From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from lists.gentoo.org (pigeon.gentoo.org [208.92.234.80]) by finch.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1B426138247 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 2014 15:25:46 +0000 (UTC) Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 4A74DE0B6B; Thu, 2 Jan 2014 15:25:34 +0000 (UTC) Received: from smtp.gentoo.org (smtp.gentoo.org [140.211.166.183]) (using TLSv1 with cipher AECDH-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 5AD32E0B2B for ; Thu, 2 Jan 2014 15:25:33 +0000 (UTC) Received: from [10.1.1.204] (unknown [65.213.236.244]) (using TLSv1 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) (Authenticated sender: mjo) by smtp.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 824B433F5A4 for ; Thu, 2 Jan 2014 15:25:32 +0000 (UTC) Message-ID: <52C584E9.5060908@gentoo.org> Date: Thu, 02 Jan 2014 10:25:29 -0500 From: Michael Orlitzky User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:24.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/24.2.0 Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org MIME-Version: 1.0 To: gentoo-dev@lists.gentoo.org Subject: Re: [gentoo-dev] RFC: new global USE flag "srcdist" References: <21188.38566.180273.751353@a1i15.kph.uni-mainz.de> <52C4C610.1000303@gentoo.org> <52C4CCC7.8050408@gentoo.org> <52C4D3E4.6060308@gentoo.org> <21189.24948.162463.335486@a1i15.kph.uni-mainz.de> In-Reply-To: <21189.24948.162463.335486@a1i15.kph.uni-mainz.de> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Archives-Salt: 9c358dba-117c-4210-8499-b0314bbe3c92 X-Archives-Hash: 21d9efcd45e555d24772c87050e5d0d0 On 01/02/2014 07:54 AM, Ulrich Mueller wrote: >>>>>> On Wed, 01 Jan 2014, Michael Orlitzky wrote: > >> As I said in another reply, more license metadata is good and we >> should make it available. But a USE flag that changes the meaning of >> an important global variable is a little hacky, especially if it >> doesn't solve a real problem within Gentoo/Portage. > > A srcdist flag wouldn't be that much different from the bindist flag > that we already have, and which is also of a non-technical nature. Two wrongs don't make a right =) I don't have a problem with bindist, but I don't buy its existence as an argument for USE=srcdist. >> If the problems are theoretical (or aren't Gentoo package management >> problems), maybe it's better to wait and do it right in an EAPI. > > As I said, this would leave us with a long transition period. And what > syntax would you propose? Additional license variables? Or Exherbo > style depend syntax? TBH, I don't want to open this can of worms. ;-) An additional variable, similar to RDEPEND/DEPEND. We'd have one for "I'm using this" LICENSE and one for "I want to redistribute the source tarball" LICENSE. If you think the transition period for that is long, how long do you think it will take for people to become aware of the magic USE flag and begin populating the other-LICENSE-contained-within-LICENSE variable? How long until it has 100% coverage? If maintainers don't use it, the feature is useless, because you can't rely on it and have to audit everything yourself anyway. For it to actually serve its purpose (e.g. to be useful for Pentoo), it would need to be in the PMS and skel.ebuild where people have to pay attention to it. How well would ACCEPT_LICENSE work if LICENSE was optional and controlled by a USE flag? If I intend to automatically redistribute the source tarballs that portage downloads, I have a few options: 1. Audit everything myself (impossible) 2. Ignore the licensing issues (used in practice) 3. Only ship packages that declare an acceptable source distribution license There's no easy way to do (3) when using conditionals inside of LICENSE. If there's a new required license variable in EAPI=$next, however, it becomes tractable.