[SOLVED] Conversion to XLibre

[gjy0724]

I have been trying for months to migrate one of my systems as a test from Xorg to XLibre, but I kept running into an issue when I ran emerge @preserved-rebuild as it would keep trying to reinstall xorg-server. I tried blocking the package but emerge would just complain that it was blocked. So, I reverted it back to Xorg for the time being.

This weekend I was building a new system and as determined to use XLibre with the build, instead of Xorg. I had a suspicion that having the 'X' use flag in the make.conf was at least part of the problem so I removed it, and as it turns out I wasn't far off. In my first emerge after the initial boot of the system which included xlibre-server a couple packages complained that X was not included so I added it for the packages, but I do not remember seeing xorg-server in the list...but it turns out it was. So again, I uninstalled xorg-server an xorg-drivers, then just installed xlibre-server which completed successfully. Then I re-ran my previous emerge...thats when I discovered what turns out to be my problem the entire time. The display manager I use, lightdm with the 'X' flag requires xorg-server as a dependency. So I added x11-misc/lightdm -X to my package.use folder, re-ran the initial emerge and the rest installed without issue.

I guess my questions are:
1) Should there be a better long term fix for this?
2) Does the 'X' use flag do the same thing for every package or does every package have its own use for the flag?
3) Should there be a separate XLibre flag or should the X flag should somehow include both Xorg and XLibre?
4) Will current packages built with the X flag complain later if xorg-server is not installed?
5) I remove the flag completely, how bad will the breakage be even with XLibre installed?

The system is currently running as expected, but I am wondering about long-term fallout.

Thank you in advance!

[Banana]

Moved from Desktop Environments to Unsupported Software.

[szatox]

I *think* you should keep X flag enabled, add xorg-server to package.provided and add xlibre to world set.
Basically, trick all packages into using an alternative provider. Xlibre, being a fork of xorg, should be compatible enough for this to just work.

[gjy0724]

Interesting, I have not heard of package.provided before now, I will have to research that. That does sound like an interesting proposition though. I literally just finished removing the flag from my make.conf, adding it only to a couple of packages that allowed me to update packages without the flag. However, I just ran emerge -eav world | grep 'X ' and a bunch more packages will likely complain the next time I rebuild them. So I will give your idea a shot.

I did do some searching through the initial packages that had the flag removed and most of them just required X11 support packages, lightdm seems to be the only one that directly required xorg-drivers which likely calls in xorg-server as well.

I added the following to package.provided and it seems to be doing the trick. I also re-added the 'X' flag in make.conf and removed the '-X' from lightdm.

Code: Select all

x11-base/xorg-drivers-9999
x11-base/xorg-server-9999

If this works as you expect, I'll feel better about migrating the rest of my systems. Thank you!

[GDH-gentoo]

Then I re-ran my previous emerge...thats when I discovered what turns out to be my problem the entire time. The display manager I use, lightdm with the 'X' flag requires xorg-server as a dependency.

With the X USE flag set, it requires x11-base/xorg-drivers, which, in turn, conditionally pulls back x11-base/xorg-server, depending on what INPUT_DEVICES and VIDEO_CARDS are set to. I find this dependency strange, but that's a different issue.

I guess my questions are:
1) Should there be a better long term fix for this?

Yes, the XLibre overlay should provide an ebuild for LightDM that depends on x11-base/xlibre-drivers instead. Or provide a dummy x11-base/xorg-drivers ebuild that pulls x11-base/xlibre-drivers, just like it does with x11-base/xorg-server.

2) Does the 'X' use flag do the same thing for every package or does every package have its own use for the flag?

Every package has its own use for the USE flag, but it generally means "link to X11 libraries", which the XLibre project doesn't fork and, as I understand it, should work with XLibre without changes (or else, XLibre wouldn't be suitable as a drop-in replacement).

3) Should there be a separate XLibre flag or should the X flag should somehow include both Xorg and XLibre?

Xorg is in Gentoo's official repository and XLibre is not, so I doubt there would be an XLibre USE flag as long as that is the situation, but I don't think it should be necessary either; see 2).

4) Will current packages built with the X flag complain later if xorg-server is not installed?

