, which is for finer-grained control. We already expect users
to have the ability to read docs and the like, and this way we're not
introducing any surprises; for the standard update procedure we're all used
to, sets don't come into it.
 
> How about issuing a warning when portage starts if the user specifies
> "world" (with no "@" sign) as the only specified target *and* @system is
> not in world_sets?
>
It's starting to get tricky.. ;)
 
> It would warn that the world set no longer automatically includes system
>  (i.e., @system) and also that it is better, from now on, to explicitly
> use the "@" sign for all sets like world and system (since these two are
> special cases grandfathered in).
> 
.. and we still get the issue that future usage would mean needing: 
emerge @world @system # or should it be the other way round?
..when we used to have a simple 'emerge world'[1]. I don't see how that
helps our users. iow the change feels like a loss, not an improvement
(which the set code certainly is), when a little tweaking with the option
parser would mean we had both uses. I see it as polishing the UI, nothing
more.

Maybe there's a case for dropping system as a special-case over time, and
giving a deprecation warning. Personally I don't see the problem with
simply continuing to support it, or even changing to mean system without
any user-defined stuff/ as per-profile; option parsing is hardly the
bottleneck ;)

[1] Assuming user doesn't want @world always including @system, which makes
sense to a power-user who would be interested in sets, as Duncan showed.

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Joe Peterson]

Steve Long wrote:
>> @system == system
>> ...but...
>> @world != world
>>
>> This, I would think, could cause confusion too - and we'd have to live
>> with and document this "quirk".
>>
> I don't see that as major from a user pov; as soon as you see @ you're in
> set territory, which is for finer-grained control. We already expect users
> to have the ability to read docs and the like, and this way we're not
> introducing any surprises; for the standard update procedure we're all used
> to, sets don't come into it.

Ah, OK.  I have been considering that "world" is simply a grandfathered name for
"@world" (and same for system).  I.e. that "world" is also specifying the world
set, but that only world and system are allowed to have the "@" dropped to avoid
breaking things for users.  Isn't that the way the code treats it now?

Or is "world" (no "@") really not a set?

>> How about issuing a warning when portage starts if the user specifies
>> "world" (with no "@" sign) as the only specified target *and* @system is
>> not in world_sets?
>>
> It's starting to get tricky.. ;)

It just seems like that's the most common case (expecting "world" to include
"@system" and "@world"), so if it doesn't, warn the user, and in the process
migrate users to using "@" (to avoid the warning).

> .. and we still get the issue that future usage would mean needing: 
> emerge @world @system # or should it be the other way round?

True, but as Duncan discovered, if you leave off the -1, @system gets put in
world_sets anyway, and some might want that.  Then @world includes both.

> ..when we used to have a simple 'emerge world'[1]. I don't see how that
> helps our users. iow the change feels like a loss, not an improvement
> (which the set code certainly is), when a little tweaking with the option
> parser would mean we had both uses. I see it as polishing the UI, nothing
> more.

I know what you mean.  And I'm not sure what makes most sense.  It still seems
potentially confusing for "world" and "@world" to mean different things.  If the
words were different, it would not seem that way.

> Maybe there's a case for dropping system as a special-case over time, and
> giving a deprecation warning.

Yeah, I'd vote for that.

						-Joe

[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Duncan]

Joe Peterson <lavajoe@gentoo.org> posted 48AB3EE7.3080000@gentoo.org,
excerpted below, on  Tue, 19 Aug 2008 15:45:11 -0600:

> Ah, OK.  I have been considering that "world" is simply a grandfathered
> name for "@world" (and same for system).  I.e. that "world" is also
> specifying the world set, but that only world and system are allowed to
> have the "@" dropped to avoid breaking things for users.  Isn't that the
> way the code treats it now?

I believe that's the way it is now, yes.  Thus what we're proposing would 
simply keep the legacy meaning for world (and system) as they are, while 
@world (and @system) would refer to the specific sets.

Now that it has been suggested, I do believe that's the simplest way to 
handle it, since it would involve no change at all for the existing 
words.  @system would of course be the same as system, but there'd be a 
slight difference between world and @world.  I think that's still less 
confusing, however, because people who don't care about the new 
functionality wouldn't have to worry about it, while for those that do, 
world could be simply explained as a legacy special-case.  Since the only 
people worried about the difference between world and @world would be by 
definition the folks learning the new functionality anyway, that single 
legacy corner-case, once documented, shouldn't be a big deal.  People 
learning @world can be told not to worry about the world case anyway, and 
just remember that sets always get @, and they're @world view (hehe, 
punny!) will once again be consistent.

