Slackware 12.2 Released

pilsner.urquell submitted a quote from the announcement saying "Well folks, it's that time to announce a new stable Slackware release again. So, without further ado, announcing Slackware version 12.2! Since we've moved to supporting the 2.6 kernel series exclusively (and fine-tuned the system to get the most out of it), we feel that Slackware 12.2 has many improvements over our last release (Slackware 12.1) and is a must-have upgrade for any Slackware user."

Comments

Ha!

[Anonymous Coward]

They'll be more pleased than all the rugged individualists using Ubuntu.

Re:Ha!

[jellomizer]

In the meantime, predictably so, a bunch of n00bs started using Ubuntu mostly because we told them it was a good idea. Now the Ubuntu forums are filled with n00b posts flaming the world because 'Ubuntu sucks' and 'it ate my computer', etc.

Well yes, because the Linux zealots discredit or moderate down any part that states that Ubuntu isn't as user friendly as Mac OS X in any area. So when a person who wants to, or forced (via system crash and lost CD's or key) to get off Windows they read up and see oh Ubuntu is the second coming of Jesus. Install it and shortly after using the basic features (Grandma Level computing) they find they hit a wall where they need some more expert level to do things that in other OS's were either automatic or a right click away.

Re:Ha!

[FictionPimp]

My solution. Use ubuntu, ignore the forums. File bug reports and use man pages. WHy bother even reading the noob posts.

Re:Ha!

[deroby]

One simple example would be : getting the hardware to work. Followed closely by getting the wifi to work.
Ubuntu is getting much more user-friendly with every incarnation, but it still has a rather long way to go before it will reach the ease-of-use of a recent Windows platform IMHO.

Seriously, I like Ubuntu and I have 2 portables running myself + have put it on my mom's computer since she wanted a localized OS. The personal ones are for me playing around with it a bit since I'm curious what's all the fuss about. The other one is in use by my toddler-girl who enjoys to play GCompris on it or watch some DVD-rips of Dora The explorer on it. My moms is being used solely for a bit of mailing (Thunderbird) and browsing (Firefox).

In the old days, those 3 computers (all dell portables btw) ran Windows2000 Professional. Setup was simple : put in Wind2k cd in the tray, startup, go through the setup, download the driver installations from Dell and run those too. At worst you had to fiddle around a bit with tcp settings. After that the system was up and running and I'd lost half a day at most per machine... (format + setup + setting up mail accounts etc takes a bit of time).

Getting Ubuntu running on them has been a hassle for all 3 of them.

* getting video running has been HELL : with only 1 out of 3 I managed to get the nvidia blob to run after reading days and days of forums, trying out every single trick they propose. The two others still run in 'software' mode, which is fine for firefox/thunderbird or GCompris (more or less), but has cost me several days trying anyway.
* wifi wasn't always (properlty) recognized : pcmcia went mostly fine, usb was hell. Finally got it working via ndiswrapper
* each time there is an upGRade something breaks and I'm back in the 'problem-chasing' game =(

As a side-note : people always complain about Windows Update pushing lots of bytes, but boy oh boy, same is true for ubuntu IMHO. Not that I find that a bad thing per-se, but then again, stop complaining about Windows.

What's still missing

[Bandman]

As a 10 year veteran of Slack, I really like that Patrick is still doing the work, but I don't even have to go to the page to know that PAM still isn't supported, and that there's not a package manager that can compete with yum/apt-get/ports.

Last year I switched to Ubuntu on the desktop and CentOS on the server. I look back at Slackware with a lot of fond memories, but managing even a medium sized installation of Slack machines was just too time consuming to continue.

Re:What's still missing

[evilviper]

PAM still isn't supported,

Does what's "supported" or not really matter? It's a fairly standard Linux system, to which you can add-remove anything you like.

and that there's not a package manager that can compete with yum/apt-get/ports.

That all depends on what you're looking for in your package manager. I certainly like Slackware's package manager more than any other, because you can very, very easily install any mixture of binary packages and code compiled from source that you want. No other system includes the (tiny) -dev headers necessary for compilation in their binary packages, nor do they reasonably easily allow you to ignore listed dependencies and handle it yourself with eg. a source package.

