Gentoo for Mac OS X Released

joeljkp writes "According to today's Gentoo Weekly News, Gentoo has released a new project: Gentoo MacOS (sic). This new distribution adds Portage, Gentoo's package manager, to Mac OS X, among other things."

Comments

Full Text (images already /.'ed)

[Anonymous Coward]

Gentoo News
-----------

"Apple, we have a problem" - Gentoo MacOS X Released

Figure 1.1: Derived from Apple's 'Redmond, we have a problem' campaign:
The Gentoo MacOS announcement
http://www.gentoo.org/images/gwn/200 40719_macos_pr oblem.png

Almost exactly one year after the idea of porting Portage to MacOS X came
up - and the joint Metapkg initiative[1] between Fink, Darwinports and
Gentoo took off - a 20-head-strong developer team around Pieter van den
Abeele[2] (strategic lead) and Daniel Ostrow[3] (operational) is now ready
to release an extraordinary beast into the wild: Gentoo MacOS. They
deliver on a promise no other Linux distribution has been daring enough to
make yet: Portage on MacOS is now fully operational, seamlessly integrated
as a package manager in a non-Linux operating system. It initially serves
the main purpose of an SDK for inclusion of new packages, testing and
patching. Granted, KDE isn't ported yet, but make no mistake: Gentoo MacOS
is ready for consumption by Macintosh users who want, say, scientific DTP
via TeX, something they will now be able to simply emerge in OS X just
like they'd do in Gentoo Linux."Right now it's a tool to install lots of
commonly requested applications on OS X", explains Pieter van den Abeele.
"But in a few months, we'll have a port system that builds Darwin from
scratch, provides a standardised lookup and installation routine for
Dashboard widgets[4], enhancements and tools like the Desktop Manager[5]
and many, many more popular OS X applications." Downloading the Gentoo
MacOS Installer provides users with a patched portage, its tree, and the
Python modules. It sets environment variables and demands a bootstrapping
shell script to be run before the first emerge that detects the operating
system (Panther or Tiger), chooses the relevant profiles and injects every
application it finds already installed in MacOS X.

1. http://www.metapkg.org
2. pvdabeel gentoo.org
3. dostrow gentoo.org
4. http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/dashboard.html
5. http://wsmanager.sourceforge.net/

Figure 1.2: Taming the Tiger with a double-click: The Gentoo MacOS
Installer
http://www.gentoo.org/images/gwn /20040719_macos_in staller.png

Since Gentoo's own GCC ebuild for MacOS X isn't ready yet, compiling is
currently done using the Xcode development tools[6] which include GCC 3.3
provided by Apple. "People already on Tiger can experiment with GCC 3.5",
adds Pieter. Tiger, the new release of MacOS X, is due in 2005 with its
brandnew database filesystem Spotlight[7], modernised video services and
many other features. The Gentoo MacOS developers are busy polishing the
knobs (a Cocoa user interface is part of the plan), getting iSync[8]
integration to work (emerge an application on one machine, automatically
replicate onto all other Macs in a LAN), right down to making Catalyst
produce Darwin LiveCDs... "But first the cool stuff, then Darwin",
chuckles strategic lead Pieter. Even though his team is already larger
than the entire Gentoo Linux PPC developer group, they still train new
devs almost daily, and whoever wants to help with the project is very
welcome to get in touch. The public Wiki[9] holds installation
instructions and serves as a reporting tool for packages outside of
Portage that already compile without bombing out. The Gentoo MacOS
Installer can be downloaded from here[10].

6. http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/xcode.html
7. http://www.apple.com/macosx/tiger/spotlighttech.ht ml
8. http://www.apple.com/isync/
9. http://gentoo-wiki.com/Gentoo_MacOS
10. http://www.metadistribution.org/macos/
Full size (1024x768) screenshots of the Gentoo MacOS installation
procedure:
* Installer starts[11]
* Detection of OS version and installed software[12]
* Still busy injecting detected

Re:Full Text (images already /.'ed)

[loosifer]

But Spotlight is just indexing the same metadata that is in HFS+ under Jaguar, plus data that it pulls out of the file, not out of the filesystem. There is significant improvement in the mechanism and the interface, but it is not a "database filesystem."

As far as I can tell, that is incorrect; Dominic (the authoer of BeFS) has added additional metadata capabilities to HFS+, so Spotlight is actually 1) indexing that metadata, and 2) using interpreters to pull and index data from various file formats. See those post, for instance. While I agree that this does not create a true database filesystem, I would say that it's close to what BeOS had, which is the closest anyone has come.

I must admit interest in MS's claim that they're going to create a true database filesystem; while it is obviously technically feasible, it's just as stupid now as it was years ago when Be decided to back off theirs. Thus, I expect MS to produce a solution that does what they said it would do while sucking so much that no one uses it. It will be interesting to watch.

As to the claim that Apple is just doing all front-end stuff while MS is actually doing technology, I call baloney on that one. Apple has been good recently at creating and then utilyzing really good technology (although it's usually protocols, not servers). All of the technology available via .Mac is available to everyone, even if the servers themselves aren't. I can (and did) create a WebDAV server to store and share my calendars, and I can mount this WebDAV server as a local filesystem. Rendezvous/Zeroconf is another good example of a tech that Apple has developed, championed, and then been a real leader on.

I agree that there are big differences, though: Spotlight is based on proven technology and will surely arrive in 2005, while WinFS is a huge gamble, will increase costs dramatically (both licensing and maintenance), and will also arrive no earlier than 2006, without actually being based on proven tech at all. If their history is anything to go by, it will be 2010 or so before WinFS is usable.

Re:Full Text (images already /.'ed)

[Qamelian]

"while WinFS is a huge gamble, will increase costs dramatically (both licensing and maintenance), and will also arrive no earlier than 2006, without actually being based on proven tech at all. If their history is anything to go by, it will be 2010 or so before WinFS is usable."

