Re: other distros
On Sat, Apr 12, 2003 at 09:46:32AM +0530, Sharninder wrote:
>
> >
> > -an rpm-based distro (Mandrake?)
> > - do-it-youself source-based distro (linux-from-scratch?)
> > -and lately I've been hearing lots about how great gentoo is,
> > apparently because of its 'portage' system.
> >
>
> gentoo is considered to be good basically because u practically
> compile the distro on your pc and so it's optimized for the pc that
> it's running on. u download a base distro and then download all the
> packages that u require and compile and configure them on your
> machine.
One problem with "compiled distro's", is the size of the downloads... source
code is much bigger than binaries, even when compressed (check the
kernel-source packages vs the kernel-image packages).
The BSD ports concept is kinda neat in that updates are done using CVS based
"deltas", so only the source changes are downloaded. In theory this should
mean less downloads for updates (a one line source change can change a whole
binary).
Having to compile every package you install means you _must_ have all the
development tools required for building the package installed, not just the
support libs/tools needed for running it.
So you end up with a system with all the development tools and all the
source code for everything installed. You need to keep all the source
installed even after it's been compiled and installed to take advantage of
the "delta only" updates.
All this is good if you want all that installed... but a PITA if you just
want to use your system for real work/fun, unless your work/fun _is_ Linux
development :-)
--
----------------------------------------------------------------
Donovan Baarda http://minkirri.apana.org.au/~abo/
----------------------------------------------------------------
Reply to: