Slackware 12.0 Released 286
Matt writes "Straight from our good friend and colleague in the fight for quality distributions, Mr. Patrick Volkerding, comes a brand-new and eagerly-awaited release of Slackware, version 12. HAL automount, KDE 3.5.7 and XFCE 4.4.1, Xorg 7.2, 2.6 kernels as far as the eye can see, oodles of updated applications and utilities, and hardware support for just about anything under the sun. Get it here. Enjoy! I know I will."
Am I the only one? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, every extended hiatus has me trying other distros to fill in the gaps (new gcc, new kde, new X, new distro-specific widget, etc)...
But I always go back to slackware-current once the gap is filled.
Re:Am I the only one? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, you're probably not the only one. However, that opinion is the opposite as that of Jason1729 below, who states he gave it up due to too many updates and fixes, and he's probably not the only one to feel that way either. Between the two, Patrick is probably running at pretty much the right speed:
From: Patrick J. Volkerding (bf703@cleveland.Freenet.Edu)
Subject: ANNOUNCE: Slackware Linux 1.00
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux
Date: 1993-07-16 17:21:20 PST
The Slackware Linux distribution (v. 1.00) is now available for
anonymous FTP.....
12 versions in 14 years, plus revisions between. All under his guidance. Most would have abandoned the effort sooner and with fewer releases, and probably due to doing so many in that time. Hell, most would have given up rather than rewrite it all in order to switch libraries.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
3.5
3.6
4.0
7.0
7.1
8.0
8.1
9.0
9.1
10.0
10.1
10.2
11.0
12.0
(I don't know how many releases there were before 3.5.)
Re:Am I the only one? (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Once you go Slack ... (Score:5, Informative)
Well that used to be my motto, at least for my servers. But I really just got tired of having to compile things that I could not get with slackpkg or slapt. I have switched to Debian for my servers I alleviated my headaches with compiling apps (those not included or available). Mind you if you needed something that WAS available with slackpkg or slapt then it was a great system. And even still a better system to have a locked down tight server. I would rank it up there with Gentoo in certain aspects (of course not installation).
Since I will probably quest to install Slack again someday, does anyone know if it comes with a GUI installer yet? I have not installed since Slack 10 so maybe my question is obviously dated, but it is a valid one at that!
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
There does seem to be a larger gap these days. When I started to use slack in early '95 it was my first taste of Linux and I loved it. Of course back then if you used MS stuff it was DOS and Win3. Even OS/2 wasn't easy to install. I remember having to edit the config files on my boot disks to get my Sony CDU-33A 2X cdrom drive working for the install.
Slackware recognized it "Out
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Slackware is not for them, and it's not Slackware's fault.
Anyone that says Slackware is the best is right, and others that say Slackware are inadequate, they are right too.
To each it's own.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Since 3.6 or so, it's really the only Linux I've used. But it helped that I was already a Mac user and had no interest in X Windows. In fact, Xfree86 setup was so much crap back then because it wanted to create custom modelines (instead of using VESA standard modes) which would never work right if you didn't have a big name brand monitor and video card, so I avoided using anything but text mode for Linux.
One of the reasons I used Slackware in the first place was that it was basically the last distribution
Re: (Score:2)
it didn't work quite well with recent coreutils.
hopefully, checkinstall will get updated and included back, but in case somebody just wants it to get working fast, replacing 'chmod' from slack 11 made it so much happier.
changelog recommended monitoring http://asic-linux.com.mx/~izto/checkinstall/ [asic-linux.com.mx], so that's probably something i'll do for some time
Re: (Score:2)
But I really just got tired of having to compile things that I could not get with slackpkg or slapt
Often as not, converting .RPMs works fine.
Since I will probably quest to install Slack again someday, does anyone know if it comes with a GUI installer yet?
I don't think that's high on Pat's probability list (wasn't as of 11, doubt it's in this one). On the up side, it's probably the same as you remember, so it shouldn't cause you any problems.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I'd have to agree with that statement. I've gotten too used to the Slack way of doing things and really appreciate its simplicity and the fact that I can keep it nice and lightweight. Ubuntu / Fedora / Suse are all nice, but I find them way too bloated for my needs on the desktop and as a server. Slack as a server works best. Sure you'll have to compile a lot of packages from source, but that's the only way you can be sure the software is configured correctly for
Noooooooooo!!! Not tonight! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
I'm going to take a stand. I'm going to take charge. I'm *not* going to let the Slackware upgrade dominate my thoughts! I will fight the urge! I will write my code so I can keep my job and my house and my wife. I will make the right choice.
There! I don't feel any better and it doesn't make it okay. I still want to upgrade my Slack
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Call in sick. You know it will make you sick if you can't get your Slack.
