Hey there Redcore Linux lovers!

Prior to Redcore Linux 1710 we triggered a mass rebuild of the whole repository. That was done because the last mass rebuild was over 6 months old, and many things changed in the meantime. However, at the beggining of this weekend, Gentoo Linux marked a new toolchain as stable (GCC 6.4.0, Glibc 2.25 etc), so we had 2 choices :

• stay with older toolchain (GCC 5.4.0, Glibc 2.23) for as long as possible, untill Gentoo drops it; this would've saved days of recompiling everything NOW, but in the end we would've been forced to make the choice number two below
• stay in sync with Gentoo and update the toolchain, recompile core packages first and then recompile everything; this would give us the chance to fine tune some flags and allow for newer packages to come in faster

We went for choice number two. We updated the toolchain, recompiled the core packages 3 times to make sure everything is fine. We then recompiled the whole repository twice with the new toolchain. In the end we updated some packages to their new versions. The entire process took 6 days to complete.

Here are some rough stats :

• core packages rebuilt without failure everytime
• all other packages first pass : 1712 total packages -> 1710 rebuilt without errors (99,89%), 2 rebuild failed (0,11%)
  • 1 fixed (media-gfx/darktable)
  • 1 dropped (media-gfx/scangearmp)
• all other packages second pass : 1711 total packages -> 1711 rebuilt without errors (100%)

The new toolchain and rebuilt packages are being synced to the repository as we speak. That means, next time you update your system you will receive over 1000 packages to reinstall/upgrade.

!!! DO NOT ABORT THE UPDATE !!!

You will end up having mixed packages, some built with older toolchain, some with new toolchain and it will break your system for sure.

I know it will be a pain, and the reinstall/upgrade will run for quite some time (depending on your internet speed and machine configuration, it could take few hours), but it is a required step for you to continue to receive updated packages, and have a more stable system overall. Still, it won't take you as long as it took us (nearly a week as already stated).