Reviews often unnecessarily "bash" Slackware
 

A little bit of rant here. Excuse me for my english, it is not my first language.
It happens every time. Every review of Slackware says it is "hard", "non user friendly", etc. Like this one, for example.

This part makes it looks like it is insanely hard to install what you want, forgetting to say that Slackware comes with a full KDE desktop (I dislike it but still) and a full XFCE desktop. It also forgets to talk about the incredible work of Alien Bob and all the people maintaning slackware packages and the slackbuilds.org website. To someone that doesn't know Slackware at all it will look like that you would have to become a distro maintainer yourself, keeping track of every single piece of software you would like to use. In my house I am running Slackware on my computer and Xubuntu on my old dad's PC and, to be honest, I often find it harder to get and maintain a new software on his PC than on mine (he can't do it on his own, he is sort of used to windows but not at all to linux).

Another thing that bothers me is how text/ncurses-based install process are "too hard" when they are pretty much straight-foward, read what you have on your screen, follow step by step and you are done.

It happens not only with Slackware but with Linux. You often find on articles trying to get people to switch Linux saying that "this distro is pretty easy bla bla bla you won't have to use any terminal command". I find that harmful, it is almost "demonizing" command line interfaces. People would still keep the idea that it is for "hackers" and it is "insanely hard" (like Slackware). Today, a lot of my daily usage is on the command line and I can say it is as easy (if not easier) and as comfortable as GUI interfaces. And, often, it is more powerful. I am not saying everyone should use command line, I am just saying people that are promoting/reviewing Linux should stop treating it as something "out of this world" nor "very hard to begginers".

Thanks for you attention folks, this was a rent as its finest, I've wrote it without thinking too much, I just wrote it.

you shouldn't take that review (or any other you randomly find on the internet) seriously, without trusting the reviewer first: in this specific case, as lonestar says in that article's comments, I also think the author doesn't even know what he's talking about.

I personally thought that the review was largely accurate.

The reviewer shows a typical distro hopper POV: judging only the installer and concluding with a screenshot of the default desktop (in this case of Ubuntu, funnily enough). Which of course says nothing about the actual usefulness of Slackware.

But from that biased view, we can learn something interesting about the Linux ecosystem and expectations of the people inside it:
That is how PC operating systems had worked for over 30 years. It took until 2012 before the most popular implementation called "Windows" got something like an app store. I've never seen other PC operating systems (like DOS, MacOS, OS X) being criticized for that.

That is not the fault of Slackware. If you had to create MSI packages on your own, convert ZIP or RAR archives to something else and occasionally compile your Adobe Creative Suite using Visual Studio to get a productive Windows workstation up and running, who would be criticized for that? Microsoft? I don't think so.

This statement says a lot about how independent software vendors treat Linux. And this is one of the main issues of the total failure of the Linux desktop. But that is not Slackware's fault. Slackware provides a unified and complete base operating system perfect for installing third party applications. But open source software developers decide to make that complicated!

The most popular and commercially successful operating systems don't provide automatic hierarchical dependency resolution, because they don't need anything else than flat dependencies. And resolving these is the job of the application developer and not one of the end-user or its operating system.

I think the review is biased in its presentation, but like dugan says, largely accurate. You can tell the author doesn't like it, and they present it in this way.

Well, it was accurate in reporting what the author thought but less accurate in describing reality.

a little quoting (just for laughs)
I doubt that reviewer ever get it installed. ;)

I am at peace with what I use.

Those who rag Linux in general, are usually those who are 'lazy' brainers. By that I mean, they can think and breathe simultaneously without assistance, but prefer to take the 'easy way' like an animal of the forest. Then become so accustomed to having things done for them, that actually having to think, even a little bit, hurts too much and it's easier to just say it's too difficult so that makes it a Bad Thing.

For example...I know a person who will tell you how smart and logical they are, yet will go into an almost fit of rage if you try to get them to learn to use a cellphone and especially to 'text' on it. Their excuse - it's too difficult to figure out. (yeah, it's the kind of person you'd love to smack the crap out of!)

Haven't they,almost by definition, contradicted themselves? Or maybe they consider you to be the kind of person they are, not thinking in detail about their statement, and making them prove themselves. Boy, weren't they surprised when you proved otherwise?

Agreed! Thanks ponce for a good chuckle this morning. Funny stuff. :)

I have noticed a lot Linux-ers complaining about this bug and that bug, and I can't help but think 'why don't you try Slackware'?

I also noticed someone who is newer to Linux trying to install two programs (I think it was Skype and Virtualbox on an Ubuntu derivative), and apt just wasn't having it (it wanted to remove one to install the other). Why do people think dependency resolution is so great? Because so many distros do it, it must be good? That is nonsense. I absolutely love Slackware and recently converted a long time (7-year) Ubuntu user to it. He now raves about its stability, how bug-free it is, and how much you learn while using it.

I am so grateful to have the opportunity to use a system that respects the user like Slackware.

Thank you to all who maintain it! (Pat, Eric, Robby, Willy and countless others)

;-)

To touch on the comment about Slackware being less user friendly, and harder to use...

