[gentoo-dev] package.mask handling

[gentoo-dev] package.mask handling

[Robert Coie]

Is there a good reason for handling package.mask differently from the
various profiles in /usr/portage/profiles?  IOW, would it be a problem
to have portage look at /etc/package.mask (for example), which would
be a symlink to one of several choices in /usr/portage/profiles?  This
would seem to facilitate separate package masks for different
architectures, and would allow machines of different architectures to
more easily share a locally mirrored portage tree.

-- 
Robert Coie <rac@apropos.co.jp>
Implementor, Apropos Ltd.

Re: [gentoo-dev] package.mask handling

[Spider]

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sorry to poke a hole in this argument :

and how many multiple points of failure does this introduce? suddenly
you have 13 package.mask to edit to mask -one- package, instead of 1
file... 

Currently we (drobbins really) are looking at a KEYWORDS mask, giving
the possibility to tag an ebuild as "broken" or "testing" or "ppc"
inside the ebuild, thus moving the mask back one level to the actual
ebuilds, as well as fine-tuning it further, then a user can have their
own match of KEYWORDS (Ie, I want x86 and testing things, not broken)
and the mask gets applied in a more finegrained way.

//Spider

begin  quote
On Sun, 07 Jul 2002 01:40:53 -0700
Robert Coie <rac@intrigue.com> wrote:

> 
> Is there a good reason for handling package.mask differently from the
> various profiles in /usr/portage/profiles?  IOW, would it be a problem
> to have portage look at /etc/package.mask (for example), which would
> be a symlink to one of several choices in /usr/portage/profiles?  This
> would seem to facilitate separate package masks for different
> architectures, and would allow machines of different architectures to
> more easily share a locally mirrored portage tree.
> 
> -- 
> Robert Coie <rac@apropos.co.jp>
> Implementor, Apropos Ltd.
> _______________________________________________
> gentoo-dev mailing list
> gentoo-dev@gentoo.org
> http://lists.gentoo.org/mailman/listinfo/gentoo-dev


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Re: [gentoo-dev] package.mask handling

[Chad M. Huneycutt]

Robert Coie wrote:
> Is there a good reason for handling package.mask differently from the
> various profiles in /usr/portage/profiles?  IOW, would it be a problem
> to have portage look at /etc/package.mask (for example), which would
> be a symlink to one of several choices in /usr/portage/profiles?  This
> would seem to facilitate separate package masks for different
> architectures, and would allow machines of different architectures to
> more easily share a locally mirrored portage tree.

package.mask actually serves a different purpose than the packages file. 
   package.mask is for blocking packages from all profiles, usually 
because they are unstable, untested, or just plain broken -- in all 
profiles.  The packages file is a fine-grained specification of what 
files are *acceptable* in a profile.  The packages file could take the 
place of the package.mask, but, as Spider pointed out, that would mean 
making entries in all the profiles' packages files to mask out broken 
packages.  Furthermore, Every user can have their own profile (I 
recommend it for the most flexibility in your setup).  In that case, 
package.mask is really necessary to make sure a broken package is not 
merged accidentally.  Think of it this way: package.mask is our 
(Gentoo's) list of packages that *cannot* be installed, even if they are 
in the portage tree.  The packages file is your list of files that *can* 
be installed.

Chad (chadh@gentoo.org)