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Operating Systems Software Linux

Slackware Linux 10.2 Released 250

Posted by CmdrTaco from the everyone-remembers-their-first dept.
excelblue writes "Slackware Linux 10.2 has finally been released. This release comes with Linux 2.4.31, with 2.6.13 available in the testing packages and glibc 2.3.5. This time, they've decided to get up with times and switch to Firefox, Thunderbird, and subversion instead of using the Mozilla suite and cvs from the previous distros. Here are Torrents of ISO images."
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Slackware Linux 10.2 Released More

Slackware Linux 10.2 Released

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  • YAY! (Score:4, Funny)

    by frinkacheese ( 790787 ) * on Thursday September 15, 2005 @07:45AM (#13565459) Journal

    Time to test the 2Gb/s Internet connection with some torrent seeds :)

    Well done to the Slackware team on another nice release of the nicest, most stable and most usable (for admins) Linux release there is.

    Really, the completr lack of package management and silly whizzy clicky admin tools makes Slackware a lllot easier to admin when you have 120 servers running it.

    • Re:YAY! (Score:3, Funny)

      by DenDave ( 700621 ) *
      OMG you have 120 slackware boxes?

      *bow down* we're not worthy!

      Is it not easier to use gentoo for such a monstrous installation base?

      • Re:YAY! (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Mr. Underbridge ( 666784 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:17AM (#13565652)
        Slackware is a bit more mature and less prone to change. You also have a lot of people who use Slackware because they know it inside and out.

        Basically, if people haven't stopped using Slackware yet, they're not likely to.

        • Re:YAY! (Score:5, Funny)

          by part_of_you ( 859291 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:24AM (#13565709) Journal
          I am a newbie learning slackware. Many people have warned against it, but I am not having any problem with it, other than the fact that I STILL can't find the c:\ and I can't get ANY of the *.exe files to do anything

    • Re:YAY! (Score:2, Funny)

      by gowen ( 141411 )
      nicest, most stable and most usable (for admins) Linux release there is.
      YAY!

      Let's all pull so-subjective-as-to-be-meaningless statements out of our butts in order to promote a "my distro is cooler than yours" dick-waving contest!

      YAY!
      • Let's all pull so-subjective-as-to-be-meaningless statements out of our butts in order to promote a "my distro is cooler than yours" dick-waving contest!

        I'm confused by your metaphors. Are you saying you pulled a dick out of your butt?

    • Re:YAY! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by RiotXIX ( 230569 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @07:54AM (#13565526) Journal
      But there are package management tools. They've been working on it. And they're useful when you want to mass upgrade several packages on your system without having to uninstall (yes I still don't know how to uninstall a generic packages..like when I download something, untar; make; make install : where can I find out where it put all it's stuff?). Having a database/registry of where an application put's it's files is a damn good idea.

      "Updated versions of the Slackware package management tools make it
          easy to add, remove, upgrade, and make your own Slackware packages.
          Package tracking makes it easy to upgrade from Slackware 10.1 to
          Slackware 10.2 (see UPGRADE.TXT). The slackpkg tool in /extra can
          also help update from an older version of Slackware to a newer one,
          and keep your Slackware system up to date. In addition, the new
          slacktrack utility (in extra/) will help you build and maintain
          your own packages."

      Seriously many have a perception of slackware as being dated/non-user friendly, but it's one of the most integrated/structured distros I know - it DOES move forward/evolve with the times, it just keeps it's releases at stable versions.

      • (yes I still don't know how to uninstall a generic packages..like when I download something, untar; make; make install : where can I find out where it put all it's stuff?)

        Try this:

        user@darkstar $ whereis <packagename>

        or as root:

        root@darkstar # updatedb
        root@darkstar # locate <packagename>

        Hope that helps. Slackware subscriber since 7.0

      • Re:YAY! (Score:2, Informative)

        by Beek ( 10414 )
        When I compile a program, I put everything in it's own directory in /opt (use the --prefix option when you run the configure script)
        It makes for some long PATH and MANPATH variables, but it works for me
        Since there are only 20-ish extra programs that I need, I find it quite managable
      • (yes I still don't know how to uninstall a generic packages..like when I download something, untar; make; make install : where can I find out where it put all it's stuff?)

