There is probably a way people know to do this, but I don't like after doing a full install, I use pkgtool to remove programs/etc, without knowing if the file/program is required.
For just a desktop user, it's hard for me knowing what I can delete and can't. All those proto files for example.
OTT, Slackware is great!

I don't like Sendmail as the default MTA. I would much prefer Postfix.

Also I would much rather have PostgreSQL instead of MySQL.

Other than that I'm a happy camper. :)

There is nothing i would dislike about Slackware, common, it's stable, it's clean (as far as i know software included with Slack is as most pure vanilla as you can get), it's free (as in beer and as in freedom) it's fun (for the little geek in me), it's cool (as i can proudly say "I use Slackware!" :) )

The only thing i would like to see is the Slackware Wiki, where users could write how-to docs that would cover lots of things to make other users to understand Slackware better (package creation, installation, removal, dependency solving, configuring, optimizing, customizing, etc... ), and those docs should not only have a list of commands that you can copy paste to get something done, but also explain exactly what they do, how they do and why they do something. That would be truly awesome in my opinion.

P.S.
Maybe such wiki already exists and i just do not know about it?

Go to http://slackwiki.org/ and start adding documentation then!

Eric

Why do you think that this is a problem? You can think of gtk/glib/pango etc. as parts of a single big package, like the Qt toolkit. They can only exist together. At the very beginning perhaps "Gnome library" and "glib" were almost the same thing, but at least after gtk+2 they were clearly separated. Of course, glib development follows that of Gnome, but the changes are (mostly) in the form of backward compatible incremental updates. I also hate Gnome-dependent software but I'm very happy with the Gtk dependent ones, no problem there at all.

In recent releases they have begun incorporating some Gnome libraries into Glib (or more precisely, the Gtk framework), e.g. the Gio stuff or the printing interface. This is good news, as applications will have fewer or no reasons to depend on Gnome libraries. Qt seems to be more complete in that respect, but hopefully Gtk will catch up.

Sendmail. Why can't postfix be the default MTA?

I agree with you about display related things like pango, cairo and gtk being considered as a single entity and in fact there's probably a good argument for merging them into a single library. They're all related to a single area of function (i.e. graphics/display/gui) it's when routines to provide other types of function are included in what is essentially a gui toolkit that I think is a mistake.

What brought this home to me recently was when I wanted to build an application on OpenBSD that needed the gtk+ library, and to build the library I also had to build CUPS, which required me to build Bonjour and so on. If the gtk+ application doesn't do any printing and only needs the gui widgets then why should I have to add these libraries? Proper separation of library functions based on functional area would have avoided the need for this.

Keeping clear separation of function/purpose between libraries is just good practice for efficient code reuse. At least, that's the way I view it.

I won't discuss the rest of the post, as the configuration mechanisms are a matter of taste and I know for a fact that sendmail can dispatch messages faster than Postfix (but both are quite fast anyway).

However, I'd like to read some information backing up the claim on Postfix having more security problems than Sendmail in recent years. Honest question. I've looked back at some security advisories since 2006 for both projects and Postfix has only had two local minor security problems since then (both for 2.x and none for 1.x), while Sendmail has had a remotely exploitable SSL certification vulnerability, for example. Sendmail has certainly improved over the years, but I don't think Postfix is worse in any way regarding security.

the first point is a feature! there's nothing more painful than watching an inapt packet manager cluttering your hd with shit you don't need.

???

so what do you do after your kernel loaded itself into your RAM? count the blinks of your cursor?

there's only Slackware, everything else is bloat.

regards, slacky02

I have to disagree. Remember, at the heart of it, Slackware is one guy (no offense to Eric, Robbie, etc.). If Pat were to run his own forum, the time he would undoubtedly have to spend dealing with it would only take away from work on the distro itself. Instead, he outsourced the forum to the very capable hands of Jeremy and the LQ crew.

As for something I dislike about Slack, I really despise it's reputation as "a good server distro" or a distro that's "not for linux newbies". The first (and only) distro I ever took seriously was Slack and I can't even enumerate all I've learned about linux. Yes, I've taken my lumps, but it's not impossible for someone new to linux to start with Slack. All it takes is patience, google, the LQ search function and a willingness to learn.

KDE requires MySQL, so go pester them ;)

I agree that it would have been better if Gtk could be configured to use a null/dummy backend when needed (maybe it already allows that - I don't know). Still, CUPS is so standard these days that I can accept Gtk depending on it, rather than inventing its own printing subsystem. Be it Gtk or Qt or any other "rich" toolkit, many applications use only a fraction of the total functionality available. Since toolkits must provide "standard" functionality across all installations, you can't make them modular and let people leave their parts out.

