Re: [gentoo-user] "masked by: EAPI 7" trying up update "portage" - how to proceed

[Michael <confabulate@kintzios.com>]

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On Friday, 12 June 2020 15:44:05 BST n952162 wrote:
> On 2020-06-12 16:38, Michael wrote:
> > On Friday, 12 June 2020 15:00:25 BST Jack wrote:
> >> On 6/12/20 9:49 AM, Rich Freeman wrote:
> >>> On Fri, Jun 12, 2020 at 4:00 AM n952162 <n952162@web.de> wrote:
> >>>> On 2020-06-12 08:40, n952162 wrote:
> >>>>>> BTW, is it becoming clear why it is best to update Gentoo at least
> >>>>>> ever few months?  :)
> >>>>> 
> >>>>> Well, yes, but it's really pretty onerous.  If you have gentoo in
> >>>>> embedded systems, you've got to spend considerable administrative
> >>>>> effort
> >>>>> in each one just maintaining the status quo.
> >>>>> 
> >>>>> I mean, there's no competition to gentoo, of course.  But a design
> >>>>> goal
> >>>>> could be to have a one-step sync, of some sort.
> >>>> 
> >>>> Maybe one way to work in that direction would be to have regular - say,
> >>>> yearly - "releases", kind of like other distributions do, but on an
> >>>> ebuild basis, re-establishing a common base point.
> >>> 
> >>> Well, you already can just use a snapshot of the repository from any
> >>> date in time, though things like patches might not be mirrored any
> >>> longer so that isn't a perfect solution.
> >>> 
> >>> Ultimately if there was enough interest in something like this the
> >>> solution would probably be another distro that just repackages Gentoo
> >>> in a release-based format.  Release-based distros have their pros and
> >>> cons, but they're definitely a better fit for some problems.
> >>> 
> >>> One of the issues with Gentoo is that it is fairly niche and so you
> >>> don't have the manpower to support 47 forks.  With Debian you have a
> >>> bazillion derivatives - half of them are just bundling a different set
> >>> of default packages.  Ubuntu has a Desktop and Server version of the
> >>> distro, and they also have flavors for various desktop environments.
> >>> Gentoo basically has just barely enough manpower to support having
> >>> Gentoo.  We try to accommodate as much choice as possible in how it
> >>> gets used which is why this model works as well as it does.  However,
> >>> we can't support having a Gentoo flavor that is GPL-only, or GPL-free,
> >>> or FOSS-only, or no-systemd-in-the-repo, or initial install optimized
> >>> for people who read braille.  You can actually tailor Gentoo towards
> >>> just about any of those directions with some config file tweaks, but
> >>> you can't just pick the one of 300 iso images that most closely fit
> >>> your needs and run the autoinstaller and forget about it.
> >> 
> >> What about some sort of tagging?  Not bundling or packaging, just
> >> occasional (quarterly?) labels, with a matrix indicating how difficult
> >> it would be to upgrade.  A hint to folks who tend to update less often
> >> than they should.  A "heads up" that things added or upgraded in the
> >> past quarter are going to be very difficult to do if you are starting
> >> with something more than three/five/...? quarters older than that.  Of
> >> course, I suppose if you read the news items as they are released, then
> >> you should have a pretty good idea of which of them are likely to bite
> >> you if you wait too long.
> > 
> > Perhaps I misunderstand this, but isn't it as simple as booting off a
> > LiveCD/ USB, chrooting, changing profiles, cleaning up world file and
> > letting rip with a full 'emerge -e' @system, followed by @world for good
> > measure?
> 
> Is -e a solution to my situation now?  How is booting off a live media
> better than an obsolete (or broken) one?

I think so.  The LiveCD will possess an up to date toolchain you could use 
straight away.


> And, BTW, is there a reason to do @system if that's a subset of @world?

To rebuild with the latest gcc and work through any convoluted dependencies 
cutting across into world.  It may not add anything, but other than rebuilding 
a few packages I don't think it will hurt.

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