        Easiest way is probably to use Checkinstall [asic-linux.com.mx]. I'm using 1.5.3 and 1.6.0 doesn't seem to like me, but its as simple as ./configure, make, checkinstall -S (instead of make install) and it'll make install a slackware package that you can remove with pkgtool like everything else.

      • Checkinstall (Score:4, Informative)

        by Gleng ( 537516 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @09:23AM (#13566213)

        Checkinstall [freshmeat.net] is your friend. You'll never have to type "make install" again. Instead, run checkinstall at the "make install" stage, and it builds a package for your distro (it handles .rpm, .deb, and .tgz based distros) and installs it. You can then just use your distro's package management tool, in Slack's case pkgtool, to remove it at a later time.

        I think it's in the extras directory on the second Slack CD, if memory serves correctly.

        • Fuck it. Beaten like a cheap whore.

        • Re:Checkinstall (Score:2, Informative)

          by program21 ( 469995 )
          It's a great idea; it's just a shame that it's never worked for me. It does "make install," prompts for the package info, and created a .TGZ package--with only the description. It's somewhat useful for just keeping track of what version of something is installed, but since the packages are devoid of actual files, it's less than useful for actual upgrades.
        • Oh, NOW you tell me about this after I went through an annoyingly painful installation of Gimpshop that went bad twice before working right.

          I need a time machine.

      • /usr/local (Score:3, Informative)

        by toby ( 759 ) *
        yes I still don't know how to uninstall a generic packages..like when I download something, untar; make; make install : where can I find out where it put all it's stuff?

        There have been de facto standards for this for decades, and standard layouts for Linux for years. If package developers pick random install locations, that's their foolishness. (This applies to any O/S, not just Linux.)

        Having a database/registry of where an application put's it's files is a damn good idea.

        Having standard places is equall

        • Same thing in Windows, but there's a problem sometimes:

          Usually you'll find all applications in "C:\Program Files\*". So some smart novice then thinks, "ok so the default is C:\program files\ so let's install there by default", which is a bad mistake.The actual default prefix should be "%systemdrive%\Program Files\", not to mention that there is even an environment variable for it: %programfiles%.

          The devil is in the details.

      • You have at least two simple options for figuring out where a source package puts it stuff when you do a make install.

        The first is using the DESTDIR variable, the second is using the --prefix= option when you run ./configure.

        If the DESTDIR variable is supported by Makefile the source tarball comes with, then you invoke it like this:

        make DESTDIR=/tmp/install install

        That has the effect of prepending "/tmp/install" to the destination path of every file the makefile copies. /usr/bin/some_file becomes /tmp/insta

    • Re:YAY! (Score:2, Funny)

      by EddyPearson ( 901263 )
      gotta luv the old school linux system. still maintained by a single person ;) the open source dictatorship :p

    • Re:YAY! (Score:4, Informative)

      by MikeDawg ( 721537 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:59AM (#13565979) Homepage Journal
      Too bad there isn't a "completr lack of package management". pkgtool is a package management tool, it scares me to think you admin 120 boxes, and you aren't familiar with the pkgtools suite of tools.
    • The installation method looks truely ancient: seems that you need a floppy drive for installing. Is there any slackware-based distro with installer CDs?

      The FAQ actually suggest an alternative method through MS Windows (with loadlin), but needing Windows to install Linux seems pretty silly.

      • Read the documentation again.

        Of course you can install Slackware from a CD.

      • I've been installing Slackware from bootable CDs for a number of years now. Making a boot floppy isn't as easy as it was in the past either because kernels and such have grown beyond the space limitations of a floppy.

