USE Flags - Multi Use, Feature Rich Gentoo System

ChaosInMind · n00b Joined: 09 Apr 2007 Posts: 4

Ok, I want to compile a new Gentoo System. it will be either a x86 or an x64_86, depending on what system I decide to put it on.

Basically, it will be a general use PC.

I do some basic programming, some web development which includes apache, mysql, php, and graphic design, I will use it to listen to music, attach USB devices and use multiple WM's, including fluxbox, KDE, Gnome and XFCE. Watch DVD's, burn CDR/DVDR, download torrents, play some 3D games such as Quake, UT2004, Etc...

From the beginning is there any ideas on how many USE flags I should use, what flags or some ideas or thoughts on a multi use, full featured gentoo system?

SO far I have just basic things in the USE.. looks like this:
USE="X dri 3dnow 3dfx opengl xmms alsa qt3 qt4 gtk gnome kde hal avahi apache2 dbus"

shaumux · Posted: Mon Apr 09, 2007 7:57 pm Post subject:

I think u should also put unicode there for unicode support in applications supporting it.

broken_chaos · Posted: Mon Apr 09, 2007 8:08 pm Post subject:

No xmms USE flag. XMMS was removed from the portage tree several months ago.

The Unknown · Posted: Mon Apr 09, 2007 9:52 pm Post subject:

The question is hard to answer,because it is all about choice,what you want from your system,which apps your going to use.
The only thing I can suggest is what I do,use emerge -pv its displays the USE flags for each, then use a gui application like ufed to edit
your USE flags or at least to see what they pull in. There is also USE documentation in the doc`s http://www.gentoo.org/dyn/use-index.xml
and in the wiki http://gentoo-wiki.com/USE_Flags_explained and http://gentoo-wiki.com/USE_Flags

jonnevers

kmj0377 · Guru Joined: 26 Sep 2003 Posts: 397

I've got somewhat of the same stuff. Most of my use flags stem from what I need for PHP:

USE="imlib gnome truetype xml acpi X bzip2 mmx tiff mp3 png jpeg gif logrotate sdl toolbar glitz svg gtk java mozbranding mozdevelop hal samba gnutls alsa nsplugin expat fam swat syslog ldap acl async automount avahi opengl dbus pcmcia png
truetype logrotate acl xattr nfs samba dbus php html apache2 jpeg threads mpm-threadpool odbc pdo mssql mysql gmp gd curl bzip2 ldap snmp tidy tokenizer xml xmlreader xmlrpc xmlwriter zip -sasl exif imap mysqli tiff swat syslog async automount authdaemond postgres fam diskio dhcp java vim-syntax expat soap sockets simplexml iodbc posix filter curlwrappers json xsl tetex mgetty lcms gs examples fontconfig sqlite office opendoc pdf ps offensive imagemagick graphviz tcl tk cups
passwordsave mpeg wmf xine xv vorbis theora ogg mad flac firefox ffmpeg dvd a52 t1lib dvi djvu cdr guile artworkextra mono cairo ruby pango gstreamer branding x264 xvid aac dts encode moznoirc moznomail moznocompose source xpm spell win32codecs mng startup-notification libnotify tagwriting musicbrainz msn seamonkey webdav sound -macmenu esd aiglx divx gmedia quicktime realmedia wmp cdparanoia lzo real dvdread"

ChaosInMind · n00b Joined: 09 Apr 2007 Posts: 4

Yes, Thats what I was looking for, a comparison of what other people use their system for and what USE flags they use. I can read all day long about USE flags, but unfortunately I learn by interacting with people rather than reading about a subject.

If anyone else comes across this thread, please post your USE flags and what you use your system for. Thanks!

Something I think I overlooked...

The Unknown · Posted: Tue Apr 10, 2007 12:46 am Post subject:

I apologize if my answer was not what you looking for,I promote learning and research to prevent questions.
But if examples and comparisons will give you your desired results I still would love to help.
here are my use flags
USE="3dfx 3dnow a52 aac aalib acpi amarok artworkextra audiofile
bash-completion bogofilter cairo cdaudio cddb cdr cdrom clamav css dbus
dcraw dga directfb djbfft dv dvd dvdr dvdread dvi effects escreen etwin
exif ffmpeg firefox flac fontconfig gimp gimpprint gphoto2 hal imap
inkjar java jpeg2k libnotify lm_sensors lzo mjpeg mmx musepack
musicbrainz mysql nas nautilus nptlonly nsplugin nvidia plugin plugins
povray scanner sndfile sse sse2 startup-notification svg svga sysfs t1lib
tcltk tetex theora tiff type1 unicode usb vcd vdr win32codecs wma
xcomposite xine xinerama xpm xprint xrandr xscreensaver xvid xvmc -gnome
-kde"
I use my system for everything that you will plus mythtv and vdr.
here my package.use
sys-libs/glibc userlocales
www-client/mozilla-firefox java
dev-java/blackdown-jre nsplugin
media-tv/mythtv alsa opengl vorbis dvb dvd ieee1394 lirc mmx xvmc
www-client/opera qt-static
dev-lang/python tk
x11-wm/enlightenment doc esd nls xcomposite xinerama xrandr
x11-plugins/epplets esd

this is a file called /etc/portage/package.use
this where you can declare specific USE flags per package.

madisonicus · Veteran Joined: 20 Sep 2006 Posts: 1130

You'll get most features that you might want for a desktop system by using the appropriate desktop profile.
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jonnevers · Posted: Wed Apr 11, 2007 5:42 pm Post subject:

UgolinoII · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 25 Apr 2004 Posts: 119

this is my desktop running ~amd64

tuam · l33t Joined: 04 May 2004 Posts: 765 Location: CGN, Germany

If you want to develop and have mysql, I recommend adding the mysql flag, so all apps that can will interface with it :wink:

My box is mostly for watching tv, videos, listen to music, surf the web, and basic office programs:

KH · n00b Joined: 28 Jun 2003 Posts: 26 Location: Canada

I pretty much stick to surfing the internet, Amarok, gaim, OpenOffice and azureus. Over time I'v added all media related functions that I need - burn/create dvds w/ menus, transcode between video and audio formats, etc.

USE="3dnow 3dnowext \
a52 aac acl acpi aiglx alsa amr ao -arts asf aspell async attr audiofile avi \
bash-completion bcmath -bindist bzlib -bitmap-fonts bzip2 \
cairo cdr cdparanoia chroot cpudetection css -cups curl custom-cflags \
dbus dga dio djbfft dri dts dv dvd dvdnav dvdr dvdread \
-eds encode -esd exif exscalibar \
faac flac faad fftw firefox fontconfig -fortran -font-server ffmpeg fuse \
gd -gdbm gif glibc-omitfp glitz gnome gnutls gpm gs -gstreamer gtk2 -gtkhtml \
hal \
id3 imagemagick ithreads -ipv6 \
java jpeg jpeg2k \
kde kdehiddenvisibility \
lame ldap lm_sensors \
mad md5sum mime mjpeg mmap mmx mmxext mng mozsvg mp3 mp3rtp mpeg mpeg2 mplayer mono -mozilla msn mysql \
-nls ncurses network nomotif nptl nptlonly nsplugin \
oggvorbis opengl offensive -oss \
-pam pcre pdf perl pic plotutils png prelink \
qt qt3 -qt4 quicktime \
rar real readline rtc ruby \
samba sasl scenarios sdl -slang sndfile sound sox stream subtitles svg svga ssl \
tcl tcltk tk threads threadsafe tiff truetype2 truetype-fonts \
usb unicode \
v4l v4l2 vcd visualization \
wmf win32codecs \
xcomposite xforms xine xinerama xpm xsl -xmms xml xml2 xorg xv xvmc xvid x86 \
zlib"

Zillode · n00b Joined: 19 May 2006 Posts: 54

64bit arch, desktop (as much support for media/dev/web as possible) + dev pc

make.conf:

sabbat · n00b Joined: 16 Dec 2003 Posts: 34 Location: Australia

Saw this thread and thought I'd put in my 2 cents...

USE="X gtk gtk2 gtkhtml gnome alsa mmx mmxext 3dnow 3dnowext sse ssl gpm gmp zlib bzip2 zip nls gif
bash-completion unicode type1 truetype perl java nsplugin mplayer -xine pam nptl nptlonly xml
artworkextra cdr dvd dvdr asf dvdrw tools tiff cairo dvi dbus hal firefox samba mpeg xv sdl qt3
acpi -arts -esd flac -cups mp3 ogg vorbis svga wmf pdf sndfile xinerama logrotate offensive
svg mp4 dts xvid audiofile css ffmpeg musicbrainz vcd aac amr dga dv dvb dvdread enca live eds
real tga theora v4l v4l2 win32codecs x264 xanim xvmc yv12 gnutls zlib -oss png aoss aalib mng
a52 divx gmedia realmedia wmp imagemagick lzo openal expat javascript fame mjpeg glitz apache2
xcomposite jpeg2k -xmms selinux mozbranding encode lm_sensors aiglx avahi libcaca -qt4 quicktime
subversion fbcon musepack matroska rar nvidia emerald gstreamer opengl jpeg spell mad imlib
motif speex ggi bidi bindist bl cddb cdparanoia rtc"

/etc/portage/package.use
app-benchmarks/bootchart -java
mail-mta/exim exiscan exiscan-acl
net-dialup/ppp atm dhcp eap-tls mppe-mppc
dev-lang/spidermonkey threadsafe
dev-util/kdevelop ruby php pascal ada clearcase haskell perforce cvs
x11-wm/compiz -kde
sys-apps/pciutils -zlib
www-apps/gallery mysql
dev-lang/php mysql
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jonnevers · Posted: Wed Apr 18, 2007 3:17 pm Post subject:

wow. I knew my make.conf USE flags were comparatively small but damn... do all of these flags listed actually do stuff? wouldn't most be covered by the desktop profile?

Bones McCracker · Veteran Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1611 Location: U.S.A.

My God that's a lot of USE flags.

Examples are useful, but you should also consider the process of managing USE flags at this point. You don't need to set much at this time.

As someone mentioned briefly, a good way to start is to choose a profile, which will set some pretty good initial choices. From what you describe, the Desktop profile (for either arch) would be good choice. Before you go adding stuff to your /etc/make.conf file, you can easily get a summary of what is already set by the profile. If you temporarily comment out everything in your make.conf file and:

spiffywiffy · n00b Joined: 08 May 2007 Posts: 21

Great concise and helpful explanation. Thank you. BTW... euses is great!