The instalation manual is ~100 pages. To be honest though, imo Gentoo is not a good choice if your on dialup... There's just too much to download (even if you do a stage3 install) as the distribution evolves quickly. It will be a pain to maintain.

Does this mean that Gentoo is only for broadband users ? While Gentoo is free this is like twisting people's arms to have broadband. Can't one have an unmaintained Gentoo ? I still use old version of Linux and am very happy with it.

Also how long does maintenancce take on dialup ? DO I need to constatnly be there ? Can't it be done automatically overnight ?

Thanks.

Vijay

You don't have to update all the time.Didn't much to my laptop for month.Of course it's up to you how you handle security issues with installed software.When there is a security relevant bug in a gentoo app you'll need to recompile the whole thing and in rare cases also apps that might depend on it.

It's simply the way Gentoo works. It's a very "online" distro in that you can type one command and get a freshly updated list of packages from Gentoo.org, then with another command (emerge) you can download a package and its prerequisites and then compile them. It's possible to run emerge using the --fetchonly parameter which /just/ downloads, so I suppose it'd be possible to leave it running overnight downloading packages. As for maintenance, a lot of it is automated once you've set it going.

When originally emerging KDE on my system, I simply set it going in the morning, went to work and by about 7pm, it had finished (not a very fast system btw). If you don't want to do any downloading or net access, Gentoo is still perfectly usable offline, but you'll have to stick with the packages that are on your package CD and it'll be a little harder keeping the system fully up to date.

I can't speak for how long world updates take on dialup,but you can definitely do it without being there.

youd probably want to do it over two nights though, if a large package needs to be upgraded then fetch the files overnight, and then compile them the next time your away from your computer for an extended amount of time (next night/while you're at work).

Well, since security is very important, you should keep it updated. In the future Gentoo is going to have security update check integrated into the package manager (portage), so you could for example type emerge security and only get the security patches. This would help immensely, but the system isn´t ready yet.

Until then, you will have to upgrade all system packages to the newest version at once, which will need much bandwith and time. The other option would be to manually check security advisories and upgrade individual packages 1 at a time. This is of course very time consuming and there´s a big chance you´ll miss an important upgrade someday.

The reason Gentoo requires much bandwith is because as already said, it´s "built" to use the internet. Debian would be easier to use with dialup, because when you apt-get update, you just download a list of packages. In Gentoo you download/sync your entire portage tree, which includes all the Gentoo patches for example. This is why even with broadband, it takes some time to sync the tree (=update your package manager "database"). If you don´t sync the tree, then the package manager won´t "see" the new packages and thus won´t be able to upgrade your system.

Since Gentoo is mainly a source distribution, you´ll need to download lots of source code for packages. Just to get KDE/xorg/firefox/xmms/k3b you will need to download something like ~500 mb. And then you´ll have to wait a long time to compile them after the download finishes.

If your dialup connection has a steady monthly price like broadband connections, then it of course won´t matter that much. You can just start the upgrade and go and do something else. But if your connection (like most dialup connections) price depends on much much you use it, then I wouldn´t recommend Gentoo. Even if you use as much binaries as possible (stage3, firefox-bin etc) you will have to download a lot. Of course you can use Gentoo with dialup, but be prepared to spend a lot of time with it. If you want something more dialup friendly, Debian is a good choice.

Thanks a lot for all the responses so far.

I am reading the Installation manual Online currently at:
http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handboo...?part=0&chap=0

Is ICEWM/XFCE included in the Packages CD or will I have to handle these on my own if I need them ?

Also, does the KDE in the packages CD come with everything including the browser etc., ?

Can I use a package on a Debian/Slackaware Linux CD to install/work with Gentoo ?

Thanks.

Vijay

No idea about ICEWM/XFCE, but they are quite small programs so they shouldn't be a problem to compile even on dialup. The KDE on the packages CD is the full KDE, so yes, it has the konqueror browser etc, but the kde on the packages CD is an old one, and even if you only use packages from the CD, you might have to recompile some parts of KDE/libraries because of security updates etc.

If you want to use as many binaries as possible, wait until 2004.3 is released (the release is in ~2 weeks iirc)... it will have the newest binaries so you won't have to compile much.

And in theory you can install a .tgz package or .deb package if you first convert it to something else, but this is a sure way to break your Gentoo system. In practise: no you can't. (Gentoos package manager, portage, won't notice things you install without it, and this will cause major problems)

np

edit: Even if you use as many binaries as possible, be prepared to spend much time compiling things - Gentoo is a source distribution even if it supports binaries. If you want a binary distribution, there's not much point in using Gentoo.

Can't I use portage to install programs from other Distro CDs ?

Thanks.

Vijay

No, portage either uses Gentoo binaries (the portage tree doesn't have many, don't expect anything great) or ebuilds. Ebuilds are just text files which have information like where to get the source/dependency info/patch info etc. You can't use other distributions binaries with portage. In practise you can install the base system from binaries, and then perhaps KDE and X using the packages-CD. The problem is, however, that the packages-CD binaries are only updated when a new release is made, so when there's a security problem with X or KDE libraries, you will have to compile them as there are no updated binaries at the time.

You will have to use ebuilds with portage for almost everything - in other words you'll have to compile a lot from source. It's all automated in Gentoo, for example emerge xmms would first get the source code, patch it with a few Gentoo specific patches and then compile and install it.

As I already said, if you are looking for a binary distribution Gentoo is not a good choice. Debian and Ubuntu are, both have over 10 000 binary packages. There is no way to escape the use of bandwith and time (downloading source and compiling) in Gentoo, even if you plan to use as many binaries as possible.

Here is a new distro called Vida Linux:
www.vidalinux.com

It is based on Gentoo, except that it is fully installable and functional. This might encourage the user to try Gentoo from the start down the road. However, the user gets the ebenfits of Gentoo from the start.

Only drawback is that the homepage is in Spanish.

Given the offshots of Knoppix etc., can the same happen with Gentoo down the road ? Reason being Gentoo ranks quite high at distrowatch.com

Vijay

When the Gentoo LIVE/Install CD had finished booting, and ready to accept commands from you, you can always switch between two different terminals. While pressing F1 or F2, press and hold Alt on your keyboard. The current terminal is actually "Alt F1". So to be able to read the instruction manual simultaneosly, just invoke the next terminal by "Alt + F2", and open the manual from the command line as required. It's like using "Alt + Tab" to switch between two or more windows in Windows OS.

Try that.

LOL

That's too funny... read it a few times you'll get.

But seriously, Gentoo is linux...I thought they just made wiki's.