        Burn the ISO to CD and boot it. Disc 2 has (at least in the past) a number of troubleshooting tools on it when you boot. It's sort of a rescue disc. (I say at least in the past because my 10.1 discs are not working that way, though I suspect it is a bad burn.)

        I was looking for the point at whic
        • I know I used a bootable CD for Slackware 7.0. I don't know whether they had one before that.

        • I was looking for the point at which they switched to bootable CDs and more info on the boot/root floppy situation, but Slackware.com is coming up blank. Maybe somebody else knows.

          Ask and ye shall recieve.

          Slackware has had bootable CDs since at least 3.9/4.0 (4.0 was basically 3.9 with a 2.2 kernel) using floppy emulation all the way up to 8.0 (which gave you a choice of a 2.2 or 2.4 kernel). Starting with 8.1, Slackware has used el torito (I think I spelled that right) bootable CD images. Lots o

    • Re:YAY! (Score:3, Informative)

      by Lumpy ( 12016 )
      not just for admins! Slackware completely and totally rocks for the real nitty gritty linux tasks like embedded linux development.

      I can create a testing linux install in less than 20 meg with slackware as it is. using slack on my development pc makes it easier to make the embedded linux device work through the testing phases and I have only been able to get cross compiling and uclibc cross compile to work easily under slackware instead of the rpm or deb based setups. it's great when you download GCC and s
    • I like the fact that Slackware is a 'purist' distro, it's difficult to use and that forces you to learn more about the underlying OS. If you've used Slackware you'll know how to fix things in other flavors of linux when they break.

      When linuxconf's config files get buggered, if you don't know how to manually configure things you're stuck. If you understand how to manually edit config files for the various other services you can make due until you fix linuxconf(or your administration tool of choice).

      Really, t

  • cvs & mozilla still available (Score:5, Informative)

    by richlv ( 778496 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @07:46AM (#13565463)
    well, if i understood this submission correctly, it implies that mozilla & cvs now are missing - that's not true.

    it contains mozilla-1.7.11 and cvs-1.11.20

    at least in latest-current that should be identical to 10.2 :)

  • My (quick) distro of choice (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Punk Walrus ( 582794 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @07:50AM (#13565486) Journal
    I am looking forward to trying this out. Slashdot alerted me to Slack fans, and I have been using it steadily in personal and professional environments for years now. I like LFS and Gentoo, just because I can tweak every living thing out of my hardware and software, but if I need a "quick set and forget" distro just to get a box running, Slackware is hard to beat.

    I don't know why people claim the installation is so hard. I guess the disk partition thing might be intimidating, but then again, I have FDisk'd so many times because Windows/DOS had issues back in the day, I find the two-tone ncurses thing to be a positive boon!

    A hearty congratulations to Pat and all the people who worked for this!

    • Yep, the more I have used to slackware install, the more appreciative of it I am. It doesn't go to great lengths to guide disk partitioning, swap making ect, extensive configuration. Instead it just gets to the job of installing files onto the hard drive you want, and does it without wasting time I could be properly configuring the box. :-)

      It may be imtimidating to first time users, but if you are going to be installing linux more then a few times, you don't need the time wasted by complex installers. (like

  • And in other news.... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Rob_Ogilvie ( 872621 ) <rob@axpr.net> on Thursday September 15, 2005 @07:51AM (#13565499) Homepage
    slamd64 [slamd64.com] has been released with many quite similar changes. What a coincidence, 'eh? Grab [slamd64.com] it now if your CPU is of the x86-64 persuation.

  • Up with the times (Score:5, Informative)

    by bwaynef ( 692229 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @07:52AM (#13565504) Journal
    Re: up with the times... Slackware has never tried to be up with the times. They're just now allowing 2.6 kernel (from the installer). Firefox is still a 1.0.x release so its not as stable as the mozilla suite has been (though its pretty good). I think Pat just lets everyone else work out the bugs before he incorporates it into his release. Stability and Ease of Use.

