No flame bait, thanks. I am in serious, -_-b

I have been using slackware for two years, from 8.0 to current/10.0. Generally speaking I have no trouble in using slack. All the things on my box go well, but I am recently thinking about future.

The first problem is upgrade.
I don't like to do a fresh install on my box. Actually, I hate it. But last time when I upgrade from 9.0 to current by swaret(first try on swaret), my sound card doesn't work. It takes me a period of time to fix it. I need some automatic way to upgrade my system, even though upgrading isn't a constant demand. I can stay with softwares of old version, but I need the potential that one day if I want I could easily turn my system up to date.

The second problem is software installation/dependency.
Well, I like checkinstall. But sometimes I have trouble with software dependency. For example, two months ago, I needed a software to do personal accounting. Of course I found GnuCash. But the terrible thing happened. The GnuCash depends on Gnome, but I never use gnome/kde and I like to keep my system as small as possible. I don't want to install the whole gnome only for gnucash, so i have to track down the dependency and install each individual package one by one. If there is something could check dependency automatically, the world will be perfect.

The third problem is the future of slackware.
I am worried about the future of slackware. Why? Partly because it is maintained only by the _man_. If one day somebody else starts to maintain this project for Patrick has to do something else, can he/she be consistent to this KISS style? I think slack is too much depending on someone. And there exists many differences between different distro, such as mdk, redhat, slackware, debian, learning how to admin each system is time consuming. so is the cost of changing from one distro to another.

I have read the debian reference and I find it is interesting/amazing, especially for its packaging system.
Last night I installed debian sarge on my box, and it is not bad.
But i don't like the debian style! So many directories in / and so many symbolic links in the system. But indeed, the installation and configuration are easy. I just use `apt-get install *?' like an idiot, never looking at the `README' in each package, never using tar.gz. I even don't know where the *.deb are installed, just `apt-get'. I think slackware and debian are in two worlds.

So back to my topic, I don't know whether I should change from slackware to debian. The change is huge.
Can you give me some advise/suggestions/recommend? Thank you very much!

any suggestion?

;-(

Why not dual boot to see which you prefer? Or use Knoppix (which is heavily Debian based) to see how you get on.

I'll have to admit, Slackware spoiled me. . . as my first fav. distro, it has been by my side for about 2 years.

Because of my slack background, I did not like debain that much. I also hated all RPM based distros. . .

In the past few months i have been trying out different distros on my desktop. . . gentoo, SuSE, Yopper, etc. ..

I went back and forth between Gentoo and SuSE. . . I liked gentoo for it's system layout, and SuSE for it's great desktop. . . both are second to Slackware in my book, but both beat Slack in different areas. . .

Thus, I now use Slackware for my servers, and SuSE for my desktop. . .



I would suggest giving Debain a shot, do a compleat install, fresh. Tune the system, get your hardware to fully work. . . enjoy getting your hands dirty just like you did with Slackware.

If you like the system, keep it. . . if not, try another distro.

Linux is about choice. . . express that through giving different distros a shot. Asking for advice on a new distro is like asking to hear every linux zealot shout out the distro that works for them. . . So find one that works for you, on your own. . .