But I'm not one of the portage devs implementing it, so I'm not the one 
making the rules how the implementation should work. Someone (or ones, 
plural, yes I know someones isn't a valid plural, but anyway) else gets 
to decide all that.  =8^)

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

Re: [gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Marius Mauch]

On Sat, 16 Aug 2008 22:39:41 +0300
Petteri Räty <betelgeuse@gentoo.org> wrote:

> As per glep 42 (http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/glep/glep-0042.html)
> here is the required email for a new news item. This news item is
> important because otherwise users will be missing updates to the
> system set if they continue updating their system with the usual
> emerge --update 
> --deep world. Unless objections come out the new news item will be 
> committed at the same time as rc8 (rc8 will have an update man
> portage page describing world_sets).
> 
> Title: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2
> Author: Petteri Räty <betelgeuse@gentoo.org>
> Author: Zac Medico <zmedico@gentoo.org>
> Content-Type: text/plain
> Posted: 2008-XX-XX
> Revision: 1
> News-Item-Format: 1.0
> Display-If-Installed: >sys-apps/portage-2.2_rc8
> 
> As of Portage 2.2 the world set does not include the system
> set any more. If you want emerge --update --deep @world to
> update the system set too, you need to add @system to the new
> world_sets file in /var/lib/portage/. For more information on
> world_sets see man portage.

Sorry for not replying earlier, I was without mail access for the last
few weeks.

First, regarding the news item, I'd suggest that instead of telling
users to modify world_sets manually to use `emerge --noreplace @system`.
Also there have been more changes that might not be as obvious and only
affect people with "unusual" usage patterns, namely `emerge @world`
without using --update or --noreplace will rebuild packages contained
in @world (same is true for all other sets).

Second for the suggestions on how to handle the transition:
- treating 'world' and '@world' differently is a no go from my POV. One
of the main reasons to implement them as sets was to remove special
case code in emerge, so I'm quite opposed to adding new special cases
instead. And I'm quite sure that such a separation would cause
confusion, and some isues regarding (end-user) documentation.
- adding a new @worldfile set to get the new behavior, and use @world
for the old. That one is quite interesting, and should actually
be rather simple to implement: rename the existing @world to
@worldfile, create a new StaticFileSet @world that just contains
@worldfile and @system (stored in /usr/share/portage), change most
references in emerge from @world to @worldfile (for technical reasons,
the WorldSet class is somewhat special), and add world-candidate=False
to the default sets.conf
- issuing a warning if 'world' is the only argument would also be a
special case, but by far not as invasive as the first suggestion. I've
actually considered to mark 'world' and 'system' without the set prefix
as deprecated but thought it would be too invasive/annoying at this
time.
- another idea that hasn't been mentioned yet is that we could simply
inject @system into world_sets in the portage ebuild when we detect a
2.1->2.2 upgrade (the ebuild already does a few other migrations that
way). That would be the least-invasive way to keep the old behavior,
but only works for poeple who haven't upgraded to 2.2 yet (not sure if
that's a pro or contra)

Though honestly I don't think this issue is as big as some other
people make it. People might miss some updates. The same would happen
if we remove packages from @system, or people switch profiles (so
@system changes).

Marius

Re: [gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Joe Peterson]

Marius Mauch wrote:
> First, regarding the news item, I'd suggest that instead of telling
> users to modify world_sets manually to use `emerge --noreplace @system`.

++

> Second for the suggestions on how to handle the transition:
> - treating 'world' and '@world' differently is a no go from my POV. One
> of the main reasons to implement them as sets was to remove special
> case code in emerge, so I'm quite opposed to adding new special cases
> instead. And I'm quite sure that such a separation would cause
> confusion, and some isues regarding (end-user) documentation.

+++

						-Joe

[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Steve Long]

Marius Mauch wrote:

> Second for the suggestions on how to handle the transition:
> - treating 'world' and '@world' differently is a no go from my POV. One
> of the main reasons to implement them as sets was to remove special
> case code in emerge, so I'm quite opposed to adding new special cases
> instead. And I'm quite sure that such a separation would cause
> confusion, and some isues regarding (end-user) documentation.

