[Lilux-help] FreeBSD, compile from source and Distributions

[Patrick Useldinger]

Mike Pressel wrote:


> The problem with SuSE is that if you want to do something your way 
> instead of SuSE's way, than your nice integrated system starts falling apart.  
> I think SuSE is a system for people who don't care how it works, just that it 
> works.

I'd like to get it running fast, yes, but as I get more skilled with it, 
I'd also like to tweak it. So SuSE is not for me.

> Last month, I installed Gentoo on my work laptop and now I'm hooked.  Portage 
> is a great packaging system and it is well documented.  Contrary to what's 
> been said, there are binary packages available for selected packages in 
> Gentoo.  Try using the --usepkgonly option with emerge.  Large things like 
> KDE and Gnome generally have something available for them.  What I personally 
> like about Gentoo is that it forces me to learn a bit more about how my linux 
> system works.  Like Slackware, it is updated very quickly and there is a huge 
> database of packages available.  My only gripe with Gentoo is that a 
> broadband connection is absolutely necessary, otherwise things break on you.  

I installed Gentoo 2004.0, worked ok. Later, I installed 2004.1 from 
scratch, and I had plenty of problems - my network card was no longer 
recognized, for example. That put me off.

I've just had a look at the packages, and they do look complete. What do 
you usually do: compile from source or use packages?

-pu