Gentoo - what's new?

[Tacet]

After about a two year lul without any version of Linux, I've decided to install Gentoo on my PC again.

My old setup (2 years ago) was a very minimal Gentoo install with Xfce, Compiz (yeah, not minimal, I know!) and a optimized kernel. With optimize I mean that I took out all drivers that I don't use. I have a fair idea of what I'm doing, but am by no means an expert.

My current setup is a bloated Gentoo with Gnome-light and Compiz. It is currently running genkernel (I'll try to get rid of that tonight).

My question: what's new? Is Compiz still one of the best with regards to pretty window managers? I'm seriously considering getting rid of Gnome (KDE is a no-go from the very start, that's one thing I won't even consider putting on). Xfce might be an option again. What are other alternatives?

If any of those Windows freaks read this and want to present Win7 as an option - I dual boot with it. So kindly go away and don't respond.

 

[Tinuva]

There is LXDE as well, though it doesn't feel completely polished yet and a bit wierd but you have the option of having a desktop or not, it will have the traditional bar at the bottom though.
You won't get better than Compiz + Emerald for now, and nowadays it can do pretty decent things even if you don't use the shiny stuff like cube ect.

As for genkernel, if you only compile the drivers for the kernel you need, instead of compiling them as modules, compile them as part of the kernel. Then you can get rid of genkernel and boot your gentoo install with the kernel image only (ie. skip the initrd file that genkernel create).

 

[AnthIste]

You can always try something new such as a tiling window manager like dwm? Its uber lightweight and there are some cool mods that you can patch on. I've been using an old laptop for the past few months and cant even run the gnome desktop at a decent speed, let alone kde (sis). Check out a screenie of my dual screen setup (until the laptop's backlight died sigh): http://www.quickshare.co.za/files/eb72s9y4/dwm_scrot_1.png.html

EDIT: You could also check out Enlightenment (E-17). Its pretty slick despite still being heavily under development.

 

[ponder]

Openbox + tint2

 

[koffiejunkie]

...and a optimized kernel. With optimize I mean that I took out all drivers that I don't use. I have a fair idea of what I'm doing, but am by no means an expert.

You realise that this is a fallacy (even though it's the law of Gentoo land), don't you? Having drivers around that you don't use does not make your kernel or your system at large slower. Using a driver from a module instead of compiled into the kernel does not make anything slower either. The only thing where you might possibly see a difference is if you're dumb enough to compile everything you don't need into the kernel - uses more memory. By going the compiled-in route, you also lose the ability to unload drivers, should you ever need/want to - say to stop a mis-behaving hardware device from hozing your box. For years the drivers for the marvel yukon gigabit NICs and also the nVidia NICs (forcedeth) were **** and caused all sorts of problems. You could unload the module and reload it, and be back on your merry way. If you compiled it in, you'd have to reboot the box.

 

[Tinuva]

Does it really matter? Yes you have good points but to each person his own. If he wants to, why not? It is the whole point in using a distro like that. Personally though I used to use genkernel because of the extra benefits, though a machine without a initrd image does booth a slight second faster (not worth it to me but maybe to someone else).

 

[koffiejunkie]

I'm not saying he shouldn't. I'm just pointing out that it's a placebo.

 

[Tacet]

You realise that this is a fallacy (even though it's the law of Gentoo land), don't you? Having drivers around that you don't use does not make your kernel or your system at large slower. Using a driver from a module instead of compiled into the kernel does not make anything slower either. The only thing where you might possibly see a difference is if you're dumb enough to compile everything you don't need into the kernel - uses more memory. By going the compiled-in route, you also lose the ability to unload drivers, should you ever need/want to - say to stop a mis-behaving hardware device from hozing your box. For years the drivers for the marvel yukon gigabit NICs and also the nVidia NICs (forcedeth) were **** and caused all sorts of problems. You could unload the module and reload it, and be back on your merry way. If you compiled it in, you'd have to reboot the box.

@Tinuva - when I say that I've a fair idea of what I'm doing I mean that my machine will still work once I'm done with it. As to real optimization or worth of optimization - there I appreciate advise as I'm really not expert.

Here I'm going to show a lot of ignorance: doesn't genkernel detect your hardware at each boot? And if you compile the kernel yourself, with the necessary drivers/modules, doesn't that "force" it not to search for all those devices I don't have?

I've removed gnome and put xfce (with compiz & emerald) on - I love its clean UI. Clawsmail and myself aren't gonig to be friends - while trying to shy away from Thunderbird I'll have to look for a lightweight client that suits me. On the other hand - if I want Pidgin I'll probably go the Thunderbird way - I think both of them pulls in gtk? Will just double check what's already pulled in before I decide.

Will try openbox sometime - also seems simple and clean.

Thanks for the replies!

 

[koffiejunkie]

Here I'm going to show a lot of ignorance: doesn't genkernel detect your hardware at each boot? And if you compile the kernel yourself, with the necessary drivers/modules, doesn't that "force" it not to search for all those devices I don't have?