We're talking about one special case in the command-line processing, to
support the existing usage that all our users are used to. It adds
practically nothing in execution time, simply expanding to @system @world,
and means that users who don't want to know about sets, or are not thinking
in set terms at the time of using emerge, will get the result they expect.
Also it makes it easier for users who don't want @system included in
@world, eg for easy use of -e @system followed by -e @world.

> Though honestly I don't think this issue is as big as some other
> people make it. People might miss some updates. The same would happen
> if we remove packages from @system, or people switch profiles (so
> @system changes).
 
Or you could just do as above and people wouldn't miss any updates, and
you'd have less support burden from users who aren't bothered about sets,
who can carry on using their systems as they always have.

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Marius Mauch]

On Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:43:45 +0100
Steve Long <slong@rathaus.eclipse.co.uk> wrote:

> Marius Mauch wrote:
> 
> > Second for the suggestions on how to handle the transition:
> > - treating 'world' and '@world' differently is a no go from my POV.
> > One of the main reasons to implement them as sets was to remove
> > special case code in emerge, so I'm quite opposed to adding new
> > special cases instead. And I'm quite sure that such a separation
> > would cause confusion, and some isues regarding (end-user)
> > documentation.
> 
> We're talking about one special case in the command-line processing,
> to support the existing usage that all our users are used to. It adds
> practically nothing in execution time, simply expanding to @system
> @world, and means that users who don't want to know about sets, or
> are not thinking in set terms at the time of using emerge, will get
> the result they expect.

It also means we'd indefinitely have to carry another special
case around for legacy reasons (removing it later would be even more
painful than doing the switch now). You know, those are the things we
want to get rid off, as they really make our life harder in the long
run. YOu may consider it trivial in this cse, but these things always
look trivial when you're adding them, and you curse about them when you
have to modify the code later on.
Maybe the best solution is to drop the non-prefixed versions of 'world'
and 'system' completely ....

Marius

[gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Duncan]

Marius Mauch <genone@gentoo.org> posted
20080910034311.0efd25d1.genone@gentoo.org, excerpted below, on  Wed, 10
Sep 2008 03:43:11 +0200:

> Maybe the best solution is to drop the non-prefixed versions of 'world'
> and 'system' completely ....

Now that's an idea.  It /would/ avoid the confusion, since the new 
concept would come with a new name, without the legacy meaning associated 
with it to confuse people.

What I'd really prefer would be a "legacy" message much like what portage 
is currently spitting out for the output module (that I see every time I 
run esearch, or the old earch) if people use world, telling them to use 
@system and @world instead... for 2.2 at least.  Do the same for system 
but of course @system is a direct parallel there.  Then for 2.3 or 
whatever, remove both world and system legacies and force the @ versions.

However, as I believe I said earlier in the thread, I'm quite aware I'm 
not the one implementing it, so whatever you go with I'll happily use, 
regardless of whether it's what I would have thought best, or not.

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman

[gentoo-dev] Re: Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Steve Long]

Marius Mauch wrote:

> On Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:43:45 +0100
> Steve Long <slong@rathaus.eclipse.co.uk> wrote:
> 
>> Marius Mauch wrote:
>> 
>> > Second for the suggestions on how to handle the transition:
>> > - treating 'world' and '@world' differently is a no go from my POV.
>> > One of the main reasons to implement them as sets was to remove
>> > special case code in emerge, so I'm quite opposed to adding new
>> > special cases instead. And I'm quite sure that such a separation
>> > would cause confusion, and some isues regarding (end-user)
>> > documentation.
>> 
>> We're talking about one special case in the command-line processing,
>> to support the existing usage that all our users are used to. It adds
>> practically nothing in execution time, simply expanding to @system
>> @world, and means that users who don't want to know about sets, or
>> are not thinking in set terms at the time of using emerge, will get
>> the result they expect.
> 
> It also means we'd indefinitely have to carry another special
> case around for legacy reasons (removing it later would be even more
> painful than doing the switch now). You know, those are the things we
> want to get rid off, as they really make our life harder in the long
> run. YOu may consider it trivial in this cse, but these things always
> look trivial when you're adding them, and you curse about them when you
> have to modify the code later on.

I know exactly what you mean. However, this special case *will* save Gentoo
a great deal of support hassle, imo at least, and is confined to the
option-parsing code. It's perfectly well encapsulated and will never `leak'
into any of your dependency resolution or set-handling code.

> Maybe the best solution is to drop the non-prefixed versions of 'world'
> and 'system' completely ....

