[gentoo-dev] Corrections to install guide - Comments, suggestions ;)

[Jarrett Heale]

Hi guys. I just failed miserably to give you an ANSI thumbs up...

I've been using gentoo since 1.1a and, well, you guys know how great it is. Just a couple of little corrections for the install guide...

First things first. What's what in the download directory? I have a P3, so I could grab the i686 p3 one (oh wait - not an iso - nevermind) I always prefer to grab the x86 stage3 iso so I can install from scratch or stage3 on Many different computers... guess I'm just not sure what to download here. Maybe stick a text file in that directory to describe all those files?

In "2.Booting" the sentence "You should have a root ("#") prompt on the current console, and can also open new
consoles by typing alt-f2, alt-f3, etc and then hitting enter." appears at the end of both paragraphs. Is that on purpose?

Just under code listing 7 (manual static config) there's a note: At the moment the only editors installed by default are nano. Yet in the announcement for 1.4 you say you have vi (a great thing). should it say "...editors installed by default are vi and nano, a small ..." or should it say "...editor_ installed by default is nano..." ? I thought 1.2 had vi, but while installing only nano worked.

Networking is go! (not a mistake - just funny :) Loved the Thunderbirds!

How come it's "emerge sync" now instead of "emerge rsync"? (starting in the second "Important:" in "9.Unpack the stage you want to use" and on)

{Not a correction: What's wrong with grsecurity? (I thought it was gre security - like generic router encapsulation - just goes to show what I know) I thought it was a good thing! The help files in the kernel recommend it... Is this a 1.4 issue or should I disable it on my 1.2 box running X?}

I know your warning under code listing 28 has not changed in a long time, but the option "Device File System" isn't called that. I think it's devfs or something (might want to verify) - that was confusing for a newbie!! Also, could you through in a line about how to get iptables? THAT took me forever to find - and I still have no clue what I should enable with it. All I know is when I apply my settings (I use guarddog to setup my iptables rules) the same error (something like "match/rule/table not found") happens like 50 times. Isn't iptables 80% of why linux is more secure than the leading brand?

wth is a cron? I take it if you don't know you don't install one? Or should I grab vcron anyway? (as per "If you don't know which one to choose, you might as well grab vcron")

"Fully qualified domain name". Hmmm. I really don't know! I called my box hal. That's all I know. To network with windows machines do we need to use the same domain? We're behind a freesco linux dialup gateway router (using NAT - IP masquerading) so we're all 192.168..... do we have to use domain names? This always confused me. About the note under code listing 38, you mean change localhost to hal for the loopback 127.0.0.1?

That's about it. Thanks a lot for your time (if you read this, and especially if you respond!) but thanks even more for the excellent distribution!

Jarrett Heale
Network Services Section
RCMP - Royal Canadian Mounted Police (the mounties to the unlearned ;)