I'm not familiar with genkernel - in my gentoo days I did the kernel old-school style Either ways, the kernel detects the hardware, no matter how you compile it. Not Windows 95 style where it searches for each device it knows exists somewhere in the world, one by one, until it finds something. Rather, it goes through your hardware, device by device and goes something like "ooh, new toy! Do I know this? Yes? Load the driver if it's a module or turn it on if it's compiled in. No? Don't care" That's why a tool like lshw can show you rather detailed information about devices that you don't have a driver for.

 

[Tacet]

Meaning that my greatest advantage in minimizing the number of modules and built-in drivers is that my kernel compile time will be decreased. And compiling a new kernel with the sole goal of decreasing kernel compilation time... There's a certain logic fail in that.

Let's say it detects my network driver. Does it search through all the network drivers it knows for the best/appropriate one? But then, I suspect that even if it does that, searching time will be almost zero on a modern processor.

@koffiejunkie - what distro do you use atm, if indeed still Linux? I like Gentoo, as it forces me to learn more about the OS. Helps me to decrease my ignorance a bit. ;-)

 

[koffiejunkie]

Meaning that my greatest advantage in minimizing the number of modules and built-in drivers is that my kernel compile time will be decreased. And compiling a new kernel with the sole goal of decreasing kernel compilation time... There's a certain logic fail in that.

My point exactly. Recompiling your kernel with some low-latency patch - that's a different story.

Let's say it detects my network driver. Does it search through all the network drivers it knows for the best/appropriate one?

This is a little deeper than my knowledge of the kernel, but as far as I understand device IDs are in the kernel, so it knows which module to load. Either way, even if it has to sequentially load all the network drivers until it finds one that works, that will still take a few seconds at best at start-up time, and then it's over.
But then, I suspect that even if it does that, searching time will be almost zero on a modern processor.

@koffiejunkie - what distro do you use atm, if indeed still Linux? I like Gentoo, as it forces me to learn more about the OS. Helps me to decrease my ignorance a bit. ;-)

Debian. I used Gentoo for about two years, and I enjoyed the tinkering, but in the end I got tired of the work I had to put into maintaining it. I chose it mostly to stay more or less up-to-date, but to have hardware support for my shiny new laptop at the time, I had to run ~ which was pretty rough. Almost daily stuff broke during updates, and I had to go hunt on forums for obscure fixes to silly things like icons in GTK programs vanishing or vi segfaulting (I mean, WTF?). I used to be a SuSE kind of guy (before that RH) but I got tired of the release cycle - having to re-install to keep my stuff up-to-date, and as my work got more demanding and time more precious, I couldn't be bothered with that any more. Hence the move to Debian. Took a bit of getting used to, but I've been running the same installation for 4 years now, apt-get distupgrading my way through Woody to Etch to Lenny to Squeeze without ever re-installing, and the only that broke in that time was X.org unceremoniously removing support for my dual screens and both 2D and 3D acceleration on my graphics card (not distro specific).

 

[Tacet]

^^Cool, thanks. I think I'll do some serious reading about optimization before tinkering with the kernel again, as I can't see the point in doing something just for the sake of it. I think that part of my wish to optimize the kernel is silly pride - the gentoo world is quite keen on kernel configs. For now I'll concentrate on making the machine as user-friendly as possible while still keeping my personal feel to it.

I actually enjoy the tinkering for now, but yeah, the novelty will soon wear off.

 

[koffiejunkie]

I'm not saying don't do the tinkering. If you have the time and inclination for it, do it - it's a great way to learn.

 

[Tacet]

I'll probably end up tinkering with it, but I'd like to make sure that what I do is worthwhile. That's where the reading part comes in. Fortunately the gentoo forums are quite active. Should get some good information there..

 

[Tinuva]

I personally think genkernel is the way to go. When you move back to CentOS or Ubuntu or even distros like Archlinux, you will have to get used to initrd images again.

Now with CentOS and Archlinux, the initrd images get optimized as well. For example you don't throw ALL your modules in there. In fact most these distros nowadays detect your hardware, and ONLY add those modules into the initrd image, meaning smaller initrd image, faster load time of it at boot time and less modules to scan through. So taking away genkernel is not really optimizing, its more like min/maxing to get even more oomph out of it, however in my opinion it is so minuscule you could rather just go along with it.

The side affect of this is, if you make a backup of the OS and put it on to different hardware, chances are you might end up regenerating the initrd so that the OS can boot on the new hardware.

 

[MyWorld]

Yes it does matter since some of the things you said are not true. The only real world difference in compiling your own kernel is a smaller kernel image and it does noting on speed department, even the Gentoo support will clearly point it out that your image may be a few Kb or even Mb smaller but that is that.

The speed of Gentoo lies in the compiler options in /etc/make.conf (if they still use that file) and it will be worth your while to read up on the optimization options for GCC. If you do not customize this then there is absolutely no sense for me in going Gentoo. This would defy the whole point and existence of Gentoo for me.

