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A few hours and some research later, I learned that the package missing is missing because the version on the installer DVD is outdated. The newer version is, of course, available, though the installer insists in using the old one.

I'm pretty sure this issue could be resolved somehow. But I kinda wanted to use the server before it's turned into a heavy paperweight. I know, I'll be flamed for being a noob and whatever, 'cause I couldn't resolve such a simple issue, and I'm pretty sure the workaround is quite easy if you're a Gentoo-wiz, but those things tend to turn people away from a distribution. The newbies, because they can't figure out how to do something, and the Linux vets because they're used to at least working installations.

A few hours and some research later, I learned that the package missing is missing because the version on the installer DVD is outdated. The newer version is, of course, available, though the installer insists in using the old one.

I'm pretty sure this issue could be resolved somehow. But I kinda wanted to use the server before it's turned into a heavy paperweight. I know, I'll be flamed for being a noob and whatever, 'cause I couldn't resolve such a simple issue, and I'm pretty sure the workaround is quite easy if you're a Gentoo-wiz, but those things tend to turn people away from a distribution. The newbies, because they can't figure out how to do something, and the Linux vets because they're used to at least working installations.

A few hours and some research later, I learned that the package missing is missing because the version on the installer DVD is outdated. The newer version is, of course, available, though the installer insists in using the old one.

I'm pretty sure this issue could be resolved somehow. But I kinda wanted to use the server before it's turned into a heavy paperweight. I know, I'll be flamed for being a noob and whatever, 'cause I couldn't resolve such a simple issue, and I'm pretty sure the workaround is quite easy if you're a Gentoo-wiz, but those things tend to turn people away from a distribution. The newbies, because they can't figure out how to do something, and the Linux vets because they're used to at least working installations.

A few hours and some research later, I learned that the package missing is missing because the version on the installer DVD is outdated. The newer version is, of course, available, though the installer insists in using the old one.

I'm pretty sure this issue could be resolved somehow. But I kinda wanted to use the server before it's turned into a heavy paperweight. I know, I'll be flamed for being a noob and whatever, 'cause I couldn't resolve such a simple issue, and I'm pretty sure the workaround is quite easy if you're a Gentoo-wiz, but those things tend to turn people away from a distribution. The newbies, because they can't figure out how to do something, and the Linux vets because they're used to at least working installations.

Is there any way out of packaging fragmentation lane?

Yes.

Why not set up your own email server? It is much easier to write rules and such to process your email on that end, rather than trying it on the client end. It is pretty easy...even for something fairly complex like virtual hosting (slightly outdated) using Gentoo and Postfix. You can write your own scripts to handle incoming/outgoing email, filter it, alter it...etc. All for free, and just exactly like YOU like it. Heck, run it for your friends too...and then they can benefit from your work too and have better email experiences.

Not rocket science..just takes a little effort. I'd also recommend the O'Reilly book on Postfix, has great explanations on email, how the protocols work..and how to set things up.

I simply followed these instructions:

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-409194-postda ys-0-postorder-asc-start-0.html

Mate: high 5 on wanting to help out. I'm a coder who doesn't contribute to existing projects (mostly due to time contraints and not for a lack of interest or desire) but releases the odd tool under a GPL or BSD license (or similar).

The lack of documentation in FLOSS aside (no flames please) you'd obviously be contributing to user documentation. I personally favour "complete" user documentation for a single system such as the FreeBSD Handbook (Gentoo and Debian have similar efforts). Of course even blogging HOWTOs may be useful to some one some day.

There are other ways to contribute. Hanging out on forums or IRC channels designed for helping end users in need is useful.

Man, tell me about it. I'm still exhausted from typing "emerge gspcav1"...Glad I'm not using Ubuntu, or I'd have to do about twice as much work! ("gspcav1" being much shorter to type than "gspca-source"...)

Okay, in fairness, it actually was kind of a pain finding this package in the first place, but other than that, the three different types of webcams I have floating around all DO seem to "just work" with it. And don't let the "2.6.19" thing on the Gentoo package page fool you - it seems to at least compile for 2.6.21.

