On Mon, 11 Sep 2006 at 10:39 -0600, Steve Dibb wrote: > Hans Fugal wrote: > >de gustibus non disputatum est > > > >Disk is cheap compared to time. The last thing I want is to have to > >manually enable everything that is almost always going to be enabled > >anyway. I like Debian's approach. Things are enabled by default if > >they're installed, but not everything is installed unless you ask for > >it. It strikes a decent balance, although there are things that I > >personally wish Debian would install by default that it doesn't. > > > > To each his own, of course. However with Debian I assume it doesnt ask > you which system logger you want to choose I could be completely wrong, > and I'm not trying to flame Debian in the least, I'm just pointing out > that Gentoo gives you a choice between a few system loggers during > installation.
You're right, not during installation. However you just apt-get whichever you prefer and it replaces the other one without hassle. I do this with postfix replacing exim on just about every debian install I do, it's not hard. Debian does allow you to fire up aptitude (or dselect in the old days) and make as fine-grained choices as you could ever want during the installation, if you desire it. > >But more importantly, it makes absolutely no sense to me to disable > >stuff with USE flags. I can see the merit of using USE flags to _enable_ > >certain things that might not be enabled by default, and in some very > >speicific (embedded) situations I can see the use of disabling things, > >but for the most part the extra disk space required for that one library > >is worth it for the time saved on the day that I do decide I want Qt > >enabled in application foo after all. Constant recompiling for upgrades > >is silly. Recompilation because I was a nazi and disabled Qt across the > >board with USE flags is lunacy. > > > > Upgrading really has never been an issue for me. It just runs in the > background. Besides, once you get over the large libraries (gtk, qt, > xorg-x11, etc) most *everything* takes between 5 to 15 minutes to > compile on a decent system. I'm using Gentoo on an Athlon XP 1800, and > I've never been pressed for time waiting for something to upgrade. > > If you're upgrading Qt, you just emerge it. You're already running one > version so nothing's going to stop and suddenly stop working while it's > installing. > > Basically -- I don't see the whole compilation thing as a big > deterrent. It doesn't bother me. It's not a show stopper. I don't > think its really as big a deal as you might think it is though. I forgot to mention that although I don't have much gentoo experience, I have had plenty of experience with darwinports which is similar in the respect that it's a source-building package manager. I know from experience that upgrading things is a real pain as a result I don't upgrade frequently, and then when I do upgrade it's even more of a pain. However I find fink even more annoying even though it's binary- and apt-based so I live with it. It might be less of an issue on a non-laptop. > >Nobody likes library bloat, but gentoo users are particularly opposed to > >it. For good reason! The amount of time it takes to compile those big > >toolkits is phenomenal. If I were a gentoo user I would steer clear of > >them too. > > > > Changing USE flags on big toolkits is going to have minimal impact. Do > I want to install Qt with gif or jpeg support? Taking those out is not > going to magically make it take 15 minutes less. There are some > packages you just accept that they are going to take a long time to > build. You knew that when you were installing Gentoo in the first > place, so why would it suddenly be a big deal halfway during using it? Exactly my point. But people will take out gif or jpeg for whatever reason that seems good at the time, and then 3 months later find that they need gif or jpeg support, and now, but to get it they have to recompile Qt. Oops. > >Gentoo is a thief. It robs that which is most valuable: your time. You > >may say that gentoo teaches you a lot about how linux works, and you'd > >be right I reckon, but it's not very efficient. You spend far more time > >and energy in compilation than you do learning. But hey, we're all free > >to spend/waste our time however we wish. Some have disagreed with me, > >but I say better to waste your time with gentoo than many other > >time-wasters out there. > > Installation is really the only big time-waster, imo. However, since > the whole point of Gentoo is *customizing* your system to tailor it to > your needs, it is by default, going to take time. It's not killing us, > it's just a tradeoff for what we really want. So gentoo is for chavs, not for ricers. Fair 'nuff. In either case I'm glad gentoo exists. A lot of good HOWTOs and some good software (like keychain) have come out of gentoo or its community. -- Hans Fugal ; http://hans.fugal.net There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself. -- Johann Sebastian Bach
signature.asc
Description: Digital signature
/* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
