[gentoo-user] Default USE flags for net-libs/webkit-gtk

[Yongming]

Hi all,

I wonder if there is a place to read previous discussions for a
package/ebuild. Specifically, I am interested in the rationale behind
having the "geolocation" flag on by default for net-libs/webkit-gtk.

Currently on a desktop, having "geolocation" pulls in "geoclue" (which
in turn pulls in "modemmanager" and so on), which is seemingly
unnecessary in my case. I understand that these dependencies can be
customised via /etc/portage/package.use/*, but I am also curious about
the thinking behind net-libs/webkit-gtk having "geolocation" flag on
by default.

[Michael Orlitzky]

Post by Yongming
I understand that these dependencies can be
customised via /etc/portage/package.use/*, but I am also curious about
the thinking behind net-libs/webkit-gtk having "geolocation" flag on
by default.

There's no rule for this sort of thing, and that default is really old.
Your best bet is to ping the maintainers on IRC/email and just ask.

My guess: it's because upstream enables geolocation by default if you
don't specify.

[Mart Raudsepp]

Post by Yongming
Hi all,
I wonder if there is a place to read previous discussions for a
package/ebuild. Specifically, I am interested in the rationale behind
having the "geolocation" flag on by default for net-libs/webkit-gtk.
Currently on a desktop, having "geolocation" pulls in "geoclue" (which
in turn pulls in "modemmanager" and so on), which is seemingly
unnecessary in my case. I understand that these dependencies can be
customised via /etc/portage/package.use/*, but I am also curious about
the thinking behind net-libs/webkit-gtk having "geolocation" flag on
by default.

We were asked this off-list. Now catching up, it seems that didn't
reach the list too, so here's belated information to others as well:

geolocation is a browser engine feature that is expected to be built by
default. Yes, it very likely also is default enabled by upstream, but
we also want to provide an out of the box good experience for browsers
built on top of webkit-gtk (such as epiphany and midori), which means
working geolocation support. Thus the default remains.

However, based on that query, we instead ended up removing the default
enabling of USE=modemmanager from geoclue itself. As a result,
odemmanager is not pulled in anymore for webkit-gtk without user making
that choice via enabling USE=modemmanager due to actually having a
modem (think 4G mobile modems, not the dial-up kind).


Mart