According to "http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml?part=1&chap=6", one should use the mirrorselect command to select an rsync mirror using mirrorselect: Code Listing 1.2: Selecting an rsync mirror using mirrorselect # mirrorselect -i -r -o >> /mnt/gentoo/etc/make.conf This produces a line of the following form when I select "rsync://rsync.us. USA: Any available mirror - rsync.us.gentoo.org": SYNC="rsync://rsync.us.gentoo.org" When I tied to emerge --sync using this line in my make.conf, I kept getting the following error (from various servers): @ERROR: Unknown module 'metadata' Reading through other bug reports on Bugzilla (e.g., "http://bugs.gentoo.org/121491"), I found that the make.conf SYNC line should be of the following form: SYNC="rsync://rsync.us.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage" When I changed the line to that form, everything worked fine again. Either the documentation should be changed to include instructions on editing make.conf to change the SYNC line to the proper form, or mirrorselect should be changed to output the proper form. Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Type "/usr/sbin/mirrorselect -i -r -o" in any console. 2. Choose "rsync://rsync.us. USA: Any available mirror - rsync.us.gentoo.org" from the list of selections, then hit <RETURN>. 3. Copy and paste the output line ("SYNC="rsync://rsync.us.gentoo.org"") into your make.conf somewhere. 4. Try to emerge --sync from a root console. Actual Results: This is the result of one run. Other servers produced similar results. >>> Starting rsync with rsync://rsync.us.gentoo.org... >>> Checking server timestamp ... ########################################################## Rochester Institute of Technology - Research Computing o8o . .o8 `"' .o8 "888 oooo d8b oooo .o888oo .ooooo. .oooo888 oooo oooo `888""8P `888 888 d88' `88b d88' `888 `888 `888 888 888 888 888ooo888 888 888 888 888 888 888 888 . .o. 888 .o 888 888 888 888 d888b o888o "888" Y8P `Y8bod8P' `Y8bod88P" `V88V"V8P' Welcome to the RIT mirrors server located in Rochester, NY This mirror is sponsored by Research Computing http://www.rc.rit.edu/ Administrator contact: paul.mezzanini@rit.edu Machine name: mirrors.rit.edu ########################################################## @ERROR: Unknown module 'metadata' rsync error: error starting client-server protocol (code 5) at main.c(1506) [Receiver=3.0.7] >>> Retrying... ^C Exiting on signal 2 Expected Results: Normal emerge --sync activity. Here is the output from eix, indicating that I am using the latest version: sys8 ~ # eix mirrorselect [I] app-portage/mirrorselect Available versions: 2.0.0 (~)2.1.0 Installed versions: 2.1.0(07:51:42 AM 12/08/2009) Homepage: http://www.gentoo.org/ Description: Tool to help select distfiles mirrors for Gentoo ********** Here is a screenshot of the mirrorselect session, with extra blank lines removed: (sys8:dwr2:0) /home/dwr2 [609] $ /usr/sbin/mirrorselect -i -r -o * Downloading a list of mirrors... Got 111 mirrors. ┌───────────────────────────Gentoo RSYNC Mirrors─────────────────────────────┐ │ Please select your desired mirror: │ │ ┌────^(-)────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync.tw. Taiwan: Any available mirror - rsync.tw.gentoo.org│ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync3.tw Taiwan: isu.edu.tw - rsync3.tw.gentoo.org │ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync6.tw Taiwan: National Center for High-Performance Compu│ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync.uk. UK: Any available mirror - rsync.uk.gentoo.org │ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync2.uk