Matt Schmandt

I upgraded my Gentoo desktop to Gnome 2.16. I really like many of the new features. The Tomboy note taking app is much better than the old sticky notes applet. I also really like the baobab application. It is an app that shows disk usage in a gui. You can drill into folders and find how much disk space it is taking. There were also many changes to some system UI objects like the file browser and printing dialog box. Overall, I recommend the upgrade.

The Gnome package and most of the dependencies are currently masked so you have to unmask many of them to upgrade. You can unmask a package marked testing with the ~x86 flag by adding a line with the full package name to the /etc/portage/package.keywords file.

Example
echo gnome-base/gnome >> /etc/portage/package.keywords

If the package is blocked by package.mask, it can be overridden by adding a line with the full package name to the /etc/portage/package.unmask file.

Example
echo gnome-base/gnome >> /etc/portage/package.unmask

Below is the list of things I had to add to my package.keywords

gnome-base/gnome
dev-libs/atk
gnome-base/libbonobo
app-text/evince
gnome-base/gnome-applets
x11-libs/libxklavier
x11-themes/gnome-icon-theme
x11-misc/icon-naming-utils
app-editors/gedit
dev-libs/glib
dev-python/gnome-python-desktop
gnome-extra/nautilus-cd-burner
gnome-base/nautilus
gnome-base/eel
x11-libs/gtk+
x11-libs/cairo
x11-libs/libwnck
x11-wm/metacity
gnome-base/gnome-keyring
dev-python/pygtk
dev-python/pygobject
x11-libs/gtksourceview
gnome-base/libgnomeui
gnome-extra/gcalctool
x11-themes/gtk-engines
gnome-base/librsvg
media-video/totem
x11-misc/alacarte
gnome-base/gnome-menus
net-analyzer/gnome-nettool
gnome-base/gnome-panel
media-sound/sound-juicer
app-admin/sabayon
gnome-extra/gconf-editor
gnome-extra/zenity
gnome-base/gdm
x11-terms/gnome-terminal
x11-libs/vte
gnome-base/gnome-session
gnome-base/control-center
gnome-extra/evolution-data-server
mail-client/evolution
net-libs/libsoup
app-arch/file-roller
gnome-extra/gnome-power-manager
gnome-extra/fast-user-switch-applet
gnome-extra/gucharmap
gnome-extra/gtkhtml
gnome-extra/evolution-webcal
gnome-base/libbonoboui
x11-themes/gnome-backgrounds
gnome-extra/gnome-utils
www-client/epiphany
x11-libs/pango
gnome-extra/gnome2-user-docs
gnome-base/libglade
net-print/gnome-cups-manager
gnome-base/gnome-vfs-monikers
gnome-extra/yelp
gnome-base/gnome-desktop
gnome-extra/bug-buddy
gnome-base/libgtop
gnome-base/libgnome
dev-libs/libIDL
x11-themes/gnome-themes
gnome-extra/gnome-media
media-gfx/eog
gnome-base/orbit
app-admin/pessulus
gnome-extra/gnome-keyring-manager
gnome-extra/deskbar-applet
gnome-extra/gnome-games
gnome-extra/gnome-system-monitor

Below is the list of things I had to add to my package.unmask

gnome-base/gnome
gnome-base/libbonobo
gnome-base/gnome-applets
x11-libs/libxklavier
x11-themes/gnome-icon-theme
x11-misc/icon-naming-utils
gnome-base/gnome-vfs
app-editors/gedit
dev-libs/glib
dev-python/gnome-python-desktop
gnome-extra/nautilus-cd-burner
gnome-base/nautilus
gnome-base/eel
x11-libs/gtk+
x11-libs/libwnck
x11-wm/metacity
gnome-base/gnome-keyring
dev-python/pygtk
dev-python/pygobject
x11-libs/gtksourceview
gnome-base/libgnomeui
gnome-extra/gcalctool
x11-themes/gtk-engines
gnome-base/librsvg
media-video/totem
x11-misc/alacarte
gnome-base/gnome-menus
net-analyzer/gnome-nettool
gnome-base/gnome-panel
media-sound/sound-juicer
app-admin/sabayon
gnome-extra/gconf-editor
gnome-extra/zenity
gnome-base/gdm
x11-terms/gnome-terminal
x11-libs/vte
gnome-base/gnome-session
gnome-base/control-center
gnome-extra/evolution-data-server
mail-client/evolution
net-libs/libsoup
app-arch/file-roller
gnome-extra/gnome-power-manager
gnome-extra/fast-user-switch-applet
gnome-extra/gucharmap
gnome-extra/gtkhtml
gnome-extra/evolution-webcal
gnome-base/libbonoboui
x11-themes/gnome-backgrounds
gnome-extra/gnome-utils
www-client/epiphany
x11-libs/pango
gnome-extra/gnome2-user-docs
gnome-base/gnome-vfs-monikers
gnome-extra/yelp
gnome-base/gnome-desktop
gnome-extra/bug-buddy
gnome-base/libgnome
x11-themes/gnome-themes
gnome-extra/gnome-media
media-gfx/eog
gnome-base/orbit
app-admin/pessulus
gnome-extra/gnome-keyring-manager
gnome-extra/deskbar-applet
gnome-extra/gnome-games
gnome-extra/gnome-system-monitor

I am sure the list will change but this should get you started.
After completing the upgrade I recommend a restart of the computer to make sure all the new versions of the apps are running. I had issues trying to get by without a restart.

When upgrading Gnome on Gentoo, if you get errors like The panel encountered a problem while loading “OAFIID:GNOME_ClockApplet”.? Make sure you do a “revdep-rebuild” to resolve the issue.

A friend accidentally removed Portage with an emerge -C portage. After not finding any info on this issue for a while, I went to the IRC channel. Gentoo’s IRC channel is on Freenode and the channel name is #gentoo. Shortly after posting a question about how to resolve this issue, Nailbags pointed out a guide on Portage Rescue. The document Nailbags refered to is manually fixing Portage.

The guide is very good except it is missing one thing that was hanging my friend up. After manually putting Portage back, it failed to tell the user to put /usr/lib/portage/bin in the PATH variable. Without this step the user thinks, he can type “emerge portage” but has to type out “/usr/lib/portage/bin/emerge portage”. Once the Portage is successfully emerged it updates the PATH.

I have contacted the author of the guide about this issue. Hopefully it will get fixed soon.

I successfully upgraded my Gentoo MythTV box from .18 to .19. The upgrade was very smooth. In the past, it was very difficult to build a myth box on Gentoo because of odd bugs with combinations of the nvidia driver, lirc, ivtv and the kernel. I really like that it records mpgs instead of nuvs. It no longer requires any extra scripts to convert them for playback on my computer. They moved around some of the menu items to more logial places and also did many nice upgrades to MythWeb. The dual tuner support got improved but I don’t care about that much yet since I only have 1 tuner.

Hopefully sometime in the next with in a month or 2, I will finally mod my Xbox to be a 2nd frontend. I think I have decided on doing a hardware mod so I can still play all my old games. I still have a lot of research to do on deciding on a chip but I has seen some nice guides out there. If anyone can recommend one please post info about it in the comments.