[sclug] Re: Gentoo

[Sandeep Varma]

On Fri, 12 Nov 2004 12:00:06 GMT, sclug-request at sclug.org.uk
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> Today's Topics:
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>    1. Gentoo (Neil Haughton)
>    2. RE: Gentoo (Christopher West)
> 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Message: 1
> Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 21:10:47 +0000
> From: Neil Haughton <n.a.haughton at bigfoot.com>
> Subject: [sclug] Gentoo
> To: sclug at sclug.org.uk
> Message-ID: <4193D557.5070106 at bigfoot.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
> 
> I was seriously toying with the idea of adding a Gento installation to
> my Mandrake/WinXP machine - just for the challenge really, and out of
> curiosity. The portage idea has a certain appeal.
> 
> Anyone tried a dual boot Gentoo setup?
> 
> Anyone got any advice to offer me, before I leap in? I'm not a Linux
> 'guru' by any stretch of the imagination.
> 
> Neil Haughton
> 
> ------------------------------
> 
> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 22:09:35 +0000
> From: "Christopher West" <chriz_w at hotmail.com>
> Subject: RE: [sclug] Gentoo
> To: sclug at sclug.org.uk
> Message-ID: <BAY20-F3AUor03u9PH30004026f at hotmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed
> 
> Ive been running a gentoo system for about one year now and im no guru
> either and i would say that its an interesting way of running linux. I'm
> dual booting with xp everything run perfectly.
> I found that the installation documentation is good its step by step, i got
> it to install first time but be warned that i will take a day to initially
> set up.
> The portage system is great if you find that there are any broken emerges
> take a look at the make.conf file there will be use declarations missing.
> ive found that once you have you basic make.conf transfer the info into the
> make.conf.example and rename it make.conf then you have all the setting for
> portage that you could ever need and emerge -av is youre friend.
> 
> ----Original Message Follows----
> From: Neil Haughton <n.a.haughton at bigfoot.com>
> To: sclug at sclug.org.uk
> Subject: [sclug] Gentoo
> Date: Thu, 11 Nov 2004 21:10:47 +0000
> 
> I was seriously toying with the idea of adding a Gento installation to my
> Mandrake/WinXP machine - just for the challenge really, and out of
> curiosity. The portage idea has a certain appeal.
> 
> Anyone tried a dual boot Gentoo setup?
> 
> Anyone got any advice to offer me, before I leap in? I'm not a Linux 'guru'
> by any stretch of the imagination.
> 
> Neil Haughton
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> End of sclug Digest, Vol 14, Issue 7
> ************************************
> 

I tried Gentoo about 2 months ago, the install is very very
educational and does teach you a lot about system internals, and the
installation guide/documentation is very well put together. However, I
don't run it now for a few reasons, some/most of which may not apply
to you

1) It takes awfully long to install, 1 day for the shortest (Stage 3)
2) Compile Times, need I say more?
3) I'm limited to a 56k connection, so getting KDE and then compiling
it was very very difficult, and I needed to have that installation
work ready.

Overall, I'd say Gentoo is a pretty good choice, the optimizations are
nice and the speed is pretty good, though I'd only reccomend it if
you're willing to spend a lot of time making it usable, and keeping it
up to date. System requirements are also pretty hefty.

A notable alternative to Gentoo is the (similarly source built, then
packaged) Slackware, I think Slackware 10.1 is due within a month.
It's just as fast as Gentoo to me, and just as educational, if not
more. It's also rock solid and incredibly hard to break.

One very important thing to note when dual booting with Win2k/WinXP is
to be careful when using a 2.6 kernel, they change the partition map
so that Windows won't boot without fixing it. 2.4 kernels are
perfectly fine.

-----------------

Sandeep Varma