Now, does anyone have any good recommendations for webcam capture software? (How the heck do I get mencoder to use the webcam for input, anyway?...)

An interesting chart showing power use comparison can be found here

Gentoo's Power Management Guide is a bit gentoo-centric, but most things carry to another distribution easily.

There's a huge thread about broken disk IO in kernels > 2.6.17.
http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-482731.html

How about fixing that first?

I've noticed all kinds of new schedulers coming out of the woodwork in 2.6. Optional kernel preemption. And also changes to the default timer (250 instead of 100, etc.). These are choices like I've never had in Linux before. Should be good, right?

But at a higher level there's been such brokenness.
K3B CD burning broke in 2.6.8 and wasn't fixed until 2.6.10.
Firewire performance (for me) started fluctuating after ~2.6.7. Although grabbing DV over firewire doesn't take much CPU time, for some reason having video preview enabled during capture may/may not cause dropped frames (on a modern amd64! pathetic!) depending on kernel version.
And the promise of 2.6 being responsive and feeling interactive under heavy load? Also ended after 2.6.7 for me.
Recent kernels, like 2.6.18, seem to take minutes to balance tasks out. Playing video during heavy CPU usage? For me it gives priority to everything else BUT the new video process for about 30 seconds. (CFM or anticipatory scheduler)

So I'm not sure if we should be welcoming all this new "choice" with scheduler-du-jour or try to give us a good default choice that actually works right first.

A lot of people say that Gentoo is compiled for your system and thus results in a massively faster system. This only has some truth to it. They also say that Gentoo allows for a much deeper understanding of linux and how their computer works. This is even less true. There used to be a site up making fun of gentoo users who think they are bad ass by using gentoo, but I believe it is MIA now. You can browse this thread to get the jist of what it said: http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=181330&po stdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0 I'll admit that Gentoo is far harder to get running then say, Ubuntu, but by no means does it make you an expert. At the least, it makes you really efficient at copying-pasting errors in google... at the most... ??? Although, I run it on my laptop, and it took a bit of time to get everything working. Would I switch distros? no, I like it a lot.

I was in a similar situation about a year ago, and I found that the best way to learn about the guts of the system, so to speak, was to pick up Gentoo, which is something of a "Roll your own" kind of Linux distribution.

Now, by no means do I recommend this for day to day use. I love Gentoo, but it breaks. Frequently. And unless you know a fair bit about how the system works, you'll end up breaking it quite often yourself. This is a good thing, and introduces you to the various configuration files, locations of critical items, how everything slots together, and how to compile your own kernel. The Gentoo documentation is excellent, and if you go about it with a certain goal in mind (web server, router, media center) you'll end up learning a fair bit about Linux in the process.

Apmache can work with wii browser, but with a few tweaks. See the discussion at http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-541340.html

Let us take a look at the recent topic of a Madwifi vulnerability affecting certain wifi users in Linux.

Julien Tinnes reported it at 13:48:00 EST on December 7, 2006.

At 14:17:50 on the same day the patch was available in the main source code repository.

A little while later at 17:08:26 the vulnerability is officially confirmed by Madwifi and advisories had been prepared.

Looking downstream, the response times for an official fixes/advisories by distribution specific security teams were:
Gentoo: December 10
SUSE: Confirmed December 8, Fixed December 11
Ubuntu: January 9

There is certainly some room for improvement here with distribution specific fixes, but that also includes time spent testing the changes to the driver. To be fair to Microsoft (actually, I'm just being overly optimistic), they probably had a patch ready within 30 minutes of the initial vulnerability report as was the case with Madwifi. But instead of giving the customer the option of trying the "beta" patch so they can test it themselves, it is kept private. Days tick by at Microsoft HQ and nothing appears to happen. Eventually, a patch is released on the patch Tuesday of the next month (or the month after that). System administrators get no choice and no chance to test it themselves.

I have several times offered to help document open source software, but my offer has always been refused. Apparently there is a strong attachment to doing things the old way. Apparently there is a feeling that someone who writes the documentation will get too much credit, even though I did not expect to have my name on what I wrote.

