Re: [gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages)
Dear All, Thanks to everyone for your advice. I really appreciate it. I think you've convinced me that: a)I want to have a go with Gentoo. b)That everything I want/need can be done, and done well. c)That it will take quite a bit of time (but be worth it) Given (c), I shall probably stick with (and finish) my half-installed Mandriva system on the ThinkpPad for now - but it seems like an excellent reason to buy that Dual-Opteron desktop I have been dreaming about :-)When I do, I'l be back! Thanks a lot for your help - and Happy New Year. Best wishes, Richard -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
[OT] Dual-Opteron (was: Re: [gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages))
On Sunday 01 January 2006 13:35, Richard Neill [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote about 'Re: [gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages)': Thanks to everyone for your advice. I really appreciate it. I think you've convinced me that: c)That it will take quite a bit of time (but be worth it) it seems like an excellent reason to buy that Dual-Opteron desktop I have been dreaming about :-) As the owner of a dual-Opteron 275 system, I can say they they are very nice. An emerge -e world (700+ packages) only takes 24 hours, during which the system is totally usable (full-screen video + 5.1 audio does not stutter). -- Boyd Stephen Smith Jr. [EMAIL PROTECTED] ICQ: 514984 YM/AIM: DaTwinkDaddy -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
[gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages)
Dear All, I am a newbie here, and I wonder if I might ask you a few questions about Gentoo. I've looked on the Gentoo website, but can't see answers to all of these. Basically, I've now used Mandrake/Mandriva for the last 4 years, and become fairly proficient with it, but am considering that it is time to move (Mdv is getting increasingly non-free, and is also less transparent than it used to be; they also ignore bug reports!). Gentoo looks to me to be the best alternative, and I have already made frequent use of the excellent documentation eg on udev or dvd authoring. But before I jump into the unknown, I wanted to ask a few things. 1)My main machine is a laptop, so it doesn't really have either the disk space for sources or CPU power to compile everything kernel,X,kde,openoffice ...). Is there a way to do a binary install that will get me a fully working system within a few hours? Of course I want to learn gentoo properly, but I'd prefer to do this from within a working system! 2)How exactly do gentoo security updates work? Under Mdv, there is a mailing list with announcements of which RPMs to install. If I have a binary-based distribution, will it be possible to keep it current? 3)Is there a relatively stable fork of gentoo with less frequent updates, or do I have to stay on the bleeding edge? Of course I want to get eg the latest kernel, or firefox, but I ran Mandrake Cooker for a while, with 100MB of updates per day and all sorts of random breakage! 4)Does anyone know of a good resource for ex-mandriva users? Thank you very much for your help, Richard -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages)
On Thu, 29 Dec 2005 15:24:58 +
Richard Neill [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
1)My main machine is a laptop, so it doesn't really have either the disk
space for sources or CPU power to compile everything
kernel,X,kde,openoffice ...). Is there a way to do a binary install that
will get me a fully working system within a few hours?
I just installed Gentoo onto a 640 MHz PIII that had a 4GB disk drive. Upside,
it took all of about 1 hr from a 2005.1 Stage3 CD, to get to the shell.
Downside,
2005.1 still has the old gcc, so it took a few days to upgrade gcc to 3.4,
emerge -e system,
emerge ufed, set the USE flags, then emerge -e world. But I only use
Enlightenment
or fluxbox. If you want KDE, emerge something really lightweight - fluxbox and
rox,
then let KDE crank in the background. Also, you'll need - laptop-mode-tools.
2)How exactly do gentoo security updates work? Under Mdv, there is a
mailing list with announcements of which RPMs to install. If I have a
binary-based distribution, will it be possible to keep it current?
The is a gentoo-announce list that the security updates get sent out on.
Typically, if
you're doing a daily syncs, the updates show up before the announcement.
3)Is there a relatively stable fork of gentoo with less frequent
updates, or do I have to stay on the bleeding edge? Of course I want to
get eg the latest kernel, or firefox, but I ran Mandrake Cooker for a
while, with 100MB of updates per day and all sorts of random breakage!
If you run a straight arch flag, like x86, vs unstable - ~x86, then you'll
not see
lots of updates. But, running a desktop means you'll see more packages
changing.
The other consideration is Gentoo is source based. Thus the dependencies on
specific
revisions of libraries is somewhat relaxed. And you control the interrelated
dependencies.
Thus fewer packages will change vs a binary based dist. Though with
heavyweight desktops
like KDE and Gnome, there will be more related lib changes to occur, it's just
the nature
of the beast.
4)Does anyone know of a good resource for ex-mandriva users?
