Ignoring the question of GCC-specific code, think about it for a second. If all source that GCC can compile were automatically to fall under the GPL, then all standards-compliant C code would automatically be GPLed. In other words, the mere existence of GCC would force all code written in C to be GPLed.
No, it is the binary compiled by gcc that could be construed as derived from gcc - not the source code. So without that clause in the license, binaries compiled with gcc would demand that you redistributed the source code of the program as well as the source code of gcc. A bit ridiculous, eh? Hence the exception.
This is what gadgets using c-pen and anoto technologies is for (I have no affiliation
with them). I know gadgets wasn't what you asked for - but these are the closest solutions I have seen.
There's a certain OS that more or less demands that you set hardware time to local time - whereas some other OSes prefer hardware time as GMT. This difference is not exploitable in UK during the winter, and probably not on 'puters with dual boot. It does have something to do with date and time though...
As a kid I was sitting with my kid brother beside our father - as he read bedtime stories. The Cyberiad easily made the deepest inpact on us (though The Hobbit also made an impression). I have never read a boring book by Lem! It is tempting to believe, as PKD did, that he was indeed a commitee - such a genious.
Alas, being fed Lem as a kid kinda set us apart from the other kids a bit.;)
What is really stopping me right now from switching to a linux desktop is software support...
Not that I would want to tire you with a meaningless argument - but what software do you miss? I'm genuinely interested here - since I havent missed a thing since I took the plunge. More importantly, neither has my (distincly less computer literate) wife.
Zealots, dupes, spelling errors, clueless and rabid posters. They've all been here for as long as I can recall. Now, my memory in a bit dim, but I was reading/. for a long while before I felt the urge to post - and so registered an acount (and there's a reason my ID is roughly a tenth of yours).
I'll believe the thoughtfull posters (as well as your other ID) you are raving about when I see them.
Now, if the moderators are doing their job (fat chance!) - we'll both get moderated OT.
Having read "Salmon of doubt", I gather Douglas Adams very much wanted to be involved in this project, (I found his list of phone numbers rather funny:), but then he died.:(
What I wonder is how much he got the chance to be involved, and what (if any) of his contributions to the movie script that were cut (and that you miss)? Were there new stuff, or was it a question of selecting from the preexisting versions?
(I realize answering this question might require the protection of an asbestos suit, but you are welcome to borrow mine.)
This is not like the GPL. If you get something for free under the GPL, the GPL is the only thing that certifies that you have a legal right to have that software. If you buy software in a shop (even if it is only bundled with some hardware), you have a nice little receipt that says the software is yours.
Old Borland software used to have a not that said you should treat the software like a book. Use it, and resell it if you like, but don't sell, give away, or keep a copy. Seems reasonable to me.
The simputer is supposed to be a symbol-centered simple computer - instead of a text-centered advanced computer - so the idea was to make it usefull to (computer) illiterate people. It is a handheld - so the power is supplied by a battery, which is charged when there is power. (And having been to India, I can tell you that all but the poorest buildings have a TV, and if you don't aford a TV - you won't aford any kind of 'puter.)
The problem is that the idea with "simple" might make literate people shun it, since it could be percieved as insulting to their intelligence. OTOH I don't think all that many illiterate people in rural areas can aford it.
Dust is of course an issue too, though India isn't exactly a desert country. Isn't dust an issue in eg Texas? IIUC mobile phones do sell in India without any special dust protection.
But the simputer is a handheld, so it has a battery. You plug it in, and while there is electricity it charges.
The thing you write about blackouts is what I percieve as the biggest hurdle for stationary 'puters in rural India (having been there). You need to have a rather big battery backup to get any job done on computers, since it isn't good enough to shut down gracefully on a power failure. If you do, all of your day will consist of computers going up and down, and it will be rather hard to get anything done. The battery backup you need to stay afloat is a bit expensive, so it turns out it is a bit hard to bring 'puters to rural India that way (unless you're rich, a business, or some kind of institution like eg a school or a mission or something).
Well, look at it as a friendly advice then, and not an attack. I much prefer Free software myself (only non-free code on the 4 'puters I admin is the nvidia-driver - the graphics driver situation on Linux is a good demonstration of why Free is better than free), and when I do program I avoid Java for the same reason as you do.
Still, when I read the comments to this story (browsing at 2), I first read 4-5 comments about how this is already fixed. Below them, I read your comment - which came out as a bit agressive. So, maybe you could have reread the comments before pressing submit?
