On Wednesday 04 February 2009 01:48:34 Nikos Chantziaras wrote: > So all in all, I agree. Using Gentoo is nowadays not so much a matter > of performance optimization but of better control of how to build the > packages and the rolling release nature (I'm tired of major updates > every 6 months in the majority of binary distros.) I also like the USE > flags which let me chose how to build something and get rid of > dependencies I don't need. Administrative features like dispatch-conf > are also very useful.
This is the main benefit of Gentoo for me. I have to use SuSE or RHEL at work for the database machines - Sybase will not support any other other distro - and the 1G+ base install from those distros drive me nuts. Contrast that with the DNS caches which run FreeBSD, the difference is about a factor of 5 if not more. I also get sick and tired of installing postfix on a database machine purely to send nagios alerts, and watching the distro "helpfully" want to pull in PostgreSQL, MySQL, LDAP, SASL, Courier and some fancy MTA-switcher thingy. All because the maintainer enables those features and now I gotta have them. No thanks. Rather give me USE so I say what goes on the box. -- alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com
