“Slackware is one of the oldest (arguably *the* oldest) Linux distributions still around today. It is the pet project of one Patrick Volkerding who, love him or hate him, has ruled his distribution with an iron fist since the beginning. This is fine if you agree with his choices, but like all dictators, Patrick doesn’t always make decisions based on the good of the populace, but rather sheer unmitigated ego. Here is my experience with his latest iteration, Slackware 11.” More here.
Slackware 11: Grandfather Distribution Showing Its Age
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Most Slackware software that I know of, including the kernel, is in essence “vanilla software”. That means that most packages in slack are ./configure-ed, make-ed and make installed-ed; this is simply the process that you have to do when you install most software from source code, ie. that source comes directly from the authors or the project in question. The result of such a process (and the contents of a slackware package for that matter) is a piece of software that actually behaves exactly how the original authors intended. There are no advanced configuration files, no different locations for some data files, or special patches. When you solve problems on such a system, then you seek information advice and documentation more or less from the original authors.
Slackware is indeed intended for people who like to do it the raw way, but more or less also for people who like it “from the default way”, in my perspective. But the article does imply that, because of that, such people are allergic to things that supposedly should life make easier. I find that a pretty absolute and wrong statement, since “making life easier” is actually what all distributions are about. Slackware is about that too, but for people who actually prefer it that raw way since they get more results and less problems because of that. If that’s not your kind of thing, fine, use something else. That’s why there is choice anyway.
The fact is that such Slackware users could write similar articles about, say, Ubuntu or Fedora, stating examples where the automatic install process or hardware detection failed miserably, resulting in much work, frustration and investigation about how such distributions manage that thing differently, supposedly too complex, etc.
But it’s actually all in the eye of the beholder.
And when you realize that, then such complaints are preferences become personal, and these preferences don’t have to apply to others, let alone everyone.
Interesting article, but slackware is, and has always been, a distribution for people who enjoy doing things the raw way. This article mainly just shows that the author doesn’t have the skills, or patience to develop the skills, to install and maintain such a distribution.
Simply put, slackware works as good as your ability to maintain it allows, and that’s, imho, what makes it such a wonderful distribution.
Edited 2006-10-28 08:36
…if you’re not comfortable creating your own partitions with cfdisk from the command line and navigating ncurses text menus, leave now.
I want to know who use cfdisk?
I like to use the old fdisk to do job.
It’s old, it’s ugly, it works, and i love it.
I want to know who use cfdisk?
I like to use the old fdisk to do job.
Slackware offers both. 🙂
The only thing I found interesting about this article were some insights into Slackware itself. I read the tiny article, and thought “tough cookies”.
As a FreeBSD user, I’d say it is no worse than anything I have to do for an initial install. In otherwords, so people like barebones and some don’t – that is why there is Ubunto and Windows.
Simply put, slackware works as good as your ability to maintain it allows, and that’s, imho, what makes it such a wonderful distribution.
How does this ability makes the user’s life any better? It’s just like to make fire using a stick when there is a lighter at hand.
Plain stupid, bah (all right, mod me down as you wish!)
Slackware has always been a distro for people who don’t want a nice flashy GUI to do things for them. It makes no excuses for being harder to use, that’s the way it’s built. It makes my life better as a user because it does what I want it to do. I don’t want something to make assumptions about what I’m trying to do. Slackware never pretends to be a distro for your average joe so why bitch about it not being so?
Oh, and I really hate when people say things like “mod me down as you wish”. It’s a cheap way of getting modded up.
It makes my life better as a user because it does what I want it to do.
So I guess you draw the packages’ dependency tree on paper to figure out what you need to install in order to run an app? And you also have a very old comp that’s not equipped with usb??
My last experience with slackware ended when it failed to detect my hd, no more! At that time it’s the only distro which CANNOT detect sata – what a joke.
Edited 2006-10-28 20:42
I guess you didn’t bother investigating further then. I’ve been using SATA disks for a good long time now and have managed just fine with slackware.
Package management isn’t so much of an issue. If I’m missing something and can’t get the package from places like linuxpackages.net I just compile from source (and sometimes get off my ass and make it into a package so others can benefit). I’ve yet to run into too much dependancy hell so please stop making it a bigger issue than it actually is.
If slackware isn’t the distro for you fine, everybodies looking for something different, just quit complaining about it just because you’re looking for something different. Again, it’s never pretended to be anything “user friendly” or “newbie safe”. Slackware’s slackware and should be used by people who want what it offers.
Automatic transmission. It makes cars easier to drive right? You only need one hand and one foot, and it works pretty well?
It’s also expensive to fix, and it rarely doesn’t break within the lifetime of a modern car (200,000 or more miles).
But that’s not a big expense, it’s worth the cost to drink a cup of coffee while you drive right? Maybe it’s not to some people?
Maybe some people prefer to do things themselves, even if they’re completely automatable. Surely they must be stupid? Or maybe they’re just comfortable with it and picky about it?
I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone recommend Slackware to someone that wasn’t knowledgeable. And if you read about it on any site it’s usually prefixed with: “Good for *nix geeks, not you.” — or something to that effect.
The ability of people to stick their nose into someone elses business (which so many are so happy with) and call it completely stupid will never cease to amaze me. If you don’t like Slackware, great, _IGNORE IT_.
In your analogy, it’s more like making fire using an old zippo even though you have to refill them all the time and change out the wick and maybe the flint. Oh, and they can be dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing (although it’s probably instinctual that throwing fire in a corner is a bad idea). But a lot of people still use them because they have advantages, and they also have a charm value.
Slackware has charm. To many people, I really think, it’s like the old days but with modern software.
Funny how you can use “mod me down as you wish” tactics to get your post modded up, regardless of content:
“How does this ability makes the user’s life any better?”
This is a rather silly question – need I spell out the benefits of knowing linux? I mean this was the grandparent’s original claim: “Simply put, slackware works as good as your ability to maintain it allows…” Well, believe me, if you learn to use slackware, your life as a linux/unix user will become easier.
if you learn to use slackware, your life as a linux/unix user will become easier.
Choose a normal distro and you wouldn’t need to learn anything before you can start using linux – that’s MUCH MORE EASIER.
If you spend more time on learning something than actually using it, either you have a special hobby or that thing is a junk.
Repeat after me.
Easier for you != Easier for me.
Get it?
– Gilboa
This article mainly just shows that the author doesn’t have the skills, or patience to develop the skills, to install and maintain such a distribution.
And you came to this conclusion _how_ exactly? He might have the skills. It was not indicated in his rant in any way. Yes, I consider it a rant.
I know how to use the original fdisk, which someone else mentioned, but I prefer cfdisk much more. I can live in the original “sh”, but prefer bash. vim over vi, gnome over twm, automatic detection and configuration of connected hardware over manually compiling the kernel and selecting just the required drivers.
If a task is mundane, repetetive and can be done by the computer, it should be done by the computer.
You are right, Slackware is not for everyone, but you are wrong saying people miss skills, based on their not-liking Slackware.
I hardly ever post let alone first on a news article, but I have gone through this link and find little of any value.
To quote one line that I found offensive “Wake up, Patrick. Quit being such a stubborn a**hole. More on that later.” What kind of writing/review is this.
