Pat Regan on 18 Jul 2005 23:21:16 -0000


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Re: [PLUG] Re: why Gentoo


Luke Renn wrote:
>> If a vulnerability is released with a patch you don't need to be running
>> a source based distribution to recompile a single package.
> 
> No, but most people wait for the new binary package wouldn't you
> agree?  And when you do, it can be a pain in the butt.
> 

I almost always wait for a binary.  Thankfully Debian is usually quite
quick with security fixes :).

> I would say it doesn't live up to the hype.  However, I'm glad my
> binaries won't run on a 386, and are optimized for my processor, even
> if I don't always notice the difference w/ high visibility apps like
> Firefox.  If you're running servers you usually want to compile a few
> things from source anyway, apache, php, etc, just so you don't get a
> bunch of crap you don't want...so might as well optimize while you're
> doing it.
> 

You are absolutely correct that there are usually a handful of packages
that you may want to build from source.  Most of the time it is quite
simple to build a Debian package out of a tarball, so I don't mind doing
it a handful of times.

> emerge emacs-cvs
> 
> Another nice thing...the most popular packages already have cvs
> ebuilds.  Which means, you can track a project's cvs builds, but still
> have it managed by your package manager.
> 

My Emacs CVS build is managed by my package manager.  deb-make is a
piece of cake to use.

> Debian is so far behind, I wouldn't consider using it, but thats just
> me.
> 

I've been keeping my home workstation mostly up to date with Debian
Unstable for quite a few years now.  Most of the times things have been
as up to date as I needed them, until recently.  When Sarge was being
frozen, Unstable was falling way behind.  I don't think that will be
much of a problem until the next freeze though.

> All and all, I wouldn't recommend Gentoo to anyone who needs
> convincing.  It's either something that you immediately want, or its
> not going to be for you.  One great way to get BSD snobs (like myself)
> back to linux, it to show them gentoo.  Essentially, all BSD distro's
> are like Gentoo, Gentoo just took what BSD started and made it 10x better.
> 

Well, I worry that I have just gotten too comfortable with doing things
the Debian way.  I just want to make sure I am really not missing out on
something that would revolutionize the way I do things :).

Pat

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