Normally, when USE flags are enabled, they are marked in red when doing emerge -pv. This does not happen with masked USE flags that are force-enabled, such as "multilib" in the 2005.0 amd64 profile, or the 3dnow/sse/sse2/mmx USE flags in the amd64 profiles. They are simply marked with paranthesis to show that they cannot be modified by the user. It might be good to highlight masked USE flags that are "always on", so that it's consistent with the rest of the USE flags displayed by emerge -pv. Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: For an example, on an 2005.0 amd64 computer, try doing an emerge -pv gcc and notice how multilib is masked and supposed to be enabled, but still blue color because of the USE flag masking. Actual Results: emerge -pv gcc These are the packages that I would merge, in order: Calculating dependencies ...done! [ebuild U ] sys-devel/gcc-3.4.3-r1 [3.4.3] -bootstrap +boundschecking -build -debug +fortran +gcj +gtk -hardened (-ip28) (-multilib)* -multislot (-n32) (-n64) +nls -nocxx +objc -static (-uclibc) 0 kB Total size of downloads: 0 kB Expected Results: Highlight the masked, but enabled USE flags. Portage 2.0.51-r13 (default-linux/amd64/2005.0, gcc-3.4.3, glibc-2.3.4.20041102-r0, 2.6.10-nitro1 x86_64) ================================================================= System uname: 2.6.10-nitro1 x86_64 AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3200+ Gentoo Base System version 1.4.16 Python: dev-lang/python-2.3.4 [2.3.4 (#1, Dec 26 2004, 11:54:56)] dev-lang/python: 2.3.4 sys-devel/autoconf: 2.59-r5 sys-devel/automake: 1.8.5-r1 sys-devel/binutils: 2.15.90.0.1.1-r3 sys-devel/libtool: 1.5.2-r7 virtual/os-headers: 2.6.8.1-r4 ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="amd64" AUTOCLEAN="yes" CFLAGS="-O2 -march=athlon64 -mmmx -m3dnow -msse2 -mfpmath=sse,387 -pipe" CHOST="x86_64-pc-linux-gnu" CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb /usr/kde/2/share/config /usr/kde/3/share/config /usr/lib/mozilla/defaults/pref /usr/share/config /usr/share/texmf/dvipdfm/config/ /usr/share/texmf/dvips/config/ /usr/share/texmf/tex/generic/config/ /usr/share/texmf/tex/platex/config/ /usr/share/texmf/xdvi/ /var/bind /var/qmail/control" CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/gconf /etc/terminfo /etc/env.d" CXXFLAGS="-O2 -march=athlon64 -mmmx -m3dnow -msse2 -mfpmath=sse,387 -pipe" DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles" FEATURES="autoaddcvs autoconfig ccache distlocks sandbox" GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://mirror.averse.net/pub/gentoo/ ftp://mirror.averse.net/pub/gentoo http://mymirror.asiaosc.org/gentoo/ http://gentoo.scphost.com http://www.zentek-international.com/mirrors/gentoo/" MAKEOPTS="-j2" PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages" PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp" PORTDIR="/usr/portage" PORTDIR_OVERLAY="/usr/local/overlays/portage /usr/local/overlays/bmg-main /usr/local/overlays/fluidportage/trunk" SYNC="rsync://rsync.asia.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage" USE="amd64 X aac alsa anthy audiofile berkdb canna cjk crypt cups curl dga directfb fam fbcon flac gdbm gif gnome gpm gstreamer gtk gtk2 imap immqt immqt-bc ipv6 jack java jpeg libclamav mad mysql ncurses nls nntp nptl nptlonly oggvorbis opengl pam perl php png python qt readline samba sdl skey slang spell ssl tcltk tetex tiff truetype unicode xml xml2 xprint xv zlib" Unset: LDFLAGS
There is no such thing as a USE flag that is forced on at this stage. You are free to disable any flags set by your profile.
umm, paranthesis means those USE flags are forced disabled, not forced enabled