I am not a slack user, tried it once but Gentoo because my job uses it. But Patrick has done a wonderful job maintaining and updating slackware for a very long time, based on what I have seen and read over many years.
And there are several distribs based on slack and many lovers of slack that want what Pat delivers. A stable tested and true Linux distribution that isnt obsessed with the newest kernel and fancy toys. If he was to offer anything else he would be loosing what is unique to slack and would become just another vanilla distro out of hundreds.
As for the review itself there was none. The fellow couldn’t even install it in his VM software which wasn’t specified. I am sure that a dozen people can download the ISOs and startup VMware and have slack installed in no time with X and mouse, but it seems beyond this reviewer and with no data/logs posted how is anyone suppose to comment on this issue.
All the reviews so far have been highlighting how old Slackware is, how difficult it is to configure, etc etc…
This review is no different. A few quotes…
…if you’re not comfortable creating your own partitions with cfdisk from the command line and navigating ncurses text menus, leave now.
Don’t expect any automated tasks whatsoever.
Wake up, Patrick. Quit being such a stubborn asshole
Who’s it best for?
Like kernel 2.4? Still play music on LPs? Don’t mind having to do everything manually? Try Slackware. Everyone else should stay away, and I dare say encourage everyone you know to do so as well. Perhaps one day we can de-program the Slackware faithful and this grandfather will get taken off life support for good.
I’m ashamed my favourite distro is being treated like this. It’s making me angry.
Pat makes some wise choices. Slackware is an awesome distro.
This doesn’t even belong on OSNews.
Please, someone, write a half-decent review!!!
Forrest.
Right now, I’m ashamed of osnews editors – there should be some standard (for instance, don’t call an open source contributor an asshole) for accepting submission. And I’m not even a slackware user (freebsd, if it has to be linux, than archlinux).
This article is a shame, not only for the reviewer, but for osnews as well.
Archlinux is the same, you need to manually create regular users, there is no xorg.conf even after X is created so you need to run some command line configuration to get a working xorg.conf and I still love archlinux.
The only reason I haven’t tried slackware is I never needed to.
I know, that’s why I like it. Even though you have to do configuration manually, it is easier to do so than with other distroes. Arch is the closest thing to FreeBSD in the linux world as far as development philosophy goes… even package management resembles FreeBSD’s a lot: free~ has ports and packages, while arch has AUR – which is similar to ports – and pacman. Both systems handle dependencies very well, and there is a seamless integration between binary and source installation systems. Slackware is a second favorite
Although most would think that FreeBSD users favour gentoo (because of portage), in my experience, many FreeBSD users prefer slackware (this is based on the posts I saw on bsdforums).
Edited 2006-10-28 15:34
Well-said. I also like FreeBSD 6.1, and find the installation routines of FreeBSD and Slackware to be easy to use, simple. If you can read the ample, well-written support documentation provided by Slackware then you can install 11.0. I like the fact that Slackware system functions can be controlled by editing text files. A shiny GUI eats up gobs of RAM and is not needed to set-up a system.
Agreed.
I’m guessing the author of the article was frustrated because Slackware is not SuSE or Ubuntu and so he is venting his frustration and attacking Pat to make him/herself feel better.
It is a shame that OSNews is giving the author a platform to spew from.
Please, someone, write a half-decent review!!!
So write it. Tell us all the things the author pointed out do have benefits to the users.
You could begin by enlightening us why the 5-years old kernel 2.4 is still better than 2.6
It was previously meantioned that Slackware 11 does contain kernel 2.6 even if not the default kernel. And when 2.6.19 is out, no one said you can’t compile it and install it yourself. There are plenty of easy guides on how do that on the internet.
Desides, slackware does contain some new packages like kde 3.5
And aquila_deus, aren’t you a archlinux user? Archlinux isn’t exactly the most user friendly distribution and you still manager to use it.
I stopped reading after the second paragraph.
Obviously the writer wants to use ubuntu, SUSE, Fedora etc, So I can’t understand why they would even bother with slackware.
“Don’t expect any automated tasks whatsoever.”
I use gentoo, and one of the things I love about it is that there is a lack of generic automated processes that don’t suit my needs. I guess slackware is the same.
this review was the worse that i’ve seen.
the author is just a new guy entering in the _linux_world, in love with all newbie, fancy features.
can’t believe this review hits osnews.
Eugenia, can you try to put some good stuff?
Not really. The guy is NOT a newbie. Everyone has an opinion, and even if I don’t agree with him, I still believe that his voice must be heard, because it exists and there are others who think like him. If you have a problem with his ideas about Slackware, write a review too and submit it to us, we will publish it.
Edited 2006-10-28 09:03
Isn’t “everyone has an opinion” just a rather weak excuse for the lack of quality of the linked article?
The article is simply an uniformed, poorly written diatribe by some poor victim of the internet age who happens to have a blog.
It’s neither interesting, nor thought provoking, nor well informed, it’s simply dumb and to top it off, insulting.
Really, why post something like this on osnews?
Everyone may have an opinion, but this person had an axe to grind.
I am one of the people who believe that this article should not have been linked.
If he wanted to write a negative review on Slackware, then go ahead. But be civil about it. Say that you think that text based installers are passe. Say that the 2.4 kernel is old and lacks many features. Say that the lack of dependency checking makes installation harder. But do NOT insult the person who makes it or the people who use it. Not only is that hitting below the belt, but it is trolling — something which the staff at OSNews was working to reduce among its users a few months back!
If I rant about a linux distro on my blog, would you link to it? Or does it have to be of a certain quality… Does osnews have standards for accepting submissions? Because the review is worse than most +3 comments on slashdot. Yeah, why not link to slashdot or forum posts? At least on ./, a +4 or +5 comment already passed the “there are others who think like him” test of yours.
Frankly, I am not interested in reading everyone’s opinion on Slackware. There’s a difference between an objective and respectful review of a distro (even if the reviewer comes to the conclusion that he really does not like the distro) and something like this, which almost seems like a personal attack on Patrick Volkerding. I think that the former has a place on OSNews, but the latter shouldn’t have.
I don’t currently use Slackware, but I have a lot of respect for Patrick Volkerding. He created Slackware and has been maintaining it all these years. He is shaping his distro in the way he thinks is best. That is his right. Even though you can respectfully disagree with the way someone sets priorities or makes choices in his project and even though you can suggest changes, which you think would make the project better, you don’t have the right to call someone “asshole” for making his own choices in his own distro.
I think a lot of open source users should change their mentality. An open source project maintainer is someone who writes code and shares that code so that other people can benefit from it too. An open source project maintainer is not your personal slave programmer who needs to fulfill all your personal wishes regarding the project he is maintaining.
Lately, all I read is “this distro should be changed like that, because I would like it that way, and since I like it that way, everyone will like it that way and the distro could get more marketshare”. What about trying to find the linux distro which fits you, instead of picking a distro and demanding that it is changed so it will fit you?
To give an analogy… if I go to a foreign country, I try to understand the local culture, the local habits, I’ll try the local food… how rude would it be to visit a foreign country and call the people there stubborn assholes because they refuse to give up their culture and refuse to adopt my culture?