MS has already announced that WinFS is being withdrawn from Longhorn along with several other technologies, all of which have now been pushed back to the following Windows release("Blackcomb"). This was a result of basically two factors. First, there were too many difficulties in hitting the target dates unless some items were dropped. Second, too many third-party developers were at best apathetic over the concept of supporting some of the features, most notably Microsoft's "Trusted Computing" platform.

Re:Full Text (images already /.'ed)

[Elwood P Dowd]

I'd already read the article you link to. It is what I base my point on. There are additional metadata capabilities in Tiger, but they are not part of the fileystem. Your ID3 tags are not being stored in HFS+ metadata. Everyone who thinks that HFS+ will have user-extendable metadata or a database-driven filesystem will be disappointed. It is not a database filesystem. That's perfectly OK with me.

As to the claim that Apple is just doing all front-end stuff while MS is actually doing technology, I call baloney on that one.

You seem to misunderstand. I called it MS's "pie in the sky" technology for a reason. My analogy is a good one.

I agree that there are big differences, though: Spotlight is based on proven technology and will surely arrive in 2005, while WinFS is a huge gamble, will increase costs dramatically (both licensing and maintenance), and will also arrive no earlier than 2006, without actually being based on proven tech at all.

You say that as if you had made the point, rather than me.

Re:Cool

[Anonymous Coward]

there already is a distribution for xbox that is based on gentoo.
its called http://gentoox.shallax.com/

-Jonathan

That's why the Metapkg Alliance was formed

[Shinzaburo]

The Metapkg Alliance was formed explicitly to improve cooperation between Fink, Gentoo, and DarwinPorts. Besides, have you actually tried Gentoo MacOS yet? Perhaps it offers (or will eventually offer) a significantly large value proposition over the other port distributors. Only time will tell.

Re:Gentoo MacOS?

[Noksagt]

um, isn't that 'Gentoo MacOS' a tad misleading? It's like calling x86 Linux 'Linux Windows'
No--this isn't an OS (gentoo has run on the Mac hardware for sometime). Rather it is a native OS X port of portage and other gentoo utilities. It would be like calling cygwin "cygwin" (in other words Cygnus + GNU on windows).

Re:Fink?

[Shinzaburo]

Gentoo MacOS brings the Gentoo Portage package management system to Mac OS X. Yes, it provides functionality similar to Fink and DarwinPorts, and all three solutions have agreed to cooperate in the future.

Portage seems to have several advantages over the other package management tools, including the following summary from the Portage manual:

Multiple versions and revisions of the same package in the tree, conditional dependency resolution and feature support, fine-grained package management, sandboxed safe installation, configuration file protection, profiles, and much more.

Re:In case you don't get it.

[mikrorechner]

In other words, a 'better build system: a public one' has been unleashed on a commercial operating system, so that - separate from the company itself - alternative builds of the OS can be done, publically.

I think you forgot that while the source for Darwin, the system "under the hood" of OS X, is available, the UI is not. That means no Quartz, Spotlight or Core Image technologies, and no applications like the Finder or Expose.

Now, who would want a Mac without all this? That stuff, among other, makes it special. If you want only the underlying system, you can install OpenBSD right now.

Re:Yea, and?

[Massacrifice]

I recently moved bask from Gentoo-PPC to Mac OS X + Fink lately after my Linux HD crashed, so I'll tell you what I am missing the most about Gentoo.

First, there are a quite a bunch of advanced build options in Portage that are not available under Fink (see /etc/make.conf). USE variable, easy distcc, easy ccache, powerful package query... These are things that you can't go without once you've tried them.

Fink is nice, but its package tree is smaller and less up to date than Portage is. Besides, nobody will prevent you from having both.

Apart from Portage, Gentoo offers multiple system management facilities. I don't know if these will be ported, but things like rc-update (init script management) and java-config really help.

Finally, I think that what will set Gentoo-MacOS apart from Fink is the number of developper and community size. That is something that cannot be duplicated.

Not true

[Anonymous Coward]

Shallax has been kicked off gentoo because he refused to work as part of a team or commit the xbox patches back to gentoo. At this point in time gentoox has nothing to do with gentoo, and he is violating the "gentoo" trademark by using the name.

Re:OK, so...

[Anonymous Coward]

Aqua : OS X :: Gnome : Linux

OS X is Darwin, but OS X also includes additional software. As in all Unixes, the GUI in OS X is not an integral part of the operating system. There are even OS X users who boot to a console, and then run X if they want a GUI.

Repeat once again: WinFS is NOT a filesystem !

[theefer]

I must admit interest in MS's claim that they're going to create a true database filesystem

I read this occasionally on /., but it is wrong. WinFS is not a (database) filesystem, and this is why the FS in WinFS does not stand for FileSystem but FutureStorage (there must have been a contest to find such a stupid name). WinFS is a database over NTFS that remains the filesystem. It just adds meta-data to files, but in a separate database.

I went to a mini-conference by a ms evangelist, and he repeated it many times.

I'd be more interested in what Reiser4 does with metadata, it seems much more interesting than a mere additionnal layer.

Re:how's its hygiene?

[Anonymous Coward]

Judging by the screenshot here:
http://www.metadistribution.org/macos/8.png

It seems that it puts stuff into /usr/bin

I don't know what the effects of that would be on an OS X system.

Re:how's its hygiene?

[akiro]

http://gentoo-wiki.com/Gentoo_MacOS

From the documentation: "Portage installs things in / and could possibly overwrite important packages that were installed by OS X. Use this technology at your own risk!".

I think I'll stick to fink for now, they could at least have used /usr/local and not mess with / :-/