They say that in mathematics "proofs get shorter, and the definitions get longer" over time :). This is like it, you code's dependency list will be reduced to a mere "gtk", while all those zillion gnome/cups stuff will be included in a gtk installation.

I don't like the format for slack-desc files; particularly needing to affix the appname to every line.

Slackware is perfect, nothing to change.

They don't have *any* package authentication verification ( at this time) ; and so therefore, and therof , I don't consider it a _serious_ distro until they finalize their verification ( which I know is planned , but for all intents and purposes, does not exist).

Other than that, it still has predefined dependencies, I prefer my own, but that's really a small point.

The only other thing I don't like about arch is that I think they could do more "sane" default configs for some things, such as locale, hostname, etc. There's a lot of config editing the first time around using arch, which obviously only needs to be done once. But, first time out of the gate, there's a lot of config file editing, whereas Slackware for example has some pretty sane default configs (at least for most USA people).

Lastly, I don't understand why the arch dev's use "AlL dIfFeReNt CaSeS FoR tHe PaCmAn BiNaRy" ... using the cli is a typing pita.

Other than that arch is promising, but no gpg/hashes for packages is a major flaw to me.

/me takes off the tin-foil hat.

--- back on topic...

What I don't like about Slack?
- needs better imap email server (such as courrier)
- postfix in /extra would be nice.
- firefox (since it's static IMO should be in /opt)
- /var/lib/nfs/v4recovery is still missing on default install after 4 bug reports of it over time I've used Slackware.
- Slackware doesn't include much glib2/gtk2 apps; I see no reason why we typically are far back in revisions vs latest. (well I haven't built kde4 yet - so that may be different now that I think of it, but in the past, this was a big issue for me.)
- I wouldn't mind a bug-wiki of some kind, I feel bad when sending in a bug (which is rare) , cuz I have no idea if he already knows of the bug, and that I may be wasting his time with duplicity in reporting.
- I wouldn't mind seeing some kind of ncurses front end to make a rc.firewall script on install (but that's nit picking I guess) :)

But at the end of the day, I use Slackware cuz it annoys me *LESS* than any other distro :)

I'd agree with those two as well.
Well we sort of treat this forum as a kind of bug-wiki. Lots of people report bugs and others get a chance to verify them or let them know it's already identified.
The team have thrown the idea around but it's never been seen as a priority.

What he said. ;)

I agree on that point. I've had far less trouble with it than any other.
The only thing I don't like is that without something like GSB, I can't have Nautilus, and with those, it always seems to have some small complaint about DBus. It's always seemed to have more functionality than Konqueror/Dolphin to me.
Well, that and the fact that I *still* can't get off my habit of using certain gnome-panel apps. Need a way to run some of them on a KDE panel.

What I don't like about Slackware:
1. When installed on my wife's laptop, had to jump through hoops
to get wireless connection functional.
Then one day wireless connection just quit.
So I installed Knoppix to the hard drive.
Now wireless works like a champ and wife likes Knoppix better as well.
Wireless is built in to Knoppix. Why not Slackware? There is nothing
"extra" about laptops.

2. KDE4. That feature more or less forced me to use XFCE instead.

3. Poor library support for established OS apps such as Inkscape. Every
time I need to install one of these apps I have to go library chasing.

4. When slack 13 appeared Quanta Plus disappeared. I keep
a 12.1 partition around just for that one app.

Any Operating system exists to support applications. If established
apps like Inkscape, Scribus etc. require a set of libraries then those libraries
(and for that matter those apps themselves) should be included. Blaming the
app maintainers for using particular libraries is just ridiculous. Slackware is
a very minor part of their audience.

I have been using Slack since it came on a set of floppies. But it is trying my patience.

John Culleton

Installing wicd from /extra is jumping through hoops?

I wasn't aware of Slackware forcing me to do anything at anytime.

One has always had to do dependency checking in Slackware. Build what you want.

I have no clue what Quanta Plus is - although I realize it is important to you.

Its hard to believe you have been using Slackware since it came on floppies, and still not understanding the Slackware philosophy.

John, I have to agree with mlangdn, from what you've said it sounds like you'd be better off with a "Do everything for you" distro like PCLinuxOS. You do surrender a degree of control to the repository maintainers, but that's the price you pay for that sort of distro, and from what I've seen of it so far (still early days) it's actually very good.

Slackware64 13.1 so far. I must say that this version of Slackware appears to be the buggiest version that I've ever encountered (~13 years) while Slackware64 13.0 was probably one of the best. I simply can't believe what I've been experiencing ...

Bad Bulgarian localization.

I assume that you have a list of such bugs. Please share.

I feel the same way. It needs an official dependency checking PM. I also don't like it's best to do a full install and then remove un-needed apps.

I started out using Slackware & Debian and at the time both was one of the few distros that worked with my hardware and didn't try to take over the whole hard drive.

