I'd like a way to 'lock' a version of a package that I have installed, so that Portage will leave it alone. I'd like to put this list of package versions outside of package.mask so it won't get zapped by an 'emerge sync'. This would be useful for packages which take a certain degree of 'tweaking' to make them work as desired, (editing the .ebuild, manual .configure, and so on) and would be _known to break_ if one were to 'emerge -u world' and there were a newer version available. I've taken out qmail twice and apache once, through (admittedly careless) use of 'emerge -u world' and I'd like to be able to protect myself from my own mistakes. Reproducible: Didn't try Steps to Reproduce: n/a
*thinks* - Perhaps this could be implemented quite simply, with just an /etc/mask.conf that overrides the settings in package.mask and isn't therefore altered by emerge sync. (Same ways as make.conf & make.defaults work together)
you can 'pin' packages in your world file
