Meta ebuilds

The concept of a meta ebuild, also referred to as a meta package, exists in the Gentoo ebuild repository and other ebuild repositories. These ebuilds typically include the term "meta" as a naming suffix, although doing so is not a requirement of a Gentoo development standard (such as the EAPI, GLEPs, or the developer manual). Not all meta-style ebuilds use the same terminology.

A meta ebuild is an ebuild containing a developer-selected, curated software suite that generally relates to a certain family of related software packages. Many meta ebuilds do not install any files themselves, but are used to reference the installation requirements for a family of related software packages.

Some meta ebuild examples include:

Meta ebuild examples
Ebuild name	Description	Notes
gnome-base/gnome	Meta package for GNOME, merge this package to install.	Includes a maximalist packages set for the GNOME desktop environment. Review the various USE flags for this package to adjust features included with GNOME.
gnome-base/gnome-light	Meta package for GNOME-Light, merge this package to install.	Includes a minimal package set for the GNOME desktop environment.
gui-apps/coreapps-meta	Meta package for coreapps (C Suite).	Available from the ::guru ebuild repo.
kde-plasma/plasma-meta	Merge this to pull in all KDE Plasma 5 packages.
lxde-base/lxde-meta	Meta ebuild for LXDE, the Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment.
lxqt-base/lxqt-meta	Meta ebuild for LXQt, the Lightweight Desktop Environment.
media-fonts/fonts-meta	Meta package for fonts to cover most needs.	This ebuild includes an `emoji` USE flag, which is very useful for systems starting a desktop (graphical) profile.
media-plugins/gst-plugins-meta	Meta ebuild to pull in gst plugins for apps.	Review the various USE flags for this package.
xfce-base/xfce4-meta	The Xfce Desktop Environment (meta package).

Meta ebuilds

See also