Now, will you take to browsing at 1 before you post too? (RTFAing does not seem to be enough.)
Your point is valid - Sun can revoke the license unilaterally. However, when you shot off this post you already had a couple of factual errors: Sun revoked it by mistake, the guys at FreeBSD knew who to ask, and their emails did get answered.
In short, for not having done your research (there are not that many comments here yet, and they were fewer when you posted), you look at least a bit raving IMHO.
The binary drivers are not a non-issue. I have described exactly what are the issues with the binary drivers. We are not being stupid about it; we actually expect hardware we pay for to work. Not work as perfectly as it does in a Windows environment, not to be as easy to install. But you yourself have commented that only old hardware has working support (in free drivers). Everybody is not a hardware developer; and unless we buy old hardware - the hardware we buy is not adequately supported. (As in video-in, framrate not being on par with the competition because of driver issues, etc)
As I said, if you don't have issues: Fine! There are others who have issues with the binary drivers. And as you commented elsewhere, the Free drivers for newer hardware (which you kindly linked to, and which I already knew about because I diligently researched the hardware + drivers before coughing up money) are NOT USABLE. So unless someone is a hardware hacker looking for a challenge - ATI really does have some serious driver problems, and you are better off buying an ATI 9200 than the latest and greatest. Meanwhile, Nvidia's newest does support all on-board features without killing X, switching between video-in/3D-support.
Next time, answer all of the comment - or don't bother at all.
Why, that's grand. Then you have what you want already. Why can't you let us bitch and moan about the real problems we have?
Remember that my problem is that you are afraid we'll miff someone at ATI with a big ego, and because of that you chastise people who complain about real problems. (The latest ATI performing poorly compared to an old Nvidia, having to restart X switching between features etc.)
I don't know what model you have, but the poster is not satisfied with that of his 9600AiW. Have you completely mised out on the AiW part? The one about having a card that either has a dead video-in or a dead 3D?
So, if I want a card with both 3D-acceleration and video-in; my option is buying an old ATI card on a fleamarket - or buying a recent Nvidia card where the binary and OSS drivers can cooperate.
And you claim that there is something about this situation that works? That there is something about this situation worth perpetuating by not offending those who work on the binary drivers telling them the truth?
Or do you mean that it is the binary drivers for recent ATI cards that work? Those drivers which lets an Nvidia 5700 stomp all over the X800Pro in Anands benchmarks? And which will not let the user use video-in?
If ATI wants the Linux community to buy their (new) video cards, it is their responsibility to give us usefull drivers - which will not demand that we restart the X server, if we want to use one or another feature. It's a showstopper.
It is not the responsibility of the community to tread lightly around ATI's developers. It is the responisbility of the community to shout CAVEAT EMPTOR! - as long as the situation is like it is today.
Here's the deal: I will not buy an ATI card until I'm confident that it is comparable to an equally priced Nvidia card in performance and features, as well as I'm confident that I will never ever have to restart the X server to use a certain feature.
The headline? It says: "ATI drivers for Linux that Work?"
And you concluded: "Or he'd buy an older card. Thats what ATI doesn't see, the many of us who just don't upgrade because the driver won't work."
So you said the same thing yourself.
What I don't like is the attitude that we should tread easy, lest we offend someone with a too big ego. We are the customers; ATI should tread easy lest they offend us!
As for open drivers, ATI boast with their support for open source drivers for their older hardware. That still will not generate any sells for them, since that old hardware will be sold in [virtual/meatspace] fleamarkets. Even with this older hardware using OSS drivers, I couldn't come up with how I should be able to have 3D-acceleration (Utah-GLX) and video capture (Gatos) without having to restart X switching from one feature to the other! Hello? Should I be happy I don't have to restart the entire computer, loading a new kernel? (NB: This does work with Nvidia binary drivers and RivaTV OSS video capture driver.)
He didn't exactly say "ATI are teh suxxors". He said that performance of the ATI drivers are not up to par. I assume he speaks of 3D performance - 'cause if he does, he's very right. Why can't we say what's obvious? Because you are afraid we'll miff someone with a big ego?
As for Nvidia drivers not being free, well ATI drivers for cards later than 9200 (IIRC), that have any 3D support, are not free either. And they will never be, because there is intellectual property in them that doesn't belong to ATI (says ATI). So, this guy will use a non-free driver no matter what.
If he would want both 3D and the AllInWonder features - he will have to alternate between different drivers (ie he will have to restart X). That's ATI's support for you.
