Gentoo advantage? (was: [TriLUG] What distro do you use AT WORK on your SERVERS.)

[Jason Faulkner]

I have a THIRD point, woo.

Gentoo has some of the *best* documentation and infrastructure on
running distCC locally. I've known SEVERAL people who have installed
gentoo on really, really weak hardware using distCC to make it go
reasonably quick.

--Jay

On 1/14/06, Owen Berry <oberry at trilug.org> wrote:
> Two points on this. Firstly, there are binary packages available, and
> apparently there are even Package CD images available for download which
> contain pre-built packages for initial installation. Secondly, after a
> few days of patiently compiling, you will get good use out of your
> minimal hardware and your system will rock! :-) I've run Gentoo on
> really sucky hardware that was made for Win98 only (not good enough for
> any other Windows), and had good use out of it as a desktop with a real
> OS on it.
>
> Owen
>
> On Fri, 2006-01-13 at 22:16 -0500, Matt Pusateri wrote:
> > The downside to Gentoo is that it is mostly a complile from source
> > distro, so your old clunker laptop may take longer than you would like
> > to compile :)
> >
> > Matt P.
> >
> > On Wed, January 11, 2006 10:36 pm, Randall Barlow wrote:
> > > Cristobal Palmer wrote:
> > >
> > >>
> > >>I know that there are people on the list who are actively using
> > >> gentoo
> > >>in production environments, so can one of you give a more complete
> > >>argument for why the customization is easier?
> > >>
> > > I don't know that I would say that the customization of Gentoo is
> > > really
> > > easy necessarily, but *you* make the system the way *you* want it to
> > > be.  Gentoo is not for the casual user, or the new Linux convert for
> > > sure.  But the installation process is great for someone who wants to
> > > learn more about Linux, or even computers for that matter.
> > >
> > >> Does a gentoo install
> > >>start out significantly smaller?
> > >>
> > > YES!!!  Well, I don't know how it stacks up against DSL, but it's
> > > pretty
> > > freakin' small on a base install because that's exactly what you get
> > > with Gentoo - a base install.  You compile your kernel, install the
> > > basic Linux tools, yada yada, reboot, and bam you're at a blinking
> > > prompt.  It's small, but you can still choose to add more (X windows,
> > > yada yada).  Of course, most any distribution will allow you to do a
> > > stripped down install, but most of them don't compile from source.  As
> > > Jason pointed out, the USE flags are great for trimming down the
> > > packages, and this is something you won't get with any binary based
> > > distribution.  What you will NOT trim down is install time because
> > > compiling all those packages can take a loooong time (binaries are
> > > much
> > > faster to install for sure).
> > >
> > >> Do those of you who use it know that
> > >>you would be compiling just about everything to begin with?
> > >>
> > > Well, yeah, compiling these is what gives you all the flexibility.  If
> > > you don't use kde, don't compile support for kde in your apps
> > > (likewise
> > > if you don't use gnome).  For example, the machine I'm typing this on
> > > is
> > > rather old and has no DVD drive, so I put "-dvd" in my use flags and
> > > all
> > > programs that would otherwise support DVDs don't now.  If I later get
> > > a
> > > DVD drive, all I have to do is remove the minus in that USE flag and
> > > emerge --update --newuse --deep world (well, and wait possibly a long
> > > time :)) and bam, DVD support.  The same goes for compiling your own
> > > kernel.  Of course you can do this in any distribution, but the point
> > > is
> > > that Gentoo is made with customization in mind!
> > >
> > >> Give me
> > >>some arguments that'll inspire me to give gentoo a shot on _my_ old
> > >>clunker laptop.
> > >>
> > >>
> > > How about trying it as a challenge to learn new stuff?  Seriously, I
> > > learned a lot just in the install process.  I do actually use it on my
> > > $WORK machine as well (a Sun workstation), and it's been good for that
> > > as well.  I suppose I'd say that Gentoo is a good "hobbyist" Linux
> > > distribution though.  Sometimes you just need your machine to work
> > > with
> > > no hassles, and you may not get that very easily with Gentoo.  But if
> > > you're interested in learning a lot, and you have an old clunker and
> > > some free time, give it a whirl!
> > >
> > > --
> > > Randy Barlow
> > > Research Assistant
> > > Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
> > > North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC
> > > rpbarlow at ncsu.edu
> > >
>
>
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--
Jason Faulkner
------------------------
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