Re: Re: news item: Introduction of app-alternatives/coreutils

Sam James <[email protected]> Sun, 22 Mar 2026 00:30:17 +0000
Newsgroups	gmane.linux.gentoo.devel
Organization	Gentoo
Message-ID	<[email protected]>
Ionen Wolkens <[email protected]> writes:

> On Sat, Mar 21, 2026 at 11:36:18PM +0500, Anna Vyalkova wrote:
>> On 2026-03-21, moltonel 3x Combo wrote:
>> > Hi,
>> > 
>> > This news item can also be reviewed at
>> > https://github.com/gentoo/gentoo-news/pull/5
>> > The corresponding code PR is at https://codeberg.org/gentoo/gentoo/pulls/89
>> > This is my first time posting here and I'm not a Gentoo dev, apologies
>> > if I made mistakes.
>> > 
>> > 
>> > Title: Introduction of app-alternatives/coreutils
>> > Author: Vincent de Phily <[email protected]>
>> > Posted: 2026-03-04
>> > Revision: 1
>> > News-Item-Format: 2.0
>> > 
>> > A new app-alternatives/coreutils ebuild is available, giving the
>> > choice between sys-apps/coreutils and sys-apps/uutils-coreutils as the
>> > main coreutils (mkdir, ls, etc) implementation. The default will
>> > remain the gnu implementation for the foreseeable future.
>> > 
>> > The update should be transparent to most users, read on for further
>> > details.
>> 
>> As it has been pointed out, there's barely any need for a news item. It 
>> looks like an advertisement that most users won't find useful.
>
> Admit I'm not fond of the visibility bit either, I'd rather that this
> goes under the radar (like virtual/zlib did) so a potentially large
> amount users don't try switching on a whim after reading news (even if
> we mask USE=uutils).
>
> I don't really care about the rust or licensing bits, it's more about
> potential compatibility issues that may still need to be ironed out.
> Even moreso when (for Gentoo) build systems are involved.
>
> ... albeit a transition without a news warning does also worry me,
> app-alternatives switches haven't always been the smoothest given
> users also do all sort of things that may make it go badly, and then
> this is quite a core package. So not quite sure what I think of this.
>  

This is what I'm torn on and I don't yet know. I'd prefer to not have to
do one indeed given I think it will encourage people or give some
legitimacy to it being a "reasonable option".

>> To me, "rewriting coreutils in Rust" looks like a move against copyleft.  
>> If authors of uutils did not intend it, companies like Canonical switch 
>> to uutils not because it's better but because they hate GPL. But 
>> whatever, Gentoo is about choice.
>> 
>> > ## Choices
>> > 
>> > If uutils-coreutils is available for your arch and profile, you
>> > can select it by setting `app-alternatives/coreutils -gnu uutils` in
>> > your packages.use.
>> > 
>> > If you want to postpone or revert the transition, mask the
>> > corresponding ebuild versions:
>> > 
>> > ```
>> >>=sys-apps/coreutils-9.10-r1
>> >>=sys-apps/uutils-coreutils-0.6.0-r1
>> > app-alternatives/coreutils
>> > ```
>> > 
>> > ## Preparation and troubleshooting
>> > 
>> > The new version of sys-apps/coreutils and sys-app/uutils-coreutils
>> > install their files with a prefix (`g` for gnu, and `uu-` for uutils).
>> > Afterwards, app-alternatives installs symlinks with standard names.
>> > 
>> > Portage preserves some critical binaries, which will trigger a
>> > harmless file collision warning (assuming the default `protect-owned`
>> > portage feature is enabled) when app-alternatives/coreutils is
>> > installed for the first time.
>> > 
>> > To reduce the window during which some utils will not be available at
>> > the standard location, make sure that app-alternatives/coreutils is
>> > merged straight after the new sys-apps/coreutils, by running
>> > `USE="gnu -uutils" emerge -v1 app-alternatives/coreutils` before
>> > updating the rest of the system.
>> > 
>> > In the unlikely event of an incomplete update, keep in mind you can
>> > still use the prefixed names. If you somehow need to manually fix some
>> > symlinks, use the command below and consider reporting the issue:
>> > 
>> > ```bash
>> 
>> Markdown syntax is not supported for gentoo news items. Please keep it 
>> formatted in plain text.
>> 
>> > # Critical utils that portage should have preserved
>> > export U1="[ arch basename cat chgrp chmod chown cp date dirname echo env expr
>> >           false head hostname id install ln ls mkdir mkfifo mktemp mv printf
>> >           pwd readlink rm rmdir sleep sort stat tail test touch tr true uname
>> >           uniq whoami"
>> > # Utils that might be missing until app-alternative installs
>> > export U2="b2sum base32 base64 basenc chcon chroot cksum comm csplit cut dd
>> >           df dir dircolors du expand factor fmt fold hostid join kill link
>> >           logname mknod nice nl nohup nproc numfmt od paste pathchk pinky pr
>> >           printenv ptx realpath runcon seq shred sha1sum sha224sum sha256sum
>> >           sha384sum sha512sum shuf split stdbuf stty sum sync tac tee timeout
>> >           truncate tsort tty unexpand unlink users vdir wc who yes"
>> > for t in $U2; do
>> >  gtest -e /usr/bin/g$t -a ! -e /usr/bin/$t && gln -sf g$t /usr/bin/$t
>> >  gtest -e /bin/g$t -a ! -e /bin/$t && gln -sf g$t /bin/$t
>> > done
>> > ```
>> > 
>> > The current implementation of app-alternatives/coreutils does not
>> > switch shell completions, so `cp` uses gnu completions, `uu-cp` uses
>> > uutils completions, and `gcp` does not complete. This will be
>> > addressed progressively, in collaboration with upstreams.
>> > 
>> > ## Further reading
>> > 
>> > [0] https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:Base/Alternatives
>> > [1] 
>> > https://www.gentoo.org/support/news-items/2022-12-27-alternatives-introduction.html
>> > [2] https://bugs.gentoo.org/961068
>>
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