Now days I use the so-called easier distros, I've lost the lust of doing too much tinkering!

You need to search. My legitimate problems with the bugs in Slackware64 13.1 are posted all over this forum.

In the opinion of this 'end user,' 13.1 has been the most "trouble free" release I've used to date.

Agreed.........just installed it on a HP Pavilion dv7-3186cl, only thing I had to do after install was to get the Slackbuilds for my Broadcom WiFi.

Absence of HowTos for various wireless adapters, ndiswrapper configuration etc. A hardware list of wired/wireless adapters which work or doesn't work out of the box are welcomed.

A LiveCD for testdrive before an upgrade.

About "automatic dependencies checking"
 

I don't miss that in Slackware and now that we have slackpkg, things are even easier. I don't miss "automatic upgrade" either, and slackpkg is good enough at presenting you the proposed upgrades.

I have installed some other distributions recently in virtual machines and IMHO apt, yum and urpmi e.g. are not that bad, but dependencies problems which arise as soon as you begin to install "non official" packages for your distributions are not easily sorted out.

I like to be able to check (and modify if needed) the Slackbuild before making a package (think of what occurs when the package does some nasty chmod).

I don't like the bad habit of other distributions' packagers to cut software in thin slices and/or patching or "customizing" it only to look smart. For instance shipping some-package and some-package-dev separately, or stripping Firefox from its xulrunner internal engine.

To people complaining about having to install everything then remove what they don't use: unless you be really short on disk's space, why do you need to remove anything ?

I only wish we could have some more packages, in an official repository as space is limited on a DVD, e.g. corresponding to those among the slackbuilds available @ slackbuilds.org that do not depend on anything not included in a full Slackware install.

Huge thanks to Pat and the Slackware team.

I arrived at the end of 12.2 and upgraded to 13 and had nothing but troubles until I got lucky and it all came together...then along came 13.1 and lo I am struggling to get it up and running again...
Well thats what I like about Slack its making me *learn* but at the cost of being a complete and utter Slacker... LOL

You're the one sniveling about the number of errors. It's not my job to prove your point.

packages are hard to come by, and getting dependencies is sort of a hassle.

I think making your stance on things once is good, twice is pushing it but thrice is superfluous. Please cut it out.

You must surely mean "pre-compiled packages" and their dependencies - ?

What I don't like about Slackware, is that I have no complaints about it, :D.

I just stumbled across this thread and read all posts.

My first inclination was to post some "clever" remark, but that is beyond my mental abilities today!

Then I thought - seriously - what one thing do I not like about Slackware? If there were one thing I could change, what would it be?

... I am stumped!

Some things mentioned negatively by others, are things I love about Slackware!

Lilo is the default boot manager - I love lilo and cannot think of a singly grubby replacement that I would prefer! I know lilo is getting stale, but I see no reason to change in my lifetime!

No package dependency checking - again, this is a valuable feature! The slackbuild approach is simple, elegant even, the perfect approach in my (much under-rated) opinion! ;)

So, after some serious thought - I would not change ANYTHING about Slackware, except post-install! But that is the way it should be, and that is why Slackware is perfect!

Agreed! I just completed an install of Slackware 13.1 on my little Toshiba NB200 Netbook. Install went without a hitch. Installed wicd and it found my encrypted home wireless network instantly.
I love Slackware!

Bit late on the spanking there ;) Those posts were from Feb 2010 =)

Trolls looking for a fight on the "official Slackware" forum

Well I'm a faithful Slackware follower and I could probably list several things I don't like about Slackware if I put my mind to it. Constructive criticism is always helpful or at the very least interesting. That being said these things tend to devolve into flamewars but the thread itself is fine IMO.

I think that this thread is okay, it isn't overtly hostile. How is Ubuntu treating you, running well?

Heh, yeah, you're right! The point is still valid though, generally speaking.

Aknonadi/Strigi/Nepomuk being launched at startup without my will.

And the fact I have to set cyrillic fonts/keyboard mapping/ X keyboard language/encoding switching manually every time I install new release.

It's not as cute as Fluffy Linux. :rolleyes:

The official website contains (very) outdated information.

indeed I do, thank you for clarifying. :D

It sure does....

It's umm... "on the list" =)

I don't like people bashing slakware. bash is a great shell. so why are they always shelling slacky?

that's part of the legacy. if you want state of the (f)art websites telling all about the newest candy cane linux, go for the others

if you want to concentrate on LINUX and the thoughts behind it, keep things slack and simple. Slackware shalst not embrace the looks and feels of lesser distributions in favr of the windows pentiti who want to feel at rest in a cabdy cane style website.

Slack RULEZ!

Slack FOREVER!

Slack is the Uber Linux!

I hope you get the message now. :0)

I have no idea if you were trying to be funny or actually are that ignorant.