Umm... yeah, I deleted my /var directory.
 

(Edit: Forgot to mention this earlier, but I'm using the newest Gentoo)

Not the smartest of things, I've done, but regardless, I was swapping partitions around last night now that the new kernel finally supports my SATA VT6421 card properly, and moved /var to its own partition. Well, the partition fluked out and I had to reformat it, leaving me without a /var directory.

Which is bad.

I booted the live CD and copied its /var out to the new partition, but a handful of programs are complaining (soon to be silenced with the swift justice that is "emerge") and now my Portage updates take a fair bit longer than they should.

Is there any chance that I'm missing anything vital? As per my understanding, /var is for temporary-ish files and therefore isn't exceedinly important, but I could be completely bonkers here. Any ideas?

Well... /var is for data-ish stuff. /var/tmp is for temporary-ish stuff.

Mysql keeps it's databases in /var.
Postfix keeps it's databases in /var.
Just about every daemon keeps it's data in /var.
All your logfiles are in /var.
Oh, and, have you considered that your world file sits in /var/lib/portage/world?
That's what may be causing the portage slowness - the world file is wrong.

I've heard of some option/tool that regenerates your world file from logfiles left by portage... But sadly all your logfiles are gone, so that's not much help.

You should edit the world file 1st, run emerge -e world, and hope for the best I think...

But you still got out lucky. I deleted my /lib once :D. What a horrendous week that was...

Ah, I quickly discovered that issue with the world file after poking around a bit more on the Gentoo forums. However, I'd been worried that I might have lost something non-portage related.

Thankfully I haven't started my web dev stuff on this system, so nothing important was lost.

Thanks for the info!

Ok then:D

Oh, on a totally off-topic basis, does your name suggest ascii-art? Because it could be monochrome, but I don't think that's the case.

Close, but not quite. I'm a web designer and when it came time to get a name for my "company" (loosest of quotes), I named it 8-bitDesign as I got into drawing and design after the NES (badass system that it is).

:)

Cool!

Is it easy, being a small company? I mean, relatively? Because I don't think i'd be able to stomach much if I had someone above me, and i'm a good webprogrammer (a lousy disegner, but libraries and backends are really my thing), and if I got a disegner as a partner... How much business do you get?

No need to answer that if you feel offended, but I won't be your competition for quite a few years, as I'm still in highschool... :D

Thankfully, I'm not my own company, though I do a fair bit of freelancing. However, from my friends to do work as their own company, it's pretty hard, I hear. Personally, I prefer working for a small design firm. Usually web design firms are pretty cozy and nice to work for. I mean, I have a boss, but it's not like many of the jobs I've had where you're working for some faceless, corporate entity. Nope, there are 7 designers in our firm, and I'm the "techie" one.

I know some people who are ready to swear off working for other anyone by themselves, but from what I've heard, it takes a fair bit of discipline and business know-how to handle your budgeting, recruit clients, and keep yourself in the black.

Personally, I just work with some really cool people, and let them worry about the logistics. :)

Seriously though, in your case, I'd brush up on some of your front-end scripting skills, and just find a small web firm you can get comfortable in (a few years down the line, mind you :). There are plenty of designers who just need someone who knows XHTML/CSS and Javascript to handle the technical side for them.