Re: [gentoo-dev] New developer features in portage: cgroup, network-sandbox, ipc-sandbox

[Albert Hopkins]

This sounds like cool stuff... I wonder if this could be a step towards
unprivileged users being able to use portage for user-installed apps.

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: Making systemd more accessible to "normal" users

[Albert Hopkins]

On Mon, May 20, 2013, at 11:03 PM, Daniel Campbell wrote:

> That's missing the point. If you don't run systemd, having unit files is
> pointless. Thankfully there's INSTALL_MASK and whatnot, but that seems
> like a hack instead of something more robust. Why include systemd unit
> files (by default, with no systemd USE flag, thanks to the council...)
> on a system that's not using it? 154 files isn't negligible unless
> you're flippant with your system and don't care about bloat. Unused
> software sitting around *is* a waste of disk-space.
> 

You've either won the "Unreasonably Pedantic Award" or the "Will Say Any
Stupid Thing Prove His/Her Point Award".  Please let me know which one
to send to you.

-a

Re: [gentoo-dev] splashutils needs a maintainer

[Albert Hopkins]

On Sat, Feb 2, 2013, at 02:24 PM, Dustin C. Hatch wrote:
> On 2/2/2013 13:19, Pacho Ramos wrote:
> > El mar, 29-01-2013 a las 15:55 +0400, Sergey Popov escribió:
> >> 28.01.2013 23:26, Pacho Ramos пишет:
> >>> Then, looks like no alternative is in good shape on Gentoo. What is
> >>> Sabayon using? They look to have plymouth ebuilds in their overlay (but
> >>> not in "for-gentoo" one, then, it probably has some incompatibility
> >>> Gentoo :/)
> >>
> >> We have plymouth ebuilds in tree, but they are outdated(see
> >> https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=430478).
> >>
> >
> > Could anyone summarize the advantages of splashutils over plymouth? As
> > both look to be needed of some love in Gentoo, maybe would be better to
> > focus on later one (that is the preferred option in most distributions
> > and is actively developed)
> >
> As a user, I can say that one advantage of splashutils over plymouth is 
> that I could never get the latter to work, whereas the former has worked 
> on every machine I've tried to use it on (server, desktop, and virtual 
> machine).

IIRC plymouth requires KMS so if your driver doesn't have KMS support
then it doesn't have plymouth support.

Re: [gentoo-dev] revdep-rebuild bikeshedding

[Albert Hopkins]

On Wed, Jan 16, 2013, at 03:57 PM, Ian Stakenvicius wrote:
[...]
> +1 on the replace.

+1

Re: [gentoo-dev] Inspiration

[Albert Hopkins]

On Wed, 2012-09-19 at 22:12 +0800, Ben de Groot wrote:
> So what is the Zen of Gentoo?

How about:

My set-up is better than your set-up ;-)

-a

Re: [gentoo-dev] Re: DistroWatch and Gentoo packages: status quo and future

[Albert Hopkins]

On Sun, 2009-09-13 at 09:36 -0500, Dale wrote:
> >> Seriously, I doubt that the average Gentoo user comes from
> Distrowatch.
> >> Gentoo is born from a necessity which is very different from the
> usual
> >> binary distro. Gentoo has never been about fame or marketing.

> - -  I came here because of distrowatch.  I started with Mandrake 9.1
> but didn't like the upgrade process.  I went to distrowatch to see
> what
> else I could find to use.  I found about about Gentoo and here I am,
> years later using Gentoo. 

What do our market research people tell us? ;-)

-a

Re: [gentoo-dev] Gentoo's problems

[Albert Hopkins]

[Oh no! How did I let myself get sucked into a gentoo-dev thread? ;-)]

On Wed, 2007-03-14 at 13:31 -0700, M. Edward (Ed) Borasky wrote:

[...]
> I'll just throw out a couple of my own comments:
> 
[ I'm skipping the first one because it doesn't interest me]

[Comment about Gentoo's non-participation in LSB]

While I somewhat agree, I think Gentoo's main selling point (at least
for me) is that is the way it stands out from your typical Linux distro.
It's source-based package system was once what distinguished it from the
rest.  In summary, I don't think Gentoo should totally adapt to what
"the rest" are going any more than I think Slackware or GoboLinux
should.  What I do see is that perhaps there are ideas that Gentoo has
that maybe other distros could benefit from, and vice versa.  But
sometimes we have to agree to disagree with "mainstream".

As for "enterprise"... that's fine.  Gentoo has traditionally been the
kind of distro that throws you just enough rope to hang oneself, so I
never really considered it an "enterprise" Linux, but if that is the
direction that it wants to head in then it benefit it to make it more
known to the general public.

[Stuff about distrowatch, other distros and "market" share...]

