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wiggly
n00b
Joined: 05 Jun 2002
Posts: 5
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 Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 10:19 am Post subject: Comprehensive Portage/emerge documentation |
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Hi all,
I've been using Gentoo for about a month or so now and I'm fairly hooked. I have only one problem. The documentation. It needs feeding and nurturing.
There are *lots* of things that need sections and discussing for people who actually want to get the most out of the system. I know people are hard at work on Portage 2 but until that is here I want to know how to do things like;
- Keep my own set of package masks
- Keep a file with things I want in it and have it checked when I 'emerge -u world'
- Know and understand all the errors that emerge can come back with. (i.e. 'blocks' error that is totally undocumented.
Basically I want to be able to RTFM and find the answers. Is anyone updating the real docs or is someone maintaining an 'unnoficial' HOWTO somewhere? Am I going to have to dig around in the emerge source to find the answers? (I don't want to but I will...)
Oh, and also, I love Gentoo...
- Wiggly Worm |
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klieber
Bodhisattva
Joined: 17 Apr 2002
Posts: 3657
Location: San Francisco, CA
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| Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 3:07 pm Post subject: Re: Comprehensive Portage/emerge documentation |
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| wiggly wrote: | | - Keep my own set of package masks |
Create a new profile dir in /usr/portage/profiles/. (easiest to copy an existing profile) Symlink /etc/make.profile to that new profile dir.
| wiggly wrote: | | - Keep a file with things I want in it and have it checked when I 'emerge -u world' |
"checked" and what? Checked and updated? Then it needs to have an ebuild and be installed via that method. Or are you asking for something else?
| wiggly wrote: | | - Know and understand all the errors that emerge can come back with. (i.e. 'blocks' error that is totally undocumented. |
Pretty sure you're hosed here -- Use The Source, Luke. 
| wiggly wrote: | | Basically I want to be able to RTFM and find the answers. Is anyone updating the real docs or is someone maintaining an 'unnoficial' HOWTO somewhere? Am I going to have to dig around in the emerge source to find the answers? (I don't want to but I will...) |
As with most (all?) open-source projects, the documentation is somewhat behind the curve. Actually, Gentoo seems to do better than most, but even so, there are a lot of areas where documentation hasn't caught up with features. So, for now, I think you're limited to source-browsing and asking questions. However, if you go to all that trouble, it would be great if you, then, could write up some documentation so others can learn from your experiences.
--kurt
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wiggly
n00b
Joined: 05 Jun 2002
Posts: 5
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| Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 3:49 pm Post subject: Re: Comprehensive Portage/emerge documentation |
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| klieber wrote: |
| wiggly wrote: | | - Keep my own set of package masks |
Create a new profile dir in /usr/portage/profiles/. (easiest to copy an existing profile) Symlink /etc/make.profile to that new profile dir.
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Hmm, as far as I could see (on a Win box now) the package mask is held in /usr/portage/profiles and affects every profile rather than having a per-profile package mask.
Or do you mean I can create a package.mask file in a profile directory and have it picked up? (One of the things I am not sure about is what files are allowed where...) I have tried;
| Code: | | bash# man package.mask |
but to no avail.
| klieber wrote: |
| wiggly wrote: | | - Keep a file with things I want in it and have it checked when I 'emerge -u world' |
"checked" and what? Checked and updated? Then it needs to have an ebuild and be installed via that method. Or are you asking for something else?
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No, I mean that in the install docs it mentions that you can add entries to /var/cache/edb/world and that they will then be emerged on a;
This doesn't seem to work for me, even with the -u switch to emerge.
What I really want to be able to do is backup my system config/home/databases etc and the world file and be able to rebuild a system from that, or clone a system based on a known world config file. (Yes, at the moment I am using scripts to do stuff like that but it seems like portage should be able to handle simple tricks)
| klieber wrote: |
Pretty sure you're hosed here -- Use The Source, Luke. :)
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Joygasm. I may be perusing the source at home then...
| klieber wrote: | So, for now, I think you're limited to source-browsing and asking questions. However, if you go to all that trouble, it would be great if you, then, could write up some documentation so others can learn from your experiences.
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Yeah, I figured that I was being daft and not being able to find the good (tm) docs or something.
Do you have any siggestions of which forum/mailing list is best to pester the developers on if I get around to having source questions?
--Wiggly |
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klieber
Bodhisattva
Joined: 17 Apr 2002
Posts: 3657
Location: San Francisco, CA
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| Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 4:59 pm Post subject: Re: Comprehensive Portage/emerge documentation |
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| wiggly wrote: | | Hmm, as far as I could see (on a Win box now) the package mask is held in /usr/portage/profiles and affects every profile rather than having a per-profile package mask. |
Sorry -- should have been more specific. package.mask affects all profiles, but /usr/portage/profiles/<your profile>/packages is profile-specific.
| wiggly wrote: | No, I mean that in the install docs it mentions that you can add entries to /var/cache/edb/world and that they will then be emerged on a;
This doesn't seem to work for me, even with the -u switch to emerge. |
Ah -- can't be of much help here since I've never attempted this myself. I can't imagine that anything can be emerged, however, without a corresponding ebuild to emerge from. The ebuild contains important things like tarball locations, dependencies, etc.
| wiggly wrote: | | Do you have any siggestions of which forum/mailing list is best to pester the developers on if I get around to having source questions? |
Best source seems to be IRC. Second best source would probably be the gentoo-dev mailing list.
--kurt
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The problem with political jokes is that they get elected |
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wiggly
n00b
Joined: 05 Jun 2002
Posts: 5
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| Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 5:06 pm Post subject: Re: Comprehensive Portage/emerge documentation |
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| klieber wrote: |
Sorry -- should have been more specific. package.mask affects all profiles, but /usr/portage/profiles/<your profile>/packages is profile-specific.
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Hmm, yeah. I had the impression that that was only to be used for 'system' packages though. Maybe I should just use that instead. I may experiment at home. I have already copied a profile for messing with at home but cannot remember the things I tried with it.
| klieber wrote: |
Ah -- can't be of much help here since I've never attempted this myself. I can't imagine that anything can be emerged, however, without a corresponding ebuild to emerge from. The ebuild contains important things like tarball locations, dependencies, etc.
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Ah, no I mean like adding a line like;
| Code: |
<dev-java/sun-jdk-1.4.0
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to the world file and then doing an update of the world.
| klieber wrote: |
Best source seems to be IRC. Second best source would probably be the gentoo-dev mailing list.
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Cool, cheers
-- Wiggly |
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klieber
Bodhisattva
Joined: 17 Apr 2002
Posts: 3657
Location: San Francisco, CA
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| Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2002 5:12 pm Post subject: Re: Comprehensive Portage/emerge documentation |
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| wiggly wrote: | | Hmm, yeah. I had the impression that that was only to be used for 'system' packages though. |
Damn -- I keep forgetting about that. Yes, it's only for system packages. There is no good way (that I'm aware of) to have profile-based package.mask-type files. (might be a good feature request to file on bugs.gentoo.org. )
--kurt
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