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

On Mon, Mar 23, 2026 at 12:47:35AM +0100, Marc Schiffbauer wrote:
> * Ionen Wolkens schrieb am 23.03.26 um 00:22 Uhr:
> > If e.g. you install uutils-coreutils with USE=native-symlinks or
> > something, it would *overwrite* bin/cp and tell portage to unmerge
> > sys-apps/coreutils in the process rather than let it coexist.
> 
> I also do like the virtual approach more than app-alternatives. Why 
> would someone want having installed both at the same time given that 
> uutils are meant to be a drop-in replacement?
> 
> I can image shell scripts in the wild which may change their behavior 
> unintentionally if some core commands are suddenly being replaced by a 
> symlink instead.

fwiw only the original coreutils would be non-symlinks, uutils-coreutils
works by installing a single big binary that can symlink to e.g. bin/cp
to start using it as system's (not that I know uutils-coreutils very
well, correct me if I'm wrong).

So if there are scripts with poor tests that break when tools are a
symlink (I wouldn't be surprised tbh) they will still need fixing, but
this wouldn't start affecting regular coreutils users out of nowhere
which is the point here.
-- 
ionen

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