As I said, giving an overview of what you like and don’t like and suggest things, which might make a distro better in your opinion, is fine. Calling names and making accusations because a distro happens to have a target audience you don’t belong to, is not.
———–I still believe that his voice must be heard, because it exists————-
There’s never been anything written that states that a person has a right to be heard.(at least, nothing credible that I’ve seen)
We should all have the right to speak, but that’s the whole point of free speech. If you speak idiocy, you get shunned by the masses because you’re an idiot.
Right to speak freely does not = right to be heard by all.
Edited 2006-10-28 13:04
you get shunned by the masses because you’re an idiot.
Actually, you’re more likely to be shunned “by the masses” because you have an opinion that “the masses” don’t share. Who’s more of an idiot, the person who takes the same line as everyone else, or the person who takes the trouble to at least ATTEMPT to form an informed opinion?
Say what you will, the guy is not competent. Am I really to believe that you will publish anything I may have to say because my voice “exists and there are others who think like” me? For example, suppose I were to write a review of OSNews stating that the site has absolutely no editorial standards, that Eugenia will link to absolute trash because she “doesn’t understand the idea” of editorial standards, that Eugenia will defend her retched choices out of “sheer unmitigated ego,” and that one shouldn’t expect any credibility out of OSNews whatever. Would you publish that? Hmmmm?
I just thought I should let you guys know that this reviewer is not an amateur or incompetent or a linux newb. He knows Linux very well and you would know that if you ever stumbled upon LinuxForums.org. There he is a valued member of the Linux and open-source community and his reviews are held in high esteem. Say what you will about the review or his opinions of slackware but saying that his opinions aren’t valid and that he’s not qualified to give his opinion is rubbish. I’m sure he didn’t submit this review to OSnews because he has said repeatedly that his reviews are mostly for his own amusement and those own LF that are interested. The personal insults being slung his way are completely unwarranted.
Edited 2006-11-01 08:03
As one previous poster said, the author like and wants to use Ubuntu. Funny thing is that nobody stops him in doing so.So why bash (as a linux addict – as he says) another (I dare to say fine) distro? Or it’s maintainer.
That’s funny :
There is no democracy in this distribution
Well,there’s no democracy in Linux/Unix. Root rules them all.
Yes, I’m a Slackware user.I assume the guilt.
confessions of a Fruit addict
Written by “Fruit Addict”.
The Apple is one of the oldest Fruit distributions.
If you want to eat the Apple without using your Teeth, stay away from it. Don’t expect any automated Teeth or Knife whatsoever.
While numerous Fruit providers sell ready-to-drink Juice, and while the Tangerine variety of Fruit is very easy to peel and eat, as I said, the Apple comes with no automated Teeth whatsoever. You even have to bring you own Knife for Peeling the Apple, or alternatively, even Wash the Apple if you want to ever eat it. What type of guy is the Dictator that grows this type of Fruit? Isn’t he just an As***le?
As a true Fruit Addict, I tried to Eat this Apple, but my knife was so blunt I couldn’t even peel it. And I couldn’t wash it because I have no Water. I tried to eat it Anyway but my fake Teeth fell out.
I can’t really comment on any Taste included with the Apple because I could not get a usable Eat.
Frankly, I’m just a phony Crybaby who only wants pre-sliced canned no-can-opener-needed slices of PineApple.
LMAO OMFG j00 0wN!
I dont think that this review is for serius people.
I would not say that you cant run slackware as a desktop, as i think this reviewer set out to do, but if you what a desktop, then you would be way better off chosing a desktop targetet distro.
Slackware is a great distro, if you have the skills (or dont mind spending lot of time reading, me situation) to set it up. I do however think slack shines brightest when it is used for a server, but i dont think iam offending anyone saying that.
(woo, it’s a long one, sorry folks, it’s late, I tend to ramble when I’m tired.)
I’ve been using it as a desktop install on several system for years and never once had any problems. There really isn’t nearly the “configuration” that everyone talks about… it’s pretty simple, there’s about 6 files you actually have to edit to get a working secure desktop system (that’s including services being turned off, disabling open ports, firewall, etc.) and the files themselves tend to have all the information in them you really need to know (and if not, just man the file name and you’ll get it in about 20 seconds or check the example files).
The thing I think people really fail to realize when they look at this system is that it’s not really a “linux” distribution so much as it’s a BSD system that happens to use the linux kernel. People always get used to the idea of having constantly updating packages, the newest greatest kernel and compiler suite, and a constant automated updating program… but never bother to think about why those things are not present.
Slackware has always been a full operating system, not a bunch of crap thrown around a kernel (cough, cough, Fedora Core, cough). Patrick takes a list of packages, sets them together, and makes sure they work together without any odd problems. He turns a group of disparate programs into a tightly knit operating system that is more or less on par with what you get from the BSD camps in terms of reliability, speed, and internal compatibility.
Yeah, I understand the urge to always have the newest and greatest things that are out there. Hell, I buildworld my FreeBSD Sparc64 system every couple of weeks from the cvs sources, followed by an impulsive portupgrade -nra, but really, it never changes anything. You don’t need the newest version of gzip, it won’t make things run any differently for you, it will just introduce new variables into the battle for system stability, making too many things for you to pin down.
As to the rest… partitioning? Oh come on, how hard is it to press the keys the partitioning software tells you to? “Press m for help:”… “uuuuggggggghhh, brain… exploding… too many options!… nnngggg”… what’s so hard about that? I mean, they even moved up to cfdisk, it doesn’t get any easier than that… MS-DOS had a harder to understand fdisk program than cfdisk is… I’ve never in my life seen an “automated partitioner” that didn’t give me a completely retarded partition table (read: all one big partition)… yeah, I know it’s “intimidating”, but don’t be chasing people away over it, it’s a graphical program without any pretty colors… besides, nobody ever learns a damn thing about this stuff if they keep hiding behind their wizards… I’m afraid to think what admins will be like once everything has a wizard available.
As far as I’m concerned, cfdisk is making things too easy for the end user. If you can’t figure out how to read the screen in front of you when it gives you the information you need (press m for options, p to print, n for new, whatever it was, I don’t even know them because they are so easy to access and it tells you exactly what to do) then you are better off turning the PC off… I’m not suggesting everyone needs to be a sysadmin, but come on people, it’s printed right there, just do what it tells you to do…
The kernel? I don’t know about now, but the last time I looked into the 2.6 kernel it looked as if a drunken monkey had written most of the new features… and talk about unneeded bloat… again, this is a minimalist power user system, if you don’t need the extra features (what server needs USB? don’t answer that…) then it’s better that they aren’t there… and USB works on all my systems with 2.4, mind you they date back several years (version 8 release, anybody? when was that?)… and I recall being able to install 2.6 kernels without any issue at all back in 9.1… was it on the CD? I don’t really know… but it didn’t kill me to download and compile the sources myself. Believe it or not you will learn something in doing it, and a little added knowledge won’t kill any of you, I promise (note: I am probably a compulsive liar, don’t believe me, everything I say is a lie, especially that last part)… lazy stupid hobos whining about how someone isn’t doing it for you… “why won’t you do more work so that I don’t have to do any!?”… what the hell is up with that? anyway…
Grub is a P.o.S, it’s just more pretty bloatware, people like it because it’s pretty, ooh, ahh, pictures… no wonder there are so many darwin awards each year…
And… I believe the installer allows account creation unless he removed it? if nothing else, was it not listed in the configuration menu thing? perhaps I am confusing it with the FreeBSD installer, I haven’t actually had to touch the configuration in my Slackware systems in over a year, so I can’t say I’m 100% sure there…
The freezing thing has to do with X itself, it’s done that to me for years on various systems with various hardware… 1/2 the time it’s not working well with a kernel option for my video card, the rest of the time it’s just being a bastard about some option I have enabled… never once had such a problem with a properly configured system, however.