Well, Gentoo is always looking for good documentation people. Gentoo prides itself on having top-notch documentation. This is only possible by having good people. If you're really interested in helping out, you should contact the Gentoo Documentation Project and see about joining up. Even if you don't feel like joining the project, we always accept contributions from the community. There's also the Gentoo Weekly Newsletter if that is more your style.

I have several times offered to help document open source software, but my offer has always been refused. Apparently there is a strong attachment to doing things the old way. Apparently there is a feeling that someone who writes the documentation will get too much credit, even though I did not expect to have my name on what I wrote.

Well, Gentoo is always looking for good documentation people. Gentoo prides itself on having top-notch documentation. This is only possible by having good people. If you're really interested in helping out, you should contact the Gentoo Documentation Project and see about joining up. Even if you don't feel like joining the project, we always accept contributions from the community. There's also the Gentoo Weekly Newsletter if that is more your style.

I gladly leave the picking up of unsatisfied Windows users to other flavors of Linux, I myself prefer to stick with Gentoo and wish that all the developers at Gentoo would realize that Gentoo just isn't and is not supposed to become an "click and go" OS.

Says who? Gentoo's goals are fairly well-aligned with making things simpler, so long as flexibility is not sacrificed for it.

It is my personal opinion that if you have to do anything on the command line, the software/OS has failed. Of course, that means that all operating systems out there fail in my eyes. Well, they do. Computers are complex, but the interface doesn't have to be complex. Gentoo will never likely become an OS that removes the ability for power users to use it as they wish, since that is one of the fundamental advantages of Gentoo, but it is very likely going to continue moving towards a more simple default installation. The goal is to eventually allow people to never need to drop to the command line to perform at least the most common tasks. Power users will always have the option to be CLI junkies. Of course, I'm referring to a user-oriented OS, not a server OS. Gentoo can be used for both, and only the user side is being geared towards making things more simplified and graphical. We would like to simplify the server side, as well, but only so far as to make management of Gentoo servers easier for the administrator without removing flexibility.

If you're interested in the server side of Gentoo, check out the SCIRE project.

Easy...set up a linux box at home and install Postfix and Squirrelmail . These work great and will do as you wished.

Here's a good link for setting up virtual hosting before you put on the webmail front end.

Gentoo works nicely too.

http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/gentoo-alt/prefix/bo otstrap-macos.xml

Or you can get pre-built binaries from http://metissian.com/projects/macosx/subversion/. They're a little behind though.

Undervolting goes well with underclocking too. If you have a good CPU, you can undervolt a lot even at stock speed. You can tweak it pretty easily in Windows using RMClock. It's a little more challenging in Linux, but still possible. You have to edit the voltage tables in the speedstep_centrino kernel module and recompile it.

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-341298-highli ght-undervolt+speedstep.html

I think you meant to say:

Download Live cd and boot.
net-setup eth0 (or just use ifconfig :) )
cfdisk /dev/hda
mke2fs -j /dev/hda1
mke2fs -j /dev/hda3
mkswap /dev/hda2
swapon /dev/hda2
mount /dev/hda3 /mnt/gentoo
mkdir /mnt/gentoo/boot
mount /dev/hda1 /mnt/gentoo/boot
cd /mnt/gentoo/
wget http://gentoo.osuosl.org/releases/x86/current/stag es/stage3-i686-2006.1.tar.bz2
tar xjpf stage3*
cd /
mount -t proc proc /mnt/gentoo/proc
cp -L /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/gentoo/etc/
chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
env-update && source /etc/profile
emerge --sync
emerge portage
date
passwd
cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/America\Los_Angeles /etc/localtime
cd /etc
echo "127.0.0.1 mybox.at.myplace mybox localhost" > hosts
sed -i -e 's/HOSTNAME.*/HOSTNAME="mybox"/' conf.d/hostname
hostname mybox
download and compile kernel from Kernel.org
emerge lilo syslog-ng dcron dhcpcd
cd /etc
nano -w fstab
cd conf.d
echo 'config_eth0=( "192.168.1.10/24" )' >> net
echo 'routes_eth0=( "default via 192.168.1.1" )' >> net
rc-update add net.eth0 default
rc-update add sshd default
rc-update add syslog-ng default
crontab /etc/crontab
nano -w /etc/lilo.conf
lilo
exit
umount /mnt/gentoo/proc /mnt/gentoo/boot /mnt/gentoo
reboot