>  Gentoo "share of mind" is dropping and dropping rapidly, although I don't 
> think 
> it's because of misbehavior in the community. I think it's because:
> 
> a. Daniel Robbins left and went to Microsoft, leaving no "Mr. Gentoo", and

I would generalize this more.  I would say that "Mr. Gentoo"
isn't/wasn't Daniel Robbins but Larry, and in recent times Larry has not
enlightened us with his vision of Gentoo and where it's going.  We have
http://www.gentoo.org/main/en/about.xml but where do we go from there?
Maybe we need to have a sit down with Larry so we can know what Gentoo
really is.

> b. No effort to seek corporate support, at least none that I'm aware of.

I would also like to generalize this more.  Instead of "corporate
support" I would say funding, whether it's corporate or what.  I think
it's important to convince people that they should give us money, and we
should have the wisdom and capability of receiving said money and doing
something productive with it.

> In short, I'm not sure there is any future for *any* "pure community 
> distro". Somehow Gentoo needs to at least find a marketable defendable 
> niche and some kind of corporate sponsorship. Maybe embedded will turn 
> out to be that niche -- I'd love to have even 1/4 of Portage on 
> something like a Zaurus or "iPhone".

It's NFP, but even NFP has to have some sort of structure and unified
vision.  Even my neighborhood coop has decent solidarity and a marketing
strategy.

--
Albert W. Hopkins

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Re: [gentoo-dev] init.d problem

[Albert Hopkins]

On Tue, 2006-07-04 at 18:58 -0400, Mike Frysinger wrote:
> On Tuesday 04 July 2006 18:43, Enrico Weigelt wrote:
> > We should think about mechanisms to check if the service is
> > actually running. This could also be used for frequently service
> > checks and notification.
> 
> there is no fool proof way to do this

Has anyone considered daemontools?  It does this kind of stuff very
well.

-m

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Re: [gentoo-dev] Which license?

[Albert Hopkins]

On Thu, 2006-04-27 at 14:21 -0400, A. Khattri wrote:
> 
> Im working on an ebuild for a package and Im not sure what license to use.
> The package is Copyright Company "X" but has this underneath:
> 
> 
> ## This software may be freely copied, modified and redistributed
> ## without fee for non-commerical purposes provided that this license
> ## remains intact and unmodified with any distribution.
> ##
> ## There is no warranty or other guarantee of fitness of this software.
> ## It is provided solely "as is".  The author(s) disclaim(s) all
> ## responsibility and liability with respect to this software's usage
> ## or its effect upon hardware, computer systems, other software, or
> ## anything else.
> ##
> 
> 
> Last time I looked, there were some 800 or so files in
> /usr/portage/license/ - so which one would I use?

I'd go for AS-IS.



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Re: [gentoo-dev] Looking for a vile maintainer

[Albert Hopkins]

LOL.  Sorry, subject line gave me the chuckles.

-m

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Re: [gentoo-dev] my apologies for the mess with this release of MySQL 5.0.16

[Albert Hopkins]

On Fri, 2005-11-25 at 11:26 -0600, Andrew Gaffney wrote:
> It's really not the best idea to be using ~arch on a box with
> important data. 
> And if you are going to be running ~arch, you should really know what
> it means 
> to do so and how to use it properly. I recommend reading 
> . Of 
> course, having done a gentoo install already, you should have already
> read 
> through the entire handbook and thoroughly understood its contents :P
> 
Ah, but that document does little to answer my specific question which,
due to the fact that some people can actually be constructive, has not
only been answered, but it seems the original issue has been resolved.
To those people I am thankful.
 

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Re: [gentoo-dev] my apologies for the mess with this release of MySQL 5.0.16

[Albert Hopkins]

On Fri, 2005-11-25 at 10:51 -0600, Andrew Gaffney wrote:
> Or you can just unmask it locally and stop whining.

I think users have a valid reason to be concerned about this, but if
that is the developer's intention (to unmask it locally) then may I
suggest this information be provided somehow to the user?  Before now
the only information I got was it was masked because it doesn't work...
even though it has been working, at least for some users, for quite some
time.  I'm not trying to whine, just to get the what and whys.

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Re: [gentoo-dev] my apologies for the mess with this release of MySQL 5.0.16

[Albert Hopkins]

On Fri, 2005-11-25 at 17:32 +0100, Simon Stelling wrote:
> Albert Hopkins wrote:
> > Now all-of-the-sudden MySQL 5 is marked -amd64 so now I must downgrade.
> > Is this intentional?
> 
> read the changelog, it says:
> 
>24 Nov 2005; Jory A. Pratt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> mysql-5.0.15.ebuild,
>mysql-5.0.16-r3.ebuild:
>version 5 does not work on clean install

Is there a guide or something on how to downgrade from version 5 to 4?
I'm assuming that I can't just point 4 to my database files and expect
them to work.

