Are there new concepts in Slackware?
 

Hi,
the question is fundamental. Having in mind the way Slackware is maintained
it is very important to get an answer. I sometimes think than Slackware is not only one of the oldest distribution but simply old. Of course 'stable' and 'reliable'. But this what try to offer any other distro.

Some parts are seems to unchanged since ... ever. I am using Tex for editing
but Slackware offers only old TeTex. Quiz: what is it elvis ? workbone ?

Configuring a system via static scripts also seems rather an old concept. I think that scripts should be rather generated dynamically. This way one can easily add a language service for default installer or other tools.

I am intresting in your opinion. Do you think there are new concepts?

There's a SlackBuild for TeXLive:
http://slackbuilds.org/repository/13.1/office/texlive/
And as far as other software is concerned (the kernel and gcc, for two examples), Slackware 13.0 is more up-to-date than that other stable distro: Debian Lenny.

I think you are confusing 'old' with 'I don't understand'.

And as for dynamically generating scripts--if I had a way to do that, I would retire.

elvis is a clone of the vi editor; vi is actually the ex editor that, when started with vi on the command line, starts in "visual" mode (thus, visual). Another clone is vim, "vi improved" (you have vim in Slackware).

You have ex in Slackware, ex is a symbolic link to vim (which is a clone of vi which is a clone of ex which is...).

All of these guys date back to ed which got "extended" as ex many, many decades ago; see http://www.softpanorama.org/Editors/.../history.shtml, an interview with Bill Joy (yes, that Bill Joy) for the complete story... and, if you don't know who Bill Joy is, Google is your friend. ed came first, ex came second, and vi came third. The clones came later.

As to the rest, there is nothing whatsoever wrong with something that works as well as Slackware does; it ain't broke and it don't need fixing. Fancy-schmancy GUI? Uh, what have you gained? To my way of thinking (and bear in mind that's just my opinion), simple and elegant is far better than complex and confusing. Slackware doesn't do thing for (or, more importantly, to) you -- if you've ever installed, say, Ubuntu, you may have noticed how much different it is than Slackware; just start Firefox and note how much differently it looks and behaves from the Slackware Firefox (which is un-screwed-around-with). System things are hidden from you, you don't know what's going on, you don't know why and you have a heck of a time trying to figure out how to quickly and easily change things to suit your needs.

Somebody (I don't know who to credit for this) has said, if you learn Red Hat, you've learned Red Hat; if you learn Ubuntu, you've learned Ubuntu; if you learn Slackware, you've learned Linux.

Again, just my opinion, but it seems to me that Ubuntu (and other distributions) are on a headlong race to the lowest common denominator -- perhaps a Microsoft-like turn-key computing platform totally isolating a user from everything but the keyboard, mouse/finger pad and display. That may be a good thing to get Linux acceptable as corporate workstations and the folks that want an appliance and don't what to have to know anything about it but I, for at least one, am grateful that Slackware exists and that I can make it do what I want it to (and you can you) the way I want it to do it.

Arrgghh! A harangue! Sorry 'bout that.

Hope this helps some.

I've said this before (about 3 times?), and I'll say it again. There are very few unique distros among the 300+ out there. Slackware is one of them. Let's keep it that way.

I assume that's a rhetorical question, because the answer is in the PACKAGES.TXT file included on every Slackware mirror and installation CD/DVD.

Of course there are new "concepts" (things to learn) in every version of Slackware. That's why they have a CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT file.

Not everyone agrees that the new stuff is better. ;)

The term concept comes from the Latin conceptum, which means "something conceived". I believe that Slackware provides a reliable and stable platform that can support a user's new ideas. We are free to experiment with our own concepts and apply them to the framework that is Slackware. If your new idea works for what you intended, submit it to the community. Who knows? It may get included in a future release! :)

Oh God No!.

Dynamic configuration/scripts are all well and good when they work, but when they break they're a nightmare. They tend to be over complicated due to having to try and deal with all possible eventualities and that makes them difficult to understand, debug and customise. In contrast, static configuration tends to be much simpler, and as a consequence more reliable and easily customisable.

Computers are dumb/stupid machines. Most humans are dumb/stupid animals. From my experience, when the latter try and make the former do things that are just a little bit too clever for the both of them, bad things happen.

Even in slackware if you look at the bits that try and be clever you'll see what I'm getting at. Take a look at the network config stuff in /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1: 276 lines of script that does little more than what could be achieved with an "ifconfig" and "route add" command (or dhclient). (Well, ok, it does slightly more than that but you see what I'm getting at). If one trusted the user to hard code it, you could cut it down to a script of just a few lines!

Slackware's approach is not so much 'old' as 'traditional'. If you think it's time to take a more modern approach, use something else. I for one am glad that Slackware is what it is (not that I don't think it could stand some improvement - just so long as that improvement is in keeping with Slackware's traditional values)


The TexLive thing is a different issue. It's been commented on before here in Slackware@LQ, and the reason Texlive isn't included is that it's simply too big. Now whether there's any value in still shipping the old Tex is a different discussion. One might argue that Slackware should drop the old Tex completely and leave installing Texlive as an exercise for the user.

P.S. I prefer elvis to vim, so you can keep yer grubby paws off that too! ;)

You can keep yer grubby paws off Tetex too!
Lets my workplace keep a single pdf file instead of a 200+ page printed hardcopy for archiving purposes.

lol! :)

Anyone from the Workbone Preservation Society out there?

I'm always on the side of the underdog, so yeah - keep yer grubby paws off Workbone!

I had to google workbone. lol!

igadoter, you're trolling, right?

First you get asked to help the Trinity project then you start a thread bitching because there's no KDE 3.5 in Slackware. When that thread got locked, you start this one. WTF?

Fully trolling. It's sorta like this one:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...behind-748513/

And this post:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...3/#post4047577

We should just cut this thread off and let it die.

I have no idea why some people try to make Slackware into something it is not. For the record, I think igadoter is more clueless than troll.