Source: My brain, and http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/gentoo-x86-quickinsta ll.xml

And would it be so hard for the frickin' date applet to have Sunday as the first day of the week instead of Saturday?

Linux has been able to do this for ages...

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-443324-highli ght-vol+volume+controls.html

Well if you want to reinstall then that I am not going to stop you, but repairing a messed up installation usually isn't that hard if you know a bit about the system or go get a bit of support on the Gentoo Forums.
Just use a bootable CD and chroot into the system and get whatever fails on you fixed.
If it is a hardware failure then that is something totally different and it should not in the first place be blamed on Gentoo (even though compiling can be tough for the HD)

Ick. GP should file a bug; there are too many Gentoo devs that need a kick in the ass before they bother to do basic QA.

Hardening

And keep in mind: Even if you are not paranoid, they still could be out to get you.

Found on http://www.gentoo.org/

Triggered by recent examples of bad behavior and dissatisfaction among developers and users alike, the Gentoo Council has drafted a new Code of Conduct that will be enforced for both developers and users. The draft version of the Code of Conduct is currently being discussed on the Gentoo-dev mailing list. To subscribe, send an email to Gentoo-dev+subscribe@lists.Gentoo.org or read the archive.
The Code of Conduct will be voted upon by the Gentoo Council Thursday, March 15th; implementation will be immediate upon final approval. The Code of Conduct describes what the Gentoo Council has deemed acceptable and unacceptable behavior. It also describes the punishment that will be enforced if the Code of Conduct is breached.
The Gentoo Council expects the Code of Conduct to end the bad behavior shown by some and hope it will help Developer Relations enforce good behavior among the developers.
The Gentoo Council has scheduled a Question and Answer session Wednesday, March 14th between 2100UTC and 2300UTC in the #gentoo-council channel on the Freenode IRC network, irc://irc.freenode.net. We welcome all interested parties to participate in the Question & Answer session.

It might be advanced and very fast - but it is NOT mainline nor accepted.

Which is also not the issue.

Also check XFS people: they do not scream laud albeit their file system is alos unsupported by Gentoo though it is in mainline kernel.

Wasn't asking for support or endorsement, merely accurate representation. I'd be equally annoyed, for instance, if they claimed Vista was in Beta. I don't like Vista, and I think it's still Beta quality, but it's been released for awhile now.

IOW, the response you have received from Gentoo was more like "we have our hands full with mainline file systems to bother with something external."

Which seems both blatantly false (see below) and irrelevant. It was a documentation issue, not a support issue, and it was about three words.

For instance: They have sys-fs/reiser4progs-1.0.5 in the Portage tree. It's not only there, but it's unmasked. Sadly, they may be right about the fsck being more stable than the FS itself...

My point is, what I was complaining about would be roughly equivalent to them calling it "sys-fs/reiser4progs-1.0.5_beta", and using the same source. There's a difference between saying you don't like something and outright lying about it.

I'm finding it hard to locate the actual chunk of documentation I had a problem with. I can certainly point to some unfriendly ones -- this is just stupid, there's nothing to stop you from patching your own kernel and running it anyway, and I have two Gentoo systems and one Ubuntu system running on Reiser4. The correct thing to put there would be "We don't support it."

However, I can't find either my bug report or the original page I didn't like. It was some sort of very small comparison matrix between various filesystems. So for now, there's nothing wrong; however, it was NOT simply an issue of "We support this" or "We don't support this". If it was, it wouldn't have bothered me at all.

