* Hall Stevenson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2003-10-21 13:18]: > Someone commented about *not* replacing files like /etc/fstab or /etc/issue > and the response was that "we sometimes need to merge new information". I > guess I have a different definition of "merge"... To me, "merge" would > imply "add to", not "replace".
> I do see mention of an option "CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="enter files here..." > that you add to /etc/make.conf. Haha !! But /etc/make.conf is a file that > frequently gets replaced !! No file gets replaced unless you replace it. Portage places new versions of files beside them and tells you to update/merge any new information. etc-update is a tool to help you do that. Sure, it could be a bit more user friendly and better documented but you can't really add anything more than that. True, replacing fstab will make your system unbootable, but it's fairly quick to boot from CD and edit the file correctly. But it would take me much longer to figure out all the custom options in my apache conf file if that got replaced with the default - can we have non-replace functionality for that too? What about ... [pick one from the infinite list of possibilities]. There isn't really anywhere to draw the line, so if you got involved in doing something like that it would become hugely complicated. And it would probably lose functionality. A more novice-friendly tool would probably benefit a lot of users. But it should be as an additional option for updating files as well as the current etc-update, not instead of it. Seeing as so many people are keen for such a tool it shouldn't be too long before someone writes one. Maybe the graphical program someone mentioned fits the bill already... Cheers David BTW it may be helpful to read the last couple of paragraphs from Heschi Kreinick's post in August for a brief overview of how the current `problem' came to be: http://article.gmane.org/gmane.linux.gentoo.user/42052/ -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list
