old skool .vs the nu

[s0lar]

'Sup All, I had this debate with some co-workers who have been in the industry since the beginning of time and some even remember the Linux kernel before it became 1.0. :wtf:

Now I got ripped to **** and back from installing netBSD on my desktop at the office. Why did I do it? bored out of my mind with "instant noodle" Linux OS's i.e. Ubuntu on my laptop. The whole reason I got into IT is cause I like to hack away at problems.

This led to a debate on the merits and demerits of "nu skool" OS's such as Ubuntu, Fedora etc.

I say from my days of hacking around with gentoo, slackware, BSD etc. I was able to pull of feats others where not. Case in question I had to back port IBM megaraid kernel module from 2.6 to 2.4 in order for a specialized platform to work in a mission critical environment. (Before anybody asks why, the system used the BSD "streams" lib which only compiled against 2.4, obvisouly its a no-show without being able to access the RAID controller) I believe the "nu skool" guys wont be able to pull it off. The office guys say it wont happen in future due to the active community.

What do you think? Do the guys who compile and tune their own kernel have an edge or is it just a waste of time when there is "real" work to be done?

 

[DrJohnZoidberg]

Depends on how much time you have on your hands Just put it this way, it's nice to have control over your OS like this - which is more than a Windows user can say.

 

[grayston]

It's a waste of time if you know how to do it.

Otherwise, it's fantastic and probably very handy practice for newbies. Helps you figure out what goes into the kernel in the first place.

 

[koffiejunkie]

'Sup All, I had this debate with some co-workers who have been in the industry since the beginning of time and some even remember the Linux kernel before it became 1.0. :wtf:

I hope you're not suggesting some of us are old...

I say from my days of hacking around with gentoo, slackware, BSD etc. I was able to pull of feats others where not. Case in question I had to back port IBM megaraid kernel module from 2.6 to 2.4 in order for a specialized platform to work in a mission critical environment. (Before anybody asks why, the system used the BSD "streams" lib which only compiled against 2.4, obvisouly its a no-show without being able to access the RAID controller) I believe the "nu skool" guys wont be able to pull it off. The office guys say it wont happen in future due to the active community.

Don't be so sure. I have been working with computers for longer than some of the guys I work with have been around. I programmed in assembler when others in my class stuck to pascal and basic. I installed my first linux "distro" back when you got it on a floppy and had to compile the kernel and X11. And I had no internet to google stuff on. But most of these guys are far more skilled than I am, and I suspect it has a lot to do with them being immersed in the technology right from the start and for the ones that have a strong technical inclination, everything comes very naturally. Most of them can do stuff that leave me dizzy and the only thing I really have on them is years of sysadmin experience. I can spot problems and their causes much quicker in general, but they can usually fix them much quicker.

 

[avert]

who cares what distro, WM, or shell you use. In the end the base is all the same.

What do i use? Ubuntu, why because i like their package management and repositories(i assume Debian is the same).

Also you have to remember calling Ubuntu and Fedora "nu skool" is a bit silly as they're the same as debian and redhat( put your hands up if you used redhat 5.2 o/)

Also i have been recompiling kernels for close on 10 years now. Why? because it makes me feel happy on the inside. Although i do blame Soundblaster16 for forcing me to do it the first time and getting me hooked. That being said, i wanted to hear Linus say "Hi my name is Linus Torvalds and i pronouce Linux as Linux". So when you need something done, you learn how to do it no matter the tools.

But as i said, the base is all the same. Who cares if you run Gentoo + kde or Ubuntu + Enlightenment, recompile your own kernels or dont.

 

[s0lar]

Depends on how much time you have on your hands Just put it this way, it's nice to have control over your OS like this - which is more than a Windows user can say.

+1 its the only way I can "bounce out" of a secure environment and actually access MyBB, youtube etc. without touching the M$ proxy and its nasty ACL's.

 

[s0lar]

I hope you're not suggesting some of us are old...



