Re: [gentoo-user] Re: flag details

[Michael Orlitzky <mjo@gentoo.org>]

On 11/24/2014 01:19 PM, James wrote:
> Jc García <jyo.garcia <at> gmail.com> writes:
> 
> 
>> I use
>> $ equery u cat/pkg
>> It list the useflags and what the metadata.xml of the package says
>> about each of them, plus highlights the active ones if you have the
>> package already merged.
> 
> yea that helps. But the information is a terse, single phrase usually.
> I'm looking for something (if it exists) that is more detailed
> about the flag usage and issues. Maybe nothing exists? Maybe
> it's only avaiable reading the sources?
> 

Basically. It kinda sucks. To fix it, we'd need a policy that every
ebuild has to properly document each of its USE flags in metadata.xml,
which means explaining how it actually affects the package, and not just
"enables libfoo." Then we'd need a repoman check to bitch at people who
don't do it.

Personally I'd be strongly for such a policy, even if it means every
package in the tree would become "in violation" overnight. This is
something that users could easily help with, by posting updated
metadata.xml on b.g.o.