[gentoo-dev] Re: The fallacies of GLEP55

[Steven J Long <slong@rathaus.eclipse.co.uk>]

Ciaran McCreesh wrote:

> On Sat, 16 May 2009 11:27:10 +0200
> Tobias Klausmann <klausman@gentoo.org> wrote:
>> Change the spec, then.
> 
> If we change the spec, we can't do anything with the change until we're
> absolutely sure that everyone's updated both their ebuilds and their
> package manager for it.
>
Isn't that what the EAPI process is for?

The "support every overlay and old version of portage known to Gentoo"
is a "straw man" as one hears so much of. GLEP-55 makes explicit mention
of waiting for 2008.0 to ship, and Gentoo is ultimately only responsible
for the software it ships, including sunrise.

Since this is Gentoo, ofc, users will be kept in the loop, and upgrade paths
will be provided. It's about the users, or it used to be. (As is the GPL.)

>> Actually, I personally would prefer taking it out of the
>> parsed-by-bash part entirely. Add it as a shebang-like line at
>> the top:
>> 
>> #EAPI-1
>> 
>> as the first or second line. Allowing it on the second line
>> allows you to later bolt on a true shebang-line if you should so
>> desire. Only having to look at the first two lines makes finding
>> it out easier (note that I don't call that parsing on purpose).
>
Restricting (via repoman or equivalent) to first non-comment line
means we can use existing ebuilds with a minor edit, which can be
automated as part of repoman, with a warning if not -q etc, and
makes it easier to find, and to scan for. (I agree, it's not
parsing.)
 
> Would mean we'd have to change every existing ebuild everywhere.
> 
>> I was under the impression that it's illegal to change/set the
>> EAPI after using inherit.
> 
> Nope. It's considered by some to be a QA violation, but EAPI's rules
> are the same as the rules for any other metadata variable.
> 
So refine the spec; that's what the discussion is supposed to lead to,
remember?

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