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SlackWare 4.0 is available 172

Posted by Hemos from the come-and-get-it dept.
crunge writes "SlackWare 4.0 is now available. It is based on the 2.2.x kernel. It is still libc5-based (but glibc 2.0.7pre6 compatibility libraries are available for those who want/need to run glibc2 applications. (My understanding is that the next release will be glibc2.1-based). Grab it from the usual usual places.
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SlackWare 4.0 is available More

SlackWare 4.0 is available

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  • Slack Attack! (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I've been using the final beta for about a week-- it's real sweet on a 486 with 8 MB RAM. On another 486, I did a floppy install of the first beta.

    There will always be a place for Slackware-- the servers-in-the-closet, the Linux-can-do-it routers, etc.

    RedHat may be winning over Micros~1 converts, but if you don't know Slack, you don't know jack.

  • Ever heard of Alien?? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    You should try the alien software package (try Freshmeat). It can convert rpms to other forms (including *.tgz).

    RPM is good. If you are so concerned with having source files why not try source RPMS? Or download things from source and build your own RPMS. My system is damned organized thanks to it. If I want to delete an entire software package (no poking about in lib, bin, include, etc for file names that may apply for me) I simply remove the entire packag and its corresponding files from the RPM database.

    I agree that RH is making everything easier, but that is because as of yet, linux is still primarily a hobby. Most people like to do fun things with their computer (e.g. play a game, program a game, type a novel, etc) very few want to constantly worry about keeping the system up to date. This is why debian's "apt-get update" is so appealing to me.

  • Except that... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ...you have to have RPM installed for MC to be able to do that.

  • Re:What is so great about libc5? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    libc5, in my experience, runs faster than glibc, because when you are not concerned with threadsafe design, you can "cheat" in the design of the library (static globals, or static variables in functions). In other words, if you don't run threaded apps at all (apache isn't threaded (yet), ftpd isn't threaded, heck, most software on the linux cd's aren't multithreaded) there is no true need for libc5.

    userspace implementations of pthreads mean:
    1) your kernel doesn't have the overhead of keeping track of threads. IE, kernel tasks are greatly simplified with userspace threads... Think of processtable size if you have to do this all in the kernel.
    2) having your kernel keep track of threads results in more overhead that outweighs some benefits, especially in uniprocessor systems. Syscalls are required to do thread work. I don't think most users have SMP systems, yet.

    In fact, if you check out books on threading, the best system is a hybrid kernel-user space threadlib.

  • smallest slackware install.. (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    my smallest slackware 4.0 install so far :
    hardware :
    386SX-16, 10Mbps 21040 tulip, 43MB HDD, CGA (80 x 24)
    software :
    36MB total (A and N series with large stuff removed)
    4MB swap.
    runs :
    webserver, ftp server, samba (win95 server), netatalk (apple fileserver), lpr print server,
    mail handler.

  • Midnight Commander comes in handy (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Hi - too lazy to log in... (actually am RAK)

    I thought you might find mc useful. Just take
    your generic RPM, open it up with mc (or an
    equivalent tool) and copy the tarball that's
    inside it to anywhere you want... then procede
    manually, unhampered by the RPM "install"
    procedure. :)

    Yup... there is a tarball in each of those RPMs.

    Cheers,
    RAK

  • Ahh... I remember the day... (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I remember back when Slackware was first announced, and he was going to charge like $30 for a set of floppies that you could install off of.

    And the flame war which resulted at the nerve of some guy suggesting that Linux should be anything other than totally free.

    Even if it did take you 2 days to download with a 2400 baud modem... :)

    Ahh the good ole days.

  • Re:Cool (Score:3)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 22, 1999 @04:36PM (#1882975)
    I tend to agree with this person that Linux as a product wasn't ready for the sudden infusion of newbies. Linux has historically required you to know your machine inside and out to get everything working okay. Red Hat, however, changes that. This does 2 things. First, unfortunately, it empowers a lot of people who really have no business using Linux *YET*, before it's ready for them. This is bad, not so much for us ( I LOVE to answer questions and help people along ) but for them and their lost productivity, data, etc.

    But the other effect it has is a good one. It enables those of us who know what we're doing to have an easier time of managing our systems, so we can concentrate our efforts on more important, bigger jobs like security, coding, or advocacy, etc. I remember when I ran slackware (Which I loved then and still do), and 5/6 of my time was spent keeping up-to-date on all the latest libraries. I never got ANYTHING pre-compiled.

    But now, with RPM, I can let somebody else sweat the small stuff. The way I see it, I've already mired through the learning process, I already tore my hair out tring to make QT install where I want it and still link right, I already read all the docs on how to compile X, I already know that I CAN do everything I need to get my system working like a charm. Now, I don't have to anymore and can concentrate on other things.

    One of my wiser fellows once said "You use Slackware when you're starting, until you know how to do everything yourself. Then you go to Red Hat so you don't HAVE to do everything yourself anymore." To that I would add, you don't have to with Red Hat, but you still can if you choose. I use RPM, but I don't use any form of GUI like GLINT or LinuxConf. I know my system as well as I did when I was a Slackware user.

    Not all Red Hatters are lame, I guess is the short version of my point =)

    Long live Linux, and may distribution wars never cease, for they make us all stronger.

