Re: [gentoo-portage-dev] Improved user information and communication

[Daniel Stiefelmaier <mail@stiefelweb.de>]

>emerge --changelog ?
>  
>
k, sorry :)

>This should go to gentoo-dev@g.o as ebuild developers are the ones that decide 
>what USE flags are available and how they're documented.
>  
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Of course they decide what flags are available, but how do they decide 
how they are documented? I'm sorry if i did not yet discover gentoos 
ebuild-feature-documentation system.

I thought of a command like emerge mozilla-firefox --useinfo
that prints what each flag is good for. Maybe some are explained in 5 
words, other may need 5 lines.

>>also, the advanced could provide
>>- links to howto's (like configuring apache)
>>    
>>
>
>This is out of the domain of a package in any package management system IMO.
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You are right, there may be no pms out there that has this feature.
I refuse to accept this as an argument to not change that.
You may be a pro who does not need any HOWTOs, i am not.
Portage saves a lot of work for people who use it. But in some cases, 
ebuilds don't do everything they could or should.
Example: Firefox and Thunderbird don't give a damn on the LANG setting, 
they are english by default. There is no obvious way to change the 
language, you need to do some investigation. (Look for the HOWTO ;) )

BTW, if "This is out of the domain of a package in any package 
management system", then why do some packages print additional 
information after emerging, like what files should be updated manually?
THIS is not really the solution. if you batch-emerge or the package that 
wants to tell you something is just a dependancy, then you may probably 
miss that note.

Another reason to inform the user before emerging maybe this:
I emerged a package recently, think it was amule, that first emerged 
some dependancies, including wxGTK.
Then, after all dependancies were emerged, the package itself quitted 
saying that wxGTK needs to be emerged with flag wxgtk1.
I thought the ebuild could manage flags of dependancies automatically, 
but that is not the point.
The user could be informed before starting to emerge.

>>- list packages that are of use for this (plugins or utilized apps like
>>cervisia that integrates in quanta plus)
>>    
>>
>
>Do you mean finding packages that depend on that package in question?
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Not necessarily. Cervisia, Kompare and Tidy are standalone applications, 
but Quanta integrates them automatically if they are installed.

>>- tell how to contact the ebuild maintainer
>>    
>>
>
>metadata.xml. This information is printed out when using -vv in 
>portage-2.1_alpha.
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Hey, thats cool :)
But then, why not include additional information there? like the useflag 
documentation or links to HOWTOs?

>Personally, I hate most wikis. 9 times out of 10, they are full of 
>half-correct information. This makes them all the more dangerous as the 
>"average Joe" can't tell what's correct and what isn't.
>  
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My wiki experiences are all good, but i also wrote, that it could only 
be maintained by the developers. Only the discussion page attached to 
each page is open for comments. This also prevents defacements.

>Ideas are "a dime, a dozen".
>  
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Ideas are even free. That's what makes open source what it is.
Ask Bryce Harrington what he thinks how Inkscape's well development is 
related to its community.

Caliga
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