On Tuesday 11/27/2012 the kde-base/kremotecontrol.ebuild was modified to pull in app-misc/lirc as a dependency in reference to this bug #444782. Unfortunately, like the vast majority of PC owners I don't have any infared on my laptop. For years I've installed the KDE suite by using the kde-meta package which in turn pulls in the other most commonly used KDE packages in the suite and their dependencies. Since I don't have any need for lirc, I struggled with a way to keep it from being installed on my system. The way it stands now, the only way to block lirc from installing is to uninstall the kde-meta package, then install every sub kde-meta package individually i.e., (kate, kdeadmin-meta, kdeartwork-meta, kdebase-meta, kdeedu-meta, kdegames-meta, kdegraphics-meta, kdemultimedia-meta, kdenetwork-meta, kdeplasma-addons, kdetoys-meta, kdepim-meta) and every package within the kdeutils-meta minus kremotecontrol individually. I don't find this to be a very acceptable solution. Are we becoming Microsoft, Red Hat or Ubuntu, where we are all forced to install unnecessary bloat in order to satisfy the small percentage of users that MIGHT need a package? Instead, a better solution would be to add the lirc "use" to the kdeutils-meta package like we do with cups and floppy. This way all one has to do if they have an infared device is add the lirc "use" to draw in both kremotecontrol and lirc. This to me seems like a more elegant solution than forcing the vast majority of us who don't have infared devices to install packages we don't need. So what I've done is modify the current kde-base/kdeutils-meta.ebuild so that it now has USE="lirc" which makes kremotecontrol and its dependencies optional for those who may need it. I am submitting this modified ebuild as an attachment in hopes that it will shortly be added to the tree. I've tested it in my personal overlay and it appears to work as expected. Reproducible: Always
Created attachment 330886 [details] modified kde-base/kdeutils-meta-4.9.3.ebuild Added the modified kde-base/kdeutils-meta-4.9.3.ebuild which adds USE="lirc" to optionally pull in kremotecontrol and its dependencies. This was the default behavior on the old kde-3.x series. TIA
(In reply to comment #0) > I don't find this to be a very acceptable solution. Are we becoming > Microsoft, Red Hat or Ubuntu, where we are all forced to install unnecessary > bloat in order to satisfy the small percentage of users that MIGHT need a > package? I was also suprised by this (for me) unnecessary new dependency yesterday. But I think the devs have a lot to keep in mind, so I think this is just a small issue they might have missed. So, no need to use such "hard" words. ;) Imho, there's no reason why your patch should not be included.
I find it a bit ironic you're complaining about the dependencies for a package you don't use. :) The point of a meta-package, after all, is to pull in a certain group of packages. That said, I have no objection to adding the USE flag, but if I recall someone else did, so I will wait a little bit to see if they chime in. (In reply to comment #1) > USE="lirc" to optionally pull in kremotecontrol and its dependencies. > > This was the default behavior on the old kde-3.x series. For the record, the offending commit that changed this: http://git.overlays.gentoo.org/gitweb/?p=proj/kde.git;a=commit;h=27cc65b16cf52c581b5ccbac8f57d8286eaa17d5
@Mario and @Michael You both make good points in regards to why I use the kde-meta to install the KDE suite. Without writing a novel here and a long dragged-out explanation, let's say it's easier to maintain my systems this way. I'm a 50 year old truck driver and family man, not a programmer. Computers have been a hobby of mine for well over 25 years and I've been using Linux as my primary OS for over 15 years and Gentoo for over a decade. I try to set up all 5 of the machines in our house so they run identical software with the only differences being drivers, and that I run ~arch, while I have their boxes running stable arch. All of them have identical make.conf, world and other configuration files and thus their "USE" flags are the same. Using the kde-meta to pull in the entire KDE suite is just one way to make them much easier to maintain and update. I could go into further detail, but I think you get the gist of it. BTW thanks for responding and I hope that this can make it into the tree soon. TIA
Thanks, fixed in CVS and git. + 01 Dec 2012; Michael Palimaka <kensington@gentoo.org> + kdeutils-meta-4.8.5.ebuild, kdeutils-meta-4.9.3.ebuild: + Add lirc USE flag making kremotecontrol optional, wrt bug #445150. http://git.overlays.gentoo.org/gitweb/?p=proj/kde.git;a=commit;h=09947d8efe4a0cef12d1c80e9e37f47c4ebc9fe5
