Re: [gentoo-user] Re: can one tell me: gentoo vs opensuse

[Paul Hartman <paul.hartman+gentoo@gmail.com>]

On Tue, Dec 6, 2011 at 3:35 PM, Indi <thebeelzebubtrigger@gmail.com> wrote:
> Whaddayatawkinbout, gentoo is more than great, it's awesome!
> Gentoo isn't intended for beginners, and makes no claims about
> "user friendliness" of which I'm aware. Generally speaking, making
> things "user friendly" entails adding more layers of abstraction.
> It's nice for those who don't want to study to learn how to use their
> computer, but it's not going to give the best performance. Security is
> also frequently impacted to some degree.

I just want to say that I love Gentoo Linux, have used it as my
primary OS for years on multiple computers and can't stand to use
anything else. I like having total control over everything. I truly
enjoy it, the Gentoo Way just feels like "the right way" in general to
me. That is my subjective opinion.

But I also want to say that just because you're forced to do things
yourself doesn't mean that makes them inherently better-performing or
secure. :) One can just as easily screw up their CFLAGS and a have
terrible security setup, especially a beginner. This list's archives
are full of such stories...

I say install a binary distro to get your feet wet with Linux.
Understand the basic concepts of how the system works, using a shell,
editing config files, etc. Once that's not a 100% foreign experience
to you, then go and install Gentoo using the great docs, wikis,
forums, mailing lists and IRC as your guide, and we can be your
hand-holding friends along the way.

I would also suggest using a virtual machine for your first
installations. It will make it a lot less scary. You messed up
partitioning? No problem, you didn't just destroy your Windows
installation or your life-long collection of digital photos (that you
probably never got around to making a backup of).

As a newbie to Linux, comparing distros is usually equivalent to
comparing the default desktop environment, wallpaper and color scheme.
They don't know enough to care about bootloader, filesystem layout,
LVM, package manager, or whatever holy wars linux distros are having
these days. :)

A beginner can certainly follow along the Gentoo install docs, but I
think it takes a certain kind of person to tolerate it... Blindly
copy-pasting commands that they don't understand isn't necessarily
going to teach them anything. Not any more than blindly copy-pasting
example code from a programming textbook makes you a programmer...
Having at least some basic understand of the commands you're typing in
will greatly enhance the experience, in my opinion.

Good luck to the OP, whatever he chooses. Welcome to the dark side. :)