Slackware... ironic that it's too much effort (Score:2, Insightful)
if it still lacks a ports or packaging system that allows easy to update packages and conflict resolution, it's not worth the time.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Slackware... ironic that it's too much effort (Score:4, Informative)
That isn't unique to Slackware by any measure. Even Debian, with its fat 14-CD install set, can't include everything. You are more likely to find what you need in a Debian package, but once you step outside the repository, it's tough going. With Slack's simpler layout and simpler package tools, at least you have a chance when rolling your own.
AFAICT, there is no silver bullet, only trade-offs. Even Windows will get hamstrung by dependencies if you stray too far from the mainstream, though commercial Windows software often packages tons of OS updates with it, solving your dependency problems but often breaking previous software installs. Debian's repository is a walled garden, and they try to mitigate the pain of the walls by making the garden really, really big. Slackware is all open, but that leaves you on your own sometimes. RPM-type distros are somewhere in-between. Choose distro most suited for your needs. If, like me, you want to do lots of oddball stuff, automated package managers create more problems than they solve. But if you can live comfortably without ever installing things outside the repository, then Debian is for you.
Re: (Score:2)
but once you step outside the repository, it's tough going
Not really. I've installed plenty of non-repository packages and it's rare to see more than one or two dependencies not already in the repositories. Things can get messy when you want to install something that is mutually exclusive with what's in the repositories (potentially forcing uninstalls of packages that have lots of dependencies) but that's rare.
Also, you may not have heard of the "checkinstall" package. It's an easy way to turn any ins
Cleaning out my garage... (Score:4, Interesting)
I know its only peripherally related to the article, but man. V12 of Slackware? Time has flown, and things sure have changed.
Re: (Score:2)
well between the four digit user ID, and the old timer war stories, what are you up to these days? just chasing the rest of us off of your lawn, cane in fist?
Re: (Score:2)
And yes, until I emigrated last year, meaning a major home clear-out, I also had old floppy boxes with stacks of a*, d*, n* disks in them. I'll have to grab me a Slack 12, although I had been thinking of trying Gentoo next, for a sheer seat-of-pants setup...
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
And I just got around to installing 11 (Score:2)
tm
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
I highly recommend building confidence in the upgrade process. This way you will never have to worry about reconfiguring y
Re: (Score:2)
Rich
I'm sorry... (Score:2)
**duck**
Seriously though, anyone know?
Still too much work? (Score:2)
Are things that different with linux now? (I'm not bashing slackware here, I tried many distros and always found slackware to be the best)
Re: (Score:2)
Rich
Version 12, wow.... I remember Slack in Dr. Dobbs. (Score:3, Interesting)
Slack Vs. Other Distro (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Then choose a different distro. The tinkerer who wants to learn about Linux can use Slackware while you use something else.
What's the problem?
Re: (Score:2)
Rich
Re: (Score:2)
If you know slaclware you know linux and almost all System V based unix systems. You even know enough about solaris to be dangerous and look like you know what you are doing.
Slack teaches you things that the others dont and there is one tiny difference between slack and the others.
you can grab a random source package, untar;
and most of the time it will work. Under CendOS, fedora, ubuntu and others that is not always the case. Many time very useful but old and no
I used Slackware once. (Score:2, Informative)
Shameless self-promotion (Score:5, Informative)
One of the defining points of Slackware is the small set of official packages it features. On top of that, the native package management tools don't track depencencies and don't have the notion of remote repositories. All together, this doesn't adapt very well to users who want to try new software all the time and spend their days installing and removing packages. Doing that is hard with a vanilla Slackware, so people have created tools like swaret or slapt-get to simplify the process and be able to use remote repositories like the one at linuxpackages.net and similar, where they can download many unofficial packages that sometimes include dependency information slapt-get can use. I don't think that's "right". Let me explain. It's cool that Slackware is flexible enough to let you do that, but your system ends up in a very chaotic state after some time, in my experience (specially if you use slackware-current instead of slackware-stable). You can manage your system that way if you want, and maybe you're careful enough to do it, but it's very hard. That type of users would probably be happier with Arch, Gentoo or even Debian (I never understood the rivalry between Slackware and Debian; I've used both and both are great in their styles).
Patrick Volkerding probably thinks that way too, because he doesn't include those tools in Slackware. If I recall correctly, swaret was included for some time but in the end it was removed. He includes, however, a tool called slackpkg, which is clearly targetted at more "classic" Slackware users, because it lets you use one official mirror and manage systems composed of official packages for the most part, and includes some mechanisms to let you have some custom packages without being a headache (maybe downloaded from linuxpakages.net or slacky.eu or built with your own slackbuild scripts that you can also download from sites like slackbuilds.org). The problem is that slackpkg is slow (it's a big shell script), and doesn't let you track many corner events that happen frequently in slackware-current, so that's the starting point of slackroll.