I have recently been shopping for a video card - and I was very tempted by a 9600AiW; but when I got a hang of the problems - it turned out that the MSI5900XT was a much better buy, since I run Linux exclusively.
The UN is run by its member nations. As long as US'ians go on with media spin involving henchmen, the rest of the world yawns.
No henchmen dictated the Kyoto treaty. It was negotiated. US was the most listened-to country in these negotiations (it has the most guns after all). Now, US looks like it is ready to screw everybody, including their own henchmen.
There are many who are geniunely afraid that if we continue down the current road, the US will be the only free country.
The US has a long record of supporting dictators of non-free countries. I'm not sure I see that changing. Please prove me wrong. (Afghanistan and Iraq is not looking very encouraging right now.)
Saddam was not a threat to anybody except Iraqi citizens. That's bad enough, but guess what? The US has killed a lot more civilians than Saddam has lately. I don't take the cruelty of this former dictator lightly, my country hosts a lot of refugees from Iraq.
However, I can't see how such an offtopic post can be modded "informative".
As for Kofi, the problem with the US is that you believe that you have the right to make and unmake SG at will. The rest of us are tired of that.
As for the UN, other countries thought it modest to at least continue inspections a while longer. Colin Powell thought it modest to wait a bit, to get more allies for the invasion. And I still have not heard of a single shred of evidence of WMD (except for republican pre-election spin) You say such evidence exists, then provide a link to impartial media reporting such findings - else shut up.
Back to the Kyoto treaty: You haven't adressed it at all. US'ians were there negotiating the treaty, why didn't they talk then? A treaty that anybody had thought the US didn't back would have been stillborn. The treaty is not imposed from the UN, it was negotiated among the countries in the UN - of which the US is the most influential.
Last things last: I haven't heard anything about Kofi trying to wage war on the US. Comparing him to Usama shows you for the troll you are. Who do you think the UN is? It is an assembly where the US is without a doubt the strongest player. Any future alternative will not be situated in the US, and will not allow the US to veto anything and everything.
Yeah right. It's much better to ignore problems completely - instead of getting started somewhere.
The Kyoto treaty was negotiated. The US was represented. Guess what? If you had a problem with the treaty you should have said so in Kyoto.
But you decided it hurts your precious industry, so you backstabbed it instead - so that you won't have to do anything at all. Nice job.
Now, in all fairness. The treaty does tax industrial countries higher (not just the US - but all industrial countries). This was not a question of fairness, but a question of what is possible. In developing countries, there is a larger need to put food on the table, get health care working, build infrastructures etc. The industrial countries have resources to spare, then why the fuck should we not take that responsibility?
If you want to speak in terms of fairness, these countries are way behind our industrialized countries in pollution. They have a lot to catch up on. (Moral: There will always be a kid who's shouting "unfair". The only reason to listen to you is the amount of guns you have.)
If memmory serves, Kofi was installed to please the US, who didn't like his predecsessor (Boutros Boutros-Ghali) enough. Now the US (who pretty much owns the UN as far as the rest of the world is concerned) whines about Kofi. Well, don't meddle so much next time then! (Disclaimer: I'm of the same nationality as Kofi's wife, Nanne Annan.)
Also, you say "screw the UN". Do you mean that as in "screw the rest of the world", or do you mean that as in "screw a system where the veto-power-of-the-strong handicaps most efforts". If the former, you sound like a child. If the latter, I agree - I'd be a lot happier with binding majority votes.
That's what the homepage and documentation of that package is for.
Spamming the console with duplicate information just desensitizes people to information.
Portage is a CLI tool executing batch processes, it usually installs/upgrades many packages in one go. If I was installing koffice (and did not have kde before) - I would get loads of documentation for my dependencies too. Probably too much. Not exactly helpfull.
Last time I checked, no other command line package managers had such a feature (at least none I've used). Some gui tools may, or may not, have that type of feature.
AFAIK most packages in gentoo have a basic default config on install.
IMHO the problem arises when people install random packages with interesting names out of the blue - just because they're in/usr/portage. (Who? ME?)
So it seems to me that a GUI frontend for portage would be better suited for that type of problem. Such a frontend could handle both information about what the program is/does, and postinstallation information. (A port of synaptic perhaps?)
Slashdot Mirror
No, it is the binary compiled by gcc that could be construed as derived from gcc - not the source code. So without that clause in the license, binaries compiled with gcc would demand that you redistributed the source code of the program as well as the source code of gcc. A bit ridiculous, eh? Hence the exception.
