Life on the bleeding edge

[david thornton]

Walter Dnes wrote:

>On Thu, Sep 21, 2006 at 11:07:23PM -0400, Evan Leibovitch wrote
>
>  
>
>>>As for Gentoo, I have it running on a few servers.
>>>      
>>>
>>I suspected it was great for that. What's it like on the desktop?
>>    
>>
>
>  Using it and loving it on my desktop.  The package-management rocks.
>Install basic text-console-only setup.  I then say "emerge bbkeys".
>bbkeys is the keyboard config for blackbox WM, so it obviously depends
>on blackbox.  blackbox obviously depends on X, which depends on a whole
>bunch of other stuff.  Portage will figure out the dependancies and pull
>them in and build them in the right order.  So issuing the single
>command "emerge bbkeys" takes the system from text-mode only to one with
>a fully functional X gui and WM.  Mind you, on an older machine, building
>X might be an overnight job, but you don't do it very often.  With the
>new modular X, only updated pieces get rebuilt.
>
>  The package-management can be annoying at times, if it pulls in stuff
>you didn't want.  It's always recommended to do a "--pretend" emerge
>first, to see if you really want all the optional dependancies it pulls
>in.  There's a very large selection of ebuilds covering just about every
>package you want.  Failing that, you can always compile stuff manually
>into /usr/local.  You can even do your own custom ebuilds, if you want
>portage to manage the package just like regular ebuilds.
>
>  In Gentoo, there aren't major version changes, named after different
>animals.  Gentoo's update process is sort of like a "rolling upgrade".
>If you installed Gentoo 2 years ago, and applied the updates every
>couple of weeks, today you would have the same system as if you had done
>a fresh install today.  None of this blowing away / and installing
>fresh.  The closest you come to this is during major upgrades to gcc.
>Going from 3.4.x to 4.1.1 involved a rebuild of all programs, but it's
>only two commands, and let it run overnight.
>
>  Gentoo is not perfect, and just like any other distro, there are
>occasional hiccups.  That's what the Gentoo mailing list is for.  To
>excercise the control Gentoo gives you, there are a few extra config
>files.  If you want something that works out of the box, and you'll take
>someone else's defaults, Ubuntu is OK.  Gentoo is for people who want
>full control.
>
>  
>
Bump

Gentoo = great
All the coolness of linux + all the smarts of Freebsd
Sigh, oh for gentoo at my workplace.

David
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