UK: Bytemark Hosting - rsync2.uk.gentoo.org │ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync1.uk UK: Qube Managed Services - rsync1.uk.gentoo.org │ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync3.uk UK: star.net.uk - rsync3.uk.gentoo.org │ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync.ua. Ukraine: Any available mirror - rsync.ua.gentoo.or│ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync1.ua Ukraine: gentoo.kiev.ua - rsync1.ua.gentoo.org │ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync2.ua Ukraine: ITEAM gentoo mirror - rsync2.ua.gentoo.or│ │ │ │(*) rsync://rsync.us. USA: Any available mirror - rsync.us.gentoo.org │ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync7.us USA: CERIAS, Purdue University - rsync7.us.gentoo.│ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync21.u USA: Chemistry Dept, University of Wisconsin at Ma│ │ │ │( ) rsync://rsync9.us USA: gentoo.insync.za.net - rsync9.us.gentoo.org │ │ │ └────v(+)────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ │ ├────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤ │ < OK > <Cancel> │ └────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ SYNC="rsync://rsync.us.gentoo.org" (sys8:dwr2:0) /home/dwr2 [610] $ ********** Here is the output from emerge --info (with the erroneous SYNC line in make.conf): Portage 2.2_rc67 (default/linux/amd64/10.0, gcc-4.4.3, glibc-2.11-r1, 2.6.32-gentoo-r6 x86_64) ================================================================= System uname: Linux-2.6.32-gentoo-r6-x86_64-AMD_Athlon-tm-_64_X2_Dual_Core_Processor_4200+-with-gentoo-2.0.1 Timestamp of tree: Fri, 02 Apr 2010 04:30:01 +0000 app-shells/bash: 4.1_p2-r1 dev-java/java-config: 2.1.10 dev-lang/python: 2.6.5-r1, 3.1.2-r1 dev-python/pycrypto: 2.1.0 dev-util/cmake: 2.8.1 sys-apps/baselayout: 2.0.1 sys-apps/openrc: 0.6.1-r1 sys-apps/sandbox: 2.2 sys-devel/autoconf: 2.13, 2.65 sys-devel/automake: 1.4_p6-r1, 1.7.9-r2, 1.8.5-r4, 1.9.6-r3, 1.10.3, 1.11.1 sys-devel/binutils: 2.20.1 sys-devel/gcc: 4.4.3 sys-devel/gcc-config: 1.4.1 sys-devel/libtool: 2.2.6b virtual/os-headers: 2.6.33 ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="amd64 ~amd64" ACCEPT_LICENSE="* -@EULA DOOM3 ETQW IBM-J1.6 PUEL dlj-1.1 sun-bcla-java-vm" CBUILD="x86_64-pc-linux-gnu" CFLAGS="-march=athlon64 -O2 -pipe -g -ggdb" CHOST="x86_64-pc-linux-gnu" CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/kde/3.5/env /usr/kde/3.5/share/config /usr/kde/3.5/shutdown /usr/lib64/fax /usr/share/X11/xkb /usr/share/config /var/bind /var/lib/hsqldb /var/spool/fax/etc" CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/ca-certificates.conf /etc/env.d /etc/env.d/java/ /etc/eselect/postgresql /etc/fonts/fonts.conf /etc/gconf /etc/gentoo-release /etc/revdep-rebuild /etc/sandbox.d /etc/splash /etc/terminfo /etc/texmf/language.dat.d /etc/texmf/language.def.d /etc/texmf/updmap.d /etc/texmf/web2c" CXXFLAGS="-march=athlon64 -O2 -pipe -g -ggdb" DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles" FEATURES="assume-digests distlocks fixpackages installsources news nostrip parallel-fetch preserve-libs protect-owned sandbox sfperms strict unmerge-logs unmerge-orphans userfetch" GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://www.gtlib.gatech.edu/pub/gentoo http://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/distributions/gentoo/ http://mirrors.rit.edu/gentoo/" LANG="en_US.UTF-8" LDFLAGS="-Wl,-O1" LINGUAS="en_US en" MAKEOPTS="-j1" PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages" PORTAGE_CONFIGROOT="/" PORTAGE_RSYNC_OPTS="--recursive --links --safe-links --perms --times --compress --force --whole-file --delete --stats --timeout=180 --exclude=/distfiles --exclude=/local --exclude=/packages" PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp" PORTDIR="/usr/portage" PORTDIR_OVERLAY="/usr/local/portage/layman/sunrise /usr/local/portage/layman/voyageur /usr/local/portage/layman/kde-sunset /usr/local/portage/layman/roslin /usr/local/portage/layman/haskell" SYNC="rsync://rsync.us.gentoo.org" USE="3dnow X a52 aac acl acpi aim alsa amd64 ao apache2 apm atm audiofile avahi bash-completion bcmath bidi bindist blas branding bsf bzip2 cairo calendar caps cdda cddb cdparanoia cdr cgi chasen cjk clamav cli cracklib crypt cscope css ctype cups curl curlwrappers cvs cxx dbi dbus dbx dga directfb djvu doc dri dts dv dvb dvd dvdr encode enscript esd evo examples exif expat fam fastcgi fbcon ffmpeg fftw flac fltk fontconfig foomaticdb fortran freewnn ftp gcj gd gdbm geoip ggi gif gimp ginac glut gmp gnome gnome-keyring gnuplot gnustep gnutls gphoto2 gpm graphviz gsl gsm gstreamer gtk gtkhtml guile hal handbook hardened hddtemp iconv icu idn imagemagick imap imlib inifile innodb iodbc ipv6 jack java java6 javascript jbig jpeg jpeg2k kde kerberos kontact krb4 ladspa lame lapack lash latex lcms ldap libcaca libedit libgda libnotify libsamplerate libwww lm_sensors lua lzo m17n-lib mad maildir mailwrapper matroska mbox memlimit mhash migemo mikmod mime mmap mmx mng modplug modules mono motif mp3 mp4 mpeg mpi mplayer mtp mudflap multilib musepack musicbrainz mysql mysqli nas ncurses neXt netcdf networkmanager nis nls nntp nocd nptl nptlonly nsplugin ocaml ocamlopt odbc offensive ogg openal openexr opengl openmp osc pam pcntl pcre pdf plasma plotutils png policykit portaudio posix postgres ppds pppd prelude profile pulseaudio python qt3 qt4 quicktime raw readline recode reflection rss ruby samba sasl scanner sdl seamonkey semantic-desktop session sharedmem shorten simplexml skey smartcard smp sndfile snmp soap sockets socks5 source sox speex spell sqlite sqlite3 sse sse2 ssl startup-notification static-libs subversion suid svg symlink sysfs syslog sysvipc szip taglib tcl tcpd theora threads tidy tiff timidity tk truetype unicode usb vcd vhosts videos vim-syntax vorbis wavpack wddx wmf wxwidgets x264 xattr xcb xcomposite xface xft xine xinetd xml xmlrpc xorg xosd xpm xprint xscreensaver xsl xulrunner xv xvid zeroconf zlib zsh-completion" ALSA_CARDS="hda-intel" ALSA_PCM_PLUGINS="adpcm alaw asym copy dmix dshare dsnoop empty extplug file hooks iec958 ioplug ladspa lfloat linear meter mmap_emul mulaw multi null plug rate route share shm softvol" APACHE2_MODULES="actions alias auth_basic auth_digest authn_anon authn_dbd authn_dbm authn_default authn_file authz_dbm authz_default authz_groupfile authz_host authz_owner authz_user autoindex cache dav dav_fs dav_lock dbd deflate dir disk_cache env expires ext_filter file_cache filter headers ident imagemap include info log_config logio mem_cache mime mime_magic negotiation proxy proxy_ajp proxy_balancer proxy_connect proxy_http rewrite setenvif so speling status unique_id userdir usertrack vhost_alias" CAMERAS="canon directory" ELIBC="glibc" INPUT_DEVICES="evdev keyboard mouse wacom" KERNEL="linux" LINGUAS="en_US en" NETBEANS_MODULES="apisupport cnd dlight enterprise ergonomics groovy gsf harness ide identity j2ee java mobility nb profiler ruby webcommon websvccommon" RUBY_TARGETS="ruby18" USERLAND="GNU" VIDEO_CARDS="fbdev nv nvidia vesa" Unset: CPPFLAGS, CTARGET, EMERGE_DEFAULT_OPTS, FFLAGS, INSTALL_MASK, LC_ALL, PORTAGE_COMPRESS, PORTAGE_COMPRESS_FLAGS, PORTAGE_RSYNC_EXTRA_OPTS
Fixed in >=app-portage/mirrorselect-2.1.0-r1, thanks!
