Re: [gentoo-user] Re: package.keywords

[Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@gmail.com>]

On Tuesday 23 June 2009 16:40:51 James wrote:
> Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon <at> gmail.com> writes:
> > > This is my (mis)conception, although, as you have suggest,
> > > there are (gentoo) cultural norms that do suggest
> > > certain boolean operations should not be used,
> > > in say for example, package.keywords?
> >
> > That's more just a safeguard against forgetting you put it there than
> > anything else
>
> Good to know.
>
> > The vast majority of cases will use only the "=" operator or nothing.
> > That's so you unmask the one version you are interested in, not
> > everything from here on out, including every buggy, pre-release and just
> > plain broken version that happens to have an ebuild.
>
> So entries in package.keywords should just have the ~ in front of them?
> No point in using other boolean operations in the package.keywords file?

I personally have never used other operators. But Murphy says that as soon as 
I say there's no need for them, someone will come along and prove me wrong :-)

It's not a bad thing to have all operators be valid syntax, then you (the 
admin) can choose what you actually need

> > The use-case for no operator is mostly for the case where you run say a
> > stable box, and want the latest of a specific well-known package. You
> > might want the latest Qt for example. Another example is -svn ebuilds -
> > enlightenment is a case in point. The snapshots are always out of date,
> > latest svn is pretty stable, so one must unmask everything to get the
> > -9999 versions
>
> Ok, now you just tossed my little (pee brain) around quite significantly...
> Your saying that not operator will get me the -9999 (SVN) version
> of a package?And that this is most likely the most stable because
> the devs/hacks work on it often?

I cheat and just do this:

x11-wm/enlightenment * ~* **

But enlightenment is a special case. e17 has never had a release (snapshots 
that are known to build are not considered releases) and the majority of users 
simply check out and build the latest commits in svn. The way the ebuilds are 
versioned, enlightenment-9999 gets you the latest in svn.

That's a pretty normal gentoo convention

>
> If so then lets put it to the test.
> Maybee app-arch/xz-utils ?
> so my entry in /etc/portage/package.keywords should look like this:
>
> app-arch/xz-utils
> Nothing I tried in either package.keywords or package.unmask
> make the app-arch/xz-utils-9999 (SVN) version available.
>
>
> So what did I miss?

You need to put a mask after the package name - *, ~* or **. The default is to 
use your current ACCEPT_KEYWORDS.

* removes masking keywords if the package is stable on your arch
~* removes masking keywords if the package is stable on any arch
** removes masking keywords for the package unconditionally

-- 
alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com