  • Glad they stuck with 2.4 (Score:4, Interesting)

    by m50d ( 797211 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @07:58AM (#13565548) Homepage Journal
    Others will disagree with me but I still find 2.6 kernels to be unstable more often than not (see my journal [slashdot.org]). As a more server-oriented distribution, stability is perhaps more important with slackware than many distributions, and it's good to see Pat's priorities reflect that.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Making me a Slacker again . . . . . (Score:5, Funny)

    by failure-man ( 870605 ) <failureman@ g m a il.com> on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:07AM (#13565604)
    I could:
    a) Get some work done tonight so I don't fail classes.
    or
    b) Install some new Slackware on my primary beast.

    I think I hear the torrent's call . . . . .

    • Re:Making me a Slacker again . . . . . (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      You will have plenty of time to do your homework, the torrents are slow as balls.
    • That's funny. I find that when things fail on heavily packaged distros, they fail miserably.

      I am in charge of a Gentoo server. I've fucked a service up on it, precisely because I was able to carry out a partial upgrade without knowing what I was doing. Now, the former maintainer is on my ass about it, and even after trying everything I know, short of rebuilding the entire box (on an PII, nonetheless), I am going to end up building a copy of the whole mail system on my own (Slackware) system.

      Yeah, as usual,

  • Slackware's purpose? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Zemplar ( 764598 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:08AM (#13565610) Journal
    Now that you can get a 'real' UNIX for free, what are the compelling reasons to use Slackware GNU/Linux whose primary function is to be "...the most "UNIX-like" Linux distribution out there."
    • Linux has surpassed traditional Unix in many ways:
      • O(1) scheduler
      • aggressive virtual memory subsystem
      • /proc filesystem
      • quality documentation
      • active developer/user communities

      I enjoy these Linux features. But I prefer traditional, Unix-like distros. I use Slackware.

  • Is this true for Slackware? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bogaboga ( 793279 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:20AM (#13565683)
    Is the following true about Slackware?

    Is the snappiest distro out there in terms of overall responsiveness?

    True that it is the oldest Linux distro?

    If so why does it not seem to have the mind share that Fedora, SuSE, Mandriva and [K]ubuntu appear to enjoy?

    • If so why does it not seem to have the mind share that Fedora, SuSE, Mandriva and [K]ubuntu appear to enjoy?

      If my experiment with Slackware 10.0 a while back was representative, it's because of : lack of good automatic package management, lack of newbie-friendly administration tools, lack of all the advanced stuff like Project Utopia etc. and the relatively small selection of official packages

      Of course, Slackers would probably say that all those things are the reasons they use Slack, which I don't under

      • I won't necessarily say I use Slackware because those items don't exist, but I do use it because of frustration with many of those things on other distros.

        Preface to say, I have been using Slackware since I first started with Linux, back around 1994 or so, so I've had plenty of time over the years to get used to "bare metal".

        However, I have frequently wished I could just "apt-get install whatever" so I've tried various distros over the years. Used Red Hat for quite a while, really enjoyed Mandrake, never c

      • lack of good automatic package management, [..] lack of all the advanced stuff like Project Utopia

        By omitting nonessential bells and whistles, Patrick Volkerding doesn't have to waste his time and energy QA'ing them. He puts more QA hours into features essential to the operation of a production server, instead. This is of critical importance. QA effort cannot entirely eliminate the bugs and incompatabilities within and between packages, but the more hours are spent doing it the closer the distributio

    • Re:Is this true for Slackware? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by FauxPasIII ( 75900 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:55AM (#13565943)
      > If so why does it not seem to have the mind share that Fedora, SuSE, Mandriva and [K]ubuntu appear to enjoy?

