I'M DONE - 4 YEARS of Gentoo is ENOUGH.

GODhack · Guru Joined: 26 Jan 2008 Posts: 389 Location: Lithuania

You have M16?
We may start Gentoo revolution then.
We will create Gentoo without angry leavers posting long posts and without those bugs where someone talks about * and how update nuked his p0rn collection, but do not post emerge --info, xorg.conf and even no video player version.
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wesw02 · Posted: Mon Apr 27, 2009 8:03 am Post subject:

So for whatever reason (probably the massive amounts of caffine) I've just read the entire thread (all 23 pages). My first year in college I worked tech support for "Company X" and they had a saying they would use when customers were unreasonable and complaining about everything they could, that saying is "Company X is not for everyone". I think the same can be applied to the whiners in this thread, "Gentoo's not for everyone". If you want a distro to "hold your hand" while installing applications or configuring your fancy toolbar, your in the wrong place.

Bluespear · Posted: Tue Apr 28, 2009 6:10 am Post subject:

Ormaaj · Guru Joined: 28 Jan 2008 Posts: 319

One thread of flame has generated 4 years worth of crying? Sensitive much?

This thread should have been responded to with a page or two of "fuck you. have fun with ubuntu. See you in a few weeks after you realize how much you miss us.", and left to die.

GWilliam · Guru Joined: 29 Dec 2005 Posts: 350

When I finally wised up and ditched Gentoo for a better distribution, I didn't natter on about it so.

Magnum_ · n00b Joined: 01 Mar 2004 Posts: 61

I'm off to "Jaunty" as well... at least for my workstation, the server remains gentoo for now.

I've been using gentoo for years now (but I'm not the most experienced user, far from...), and lately I'm noticing that I'm putting less and less effort in maintaining my systems. I used to put hours and hours in installing, reinstalling, finetuning, ... But these last few months I was not really motivated anymore to do so, I had other concerns and occupations. So, with Jaunty almost being released, I was thinking : maybe I should switch to a system that requires less effort to be updated. So I downloaded a Jaunty liveCD, and I was not really disappointed. It immediatly worked with my X4500HD, and also with my intel HDA (WITH SPDIF optical output, which took me weeks to notice that kernels < 2.6.28 simply don't have that feature for my particular card!).

But because my gentoo workstation was working, there was no reason to change yet. Maybe one reason: I couldn't really get my onboard X4500HD working as it should in gentoo, so I was forced to plug in an NVIDIA card which worked flawless. But that's no biggy. Until yesterday :

I updated my workstation yesterday for the first time in a few months probably, and had a whole bunch of issues with blocking packages and packages with errors. After finally solving those problems, I thought it would be a nice idea to revdep-rebuild, emerge --depclean --pretend, I checked the list of packages that would be removed, emerge --depclean. After all of that, my system practically died. My fault probably. I can reboot, I have the console, but X won't start. I couldn't compile _any_ packages anymore. RAGE :evil:

.
I then rebooted with the newest minimal gentoo liveCD. Started and configured mdadm. Mounted my partitions. Chrooted into my environment. Tried to re-emerge every package in the system. Same errors. Seems hopeless. I can't even bring up the courage to start looking where it went wrong anymore.

So I mounted my /home dir, and started a full backup to my fileserver yesterday night (over wireless connection, might take a few days :roll:

). When it's done, I'll probably install (x?)ubuntu, hoping that it will require much less maintenance, and an even bigger community to solve problems if they should occur.

Probably my leaving is much due to a lack of knowledge and patience. So be it then, gentoo might not be my cup of tea.

When I come to think of it, a lot seems to have changed since I joined the gentoo community. I always thought that gentoo was the bleeding edge distro, with the latest software packages available in the unstable tree, to install "at your own risk". Lately, I'm considering the stable tree as the "old" tree, with almost ancient packages (some released over a year ago). And the unstable tree as the slightly more recent but fairly stable tree.
Why are recent packages no longer "directly" available in the unstable tree? KDE 4.2, gnome 2.26, Xorg 1.6 are not directly available in the unstable portage tree, but they can be installed using an "overlay". I tried this once on a VM, but couldn't get it working. Why are these packages not directly in portage? Isn't that the purpose of the "unstable" tree?? Meanwhile, the canonical people already consider these packages stable (as they are all in Jaunty), and for gentoo they aren't even directly available, not in the stable, not in the unstable tree. I can't really see the logic in that. But I'm sure there's a logical explaination. It just doesnt seem really user-friendly, and not everyone can free up the time to follow up all of this.

d2_racing · Posted: Wed Apr 29, 2009 10:41 am Post subject:

MaximeG · l33t Joined: 15 Apr 2008 Posts: 722 Location: Belgium

Gentoo and Ubuntu/Debian use 2 different philosophies.
It's a matter of choice and freedom, so don't try to compare them please.

I personnally consider Gentoo as an opened and living distribution without fixed releases/versions as opposite to Ubuntu with its 6 month release cycle.
Which approach is the best ? Well, the real question is 'who cares?'.

Now, if you feel like quitting, then quit and that's it, nobody will complain.
Good luck with your other distributions and be well.

Regards,
Maxime
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Tekeli Li · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 03 Jan 2009 Posts: 95

snailhead · n00b Joined: 13 Nov 2006 Posts: 5

Tekeli Li · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 03 Jan 2009 Posts: 95

IMHO, the bottom line is much more simple. Gentoo is just a meta-distribution, a set of tools which enables the user to set up any system configuration he or she pleases. That alone defines Gentoo as not just "yet another distro but with super cool optimializations". It's a toolset.