Instead, it was more like, "We don't support this, it's unstable and alpha..." which was actually a factual mistake. Not a political mistake, not a wrong choice, but a simple, factual mistake. And no matter how many times I re-opened the bug, I got exactly the response I'm getting from you -- missing the point entirely.

Actually, there are a lot of idiots criticizing Gentoo. Why do I use it...

1) Good-bye to dependancy-hell. I started off in 2000 on Redhat. It was nice for beginners (through 7.3) but some relatively simple programs were murder to install. The developer who put together the RPM for a program I wanted happened to have optional package A on his machine, so the RPM linked to it as a mandatory dependancy. Package A depended on package B, which depended on library C, etc, etc. It would take forever to track down RPMs for the dependancies. And woe unto you if you wanted 2 apps, where the RPM maintainer of app A had different versions of some libraries than the RPM maintainer of app B. Try the following dependancy torture test...
- install a text-only base system
- attempt to install Gimp
Gentoo will figure out and, pull in, and compile the base X libs, and all the necessary dependancies, and a few hours later (I run it overnight and get some sleep) you'll end up with a working X, running basic TWM, and a working Gimp. Try that on an RPM-based distro, I dare ya. I actually prefer Blackbox as my WM, so I "emerge bbkeys". SInce bbkeys depends on Blackbox, portage pulls in Blackbox, and all is copacetic.

2) I can control what optional crap is/isn't built in. I got rid of pam and java and ipv6, via the USE variable. The thing about *PERSONAL* computers is that they're personal, and one size does not fit all. For those of you running a server with multiple people logging on, yes pam is a good idea. For my personal 1-user home machine, it's overkill. If you need something that needs java, fine. What I don't understand is why java can be squeezed into a cellphone, but takes up almost a gig on my harddrive just to allow a singing/dancing webpage. I don't miss it. And my ISP doesn't support ipv6, so I don't see the point in various apps calling ipv6 addresses first, waiting for the timeout, and them getting around to connect on ipv4.

3) Yes, there is a speedup on *SOME* apps. Obviously, disk I/O bound apps won't benefit. I did have a "negative experience" with an old video game "Xboing". I used to run it on my 1999 Dell 450 mhz PIII with 128 megs of ram and 8 meg video card. I could handle it up to "speed level 3". On Gentoo, it flew by so fast that it was unplayable, even at speed level 1. Yes, *THE SAME MACHINE*, no upgrades at all. I had to manually step through the "emerge" process, and patch the delay loop. See http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-131884-highli ght-xboing.html for details.

Hi Cirian

Releases are still on track.

Sorry, you don't know what you're talking about. The 2007.0 release is 2 weeks overdue without explanation, and the tracking bug for it has been restricted to developer's eyes only.

All is well from the end user perspective.

And sorry, 2 months of Gentoo usage doesn't give you any perspective into how Gentoo has been regressing. You're still a n00b.

Ah yes... I suspect ciaranm may have been part of the reason flameeyes resigned. In fact, interesting things seem to happen around ciaranm - it looks like he was heavily involved in the flamefest where Daniel Robbins resigned (you know, the founder who came back - briefly) and appears to be part of the reason why he resigned as well. (I'm not even entirely sure exactly what said flamewar was about - I think it was related to some spinoff project of ciaranm's Paludis package manager, but I'm not sure if even the Gentoo devs know.)

Of course, I don't really do Gentoo development or read gentoo-dev (the latter looked like a waste of time - though funnily enough, the last time I glanced in there was the flamewar over Paludis a few years ago).

You're right on target with the biggest problem currently. There is an idea of creating PortageSQL and keep it all in a DB instead. Until then there are solutions such as this: http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-401647.html (which is what I'm currently using).
I have one machine generating a squashfs file from the latest release and a ramdrive which holds the changes. It works really well and keeps the portage database to ~40MB instead of 600. Then I just wget that file onto my other machines.