Now, I wouldn’t blame his Virtual machine for his mouse problems, I would blame him choosing the wrong pointing device entirely and not realizing it… considering the the mouse drivers are X standard, I would first guess it to be something like not realizing gpm was running or some other nonsense, which is all easily fixable if you bother to take more than 12 seconds and, you know, loot at what is going on… oh, right, the brain exploding…
Why are people such dicks that they can’t get past that? If you don’t want to “spend time dicking around in text files” then why the f–k do you try to install a power user OS?
I’m waiting on the DVD to finish in bittorrent, then, if nobody else does anything on this I’ll give it a proper once over…
Lazy good for nothings…
Agree completely apart from the GRUB part – you can make it as ugly as you like and it’s about as close to proper firmware (i.e. OpenBoot PROM) as you’re likely to get on an x86.
You needn’t read more than the first two paragraphs, you got it all. I am really fed up with “reviews” where the “reviewer” wouldn’t have a clue even if you’d hit it with the bat. Here, he takes slackware, which hopefulyl most of us here know about, and starts complaining for the lack of gui installers, mocking about Patrick’s geekness, even calling him an asshole.
This guy is a prick. We shouldn’t generate him page visits.
I think this article is a little unfair.
I haven’t used Slackware for a couple of years now, but without a doubt it helped me learn a lot about Linux. Once I understood the way slackware does things, doing things that was wasn’t a hassle.
The article advocates doing everything the way other distros do it. Slackware takes the approach “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. It’s a good distro to learn with, and a good distro if you are very competent.
I didn’t share at all the author’s view that a text mode installer is necessary or that more layers of automation is needed. Not for Slackware/Arch/FreeBSD/… Go play with Vista, Suse or Xbox.
But the choice of kernel 2.4 and more so, LILO, is telling… LILO? today? why?
I would use Slackware on a server and Arch on a desktop, where the deficiences of each don’t show and their advantages are highlighted.
I’ve always found slackware to be one of the more easier to use distros because of it’s simplicity. It doesn’t hide things under “easy to use” guis.
I’ve had more problems fixing things with the more “easy to use” because when the gui config tools are unavailable, things seem to be much more complicated.
As for 2.4? 2.6 is optional in Slackware and has been for a while now.
It was a bad review made worse by personal attacks on pat.
I have been using Slackware for several years; it is my distro of choice. I am quite surprised that OS News allowed this article to be printed. Allowing vile personal attcks against Pat is shocking to my way of thinking. The author’s ignorance about Slackware is evident. Slackware also provided a 2.6xx kernel in Slackware 10.2. The author makes a big deal about the difficulty of installing the 2.6xx kernel in Slackware 11.0. If you have some basic command line experience and can mount a CD then the 2.6xx kernel is straight-forward enough.
Heh, if you want to run a n00btastic distro then do so. Slackware does the job for me.
I got up this morning and decided it was time to do a little optimizing on my Slackware 11.0 system.
Let’s see, I went to make xconfig and set it up for a 64 bit athlon and changed the mhz option to 1000 took out some brand specific settings and a few other things I don’t use.
Then typed in make bzImage && make modules && make modules_install && make install.
In about 30 minutes I had a new kernel with modules installed.
In Slackware the ‘make install’ even updates lilo.
All I had to do was reboot.
Not bad for an such an aging distro, eh?
Life is sweet, SLackin’ is good, whiners notwithstanding.
i’ve used slackware (on & off basis) since version 9 and have my reasons why it’s not my preferred distro. slack’s stable but a bit of pain for most to configure…the fact is slackware is not for everyone.
nonetheless, that article wasn’t a review, it was a personal attack equivalent to recent election ads on television.
Spix- sorry, i meant to post a comment :=)
it’s my first post. again, my apologies.
cy
This is a really poorly written and exceedlingly unprofessional article. It is nothing more that mudslinging someone who has thier own opinions on how things should be done – something he has more than a right to have.
I am really disappointed OSNews has linked this – I thought this site was about news in the operating systems world – not links to bitch-fest articles written by someone who clearly has a chip on his shoulder.
Pat’s slaves sqeaking in pain and anger! Hahaha!
… because I think that this idea may be considered old fashioned: but what ever happened to an OS being an OS?
An OS is there to provide services to developers to make great software, to allow software to share resources, and stuff like that. Yet many of the reviews that I have been seeing as of late focus on things like installers, or the bundled applications, or the eye candy, or how “modern” everything is.
And if you are only interested in a user-visible feature list, of course an OS like Slackware or NetBSD is going to look bad. Some OSes are not about mimicing Windows or Mac OS or Ubuntu. They are about making a better workstation for developers. Or maybe they are about providing a stable base for servers. Or maybe they are about satisfying needs that we are not even aware of.
A good reviewer analyses a product in the context of its target audience. Bashing vi for being a bad spreadsheet obviously isn’t going to do any good, because it isn’t intended to be a spreadsheet.
So, a good review of Slackware Linux would analyse if Slackware Linux fullfils the needs of its target audience. The Slackware Linux site states that “Since its first release in April of 1993, the Slackware Linux Project has aimed at producing the most “UNIX-like” Linux distribution out there.” That should ring a bell that we are dealing with a system that has a user who wants a “UNIX-like” system as its target user. In this context, the review should focus on the inverse of what this reviewer does:
* Does its environment/toolchain provide what a UNIX user expects? (Or maybe: how well does it comply with UNIX standards like SUSv3.)
* Doesn’t it get in the way too much for people who like to work in a UNIX-ish way.
* Does it maintain the simplicity that is one of the trademarks of traditional UNIX systems?
* Does it maintain the stability and reliability of traditional UNIX systems?
Slackware does at least very well on the last three of these points.
Another useful aspect of a good review is that it compares a product with products that compete for the same target audience. In this case that would probably be Open/Net/FreeBSD. I think the potential target audience of Slackware would be much more interested in such a comparison than the usual “it doesn’t have dependencies” and “it still has kernel 2.4”.
But this is the blog age, and anyone can put up uninformed rants. It is the responsibility of mainstream tech news outlets to separate uninformed rants from good articles. In my opinion the editors failed in this case.
Edited 2006-10-28 11:30
Kernel 2.6 is absolutely superior for my hardware and I actually *need* the features (such as USB support) that it offers over 2.4. Kernel 2.6 has been in development for 3 years, so Patrick’s constant “it’s not stable yet” mantra has gotten very old. Wake up, Patrick. Quit being such a stubborn asshole.
Who cares? Why getting upset because a distro that’s clearly not suitable for you doesn’t fit you? Obviously Patrick Volkerding doesn’t intend to make Slackware user friendly. However, there are hundreds of other distros that are, so just do the only sensible thing and leave Slackware.