    ~ Josh Litherland (fauxpas@cc.gatech.edu)
    (Sorry for long post)

  • woohoo (Score:4)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 22, 1999 @02:27PM (#1882976)
    As a newbie using linux, slackware, patrick, offered some of the best support i have ever had and as a result i was able to get slackware running in one evening and get connected to the net, (mind you i had never touched linux before in my life). I would hate to see it go the way of the dinosaur's, like the previous message seems to imply.

  • RedHat and Debian remove no options (Score:4)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 22, 1999 @03:58PM (#1882977)
    There is nothing stopping anyone from installing from source on a system that uses package management. There is a lot more to package managers than just the simplicity of pre-compiled binaries.

    For one, it makes distibution of software on a farm really easy. I build my own apache rpms, then distribute and install them automatically onto my web farm using autorpm.

    Second, package mangers offer a good layer of security. It is very easy to see if any trojans have replaced one of your core files simply by comparing the file to the hash stored in the package manager's database.

    Finally, it offers a consitency check and a built-in software inventory system.It is also nice to know that you won't do some braindead thing that will break some important software, overwritting a key file with a 'mmake install'. It is also good to know what software depends on what software so you don't accidentally uninstall something, or install a commercial package only to learn afterward that it requires something you don't have.

    The effort involved in building and maintaing one's own set of home-grown rpms has been, at least for me, much less than maintaining and administering a bunch of disorganized tar files.

    I love Slackware. I used Slackware for several years, but switched to RedHat. The folks who think that RedHat or Debian is uncool because it is too easy are missing the point of Linux. Linux is great because it works, it is stable, and it is easy. It is this system administrator's dream come true. I for one am not going to go out of my way to be "cooler" if it makes my job harder.

  • Ah, Slackware, I knew them well... (Score:5)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 22, 1999 @03:09PM (#1882978)
    I have fond memories of using Slackware. The first install I did past 1.0.99plwhateveritwas. A fine distribution, for the time.

    A few more versions... then I got tired of, basically, having to reinstall linux. I guess as a newbie I should have learned all the intricate steps involved in upgrading each tarballed package but somehow something was always left out of the FD.

    Then I heard of something called "Red Hat". And some Slackware folks commenting about the low technical expertise of people running and actually _using_ Red Hat's absurdly simple RPM system, and still _not knowing things_. I ran for Red Hat. Hey! Where'd that webserver come from! Whee!

    Now, most of those particular folks I know have followed, and an IPO is anticipated. I sincerely hope that the result is that Slackware spur ahead of Red Hat and spur them forward as well, viva competition. I wish both factions well and will stay with or switch to the best IMO.
  • > I actually enjoy installing a distribution and having all of the software I installed actually work reliably, a feature which the other distributions, especially Debian, severely lacks.

    Uhh, you are insane? Debian has far far superior packages than any other distro out there, the others only wish they could be half as good.

  • Uhh, try to go an order a debian cd set, you wont find any non-free software on it.
  • Packages in contrib are free, and the non-free section isnt distributed on the main (2cd) set.

    So the "Official" distro is free.

  • Re:Cool - Glibc vs libc (Score:4)

    by Erich ( 151 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @06:40PM (#1882982) Homepage Journal
    2.0.* aren't necessarily compatable or stable. 2.1.* is compatable with each other.

    I mean, would You want to trust every program to something with the version number 2.0.7pre6?

    I've seen a lot of problems with people who say ``I can't run that, I've installed glibc2.1'' or ``That's compiled for 2.1 and I just have 2.0.''

    What I suggest is have your server run libc5 with linuxthreads and then add your glibc runtime of choice. When things settle down in the 2.1 series of libc, then switch to that.

    Hmm... that's what slackware does.

    Anyway, I like slackware, it feels like home. Isn't the nice thing about free unicies is that we can all get along?

  • ...what the hell's the difference between a tarball and an rpm? Nothing so far as I can see, except you get to struggle through the compile process.

    Well, actually, most of us use a compiler, so it's no struggle at all. YMMV if you're trying to produce the binary by hand...

  • AFAIK, it has GNOME and KDE. And to be honest glibc-2.0 wasn't all it cracked up to be. If the next version uses glibc-2.1, which is apparently much better (even if it's still not offically released), I don't see the problem..

  • Incorrect. A disk burnt with proper Joliet extensions works perfectly in Linux. (ie. the extensions are completely ignored) I I burn discs with both Joliet and Rock-Ridge on them all the time. They work happily in both Linux and Windows.

    There may have been a buggy version or two of mkisofs that has given people this impression.

  • Ahh, you are correct. I tend to use disks that have both Joliet and RockRidge extentions, and in that case it seems that the RockRidge extentions are used in prefernce to the Joliet extents.

  • Basically, the command line will look like:

    mkisofs -J -r -o output-filename root-directory

    This will create a an ISO9660 image file. You then use cdrecord or other similar program to burn the image to the disk. (In a pinch I've used Adaptech EZ-CD Creator on a Win95 box to burn an image created this way. You might also want to look into a program called xcdroast which is a nice graphical front end for mkisofs and cdrecord.

    And, of coarse, you can always add more options - like bootable CDs, volume names, etc - when you are more comforatble with it.

  • ...is the day I eat my socks. (I will, of course capture a video of it and stick it on a publicly accessible site somewhere.)
  • You didn't look very carefully at all then. KDE is the default interface with gnome available in /contrib.