Look at this weeks news letter... Besides Daniel Robbins, Luis Medinas (metalgod), and Sandro Bonazzola (sanchan)

http://www.gentoo.org/news/en/gwn/20070305-newslet ter.xml

Ever heard of glsa-check, ? Did you ever consider that with gentoo you can roll your own updates from upstream and test them without fear of major breakage instead of waiting for a distro-supplied .deb to finally come out three days after the vuln is made public? Do you claim that distro-provided defaults are sufficient configuration for your servers or that somehow debian automagically removes the need to edit config files when changes in their format/content appear once in a while and you have (gasp) new options to consider?

No? Ok, then please take your ubuntu superiority myths (I don't believe for a second that you're running vanilla debian) and stuff'em where the sun don't shine. Why the heck were you doing updating a production server just to get a new version on day three after deployment anyway?

council meeting sumary, taken from gentoo-dev

http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/council/meeting-logs /20070208-summary.txt

full log

http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/council/meeting-logs /20070308.txt

for me, gentoo is still more healthy than any other platform ever

council meeting sumary, taken from gentoo-dev

http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/council/meeting-logs /20070208-summary.txt

full log

http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/council/meeting-logs /20070308.txt

for me, gentoo is still more healthy than any other platform ever

The GP might have been thinking about DarwinPorts (now called MacPorts), a different, ports-based package manager. I've found that Prefixed Portage works best on OS X. See http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/gentoo-alt/macos/

What platform-specific hardware do I have then? ATI X1900 XTX, a Creative Live! 24-bit soundcard, an nForce 560 motherboard, an AMD 64 3800+ processor that I put together myself. Obviously so substandard that it Supreme Commander is playable at 1280x1024 at maximum graphics quality, and under Vista it hasn't crashed once. Ubuntu tried to tell me my hard-drive was corrupt when I tried to install it. Running off the live CD it couldn't detect my keyboard. These are problems that I wouldn't expect from any OS, and with Windows I didn't have them.

Face it, if I could find a distro that worked properly I could just move, but I don't want to.

Stop making excuses.

5) Using another distribution-independent system like autopackage, zero-install or klik -- none of them gained a significant market share so far.

Here is is a what a "emerge --search java" yields in gentoo:

* app-accessibility/java-access-bridge Latest version available: 1.6.0-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 120 kB Homepage: http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gap/ Description: Gnome Java Accessibility Bridge License: LGPL-2 * app-emulation/emul-linux-x86-java [ Masked ] Latest version available: 1.6.0 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 61,248 kB Homepage: http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.6.0/ Description: 32bit version Sun's J2SE Development Kit License: dlj-1.1 * dev-java/ant-javamail Latest version available: 1.7.0 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 6,682 kB Homepage: http://ant.apache.org/ Description: Apache Ant's optional tasks depending on sun-javamail License: Apache-2.0 * dev-java/apple-java-extensions-bin Latest version available: 1.2-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 3 kB Homepage: http://developer.apple.com/samplecode/AppleJavaExt ensions/AppleJavaExtensions.html Description: A pluggable jar of stub classes representing the new Apple eAWT and eIO APIs for Java 1.4 on Mac OS X. License: Apple * dev-java/aterm-java Latest version available: 1.6 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 93 kB Homepage: http://www.cwi.nl/htbin/sen1/twiki/bin/view/SEN1/A TermLibrary Description: Java library for ATerm exchange License: LGPL-2.1 * dev-java/blackdown-java3d-bin Latest version available: 1.3.1-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 9,881 kB Homepage: http://www.blackdown.org/ Description: Java 3D Software Development Kit License: sun-bcla-java-vm * dev-java/cairo-java Latest version available: 1.0.5-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 353 kB Homepage: http://java-gnome.sourceforge.net/ Description: Java bindings for cairo License: LGPL-2.1 * dev-java/glib-java Latest version available: 0.2.6-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 323 kB Homepage: http://java-gnome.sourceforge.net/ Description: Java bindings for glib License: LGPL-2.1 * dev-java/gnu-javamail Latest version available: 1.0-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 690 kB Homepage: http://www.gnu.org/software/classpathx/javamail/ Description: GNU implementation of the Javamail API License: GPL-2 * dev-java/java-config Latest version available: 2.0.31-r3 Latest version installed: 2.0.30 Size of files: 16 kB Homepage: http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/java/ Description: Java environment configuration tool License: GPL-2 * dev-java/java-config-wrapper Latest version available: 0.12-r1 Latest version installed: 0.12 Size of files: 7 kB Homepage: http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/java Description: Wrapper for java-config License: GPL-2 * dev-java/java-getopt Latest version available: 1.0.13 Latest