      If you're used to Windows or Mac, it requires you to do more learning of Linux up front.
    • According to good old Wikipedia [wikipedia.org], Slackware is not quite the oldest distro. The earliest were MCC Interim Linux, TAMU and SLS (Softlanding Linux System). AFAIK Slackware is, however, the oldest distro that is still under active development.
    • Slackware is the oldest maintained distribution, Slackware 1.000 was released on July 16, 1993. The first Linux distro was MCC , which was made available to the public for download on the ftp server of University of Manchester in February, 1992, and the second was SLS (founded in mid-1992). Pat decided to modify SLS. He called the finished work Slackware. That's it.
    • The snappiest is going to be some homemade combination, tuned to the individual machine and software requirement. However, the default Slackware environment will be better than most Gentoo/LFS users could conjure without a great deal of tweaking.

      Slackware is not the oldest, but is certainly the oldest surviving currently-maintained distribution.

      It doesn't have the mindshare because there are relatively few active developers and because the installer is a bit too much of a culture shock for it to be a sensib

  • Patricks Health (Score:4, Interesting)

    by nighty5 ( 615965 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:23AM (#13565703)
    Last time I heard he was very ill, anyone have the latest?

  • Nice one Taco (Score:5, Insightful)

    by big_groo ( 237634 ) <groovis.gmail@com> on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:30AM (#13565755) Homepage
    Instead of linking to the torrents, which are easy enough for anyone to find, why not link to the Slackware Store [slackware.com] and try to support Pat's efforts.

    You have no problems pimping ads and subscriptions on /., but you won't link to the store of the oldest linux distro out there.

    • Great, slashdot the store so nobody can get to it! You insensitive clod!

    • Re:Nice one Taco (Score:3, Insightful)

      by tjw ( 27390 )
      Somehow I doubt that it would have boosted sales. I would be willing to bet that most of Slackware sales are to loyal users, not first time users.

      I signed up for the Slackware subscription [slackware.com] service to support Pat, not for the CDs which still sit in the shrink-wrapped cases they were mailed in.

      Promoting the torrents is probably a good thing. It wasn't an FTP link to slackware.com after all.

  • Vector Linux (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Vector Linux, based on Slackware, is the best personal-use distro I've seen. Got all of Slack's stability, basic package management system that doesn't try to do anything for you, but set up a bit more for desktop use. And it's FAST, the fastest binary-based distro I know of by a long shot.

    http://www.vectorlinux.com/ [vectorlinux.com]

    Now I just need to wait for them to update so they're compatible with 10.2...

  • History of slackware? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by hackstraw ( 262471 ) * on Thursday September 15, 2005 @08:50AM (#13565898)

    Slackware was my first linux distro. I learned a bunch from it when I first got into linux in 1994 with Slackware 1.something. It used the kernel version 0.99pl13. That was a long time ago.

    I'll tell you, it was the best OS I could run at the time. I also thought it was cool that the default computer name back then was "Dark Star", which is a Grateful Dead song for those that don't know. The system was very modular, and it was relatively easy to install. Yes, I installed via sneakernet on 1.44meg floppies. The second time I installed it, I downloaded it over a 14.4 modem, possibly slower.

    I did more reading when downloads took days at a time :)
  • I didn't think people -reinstalled- Slackware ...

    All this talk about going home and reinstalling 10.2 over 10.1 ...

    Why not just update your packages or kernel and be done with it
    • While that would be the ideal, I usually take the "reinstall" as an opportunity to clear out all the cruft I've accumulated over the months or years. I just back up to the server, maybe make a dupe on a USB HD, then pull data over as I need it. After a while, I burn what's left to CD and delete.

      I'm bad at housekeeping, so having an opportunity to sit around and remember just what I did to get everything working last time (for whatever reason, an enjoyable experience to me! ;) gives me an excuse to tidy up

  • Magnet URI links (Score:3, Informative)

    by Danathar ( 267989 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @09:19AM (#13566165) Journal
    Here are the Magnet URI links. The trackers are having problems. Connect this way...

