As a learning exercise

[eraker]

I installed Gentoo last weekend for the first time. In the process, I finally learned how to configure Grub manually and a few other things I didn't realize. I screwed it up a couple of times, but the screw-up resided in the fact that the driver I compiled for the graphics card actually doesn't work with this laptop, and I had to use google to discover that. Other than that, it seems pretty speedy (even if it's the first linux install I've done on this old Dell), but compiling stuff takes a damn long time.

Overall, it was worth it as a learning experience, but I'm not sure if I have the patience for compiling everything. I'll give it a month or so and see if I like it.

One big plus from my perspective: being forced to configure a compile a custom kernel outright.

So, yeah, I guess this is the stuff that always comes up when people argue about gentoo. Nothing new here.

[bidi]

I never understood why someone would choose Gentoo over something like Linux From Scratch. I really don't see any advantage, and in the end you learn a whole lot more from LFS than you would with Gentoo. I'm speaking from partial experience, I've tried installing Gentoo in the past but could never get past the initial configuration.

Please, don't anyone get me wrong, I'm not putting Gentoo down, specially since this is just my opinion. I just don't see any advantage in compiling from source if you're not going to learn anything more useful than a new package manangement system (and you can use PM with LFS).

[techieMoe]

Please, don't anyone get me wrong, I'm not putting Gentoo down, specially since this is just my opinion. I just don't see any advantage in compiling from source if you're not going to learn anything more useful than a new package manangement system (and you can use PM with LFS).

Well, for some people the Portage system is worth using Gentoo. It is after all unique to that distribution. You can't use portage on Linux From Scratch, can you?

[bidi]

You can't use portage on Linux From Scratch, can you?

I believe you can! If I remember correctly from the Gentoo Handbook portage just reads an ebuild file and compiles based on that and some enviornment variables. If that is correct, all you would need are these ebuild files and wa-la! Under the Hints section in the LFS website, they kind of teach you how to build LFS using RPM, but it applies to other package managers as well. There's also another project called DIY-Linux that aims at doing LFS with less restrictions (ie: it uses package management, build scripts, etc), it's a little more advanced as it doesn't hold you hand as much as the LFS book, but it's still very informative.

[eraker]

Well, I still consider myself a beginner (no matter what that thing under my handle says), so gentoo was probably good enough for me as a learning exercise. I should admit too that at certain points (like when staring at grub.conf), I was heavily reliant upon the gentoo handbook.

Portage is pretty cool, in my opinion, but I'm probably too impatient for it.

[smolloy]

I have installed both gentoo and LFS on my old laptop, and I found that I learnt a lot from both installations, but that, in the end, Gentoo was a much more usable system. LFS always felt like a DIY OS, while Gentoo felt more professional. I'm glad I tried both, and I would recommend doing that for anyone who wants to learn more about linux.

That's my opinion for whatever it's worth.

[maggie]

same here