How to install a masked package in Gentoo 2008?

Question

I searched the net and handbook, but I only managed to learn what is the masked package, and not how to install it. I did find some commands, but they don't seem to work on 2008 (looking at it, it seems those are for earlier versions). I have something like this:

localhost ~ # emerge flamerobin
Calculating dependencies 
!!! All ebuilds that could satisfy "dev-db/flamerobin" have been masked.
!!! One of the following masked packages is required to complete your request:
- dev-db/flamerobin-0.8.6 (masked by: ~x86 keyword)
- dev-db/flamerobin-0.8.3 (masked by: ~x86 keyword)

I would like to install version 0.8.6, but don't know how? I found some instructions, but they tell me to edit or write to some files under /etc/portage. However, I don't have /etc/portage on my system:

localhost ~ # ls /etc/portage
ls: cannot access /etc/portage: No such file or directory 

Answer 1

Simply mkdir /etc/portage and edit as mentioned here: http://gentoo-wiki.com/TIP_Dealing_with_masked_packages#But_you_want_to_install_the_package_anyway...

Answer 2

There are two different kinds of masks in gentoo. Keyword masks and package masks. A keyword mask means that the package is either not supported (or untested) by your architecture, or still in testing. A package mask means that the package is masked for another reason (and for most users it is not smart to unmask). The solutions are:

• Add a line to /etc/portage/package.keywords (Check man portage in the package.keywords section). This is for the keyword problems.
• Add a line to /etc/portage/package.unmask for "package.mask" problems (you can also use package.mask for the converse). This is in the same man file, under the section package.unmask. I advise to use versioned atoms here to avoid shooting in your own foot with really broken future versions a couple of months down the line.

Answer 3

These days there's also a more 'automated' solution, called "autounmask". No more file editing needed to unmask!

The great benefit of the package is, it also unmasks / handles keywords of dependencies if needed. It's provided in the package app-portage/autounmask.

/etc/portage/package.keywords and
/etc/portage/package.unmask

can be directories as well nowadays (but autounmask handles single files as well). In those directories, multiple can place multiple "autounmask" files, one file in each dir per "unmask"-package. If you use single files instead of dirs, 'autounmask' will place some kind of header / footer, and this way it becomes easy to remove "unmasks" if wanted.