Re: [newbie] Backup to CD-R/RW

[John Richard Smith]

Terry Smith wrote:

FWIW, gentoo is an complete linux distribution that is entirely "roll
your own". 

So it's the ultimate custom made OS to your equipement.

It manages software via a ports system called the portage
tree. 

I don't understand this concept.

Everything is downloaded in source form and must be compiled for
your machine.
So your downloading binaries and compiling everything.

As a result you have a very fast, clean system running only what you've
specifically installed.  It works well and I've been using it for 6
months. Version 1.4 is about to be released.
Did you find it a nightmare at first ?

BTW, there are several stages possible - stage 1 provides only a core
(this is actually the iso image you've been speaking about) - you have
to build a system from scratch;
I didn't know that but it fits what I've been doing. The disc is
quite easy to use, and I like being free to image any file to any
partition, and restore from any partition/device to any partition.
Plus if they could every come up with a partition tool better than
fdisc and cfdisc it would be easy to do all your partitioning from
this type of utility.
stage 2 has some additional parts and
stage 3 is a minimal system. Of course, each successively numbered stage
representa a larger download and less customization.
For example, in the versions to date, you *must* download kernel source
and compile your own kernel.
Gentoo says that the final 1.4 release will change the basic
installation philosophy and perhaps provide for a binary system that is
functional out of the box. I don't know the details.
There's no free lunch of course! There are least two drawbacks for such
an approach. First installing major software systems takes a long time.
The installation of KDE 3.1 from source, for example, takes about 4
hours on my Athlon XP 1700.
Of course most people will feel that to be too much. However I can
see it would maybe provide the ultimate customised OS to your equipement.
and once created one could easily image file the result to CD's for 
reinstalling
again, which would save an awful lot of time.

The other disadvantage stems from my 'newbieness'....you have to learn
about packages on your own...since you have to select everything
yourself you need to know the names (and maybe the class) of software
packages to even find them in the portage tree. There are generic
directories for say window-managers but it helps to know a bit about a
program before you grab it.
For me, gentoo is test system...they always have the latest version of
pgms and if you want to move to a real gory bleeding edge kind of
install you can override their 'masks' (which block software pkgs in
devleopment or not fully tested) and really have fun!
It is however, very fast, and everything I've installed works
beautifully.
Terry Smith

 

How long did ittake you to learn to get a fair working OS up and running?

John

--
John Richard Smith
[EMAIL PROTECTED] 



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