  • Slack 3.9 (Score:3)

    by Matrix ( 290 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @02:58PM (#1882990) Homepage
    Please note also that Slackware 3.9 is available as well. 3.9 is just 4.0 with the 2.0.37pre10 kernel for those who are hesitant to use 2.2. Check http://www.slackare.com [slackware.com] for more info.
  • If you have a single box and enough time to keep up with every software update that comes across Freshmeat, you may be right. If you've got more than one machine to keep track of, frequently install on new machines, or just don't have the time to keep track of every release of every minor package on your system, distributions come in very handy.

    I've been using a Slackware 3.0 CD to do my installs for years (and, for those of you who are used to Red Hat and SuSE and so on changing major version numbers every ten minutes, Slack's last .0 release was based on the 1.2.13 kernel), and I've been upgrading my boxen piecemeal for just as long. I've got entire ~ftp directories full of the packages I need to turn a freshly installed Slack 3.0 system into a 2.2.9 box. But, for all that, I'm sure I've missed as much stuff as I've upgraded.

    For me, a new Slackware release is a chance to update everything in one fell swoop. I can re-do the four years of customization that have gone into my oldest box. It's really not all that much, when I think of it. The /home volume, a couple of tweaks to support my peculiar hardware and network configuration, a few software packages I've added... most of which come with modern distributions, but just didn't exist when Slack 3.0 came out. At this point, it's easier to re-do my tweaks on an effectively new system than it is to upgrade the system I've got. And when I set up a new box, I'll have a more recent starting point for my upgrading, which will probably carry me through 'til Slack 5.0 comes out in 2003 with the 3.2.10 kernel.

    And, regarding the relative merits of the different distributions... your post seems to imply that you've never used anything but Red Hat 5.2. If that's the case, I can see how you might think all distributions are the same. As someone who's owned Slackware 3.0 and Red Hat 4.2 boxen, and extensively used Red Hat 5.*, Mandrake, and assorted other Slackwares between 3.2 and 3.6, I can assure you that they are *not* all the same. Oh, yeah, they can be _made_ to be the same, but it's pretty silly to start with a Red Hat installation when what you really want is something more like Slackware. That's why I use my Slackware 3.0 CD for new installations, in preference to my more recent Red Hat 4.2 disk... I find it easier to update Slack than to make Red Hat behave in something resembling a rational manner.

    And I'd agree with you that Linux is pretty unusable unless you know what's happening inside your system. And, no, none of the distributions actually prevent you from learning that, but a lot of the stuff Red Hat does seems designed precisely to obscure it as much as possible. I know, it's not deliberate, it's just a side effect of making the GUI tools easier to use and simpler to write, but it feels obscurationist to an old-fashioned command-line junkie. And that's the reason I use Slackware instead of anything else (though I've been considering giving Debian a whirl). And that's why I just sent in my $40 for the new Slack 4.0 disks.
  • This is great - Although I am writing this from a RedHat install, I started on Slackware, and still like it because I can always pick a minimal number of packages, download them in one evening via my 28.8 modem, stick all of them on a zip disk, and have a very useable Linux system the next morning. If you ever need a quick and dirty Linux installation, Slackware is the way to go.

    . There is a slight lag in features, but nothing that can't be downloaded and easily adapted. Slackware embodies the spirit of Linux (fly by the seat of your pants and figure it out yourself - failing that, turn to your peers), and encourages learning, hacking, and "thinking outside the box." I owe much of my Unix knowledge to using Slackware, and for that I am thankful.

  • Why I run Debian (Score:3)

    by HoserHead ( 599 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @07:01PM (#1882993)
    I started with slackware, like a lot of people. For a while, packages seemed the wimp way of doing things - it wasn't actually accomplishing anything, for God's sake! Far too easy.

    Yes, I ran slackware. I was a real hacker. I singlehandedly installed gnome from source 4 or 5 times, in its entirety, because of how often I nuked my partition and started over.

    Then, I realised that I was wasting far too much time compiling things. My Pentium 166 with 32 MB of RAM, which used to be state-of-the-art, now was taking an awfully long time compiling things.

    So, for a while, I ran Red Hat. I liked it, too. Its printer management meant I didn't have to futz around with magicfiltres and linuxconf meant that, generally speaking, I didn't have to worry about much.

    Then, I found Debian, and my saviour - apt-get.

    Simply put, apt-get makes things absurdly easy. I don't have to worry about upgrading to glibc2.1 - apt does the worrying, the downloading, and the installing for me. With Debian I've finally set up the production box I knew Linux could be.

    While Slackware will always hold a special place in my heart, for "where I started," Debian is where I am, and where I'm going in the future. Even though something still tells me it's a bit too easy, I just ignore that part of me. It's just too easy to tell my box to upgrade everything on my system to ignore it.

  • Posted by ICouldntGetTheAccountIWanted:

    To right!

    I love slackware, was the first distribution, and in my opinion, nothing beats it. Ive used it as a base install, and built scripts upon patricks scripts. Making it what I want it to be.

    redhat seemed bloated, and I couldnt get the hang of debian to much stuff, and couldnt find anything!
  • Posted by ICouldntGetTheAccountIWanted:

    Ooops. I meant the first distro _I_ used :)
  • Posted by bilbo.balings:

    I once followed a thread on CIS Forums comparing VB and Delphi. Wich turned out IMHO to comparrissing dick lengths.
    You'r two cents sound like a part of that thread.