Also why did it take so long to determine that 5 does not work?  I've
been running 5 on amd64 systems since 21 October without any issues and
now I have to figure out how I am going to downgrade.


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Re: [gentoo-dev] my apologies for the mess with this release of MySQL 5.0.16

[Albert Hopkins]

On Thu, 2005-11-24 at 22:51 +0100, Francesco R. wrote:
> my apologies for the mess with this release of MySQL 5.0.16 and for the 
> one will come with the dev-db/mysql-4.1.15-r1 ebuild

I'm confused.  MySQL 5 seems to have been available on ~amd64 for quite
sometime.  I've already converted my database files the the 5.x format.
Now all-of-the-sudden MySQL 5 is marked -amd64 so now I must downgrade.
Is this intentional?



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[gentoo-dev] Identical Packages?

[Albert Hopkins]

There are two packages in portage with the same category/name:

dev-perl/Text-Reform
dev-perl/text-reform

(I know, they're not exactly the same ).  They also have the same
description, etc. Is this intentional?

-m



signature.asc
Description: This is a digitally signed message part

Re: [gentoo-dev] Questions about XML files used in portage

[Albert Hopkins]

On Wed, 2005-09-21 at 16:34 +0200, Paul de Vrieze wrote:
> On Wednesday 21 September 2005 16:18, Chris Gianelloni wrote:
> > I think the problem here was that longdescription was in an ebuild, but
> > was empty.
> >
> > Also, packages.gentoo.org doesn't use this data, but rather just the
> > DESCRIPTION field in the ebuild, at least for the few that I checked
> > that have a longdescription in metadata.xml...
> 
> I know it doesn't, that does not preclude that it was mainly meant for 
> such purposes. There has even been a short expirmental package list based 
> on xml/xslt which used it, but it's searching mode was way too slow, so 
> it was abandoned.
> 
> In any case a longdescription tag if present should not be empty.
> 
> Paul
> 

The list is actually longer than I thought. 

Currently my code does:

description =  xmldesc['en'] or xmldesc[None] or ebuild_desc

which is fine for packages, but categories do not have a fall-back
description without the metadata.  I could have sworn there was a
category with an empty description but I can't find it now ;-)

-m



 
INFO:root:NODESC: app-admin/ranpwd lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-admin/sdsc-syslog lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-benchmarks/iozone lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-benchmarks/ltp lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-editors/lfhex lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-editors/xemacs lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-editors/XML-XSH lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-misc/bins lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-misc/filer lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-misc/gwine lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-misc/misterhouse lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-misc/smtm lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-shells/rrs lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-shells/tcsh lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-text/po4a lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/apel lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/eshell lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/ess lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/fsf-compat lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/gnus lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/ilisp lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/jde lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/mail-lib lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/mmm-mode lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/mule-base lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/mule-ucs lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/net-utils lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/perl-modes lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/psgml-dtds lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/psgml lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/ps-print lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/text-modes lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/xemacs-base lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: app-xemacs/xslt-process lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-db/gmyclient lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-db/stldb4 lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-embedded/ftdi_eeprom lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-embedded/libftdi lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-embedded/yapide lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/flute lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/forehead lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/jamvm lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/javatoolkit lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/jgoodies-animation lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/jgoodies-forms lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/jgoodies-looks lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/jruby lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/sac lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/scala-bin lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/swidgets lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-java/toolbar lang=en
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-lang/parrot lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-lang/perl lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/ace lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/ferrisloki lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/libferrisstreams lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/libip_vs_user_sync lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/log4c lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/newt lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/syck lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/tre lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/vanessa-adt lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/vanessa-logger lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-libs/xapian lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Algorithm-Annotate lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Apache-DBI lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Apache-Session lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Apache-SessionX lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/AppConfig lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Archive-Tar lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Archive-Zip lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Array-RefElem lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Array-Window lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/AtExit lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Audio-CD-disc-cover lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Audio-Mixer lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Audio-Tools lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Audio-Wav lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Authen-DigestMD5 lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Authen-NTLM lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Authen-PAM lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/Authen-SASL lang=None
INFO:root:NODESC: dev-perl/aww lang=None
INFO:r

Re: [gentoo-dev] Questions about XML files used in portage

[Albert Hopkins]

On Wed, 2005-09-21 at 09:21 -0400, Chris Gianelloni wrote:
> On Wed, 2005-09-21 at 07:28 -0500, Albert Hopkins wrote:
> >  2. Are metadata.xml files a requirement for categories?  There are
> > a few categories that do not have one:
> >   * x11-proto
> >   * x11-apps
> >   * x11-drivers
> 
> They should have one.

Ok, then I will submit a bug report to have them added.

