[gentoo-dev] gentoo 1.0_rc6_r12 impressions from gentoo newbie (long)

[Gold is Heavy]

Hi Gentoo Hackers,

I've heard of your distro on LT and decided to try it.

My overall impression is that this distro really *kicks ass*.  I like it a 
lot!  I like portage.  There is a good chance I will make this one of my 
default distros.  I think this is just the distro to run if I want up to date 
packages that are optimized for my box, all without a major hassle, while 
respecting config files created by hand.  I think this is great.  I get the 
feeling of "power" like from no other distro (that I've tried).  Alright, now 
that I've complimented your fine work, it's time to mention some snags I've 
experienced.  I hope to get help, if possible.

If you decide to help me, please CC: aeoo blah myrealbox dot com.  Replace 
blah with at sign.

1. I noticed that both bootstrap and emerge seem to download then compile, 
then download, then compile again, and so on.  Idea: why not compile while 
downloading?  Is it possible to take advantage of multitasking in Linux 
kernel to compile and download at the same time?  Maybe a simple way to do 
this would be to somehow tell bootstrap/emerge to download only, in one 
virtual terminal.  Then switch to another one, and run bootstrap/emergy and 
tell it to compile only.  If compiling bootstrap/emerge finishes too soon 
(before the next download is complete) then it should gracefully wait and 
continue as soon as possible.

There might be even better ways to do this.  This would be desireable, as the 
time spent both compiling and downloading is very considerable (huge).  I 
have 190kbps DSL and Athlon 1333Mhz, and it took me a while to get just 
the barebones system going.  Never mind X/KDE and other goodies I want! :)

2. Perl 5.6.0 test complained with this message "(maybe your system does not 
have a localhost at all, 'localhost' or 127.0.0.1)".  I checked /etc/hosts, 
and of course, it's true: nothing is configured.  Then I look at your (really 
FINE) installation doc, and I do see a step configuring /etc/hosts, but it's 
way in the future.  Suggestion: move /etc/hosts configuration to the front of 
the installation, OR, change your .ebuild package to NOT run tests while 
making Perl 5.6.0.

3. I've seen numerous complaints about pharmacy package.  I bet you've seen 
them too, but if you want more detail let me know.  From memory, one of the 
errors looked like "...name error in pharmacy-0.3-1..." another one looked 
something like this "invalid pharmacy directory in gentoo/portage".  If you 
want the exact error string, I will supply it.

4. I was wondering where (and if?) all of the output from bootstrap/emerge is 
logged?  If the output from bootstrap/emerge is not logged, it should be!  If 
it is, I want to know where it is.  The reason for this is that I like to 
leave the box for a while, but then I want to see if any of the packages had 
errors.  I imagine I would want to look at the log file somewhere and see 
what happened?  I didn't read *all* the docs yet, so if this is FAQ, forgive 
me please :).

5. During a very long bootstrap/emerge process, some kind of total progress 
indicator would be helpful.  This is just a minor wish/idea.  It doesn't even 
have to be a fancy visual one.  Maybe overwrite some file in /tmp every 20 
seconds?  Just make /tmp/ebuild-progress or something, and overwrite it with 
estimated time left, bytes downloaded, other stats.  Just an idea.

6. When I did 'emerge system' I noticed that latest Linux kernel was being 
downloaded somewhere.  So I was pretty puzzled when the docs asked me to 
emerge it explicitely.  Indeed, there was nothing in /usr/src until I did 
emerge the Linux kernel explicitely.  I wonder why?  Just curious.

7. I get a LOT of "unresolved symbol" errors from depmod.  Now, let me point 
out that I've built my kernel to statically compile with all the stuff I 
want, and ONLY the stuff I want.  I had to unset a ton of junk (why is it set 
by default?  Some things there are hardly used by anyone!).  I ran into a 
snag where IDE driver was setup as a module.  Everything was fine after I 
made it static.  I think it should be static by default.  Generally, I think 
default configs can be much better.  I am talking about 2.4.10-r1 kernel.

So, back to "unresolved symbol" errors.  I don't know why I see them.  I read 
that depmod uses System.map file.  Ok, so I tried copying System.map file 
from /usr/src/linux to /boot, and to / and to /lib/modules with no effect.  
In fact, if System.map normally sits in /boot, but /boot is normally NOT 
mounted in gentoo, it's kinda weird?  Plus, installation doc didn't mention 
anything about System.map.  So what's up?  How can I fix my errors?

I ran depmod -c and I noticed that it's trying to load every module I have 
(which is not a lot, but still...I don't need any of them loaded at all).  I 
left my /etc/modules.conf empty because all the stuff I want is already in 
the kernel.  I tried putting stuff in /etc/modules.conf, to no avail.  I have 
to admit, I don't know much about modules.conf file.

8. Emerging vim installed XFree86 4.1.0?!!! Holy cow, man!  I just wanted an 
editor.  I absolutely HATE e3.  I wish there was some kind of real vi clone.  
I know e3 was chosen for its size, but still, I could not do any real editing 
with it.  I couldn't even find how to do search and replace in vi mode.

Anyway, I was going to install XFree86 4.1.0 anyway, so it wasn't that big of 
a deal.  But I think something needs to be done about being able to use vim 
in console mode without X.

9. There is a mistake in your installation doc.  In Code Listing 21 you say:

# mv bzImage bzImage.orig

but you probably mean

# mv /boot/bzImage /boot/bzImage.orig

Not a biggie, but it could confuse someone following the docs literally.  
Also, you should make up your mind about /boot partition.  In the docs is 
says /boot, but in the /etc/fstab template you suggest /mnt/boot.  The docs 
should match the template file from the build.


Thank you very much!  I had *tons* of fun with Gentoo :).  It rocks.
--Leo Lipelis