It depends on what they use the USE flag for, but I expect the answer to generally be "no"; see 2). LightDM seems to be the exception.

5) I remove the flag completely, how bad will the breakage be even with XLibre installed?

You probably shouldn't remove it if you are going to run an X11 environment (with Freedesktop's Xorg or XLibre).

[gjy0724]

GDH-gentoo,

Thank you for your direct responses to my questions, they are helpful. I honestly hope that XLibre does make it into the main gentoo repo, especially if Xorg continues to be dormant as it has been. But that is just my personal opinion. However, as long as XLibre is available that's all that really matters. I have always thought that Linux should be about choice no matter what distro someone uses, which is exactly why I use Gentoo as my daily. Oh the irony!

[mirekm]

Instead of fighting with the xorg-server being installed by portage, you could add xorg-server, and other packages that you want to remove into
/etc/portage/profile/package.provided

[flexibeast]

Instead of fighting with the xorg-server being installed by portage, you could add xorg-server, and other packages that you want to remove into
/etc/portage/profile/package.provided

Yes, szatox already noted this upthread (and the OP acknowledged it).

[gjy0724]

GDH-gentoo,

Yes, the XLibre overlay should provide an ebuild for LightDM that depends on x11-base/xlibre-drivers instead. Or provide a dummy x11-base/xorg-drivers ebuild that pulls x11-base/xlibre-drivers, just like it does with x11-base/xorg-server.

Would it be possible for the lightdm ebuild in the core repo include xorg-drivers or xlibre-drivers when the 'X' flag is called? I've always wanted to get into get into writing my own ebuilds from scratch, but life and time haven't allowed it yet. While I am fine with the current solution, I was just wondering if it would be worth the effort on their part as a long term solution so others don't run into the problem I did.

Thanks again!

[Hu]

An ebuild should not depend on a package that is not visible to Portage. Users who only sync the main tree, but not the Xlibre overlay, would not be able to see an xlibre-drivers package, so lightdm in the main tree should not depend on a package that is not in the main tree. You could ask for the Xlibre overlay to maintain a patched lightdm ebuild. Is it legal to install Xorg drivers and Xlibre drivers concurrently? If not, then perhaps the Xlibre overlay should have a package named xorg-drivers, which installs drivers for Xlibre.

[grknight]

Would it be possible for the lightdm ebuild in the core repo include xorg-drivers or xlibre-drivers when the 'X' flag is called? I've always wanted to get into get into writing my own ebuilds from scratch, but life and time haven't allowed it yet. While I am fine with the current solution, I was just wondering if it would be worth the effort on their part as a long term solution so others don't run into the problem I did.

No because dependencies of packages in ::gentoo need to be contained within it. It cannot look to other repositories without causing errors (mostly QA scripts but possibly in other parts of emerge).

[gjy0724]

Hu and grknight,

Those reasonings do make sense, it was just a curiosity on my part. So my current solution is likely the best as long as xlibre continues to be maintained in its own repo. It may be a good idea to add a reference to this solution on the XLibre wiki page as I can't believe I would be the only person that could run into this problem.

Thank you all for the assistance with this issue. While I suspect my issue is likely resolved, I would like to leave it open until I do a system update this weekend.

[GDH-gentoo]

Is it legal to install Xorg drivers and Xlibre drivers concurrently?

I believe that they install files with the same name, but have incompatible ABI, so probably not.

You could ask for the Xlibre overlay to maintain a patched lightdm ebuild. [...] If not, then perhaps the Xlibre overlay should have a package named xorg-drivers, which installs drivers for Xlibre.

Either of those IMO are the best solutions so that users don't have this problem, and should be requested to the overlay maintainers. package.provided is a hacky workaround.

[gjy0724]

Marking this as SOLVED. I recently migrated another system from Xorg to XLibre using the same steps, then updated it with no issue, there were no attempts to reinstall Xorg.

I also submitted an issue with the gentoo-ports repo of XLibre discussing their maintaining of ebuild replacing xorg-{drivers,server} with xlibre-{drivers,server} and referenced this discussion. So we shall see what happens.

[szatox]

Great, so which approach actually worked in the end?