maintainer-feedback requested: [Bug 259410] x11-servers/xorg-server does not have dependency for x11-drivers/xf86-input-evdev

From: <bugzilla-noreply_at_freebsd.org>
Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2021 17:27:21 UTC
Bugzilla Automation <bugzilla@FreeBSD.org> has asked freebsd-x11 (Nobody)
<x11@FreeBSD.org> for maintainer-feedback:
Bug 259410: x11-servers/xorg-server does not have dependency for
x11-drivers/xf86-input-evdev
https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=259410



--- Description ---
Recently I built ports from scratch using the 2021Q4 ports tree.  Since I also
updated the kernel from 12.1 to 12.2 (STABLE) I was unaware of the automatic
use of EVDEV within the kernel, and a (apparently) recent change to the
xorg-server behavior to always make use of EVDEV (and never use the legacy
devices).

As such I had not installed x11-drivers/xf86-input-evdev in a previous release.

The handbook did not seem to point out that the EVDEV driver needed to be
installed (it did have some hints on sysctl vars and related things, which did
not work for me since the driver was not there).  However, through some
sleuthing, I figured it out and installed the EVDEV input driver manually. 
Then X11 started working properly.

It occurs to me that there needs to be some kind of dependency for this device
in kernels where the default kernel includes EVDEV support, since the xorg
server will not work any more without it.  And as it is a single port
dependency, ir probably would not hurt to make it an option that is (by
default) on so that packages also load the driver.

uname information:  FreeBSD hack.SFT.local 12.2-STABLE FreeBSD 12.2-STABLE
r370671 GENERIC  amd64

Ports collection:  2021Q4
(first time observed)

(sorry if it's a bit wordy, this is really a non-critical bug that may be
better solved by adding information to the handbook)