While I agree with the author of the rant, I don’t understand why he’s trying to make his point as if Slackware was the only alternative out there.
The author forgot that UNIX is user-friendly; it’s just picky about its friends.
I have to agree with every person who has criticised this “article”. It’s nothing more than a personal attack on Patrick Volkerding. Does this guy even know him well enough to accuse him of basing his decisions on ego? It’s just a load of slander and insults in my opinion, and I am disappointed that OSNews sees this as being fit enough for wider viewing.
From an editorial perspective, linking to this article was not a wise decision. Of course everyone has their own opinion, but does the NY Times publish everyone’s opinion? Obviously not, because they have editorial standards.
You must establish and maintain editorial standards and any self-respecting publication would reject this type of submission out of hand. Again, I am speaking from an editorial perspective. His opinion of Slackware is irrelevant. On the other hand, If this type of article meets your editorial standards that says volumes about the quality of OSNews.
I have been reading OSNews for 4-5 years and this particular article ranks up there with one of the worst. I would pull it.
Everyone has an opinion, and even if I don’t agree with him
Everyone is welcome to have their opinion, but it is sad to see OSnews publicize articles that stoop down to personal attacks..
Slackware is obviously not for a newbie, and people who have learnt their way thru Slackware will vouch for its quality and stability.
Pat was clear that he was doing a last 2.4 release to support users who are still using it on their production servers
It is sad to see OSnews link to a useless rant posting on one of the finest linux distros
If you browsed the man’s website further, you would find a list of all the operating system rants he has written:
http://www.techiemoe.com/osreviews.htm
Reading a couple of those and taking the disclaimer at the top of the page into account, it’s very clear that the reviews are not meant to be unbiased or even “professional”. He is clearly venting out his frustrations in some of the reviews. (Read the ones with rating 0-2.)
I find this actually refreshing. Of course the reviews provide little value to the general populace, but at least they are something else than the all too common recipe for reviews these days: check if Flash and Java are installed, check if GNOME or KDE is used, check if there is any automation in mounting USB sticks, be done with it.
Therefore, I don’t mind if these crop up at OSNews.com every once in a while. They provide good contrast, and (hopefully) make you see what the other reviews are actually about.
Yeah, thank you for advertising his site, we are so eager to generate more hits for his rants… If I want to read crap, I would browse slashdot at -1, thank you.
There is a perfectly good reason to create a minimalist distro like Slackware. A few years ago I got ahold of a *really old* Packard Bell PC. Because the hardware was so old, Slackware was the only distro that I was able to get running on it. I was able to breath life in that old piece of junk and turn it into a DNS/DHCP server. I used dnsmasq, which is included with Slackware.
In fact, I’m amazed that this little box has over a year of uptime with zero maintenance required. That’s pretty good considering it’s running on ~13 year old low end hardware.
Just because Slackware didn’t meet the author’s needs doesn’t mean it isn’t a great OS. It was perfect for what I needed.
Slackware is there for those who want to use it and who like it, same as any other distro. No one calls someone who drives a classic car a nutter because they don’t drive the latest Japanese model. It’s simply accepted that some people love classic cars and are prepared to put in the work of maintaining them. And, shock horror, sometimes these lovingly maintained beasts perform better than the newest mass-market gizmos.
Every distro has its downside. I use Debian, and from time to time the ignorant, bumptious comments of some of the Debian devs drive me to carpet-biting. But I still use Debian because it is the distro that works best for me; and deliberately avoiding the locus classicus of this poncing, Debian Planet, is a small price to pay.
So rock on, Slackware. There are only two points I can see worth making about it. First, whether Linux has grown so big that it is simply beyond the ability of one person to manage a distro any more, and eventually this will tell against those who do. And second, that some distros, of which Slackware is one, are frequently cited in Linux pissing contests by those who want to show how hardcore and knowledgeable they are. But that has nothing to do with Slackware, only with the possibility that those particular Tuxers need a strong reality check.
Nice comment, it’s just the way I see this too…..I’m a (Free)BSD loving person myself too and although I sometimes can’t have all the desktop niceties of Linux, the xxxBSD’s are MY OS’s of choice……..
Firstly, I’d like to say that I agree completely with everything said by grahamthegoldfish.
Secondly, and I don’t know if this is correct or not but I get the impression that the reviewer tried to suggest that Pat “update” slackware and was brushed off, whereupon he decided to flame Mr. Volkerding.
This (so called) article makes me wonder if OSNews shouldn’t have the “Comdemn this story” link in addition to the “Recommend this story”.
While I don’t use it anymore, pretty much because of what Patrick does with HIW OWN distro, I recognize the guy has every right to do so.
This “article” is insulting the efforts of some of the important figures in the Gnu/Linux world, even if it is one that usually stays “behind the curtains”
If anyone wants to hear Pat talk about Slackware and tell why he is doing things the way he does the Linux Tech Show did a 90 min phone interview with Pat:
Interview with Patrick Volkerding
http://www.foogazi.com/2006/10/26/slackware-interview-with-patrick-…
The Linux Tech Show
http://tllts.org/dl.php
Episode #164
ENJOY!! I sure hung on every word Pat had to say…
I would like to see ANYONE run FC6 on a Pentium 100 with 64 megs of ram. Slackware runs like a champ. Slackware (up to 11) has been the MOST EFFICIENT linux distro out there that doesn’t load craploads of junk daemons and helper apps to handle internal configurations, like most other distros.. All to boggle down the CPU and ram with unnecessary crap.
That guy is TechieMoe who is the ‘super mod’ from the linuxforums/forums site.
http://www.linuxforums.org/forum/coffee-lounge/46049-techiemoes-rev…
I believe he calls them rants but also uses the word reviews sometimes.I think “rant” is the proper term.
I wonder if it is just bait to get people to look at his comics?
Plenty more reviews/rants on his home page and few are nice. http://www.techiemoe.com/index.htm
Looks like a mepis user to me!
He also did a freeBSD review and said this – “find that most commercial software (Java for instance) won’t work, you might not mind FreeBSD”. Is this true?
He also did a freeBSD review and said this – “find that most commercial software (Java for instance) won’t work, you might not mind FreeBSD”. Is this true?
Of course not. JAVA always worked on FreeBSD. Due to licencing issues, there were no binary versions of certain JDK releases for some time, but you could always build them from source (took one simple command). But these issues have been solved for some time now, so we have binaries of the latest JAVA available for FreeBSD. Oh, and binary linux JAVA always worked btw… I’m speaking of native JAVA. There are 370 entries in the JAVA category in the ports tree
http://www.freshports.org/java/
Just shows how uninformed the guy is. Most commercial software? That’s simply bs – I wonder how many has he tried… The only commercial software I can think of that has some problems is flash, which works under a linux emulation layer… but still works. It is just some hassle to set it up (meaning a minute or two of putting some lines in /etc/libmap.conf).
