🚀 go-pugleaf

dirk@loth.demon.co.uk (Steve Dodd) writes:
> Hi everyone,
> 
> I've finally had it up to _here_ with Slackware. When I first started off
> with Linux and knew nothing about it, Slackware was wonderful. Now I'm older
> and wiser (by 2+ years or so), I seem to keep finding little niggles in
> Slackware 96. I had problems installing it ( /dev/console missing, syslogd
> dumping core), along with all sorts of other things. The thing that finally
> flipped me out tonight was finding /usr/include/ndbm.h and dbm.h missing - 
> a small thing I know, but on top of everything else I feel it is time for
> a change..
> 
> Are there any distributions out there aimed at 'techies'? In other words,
> that expect you to know what you're doing on the install, but actually provide
> packages with all the bits present (and working), etc, etc. Alternatively,
> does anyone know of any 'bootstrap' distributions that would provide me with
> enough of a working system to build everything else from scratch? Thanks in
> advance..
> 
> 	Cheers,
> 		Steve

	I don't understand your question, you say you want a
	distribution for techies, but you also say you don't
	want something that might require you to roll your
	sleeves up and fix things. 

	If you want a boot-strap distribution, that requires
	you to build things from "scratch", then you are a
	very brave person. You will soon realise what an
	enormous amount of work it is to put a distribution
	together. Even then, you will probably be taking large
	pre-assembed components (eg X11) and INSTALLING them.

	RedHat comes with it's own boot disks, that's a good
	place to start, then have a look at

http://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/linux/system/Misc/util-linux-2.6.lsm

	Even the best utilities that install 'out-of-the-box'
	benefit from getting involved, and tweaking to some
	extent, you will quickly see that a fully working
	package, is running on a carefully written
	configuration, which the original author may have
	documented (in the source) but not "spoon-fed" to you.

	Debian is also a good place to start, as it is in
	need of second points-of-view. (Put 2 sys-admins in
	a room -- you get four "ideal" configuration, put
	200 on the 'Net, and you get a common-denominator,
	that represents what they think OTHER people expect
	- look at /etc/rc.d for example, what a mess, but
	it's _supposed_ to be something like that.

	Have a play with the mini-distibutions (a boot
	diskette is a "complete" sub-system) and you will
	then realise just how extensive the task is.

	You will be the first to announce that a missing
	/dev/console line in a make-dev configuration script
	is nit-picking, easily-fixed, trivial ... it just
	didn't make it to the CDROM on schedule.

     Graham             gps@trix.dircon.co.uk
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