Granted that tracking down dependencies can be a pain with Slackware, I've always felt that doing so avoids "dependency hell," which (as I understand it) is a situation where the different applications overwrite one another's dependencies eventually causing something to break.

Good dependency-tracking package systems alert users to changes in their libraries, but users can still make unwise choices by thinking that the latest version is always best.

I think it's mostly a moot point. Since I started running Slackware right after version 11 debuted, I've not had any trouble with my built packages and library conflicts. I build using a mix of SlackBuilds.org and src2pkg.

Regards,

I've seen "dependency hell" used two ways -
1. You want package A. It requires packages B and C. B requires D, E, and F. C requires G. E requires H, etc. None of the requirements are mutually exclusive, you just have a lot of packages to chase down until they stop requiring new libraries that aren't in the base system.

2. What you're describing - packages B and C require different, overlapping packages that can't exist simultaneously on a system.

I'm arguing Slackware can be prone to definition 1, and I'd agree that an rpm or deb-based system is prone to definition 2. I've not had any issues with Slackbuilds, even with two or three levels of dependencies. It's just more work than letting synaptic do it for you. And, if what you want doesn't even have a Slackbuild, you've got even more work to do.

I've always liked that Slackware has a very large amount of libraries, but a lot of the multimedia-related stuff like ffmpeg and the libdvd*'s can't be included.

Ah yes. I wouldn't consider that hell, but it is a pain. For me, QGIS was the worst example of this -- until everything became available on Slackbuilds.org. Not only did I have to chase down a whole bunch of different packages, the documentation was written specifically for building on Ubuntu (!) making it unclear which exact packages I needed to build in what order.

Still, I managed to do it over a day or so of evenings, building some packages from available SlackBuilds and making the rest with src2pkg.

True, although src2pkg makes it pretty easy most of the time. If you haven't used src2pkg, I'd suggest giving it a try.

Yup. The multi-media stuff is a hassle, but almost all distributions struggle with it. From what I understand, Ubuntu has compromised by making the non-free codex packages available, but warning users about them.

Back to the original question, though: I don't think characterizing Slackware as being best used as a base for various distributions that are more "desktop-friendly" is fair. Even though installing extra packages can take some work, an unmodified Slackware system is completely usable for everything but multimedia tasks.

All the tools are there, the desktop is friendly, powerful, and useful. E-mail, web browsing, office software, PIM, PGP encryption, software development, and listening/viewing a huge variety of multimedia file types. The things missing from a normal user's perspective is being able to watch a DVD and being able to rip MP3s (although one can listen to them in stock Slackware).

Frankly, the problems with non-free media codices are bigger than Slackware. However, perhaps VLC can start to become part of Slackware given Eric's work packaging it.

Situation #1 has only happened to me rarely, mostly for GNOME apps.

Personally I've had more problems from faulty dependency resolution than from the lack of dependency resolution. Thus for me, dependency resolution is a con not a pro.

For me too. Like why is CUPS required for Gnome on ubuntu (on a system with no printer)?!

Not that it is necessarily "faulty" (there may be reasons I wot not of) but ...

I've messed with most of the major distributions and Slackware is the only one that really does everything I need it to. I started out using ubuntu back when it was still 5.04 and it was one of the best at the time. But it grew increasingly complex with each new release and thus by 7.10 was unusable for me as it was constantly borked. And all the other major distros suffer from the same problems. I absolutely despise having to upgrade my system every 6 months and then do 5million updates over the life cycle of a release. The release engineers who came up with that should be shot because it gives the entire Unix/Linux community a bad reputation for rushing unfinished broken products out the door.

Slackware puts out a solid release on Day 1 and only updates a few packages as needed usually for security purposes. It's stable, runs fast and gets out of the way quickly to get to work. Although the big mainstream distros do well on the third point, they don't have the first two points nailed down. And quite frankly, hunting down bugs in Ubuntu is A LOT more difficult and time consuming than learning how to configure a few /etc files (which in my case has only been inittab as all other etc files are just fine in their default states) to get the system configured to your liking. Slackware isn't the easiest distro out there to use. Let's face it, I wouldn't recommend it to my grandmother. But it is made out far more difficult than it is. Because it contains very few bugs, the difficulty mostly lies in learning how to use it as oppose to hacking through complex procedures to workaround bugs. The nice part is that due to the fact that Slackware is pretty vanilla, you can just refer to the original author's documentation to figure stuff out as oppose to reading through huge wiki databases of distro specific tricks.

As far as performance goes, Slackware is up there. Gentoo is rumored to be faster, but having tried it for a few months a short time ago, getting the right optimizations is a challenge. Most of the time, you end up hurting your performance more than anything. And you also have to ask yourself whether spending countless hours compiling stuff before you can use it is really a productive way to spend your time. In the time it takes to just install Gentoo with a similar level of functionality as Slackware, I will have been running Slackware for a week at least and will have written pages of code and will have run dozens of computer simulations. I think reviewers cannot really appreciate slackware because they don't use it for a while. You can't properly weight the pros of having huge uptimes with no crashes and no performance degradation 6 months or even a year down the road if you just run the OS for 48 hours and then write your article. Seriously, don't read slackware reviews. They don't say anything useful.

I think that's probably the most true statement of all in the thread. I was personally AFRAID of Slack after everything I read, but it sounded like a challenge so one day I installed it. It took me a month before I was sure that it was definitely for me.

I was scared to try after i read all the reviews as well. One day
i was fed up with using all the other distros . Open Suse, Fedora, Ubuntu etc. I felt like it was windows all over again. I was too comftorable. Not having to do any work on my computer. For me linux is supposed to use my brainpower. I like the slackbuild system and i do not mind compiling my own programs. Slackware is just best for me. I actually have fun using this distro.

SpelledJ,

You know, you make an excellent point. I've never really thought about this from that point of view. I'll admit that, especially since Slackware ditched GNOME, some of the heftier multimedia applications require a lot of dependencies to be tracked down and built. (Heck, some pretty mundane applications, too.) I've been using Slackware exclusively on my home desktop since version 3.2, when I ditched Windows 95, so I guess I am just used to this sort of thing. In fact, I find it intriguing to investigate each dependency and read it's documentation while building it, learning exactly what facilities it provides, who wrote it, and the basics of how it does what it does.

I can see where I am, in this way, not the typical user, and others would certainly not enjoy tracking down, investigating, and building from source five, ten, or sometimes even more dependencies. I am kind of a control freak when it comes to my PC, however, and wouldn't want it any other way. I have, of course, experimented with other distributions extensively; nothing tightens my gut more than helplessly watching apt or RPM download and install dependencies . . . . "No!" I think, "Do we really need that one? What the hell does it do"

+1 to that, not just about Slackware but about any product. When researching products I look for reviews by real-life users who have used them for significant time -- and for BBS discussions of the product.

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