[gentoo-dev] Portage Configurator

[gentoo-dev] Portage Configurator

[Silvio Fonseca]

I'm planning on do a Portage Configurator (I know it's already easy to 
configure I'm just trying to do it in a more 'friendly' way). So, there's a 
few questions that I have :-)
1) I can do this? Since you're the developers I think I should ask first :-)
2) Which are the valid values in USE flag?
3) Where are the USE flag defined? (/etc/make.globals & /etc/make.conf ? If 
it's set on the globals and unset at conf which is going to be valid? I know 
this question is pretty basic, but I need to be sure...)
4) How I know which USE values are counted on a specific package? (e.g. How I 
know if the presence of 'alsa' (or '-alsa') will change esd ./configure?)

That's pretty much for now :-)

I'll be glad to hear any comments about...

Silvio Fonseca

Re: [gentoo-dev] Portage Configurator

[Thomas Beaudry]

>1) I can do this? Since you're the developers I think I
>should ask first :-)

I'm not a developer but it's done all the time with other
distros and I can't see a reason why it would be different
with Gentoo.  The only thing is if you do it without their
sanction first, it may or may not be picked up for addition
to the distro.  Also, they may already be working on
something that you could help with, so it is still good to
ask.  (Yeah, I know, long-winded answer.)

>2) Which are the valid values in USE flag?

/usr/portage/profiles/use.desc

>3) Where are the USE flag defined? (/etc/make.globals
>& /etc/make.conf ? If it's set on the globals and unset
>at conf which is going to be valid? I know this question
>is pretty basic, but I need to be sure...)

make.globals has the default values
make.conf USE settings override make.global
environment USE settings override both

>4) How I know which USE values are counted on a specific
>package? (e.g. How I know if the presence of 'alsa' (or
>'-alsa') will change esd ./configure?)

You'll have to look at the ebuild to answer that.


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Re: [gentoo-dev] Portage Configurator

[George Shapovalov]

I would like to add a few comments to what has been said by Thomas.

On Thursday 25 July 2002 21:06, Thomas Beaudry wrote:
> >1) I can do this? Since you're the developers I think I
> >should ask first :-)
> to the distro.  Also, they may already be working on
> something that you could help with, so it is still good to
Yes, that would be the most important issue :).
Well, I cannot easily answer if anybody is doing what you intend to, because I 
did not completely understand what kind of configurator you are talking 
about:
1. Do you want to create a gui configurator for make.conf (say to set USE 
flags, and other values)?
Then the answer is - partially yes. Please take a look at bugs #2748 & #2846. 
Please also take a look at the tools available in gentoolkit. You will 
probably want as well to do a search on bugs.gentoo.org for certain keywords 
that would make sence to you.

Do you want to create a gui wrapper for emerge?
Try looking in your portage tree for what's available. kportagemaster comes to 
mind. One of the tools in those two bugs I mentioned above is also somewhat 
relevant.

Generally, if you could formulate the concept of the tool you are looking 
into, that would help to identify related projects. Then you would probably 
want to post this description/proposal here *and* create a new bug describing 
what you intend to do and proposing your help. Also, for a real-time chat 
with core devs you can always get us on channel #gentoo at 
irc.openprojects.net.

And great thanks for taking your time to make gentoo even better!

George

Re: [gentoo-dev] Portage Configurator

[Silvio Fonseca]

> > >1) I can do this? Since you're the developers I think I
> > >should ask first :-)
> >
> > to the distro.  Also, they may already be working on
> > something that you could help with, so it is still good to
>
> Yes, that would be the most important issue :).
> Well, I cannot easily answer if anybody is doing what you intend to,
> because I did not completely understand what kind of configurator you are
> talking about:

 I was a bit vague on my message, I know... :-) Anyway, I'll explain better to 
see if anyone is doing the same thing so I can help or if anyone wants to 
help me :-)

> 1. Do you want to create a gui configurator for make.conf (say to set USE
> flags, and other values)?
 I was thinking in something more complete, but it involves the make.conf 
configuration... If I understood right the make.globals should not be changed 
from the original, right? Just setting the make.conf will do...
 The other thing I was thinking is an ebuild info viewer (If there's already 
something to configure make.conf I'll do this separated). There's things I 
missed when I first tried Portage like how I know if will make any diference 
if I set 'x' value in USE for 'y' program? I know each ebuild file has a test 
to see if the value is setted or not, so the viewer program will read the 
ebuild and show which USE values are used, which is currently setted on 
system, the URL of the file, homepage, description, etc...

> Then the answer is - partially yes. Please take a look at bugs #2748 &
> #2846. 
 They look nice, but I'm not thinking in GUI with X/GTK but with ncurses, this 
way, people without X can still configure Portage (on a server for 
example...). Of course, if everything goes as I expect I may port it to X...
 (PS: I really can't program anything in Python :-) )

>Please also take a look at the tools available in gentoolkit. You
> will probably want as well to do a search on bugs.gentoo.org for certain
> keywords that would make sence to you.

I looked at gentoolkit and I saw useflag, it has some features I'd like to 
have on the make.conf configurator like descriptions of the USE flags... :-)
I'll make a more deep search on bugs.gentoo.org to see if I can find 
anything...

> Do you want to create a gui wrapper for emerge?
 No (not for now at least...)

> Generally, if you could formulate the concept of the tool you are looking
> into, that would help to identify related projects. Then you would probably
> want to post this description/proposal here *and* create a new bug
> describing what you intend to do and proposing your help.

Let's see :-) I want to make a tool that can configure all the aspects of 
make.conf (like CHOST, CFLAGS, USE, etc) and give the user package 
information (what packages are installed, what USE flags are used in the 
ebuild and things like that, I'm accepting features requests to implement as 
soon as I get this things working)
I'll fill a bug report as soon as I get something (barely) working...

> Also, for a  real-time chat with core devs you can always get us on channel
> #gentoo at irc.openprojects.net.
I went there a few times (almost every evening :-) )

If anyone have more comments I'll be very glad to discuss it :-)

Silvio Fonseca
 LinuxLab - Mackenzie University - Brazil