On Mon, 13 Apr 2015 22:51:58 -0500, »Q« wrote:

> > > How can I find out whether the profile is setting those variables?  
> > 
> > By removing USE="-*".  At the moment it doesn't matter which profile
> > you use or what it sets as you are then telling portage to ignore all
> > its settings, even the critical ones.   
> 
> I'm getting conflicting info on this.  Do profiles really only set USE
> flags or do they do something else as well?  (Or does USE="-*" affect
> things *other* than USE?)

Things like PYTHON_TARGETS, X86_ABI and VIDEO_CARDS are implemented as
USE variables, so yes, -* clobbers them too.
 
> > As portage evolves and the devs update the profiles to keep in line,
> > your system will be come gradually more broken, as happened when
> > PYTHON_TARGET variables were introduced.  
> 
> Following this list and -dev seems to keep me up-to-date on the
> changes, as happened when the PYTHON_ variables were introduced.
> AFAICS, the only brokenness so far is that I'm complicating my life
> more than several people here think I should be.

A lot more complicated if you have to follow a mailing list just to keep
your system working. You have essentially put your system into a
firefighting mode where you have to deal with each change as it breaks
things. The real problems occur when the cause of the issue that you are
suffering is not clear, and others cannot help because they use a profile
so do not experience it.

If you comment out your USE line and run "emerge --changed-use -p
@world" (do not use -v!) you will see what you actually need to set. Then
you can ad those to make.conf or package.use. It may take you half an
hour, but you'll end up with a system that maintains itself to a greater
extent.


-- 
Neil Bothwick

I just bought a microwave fireplace... You can spend an evening in
front of it in only eight minutes...