    Note that slashdot mangles URI's so ther is NO space before the last two charachters like it prints here...just get rid of the space

    Disk 1
    magnet:?xt=urn:btih:YYXZAJR2B3WFBOZCWCFXUSZBOA2MRA 5L

    Disk 2
    magnet:?xt=urn:btih:YWPGO6H445YQILY5A5XYGSZATPQCPW ES

    Disk3 Source
    magnet:?xt=urn:btih:FVUYDWUGGYSDXS3CH6KU4SDOEJIJKQ ZK

    Disk 4 Source and Extras
    magnet:?xt=urn:btih:PVCGFALOO52JJOSEHJA7YCIHHWERHG SN

  • I just installed 10.1 (Score:3, Funny)

    by Ximok ( 650049 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @09:21AM (#13566187)
    Crap, I held out for 2 weeks hoping they would come out with 10.2. So got tired of waiting, downloaded and installed 10.1 LAST NIGHT until 11:45! GRRRR.... I just wasted 2 cds on 10.1... Oh well, at least I don't have to download firefox now... seperately...

  • No More Gnome (Score:3, Informative)

    by bender647 ( 705126 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @09:42AM (#13566352)
    I follow slackware-current, so I guess as of today I am running 10.2. I find the development (-current) version of Slackware more stable than the "enterprise" distros I am forced to use at work.

    Anyways, I thought I'd mention that this is the first official release of Slackware in which there is no Gnome. Patrick has (perhaps wisely) left Gnome to be an add-on supported by 3rd parties.

  • For the player haters (Score:5, Informative)

    by CatsupBoy ( 825578 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @09:43AM (#13566356)
    Come on, i'm tired of hearing the same old misconceptions about slackware here on /. (wait, i think thats why i stick around)

    MISCONCEPTIONS
    1: Slackware doesnt have a package management system
    FALSE: Slackware uses a very simple package management system that accomplishes two things. 1. it allows you to track files installed. 2. allows you to upgrade to newer versions (yes there is versioning). And as a bonus, your not bogged down with dependancies.... oh wait you want cyclical dependancies???
    2: Slackware is outdated/behind the times.
    FALSE: Why? because it still uses 2.4 kernel? Please! stability is the issue here. Purchase a RedHat Advanced server and you'll find it STILL uses 2.4. You cant please everyone all the time, but you can still produce a quality product with proven technology.
    3: Slackware is too hard to use for newbies and/or my grandparents
    AD-HOMINIM: This argument is too often used against Slackware in general. For what it is, an "everything is a file" operating system, you must expect to have to get to the command line eventually. If your using it as a server in place of another Unix OS, its not any harder to manage. If your using it to replace RedHat or SuSe, still, its not any harder, and with the added bonus that you dont have as much bloat (did i mention cyclical dependancies?).
    4: Pat is a selfish dictator and I dont like his direction
    TRUE: So is Linus Torvolds, and as far as direction, every company, ceo, lead developer must make thier own decisions and you just cant please everyone all the time.

    Before the mods make me -1 troll, let me just say Slackware is not perfect, but nothing is. I dont like the fact that PAM will probably never be added :(

    I use it as a desktop and a server. My servers are usually stripped down and single serve boxes, and slackware is a perfect fit. By trade, I work with Solaris, AIX, and RedHat. The only reason I dont push Slack at work is that my company wants to spend the money to have a finger to point at (specifically a large company to point at) when a problem arises.

    But in the 5 years i've been using slackware, I've never encountered a show stopper.
    • 2: Slackware is outdated/behind the times.

      FALSE: Why? because it still uses 2.4 kernel?
      Please! stability is the issue here. Purchase a
      RedHat Advanced server and you'll find it STILL
      uses 2.4. You cant please everyone all the time,
      but you can still produce a quality product with
      proven technology.

      keep in mind that the latest version of redhat AS does come with the 2.6 kernel.

    • quibble (Score:2)

      by toby ( 759 ) *
      Point 4 is arguably ad hominem; point 3 isn't.

    • 2: Slackware is outdated/behind the times.