    -- Friends use whatever you like, and be happy
  • >i want to spend more time coding new things than trying to figure out why the outdated old things are broken.

    Here,Here. I have to laugh when reading some of the comments from the rabid Slackware users. Slackware was never as good as these guys claim it was. Actually the expression "pain-in-the-ass" describes Slackware a hell of a lot better. Like a lot of Redhat users who jumped ship, Slackware was the 1st linux dist I used, and was overjoyed when RedHat appeared on the scene. I ditched Slackware and have never looked back.
  • Linux has had Joliet-support for quite a while now, so the long file names will not be ignored.

    --
  • Check out www.slackware.com [slackware.com] for more information on Slackware 3.9/4.0.

    --
  • Sorry, but if your distro is using a glibc2 prior to that, it's based on a pre-release developmental C library.

    That may be the impression presented by the glibc 2.0.x documentation, however, glibc developers recommended that distributions use glibc 2.0.x, and 2.0.x was on ftp.gnu.org (pre-releases are not allowed there).

    -- Joel, Debian package maintainer for glibc

  • I for one am very pleased to see this distribution (that I run) continue to thrive. Way to go Patrick. :-)
  • Because there hasn't been time to build and thoroughly test a distro based on glibc2.1. Sorry, but if your distro is using a glibc2 prior to that, it's based on a pre-release developmental C library. Which smacks of stupidity, IMHO.
  • We're calling them "software sets" now.. only a couple are still truly "disk sets." :)
  • Err... Actually, MCC was the first distro. FWIW, the big advantage of SLS when it came out was that it had X-Windows! Forget "advance enterprise support" -- we were just wired that we would get to play xtank at home.
  • Would you mind informing all of us how Slackware has not kept up?
  • Did you bother reading the release notes or anything? KDE 1.1 is included in the normal install, and Gnome is in the contribs.
  • Why did this particular comment get moderated up? It's incorrect and rather pointless...

    And you didn't exactly bother to look before saying Slack doesn't have KDE or Gnome, did you?

    /me looks at his Slackware 4.0beta1 box running KDE 1.1, which was installed by default.
  • Of course you can. This is Slackware, after all.
  • Well, A and N fit on a disk set. It comes in
    *very* handy for special occasions that you're
    dying to install and a ether is not around.

    Believe me, I have met the situation ;)
  • I don't intend to flame here, but to say that
    RedHat is all a bed of roses is bit out of reality.
    I found Redhat to have twiddling the code a bit
    *too* much. Look at BugTraq and you'll find quite
    some *specific* RH exploits.
  • It's getting a bit of a boring story but here it is again:

    Slackware has runtime support for glibc2

    And if you want glibc2 building libs go to the contrib dir and install glibc2-devel.
    I have a slack box ported to glibc2 ( A 386, Whooey, building egcs and glibc2 took *days* ;-) and it runs quite fine.
  • "and linuxconf meant that, generally speaking, I didn't have to worry about much."

    ..except for possible exploits

    http://geek-girl.com/bugtraq/1999_2/0317.html

  • It seems that the following distro is going to be
    glibc2 based. What I've heard is that Patrick is
    halveway a box with glibc2.1.1.alpha.what.have.you
  • The four point for upgrading slack to glibc2

    1. Remove your libc.tgz package with pkgtool

    2. Install the glibc2-devel.tgz package from the contrib dir

    3. Rebuild egcs and binutils

    4. Rebuild libgdbm and sendmail,ypstuff and perl

    Enjoy your fresh and shiny libc6 box!
  • ftp://rasputin.linuxos.net/pub/slackware-packs/gno me

    Read the readme's as gnome is a cmplicated package with lot of libs.
  • In other words: You have an imac

  • Re:Still the best (Score:3)

    by jjoyce ( 4103 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @03:35PM (#1883019)
    A few points:
    1. There is more control involved when compiling. For example, I like to use certain compile flags. People who use pgcc would probably agree.
    2. There's no need to look at any source code in order to compile to one's liking.
    3. I've compiled pretty much everything on my system and it was far from a struggle. Rather pleasurable, in fact.

    But you're entitled to your opinion.

  • Err, I guess the fact that slackware has Gimp and Netscape and KDE and Apache and QT and glibc run time support means that slackware "has not kept up".

  • Erm, that really isn't the usual situation, you realize. I upgraded to glibc2 almost the instant it came out (I'm funny that way), making it the default C library. It was a bit of work to do it by hand (mainly because of incompatibilities in the crt*.o objects) but it worked out fine. There aren't very many source-level incompatibilities, either, I remember sys_errlist being the most annoying. To fix stuff that relied on that, I wrote a "retrocc" script that passed gcc all the necessary flags to use libc5, which I'd relegated to /usr/linux-libc5 (or something alike).

    So, er, ahem, I'm not saying you're dumb, but most people haven't had the problems you're describing...