I also appreciate Slackware's init scripts... Just about every other Linux distro has at least 3 levels of indirection to their scripts, just making for needless hassle. On a similar note, never have I seen a note in an important config file on Slackware suggesting: "Do not edit this file. It will be automatically overwritten." But that's sadly common practice everywhere else.

I'm glad Slackware has pushed against Linux stupidity, and stayed away from the PAM mess. I just wish Patrick had been able to hold back the switch from OSS to the clunky mess that is ALSA as well. Oh well... Linux looks a little more like Windows every day. Luckily Slackware resists. But then there's always the BSDs... they all do just fine without PAM, ALSA, sysV, apt-get/yum, etc.

Re:The Only Reason This Distro Exists

[TheSovereign]

wow. are you assuming that every person from a windows backround does not have the mental facilities to actually learn how to use linux as he goes? Slackware actually taught me to use linux instead of its interface. you may aswell be a Mac user.

Slackware vs Ubuntu.

[RandomInteger()]

http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/10/27/1212214&from=rss and so on. It's nice to see that some distro maintainers have the "right" values about what to focus on. In a world of wussies, Slackware still stands tall and proud!

Re:Wow. Still chugging...

[mikael_j]

xf86config is old-school now? I guess I'm getting old, when I started using *nix the standard practice was to run through xff86config as accurately as possible and then manually editing your config to make everything work properly (trying to run X immediately after running xf86config generally resulted in some pretty odd behaviour or if you weren't so lucky, broken hardware).

/Mikael

Re:Will it still run on '386 machines

[Bandman]

Stuff like this is the textbook example of the ideal use of Slackware, imo.

Not in giant server farms, but in places where you need something solid that can run for 3 years and not hiccup.

Just remember to rotate your logs ;-)

I'm a recent slack user

[rsayers]

Used it many years ago and recently installed 12.1 on my eeePc. Surprised to see nearly nothing had changed, but I think that's a good thing. I like the fact that I essentially get a base system that I can just take over and manage myself. It doesn't install a bunch of stuff I don't want, and installing new software from source is pretty simple. Maybe it's just me, but package managers always end up giving me issues with certain software (ruby comes to mind) and I end up having to build certain things from source anyhow.

Re:Will it still run on '386 machines

[LWATCDR]

Why upgrade?
If they work and are on a private network why change the OS?

Queue the n00bs

[kwabbles]

"Slackware sucks, it has no package manager."
"Slackware sucks, it takes so much time to get an uber elite desktop with avant and spinning cubes."
"Slackware sucks, it's so much harder to install than Ubuntu."
"Slackware sucks, you spend way more time on the CLI than other distros."

There are still some of us left that don't think the primary goal of every linux distro is to become a clone of the Windows desktop. There are less and less of us left that want to kick the hell out of anyone that thinks the command line should go away or be used as little as possible. Slackware is what it is - a robust linux system that tries to be as unix-like as possible.

If you want your hand held for you, and you don't understand what *nix truly is and can do and don't really care - if all you want is a simple drop-in replacement for Windows - go download Ubuntu. Each distribution achieves a different goal. THAT's the real beauty of linux, not its potential to become "grandma's operating system".

Re:Queue the n00bs

[someone300]

"Slackware sucks, it has no package manager."
[...]
There are still some of us left that don't think the primary goal of every linux distro is to become a clone of the Windows desktop.

I always felt that a decent package manager was one of the things that really seperated Linux from Windows. :)

I agree with the rest though.

Re:Queue the n00bs

[kwabbles]

The suggestion that having your hand held is a bad thing is just stupid.

I wasn't trying to imply that having your hand held was a bad thing. What I meant was that if you want your hand held, then you shouldn't be looking towards Slackware. There are other distributions that achieve that goal. People that get on and start pissing and whining about how Slackware has a steeper learning curve as a desktop OS just don't understand the spirit of the distribution.

Because I don't have time to compile my OS from scratch, and I don't want to have to recompile it if something goes awry....I'd rather grab the same binaries everyone else is using.

