PHPUnit2 uses some features of the xdebug php extension for its code coverage analysis. If xdebug is not available, the code coverage feature is disabled, but PHPUnit2 still works. This is why I'd suggest to either remove the xdebug dependancy from the xdebug ebuild or to trigger it via a local USE flag (e.g. "code-coverage").
There was a recent discussion in the PHP Herd that PEAR packages should pull in even their optional dependencies and I don't see why this should be a problem in this case.
Hi Sebastian, I'd like to avoid installing unneeded software on my machines. Installing a package just to satisfy another package's depedency for a feature I don't use does not make much sense to me and afaik this is what Gentoo's use flags are for. I don't want to annoy you, but what do you think about my suggestion regarding that use flag? It could be enabled by default, so adding that flag won't change anything unless I deactivate it in my package.use.
Reverted until I figure out/decide on another way to handle this.
