!!! /etc/make.profile is not a symlink and will probably prevent most merges.
!!! It should point into a profile within /usr/portage/profiles/
!!! (You can safely ignore this message when syncing. It's harmless.)
!!! ARCH is not set... Are you missing the /etc/make.profile symlink?
!!! Is the symlink correct? Is your portage tree complete?
etc/make.profile WAS a symlink, to a file/directory that did not exist when I checked. I deleted make.profile and re-created it as just a plain file. I deleted it again. There is no such file as /etc/make.profile, yet emerge still gives that same error.
How can I fix this whole mess so that I can use emerge once again?
I have the same problem. I did a new native install today, and magic doesn't want to work and emerge has the same problem as you have.
Xbox root # emerge ntp
!!! ARCH is not set... Are you missing the /etc/make.profile symlink?
!!! Is the symlink correct? Is your portage tree complete?
I had this problem a few days ago. The symlink by default is set to the wrong file. I hope you haven't messed it up by deleting make.profile... . But this is what I did to fix it...
running
ls -la /etc/make.profile
should show the symlink to /usr/portage/profiles/default-linux/x86/2005.0 (or 1)/
[EDIT]
IIRC its not set wrong, when you run emerge sync && emerge system (or world) from the latest versions of Gentoox it updates portage, which need to have the new /etc/profile symlinked. Unless your sitting and watching everything scroll by on your screen you miss it. But every time you update portage you should have to resymlink the make.profile
NEW PROBLEM THOUGH
It updated portage, and now the mofo can't find the kernel or something to boot from.
I plugged it in to my TV and I see that it fails "loading /vmlinuz". What do I do about THIS? Should I make a new topic?
Tried some of them with varied results... Not sure which are caused by
the link, by magic being down, or by my local mods to /etc/make.conf .
But if I know which ones are OK to use, then magic comes back up, I'll know its my /etc/make.conf and can debug it.
Magic should be fixed now. Try these three... It only takes a second.
/usr/portage/profiles/default-linux/x86/2005.0
/usr/portage/profiles/default-linux/x86/2005.1
/usr/portage/profiles/default-linux/x86/2006.0
Running `magic` fixes your make.profile symlink to the correct one.. It always has had this functionality. Seems you could have saved a lot of hassle doing this ;p