Re: [gentoo-user] Is Gentoo Healthy? (The Return)

[Grant <emailgrant@gmail.com>]

> >>>> If gentoo became an *easy* distro like sickbayon or ubuntu.. I would
> >>>> stop using it. Seriously..  user friendly distros is not what I am
> >>>> looking for.. I am looking for a distro to have one fun and learn.
> >>> I second this sentiment.  Since starting to use Gentoo in 2004, all
> >>> other distros pale in comparison.  Yes, there have been a couple of
> >>> hurdles, but it was all learning.  I view these, not as annoyances, but
> >>> challenges.  I love what I have learned about my system with Gentoo and
> >>> there is *no* other distro that has a package management system that is
> >>> better than portage, IMHO.  So, thanks from me to all the devs!  :-)
> >> Thirded (smile).
> >>
> >
> > Fourth one here...
> >
> > Gentoo has been one of the most rewarding linux experiences that I've had in
> > years. The only thing that even comes close is LFS... but then upgrading it
> > is a nightmare.
> >
>
>         I'd like to tell the previous four people to move on to meaningful
> challenges like reverse proxying HTTP to split media and application
> serving or db replication or ldap backended mail systems or hell
> anything other than installing a base system. :-) Come on, installing an
> OS shouldn't be complicated in this century.
>
>         Given a choice I prefer my tools extremely powerful AND easy, but I'm a
> professional sys admin with a large pragmatic streak and a low tolerance
> for technology that makes me jump through hoops. This is coincidentally
> why Mysql continues to be used in a hundred time more places than
> Postgres. I find Gentoo to be both easy and powerful most of the time so
> I have few complaints. However his idea that installing an OS has to be
> some sort of trial by fire to prove your worth is wacky.
>
>         I say bring on the easiness. Make a big fat button after the liveCD
> loads that says "Just install it for me in a nice default kinda way so I
> can start playing with this whole USE flag thing I've heard so much
> about" and be done with it. Yes, yes you can still choose to set things
> up yourself and frankly I still find command line fdisk to be much
> simpler to use than any other tool. After that we can start working on a
> big fat button that says "I handle all the USE flag stuff rather than
> having to figure out if equery, ufed, emerge, eix, qpkg, and whatnot
> tells you what you want to know". Wouldn't that be nice?
>
>         Gentoo got lucky (or maybe I did) when it was the only distro I could
> get to install on a office server some idiot has spec'ed with a bleeding
> edge gaming motherboard that refused to boot any other Linux distro. I
> ran through the lengthy install because I was out of options and then
> found I liked the system. I like to think I've been an asset over the
> years for Gentoo (1500 helpful posts on the forum and counting), but how
> many busy professionals have taken a look at the install and decided
> "fsck that, I've got ninety other things I could be doing" and walked away?"

Great post, I couldn't agree more.

- Grant
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