Comments on: Gentoo http://blog.derekbodner.com/2007/11/05/gentoo/ Geek talk, sports and ramblings Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:48:48 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9-rare hourly 1 By: Derek Bodner http://blog.derekbodner.com/2007/11/05/gentoo/comment-page-1/#comment-256 Derek Bodner Tue, 06 Nov 2007 05:07:01 +0000 http://blog.derekbodner.com/2007/11/05/gentoo/#comment-256 Yeah, the value I see in portage isn't really the "it'll be faster" reason that a lot of Gentoo'ers claim (there may be a performance benefit, but on my desktop, it's nearly negligible), but because of flexibility. Particularly on my personal servers, as I'm not sure I get nearly as much benefit on my desktop machine to make it worth the time (especially on my home desktop, where I'm not physically at all that much). And these servers are more for development and testing than a production environment. It's one thing to use it to setup things like this server that runs my blog, a few other sites, and development stuff I do, or a samba server I have setup for my house, and another to use in a production environment. Even at work, our Gentoo boxes are almost exclusively either development environments or specialized services (mail servers that only run exim, a dhcp server, etc). That's not to say I wouldn't run it in a production environment, I just haven't been completely convinced. I really need to get around to using Open/Free more. I had to use a server that had FreeBSD on it a couple weeks ago, and it was slightly different, but nothing that a little reading and practice wouldn't clear up. I'm particularly interested in trying the next release of Free on my desktop. We'll see. Yeah, the value I see in portage isn’t really the “it’ll be faster” reason that a lot of Gentoo’ers claim (there may be a performance benefit, but on my desktop, it’s nearly negligible), but because of flexibility. Particularly on my personal servers, as I’m not sure I get nearly as much benefit on my desktop machine to make it worth the time (especially on my home desktop, where I’m not physically at all that much). And these servers are more for development and testing than a production environment. It’s one thing to use it to setup things like this server that runs my blog, a few other sites, and development stuff I do, or a samba server I have setup for my house, and another to use in a production environment. Even at work, our Gentoo boxes are almost exclusively either development environments or specialized services (mail servers that only run exim, a dhcp server, etc).

That’s not to say I wouldn’t run it in a production environment, I just haven’t been completely convinced.

I really need to get around to using Open/Free more. I had to use a server that had FreeBSD on it a couple weeks ago, and it was slightly different, but nothing that a little reading and practice wouldn’t clear up. I’m particularly interested in trying the next release of Free on my desktop. We’ll see.

]]> By: escapenguin http://blog.derekbodner.com/2007/11/05/gentoo/comment-page-1/#comment-254 escapenguin Tue, 06 Nov 2007 04:42:10 +0000 http://blog.derekbodner.com/2007/11/05/gentoo/#comment-254 Stability and compatibility are most important on fast hardware right now. Binary packages are also a huge plus in production as you pointed out. I dreaded having to drop OpenBSD for the Fedora variant I'm running right now, BLAG, but I needed the samba support for work. There were just too many instances where I'd have to poke around on a share for something someone asked me to grab, and all I had was smbget and the supportvps. Also, OpenBSD doesn't coexist with other operating systems on the same drive well. Being asked to dual-boot to add more available workstations when I'm gone was the nail in the coffin. I hope to test the latest release and see if it's a little more compatible. I love Linux, but the lack of quality control infuriates me more often than I'd like. I'm stressed out enough as it is. Stability and compatibility are most important on fast hardware right now. Binary packages are also a huge plus in production as you pointed out. I dreaded having to drop OpenBSD for the Fedora variant I’m running right now, BLAG, but I needed the samba support for work. There were just too many instances where I’d have to poke around on a share for something someone asked me to grab, and all I had was smbget and the supportvps.

Also, OpenBSD doesn’t coexist with other operating systems on the same drive well. Being asked to dual-boot to add more available workstations when I’m gone was the nail in the coffin. I hope to test the latest release and see if it’s a little more compatible. I love Linux, but the lack of quality control infuriates me more often than I’d like.

I’m stressed out enough as it is.

]]> By: Derek Bodner http://blog.derekbodner.com/2007/11/05/gentoo/comment-page-1/#comment-251 Derek Bodner Tue, 06 Nov 2007 04:20:38 +0000 http://blog.derekbodner.com/2007/11/05/gentoo/#comment-251 One thing I did have a problem with was redrawing screens with terminal windows displayed was very, very slow. Whether this was opening multiple terminal windows, or switching to a workspace that had terminal windows in it, and happened with either xfce4-terminal or gnome-terminal (but not aterm or Eterm). I thought this might have been related to vte, so I tried upgrading that to 0.16.9 (which is flagged as unstable in portage), then downgrading it to 0.16.6 and even 0.14.2, and the lag was still there. So I put vte back to 0.16.8 (what it was installed at), and downgraded xorg-xserver from 1.3.0.0-r1 to 1.3.0.0, and it was fixed. I know it's really an xorg-xserver problem, but you probably shouldn't get this as the default package set when you emerge xfce4. One thing I did have a problem with was redrawing screens with terminal windows displayed was very, very slow. Whether this was opening multiple terminal windows, or switching to a workspace that had terminal windows in it, and happened with either xfce4-terminal or gnome-terminal (but not aterm or Eterm). I thought this might have been related to vte, so I tried upgrading that to 0.16.9 (which is flagged as unstable in portage), then downgrading it to 0.16.6 and even 0.14.2, and the lag was still there. So I put vte back to 0.16.8 (what it was installed at), and downgraded xorg-xserver from 1.3.0.0-r1 to 1.3.0.0, and it was fixed.

I know it’s really an xorg-xserver problem, but you probably shouldn’t get this as the default package set when you emerge xfce4.

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