Some people do have the time to compile their OS from scratch. Some people like compiling their OS from scratch. Others see the value in natively-compiled binaries. However, Slackware really isn't like that (as you probably already know). The kernel, basic userland, gcc, libs, etc are already compiled and ready to go. What has to be compiled from there depends on the user's preference.

You mention that you'd rather grab the same binaries everyone else is using, because "that's the value of open source". Well, if you're really and truly wanting to use the same thing "everyone else is using", then you'd be staying away from pre-compiled binaries and use something like Slackware, which stays close to the original source. DEBs are compiled for Debian/Ubuntu systems. RPMs are compiled for RedHat/Suse/etc systems. Those binaries are being used only by those using those distributions. If you download the nmap source from sourceforge - you really ARE using what's being used by everyone else. You're using the nmap source code used to compile binaries on Debian systems, RedHat systems, *BSD systems, Solaris, you name it. You're staying true to the original author's source - and using what everyone else had to use to get theirs running on their platform.

To each their own. That's what my original point all boiled down to. People that complain about the vast variety of distributions and go off like all distributions should be some sort of dumbed-down easy to use desktop OS just don't get it.

Re:The Only Reason This Distro Exists

[Fri13]

And thanks for the Ubuntu Fanboys, we have wikipedia saturated with Ubuntu, on articles where it does not belong etc. And Ubuntu has gone over "Linux" on them. Even the normal user ask "Where I can get Linux" and stupid Ubuntu fans yells back for that "I is just a kernel you idiot!".

In few years you dont have device drivers for Linux, but for Ubuntu. You dont have commercial software available than few commercial distributions and Ubuntu. And all the n00bs keeps talking that "You can have Ubuntu or Linux, those are two different Operating Systems, Ubuntu altought is much better because the browser and office applications are integrated to operating system itself".

So thanks a lot Ubuntu users what you have done to promote the Linux, but no thanks for negative attitude against Linux community, just being so annoing and blind Ubuntu fans...

Re:Great work!

[Bandman]

Judge me by my distro do you?

My Ubuntu on the desk and CentOS in the server rack don't tell you that I ran Slack for 10 years while you were still trying to figure out how to make the magic black screen go away ;-)

hrmph.

Re:The Only Reason This Distro Exists

[muckracer]

> I'm not convinced that the normalization on a "standard" distro is a bad thing.
> Choice is freedom for some and confusion for others.

A 'standard distro' IS a bad thing. Distro's come and go whereas the UNIX aspect of any distro remains in large parts. Hence it makes much more sense to sensibly invest in FHS and similar efforts than to focus on the current fashionable packaged distro. I agree with your comment on freedom for some and confusion for others, but the same way that I don't want to ever see gasoline released just for the 'standard Ford Focus' I don't want to see drivers for a specific distro only (which is not to say, that it can't be pre-packaged for certain distro's since there is a convenience factor involved. But the source should compile on any sane distribution).

Slack? Ubuntu?

[heri0n]

Seems to be two camps in this discussion... The hardcore slack users who hate on the Ubuntu "noobs", and the Ubuntu users who claim Slack should only be viewed as a piece of nostalgia.

I have used both distributions quite a bit and enjoyed both. I started out with Slackware, and one things for sure, I learned a lot about navigating Linux systems. Eventually, I got sick of manually compiling/installing every package so I made the switch to Ubuntu. I was actually quite impressed with Ubuntu and its ease of use. I would say the best things about Ubuntu would be ease of use and installing packages using Synaptic. However, you don't really learn how the underlying system works. Recently, I've re-installed Slackware to get back to my roots. I think Slackware is much better as a server or as a simple desktop.

I think both distros have their own place. To the Slackware veterans, you can't deny that Ubuntu has made a huge impact on converting Windows users to Linux. Even if they may be noobs and flood forums with noobie questions, converting users to Linux can be only a good thing, right? Also, personally I have found Ubuntu forums to be some of the most helpful and friendly. Pat and Slackware are keeping it real as usual, enough said.