This is what gadgets using c-pen and anoto technologies is for (I have no affiliation with them). I know gadgets wasn't what you asked for - but these are the closest solutions I have seen.
There's a certain OS that more or less demands that you set hardware time to local time - whereas some other OSes prefer hardware time as GMT. This difference is not exploitable in UK during the winter, and probably not on 'puters with dual boot. It does have something to do with date and time though...
As a kid I was sitting with my kid brother beside our father - as he read bedtime stories. The Cyberiad easily made the deepest inpact on us (though The Hobbit also made an impression). I have never read a boring book by Lem! It is tempting to believe, as PKD did, that he was indeed a commitee - such a genious.
;)
Alas, being fed Lem as a kid kinda set us apart from the other kids a bit.
Now, to use the phone - I'd have had to:
1) login
2) shave
3) keep the phone awake while shaving
4) update the image
Failing at one of these steps would have rendered the phone unusable. What's the solution to this?
Easy: Integrate a razor into the phone!
What is really stopping me right now from switching to a linux desktop is software support...
Not that I would want to tire you with a meaningless argument - but what software do you miss? I'm genuinely interested here - since I havent missed a thing since I took the plunge. More importantly, neither has my (distincly less computer literate) wife.
Zealots, dupes, spelling errors, clueless and rabid posters. They've all been here for as long as I can recall. Now, my memory in a bit dim, but I was reading /. for a long while before I felt the urge to post - and so registered an acount (and there's a reason my ID is roughly a tenth of yours).
I'll believe the thoughtfull posters (as well as your other ID) you are raving about when I see them.
Now, if the moderators are doing their job (fat chance!) - we'll both get moderated OT.
Having read "Salmon of doubt", I gather Douglas Adams very much wanted to be involved in this project, (I found his list of phone numbers rather funny :), but then he died. :(
What I wonder is how much he got the chance to be involved, and what (if any) of his contributions to the movie script that were cut (and that you miss)? Were there new stuff, or was it a question of selecting from the preexisting versions?
(I realize answering this question might require the protection of an asbestos suit, but you are welcome to borrow mine.)
This is not like the GPL. If you get something for free under the GPL, the GPL is the only thing that certifies that you have a legal right to have that software. If you buy software in a shop (even if it is only bundled with some hardware), you have a nice little receipt that says the software is yours.
Old Borland software used to have a not that said you should treat the software like a book. Use it, and resell it if you like, but don't sell, give away, or keep a copy. Seems reasonable to me.
The simputer is supposed to be a symbol-centered simple computer - instead of a text-centered advanced computer - so the idea was to make it usefull to (computer) illiterate people. It is a handheld - so the power is supplied by a battery, which is charged when there is power. (And having been to India, I can tell you that all but the poorest buildings have a TV, and if you don't aford a TV - you won't aford any kind of 'puter.)
The problem is that the idea with "simple" might make literate people shun it, since it could be percieved as insulting to their intelligence. OTOH I don't think all that many illiterate people in rural areas can aford it.
Dust is of course an issue too, though India isn't exactly a desert country. Isn't dust an issue in eg Texas? IIUC mobile phones do sell in India without any special dust protection.
But the simputer is a handheld, so it has a battery. You plug it in, and while there is electricity it charges.
The thing you write about blackouts is what I percieve as the biggest hurdle for stationary 'puters in rural India (having been there). You need to have a rather big battery backup to get any job done on computers, since it isn't good enough to shut down gracefully on a power failure. If you do, all of your day will consist of computers going up and down, and it will be rather hard to get anything done. The battery backup you need to stay afloat is a bit expensive, so it turns out it is a bit hard to bring 'puters to rural India that way (unless you're rich, a business, or some kind of institution like eg a school or a mission or something).
Well, look at it as a friendly advice then, and not an attack. I much prefer Free software myself (only non-free code on the 4 'puters I admin is the nvidia-driver - the graphics driver situation on Linux is a good demonstration of why Free is better than free), and when I do program I avoid Java for the same reason as you do.
Still, when I read the comments to this story (browsing at 2), I first read 4-5 comments about how this is already fixed. Below them, I read your comment - which came out as a bit agressive. So, maybe you could have reread the comments before pressing submit?
Now, will you take to browsing at 1 before you post too? (RTFAing does not seem to be enough.)