      FALSE: Why? because it still uses 2.4 kernel? Please! stability is the issue here. Purchase a RedHat Advanced server and you'll find it STILL uses 2.4. You cant please everyone all the time, but you can still produce a quality product with proven technology.

      Funny...

      [root@satellite02 mnt]# uname -r
      2.6.9-11.ELsmp
      [root@satellite02 mnt]# cat /etc/redhat-release
      Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS release 4 (Nahant Update 1)

    • One of the reasons that Slackware doesn't come with PAM is because of security issues. A lot of people feel that PAM is inherently insecure, and don't want anything to do with it. Not including it also keeps the distribution a lot more simple.

      OTOH, I've added PAM to a Slackware system before, and it didn't require all that much effort.

      I love Slackware because it lets me easily configure things without using some distro-specific tool, and without breaking any of the same by doing it manually. I also prefe

  • I use Slack on all my home PCs... (Score:4, Funny)

    by zenmojodaddy ( 754377 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @10:04AM (#13566591)
    ... and the only big problem I have with it is that in order to get it just how I like it from a stock install, I have to do a lot of customisation. This is one of Slack's strengths - it's easy to tweak - but it does take time.

    From time to time I think about trying a Slack-based distribution which is focused more narrowly on desktop use, but the package selections are never quite right... so I'd end up trying to tweak them as well. In which case, might as well stay with the original.

    Ah, Slackware. Frustrating. Beautiful. Just like a woman, but without the breasts. And, in all probability, the closest most of us will ever get to a woman.

  • Mirror performance (Score:2, Interesting)

    by AshPattern ( 152048 )
    We use slackware as our primary distro for our servers, so I set up a private mirror of slackware with a slackware-mirror-making-tool that syncs with multiple mirrors simultaneously. The tool keeps track of successful transfers and errors. Apparently, some mirrors aren't really pulling their weight (slackware.com is when it couldn't find the file on any host):

    Rcvd Err Host
    100 0 slackware.mirrors.easynews.com
    87 0 slackware.cs.utah.edu
    18 7 ftp.slackware.com
    8 0 slackware.mirrors.tds.net
    7 99 carroll.cac.psu.e

  • Got Slack? The Linux that switched me from Windows (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MindPrison ( 864299 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @10:34AM (#13566908) Journal
    Slackware is a special Linux distribution, the fact that it's being maintained and directed by one man (of course with a lot of other contributors) is baffling to me.

    It's baffling because with the 8-10 years I've got behind me now...trying and TRYING to get Linux distro's to work for me...so I can leave Windows forever - Slackware is the ONLY Linux that made me switch completely.

    Yes... I'm now officially an Slackware Fanboy! But what's wrong with being a fan? I love this distro - it just works!

    Back in the heydays when I used Mandrake (now Mandriva) and SuSE ...I used these because they offered a Quick-Fix...everything worked from scratch...well...nearly everything that is...except from compilation of other sources, windows mediaplayer formats etc. etc. And hoo-and-behold if you should dare to venture into compilation on your own....then you'd be in knee deep with problems, why? Because these packages makes you dependent on packages, it makes you a slave to downloading RPM for "your-package" and if you want to do things on your own...there's simply too much to learn for a beginner because of all the dependencies and installs you must do (and KNOW) before you can do anything useful at all.

    It's possible that a lot of you reading this using (insert-your-favourite-package-here) will go into "flame-shock" and tell me that (your-package-will-do-this-and-that-and-I-dont-kno w-jack) but that's not the point here. The point is that Slackware comes with tools to make you independent! It already installs a TON of utilities, libs, devs, compilers etc. to make your life easier when you want to do stuff on your own instead of being a package-whore.

    That's what I like about Slackware! I'm free here, not "strategically" controlled by a corporate that figures out WHAT to bring me so I can "somewhat" be steered into the direction they want me to take by handicapping me doing stuff/learning on my own!

