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On Tue, 3 Jul 2007 09:07:24 -0700 |
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Grant <emailgrant@×××××.com> wrote: |
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> In December 2006 I started a thread titled "Is Gentoo Healthy?" in |
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> which I was roundly put down for raising the possibility that the |
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> decline in the number of Gentoo users could possibly affect the |
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> remaining Gentoo users in a negative way. |
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> |
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> Is everyone still toeing that line? The Gentoo Weekly Newsletter |
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> hasn't been published in almost two months. Is Gentoo destined to be |
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> just another distro starved for contributors and struggling to stay up |
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> to date? If so, I really misjudged it. The meta approach of Gentoo |
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> is superior to any other in my mind, and I think it's growth and |
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> potential are being stunted by the "we don't need them" attitude which |
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> perpetuates Gentoo's lack of usability features for beginners. |
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> |
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> Gentoo needs as many users as possible to reach its potential. It's a |
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> short-sighted mistake to think that non-contributing users do Gentoo |
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> no good. Non-contributing users become contributors as time passes. |
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> Car mechanics all start as car drivers. |
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> |
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> - Grant |
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As an experience Windows programmer who was moving into Linux last |
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summer I started off with Ubuntu. The ease with which it installed |
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and updated itself was a big surprise and pleasure. But then |
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as my knowledge grew I decided to use a more demanding distro which in |
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my case would allow me to learn more about how a Linux system works; |
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and so I chose gentoo. |
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Sure there was a hurdle of a couple of days to get it installed but I |
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have not come up against any problems apart from my own lack of |
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experience. All in all the choice was a good one. |
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Gentoo appears to be very stable and the e-builds seem to be quite up |
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to date - although I have to use the ~amd64 keyword on most packages as |
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x64 support lags behind x86. |
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One problem I have however is knowing how |
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to choose between all the different ways of doing things. I recently |
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tried to get the interface to my Kodak camera working and went down |
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several blind alleys before discovering that each actual alley was no |
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longer the best ways of doing things due to changes in the kernel or |
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new tools. |
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So sure on the surface things do not appear to be changing much in |
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gentoo but that does not mean it does not work - just that it is stable. |
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Paul |
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-- |
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gentoo-user@g.o mailing list |
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