Re: [gentoo-user] creating overlay to modify net-fs/samba-3.6.18

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

On 14/09/2013 11:26, Mick wrote:
> On Thursday 12 Sep 2013 01:28:00 Timur Aydin wrote:
>> On 09/12/13 01:00, Alan McKinnon wrote:
>>> Yes of course, it make a great deal of sense now. Basically, your local
>>> overlay had no idea where the parent portage tree is or how to find it
>>> so couldn't find the eclass directory.
>>>
>>> As I understand it, this information used to be hard-coded magic and
>>> overlays would "just know where to look". Since recently, you have to
>>> configure it explicitly and not use hidden super-magic.
>>>
>>> You would have been getting confusing messages in emerge output about a
>>> faulty masters setting for overlays, pity we didn't spot that up front.
>>> Double pity that there wasn't a clear message or news item about what
>>> the error meant and the impact....
> 
> 
> What happens when you run emerge with the new portage is that this error 
> message pops up:
> 
> # emerge -uaDv world
> !!! Repository 'x-portage' is missing masters attribute in 
> '/usr/local/portage/metadata/layout.conf'
> !!! Set 'masters = gentoo' in this file for future compatibility
> 
> 
> However, as Alan says it is a puzzle why there wasn't a news item warning 
> users of this new configuration requirement and how things may break if it is 
> not complied with;  or why the ebuild does not create itself the 
> '/usr/local/portage/metadata/' directory and populate layout.conf with default 
> values - unless the user has already done so.
> 
> Either way it shouldn't let the user make WAGs as to what is now necessary for 
> a properly functioning package manager.


Is it just me, or has there really been an extraordinary number of
high-impact changes this year made WITHOUT news items?

I get a sense of a culture shift amongst the devs where news items are
considered less important than they should be. I don't have hard facts,
this is just my impression, but maybe the Council should do a PR
exercise to impress on devs that news items are really important


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com