@aeva if you install a rust package via portage it will download the whole rust dependency tree and compile it, just like if you had done `cargo install`. however, because it's a system package now you get automatic updates instead of forgetting about it forever, if you want that. also for some apps like app-editors/helix, the `cargo install` version leaves you with a somewhat broken setup out of the box until you take some extra manual steps to put its runtime files where it needs them. whereas if you install with portage it's actually set up correctly on your system

@aeva portage managing the rust package also confers some benefits that you probably don't care about, like the build is network isolated (some people care about this). And also cross-compilation will usually just work if you were say using gentoo to build a raspberry pi image from an x86 machine.

so basically there is a lot of nice things it can provide, but none of them are "saving you from compile times". this is true of golang packages as well, just the nature of those languages really

@artemis that makes sense. is there a way to mask these all by default so I don't install them on accident?

@aeva mask all rust applications you mean?

@artemis yes