> 
> >  3. If a metadata.xml has a  element, is it
> > required to contain text?  There is at least one package that
> > has an empty .  I wanted to use the
> >  to override the DESCRIPTION in the .ebuild, if
> > it exists, but in this case the DESCRIPTION is actually
> > infinitely longer than the .
> 
> It should contain text, but I don't think that the dtd requires it.
> Perhaps it should?

Admittedly, I have not read the DTD (must first learn *how* to read
DTDs), but I think if the element exists, it should have text or else
it's meaningless.

> 
> >  4. Speaking of , are line breaks to be preserved
> > in their representation?  There are a few packages whose
> >  use line breaks for formatting.  One in
> > particular, gnustep-libs/steptalk  not only prefers to preserve
> > line breaks, but also appears to prefer a fixed-width font in
> > it's representation.  Is this also a requirement?
> 
> As far as I know, there are few *requirements* defined for metadata.xml
> files.  All we really have is the dtd to determine what is legal.
> Anything beyond that really hasn't been discussed.
> 
> Perhaps now is the time to start such discussions?
> 

I think so.  There seem to be different formats for the
 and I would hate to have to guess or make special
exceptions because I know I'll do it wrong (e.g. the Changelogs).  Would
prefer if there were a more strict definition so then at least I could
say it's not my fault ;-)

> > If anyone has answers to any of the above questions I thank you in
> > advance for your response.
> 
> Just out of curiosity, what is your project?
> 
This is for the new packages.gentoo.org.

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[gentoo-dev] Questions about XML files used in portage

[Albert Hopkins]

I'm trying to incorporate into my project the metadata.xml files used in
portage, but I have a few questions:

 1. It seems like many of the package metadata.xml files \-escape
"special" characters a la bash.  This isn't really necessary in
XML and if there are special characters, such as '<', etc. then
there is an XML way of presenting them.  Is there a special
reason that the '\' is used (i.e does software exist that
requires this)?
 2. Are metadata.xml files a requirement for categories?  There are
a few categories that do not have one:
  * x11-proto
  * x11-apps
  * x11-drivers
 3. If a metadata.xml has a  element, is it
required to contain text?  There is at least one package that
has an empty .  I wanted to use the
 to override the DESCRIPTION in the .ebuild, if
it exists, but in this case the DESCRIPTION is actually
infinitely longer than the .
 4. Speaking of , are line breaks to be preserved
in their representation?  There are a few packages whose
 use line breaks for formatting.  One in
particular, gnustep-libs/steptalk  not only prefers to preserve
line breaks, but also appears to prefer a fixed-width font in
it's representation.  Is this also a requirement?

If anyone has answers to any of the above questions I thank you in
advance for your response.

-m

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Re: [gentoo-dev] Resolution - GTK Useflag Situation

[Albert Hopkins]

On Mon, 2005-09-19 at 20:24 +0900, Chris White wrote:
[..]
> Marduk,
> 
> >I have a different solution that should, no doubt, satisfy both
> sides:
> >
> >We fork Gentoo.  Create a new distro, called GenOne.  This distro
> will 
> >include only older wares such as GTK1, Kernel 2.4, libc5, XFree86,
> devfs,
> >a.out binaries, DES passwords, etc.  It will be just as good as
> Gentoo, but 
> >catered to
> >old-timers and and those who prefer to reminisce about the good ol'
> days.
> 
> This is what we call flaming, please don't waste time with this.
> It's 
> annoying as hell, ends up making threads longer than they need, and
> does 
> nothing to benifit the argument.  Thanks.

Flaming?  I wasn't flaming.  There's nothing I said that was the least
bit insulting or controversial.  All that I was doing, for the benefit
of the list, is to introduce a little humor with the intent of perhaps
getting a chuckle here or there.  Ha ha.  Some people got it.  You
didn't.

-m

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Re: [gentoo-dev] Resolution - GTK Useflag Situation

[Albert Hopkins]

On Sun, 2005-09-18 at 13:43 -0700, Robin H. Johnson wrote:
[...]
> Your decision to remove the gtk2 use flag takes away control from people
> who were using it correctly (by what the description said). I'm not
> against having gtk2 on my systems, but I prefer gtk1 interfaces,
> primarily as they are a lot more lighter on memory and disk.
> 
> I use USE='gtk -gtk2', and putting gtk2 in my local package.mask is not
> acceptable, because I do use applications with interfaces in gtk2 only
> sometimes.
> 
> If your system has a way that I can get what I want, then that's fine,
> but it just doesn't seem to be included in your email.
> 

I have a different solution that should, no doubt, satisfy both sides:

We fork Gentoo.  Create a new distro, called GenOne.  This distro will 
include only older wares such as GTK1, Kernel 2.4, libc5, XFree86, devfs,
a.out binaries, DES passwords, etc.  It will be just as good as Gentoo, but 
catered to
old-timers and and those who prefer to reminisce about the good ol' days.

-m

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