Kwame Opam ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > Hi. I've been doing a lot of reading on Gentoo recently, and I've already > fallen in love with it. Currently, I use SuSE 8.2, but I'm bored and I want > to try something different.
Well, although after long time I got SuSE 8.2 I did not upgrade (from 8.0), but switched to Gentoo and never looked back again :-) > Before I go ahead with the install, I have a couple of questions. Since I've > only been using Linux for the past 2 months, am I adequately prepared to > install it? I printed out as much documentation as I could (I've run out of > paper), but the length of the installation is frightening. It just looks complicated. My advice is to start with Gentoo CDs (2). I did so sicne I'm on dialup (ISDN) and could quickly start from stage 3 and install bigger packages (X & KDE). After that I'm slowly updating my system and re-compiling with flags optimized for my system. All in all - great! > Also, provided I do manage to get it working, are there any ways to get > updates and patches like Red Hat's up2date? Yes, portage package management is the main reason to switch to Gentoo. > How does Gentoo compare to other distros? Are there any special advantages in > it being source-based as opposed to being RPM-based? Finally, what is portage > like? It sounds a lot like Apt to me. There is no comparison with the Gentoo :-) imho, big advantage is to completely avoid dependency hell which you have to face RPMs. I remember running SuSE 8.0, but there are only packages for 8.1. Then there is no SuSE package which you would like to see (or it's too old) and then you have to download & install from tarball .. It was too often, so I thought that it must be something wrong (although I was using apt-get), so why not to switch to Gentoo and only compile from source (and optimized for your system). With RPM distros you are forced to regularly update the whole system (or buy it), while with Gentoo I can decide what/when I want to update and from time to time just get/buy/burn Live CD to be able to boot from. Sincerely, Gour p.s. And Gentoo community is also a great one :-) -- Gour [EMAIL PROTECTED] Registered Linux User #278493 -- [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailing list
