Under no circumstances is sys-apps/less specifically necessary for the proper function of any Gentoo system. The only thing needed is a pager. However, all Linux system profiles list less, making it counterintuitive to cleanly remove (as it just gets reinstalled with every emerge -u unless you put it in /etc/portage/package.mask). It would be much more appropriate to have a virtual, e.g. virtual/pager which less provides and is the default for. For reference, packages that I know of besides less that provide pagers that would satisfy the virtual: sys-apps/util-linux provides "more" As I'm sure you know, more is pretty basic, and definitely shouldn't be the default pager. I'm not sure if more should be included since it's so basic and is from an otherwise pretty critical package. app-text/lv provides "lv" -- this is my personal preference, as it properly displays Unicode files provided the terminal supports Unicode and is correctly configured.
if we make these changes: base/packages:-sys-apps/less base/packages:+virtual/pager base/virtuals:+virtual/pager sys-apps/less sys-apps/less.ebuild:PROVIDE=virtual/pager sys-apps/util-linux.ebuild:PROVIDE=virtual/pager app-text/lv.ebuild:PROVIDE=virtual/pager i think all should be fine ... the default setup in Gentoo would still be to have less always installed and all our default PAGER settings wouldnt need to be tweaked
Not quite, but that's the idea, yeah. roothorick@prodigy /usr/portage/profiles $ find -name packages | xargs grep -Hn sys-apps/less ./base/packages:49:*sys-apps/less ./cobalt-mips-1.4/packages:72:*sys-apps/less ./default-alpha-1.4/packages:69:*sys-apps/less ./default-alpha-2004.0/packages:61:*sys-apps/less ./default-mips-1.4/packages:66:*sys-apps/less ./default-mips64-1.4/packages:69:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc/packages:91:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc-1.0/packages:115:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc-1.4/packages:51:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc-2004.0/packages:32:*sys-apps/less ./default-sparc-1.4/packages:80:*sys-apps/less ./default-sparc-2004.0/packages:81:*sys-apps/less ./default-sparc64-1.4/packages:98:*sys-apps/less ./default-sparc64-2004.0/packages:99:*sys-apps/less ./gcc33-sparc64-1.4/packages:98:*sys-apps/less ./hardened/amd64/packages:36:*sys-apps/less ./hardened-x86-2004.0/packages:51:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc-2004.3/packages:32:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc64-2004.3/packages:58:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc-2004.1/packages:32:*sys-apps/less ./cobalt-mips-2004.1/packages:69:*sys-apps/less ./default-mips-2004.1/packages:66:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc-2004.2/packages:32:*sys-apps/less ./gcc34-amd64-2004.1/packages:42:*sys-apps/less ./default-ppc64-2004.2/packages:58:*sys-apps/less ./n32-mips-2004.1/packages:65:*sys-apps/less ./default-amd64-2004.2/packages:36:*sys-apps/less ./default-x86-2004.2/packages:71:*sys-apps/less ./gcc34-x86-2004.2/packages:73:*sys-apps/less
We don't really care about non-cascaded profiles, they're just there for legacy reasons.
s/really//
added to cvs
