On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 7:49 AM, Carlos Silva <r3...@r3pek.org> wrote: > On Sun, Mar 3, 2013 at 1:42 PM, hasufell <hasuf...@gentoo.org> wrote: >> >> What do we have useflags for in gentoo? >> >> add a "unsupported-kernels" useflag, mask it, add a clear statement in >> the masking reason and be done > > > Not a bad solution, still, I, as a user, don't think making the compilation > work with a specific kernel should be considered "unsupported". How many > times modules stop working because the kernel changed something that breakes > compilation? And I'm not only talking about closed source drivers, even > open source ones have this "problem", but in fact, they are fixed faster. > > Does the gentoo community really need this kind of strictness? Don't think > so. >
So I'm going to get a bit meta here, forgive me ;) Currently the project more or less functions on herd and maintainer 'ownership.' Ownership of problems tends to be good in many cases. It is clear who is responsible, we know who to contact to fix bugs and ask questions of. This does lead to disagreements (such as this thread.) Some developers want these patches and the package maintainers disagree. In the current scheme, the package maintainer always wins. This is the downside to ownership, ownership implies control and responsibility. The package maintainers are against these patches, they do not want to own them, and they do not want the associated responsibility of users using them. I don't even necessarily mind Samuli's commit (ask for forgiveness, not permission), but I would mind if he put the patches back. The package maintainer has spoken out about why they dislike the patches and you should respect their opinion. The maintainers in this case suggested an overlay, and they even offered point users to it. This is the system we have; if you think it sucks (and it does, sometimes) please propose something better. -A
