Apparently, though unproven, at 01:43 on Friday 04 February 2011, Nils Holland did opine thusly:
I'm not in a position to give a fully definitive answer to 1) ... > 2) /etc/make.conf contains a note that one should not change the CHOST > lightly (not that I'm planning to) and links to a nice document > explaining how it can be done anyway (which, I have to admit, didn't > make me any wiser, however). The question is, out of curiosity, why > the CHOST should not be changed and what would happen if one did it > anyway. I willingly believe that it would lead to problems, but would > the actual cause of these problems actually be caused by the > configuration of the machine being mixed up (for example, by the GNU > build system / autoconf suddenly looking for a compiler or similiar > tools / libraries under a path or by a name involving, for example, > i486-pc-linux-gnu, which does not automatically exist of the > appropriate tools have not been installed accordingly. Or would > problems arise because code generated with the new CHOST does no > longer "fit" to code generated with the previous / old CHOST? The warning is actually there to stop users doing stupid things like blindly trying to convert 32 bit systems to 64 bit. This is how that goes down: 1. Change CHOST 2. emerge -e world 3. ??? 4. Fail! Yes, if you are real smart it can be done. But "real smart" really does mean "real smart" i.e. not for the faint of heart and certainly not worth being officially supported. -- alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com
