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Slackware 9.1 Released
ThatComputerGuy writes "Slackware 9.1 is now officially released. This is another great release, featuring GCC 3.2.3, GNOME 2.4.0, KDE 3.1.4, ALSA, and Kernel 2.4.22. Check the official announcement for the full feature list. Note that ftp.slackware.com will not allow ISO downloads starting with this release; instead, the first distribution of the ISOs will be via BitTorrent."
Is that Pat keeps it simple. Slack has made adminning my boxen so much easier than Red Hat, Suse, etc.
I advise anyone searching for a distro to try Slackware out, once I found it a few years ago, it's all I run-- including on my home pc.
Thanks again, Pat, for making my life easier.
Acquiescence leads to obliteration
Why go to the lengths of downloading an OLD iso just to avoid BitTorrent? What's wrong with BitTorrent?
"Oppression and harassment is a small price to pay to live in the land of the free." -- Montgomery Burns.
Cleaner? Simple boot scripts and config files, well-commented and quick to modify. Easy .tgz packages instead of some arcane binary format. I could go on...
Speedier? Boots twice as fast as Red Hat 9. GNOME and KDE are much more responsive. Doesn't start loads of services and daemons in the background.
More stable? Only well-tested stuff. Go and look for the RPM freeze/db-corruption problems in RH8 and 9 for the best example ever (still hasn't been fixed, and caused many people a lot of hassle). RH have put glibc and gcc snapshots into stable releases before (7.0 and 8.0 respectively). Mandrake throws in all manner of unproven bits and bobs (devfs, supermount) and their Control-Center is full of glitches.
Seriously, as a Linux user of five years and writer on the topic, I do have a clue what I'm talking about. I respect Red Hat and Debian, they do some good stuff and the former is ideal for newcomers, but that doesn't mean they're the best in every single area.
Slackware is a distro that has been made by just one developer, and you can notice that (for good).
We you should use Slackware:
1) Free Beer: You can just download it.
2) Free Speech: Run Only GNU.
3) Free Mind: Many Distros install the software and then install themselves!!, Slackware install the software and then you can forgot you are running it, 'cause it won't get on the middle. You can use your GNU System without stupid modifcations or distro-specific bullshit automagic config tools. (But if you want them, they are just there, and they are the best).
I Think an important concept in Slackware is this:
Slackware config tools are basic. They do a minimal setup; if you need a config tool, you will be happy with them; some people think that just making a front end to configure a config file just wrapping the options from the Option=Value Format to the input/check/click/etc format; and that is just stupid. If someone doesn't know what an option means, he won't be able to configure it, doesn't matter if it has colors and graphics all around.
So Slackware keep it simple. Their config tools asks you for the minimal. That is enough for people who require a config tool. And if you need to go further, I think you will be more confortable using vi.
I think the only thing missing in Slack is ports and other kernels (It would be nice to run Slackhurd ; )
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
Slackware gives you a lot of power, since it doesn't fuck with much.
Although there are occasionally packages that are patched, you can find out what the patches are and change them. If you order the source CD, you don't get the patches sources. You get the original sources and the patches. If you need to administer a system and ever need to customize something, that can be a life-saver.
Also, stuff is installed as it wants to be. That means you can compile anything from source and it will work right. (Okay, it might not, but it almost always has for me. The biggest change I've ever needed was to add something to my path variable).
In addition, you can usually get up-to-date programs with Slack. Although Slackware is usually fairly close to bleeding edge in Current, it isn't really buggy. The only bug I have encountered in all of Slackware 9.0 is that Qt Designer has errors when inserting widgets from KDElibs, and that can be fixed by rebuilding from source or redownloading just that package from Slackware Current (I don't know when they fixed it, but it didn't take long).
Furthermore, all of the configuration is essentially done by hand. I know, that sounds bad, but it's really kinda nice. For most important configurations, it has a configuration script. You can re-run it whenever you want, and it makes a fully readable config file. If you ever want to change how it configures things, you can just edit a script and its done. No fancy configuration tools which are broken half the time (the only tools I've found to work reliably are the proprietary Yast ones from SuSE).
There'e enough to learn and use in Linux without getting bogged down in learning about a particular distributions proprietary packaging scheme.
I've tried and used several releases of all the major RPM-based distributions (RedHat, SuSe, Mandrake), installed Debian more than a few times, spent a l-o-t of time on Gentoo installs.
What has caused me the biggest headaches in each of these distributions? Problems with their packaging systems. Every blasted one of them has managed to put my machines in a broken state.
Yes, sometimes chasing down and compiling some obscure piece of code can be frustrating if I'm using Slackware and installing from source. But, I know how to do that, the concept is simple, and if it goes wrong, I know I can trace the problem and fix it.
If RPM or apt or emerge or whatever goes belly-up, fixing the problem means I have to take time to learn about that packaging system. Why should I?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
What admin stuff is Slackware missing? Ive never had a problem with vim, pico, or any other text editor. For remote admin, use those over ssh.
/usr/games/fortune