    It's also the only package that made myself completely independant from windows, I can see whatever I want in Slack, configure the heck out of it, because of all the utilities and (smart hints and docs by the man himself) I've learned gradually what Linux is all about...and now I don't need to sit in a user-group and feel like an idiot just because I don't know jack even after 10 years with Linux...simply because Slackware teaches me to do stuff on my own and in fact encourages it.

    Got slack?! Yeah - you bet!
  • Did Patrick ever tell the FOSS community about his illness? I remember he sort of called on everyone for help in diagnosing his problem, and then when he finally got it squared away, he never told anyone what the result was. Kind of against the whole "you tell me what you did, and if I learn something new, I'll tell it to you" spirit of F/OSS...

  • Red Hat vs Slackware (Score:3, Insightful)

    by cranky_slacker ( 815016 ) on Thursday September 15, 2005 @12:15PM (#13567867) Homepage
    It's story time....and before the flamewar begins, let me just say I am telling this story to illustrate my point...so cool it.

    In the spring of 2003, I decided I was ready for Linux and somehow I ended up with discs for Redhat 9.0. Yes boys and girls, this is in the days before Fedora. A little disc partitioning, a few questions and a half hour of waiting later, and Red Hat was up and running. When it was done, I had a fully working Linux system....almost. I couldn't listen to my vast mp3 collection, but I know my audio card worked because I could play the random .wav file I had lying around. And how do I change the appearance of my desktop? What if I want to change my window manager? I couldn't answer these questions or any of the many others I had. Over the next week or so, I poked around on what felt like 100 different websites/fourms and was able to solve a few of my problems. I even learned all about RPM hell when I tried to install the proper mp3 codec package. As you might imagine, it didn't take long for me to abandon Red Hat. It wasn't that I didn't like it, I simply didn't know how to use it.

    Rewind a few months to when I was investigating the various Distros. I looked at Suse, Mandrake, Red Hat, Slackware, Gentoo, Debian, and probably some others. For whatever reason, I remember thinking that Slack's site just looked right. My impression of Linux at the time made me feel like it shouldn't be a product of a big company, but rather the efforts of a dedicated person(s). This notion ruled out Suse and Mandrake. At the same time, Gentoo and Debian seemed too hardcore. I'm not sure why I didn't go with Slack to begin with, but after the failed RH attempt, I went for it. Oddly enough, I reached this conclusion the day after Slack 9.1 dropped. Add to that the fact that I discovered the forums at LinuxQuestions.org right around this same time (if you're a linux newb, these _are_ the forums you need), and I had a shiny new distro, and a community of people working through the same kinks I was.

    The Slack install was definitely more involved than RH, at least so much as to require a lot more input from me. By the time it was over, I already felt like I knew more, and little did I know what was waiting for me. When the install was done, I had a linux system which worked, but instead of staring at a highly customized KDE, I was looking at the command line (gasp!!). Bring on the fun...While I still didn't know how to config X, how to chose a window manager, how to set up ALSA or countless other things I needed to do, I also knew that I had to find out. RH did it for me and kept me ignorant - it took decisions out of my hands, which is one of the things I don't like about M$. Slack made me do it and in the process, learn it.

    I've been on Slack ever since (except for my job and the wife's PC, where switching isn't an option) and although some things were a challenge, I couldn't be happier.

    The point of this story is that Slack is a worthwhile distro and IS accessible to newb's.
  • (and proud of it,) and, since my box just died, I'm thinking of replacing it all and changing the guts to an Athlon64 (or maybe dual Athlons?).

    Does it make sense. Can slackware handle it? (I think it should, but, like I said, I'm still a Linux newb.)

    I know it'll mean a new MoBo, 2GB RAM, 2x15GB & 2x120GB HDs (I LIKE redundancy,) a new power supply, new fanage, probably a new video card, new ethernet card(s? should I make it my firewall and phase out my use of a LinkSys router as a firewall?) a new DVD-R

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