Your point is valid - Sun can revoke the license unilaterally. However, when you shot off this post you already had a couple of factual errors: Sun revoked it by mistake, the guys at FreeBSD knew who to ask, and their emails did get answered.
In short, for not having done your research (there are not that many comments here yet, and they were fewer when you posted), you look at least a bit raving IMHO.
The binary drivers are not a non-issue. I have described exactly what are the issues with the binary drivers. We are not being stupid about it; we actually expect hardware we pay for to work. Not work as perfectly as it does in a Windows environment, not to be as easy to install. But you yourself have commented that only old hardware has working support (in free drivers). Everybody is not a hardware developer; and unless we buy old hardware - the hardware we buy is not adequately supported. (As in video-in, framrate not being on par with the competition because of driver issues, etc)
As I said, if you don't have issues: Fine! There are others who have issues with the binary drivers. And as you commented elsewhere, the Free drivers for newer hardware (which you kindly linked to, and which I already knew about because I diligently researched the hardware + drivers before coughing up money) are NOT USABLE. So unless someone is a hardware hacker looking for a challenge - ATI really does have some serious driver problems, and you are better off buying an ATI 9200 than the latest and greatest. Meanwhile, Nvidia's newest does support all on-board features without killing X, switching between video-in/3D-support.
Next time, answer all of the comment - or don't bother at all.
Why, that's grand. Then you have what you want already. Why can't you let us bitch and moan about the real problems we have?
Remember that my problem is that you are afraid we'll miff someone at ATI with a big ego, and because of that you chastise people who complain about real problems. (The latest ATI performing poorly compared to an old Nvidia, having to restart X switching between features etc.)
I don't know what model you have, but the poster is not satisfied with that of his 9600AiW. Have you completely mised out on the AiW part? The one about having a card that either has a dead video-in or a dead 3D?
So, if I want a card with both 3D-acceleration and video-in; my option is buying an old ATI card on a fleamarket - or buying a recent Nvidia card where the binary and OSS drivers can cooperate.
And you claim that there is something about this situation that works? That there is something about this situation worth perpetuating by not offending those who work on the binary drivers telling them the truth?
Or do you mean that it is the binary drivers for recent ATI cards that work? Those drivers which lets an Nvidia 5700 stomp all over the X800Pro in Anands benchmarks? And which will not let the user use video-in?
If ATI wants the Linux community to buy their (new) video cards, it is their responsibility to give us usefull drivers - which will not demand that we restart the X server, if we want to use one or another feature. It's a showstopper.
It is not the responsibility of the community to tread lightly around ATI's developers. It is the responisbility of the community to shout CAVEAT EMPTOR! - as long as the situation is like it is today.
Here's the deal: I will not buy an ATI card until I'm confident that it is comparable to an equally priced Nvidia card in performance and features, as well as I'm confident that I will never ever have to restart the X server to use a certain feature.
The headline? It says: "ATI drivers for Linux that Work?"
And you concluded: "Or he'd buy an older card. Thats what ATI doesn't see, the many of us who just don't upgrade because the driver won't work."
So you said the same thing yourself.
What I don't like is the attitude that we should tread easy, lest we offend someone with a too big ego. We are the customers; ATI should tread easy lest they offend us!
As for open drivers, ATI boast with their support for open source drivers for their older hardware. That still will not generate any sells for them, since that old hardware will be sold in [virtual/meatspace] fleamarkets. Even with this older hardware using OSS drivers, I couldn't come up with how I should be able to have 3D-acceleration (Utah-GLX) and video capture (Gatos) without having to restart X switching from one feature to the other! Hello? Should I be happy I don't have to restart the entire computer, loading a new kernel? (NB: This does work with Nvidia binary drivers and RivaTV OSS video capture driver.)
He didn't exactly say "ATI are teh suxxors". He said that performance of the ATI drivers are not up to par. I assume he speaks of 3D performance - 'cause if he does, he's very right. Why can't we say what's obvious? Because you are afraid we'll miff someone with a big ego?
As for Nvidia drivers not being free, well ATI drivers for cards later than 9200 (IIRC), that have any 3D support, are not free either. And they will never be, because there is intellectual property in them that doesn't belong to ATI (says ATI). So, this guy will use a non-free driver no matter what.
If he would want both 3D and the AllInWonder features - he will have to alternate between different drivers (ie he will have to restart X). That's ATI's support for you.
