Re: [gentoo-dev] berkdb and gdbm in global USE defaults

[William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org>]

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On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 06:27:09PM +0200, Mart Raudsepp wrote:
> Ühel kenal päeval, R, 27.01.2017 kell 13:08, kirjutas Kristian
> Fiskerstrand:
> > On 01/27/2017 01:01 PM, Dirkjan Ochtman wrote:
> > > On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 8:54 AM, Mart Raudsepp <leio@gentoo.org>
> > > wrote:
> > > > Ühel kenal päeval, N, 26.01.2017 kell 22:33, kirjutas Mike
> > > > Gilbert:
> > > > > I recently ran into a REQUIRED_USE constraint that required I
> > > > > select
> > > > > between berkdb and gdbm for an email client.
> > > > 
> > > > There shouldn't be a REQUIRED_USE constraint that forces you to
> > > > select
> > > > one or the other. The maintainer should be giving the choice of
> > > > both,
> > > > but if only one can be chosen, the maintainer should make the
> > > > choice
> > > > for you by preferring one of them. Likely gdbm, given berkdb
> > > > licensing
> > > > saga.
> > > 
> > > I'm not sure this makes sense to me. If the package will actually
> > > select one implementation out of a set, it makes sense to me that
> > > the
> > > maintainer for that package makes that choice explicit towards the
> > > user. In that case, setting REQUIRED_USE accordingly seems exactly
> > > right. The maintainer should set a good default, but if the user's
> > > USE
> > > settings are inconclusive in getting to the choice of
> > > implementation,
> > > it's better to whine explicitly than try to guess implicitly what
> > > the
> > > user wanted.
> > 
> > I tend to agree with this sentiment, explicit over implicit behavior
> > ensures better debugging ability and security considerations.

I agree, I prefer explicit strongly over implicit.

> It breaks the highly sought after "Gentoo is about choice" mantra.
> In this case, choice to not care and have the best chosen for me.

Actually it doesn't. In this case the user should make a choice rather
than the maintainer silently making a choice behind their back.

William

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