SLOTs and blocking

[SDraconis]

Is there any way to force a SLOTed package to just update the old package instead of creating a new SLOT? This most commonly happens to me with phpMyAdmin and phpPGAdmin. I understand the beauty of slotting and all, but usually I want to update these in-place rather than installing another side-by-side copy. Is umerging and remerging the only way, or is there a better solution?

On a similar note, I get worried when I have certain important packages blocking their newer versions. In this case, I'm afraid to unmerge an old version first. For example, what if the package in question was Python and the old version was blocking the new one (purely hypothetical)? Unmerging the old Python first would make Portage no longer work and leave me high and dry. Is there a standard way to deal with this?

[desultory]

Is there any way to force a SLOTed package to just update the old package instead of creating a new SLOT?

One approach would be: emerge =$package-$version.

On a similar note, I get worried when I have certain important packages blocking their newer versions. In this case, I'm afraid to unmerge an old version first. For example, what if the package in question was Python and the old version was blocking the new one (purely hypothetical)? Unmerging the old Python first would make Portage no longer work and leave me high and dry. Is there a standard way to deal with this?

If for some reason an update to Python would be blocked by an earlier version the simplest approach would likely be to use a live CD with portage to install the new Python version into the installed system. In more mundane cases, you could simply make a backup of the package before removing it.

[SDraconis]

Is there any way to force a SLOTed package to just update the old package instead of creating a new SLOT?

One approach would be: emerge =$package-$version.

The packages in question still want to install as new slots:

Code: Select all

# emerge -av --update phpmyadmin phppgadmin

These are the packages that would be merged, in order:

Calculating dependencies... done!
[ebuild  NS   ] dev-db/phpmyadmin-2.9.2_rc1  USE="-vhosts" 0 kB 
[ebuild  NS   ] dev-db/phppgadmin-4.0.1  USE="-vhosts" 0 kB

Code: Select all

# emerge -av =dev-db/phppgadmin-4.0.1 =phpmyadmin-2.9.2_rc1

These are the packages that would be merged, in order:

Calculating dependencies... done!
[ebuild  NS   ] dev-db/phppgadmin-4.0.1  USE="-vhosts" 0 kB 
[ebuild  NS   ] dev-db/phpmyadmin-2.9.2_rc1  USE="-vhosts" 0 kB

On a similar note, I get worried when I have certain important packages blocking their newer versions. In this case, I'm afraid to unmerge an old version first. For example, what if the package in question was Python and the old version was blocking the new one (purely hypothetical)? Unmerging the old Python first would make Portage no longer work and leave me high and dry. Is there a standard way to deal with this?

If for some reason an update to Python would be blocked by an earlier version the simplest approach would likely be to use a live CD with portage to install the new Python version into the installed system. In more mundane cases, you could simply make a backup of the package before removing it.

The Python case was just an example. I'm trying to see if there's a better way than unmerging and then emerging the new version. I'm guessing then that there is no better way.

[Genone]

http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=121385