-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Maciej Mrozowski wrote: > Hi > > I'd like to raise your attention on problem of in my opinion overusing IUSE > defaults in various packages. > Currently there seems to be no policy whatsoever at least advising when it's > appropriate to add +<useflag> and when not, so it's just up to developer's > taste. > While it usually doesn't do any particular harm (but I guess security and > prefix/alt team won't agree on this) - insanely enabling everything by default > is not the best idea in my opinion. > Of course we need an example. Let's have a look at latest stable media- > video/mplayer-1.0_rc2_p20090322 ebuild: > > IUSE="3dnow 3dnowext +a52 +aac aalib +alsa altivec +amrnb +amrwb arts +ass > bidi bindist bl +cddb +cdio cdparanoia -cpudetection -custom-cflags > -custom-cpuopts debug dga +dirac directfb doc +dts +dv dvb +dvd +dvdnav dxr3 > +enca +encode esd +faac +faad fbcon ftp gif ggi -gtk +iconv ipv6 jack > joystick jpeg kernel_linux ladspa libcaca lirc +live lzo mad md5sum +mmx > mmxext mng +mp2 +mp3 musepack nas +nemesi +network openal +opengl oss png pnm > pulseaudio pvr +quicktime radio +rar +real +rtc -samba > +schroedinger sdl +speex sse sse2 ssse3 svga teletext tga +theora +tremor > +truetype +unicode v4l v4l2 vdpau vidix +vorbis -win32codecs +X +x264 xanim > xinerama +xscreensaver +xv +xvid xvmc zoran"
moreover, there are certain USE flags that do not make sense in IUSE="+<flag>". for example alsa: if I use alsa, I want alsa globally enable in /etc/make.conf if I not use it (e.g. not in my profile) why should I explicitly put - -alsa in $USE? this may lead to an explosion of -<flag> flags in $USE. probably this example falls back into the "flag which pulls dependencies" case, but it is one more argument. configure scripts already have default values for the configure switches, and ebuilds should try to follow the defaults by putting +<flag> where needed, but with some exceptions (maybe on a flag-by-flag basis, or -more generally- by use-case, like you just wrote) - -- [email protected] -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.11 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iEYEARECAAYFAkoz2rMACgkQV/B5axfzrPs1dACeKIfPZ6XMRlD4Nf6L5s9WyCw5 uukAoKVmF2OMSykUhKwQ7aR5vR4j/+Nz =LuUh -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