Edited 2006-10-28 16:02
OK.. I’m an Uboingo user. That said, On my evolving use of linux.. that being. Mandrake, Redhat/Fedora, Slack than Ubuntu: I learned more about REALLY using Linux with Slackware, than with any other distro. Some say Gentoo(with its install) teaches you more about Linux, but what it teaches you is how to use Gentoo. In fact I recall going into a chat on freenode and when I said that I used Slack.. I instantly got “creds” from the whole room. I eventually swithched from slack because I just got tired of compiling all my own proggies and doing all my own dependancy checking. In short, I wanted apt. Slack isn’t for everyone, but it is a great Distro, and Pat V. should get credit where credit is due
I’m not a huge Linux user – I’ve used it several times in the past (in fact, slackware was probably the first distro I tried back in 96-ish I think) but I don’t use it for my day-to-day.
On the other hand, I have tried several distros now on my Via C3 Ezra machine here – and most of them will NOT run out of the box. This is because it requires a kernel compiled without i686 features by default.
So far, DSL and Slackware are the only two I tried that have run without issue out of the box – and so I am installing Slackware this very morning.
Edit: clarification
Edited 2006-10-28 14:41
Taking one shot at an install and failing is not a review. Every OS I have installed including Windows has given me some grief during the installation process. This is not a reviev, it is a whine!
Browser: Mozilla/4.0 (PSP (PlayStation Portable); 2.00)
The same procedure as last week ?
We had this “Stonage Slack sucks – handholding slick distro rulz !” already last week – maybe you Eugenia missed that but unfortunatly we already had this last week .. not trying to insult .
Slack being stoneage & not caring about incompetent uninterested lazy dont care – users …
I didnt bother to read the article (OMG
) because as said above its hard for an OSS project to miss the point because everyone can make something slightly different & have different goals .
AFAIK some embedded companies are using te 2.4 kernel in their products or even 2.2 .
Are they doing this for nostalgic reasons ? Dont think so .
The author of that article is maybe just jumping on the “OMG Slack is still not using the sooo superior 2.6 kernel & OMG where is my slickness & overbloated desktop (which is of no use on a low end machine)etc” – bandwagon ?
OK – I read like 5 lines of the article & .. what the f*** is his problem ?
“Im moody want to moan at someone feel important .. so Ill write an article” – highly biased & actually more than that – close to directly insulting – is the feeling I get from these 5 lines alone .
I guess he expected (which I guess he must have tried first time) Slack to be a “pretty” & furfilling his wishes as he had hoped for – but was rather shocked to find a main distro with a 2.4 kernel & non-GUI install.
OK .. read the whole thing :
What an opinionated arrogant rude asshole – with a “personality” test to read – conservative in his views from what I get .
Just IMO & of course opinionated as well
The way I see it, if you intend to compile a kernel, applications, copy/delete many files as part of an upgrade routine then you might as well download LFS and design your own distribution.
Edited 2006-10-28 14:52
slackware is great unix like os and it’s one of my favorite linux os out there.
Pat V. did an audio interview on 10-25 on the linux tech show he explains his reasons on why slackware is the way it is,etc it’s show number #164, it’s available in ogg and mp3,chatlog format.
http://www.tllts.org/dl.php
Edited 2006-10-28 14:59
What a disgusting article.
The kid insults Pat for creating a distro that doesn’t fit his “I want iTunes and sharks with lasers” mentality.
Pathetic!
Really, what more can be said? Did this article contribute anything to my life? Not really…
Oh, yeah. And insulting the maintainer went over real well.
I rest my case.
Edited 2006-10-28 15:05
Taking decisions based on one’s ego is not just right for Slackware, it’s common to Linux distros. This is why Linux distros are made for developers and engineers, not for the average joe.
…Slack 11 came up (last week?), I run a webserver (public but restricted access) on Slack 10 on a machine with P233/32Meg. Rock solid no-gui Unix performance.
Fits the job perfectly. Love it. Thanks Patrick.
“I tried every driver and option available and none seemed to work.”
“I got a strange black screen with a very faint pair of mirrored blinking cursors. At this point I gave up.”
(ignorance is bliss)
HOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!
i love slackware even more.. it as successfully prevented a moron from using it.. this ownz…
ps: “confessions of a linux addict”
im sory is linux as in operating system or as “u know what.”!.
‘sharks with lasers’ lol, bout sums it up.
Poor choice of article to link to for OSNews. Can you take it down ?
Anyone with some common sense a little bit of linux study can install any distro. It’s not rocket science. I don’t particularly mean to sound like those RTFM elitists, but it just takes a little bit of google-fu. I have used many distros and have found a home with Ubuntu because it has a nice “out of the box” setup, but it doesn’t mean that Slackware is bad at all because it takes a little more time. In fact, I -do- enjoy the tinkering, I just don’t have the time to do it right now.
My 2c I guess.
Read The Fscking Manual Elitists? I don’t believe they exist.
>gets hit by a giant copy of DNS and BIND<
Seriously, people say RTFM because they don’t want to waste their time explaining something that’s already been explained – and they have a right not to want to. Now, I agree that in most or all of those cases, if people don’t point you to the right manual (or even the right page), that might not be very helpful. Nevertheless, they (the manuals) are there to save time. It’s the same when people use qtparted instead of the command line lvm tools – both exist because some prefer graphical partitioners, some will put up with the “difficulty” of learning lvm because (among other things) it’s quick.
Oh the slackware fanboys are getting pissed!!!
Great article, the author has the guts to say what he thinks about that pretentious patrick or what’s his name…
And of course, all you slack fanboys are whining and whining and whining…
I think most Slackware users would have no problem with a fairly written but critical article. Joe Brockmeier, for instance, wrote an article on Linux.com that was pretty negative. However, Joe, being the professional that he is, did it in an objective fashion. There was no foul language, no calling people names. That’s the difference.
Obviously, anyone can blog and write whatever they want. That’s not the point. The point is OSNews, being a site that, I thought, attempts to provide some journalistic integrity, linked to it. If the articles linked to on OSNews are, in fact, supposed to be news, linking to this diatribe was poor judgment.
Is OSNews just an RSS agregator for anyone’s blog out there or is it a site where one can read real journalism about operating systems that have been sifted through and approved by editors? I thought it was the latter. Now I am not so sure.
If osnews was only about news and serious stuff, nobody woul read it.
It-s articles like this one that fire up the stamina in fanboys’ little brains.
And, as someone pointed out before, there more people thinking/feeling like the author of the review.
Is OSNews just an RSS agregator for anyone’s blog out there or is it a site where one can read real journalism about operating systems that have been sifted through and approved by editors? I thought it was the latter. Now I am not so sure.
I don’t really see what the problem is. Though the attacks on Pat were unnecessary, I found the info in the article to be most helpful. Any OS in 2006 that doesn’t recognize a mouse out of the box isn’t anything I’d be very interested in using, other than to tinker with. This article basically tells the newbies who want something ‘that just works’ to stay away, as well they should.
Still play music on LPs?
Yes i do,they last longer than CD’s and generally sound better.
Got pam yet?
but after reading this rude article, I have it marked down as a distro to install and review, and you can be sure that I won’t be calling anyone an asshole in it,
‘cept maybe the guy who wrote this article..
cheers
anyweb
Poorly written article with no good observations at all. You’re definitely not a Slacker, Eugenia – maybe Red Hat or Windows is more your bag.