Here is is a what a "emerge --search java" yields in gentoo:

* app-accessibility/java-access-bridge Latest version available: 1.6.0-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 120 kB Homepage: http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gap/ Description: Gnome Java Accessibility Bridge License: LGPL-2 * app-emulation/emul-linux-x86-java [ Masked ] Latest version available: 1.6.0 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 61,248 kB Homepage: http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.6.0/ Description: 32bit version Sun's J2SE Development Kit License: dlj-1.1 * dev-java/ant-javamail Latest version available: 1.7.0 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 6,682 kB Homepage: http://ant.apache.org/ Description: Apache Ant's optional tasks depending on sun-javamail License: Apache-2.0 * dev-java/apple-java-extensions-bin Latest version available: 1.2-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 3 kB Homepage: http://developer.apple.com/samplecode/AppleJavaExt ensions/AppleJavaExtensions.html Description: A pluggable jar of stub classes representing the new Apple eAWT and eIO APIs for Java 1.4 on Mac OS X. License: Apple * dev-java/aterm-java Latest version available: 1.6 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 93 kB Homepage: http://www.cwi.nl/htbin/sen1/twiki/bin/view/SEN1/A TermLibrary Description: Java library for ATerm exchange License: LGPL-2.1 * dev-java/blackdown-java3d-bin Latest version available: 1.3.1-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 9,881 kB Homepage: http://www.blackdown.org/ Description: Java 3D Software Development Kit License: sun-bcla-java-vm * dev-java/cairo-java Latest version available: 1.0.5-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 353 kB Homepage: http://java-gnome.sourceforge.net/ Description: Java bindings for cairo License: LGPL-2.1 * dev-java/glib-java Latest version available: 0.2.6-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 323 kB Homepage: http://java-gnome.sourceforge.net/ Description: Java bindings for glib License: LGPL-2.1 * dev-java/gnu-javamail Latest version available: 1.0-r1 Latest version installed: [ Not Installed ] Size of files: 690 kB Homepage: http://www.gnu.org/software/classpathx/javamail/ Description: GNU implementation of the Javamail API License: GPL-2 * dev-java/java-config Latest version available: 2.0.31-r3 Latest version installed: 2.0.30 Size of files: 16 kB Homepage: http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/java/ Description: Java environment configuration tool License: GPL-2 * dev-java/java-config-wrapper Latest version available: 0.12-r1 Latest version installed: 0.12 Size of files: 7 kB Homepage: http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/java Description: Wrapper for java-config License: GPL-2 * dev-java/java-getopt Latest version available: 1.0.13 Latest

That's what USE flags are for. You're don't have to select every function of every ebuild. The idea is you set the flags with the functions you want in or out and then every time you install something with Portage it looks your settings to include or exclude the relevant parts of the code. Of course some complex ebuilds have lots of flags and some especifig ones too but in the end is a really nice system.

I've never really had a problem with kernels in Gentoo. Normally it's just a matter of figuring out what devices are in your machine and then enabling the drivers in the kernel. 9 times out of 10, the machine will boot without issue, but oops, you forgot to enable a USB driver or a driver specific to your sound card and you don't have sound. And if the machine doesn't boot, it'll throw and error and you'll realize "hey, I forgot to enable drivers for my IDE card" or something similar. It's usually obvious what's wrong if you look at the output. The hardest part is finding the exact directive in the menuconfig.

but for some reason, I can't get my machine to boot with the new kernel. I've tried and tried and tried. I went through my old config and compared things; but there's a problem with doing that... The old kernel is 2.6.10 where my new one is 2.6.18 and the latter config has added quite a lot of new stuff.

