From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([69.77.167.62] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1LUTvt-0007vM-AJ for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:39:53 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id ED813E04FB; Tue, 3 Feb 2009 22:39:51 +0000 (UTC) Received: from smtp.gentoo.org (smtp.gentoo.org [140.211.166.183]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id AADE1E04FB for ; Tue, 3 Feb 2009 22:39:51 +0000 (UTC) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by smtp.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 36EDE64390 for ; Tue, 3 Feb 2009 22:39:51 +0000 (UTC) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at gentoo.org X-Spam-Score: -1.757 X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.757 required=5.5 tests=[AWL=-0.225, BAYES_00=-2.599, RCVD_IN_DNSWL_LOW=-1, RCVD_NUMERIC_HELO=2.067] Received: from smtp.gentoo.org ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (smtp.gentoo.org [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with ESMTP id AS2tBw6Z-RVw for ; Tue, 3 Feb 2009 22:39:45 +0000 (UTC) Received: from ciao.gmane.org (main.gmane.org [80.91.229.2]) (using TLSv1 with cipher AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by smtp.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 05F2564288 for ; Tue, 3 Feb 2009 22:39:43 +0000 (UTC) Received: from list by ciao.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.43) id 1LUTva-0006IM-SJ for gentoo-user@gentoo.org; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:39:34 +0000 Received: from 65.111.170.175 ([65.111.170.175]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:39:34 +0000 Received: from grante by 65.111.170.175 with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:39:34 +0000 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ To: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org From: Grant Edwards Subject: [gentoo-user] Gentoo's advantage: "optimized for your system" -- huh? Date: Tue, 3 Feb 2009 22:39:23 +0000 (UTC) Message-ID: Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: 65.111.170.175 User-Agent: slrn/pre0.9.9-102 (Linux) Sender: news X-Archives-Salt: 50e5c1d5-8789-47df-806a-33ee14ad96b8 X-Archives-Hash: 19f79b2c226b8bd40460fc7f6a0df6e0 Whenever I see a write-up of Gentoo, it's describe as a system similar to BSD "ports" where you build packages from source. The main benefit claimed for this approach is that you get better performance because all executables are optimized for exactly the right instruction set. Where did that bit of apocrypha come from, and why is it parroted by so many people? AFAICT, the "performance" benefit due to compiler optimization is practically nil in real-world usage. In my experience the huge benefit of source-based distros such as Gentoo is elimination of the library dependency-hell that mires other binary-based distros. For many years I ran RedHat and then Mandrake. After a year or so, they became impossible to maintain because of library version conflicts. Every time I tried up upgrade an RPM package to fix a bug or security hole, it required a handful of libraries to be upgraded, but doing that would break a bunch of other RPMs for which upgrades weren't available. The solution was always to start building stuff from sources. Once you started doing that, the package manager would get upset because it doesn't know about some stuff that's installed (unless you built from source RPMs, which had another set of problems). The second benefit is that with Gentoo, upgrading a system actually works over the long-run. With RedHat/Mandrake, things would gradually deteriorate to the point where the system was unmaintainable, but attempting to upgrade between major releases was always futile. I've had Gentoo machines that have been upgraded for 4-5 years without any significant problems (failed hard-drives don't count). The third main benefit I've seen is that there are vastly more packages available for Gentoo. Putting together and maintaining an ebuild appears to take a lot less work than putting together and maintaining a binary RPM package. I've had far fewer problems with third party ebuilds than I did with third-party RPMs (on the rare occasions when I found one for some obscure application I wanted to run). Again, the solution was always "build from sources". Are the real benefits of Gentoo too hard to explain to the unwashed masses, so instead they're told the fairy tale about imporoved performance? -- Grant Edwards grante Yow! ! Up ahead! It's a at DONUT HUT!! visi.com