"We choose to do these things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard." - President John F. Kennedy

Things that are harder make you learn more, and without learning more, you understand and know less. Society today is engineered to give everyone the easy way out, and not show them if you try harder, learn more, and chose more difficult paths in life, the outcome is a greater reward in the end of both knowledge, experience, and payout.

Slackware is a hand up into the Linux experience that teaches you everything possible it can, not a handout that does everything for you, teaching you nothing.

An old GNU/Linux mentor of mine (Bruno of Amsterdam - brunolinux.com) once told me that if I wanted to email and play online, I should run Ubuntu. If I wanted to learn Linux, run Slackware. I chose the latter. There's no great mystery to Slackware. It's just a solid and stable distribution. You don't have to be a Unix guru to figure out how to use it. You just need to make some effort to learn it. It's not "point & click" Linux. It requires a little knowledge and intelligence to use and maintain it. That being said, maybe it's just a coincidence, but I've found that most Slackers are pretty damned smart. ;)

Later...

~Eric

It is not actually that hard. My problem here is people making it looks like is something really hard. That is harmful but I've got your point.

Slackware is hard for users who are unwilling to read the ample provided documentation. If a user takes the time to adequately prepare for their first install of Slackware they will prevail.
I do take a look at the grass that appears greener, but, I always return home to Slackware.
Slackware is my home. :)

I don't know why a right minded Linux person will have a problem with Slackware. Seriously! ;)

Regards.

I don't see any reason to use other distro (yeah i am a fanboy xD)

It's not an excuse for them, but reviewers have very tight schedules. At best, they can try to install a distro, play around with it for a couple of hours, spend another couple of hours on writing and then have to send their article to the editor in order to keep the deadline.

If they do not happen to use Slackware for many years, they just don't have the chance to learn and understand some of the best things about:

• It takes way less effort than any other system I have ever used to maintain it. Despite the seemingly comfortable package management systems of other distros with bells and whistles like dependency resolution (which IMHO is not something evil per se, but just something that is very difficult to do right), they all need a lot more affection and love than this good ole work horse known as Slackware. It took me several years to understand that, myself, and I interpret "Slack" as "relaxed" or "easy going" from a user's as well as an system manager's point of view, since then. In other words: It just works! But how should a writer without this year-long experience have a chance to know that?
• Another, similar point: Slackware can be upgraded without doing a fresh install over many, many years and releases. Again, this is practical experience that grows confidence over years. At least, most of the reviewers know about the excellent reputation of Slackware regarding stability and long-term robustness. They just don't (cannot) understand the simplicity of this. They think, it takes super-smart people to keep it going. But I prove them wrong. ;)
• Finally, as I have expressed in many other posts here, one VERY important aspect of Slackware is the community. Whenever I had an issue that I was not able to solve myself, I found a helping hand here at LinuxQuestions.net, or received great support directly from the Slackware crew. Even my dullest quetions were answered with great patience, explaining me the often simple mechanics in Slackware, that I was unable to see myself after being spoiled by too much overbred "high-tech".

These are huge advantages that, however, only appear when using Slackware for a longer period of time. They are over-shadowed by the short and volatile impressions you may get from just installing and using it for only a few hours. The installer of Slackware works just fine and let's you do things like root partition encryption that are much harder to achieve with other distros. E. g., for my OpenSUSE system (I still have one) I did the encryption by running the Slackware installation, first, without installing any packages, before I installed OpenSUSE, as the OpenSUSE installer would not allow me to do it the way I wanted it. But this is a rather complex setup that would never be covered in an average distro review. Which is ok, as only few users have a need for that kind of information, and most of them are probably Slackers, already. ;) But the OpenSUSE installer just "looks better". And like with cars, design sells.

gargamel

Slackware by comparison to other distributions is fairly straight forward in documentation. When I first used it over 10 years ago, I found its installation far easier to use than other distributions out there including, at the time, Red Hat, Mandrake, SuSE, and Debian.

Harder in Slackwareology means reading more documentation, learning to manually do things, and learn proper UNIX etiquette.

To be honest, Slackware scares the crap out of a lot of radicals in the GNU/Linux community because it promotes proper UNIX etiquette, simplicity, and doing things the UNIX-way and not just the Linux way, and some would like nothing better than to see Slackware shut down and cast aside. Slackware, LFS, Gentoo, and several others are a major thorn in the side of the big brand of Linux who'd like nothing better than to be the next Microsoft and are trying to get their way thanks to several developers, in my opinion.

The truth is that Americans, as well as most people, I think are superficial. If it LOOKS hard then it is hard. It does not matter if it actually is hard. It just LOOKS hard. And CLI and text based installs LOOK hard.

I think you might be right about that, and that may be why it receives bad reviews. Overall it is actually easy to install, especially if you read about the install process first.

Personally, I wouldn't select a distro based on a review. Why ? Because most distros are free and I can try them and see for myself. Reviews are for things that cost money, and therefore would require buying first.

Probably not, and the last paragraph is slightly inaccurate. Here's the FTFY version:
It seems the Slackware maintainer expects a user to be able to read documentation and even type. The horror!