Think of it like slackpkg on steroids. I specifically designed it to detect situations which are frequent in slackware-current, but it can also be used for slackware-stable without any problems. By design, it can:
And more stuff. Like I said, slackpkg on steroids. It's much faster, uses less bandwidth, detects more events and it's probably more flexible. I'm pretty satisfied with the result, so I wanted to invite people to read the program's webpage and try it if you think you fall into the target audience. It would be fine if I was the only user, but more eyes mean less bugs and I think it's always a shame when you create a tool which you are proud of and SourceForge only shows 20 downloads because people do not actually know it exists. Its main problem is that the initial setup may be more complex than usual and you need to read a bit more to know how it works. Howev
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
there, fixed that for you.
You mean there's another one ... (Score:2)
Shucks.
*rolls-eyes*
5;o)>
Re: (Score:2)
Of course there's a new version (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
(or just use the kernel you just compiled, since you know it works)
Ah, Slackware. (Score:2, Insightful)
Slackware is great for many things - single-purpose machines, getting that old P1 running, etc. It has a few major flaws that make it unusable in businessland:
1: too #$%) hard for a new admin. It requires a lot of arcane skills to get set up properly - skills that don't come cheap, and are hard to find in the marketplace.
2: No dependency management. Debian- and RH-based dis
Re: (Score:2)
We need commercial support for some of the drivers we're going to be using for our fiber array, and Slack isn't among the choices (big surprise). RHEL is, and that will solve another problem that we've been running into.
There is no possible way to do a universal login / user management system with Slackware without rolling your own solution. And it is SO aggrivating.
I'm tired of telling my us
Yes, but... does it support (Score:2, Funny)
Fuck off is OK too. (Score:2)
Edgy humor is always going to step on some toes so a few "fuck offs" is fully fine with me too since your feedback suggests I hit the mark.
If I gave you a pressure release valve in the process, thats great too.
Re: (Score:2)
Feisty (Score:2, Funny)
Yeah, *Gutsy* humour is the way to go now; -Feisty-, at the very least.
upgradepkg --install-new humour-post-1979*.tgz
Re:Why? (Score:5, Informative)
www.linuxpackages.net
www.slackware-current.net
(There are more, but these are easy to remember.)
They're very nice for any omissions and/or upgrades between release versions.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
is not a slackware package site it's a easyes one and that should be taken down already sicne it's a trademark violation
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
They provide tested scripts to roll your own packages. So you know what you're getting into and that it will work with your individual Slackware installation. They've worked very hard to prepare for Slackware 12. I think they were the first, in fact, to be ready for Slack 12.
Also great: (Score:2)
Site is in italian, but the interesting thing ist the repository at http://www.slacky.eu/repository/ [slacky.eu]
Especially the complete VLC-Package including all dependencies (codecs and so on).
Thanks to mr. Volkerding. My distribution of choice since almost 10 years.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh well.
Archives, you know we all can get at em'. You do understand there are tools to use your debby stuff elsewhere deb2targz being just one. What's a kernel structure and why just 2? We tend to roll our own kernels mostly.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, when it does not have what I want. Which is far too often.
Where Debian (and Ubuntu) "win" on the desktop is not because they have the best package manager tools, its because they have the most packages. I originally switched to Ubuntu back in 2004 because it was the only Linux distro (besides Debian unstable of course) that had a program I really wanted (bit tornado) in its package repository. Thanks to this huge repository and Ubuntu, I have gotten EVERY linux program I have wanted over the past three years without touching a complier. Heck, I haven't even had a compiler installed in the last year.
I know that ruins the effect of Linux for some, but compiling programs and chasing dependencies is the worst part of the OS for me (and other like minded desktop users). Each to their own...
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Anyhow, also had the same problem, GNOME/Metacity was just painful. I switched back to Fluxbox and all was good. If you don't want to go as far as Fluxbox, try XFCE.
Is it just me? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
On a desktop system how often after initial setup and configuration (a week just to be sure?) do you need apt-get? When installing something you just learned about? Maybe once a month tops? So maybe you use it for system upgrades/updates? rsync'ing slackware-current and "find . -name *.tgz -exec upgradepkg *
Re: (Score:2)
How about FOR the initial setup? I hate compiling new programs, whether its the first week of use for a Linux install or the 36th month. On an Ubuntu box, thanks to apt-get and scripts like Automatix I can setup a new Ubuntu box (meaning blank hard drive to a full install ready to play AVI files, Flash and do everything an average user does) in less than an hour and a half. And most of that tim
Re: (Score:2)
I actually switched to Slackware after apt broke one too many times under Ubuntu (some sort of Hedgebadger as I recall it). This wasn't an ESR style "I did all the wrong things and your distro broke so it's your fault". I added repositories as described in the FM and ended up with fun things like mutually exclusive dependencies (ie; two required libs which couldn't coexist).