I'm fine with system ;) although as outlined, I don't see that it can add
maintenance to anywhere but the option parser, and only then if what you
want the end-user to update by default changes.

I see that indirection as an added bonus, since it means you can easily
maintain a cli api for end-users (or tired admins) as opposed to
power-users or devs, and the sets [or indeed options] used can change over
time (since we're discussing long-term maintenance) without the same
switchover hassles as now. There'd be zero need to reeducate the end-users,
and interested ones would be following dev, or would read about any new set
in GMN.

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Mike Auty]

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Marius Mauch wrote:
> Maybe the best solution is to drop the non-prefixed versions of 'world'
> and 'system' completely ....

Deprecating the old syntax sounds like a sensible action to get people
shifted onto the new system.  I imagine it would work very similarly to
"emerge info" at the moment?

Speaking of which, when will that actually get removed (and does anyone
know how long it's been hanging around)?

Mike  5:)
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[gentoo-dev] Re: Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Holger Hoffstaette]

On Wed, 10 Sep 2008 11:38:56 +0100, Mike Auty wrote:

> Marius Mauch wrote:
>> Maybe the best solution is to drop the non-prefixed versions of 'world'
>> and 'system' completely ....
> 
> Deprecating the old syntax sounds like a sensible action to get people
> shifted onto the new system.  I imagine it would work very similarly to
> "emerge info" at the moment?

Speaking purely as a user, from a usability perspective it's a horrible
idea. Don't make me remember special things. To me there is no discernible
difference between "system" and "@system", except that I have to remember
to prefix the latter over and over again. Different things need different
names. Doesn't portage have more pressing problems? In the last 6 years of
using Gentoo I cannot remember a single instance where the difference
between system and world even mattered to me from an operational point of
view.

Holger

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Dale]

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Holger Hoffstaette wrote:
> On Wed, 10 Sep 2008 11:38:56 +0100, Mike Auty wrote:
>
>   
>> Marius Mauch wrote:
>>     
>>> Maybe the best solution is to drop the non-prefixed versions of 'world'
>>> and 'system' completely ....
>>>       
>> Deprecating the old syntax sounds like a sensible action to get people
>> shifted onto the new system.  I imagine it would work very similarly to
>> "emerge info" at the moment?
>>     
>
> Speaking purely as a user, from a usability perspective it's a horrible
> idea. Don't make me remember special things. To me there is no discernible
> difference between "system" and "@system", except that I have to remember
> to prefix the latter over and over again. Different things need different
> names. Doesn't portage have more pressing problems? In the last 6 years of
> using Gentoo I cannot remember a single instance where the difference
> between system and world even mattered to me from an operational point of
> view.
>
> Holger
>
>   

Also speaking as a user, I confuse pretty easily and you can ask anyone 
on gentoo-user about that.  However, I see the difference between 
@system and system.  The same for world or at least a good idea anyway.

I have to also say that I like being able to type in emerge -uvDN world 
and letting my system upgrade everything that needs upgrading.  It's 
simple, easy and not so much typing.  I can somewhat understand the need 
for @system and @world but think both can live together pretty well.  I 
also can't think of a better name to call it either. 

I do think there should be some sort of notice for those users that do 
not follow -dev, -user and/or the forums tho.  That has been a issue for 
a long time.  There does not seem to be a clear cut way to inform all 
Gentoo users except during a emerge.  Thing is, emerge -uvDN world will 
do the same as it always has from my understanding.

My $0.02 worth.

Dale

:-)  :-) 

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[gentoo-dev] Re: Re: Re: News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Steve Long]

Dale wrote:

> Holger Hoffstaette wrote:
>> On Wed, 10 Sep 2008 11:38:56 +0100, Mike Auty wrote:
>>> Marius Mauch wrote:
>>>     
>>>> Maybe the best solution is to drop the non-prefixed versions of 'world'
>>>> and 'system' completely ....
>>>>       
>>> Deprecating the old syntax sounds like a sensible action to get people
>>> shifted onto the new system.  I imagine it would work very similarly to
>>> "emerge info" at the moment?
>>>     
>> Speaking purely as a user, from a usability perspective it's a horrible
>> idea. Don't make me remember special things. To me there is no
>> discernible difference between "system" and "@system", except that I have
>> to remember to prefix the latter over and over again. Different things
>> need different names.
Well you might well have other sets, like @kde4 or anything you like, which
would be up to you to maintain as a user.