Free distribution versus paid-for distributions are fickle at best. No two distributions are exactly the same to warrant reviews based on comparisons between them.

Slackware is free, yet even if you buy a copy, you aren't getting any less quality in support as fairly much the community here at LQ is the main support vector.

The best distributions in my opinion have the best communities that back them up like Slackware and LQ.

Bad reviews often come from biased groups and individuals who are paid off, hired by, or affiliated with certain companies who want bad reviews pushed out. The only real bad reviews I've known are bad reviews, are those from non-affiliated testing groups who do full comparisons with re-reviews 3, 6, and 9 months from their original reviews in a follow up.

News Media
 

When their ratings are low they'll drop a headline: "[Distribution] is dying!"

A lot of negative reviews of Slackware are so similar that I believe they're based on a template donated to reviewers by someone who tried and failed with it in 1994:
Very rarely do they mention SlackBuilds, sbopkg, and queuefiles.
I didn't read any reviews, positive or negative, before I installed Slackware 10.0 in late 2004/early 2005, just a brief article about installing it. If I had read any, I'd have ignored them, preferring to rely on my own judgement - which is infallible. ( :rolleyes: ;) :) )

I came to Slackware, because I was using Ubuntu, SuSe and other distros for a long time before.

I hopped from distribution to distribution, hoping to find the perfect one - but instead my collections of things that I hate just grew bigger and bigger.

After a while I hated:

• Bloated kernels and packages with a lot of custom patches (Ubuntu) - in reviews often referred to as "high compatiblity"
  
• Senseless GUIs that only work halfway through the system just because developers think that "Apple is the best" (Dreamlinux) - in reviews often referred to as "state of the art that doesn't have to hide behind the beauty of modern OSes"
  
• GUI changes just because developers think that "we really have to have a new version" (Yoper, switching to KDE 4.0 and ditching 3.x) - okay seriously, even the reviews bashed the new KDE release, so there is nothing to say about that.
  
• Dependency management (nearly all of the distributions I used) - You want to install Skype? Yeah, why not delete pulseaudio? Oh wait you can't because you need Skype for that - in reviews often referred to as "simple package management without any hassles")

I think at some time I was really angry at the Linux world, because I knew that the potential of doing things better than on Windows was SO GREAT - but every little distribution just kicked some standards down the drain for eyecandy or various other reasons and made it difficult to use it.

At some point I even wanted to build Linux from scratch to just use the kernel and packages like they were intended to, but I remember reading a note on a news site (I think it was golem.de) about "the oldest distribution in existance" and users bashing their head against that article because of the stupid Slackware not delivering any packages or resolving dependencies or "why the hell doesn't it start up properly, I don't have X") - and so I finally found the one distribution that is just doing it right by reading an article that the majority found bad.

I conclude: Bad reviews aren't so bad. It just depends on how you read them.

I started with 10.1. I had read horrors about Slackware being as user-friendly as "a nest of rattle snakes". My distro of choice at that time was discontinued (LBA Linux) and I was not very happy with Fedora Core. So, I read everything at Slackware's web-site, even printed some pages (I still keep them :) ) and gave it a try. It was stunningly fast, didn't have one particularly annoying bug in X11* and behaved very stable.

That's it.

---
* mouse cursor appeared as a square of vertical lines of inverted colour

A classic review of Slackware by someone who never got past the boot up screen or never installed it.

A couple of posters before me made note that the review was largely accurate. Perhaps I read the wrong article? I really fail to see it as accurate.

It's possibly the worst I've ever read, worse than those by She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. It's misleading, misinformed, misguided, and misbegotten.

Don't...just don't!! Or death to Slackware shall be chanted again! :D:D:D

Cai...Cait...Caitl...no, I dare not for the sake of my immoral, I mean immortal, soul!

Is it true that if you chant her name three times while standing in front of a mirror in a candle-lit room, the face of Anti-Bob will appear in the mirror?

Which one?

Yeah, and Slackware's server goes down.
Sorry, can't name her. Last time I did, my hair fell out.
EDIT
Here's the kind of trouble she's caused in the past:
http://www.itworld.com/it-management...-way-premature

I've sent moisespedro a private message.

Jesus, this woman is annoying

IMHO Slackware is very straight forward:

1) Boot the DVD
2) Setup your partitions (cfdisk makes it a very simple exercise)
3) Run setup and follow the instructions.
4) Reboot, run xorgconfig, and run startx.

Not too mention there is the slackbook that can guide you through the whole process.

Now where things can get a bit more complex is if you want to compile your own kernel to optimize your system--but this is true for all distros.

Cheers,
George

After all the distros I've used Slackware might be a bit "geekier" than the others but it is a lot easier to maintain.

BAHAHAHAHA! I had forgotten about that until just now. Thanks for drudging that up, Brian. ;)

Just knowing of people like her makes me wonder why the aliens refuse to visit us here on Earth...

Maybe people like her ARE the visiting aliens. ;)

Not Borg or Vogon, apparently.

People like her remind me of...

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Pakled