Re: [gentoo-user] Recommended location of the Gentoo ebuild repository

[Rich Freeman <rich0@gentoo.org>]

On Wed, Dec 16, 2020 at 9:45 AM gevisz <gevisz@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Nevertheless, the explanation why /var/db/repos/gentoo is better than
> /usr/portage is still welcomed. :)
>

There is a lengthy discussion on gentoo-dev on this, and my personal
first choice didn't win.  :)

There is little dispute that /var makes more sense than /usr other
than legacy reasons.  /usr is generally used for static data - on some
distros it might even be read-only, a squashfs, signed using crypto,
and so on.  On a rolling release distro like Gentoo it might get
changed often by updates, but other than system updates nothing in it
should change.  On a more release-based distro only security updates
or major releases would touch it.

/var on the other hand is used for application data and other things
that change all the time.  That includes things like databases, which
the Gentoo repo basically is.  Mail spools, print spools, caches, and
so on all go on there.

FHS formalizes all this stuff.

Now, where exactly in /var it goes is more a matter of debate.
/var/db is not specified in FHS, but it is used by FreeBSD which I
think was one of the selling points.  Personally I stick it in
/var/cache as (IMO) it just contains a local copy of a repository that
is entirely stored elsewhere.  Some would certainly disagree with
that.  I think /var/lib would be an alternative place that keeps more
to FHS.

However, moving it out of /usr was a move with near-universal support.
And you can really put it anywhere you want by editing one line in
your portage config.  I don't think the directory even exists in the
base install - it gets created the first time you sync so it is
entirely user-configurable.

-- 
Rich