whts the difference between "stage1 , 2 and 3"

feelexit · n00b Joined: 02 Feb 2003 Posts: 17

i just got so confusd of those 3 stages.

wths the difference between them. How are we gonna kno which stage we should pick.

if we pick stage1 and do we sitll have to go through 2 and 3.?

and if we pick stage3 , and we can just skip 1 and 2...

if some1 knows it really well. please explain it to me... thanx.

grafty · n00b Joined: 27 Jan 2003 Posts: 33

feelexit · n00b Joined: 02 Feb 2003 Posts: 17

i guess for newbie like me , should start from stage 3.

thanx for ur help.

EatYourGreens · Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2003 6:31 am Post subject:

I agree, a Gentoo n00b should start with a stage 3. It took me a few attempts to get my Gentoo install right, and I only used stage 1 the first time. It is soul-destroying to go through the whole stage 1 install process, only to find that you have made a mistake that you cannot fix and have to start again. An install using stage 3 is so much quicker.

Also, the differences between stage 1/2 and stage 3 are the compiler options (USE variables), and AFAIK there is no advantage to using a stage 1 install if you don't change the USE variables, since you will end up with exactly the same as if you had used a stage 3 install.
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masseya · Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2003 6:51 am Post subject:

You may also want to use the Gentoo Reference Platform (GRP) packages. They will help make your installation process speed up as well. This is mentioned in the Install Doc as well.
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rac · Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2003 7:02 pm Post subject:

EatYourGreens, what did you do to mess up your stage 1 install? If it really is a problem that would require a reinstall, then I think warnings about it should go in the install guide.
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EatYourGreens · Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2003 9:24 pm Post subject:

rac, I don't think that any of the problems I had were due to errors with Gentoo, just a stupid noob not understanding what he was doing. I am sure that the problems I had could all have been fixed with config file edits, and issuing commands I had missed from the install guide, but I really did not understand how Gentoo worked. I used SuSE before I tried Gentoo, and I was not ready for how different Gentoo was. I had no idea what chroot was, for example, even after I issued the command, so when I started to get problems, I reinstalled since that seemed the safer thing to do (most of my experience is with DOS/Windows and I used to reinstall Win95 every six months or so, just to keep it stable)

I installed Gentoo using 1.4rc1 and I am sure there were a number of errors in the install guide (mainly things that applied to 1.2 but had not been changed). I recently installed 1.4rc2 on a second computer, and the install guide is much better now. Also, 1.4rc2 is a much better starting point than 1.4rc1, letting me use my German keyboard for example. However, I installed this new computer using stage 3 tarball, since I had no intention of changing the USE flags from the default.

Final comment, before I installed Gentoo for the first time, I spent some time reading the forums to see what kind of problems I could expect. The general feeling I found was that Gentoo can be hard to install and has a steep learning curve, but the reward is a stable system and a much greater understanding of Linux. For me, Gentoo has lived up to these expectations.
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masseya · Posted: Wed Feb 05, 2003 10:31 pm Post subject: