Hi everyone,
I'd like to bounce a question of the community regarding the order of
profile stackings. We have a suggestion in hardened to re-introduce the
hardened desktop profile. This was deprecated because controlling the
profile stacking order is very difficult. Specifically, if we set
..
../../../../targets/desktop
in $PORTDIR/hardened/linux/amd64/desktop/parent (taking amd64 as an example),
then we get a stacking order where targets/desktop overrides
hardened/linux/amd64. This causes problems because of flags we need to mask in
hardened.
A suggestion was forwarded to switch
$PORTDIR/hardened/linux/amd64/desktop/parent to the following
../../../../targets/desktop
..
This, however, puts targets/desktop before even base which is problematic. In fact, the resulting stacking order is:
/usr/portage/profiles/targets/desktop
/usr/portage/profiles/base
/usr/portage/profiles/default/linux
/usr/portage/profiles/arch/base
/usr/portage/profiles/features/multilib
/usr/portage/profiles/features/multilib/lib32
/usr/portage/profiles/arch/amd64
/usr/portage/profiles/releases
/usr/portage/profiles/eapi-5-files
/usr/portage/profiles/releases/13.0
/usr/portage/profiles/hardened/linux
/usr/portage/profiles/hardened/linux/amd64
/usr/portage/profiles/hardened/linux/amd64/desktop
The concern with this stacking order is that, with all the later subprofiles
overriding targets/desktop, we have breakage waiting to happen when changes are
made in arch/amd64 or default/linux. Since the whole community takes care of
those profiles, this seems like a question for everyone. Do people assume a
particular order to stacking when they commit to arch/ or default/linux?
The issue is being tracked in bug #492312. I give an example of my concern
there.
--
Anthony G. Basile, Ph.D.
Gentoo Linux Developer [Hardened]
E-Mail : [email protected]
GnuPG FP : 1FED FAD9 D82C 52A5 3BAB DC79 9384 FA6E F52D 4BBA
GnuPG ID : F52D4BBA