    Steve 'Nephtes' Freeland | Okay, so maybe I'm a tiny itty

  • Am I the only one who got a good laugh out of slackware doing exactly the opposite to other dists, by making libc5 primary and glibc2 for 'compatbility', rather than the other way around like everyone else?
    Typically slackware :) (we love you, don't ever change :)
  • I origionally started with slackware 3 years ago, tried redhat, tried debian, tried susi, tried stampede...

    still using slackware today! :)

    Part of the reason why i enjoy it is that it doesn't have all the 'automation' like rpms and deb files, i like having to go ./configure ; make ; make install ... it just give you much more control with exactly as to what is installed on your system.
  • This is very cool, though it has been a long time since I have seen anyone use this distribution....
  • Well, aren't you the l33test s00pa badazz0r to ever use a computer. I ph33r your h4rd core l1nux 31337n3zz.

    Kill d n00beez and rapes their wimen.
  • Above all else, Patrick's main goal for slackware is to create a stable distribution. GlibC 2.0 isn't quite stable enough for him to feel good about making a distribution based on it. Yeah, sometimes it might mean that the software isn't the latest version, but I can be reasonably certain that the versions included with the distribution are solid. I know my system will run, without problems.

    I've been using slackware for 4 years now, and I don't really see any reason to change. I'm comfortable with it. I've done a couple Redhat installations for friends, and witnessed dozens of others, and I wasn't too impressed (never had an installation crash under slack...). Quite honestly, I find slackware's setup less confusing and easier to understand than Redhat's. I plan to try Debian sometime in the next 6 months when I have the time and HD space, but I will always, always have a slackware box.

  • Did you even read Slackware's Page [slackware.com]? It comes with KDE.

    -- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?

  • Are you kidding? I swear by 3.6......

    -- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?

  • Can you keep it from installing this crap and
    install Gnome instead?

    I left slackware a while ago because of glibc2
    but with them starting to support it I may
    have to go back again. On the other hand this
    forcing of KDE would be to hard to swallow.
  • I always found gnome unstable, until RedHat 6.0

    Now it is quite stable and I have flushed KDE
    for good with no regret.

    As for looking like winblows, it is not quite as
    bad as KDE in that regard.
  • I learned on Slackware. I still think it has one of the easier install interfaces, especially against things like dselect. I don't think I would have learned as much about compiling my own stuff if I had started on another distribution. It had and still has problems, but what distro doesn't? Here's to the distribution that also has the coolest name ever.
  • Do you think that typing ./configure; make; make install somehow gives you "more control" over what is installed than typing rpm -i foo.rpm?

    Well compiling with all the default options doesn't give you any more control, but there are a lot of packages that offer several compile-time options. For example, what do you think the vim-X11, vim-minimal, vim-color, and vim-enhanced RPMs are ? that's right, they use the same source tree, but use different compile time options. Another example: suppose you have motif , and do not want the statically linked version of (insert your favourite motif app). The answer: if there's no dynamically linked binary, just recompile. Oh, and not all rpms are relocatable ( so rpm -i doesn't let you choose where you want the package installed )

    Compiling does, in some cases, give you much more control than just installing a binary.

  • I've been constantly annoyed at finding software I want and then seeing it only comes in .RPMs.

    I am not sure what you are talking about. Most ( almost all) linux software is open source, and the author almost always makes a source tarball available.

    After obtaining it, with some difficulty (after all, it comes preloaded, so there's not as much demand), I tried to install it, and found I needed glibc2.

    glibc2 is currently used by all of the distributions except for slackware. The problem is that slackware is not binary-compatible with the other distributions. Since no-one makes binaries for slackware, this means you usually have to compile it yourself.

    You are off base blaming redhat for your problems, just as I would be off base blaming redhat because I can't install the binaries from kde.org on Solaris.

    RPM does make life easier for people who havew an RPM based distro. Of course, it doesn't make life easier for win95 users ( duh! ) or anyone else. It certainly doesn't cause win95 users any problems though.

    Most of your problems are a result of the fact that noone makes binaries for slackware because not so many people use it. If you can't handle the idea of compiling something from the source, then you need an easier distribution. OTOH, If you don't mind compiling, then slackware might be suitable for you.

  • Don't get me wrong, I love Slack... it's what I installed way back when I started with Linux, and it hasn't once left my system. However, I'm a little worried about it keeping up with Redhat and Debian and the others. Without most of the newer trinkets like GlibC and Gnome/KDE, I think it's really losing out. I hope Patrick reconsiders and adds these things in soon... I've always liked Slack's way of doing things (install, config, etc) and I'd hate to see it die on us
  • Sorry, this is the correct url for the slackware / gnome howto.

    http://www.ncal.verio.c om/~hakker/slackware-gnome-HOWTO.txt [verio.com]

  • Slackware runs everything (Score:4)

    by hakker ( 11892 ) on Sunday May 23, 1999 @01:06AM (#1883038) Homepage
    For those that keep complaining about Slackware not being a modern system, wise up. It is a base point for a completely customized distro and as fast as linux can possibly be on an intel machine. If your willing to put in the time (if you know what your doing, its not a lot of time), you can make Slack do whatever you want. Glibc2, sure fine. Changed directories, filesystems, etc. Sure fine. Compatibilty with RPM, DEB, tar balls, SLP etc. Sure, no problem. Run any program, compiled to your liking for optimum speed or install some stupid binaries. Ok. Run anything Xwise, including GNOME ( see link [verio.com]) and everyhing else. No problem. Have it be a bleeding edge work station or a server/switch that you throw in the closet or install from floppies. That is the whole point of slack. Start behind, do what you want to get current the way you like it. They didn't leave out glibc2 because they are lazy. There is so much complaining, you can probably expect to see it in next distro, but it is not in Slackware's style. This is also one possible reason why you don't see to many updates of the distro. I hope this one makes some of you happy. Slack kicks ass. /rant
  • Well, about a month ago everyone on slashdot was ranting about how 2.1 has become a bloated buggy piece of crap compared to glibc 2.0.. is this still true? It seems most distributions are moving to 2.1 anyway.
  • Has anyone had problems with slackware freezing up during kernel compiles on old cyrix machines. Particularly with cyrix 5x86/100 ? I'm running debian 2.1 on this machine now with no problems. Could this be an incompatibility with egcs vs gcc?
  • ftp7.de.freebsd.org