I may have done something wrong but meh - managing my own dependencies always works and I'm not limited by what is
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Slackware causes its own issues. My home install is borked as I have somehow have two different versions of libc in two different places (this is my fault). Stuff will run but some stuff won't compile. I am throwing a new install on a new system to fix this (I just installed 11.0 on Sunday, just before 12.0 comes out. Typical).
Also, before someone points out I should have used CPAN, I have had mixed success with installing perl packages using CPAN on Debian.
Rich
Re: (Score:2)
I wouldn't bother with CPAN on Debian - If it's not in apt I'm not bothered (since it's not my machine).
Issues I've had with CPAN on Slack amount to difficulties compiling Perl-GTK (not sure if it's 1 or 2 - possibly to do with lack of GNOME... GtkHTML springs to mind for some reason...) I had to do a bit of manual tweaking before I got it to build.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
>Another gripe about Slackware is the lack of large file support. Unbelievable as it may sound, Slackware does not yet fully support
>large (>2GB) files.
What do you mean, "doesn't support"? I'm running slackware 12.0rc2 (installed just a few days ago, it figures) and any out-of-the-box application handles any size file I throw at it. What's the context for your claim?
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Not ideal for servers (Score:4, Insightful)
$ dd if=/dev/zero of=8G bs=1048576 count=8192
I dare you to tell me that command failed on your system, with space remaining on your partition containing
Re: (Score:2)
Ahh, found the problem.
Re: (Score:2)
I handled files with much more than 2GB since years on Slackware without any problems. What concrete "incomplete compatibilities" do you mean? They are definitely not related to the common filesystems like ext3 or reiserfs. Some tools had problems, but they had these problems on other distros too, because these issues where related to the code of these tools (years ago tar, was a bug, or parted, which is not part of Slack by default) not of Slackware.
Re: (Score:2)
are you sure you tried a recent version of slackware (like 11.0) ?
if so, did you try any other kernels from the bootdisk besides "bare.i" ?
scsi, raid and other controllers like that are supported by kernels scsi, scsi2, scsi3 and raid.
second, what about 2gb ? i'm handling backups on a server with single file sometimes exceeding several hundreds of gb. i would notice if files could go only up to 2 gb.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Other than that, yeah Slackware is pretty fucking awesome. I gave Slack 12 (actually -current) a shot in the pre-RC stages and was pleasantly surprised. I might give this one a shot later on.
Re: (Score:2)
Password:
jesse is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
What's the problem? The Slackware distros I've used have no sudoers by default, so this command doesn't do much of anything. Have things changed since 10.1?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Use it carefully... Remember, with great power comes great responsibility.
You know what's an easier fix? (Score:2)
sudo -s, or
sudo su
Re: (Score:2)
My particular brand of crazy is:
$ sudo bash
Re: (Score:2)
You can set up a root user and log into it on a real console -- or at least you can in kubuntu. It'll be just like Slackware -- sort of. I think there is a way to do a semipermanent sudo, but I don't remember what it is. In any case, I
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
While it's got it's uses, if you're new enough to have to ask what the difference is (and there's no judgment in that; we were all new once), you probably shouldn't be using it. It won't help with the wifi drivers; they're all in the kernel and Slack uses a vanilla kernel.org kernel. Honestly, if Ubuntu doesn't support the hardware in question (it includes a few non-kosher drivers for stuff like Atheros), it probably won't run on Linux p
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, I meant to say 'terminal' several times in this post. Do you see a theme here? Welcome to Linux. (If this is your first Linux distro, try Slack, *then* try the others. You'll be back.)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Or very educational, depending on just how stubborn you are. *wink*
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You're free to use Debian all you want, just don't EVER go around telling everyone else what they should use.
Re: (Score:2)
As new files are added/edited, each zone has their own copy, but 90% of the files are shared, so we avoid wasting disk space. If we could do that with UML or Xen, we would. But we can't, so we don't.
Do it exactly the same way. Install your master VM to an LV. Take [a] snapshot(s) of the LV. Use the snapshot(s) for your new VMs.
(With that said, I believe snapshots in LVM have a much greater overhead than they do in ZFS.)
Re: (Score:2)
Blame Creative. (Score:2)
http://opensource.creative.com/soundcard.html [creative.com]
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
i found a link to a howto the other day: http://macbook.mared.com/linux/ [mared.com] and it looks like it didn't need too much tweaking.
i inherited a G4 the other day and tried to install slackintosh on it but it wasn't having it. not sure why yet.
Re: (Score:2)