Gentoo...huh, good God George, what is it good for....

morphal · Posted: Thu Apr 20, 2006 9:33 pm Post subject:

I think a lot of people are inadvertently making a case against Gentoo ... or certainly not for it. Yes, installing Gentoo is a great way to learn a lot more about how the scattered pieces of GNU/Linux software come together. People also bring up how much work it takes to get running but how it's worth it in the end. That's the talk of a borderline enthusiast.

As of right now, yes, Gentoo is an enthusiast distro. There's really no questioning it.
It's a matter of diminishing returns. Only an enthusiast would consider hours spent tweaking, customizing, bug-squashing, and compiling is worth having a 2% performance boost and the knowledge that they kept that one extra package off their system worthwhile ... "because they could."

That being said, maybe "enthusiast" is a poor word-choice. I certainly don't mean it to be disparaging, as the op suggests. Gentoo is about choice. To make an educated choice, you have to learn just what you're making a choice about as well as the merits and implications of your options. That kind of learning (when there are easier alternatives) requires an enthusiasm and an interest that some people just don't have when it comes to their choice of Linux distro.

Do I think Gentoo is vastly superior to RedHat and the rest? Yes.

Do most people want to put up with the headache of tons of nit-picking detais when they can just install RedHat and be done with it? No.

Essentially, Gentoo needs to get to that point where it will "just work" for a majority of the people out there without losing its customizability for everyone else.

The graphical install option on the new CDs is a huge step in the right direction in terms of how to get more people on board. Even better would be a nice little script/menu system that allowed people to make all of the relevant install choices without ever needing to skip to a command line. I know this is blashpemy for the enthusiasts but the enthusiasts already like Gentoo, the op asked what it will take to get everyone else to agree.

Napalm Llama · Guru Joined: 04 Jun 2005 Posts: 533 Location: Cardiff, UK

Before I knew about Linux I used Windows, and I'd break it enough to have to reinstall it every couple of months.

Then I tried SuSE, and broke it.
Then I tried Fedora, and broke it.
Then I tried Gentoo, and broke it...

...and fixed it again. I play with my computer, and Gentoo is the only operating system I've found to date that's robust enough to handle the treatment I put it through. That's why I love Gentoo - it's fixable :twisted:

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electrofreak · l33t Joined: 30 Jun 2004 Posts: 713 Location: Ohio, USA

I run 100% gentoo on my laptop, and I dual boot it on my AMD64 desktop. I also run a server what is gentoo, and I'm completely happy with the results. So, I have a fairly good range or systems I use it on, and it's great. So, I voted enthusiast and for mission critcal because my server and laptop are perfectly stable with it. On my desktop, it doesn't really get used much, but it's plenty stable when it does get used.
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Reikinio · Posted: Sat Apr 22, 2006 9:43 am Post subject:

SirYes · Posted: Sun Apr 23, 2006 7:26 pm Post subject:

W3BMAST3R101 · Apprentice Joined: 19 Jun 2004 Posts: 197

thesheff17 · Apprentice Joined: 12 Jan 2005 Posts: 283

there are so many good points of gentoo it is hard to list all of them. people complain left and right about it then don't use it. As a linux user for only about 3 years now gentoo has been far better than any distro I have tried. I have tried alot of them and always returned to gentoo. Everyone I know that wants to learn linux they ask what I should use. I tell them that it is just preference, but I would start with debian and move to gentoo when you feel you have a good grasp on just linux.

I see all these companies running red hat/suse and so on that people pay for. True open source is free and shouldn't be payed for. I have seen companies have so many issues with there red hat/suse distro and they call for help. Well I am I a not saying they are incompetent but I would rather just know how to fix it myself. quicker that way and I will know how to fix it when it happens again.

I have my own company now and run all gentoo. I have 1 windows box and about 30 gentoo boxes. I can't tell you how easy it is to administrate all these boxes. updates are piece of cake with rsync, http-replicator, and distcc. I just discovered distcc in the last week and it rocks my world. :wink:

Also if I ever have an issue I just post it here and it is answered so quickly for free. why pay for support?

I could go on forever but that is a good start.