Sorry, the best thing is just go through the installation guide and the Portage
related
documentation. As there are no GUI based system management tools, you'll be
doing more editing of config files. Also, leaving the world of chkconfig and
/etc/rc.*
for rc-update, /etc/init.d/ and /etc/runlevels/{boot, default,network,single}
will
be like a breath of fresh air.
Bob
-
--
gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages)
On 29 December 2005 17:24, Richard Neill wrote: 1)My main machine is a laptop, so it doesn't really have either the disk space for sources or CPU power to compile everything kernel,X,kde,openoffice ...). Is there a way to do a binary install that will get me a fully working system within a few hours? Of course I want to learn gentoo properly, but I'd prefer to do this from within a working system! Look up stage 3 installation in the installation manual. BTW, follow the instructions precisely. ;-) 2)How exactly do gentoo security updates work? Under Mdv, there is a mailing list with announcements of which RPMs to install. If I have a binary-based distribution, will it be possible to keep it current? You cannot really stay current on binaries but you can gradually convert your binary installation to a self-compiled one. You said above that your *main* machine was a laptop with insufficient harddisk space and CPU power. That implies you do have at least one other box. You could keep the whole portage tree, including the sources, on that other box and nfs mount it. Alternatively, if that other box has got more CPU power, you can compile the whole thing there, tar everything (except the portage tree) up, boot the laptop from a livecd, get the tarball over and ... well ... untar it. ;-) That's what I usually do with a new box, so I don't have to start from scratch. 3)Is there a relatively stable fork of gentoo with less frequent updates, or do I have to stay on the bleeding edge? Of course I want to get eg the latest kernel, or firefox, but I ran Mandrake Cooker for a while, with 100MB of updates per day and all sorts of random breakage! Forget about updates or versions with gentoo. It's a work in continuous progress. Every day, a little bit (and sometimes a huge bit) gets added, changed, improved. If you stay with stable ebuilds (the default) very little will break. I switched to ~86 (still under testing) early on, and it's still rare that things break. Usually, it's fixed the next day or just hours later. I had far more problems with SuSE. Gentoo is amazing when it comes to stability, performance and hassle-freeness. It is a wee bit heavy on bandwidth, especially if one sits on a modem connection like I do. To answer the question above: I don't know of any such beast. 4)Does anyone know of a good resource for ex-mandriva users? I don't know about that. Uwe -- Unix is sexy: who | grep -i blonde | date cd ~; unzip; touch; strip; finger mount; gasp; yes; uptime; umount sleep -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages)
You cannot really stay current on binaries but you can gradually convert your binary installation to a self-compiled one. You said above that your *main* machine was a laptop with insufficient harddisk space and CPU power. That implies you do have at least one other box. You could keep the whole portage tree, including the sources, on that other box and nfs mount it. Alternatively, if that other box has got more CPU power, you can compile the whole thing there, tar everything (except the portage tree) up, boot the laptop from a livecd, get the tarball over and ... well ... untar it. ;-) That's what I usually do with a new box, so I don't have to start from scratch. bear in mind that this is more difficult if they two machines don't have the same architecture/use flags. be careful with this approach. If you optimize a compile for a p4 and try to run it on a p3...well, that might or might not work. -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
Re: [gentoo-user] A few (gentoo-newbie) questions (mainly about binary packages)
Hi, Most of your questions have been answered by more knowledgeable people on the list than I. However, I do I one comment: Richard Neill wrote: 4)Does anyone know of a good resource for ex-mandriva users? I can't say enough good things about Gentoo documentation: http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/list.xml It has helped me out a number of times. I'm a relatively new Gentoo user as well (Sept. 2005) and I'm not a techy. I used Redhat and then, Fedora for about 4 years. People on this list have been great and initially pointed me toward various Gentoo documentation. I've finally clued in and realized what an invaluable resource this is. Case in point: I recently installed Gentoo on my laptop. It's a 2.4 gHz with a 40 gig hard drive, so perhaps it's a little more powerful than yours. I followed the steps in the Gentoo handbook and built ACPI into the kernel. Once I got to the boot stage, I had problems because I didn't follow the ACPI guide and I should have. Once I followed the steps in that, I was able to compile xwindows and kde-meta without a hitch. And for what it's worth, I had never compiled a kernel before using Gentoo and now, I can do it without being scared out of my mind - I may not be an expert, but I'm getting better and I am learning. And as I said, I'm not a techy - I could be someones grandmother! :-) I have to say that I am totally biased - Gentoo is the best! Anyway, that's my 2 cents! :-) Regards, Colleen -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