Regarding the modules, the whole point of going through a distro like Gentoo IMHO is to try and get it as stable as your skill will allow, an not needing to reboot is a very strong case in point. I too once was a firm believer in compiling all your drivers directly into the kernel but luckily sense later prevailed.
My personal record uptime for Gentoo on a desktop was something in the 60 days and on a small server (router/gateway/file server) I had in the ISDN days it was 163 days, you do not need to reboot, that was the whole point.

Meaning that my greatest advantage in minimizing the number of modules and built-in drivers is that my kernel compile time will be decreased. And compiling a new kernel with the sole goal of decreasing kernel compilation time... There's a certain logic fail in that.

You are missing the whole point of Gentoo, it is a linux for the intermediate to advanced users who are enthusiasts. The reason I compiled my own kernel was to see what was new, what did they change and how would it affect my system.

If you just want to use linux and not worry about optimizing and just want it to work well as close to Gentoo as you can (close to source code as possible), but without all the fuss, then try Arch. The good thing of Gentoo is that once you used it no other distro will ever be daunting again.

But I agree with koffiejunkie, the reason I left it after 7 years was that in the later years it became increasingly unstable and broken with their package management in shambles with portage not really being the up to date and overlays breaking everything, and if you are working with deadlines this can become suicidal.

EDIT:
I sounded like I flamed one of the people and I just added a smiley to soften it up a bit, I did not flame!

 

[koffiejunkie]

My personal record uptime for Gentoo on a desktop was something in the 60 days and on a small server (router/gateway/file server) I had in the ISDN days it was 163 days, you do not need to reboot, that was the whole point.

Unless there's a remote kernel exploit, like earlier this year. I cringe when I see boxes with a year or more uptime, because I know the only reason they're not 0wn3d is because they got lucky.

 

[MyWorld]

Or because you used dial-up!


Edit:
I used the term "whole point" quite a lot in my previous post, I'm tired... :/

 

[Tinuva]

I have a box thats uptime is over 800 days. It is a debian box, but mostly clients dont have access to it, as in the only thing it does is receive netflows and process them. So mostly it is firewalled off and thats that.

Sometimes if it aint broken and aint open to the world, its fine to leave it be.

 

[Tacet]

The speed of Gentoo lies in the compiler options in /etc/make.conf (if they still use that file) and it will be worth your while to read up on the optimization options for GCC. If you do not customize this then there is absolutely no sense for me in going Gentoo. This would defy the whole point and existence of Gentoo for me.

I've read up on the make.conf flags, and use them. I don't try to optimize too aggressively, though, as that tends to be counter-productive.

Regarding the modules, the whole point of going through a distro like Gentoo IMHO is to try and get it as stable as your skill will allow, an not needing to reboot is a very strong case in point. I too once was a firm believer in compiling all your drivers directly into the kernel but luckily sense later prevailed.

I've never had rebooting issues with Gentoo. While trying my best not to set uptime records (I plug my pc out of the wall socket at night - have lost too much before when the lightning struck) I've managed to get stable running systems. I'm currently on stable packages, though I used to run on unstable before. That made compilation and upgrades an issue, but once upgraded the system always ran stable.

You are missing the whole point of Gentoo, it is a linux for the intermediate to advanced users who are enthusiasts. The reason I compiled my own kernel was to see what was new, what did they change and how would it affect my system.

Yes and no. I'm enthusiast enough to want to play around a bit with optimization, that I want full control over what is on the system and what not (Gnome is now totally off my system) and that I'll probably compile my own kernel again. But I don't want to fool myself into believing that I'm "optimizing" when all I'm doing is playing around. So if kernel configuring doesn't really optmize my system, I'll just move it lower on my list of priorities.

If you just want to use linux and not worry about optimizing and just want it to work well as close to Gentoo as you can (close to source code as possible), but without all the fuss, then try Arch. The good thing of Gentoo is that once you used it no other distro will ever be daunting again.

I've considered that, but the problem is, once you've used Gentoo no other distro seems interesting enough. We were two friends who started off on the Linux road. He later tried to configure his own system from scratch (not a distro, rather compiling the pure code himself), but quickly realized the daunting complexities of such a task. Gentoo for me is a very nice alternative.

But I agree with koffiejunkie, the reason I left it after 7 years was that in the later years it became increasingly unstable and broken with their package management in shambles with portage not really being the up to date and overlays breaking everything, and if you are working with deadlines this can become suicidal.

I'm in the fortunate position that this is just a personal install. I dual-boot with Win7, so if portage (in my case it will more likely be myself, though ) breaks my system, I can afford a few days downtime. For my purposes Gentoo is more a learning and playing process than something vital to my work or personal environments.

EDIT:
I sounded like I flamed one of the people and I just added a smiley to soften it up a bit, I did not flame!

Nah, I don't think that should be called flaming. In a discussion like this one opinions are bound to differ, and what's the point if you can't say that you disagree? People tend to fun wild on a forum, throwing personal insults at people who disagrees with them. I see that as flaming. That's not what you did.