Edited 2006-10-28 20:19
Just because Pat decides not to include myriads of namby-pamby hold-your-hand graphical configuration utilities does not mean Slackware is “old”, as the author implies.
The author fails to understand this is the reason many people use Slackware.
xorgconfig, netconfig, pppsetup, alsaconf and xwmconfig are just perfect for me, thankyou very much.
This was a juvenile rant about something that the author obviously knows nothing about.
So instead of finding out what he was doing wrong he just attacks Pat. It reminds me of a child whose excuse for bad behavior is “But, He made me mad”.
The first complaint was that there was no graphical interface or automated partitioning utility. A graphical interface is neither a plus or a minus in my book. It is a matter of taste, pure and simple. As for an “automated partitioning utility” I would just look at the word “automated” to know better than use such a thing. I prefer MY preferences not someone else’s. It is a part of MY freedom.
The next think to whine about was the default 2.4 kernel. Hmm, I do believe that Debian stable uses a default 2.4 kernel also, and for many of the same reasons. When you are installing Slackware 11.0 you have a choice of two different 2.6 kernels, one is in /testing and one is in /extra I believe.
Then we move on to Lilo vs. Grub. Lilo is the default. Why? Why not! It works doesn’t it? If you need something different Grub is included on the CD’s as well. Do we really have to change something that works perfectly fine just because someone else used something different? Another case of “what the hell does it matter if it works fine”.
As far as the mouse problems go, the intaller asks for a mouse type for non-Xwindows programs. The mouse driver used in X is controlled by the xorg.conf file.
Now we get to the real childish part of the rant – attack Pat. That’s right folks “Bbb-buuttt, He made me mad”. Well Boo-Fricken-Hoo. You have demonstated your incompetence for the world to see and try to pass yourself off as an expert, or at least as someone with enough experience to write a review.
I have used Slackware for many years and I have tried all the “New and Shiny” distros with their whirly-gigs and Flimflazelers and Zoomzippities.
I prefer Slackware, and I thank Pat for all his “Benevolent Dictatorial Work”. It is a product of a man of dedicated character.(Look it up)
The installer has no graphical interface nor any automated partitioning utility, so if you’re not comfortable creating your own partitions with cfdisk from the command line and navigating ncurses text menus, leave now. Slackware is an advanced distro and makes no bones about it. The maintainer also suffers from a terrible genetic ailment known as Ubergeekus Pretensis, which means he’s allergic to anything that would make the life of the end user easier. Don’t expect any automated tasks whatsoever.
Who the * are you, anyway?
A 3-year-old wannabe script-kiddie with a bad case of command-line-o-phobia?
Edited 2006-10-28 20:54
> If you’re not, please don’t write stuff like that.
Freedom of speech babe. It’s because of it that you can write your own bullshit too. Think about it for a minute or two.
OK, I thought about it and edited it out
Sorry for that, it’s just that all these derogatory Slackware reviews are getting on my nerves..
Forrest
I would like to see ANYONE run FC6 on a Pentium 100 with 64 megs of ram. Slackware runs like a champ. Slackware (up to 11) has been the MOST EFFICIENT linux distro out there that doesn’t load craploads of junk daemons and helper apps to handle internal configurations, like most other distros.. All to boggle down the CPU and ram with unnecessary crap.
I would like to second that.
The whole point of slackware is to be as unix like so you know how to work from the terminal and don’t get lazy.
Imagine if you are in a business and your mission critical servers running the latest pre-alpha kernel etc crash and your business loses a million dollars. After you waste time using buggy graphical install software, you at last get it to work until your graphical config util messes messes everything up and you get a load of more crashes. Your boss fires you because you don’t know how to work with the command line and can’t keep the servers running.
A less drastic version of the above happened to me with ubuntu 6.06 so I switched my business systems to slackware. May be old but is works like a charm and it doesn’t get messed up every month or require daily updates. If you are looking for cute and cuddly GUIs and the latest packages, look somewhere else.
I’v read osnews for some years now, but seldom leave a comment. I’ve made the account only to ask: do people behind osnews take pride in what they do?
This has to be the worst “review” that I’ve read here (in a loooooooong time). There are enough places on the net where hatred and personal attacks are the norm, should osnews really be know by these kind of “reviews”?!
You got my vote because I agree 100% with your comment. OSNews has stooped to new lows with posting this “article”.
I’v read osnews for some years now, but seldom leave a comment.
Just curious,you did you get 5.00 if you seldom write a comment?The new voting system isn’t that old.:P
Ordinarily, I try to be tolerant of ranting views like this since they are a nice counterbalance to the overenthusiastic fanboy-ness that accompanies certain other viewpoints.
And I thought for a long time how to express my opinion on this intelligently, and maturely, and constructively, most of all.
But I am left with this:
If we were in prison I’d crudely smear lipstick on the bitch who wrote this and sell him to the Crips for cheap skag.
And I don’t even use Slackware.
Sorry if anyone was offended. I’m kind of at a loss for words. In a sense I’m glad it was posted.
it’s obvious Eugenia has a beef with Slackware… whether it be that she couldn’t get it working, or got turned down for a Date with Pat V. who knows. this is the worse “review” written. it’s obvious the “reviewer” doesn’t really know what he is attempting to do with a Linux system. trash.
Alternately it could be that occasionally it’s good to see an article that doesn’t fawn nostalgically over sacred cows.
Just for balance, you understand.
In between Sundays, you sometimes need a little beer and blasphemy.
In that spirit, perhaps we’ll see some articles on, say:
“The Gentoo install process gave me warm fuzzies” or
“Wow I couldn’t believe all of the fresh new packages in Debian’s repository” or
“God, Mandriva is hard to install” kinds of things.
Maybe even something along the lines of, “All of the bunnies and infants in a 5 mile radius of my house died under the marching footsteps of the Nazi hell-beasts that came marauding through the passage to HELL opened up by the Ubuntu install I attempted” – perhaps with the revelation that Ubuntu is *actually* an Enochian magic term used by the ancients to bring on the end of the world and how all of its users awoke one morning to find the sign of the beast permanently tattooed on their foreheads. Perhaps we could accompany this by using some kind of gematria to decipher crucial parts of the linux kernel, revealing that in fact the kernel is named WORMWOOD and that Linus Torvalds belongs to the actual unbroken line of the Knights Templar. Perhaps a hex dump of the older code in the kernel forms a sort of baphomet of 00s and FFs.
Lots of possibilities I’d like to see:
“Richard Stallman is a SEX BOMB, and why he is a puppet of Rupert Murdoch.”
or
“You know, for all of my bitching, I find Eric Raymond quite insightful, actually.”
The possibilities are endless.
Perhaps even an article entitled, “How notepad trounces vi and emacs.”
or even
“Why Lars Ulrich was right about mp3s after all” with an accompanying story about how his kids are homeless, drug addicted Vista users.
I would like to see these just to watch how the moderation system was used.
this is hilarious. You should be on the creative writing team for the next Lord of the Rings.
This guy makes himself look like a complete moron. I’m sorry, but you can’t bash a distribution for not working on vmware or qemu or whatever he was using, because it simply isn’t intended for that. I can’t get Vista to run that way either, but I’m not going to hold that against it.