I have recently been shopping for a video card - and I was very tempted by a 9600AiW; but when I got a hang of the problems - it turned out that the MSI5900XT was a much better buy, since I run Linux exclusively.
The UN is run by its member nations. As long as US'ians go on with media spin involving henchmen, the rest of the world yawns.
No henchmen dictated the Kyoto treaty. It was negotiated. US was the most listened-to country in these negotiations (it has the most guns after all). Now, US looks like it is ready to screw everybody, including their own henchmen.
There are many who are geniunely afraid that if we continue down the current road, the US will be the only free country.
The US has a long record of supporting dictators of non-free countries. I'm not sure I see that changing. Please prove me wrong. (Afghanistan and Iraq is not looking very encouraging right now.)
>> (Disclaimer: I'm of the same nationality as Kofi's wife, Nanne Annan.)
:)
> In other words your just another 3rd fucking, stealing, nigger like she is.
Yep, I'm another 3rd fucking, stealing, nigger like she is. We are both Swedish (along with Hans Blix, who proved to be correct and courageous).
(Burn, modpoints, burn...
Saddam was not a threat to anybody except Iraqi citizens. That's bad enough, but guess what? The US has killed a lot more civilians than Saddam has lately. I don't take the cruelty of this former dictator lightly, my country hosts a lot of refugees from Iraq.
However, I can't see how such an offtopic post can be modded "informative".
As for Kofi, the problem with the US is that you believe that you have the right to make and unmake SG at will. The rest of us are tired of that.
As for the UN, other countries thought it modest to at least continue inspections a while longer. Colin Powell thought it modest to wait a bit, to get more allies for the invasion. And I still have not heard of a single shred of evidence of WMD (except for republican pre-election spin) You say such evidence exists, then provide a link to impartial media reporting such findings - else shut up.
Back to the Kyoto treaty: You haven't adressed it at all. US'ians were there negotiating the treaty, why didn't they talk then? A treaty that anybody had thought the US didn't back would have been stillborn. The treaty is not imposed from the UN, it was negotiated among the countries in the UN - of which the US is the most influential.
Last things last: I haven't heard anything about Kofi trying to wage war on the US. Comparing him to Usama shows you for the troll you are.
Who do you think the UN is? It is an assembly where the US is without a doubt the strongest player. Any future alternative will not be situated in the US, and will not allow the US to veto anything and everything.
The Kyoto treaty was negotiated. The US was represented. Guess what? If you had a problem with the treaty you should have said so in Kyoto.
But you decided it hurts your precious industry, so you backstabbed it instead - so that you won't have to do anything at all. Nice job.
Now, in all fairness. The treaty does tax industrial countries higher (not just the US - but all industrial countries). This was not a question of fairness, but a question of what is possible. In developing countries, there is a larger need to put food on the table, get health care working, build infrastructures etc. The industrial countries have resources to spare, then why the fuck should we not take that responsibility?
If you want to speak in terms of fairness, these countries are way behind our industrialized countries in pollution. They have a lot to catch up on. (Moral: There will always be a kid who's shouting "unfair". The only reason to listen to you is the amount of guns you have.)
If memmory serves, Kofi was installed to please the US, who didn't like his predecsessor (Boutros Boutros-Ghali) enough. Now the US (who pretty much owns the UN as far as the rest of the world is concerned) whines about Kofi. Well, don't meddle so much next time then! (Disclaimer: I'm of the same nationality as Kofi's wife, Nanne Annan.)
Also, you say "screw the UN". Do you mean that as in "screw the rest of the world", or do you mean that as in "screw a system where the veto-power-of-the-strong handicaps most efforts". If the former, you sound like a child. If the latter, I agree - I'd be a lot happier with binding majority votes.
Nice idea, except for a few details:
- That's what the homepage and documentation of that package is for.
- Spamming the console with duplicate information just desensitizes people to information.
- Portage is a CLI tool executing batch processes, it usually installs/upgrades many packages in one go. If I was installing koffice (and did not have kde before) - I would get loads of documentation for my dependencies too. Probably too much. Not exactly helpfull.
- Last time I checked, no other command line package managers had such a feature (at least none I've used). Some gui tools may, or may not, have that type of feature.
- AFAIK most packages in gentoo have a basic default config on install.
IMHO the problem arises when people install random packages with interesting names out of the blue - just because they're inSo it seems to me that a GUI frontend for portage would be better suited for that type of problem. Such a frontend could handle both information about what the program is/does, and postinstallation information. (A port of synaptic perhaps?)