  • it's good news that Slackware keeps on going (Score:4)

    by jetson123 ( 13128 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @11:18PM (#1883042)
    I think it's great that Slackware keeps on going. Their install disks are very useful with any Linux distribution. And their low-level approach to installation works when others fail.

    I have been using RedHat for a few releases, but with RedHat 6.0 I have had real problems. The PCMCIA install seems to have serious bugs, and for them to use glibc 2.1 seems to have been premature (it breaks Java and Netscape, among other things).

    I'll probably install Slackware again on my other laptop; the combination of 2.2 kernel and pre-2.1 glibc could be quite good, and their install procedure has a better chance of working.

    I hope that the market is big enough that three or four distributions with such different characteristics will be able to co-exist. It would be sad indeed if Linux only came as RedHat or Caldera. More hands-on distributions like Slackware and Debian are needed.

  • It is very tempting to set up a Slackware 4 box, especially since I see that it's also available with the superb 2.0.37pre kernel (I'm running 2.0.37 on my production box now as I've had some minor troubles with 2.2). Having glibc already in there would be a real plus; back when I ran Slackware because it was better than Red Hat ;p and Debian was a non-entity, I disliked having to build or copy boatloads of libraries to a new machine. Granted, the Slackware I was running in December before I switched to Debian didn't look like Slackware at all (I was 100% glibc based, rearranged the filesystem to my liking, etc.), but that's what Slackware is all about.

    Again, it's tempting. But Slackware doesn't have the ability to install no non-freed packages {grin}.

    Cheers,
    Joshua.

  • Slackware not *the* first distribution. (Score:3)

    by jerodd ( 13818 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @03:52PM (#1883044) Homepage
    SLS was the first distribution. SLS was much more fun than whipping out your cross-compiler and building Linux, gcc in a.out format, C library, base tools, etc. on a DOS or OS/2 system (I believe Minix also did the job, but I didn't have Minix back then). However, when Slackware came it, it's packaging system was so superior to SLS's (I don't remember much about SLS, but I do remember that Slackware's packaging system seemed so much nicer!) that all of us made the switch. In the same way, Red Hat gained market share through better package management, and Debian is now the best distribution due to its supreme package management (now, if I could just get Debian with Slackware's nice S-Lang package selecter!).

    Cheers,
    Joshua.

  • "Nothing forces me to do RPMs." Ok try going to http://glide.xxedgexx.com/3DfxRPMS_vb_glibc.html and installing the rpms for glide and stuff. rpm2tgz fails miserably with these packages and there is no tarball. What gets me is people releasing only rpms, i refuse to use rpm based system as i have hosed my machine (redhat5 at the time) 3 times with rpm before going to slackware. PLEASE stop releasing only rpms
  • can you post the syntax that works ?
    thanks !
  • Agreed! I run just a handful of servers, and they are all libc5 based. glibc 2.x is there for an binary compatablilies.
    I love Slackware since it is more about stability than doing the latest trend in Linux. I have used it on all of my productin machines, even getting rid of Redhat if needed.
  • Hey, it is for compatibility. Just compatibility with super-new-fancy-ultra-fuzzy stuff. I love slackware, ask anybody who's worked with me. But RH does (well, did, i'm not real impressed with the newest version) have its uses. Mainly for installing on clients machines when they want linux, but don't actually know how to administrate it themselves. I'd much rather give them RH, and only show them the smiley-UI config stuff than give them slackware, and the easy opportunity to shoot themselves, and me, in the foot.
  • You know there is nothing stopping anyone using Slackware from using package management either. You can always dowload RPM's tarball and install it.
    ----
    "War doesn't determine who's right, just who's left"
  • I have switched from Slackware 3.6 to SuSE 6.0 for that ONLY reason... the upgrading from libc5 to glibc2. I needed to demonstrate to the company that there was an incentive to keep linux around and that was Oracle.

    I spent four months on the GLIBC2 problem (on and off) and finally gave up. My laptop is still slackware, and will remain so. But my workstation at home is SuSE 6.0. For the very same reason, i had to run apps like Oracle on it to work on on db design for work.

    I am afraid that that by the time Slackware comes up to glibc2 i wont be using it anymore.

    ciao, elmo
  • I don't know about you... but installing linux has been a great learning experience... from my failed Debian attempt... to my succesfull RH 5.2 install... to the tweaking and optimizing that I've done with RH 6.0....

    Hell, I bet that Red Hat isn't fully optimized for my system... so I can go two ways... slowly go through all the RPM packages... removing them and recompiling them with egcs or maybe making a few hacks here and there... OR I could forget about RPM's and maybe install slackware...