So my problem is that my server just will not boot, no matter how many times I go through the config and check and uncheck things. It also doesn't help that this machine is only 800mhz, so it takes 20+ minute each time I compile.

I've posted in the gentoo forums, but no one's answered me, yet. grrr.

In looking over the list of complaints this article has he makes some good points I think that his complaint is not about Gentoo so much as specific tools he would like to see:

1-2 Gentoo is too time consuming to install.
Basically he is complaining about the lack of a redhat-like or debian-like graphical installer. While such a thing does exist for Gentoo it is in the earlier stages. Moreover for anyone seeking to exploit the power of the system you will have to take time. One of the primary time-sinks in the install process is the setting up of use flags which the author lauds just a few paragraphs earlier.

From past experience both with RedHat and Debian they were easier to install but lacked the fine-point control that came with thinks like the use flags.

3-4 Update Everything
Again this is more of a complaint about specific tools and not quiote true in my opinion. Firstly Gentoo does not require that you update everything either for security or simple maintenance. The profile system does not "force" a change every day or even every year. Profiles have a long-term use and a support cycle much like a Debian release. After a specified period (most recently 4 years) I was informed that I should upgrade my profile or lose some support. That is no different than the messages that I received from RedHat back when I used them.

Similarly, emerge allows you to specify packages on a finer level than "world". This means that yoy do not have to upgrade everything or nothing in a single go. Yes some packages (e.g. Mysql, and Xorg) carry a heavy burden of dependencies with them and will cause a large number of dependencies to come with them but it is up to the sysadmin to update them if they so wish.

Gentoo has existing features (consistent with its package system) to enable a sysadmin to freeze some or all of the packages. These include the packages.unmask, packages.mask, packages.use, and portage overlays whick allow you to freeze the individual packages at a set version and prevent them from being upgraded automatically.

With the specific security updates, I will grant you that gentoo does not, yet, have a single tool for simply "executing security updates at the commandline". There is ongoing work on integrating the GLSA tools with emerge. It would be nice to have them.

While I do think that this guy tested Gentoo before using it I think that he missed a few details in his study.

Because of its near-unlimited adaptability, we call Gentoo a metadistribution.

Sorry, we screwed the pooch on that one. ;)

It's just not trendy to knock on Slackware, so everyone targets Gentoo.

Some people also love to ignore advances that are made. The article mentions how long it took to install Gentoo. He claims that there was not an installer when he performed his installation more than a year ago. This is false. There was an installer, but it was considered experimental. Since then, the installer has become the de facto installation method on x86/amd64 and will be the default method on other architectures as support is added for them.

As for updates, who in the world out there has a ton of servers, then compiles on all of them? What is this guy smoking and where can I get some? Does he not realize that you can upgrade only what you want? There's nothing forcing you to upgrade the entire system. Hell, there's nothing forcing you to ever update the portage tree on your servers.

Any place where I'm ending up with more than one or two Gentoo boxes, I setup a local "master" server. This server will host my portage tree, which I don't update. It will also host my overlay. I update packages and add my own packages in this overlay. I build binary packages on this "master" server and distribute them to my servers. This really isn't a hard concept. It also isn't much different than the sort of thing that any sane administrator would do with any distribution. You don't just blindly run Red Hat updates, do you?

I think the biggest problem here is one of perception. People seem to ignore that when you buy Red Hat/SuSE, you are buying a product. You're buying support and service. With Gentoo, you're "buying" a toolset and nothing more. It's the difference between buying a car, and getting a bunch of parts and tools. They simply aren't comparable. If you want a nice Gentoo server infrastructure, you have to build it!

Gentoo has projects, such as the Scire project, which are designed to create a more enterprise-ready management set for Gentoo. However, this will not be a default for Gentoo, since few of our users would need it. Like everything else with Gentoo, you pick what you want from the tools provided, and you customize and tailor it to fit your needs. This entire article reads like a rant from someone who chose a tool because of its properties, then complained about those exact properties. You don't get to bitch when the "do-it-yourself" distribution asks you to do it yourself. ;]