Is Portage fickle? Use "X", don't Use "X", ... [SOLVED]

dhave · Last edited by dhave on Tue Dec 19, 2006 10:00 am; edited 1 time in total

Why does this kind of thing happen:

(1) I want to emerge a couple of gnome components on my mainly gnome-free Gentoo system.

(2) When I attempt this, emerge reports an error related to cairo. A forum post on a related matter suggests re-emerging cairo with X support. I re-emerge cairo with USE="X".

(3) I then am successful in emerging the gnome components I wanted. I am happy.

(4) The next time I do "emerge --pretend -uDN world", portage wants me to re-emerge cairo again, but this time *without* X support (it says to use USE="-X*").

(5) Whassup wid dis? There's something basic about portage's logic that I'm not getting.

Thanks.
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Arfrever

dhave · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:31 am Post subject:

Here's what I get when I do "emerge -ptv cairo"

Genone · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:35 am Post subject:

You want to use package.use instead of USE=X to make that permanent.

drwook · Veteran Joined: 30 Mar 2005 Posts: 1280 Location: London

Never set USE at the command line unless you like digging holes...

sonicbhoc · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:41 am Post subject:

do this:

dhave · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:48 am Post subject:

O.K., thanks to all.

I did as suggested and put "x11-libs/cairo X" in /etc/portage/package.use. Now emerge isn't asking me to emerge cairo without X.

Now, is there any reason I need to re-emerge cairo yet again since previously I emerged it with USE="X" on the command line?

BTW, thanks for the warning. I remember reading about the danger of putting USE on the command line, but, in the pressure of the moment, I forgot.
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bubbl07 · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:56 am Post subject:

dhave · Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:59 am Post subject:

desultory · Administrator Joined: 04 Nov 2005 Posts: 4648

Moved from Portage & Programming to Duplicate Threads, refer to topic "Please re-emerge [solved]".

As noted in the handbook USE flags specified via environment variables are not retained as persistent settings so, aside from when a given USE flag setting is itself transient in nature, use one of the persistent USE flag setting methods (/etc/make.conf, /etc/portage/package.use). Also, note that USE flags are case sensitive.