The fact is I started out with Slackware 10+ years ago and had X11 up and running fine the first try without having a clue about Linux. Does this make me a genius? No. Did I read everything carefully and follow the instructions? Yes. If you want to complain about Slackware at least complain about the lack of dependencies in the packages or something relevant for god’s sake.
What’s with the personal remarks?
A review with childish name calling. How grown up.
I don’t agree that this dude needs to be heard. He is just having a whinge, pure nad simple.
The world is full of cry babies, here speaketh (cryeth?) another.
Another review? What review? I saw no review, just petty personal remarks…how boring. Can we keep the kiddie crying out please folks?
Any credibility this dude MAY have had a chance of keeping went out when the lil boy starting whining and name calling.
I am disappointed that we even heard about this.
It’s strange that one of the two distros that got this “linux addict’s” highest rating is a Slackware derivative, Vector.
See http://www.techiemoe.com/osreviews.htm .
I agree with those who’ve said that he should judge Slackware against the goals set out by its developer. If he wants to criticize Slackware for not meeting his needs, that’s fine, but he shouldn’t suggest that it’s a failed or obsolete distro simply because it doesn’t suit him. Obviously it suits a lot of people, and has for a long time. New Linux users who want to learn Linux from the ground up often benefit greatly from working with Slackware; I know I did. I since have come to prefer Gentoo, but I still feel indebted to Slackware, its developer and its user community.
Should I complain to that guy because his web page is NOT a wiki?
OK, he does not like Slackware 11. Fair enough. But what has **democracy** have to do with a Linux distro?
… etc … That is not an article, it’s just a rant. Might be interesting as such but… what computer is he using? why does it not work? etc etc etc
…. so void of **real** content.
This review of Slackware was both juvinile and rather pointless. Calling Patrick Volkerding an “*sshole” because of his design choices is ridiculous.
However, I went ahead a parused the author’s website, and checked out some of his other reviews. It turns out he’s pretty harsh with all his reviews, but loves Linux and will just call a spade a spade. In other words, if a distro is putting out crap, he’ll call them on it. I appreciate that. Gushing fanboy reviews are less than useless. Plus the guy has tried lot’s of distros, and seems fairly knowledgable.
I especially liked the following comment in his Fedora 5 review:
“Who’s it best for?
No one. Again. Man I get tired of saying that. This is *yet yet another* disappointingly bad distribution release to add to this year’s oily man-boob distro lineup. My only hope left is SuSE 10.1. By this time a lot of you might be getting the mistaken impression that I only write negative reviews. Not so. I simply refuse to recommend crap, and boy has 2006 been the Year of Distro Excrement. Just remember: when I do finally offer praise for a distro, take notice. I do not offer it lightly. The final word on Fedora Core 5? Sun-dried and rehydrated leper pus. Graphic enough? Good. *Now* will you stay away from it?”
I agree 100% with him. Not just that Fedora is a buggy distro, but that the quality of Distro releases over the last year has been very very bad, overall. Too many new releases of distros I’ve tried this year have been inexcusibly bloated and buggy. Even distros I used to like, like Ubuntu and Mepis, have been hugely dissapointing.
It’s good that someone out there is calling distros on their poor quality.
But then again he ragged on Slackware, which although harder to configure and get a working system, is about as high quality as you can get.
Hi folks.
Can anyone out there tell me what I have to do to xorg.conf to get a usb mouse to work in slackware 11.0?
I had to use an older ps/2 mouse to work.
peace man,
Jim
Make it point to /dev/input/mice or make /dev/mouse a symlink to that.
Here is a section of my xorg.conf file
Section “InputDevice”
Identifier “Mouse0”
Driver “mouse”
Option “Protocol” “ExplorerPS/2”
Option “Device” “/dev/input/mice”
Option “ZAxisMapping” “4 5”
EndSection
Use also
Option “Resolution” “100000”
It’ll give you smooth mouse movement too.
Thank you for your comment
When I get home from work I will use your suggestion.
When I used the 2.6 kernel from the slackware 11.0 cd uder the /kernel directory – i got that to run but my sound card didn’t get picked up after running the alsaconf program – any suggestions on this one?
Did you install the kernel modules from /extra/linux-2.6.17.13/ ?
I think Moe needs to read documentation about something before installing, like RELEASE_NOTES where it states that you need to install 2.6 modules after installation using test26.s to get support for mouse and usb stuff.
I don’t currently use Slackware but I’m seriously considering it. I’m considering it because of what I read on the Slackware website about configuring the system. Please read past the first two paragraphs for the point of my post.
I have to assume that I’ve become lazy because it’s been easier to stay with MS than switch. But in doing so I’ve let the OS take over, something that shouldn’t be. In my quest for a Linux distro I’ve tried several of the “load the CD, install the software, and viola just like Windows you’re up and running.
Two of the group actually worked “right out of the box”, the rest failed in the automatic configuration process. One was a major distro and the other was Slax live cd. Albeit a modified Slackware distro it loaded the mouse, keyboard, and an acceptable vesa driver for my embedded nVidia graphics.
If I had taken the time to configure my system from a base install of the software I might have prevented the frustration of attempting to reconfigure an installed system. If I had used the Slackware approach, I would have learned what was going on behind the scene of the gui installers and be able to fix things much quicker.
I think the Slackware approach is excellent and despite the “review” am going to make the switch to Slackware.
this site that was posted is not a review but a rant. its one mans personal opinion. i think you guys are getting way to uppity about it. i know the author and i use Slackware but i still have fun reading them. for what ever reason it got posted as a review here on OSNews. Take a chill pill people and realize it shouldn’t have been posted here. the person who did so obviously wanted to stir controversy. You people here are getting irate about it and really shouldn’t.
I do however want to respont to someone on that you have the 2.6 kernel as an option. NO YOU DON’T. you can install the kernel but you have to after the kernel is installed after installation is finished and install the packages that make the kernel work. you have a mostly broken install if you don’t. Pat is plainly wrong in this. if he wants to say that 2.6 is an option then he needs to make the kernel modules install WITH the rest of the packages. i spent another Hour after i installed Slack 11 on a virtual instance getting the kernel install finished. i don’t have a problem with having both kernels listed if Pat would ever getting around to making sure 2.6 is fully installed when you finish! Plenty of other distros still give you the option of the 2.4 kernel. but they have it fully install the kernel not just the kernel image.
TechieMoe’s article is not a review and should not have been posted here. It is a rant. Read the disclaimer here:
http://www.techiemoe.com/osreviews.htm
Yea, but even that link says “reviews” so does the page it links to as well as the forum thread about his reviews so IMO it is hard to determine if it is a review or a rant. I think the term “review” implies that it is truly a review and not just some rant about the things you do not like about it or find irritating.
His role over at linuxforums means he also has a lot of contact with users that are new to linux and I worry they make take his reviews the wrong way. I am afraid they will read the rant and assume that is all the distro is about.
But yes he does have a disclaimer or two maybe they should be at the top of each rant/review or he should be sure to link everything to that disclaimer.
I did not care for the personal statements, even in a rant so I simply do not read them. Works for me.
Either way he can say whatever he wants, but then again so can others and I see no reason why osnews should not link to it since the guy obviously wants people to see them and turn about is fair play.
Edited 2006-11-01 16:43