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Andrew Kesterson wrote: |
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> I've recently begun admining a few gentoo boxes in a distributed |
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> setting (mainly boxes that my friends asked me to set up for them on a |
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> personal, at-home basis.) I'm noticing that while portage makes |
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> updates alot smoother, compiling them takes forever, especially on |
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> initial installations. OpenOffice installs and updates are |
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> particularly heinous. |
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> How do you guys handle this? Do you configure all your systems the |
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> same, and set up a binary package host on the system somewhere for |
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> them to fetch binaries from? Or do you just use straight portage? |
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Hey Andrew. |
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In a number of instances, you are better off just using the binarys in |
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portage for a standard desktop user. OpenOffice can take hours to |
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compile.. or you can just install the binary in 5 mins, and the supposed |
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loss of optimisation is unnoticable. openoffice-bin, mozilla-firefox-bin |
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and mozilla-thunderbird-bin are always installed on my machine, and with |
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the regularity of updates released on them, I'm thankful (and this is on |
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an Athlon 64 3500.) |
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There is also azureus-bin, mplayer-bin, crossover-office-bin and a whole |
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heap of others which could be useful in some places. I am very fond of |
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use flags etc, but a lot of the time the defaults on these apps work |
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fine, so its worth while. |
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If I were doing this, I would probably add things like kde, gnome, and X |
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to package.mask (?) after installing, to "lock" them to the version |
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you've installed. Then you can run "emerge -uavD world" jobs and not |
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worry about it taking 15 hours. All you'd have to do is keep an eye out |
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for bigger releases on the packages you've masked, and remember to |
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update them (whether this be directly on Portage, DistCC, or some other |
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method). It's a waste of time updating something like X just because a |
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bugfux you're not affected by has been released, so just leave it until |
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a substantial update comes out. It can also be useful to wait a couple |
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of days after a release comes out, because you'll be snarling if you |
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update a huge package on a dozen machines, and then a day later it gets |
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updated again, or even revoked. |
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I'd also cron a once-weekly "emerge --quiet --sync && emerge -upvD |
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world" to be emailed to you from each box. It will automate the syncing, |
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and help you keep an eye on the updates. |
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Disclaimer: Most of my idea's relate directly to maintaining a |
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workstation for someone else who isnt savvy enough to do it themselves, |
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and therefore wont notice the small things. |
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Cheers |
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Jeremy |
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-- |
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