Don't be so sure. I have been working with computers for longer than some of the guys I work with have been around. I programmed in assembler when others in my class stuck to pascal and basic. I installed my first linux "distro" back when you got it on a floppy and had to compile the kernel and X11. And I had no internet to google stuff on. But most of these guys are far more skilled than I am, and I suspect it has a lot to do with them being immersed in the technology right from the start and for the ones that have a strong technical inclination, everything comes very naturally. Most of them can do stuff that leave me dizzy and the only thing I really have on them is years of sysadmin experience. I can spot problems and their causes much quicker in general, but they can usually fix them much quicker.

I guess I am somewhere between you and the "nu skool" my boss man who I know I have way more technical ability than. When posed with an issue he will call me and ask what I think. He will say some thing like "No, I think its the IPC in production 2". No further explanation, I dont push the subject. I will mission back to my desk and after a load of tcpdumps and other probes. I will come to the same conclusion. He is 99.9% right, how he gets this right I guess he sold his soul to satan or something. ??

 

[koffiejunkie]

Also you have to remember calling Ubuntu and Fedora "nu skool" is a bit silly as they're the same as debian and redhat( put your hands up if you used redhat 5.2 o/)

I have a CD labelled simply Red Hat Linux. I believe that was the first version

Also i have been recompiling kernels for close on 10 years now. Why? because it makes me feel happy on the inside. Although i do blame Soundblaster16 for forcing me to do it the first time and getting me hooked.

LOL!

I used to fiddle about with all sorts of labour intensive distros - mostly LFS and Gentoo. I liked both but these days I have more work than play time, and I prefer to spend my free time pursuing other hobbies or catching up on sleep... Debian may not have the spit/polish that Ubuntu has (although these days that gap is narrowing), but I haven't had to re-install my OS to get a newer version since 2003 - distupgrade simply works. The only re-install I did was about two years ago, to finally move to 64bit.

 

[s0lar]

who cares what distro, WM, or shell you use. In the end the base is all the same.

What do i use? Ubuntu, why because i like their package management and repositories(i assume Debian is the same).

Also you have to remember calling Ubuntu and Fedora "nu skool" is a bit silly as they're the same as debian and redhat( put your hands up if you used redhat 5.2 o/)

Also i have been recompiling kernels for close on 10 years now. Why? because it makes me feel happy on the inside. Although i do blame Soundblaster16 for forcing me to do it the first time and getting me hooked. That being said, i wanted to hear Linus say "Hi my name is Linus Torvalds and i pronouce Linux as Linux". So when you need something done, you learn how to do it no matter the tools.

But as i said, the base is all the same. Who cares if you run Gentoo + kde or Ubuntu + Enlightenment, recompile your own kernels or dont.

What I am getting at, is yes you know how but most nu peeps dont. I don't care either but is that not the challenge in IT? Is Linux not the hackers OS? Otherwise I would be running Windows ME. Whats the point of an open system if you never bother to pop the hood?

 

[MyWorld]

What I'm afraid of is the day when newbies don't want to read up on Linux any more. To me Ubuntu is steadily coaxing people into this groove and soon we will have Linux "experts" who never even used ssh or know how to search log files for answers.

I know Linus says that the OS should not be seen, it should be transparent in the background (he is referring to the kernel as the OS), the only thing you should see is the desktop. He claims that a good developer makes it unnecessary for people to use the command line, and he himself uses Fedora and he dislikes Debian, Gentoo and other like minded distros.
He is probably right (he did start Linux after all), but I feel strongly that the strength in Linux is always the CLi, not the GUI.

To answer the OP, it saddens me when I read forums like Arch and Gentoo and I see posts like "why can't I get KDE network manager to do this and that" when it should take you a minute or two to do this via CLi, and this frightens me! In the past you read forums and there were some industry gurus sharing hacks and work arounds to actual bugs and software, you could spend days just learning from these gurus by reading their replies, now the forums are populated with, "why does Gimp not do this and why does this GUI not do that" feature requests. I'm all for GUI's and moving forward, but do not throw the CLi away.

 

[koffiejunkie]

What I'm afraid of is the day when newbies don't want to read up on Linux any more.

Why? More work for us ou toppies

 

[CallaB]

I have no idea what you guys said but would love to learn. Why is Linux so addictive? Just cant get enough of it.