>> Doesn't portage have more pressing problems? In the 
>> last 6 years of using Gentoo I cannot remember a single instance where
>> the difference between system and world even mattered to me from an
>> operational point of view.
>>
I've seen it most for new installs, where the user might use 'emerge -e
system' to get the base stuff built for their specific CPU, followed
by 'emerge -uDN world'. For major gcc upgrades, it's common to want to
use 'emerge -e system' first followed by 'emerge -e (world - system)' which
is an approach emwrap[1] pioneered.

Personally I don't see much point to the first -e system, since major gcc
upgrades are really only a breakage issue for C++ apps (paludis has in the
past stopped working after a gcc upgrade of this sort, which can be an
issue if there is no way to use another package manager to get it rebuilt,
which is the recommended config.)

update[2] does the recommended (based on various user posts, can be tweaked
ofc) order for any toolchain packages (extended def'n if $compiler is in
the list, including things like automake if there's a new version) which
appear for any emptyTree build, prior to the rest of the list. This
makes 'update -e world' pretty good for gcc upgrades (it'll skip a major
gcc upgrade in other circumstances, so that your system isn't left
inconsistent.)

> Also speaking as a user, I confuse pretty easily and you can ask anyone
> on gentoo-user about that.  However, I see the difference between
> @system and system.  The same for world or at least a good idea anyway.
>
Afaict there is no difference between system and @system. The question is
whether world and @world can coexist with different meanings, provided the
user hasn't run 'emerge system' (or @system) which atm makes the @system
set part of @world. (Confused? You will be ;) This is useful for user- or
profile-defined sets, eg for the earlier example, emerge @kde4 would make
the @kde4 set part of @world (by reference; @kde4 is put into world, not
the individual packages from it, so it can be maintained as a separate
list.)

A user wishing to avoid @system being part of @world can set
world-candidate=false in /etc/portage/sets.conf, to keep using @system and
@world separately. (see /usr/share/portage/config/sets.conf for examples.)
 
> I have to also say that I like being able to type in emerge -uvDN world
> and letting my system upgrade everything that needs upgrading.  It's
> simple, easy and not so much typing.

> I can somewhat understand the need  
> for @system and @world but think both can live together pretty well.

Yeah I agree; I don't think every user is going to be interested in sets,
and I see it as a minor, encapsulated, special-case in code terms, whereas
it has pretty major impact on end-users (and will cause support hassle.)

As soon as you type @foo you know you're in set-land.

> I do think there should be some sort of notice for those users that do
> not follow -dev, -user and/or the forums tho.  That has been a issue for
> a long time.  There does not seem to be a clear cut way to inform all
> Gentoo users except during a emerge.
Yeah although the news item thing did get accepted as a GLEP, and afaik the
package managers support them, I've never actually seen a news item in the
console. Maybe I'm doing something wrong again..

> Thing is, emerge -uvDN world will do the same as it always has from my
understanding.
> 
Well it'll tell you that usage is deprecated, and until you emerge system
(or @system) it won't be considering those packages as part of world. (I
believe it will be added automatically on upgrade from 2.1 to 2.2 for
stable.) Once you do, it'll require a bit more to do an emerge -e @system
&& emerge -e @world. If you are keeping them separate, you'll need
emerge -uDN @system @world, aiui.

Hence the desire to keep 'world' meaning what it always has, irrespective of
the sets.conf.

As I said before, I consider this minor tweaking to cli usage for major new
functionality, which I think is really cool stuff. Whichever way the
portage devs decide to go, kudos to them for what they've come up with.

[1] http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-282474.html
[2] http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-546828.html

Re: [gentoo-dev] News item: World file handling changes in Portage-2.2

[Marius Mauch]

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On Fri, 5 Sep 2008 17:24:57 +0200
Marius Mauch <genone@gentoo.org> wrote:

> - another idea that hasn't been mentioned yet is that we could simply
> inject @system into world_sets in the portage ebuild when we detect a
> 2.1->2.2 upgrade (the ebuild already does a few other migrations that
> way). That would be the least-invasive way to keep the old behavior,
> but only works for poeple who haven't upgraded to 2.2 yet (not sure if
> that's a pro or contra)

This solution has been implemented now (to be released with >2.2_rc9).

Marius

-- 
Public Key at http://www.genone.de/info/gpg-key.pub

In the beginning, there was nothing. And God said, 'Let there be
Light.' And there was still nothing, but you could see a bit better.

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