So you can hit a nail with a hammer. Or you can use a (easy to use) toolkit that builds the hammer of just enough size and weight for your beloved nail, and it drives it perfectly into the wall, not a micron more or less (the process in which you learn alot about hammers, nails, driving the nails into walls, etc...).

So yes, if one "just" wants a distro to play games / do office work / play movies, Gentoo may be an overkill. "Just" hitting a nail sometimes requires "just" a hammer. So blaming Gentoo for being what it is is ludicrous. You don't want (and don't need) to build a hammer of just enough size and weight? Then don't.

Sprotte · Posted: Mon May 11, 2009 3:11 am Post subject:

The thing is, if you already know Gentoo, and if you aren't interested in the latest stuff, you have to spend very little time on updates and practically no time on optimisations.

I run stable with safe CFLAGS and update system about every six months or so (once I went a year without updates). I use Openbox and GTK, and just a minimal setup really.

Updating stuff like Openbox, Gimp, or GTK I see as totally optional. System is what matters.

Security updates, well, I have no really sensitive stuff on my machine, all my dev work is in an SVN at assembla.com, or backupped, and I run a homemade router with a totally rigid firewall. My firefox is auto-updated via Mozilla's online update.

The programs I use most are vim, mutt, some Quake clients (not online), firefox (updated), irssi, and some obscure stone-age Windows programs (texture editor, level editor, wav editor). How vulnerable are those. I use different passwords on my router and desktop. I download no shit from the internet. I don't IM or play online.

I believe my risk is rather low, and my update schedule is very relaxed.

It's not true that you have to "always compile stuff". You have the option to do so, yeah, but only if you're obsessive-compulsive.

I should probably do GLSA updates, but I forget how to do them and can't really be arsed. I am not the target group for crackers or trojans.

regeya · Posted: Wed May 13, 2009 4:49 am Post subject:

Yamakuzure · Posted: Thu May 14, 2009 10:26 am Post subject:

Hrmpf. Since I once had to compile vmware-modules on a debian Lenny machine, I know how much luxury I have with gentoo. Just go and try to figure out what you all need to get the right kernel-headers, toolchain, compiler, whatever with apt-cache and apt-get. At least you are forced to learn how to use "grep" *very* quickly...

...and even with alot of "unstable" packages in my portage.keywords, I have no problems, and updates/upgrades are fast and flawless... No need to spend more time than an hour or two per month(!!) on maintenance for two desktops and one laptop.
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Edited 220,176 times by Yamakuzure

noisebleed · Posted: Thu May 14, 2009 10:33 am Post subject:

twstd3bc · Posted: Fri Jun 05, 2009 6:59 pm Post subject:

Shovas · n00b Joined: 23 May 2003 Posts: 73

ilovebeer · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 16 Aug 2008 Posts: 87

10wattmindtrip · n00b Joined: 09 Feb 2008 Posts: 2

I barely say anything on here but I suppose I'll just throw my 2 cents out there.

Gentoo may have some issues. So what? Instead of leaving the community why not try and help out? Even little things help.
I personally haven't had too many issues with my system. I've been using Gentoo since around 2002, maybe even earlier. Sure, compiling sometimes goes for a dump, but there are usually solutions to the problems. I've read a lot of threads on here for help and almost all of them have useful information that leads to a solution(s).

While I agree that Arch Linux is a very nice system, I don't think moving my distro of choice over is a wise thing for the Gentoo community. Negative things can be fixed. There is a vast amount of work that goes into maintaining a OS such as Gentoo. I certainly won't expect things to be a certain way immediately. Rolling distro's such as Gentoo just make more sense to me.

I don't know.. just a few thoughts.

-10
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altrhombus · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 25 Sep 2004 Posts: 92

Key word being community..

*group hug everyone*

Gentoo's philosophy of choice is a huge reason I'm still an active user (and I was one of those sadist users who picked up Gentoo as my first serious Linux OS), but the biggest reason is the community. I saw a forum sig once that said something like 'my post count may be low, but that's because I research for my problem before asking.' That definitely applies here.

To those who think Gentoo is out to get them and they're going to pack their bags:
If a fellow member has a problem and you know how to fix it, respond with your thoughts!
If a fellow member has a problem and you have an idea about it, respond anyway! There have been so many occasions where just a single line in a post can trigger a thought that leads to a fix.
If a fellow member has a problem and you're clueless, keep tabs on it. Either you'll have useful comment later, or you'll learn something new.
If you have a problem, post it! Explain it clearly, and describe your troubleshooting steps. Verbose, verbose, verbose.

I think the forums need a special place for the ranting posts. That way, the unique "publicly-announce-i'm-leaving-gentoo-but-i'll-still-discuss-why-amongst-fellow-haters" groupies can hang out over there

stmiller · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 28 Feb 2006 Posts: 119

slowride · Posted: Thu Jul 23, 2009 4:17 pm Post subject: It's always WORK, but results?

01allein · Posted: Thu Jul 23, 2009 6:15 pm Post subject:

Well see you back, theres nothing else but GNU/Linux Gentoo...

Most people like ~(unstable), and if you dont know how to handle this, then you get sick...

See you soon

MarcusXP

shickapooka800 · Guru Joined: 05 Dec 2004 Posts: 304 Location: no

holy shit people, is this thread still alive? everyone comes back to gentoo if they liked it at one point.
look at me, i am back in thiscrap after much debian faggotry. although I am still banned from OTW, so I am spamming gentoo chat.