    I respect the DIY (do it yourself) attitude...

    I made my own sterio system... put together the hardware on every machine I've had since the 386 and even mucked with the win95 ini files (to remove IE4) before I discovered linux...


    IF ALL THIS WAS EASY I WOULD KNOW NOTHING!!!
  • another consideration... the Joliet fs doesn't mesh well with linux AFAIK...
  • No distributions, then I wouldn't get a shiny new box or manual. I have to make do with the old ones. What about shiny new CDs, with cool new graphics.

    Buying distros is a manner of supporting Linux (indirectly) it is also an easier way to make large scale changes. Or small scale changes that you have a problem figuring out.

    My RH 5.2 system represents almost 4 months of screwing around, so I concur.
  • *And* better cross-platform compatibility, let's not forget, shall we ? libc5 was much too linux-i386 specific to get ported to Alpha.

    the day I bought my Alpha was the day I switched Slackware for RedHat.
  • With precompiled packages you have no control over the way it's compiled. That's the case for both .tgz's and .rpm's.
    And if the only control you need is compile flags, you can use the .srpm's just as well, and AFAIK you can specify default optimization flags rpm uses. (Can't tell for sure -- still mostly build from tar-balls.) Gives you the optimization you need, and the ease of use of rpm --rebuild.
    And packages built this way are easily upgraded, deleted, ...
  • I am fairly new to Linux (about 18 months)and have to admit I still do not understand pro's/con's of glibc and libc.. I don't really understand what the difference is, except that most of the disto's seem to lean towards glibc. Anyone willing to post a somewhat objective comparison (I am not a progamer,obviously) thnks
  • and dam proud of it :)

    Over the past 3 years I've supported/admin;
    HP-Unix, ATT SysV *really*, and currently
    SunOS/Solaris. What my point simple ...

    If all you want to do is get Linux up and running
    then it doesn' make any difference which disro you use... on the other hand if you want to learn UNUX
    then Slackware is you best choice. More of what you learn will transferr over the UN*. The why Patrick uses the rc scripts and ~/.* scripts in home director mirrors what I see and work with everyday.

    Parting shot - Linux Standard Base ... Let the market determine the standard. If RedHat controls 90% of Linux market, then Redhat will become the standard.


  • Are the *BSD's compatible? Can I use some OpenBSD-package on FreeBSD?
  • There are some Die Hard slakware fans out there, I don't think we will see it go away for quite sometime yet. I still continue to use, and most likley will for quite sometime to come.

    Kthulhu
  • I'm saving your email address and /. user name just for such an ocasion. Heheh. Id like to that.

    --

  • Ha, ha, you know what the funny part is? You can do exactly the same thing with Slackware. Get the sources from ftp.cdrom.com (which, BTW, isn't some obscure and remote site), then rebuild everything with a single command. You can go have lunch meanwhile. You don't have to take my word, just check this:
    ftp://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/linux/slackware/source/S lackBuild

  • Re:Cool (Score:3)

    by rav ( 29237 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @03:47PM (#1883063)
    I'd really love to know why you think why ease of use is bad for Linux. IMO, ease of use = more users = more software = good. Oh wait you don't like lam0rz. Elite.
  • Because it is not out yet?

    But the number of prereleases (17 or more) should produce a very good kernel.

  • Re:Cool - Glibc vs libc (Score:3)

    by vgesgis ( 29354 ) on Saturday May 22, 1999 @04:35PM (#1883065)
    Well, basically the current situation is like
    • libc5 - older, proven to be robust in very "traditional" areas, lacks modern features. It is maintained only for bug fixes.
    • glibc 2.0 - has many new features such as NSS and completely thread-safety, the latest release is 2.0.7pre6. That is the release you want on your server
    • glibc 2.1 - the latest and greatest; glibc 2.1.0 contains some "issues" which make it unuseable on production machines. The next release (we are already at 2.1.1pre3) will fix most obvious bugs, but I wouldn't swear on this one within the next weeks (maybe months).
    In my administrator job I don't count on bleeding edge software - it bites too often. IMHO the ideal Linux server will run currently 2.0.36 (2.2.x will mature) together with glibc 2.0.7pre6 as primary C library.

    Have a good night.
  • I installed RedHat on my desktop machine at work, basically to make
    printing to our (non-PS) network printers easier...

    One of the tools I used on a regular basis (on Slackware) was
    Tkined/Scotty... I see there is a Scotty RPM, so I try to install
    it...

    All I get (after a few moments of HD activity) is the error message
    "This package can not be installed." - THat's it - no reason WHY it
    can't be installed... I do a dependency check - everything is OK
    there... what the fsck is wrong with this thing???? I go out and buy
    Maximum RPM.... nothing in there about error messages either...

    Not since using Windoze 3.0 have I encountered such a brain-dead error
    message... if a program has trouble doing something IT SHOULD SAY WHY!

    for fscks sake, when making error messages MAKE THEM MEANINGFUL...

    I would have to say that RPM is just a pain in the ass..
  • There are no Slackware ISOs. However, it's only trivial to generate them. Download what you want from the ftp site (I recommend bootdsks.144, contrib, docs, install, kernels, modules, rootdsks. and slakware, though you can leave out docs, kernels, and modules safely) and add in anything else you may want to throw on the CD, WordPerfect, StarOffice, etc...

