Re: [gentoo-dev] Dirt: To shove under the rug or not shove under the rug? (aka another round of USE_EXPAND)

[Donnie Berkholz <spyderous@gentoo.org>]

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Jason Stubbs wrote:
| Removing the QA check while the QA problem still exists is, in my
mind, just
| plain ludicrous. Removing the QA check once the QA problem is fixed
doesn't
| make much sense to me either. However, adjusting the check where
necessary to
| match the fix is reasonable.
|
| So what needs to be done to fix it? Well, what is the purpose of
USE_EXPAND?
| Put simply, it is to allow the user to select one or more features of a
| package from a list of choices. How is this different to USE flags? The
| choices all pertain to one aspect of the package(s).

What I have done in my ebuilds using USE_EXPAND is add extra IUSE-like
variables, for example:

IUSE_VIDEO_CARDS="radeon sis mga"
IUSE_INPUT_DEVICES="synaptics wacom"

for `use video_cards_sis` etc..

This would allow for possible QA checks. Potentially, portage could look
through and display things at --verbose like:

[ebuild  N    ] x11-base/x11-drm-20050807 +dga -nls VIDEO_CARDS="+sis
+mga -radeon" 538 kB [2]

USE_EXPAND allows grouping a similar set of USE flags together to
indicate their relatedness, and it is particularly useful when there are
both USE_EXPAND and non-USE_EXPAND flags on the same ebuild. It is also
useful when a number of packages make use of the same group of
USE_EXPAND variables.

The main problem with USE_EXPAND right now is that people just don't
realize it exists, so they don't take advantage of it. We need a way to
tell them, such as the --verbose output I suggested and some more
documentation.

Thanks,
Donnie
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