I am curious to know how Void Linux is to use. If you have tried it or use it, what can you say about it?

I am also interested to know some user-experience about void.

I am also hunting a 32bit based Slackware for old machines I maintain merely for simple database serving and clients which wanted to upgrade each stable Slackware release.

Void claims to be simplistic and fully Slackware compatible.

By the way Salix has released its 32bit Slackware 14.2 version also, if this info is relevant to you.

Thanks ahead.

Void Linux has no relationship to Slackware (although they are both avoiding systemd). Void is not a fork of any distro, as the package manager and build system have been built from scratch. I run Slackware on my desktop, and Void on a couple of BeagleBone Blacks where I send backups using BorgBackup. I like Void a lot, I think it's an excellent distribution for an embedded system. It's probably nice on the desktop too, but I have no experience with that as I prefer my workstation to have the stability and minimal upgrade policy that Slackware provides (nothing but security patches).

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I should say that my experience with the xbps package manager has been very good, and runit appears to be a clean and sensible init system. Although I'm not actually a huge fan of rolling releases, I've not had any breakage so far.

Many distros have 32-bit packages. I think distrowatch will let you search on that. Maybe look for i686 or x86 but not sure.

Two reasons I look at void, runit and the rolling release. But maybe it's too rolling because I read that if you try to update while packages are getting built it won't let you. Now that's fresh!

But not that big of a problem because it's not an automatic update/upgrade.
I like the rolling release due to having support sooner for new hardware like gfx or steam controller, etc.


Runit seems good as systemd-less setup but I don't know if it's seamless. Arch without systemd is not seamless.

What do you mean by update packages while they're being built? Void is a binary distribution, so there's no need to build from source. When updates are available from the main repo, they will appear as available after an "xbps-install -Su" command.

Yeah fair enough, lots of people like rolling release. I definitely don't want it on anything really critical (like the machine I do my work on), since I only need it work, and then keep working. As long as the hardware is supported from the start, then cool.

I personally prefer not to use systemd, but what do you mean by "seamless"?

Not sure where I was reading about it but there's a waterfall page showing build results and if they're building a package then when you try to update you can't. You have to try again later.


Agreed, it would be insane to update constantly and expect functionality to be consistent.
And no one forces the update and they don't happen automatically. But they're there if you need
something new that fixes a problem. An example would be if you try a new gfx card but it needs new Mesa. No one really wants to download source and build a new Mesa and dependencies like xserver. But on a rolling release you know you can update and get that stuff.

I mean that you really don't notice anything different using runit. While with Arch and using openrc it's not seamless. You run into problems relating to systemd incompatibility.

Ahh ok. Well, that's probably true for distributions that have adopted systemd. Being a lot more than just an init system, it's quite invasive in terms of internal changes, so I imagine it would be fairly difficult to maintain the two flavours side by side (even documentation would be tough). Void doesn't have systemd at all, so there's not much to worry about there.

For the other points;

I don't know of any distribution that would show users an update while it's still being packaged though!? Anyway, there are no such problems on Void (or any other distribution that I've used). If the packages aren't built, I'm sure they won't be pushed to the update repo.

Using a rolling release and not actually applying any updates would defeat the purpose of it though. The point with the Slackware way (which is just something that I personally like), is that there's a stable base that does not change (except for security patches). Rolling release is a moving target (which is fine if you want that). Void is rolling, which I would normally avoid, but as I said, it seems to be working well enough so far. But my experience running Void is only with homemade backup servers, I have not tried it for use on the desktop.

I too, would like to know how Void Linux is. Might try installing it on a spare desktop soon.

Cool, installing in a VM is always an easy option too.

I have been using VOID LINUX for way over a year now, maybe two, and have never had any real problems with its OS itself. the install is really fast, updating it is really fast. the fact that it is a rolling release keeps everything updated to the latest stable release of everything one has installed. meaning the benift of haiving the latest added fetures within that software where others don't and if they did decided to it would break furture updates of not only that software, but other software that also relies on some of the same dependcies. it will become out of sync with everything.

I have incountered some problems with the software itself like right now with xcfe4 not allowing me to pick a directory to use for desktop photos, it is only allowingme to select the entire hard drive, but this is not a VOID LINUX issue it is a xfce4 issue.

Void linux I believe is a solid distro. it is written by one person and what he did seems to work rather nicely. five years he spent on just developing the xbps system VOID uses to install and maintain itself.

I see no negitve comments I can offer towards this distro, and I have tired more distros then I can remember, and every main line one from Debian, and a lot of its derivatives, Slackware, its own self, Ubuntutu which is a derivative of Debian, and redhat, openSUSE, Fedora, Sabayon/Gentoo, elementary, and a bunch of others, along with obscure ones I found on distrowatch, even solaris, and freeBSD before settling on Void Linux.

keep in mind most main distros all have their own way of installing apps and upkeep. commands used, but I find this one simple, easy to use, and easy to maintain.
I highly recommended it.

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I've tried it on 2 different machines, doesn't finish booting and kernel panics. I tried it in a virtualbox, and it booted, but didn't have a driver for the NIC (this is amazing, I have NEVER used an OS that didn't have drivers for Virtualbox's NIC). IMO, Void linux has MAJOR issues, I can't remember the last time I used an OS that had such poor hardware support.

I had actually just downloaded it again last night to try AGAIN on my Yoga, and no changes, kernel panics shortly after beginning boot.

Void Linux dude go to VOID LINUX FORUM HERE and post your info and stats and stuff see what they say...

MOD:
as far as live iso on VBox I had to use a net install iso of void. establish network connection through the VBox settings then install it .. with the other ones I could never get control of the ctrl+alt+F(keys) due to the way Vbox controls them keys.