    You can use mkisofs to generate the iso which you can burn on any machine (I ftp it to my brother's win machine which has a burner on it and use Adaptec software). Here's the command I used to generate an ISO which is bootable:

    mkisofs -a -b bootdsks.144/.eltorito/eltorito.img -l -r -v -c bootdsks.144/.eltorito/boot.catalog -o slak40.iso -V "Slackware 4.0" slackware-4.0

    This command generates a bootable ISO called slak40.iso from the contents of the slackware-4.0 directory.

    That's it, burn it and boot it!

  • Re:gnome / kde (Score:4)

    by jfunk ( 33224 ) <jfunk@roadrunner.nf.net> on Saturday May 22, 1999 @07:10PM (#1883073) Homepage
    Why is everybody claiming that Slackware doesn't have this/that?

    It has Glibc2. It has KDE by default, but I just installpkg Window Maker. Gnome is also there along with AfterStep, FVWM, OpenLook, etc..

    I tried Gnome and couldn't stand it at all. It was too much like windows (I installed SuSE to try out Gnome, in order to try out the new MC. I was incredibly disappointed. But I like SuSE anyway, it will update packages like Debian, and is fairly easy to use install/use) and was horribly unstable. I'm not a KDE fan either but it's half stable and fairly straightforward to the new user.

    Patrick has had to defend his insistence on basing the distribution on libc5 (remember, glibc2 is also there) for a long time. I wondered, he explained, I now agree. Slackware is meant to be *stable*. It always was, it was the whole philosophy from the beginning. Glibc2 still has a lot of trouble but is pretty much out of it now (with the notable exception of 2.1, ouch). The next release will definitely be glibc2 based though.

    I actually enjoy installing a distribution and having all of the software I installed actually work reliably, a feature which the other distributions, especially Debian, severely lacks.

    And besides, compiling software isn't *nearly* as scary as it once was.

    ./configure;make;make install

    If a required lib wasn't there, get it and install that, too.

    Now how hard is that? It could get even easier, if the process was wizardised like those nice win32 installers. Generally, if you can compile a kernel, you shouldn't have trouble compiling other software, if it uses autoconf. You don't even have to edit makefiles anymore.

  • Slackware is what I started out with when I first tried Linux. A friend told me what packages I should get and I downloaded them all at school, put them on floppies and installed at home. Since then I've tried both RedHat and Debian but I still prefer Slackware! These days I'm actually running FreeBSD but I have Debian 2.1 on a partition here. (despite the fact that it didn't even configure LILO right, like slack does.)

    I prefer installing everything manually, although that makes for a messy system after a while. (That's why I like FreeBSD, you have full control over the sources from the ports collection, and yet you have a nice uninstall function.)

    I don't use Debian though, because I really can't stand dselect. Now that slack 4.0 is out it seems like the perfect time to wipe that partition and start over. :-)

    It's really good seeing that the distro is still going strong and I'm looking forward till my CD's arrive. :-) Happy days are here again...

    Way to go Patrick, keep slack going!
  • >It has been a long time since I have seen anyone use this distribution

    I think this means you haven't gone over to a friends house and watched them use Slackware.

    I don't think you'd be so ignorant as to mean that people haven't used Slackware in "a long time". Come on, Linux is less then 10 years old. What the heck does "a long time" mean? And what makes you so special as to think that anyone might care if you have "seen" anybody use it. It's been a long times since I've seen anyone use any product by Microsoft. Should I therefore conclude that Microsoft has gone out of business? Or should we conclude that I need to get a job at a Windows shop? Or that I need more friends? and on and on and on

    Regards,

    Tim Moran
  • Running a Slackware 96 system for quite a while,
    I've been constantly annoyed at finding software I want and then seeing it only comes in .RPMs. So one day I decided, ok, I'll just install RPM. So I started about doing this. After obtaining it, with some difficulty (after all, it comes preloaded, so there's not as much demand), I tried to install it, and found I needed glibc2. So, ok, fine, I'll upgrade to that. Found a FAQ, read it, got the binaries, started upgrading all my various utilities to the right level. Unfortunately, some of these utils could only be found as .RPMs! At this point I said to hell with it, and gave up. Granted, I'm sure that with enough perseverance I could have gotten things working. If it had worked smoothly, I wouldn't have learned anything anyway. But, for everyone who says that RPMs make everything so much easier than plain old tarballs, I can only reply, "for RedHat users.. and even then maybe not." When I was actually using a RedHat 5.2 system, even though I told it to install EVERYTHING, it seemed to not have c++. So I said, fine, I'll just re-install it via rpm. Only rpm already thought it was installed. So I had to force it to install with some strange flags (I don't recall, someone more familiar with redhat helped me out).

    Of course, I'm sure that all my problems could have been resolved with enough time and perseverance. And I don't mind spending that amount of time on something I really want -- it's a learning experience anyway. But all I've found is that RPMs definitely do NOT, overall, make my linux life any easier, and in many cases tend to shut out non-RedHat people...

  • Nice to see Slackware surviving. I'm a little
    leery of automation, like to know what's going on
    behind the screen. Patrick's distros are ideal for
    me so have kept on using it in the face of the
    "improvements".
    I'll be buying it. Voting with your money is the only sure way to keep your favorite distros going, whatever they be. Downloading is nice but they need to make a living too.
    I'm still on 3.2.

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