1. KISS
2. I dunno. Stallman is right that hardware drivers should be open source.
3. Is the ncurses setup that frightening? The huge kernel picks up everything. The setup is pretty much like installing Windows. Pick where you are going to install and install. I guess it could be simplified to just full install. I have fond memories of the 90s. For one thing the world didn't suffer the horrors of George W. Bush and the horrors he unleashed.

Hehe I very respectfully disagree. At least in my limited experience, Windoze is by far the worst to install. It basically only works when everything magically works. But most of the time something breaks, and there's no way to even figure out what.

The 100% hardware support is a myth, of course, as I've had tremendous difficulties even with machines which were designed for Windoze. Whenever I tried to install a slightly different (usually newer) version, or even the same version, but not from the vendor restore partition, I would typically run into setups with half the drivers not working or just plain not being there for me.

But beyond that, hardware issues are basically impossible to troubleshoot with Windoze.

And it tramples all over your hard drives, all of them, even without any apparent need, turning dual-boot installs into a minefield.

And gods forbid it discovers an old registry on one of them hard drives, for in that case it will ask for your permission, but then ignore you (tm), and use that fossil to "guide" your new installation anyway.

And it needs to be activated, which usually works, but sometimes, you guessed it, just doesn't (tm).

And it comes with 0 (zero) useful apps, so everything, EVERYTHING, starting with your backup/restore solution typically has to be post-installed to make the machine even remotely useful. I'll stop here, because this is just off the top of my head, and I don't want to waste my time recalling other offenses...

3 members found this post helpful.

philosophicals? we don't need no stinking philosophicals

Seems you use ubuntu, setup slackware 64 14.2 in a vm and try it yourself, then ask questions here.

Most slackware users dive in to try some other softwares out, research, then if something goes not right, ask questions here. I know I do.

1. This post last sentence ( there's a Philosophy reference too, if you look up a little )

2. ???

3. do your due diligence and this forums a friendly bunch.

Yes, welcome back matey. I thought you'd been eaten by a bunch of angry cats!

LOL, no. I was sulking because I'd got two warnings for going OT in one thread, so I thought <expletive deleted> LQ!!!
Thanks all, for the welcome back messages.

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@ bassmadrigal;

It doesn’t hurt to check the community’s perspective. Followers’ psychology tell something about their leaders’ too.

Maybe you shouldn’t jump to premature conclusions? Not all investors wear suits. Not all cows are black etc.

Me and millions of other Linux users.

As previously implied, any extra ‘little bit of work’ means production time wasted when a similar product accomplishes the same goal. As already said, what constitutes “a little bit of work” for some may be nonsensical waste of time for others.

Do you even realize what a philosophical discussion implies? Both sides bring arguments to support their statements. From my part, I’ve done enough. Others here? Not so much.

Most of the replies to my posts were borderline ad hominem to say the least. No wonder that Slackware is perceived as immature on so many levels…

Yes, fine, but still -- thanks for nothing.

@ tazza

Really? Then start a campaign for giving up the mouse in all PCs. But don’t blame me when people will cannon the rotten eggs and tomatoes in your direction.

@ enorbet;

That has nothing to do with the terminal. You can have easy terminal setup and clumsy GUI; and viceversa.

It just happens that the majority of users prefer the GUI, and for good reason. Stop implying they are stupid just because they don’t prefer the terminal.

Would you give your non-tech family members smartphones with Slackware installed where they would often have to resort to terminal commands or would you rather give them iphones/Android? Stop being a hypocrite.

Straw man... Read my posts again. Properly this time. (by the way use the last word before parenthesis as a hint)

@ qweasd;

Golly, what part of ‘less time spent installing and post install configuring’ was that ambiguous and subjective to grasp?

Take two live DVS/USBs/whatever; one with Slackware, the other with Fedora. Give them to a newbie who knows how to install Windows and Ubuntu. Measure the time it takes in each case to have a complete workable system (software dependencies solved, of course).

Then cry again that you don’t understand what "User-friendliness" is…

@ Chuang Tzu and others

Good luck on your journey, too. I know you guys have good intentions and probably in the end we all want the same thing. But let’s cut down on aggression, please.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a time machine to catch!

As far as user-friendliness is concerned, I think sbopkg + queuefiles would be less daunting for a Linux newbie than apt (the other package manager I've had most experience with). With sbopkg -i whatever.sqf, you get the list of what's going to be installed; with apt install whatever, you get what's going to be installed, what's recommended, and possibly what's going to be removed. Which do you think would be more confusing?

It seems that YOU don't know what a philosophical question is about... You are talking about marketing, HMI, strategy, tastes... NOTHING about philosophy...

I'd add to that that you know nothing about computing but try to sneak and judge a selected target community.

Although it seems that you speak Troll very well.

2 members found this post helpful.

What times did you measure when you ran this experiment?

3 members found this post helpful.

I remember installing Slackware as a rank beginner. The first distro I've tried was Red Hat version foo, back in 1999 or so. I've spent a week trying to get dial-up to work. The audio never worked.

A few years later, on my second foray into this side of the divide, I've decided to try the most beginner friendly distros of the day. Namely, Mandrake, and SuSE. It was quite obvious someone has spent a great deal of time trying to get things just right, so that I wouldn't have to fire up a text editor.

But invariably, I ended up editing the X and ALSA config files by hand. This involved reading hours of man pages and other documentation.

Then I got fed up and thought: how bad could it be to cut out the middle man and just take control of this whole thing?

As a rank beginner who did know know how to write a basic shell script, I printed out the documentation, got to work, and haven't looked back.

I remember a random bit about RMS getting his computer set up by the FSF employees or something.

My personal take on RMS: I've never met the man. I don't know much about his personality or failings, but I think he deserves some credit both for his early technical contributions, and for -- to the best of my knowledge -- starting this whole free thing, which has gradually morphed into something else. It seems there still are a good few people who care about the original idea.

@ wishwell: What I don't understand is why you ask Slackware users if they would like it to be different of what it is, say more like Ubuntu or Fedora, as then they would probably be using another distribution.

This doesn't mean that some people don't try to add some features to Slackware to make it more easily accessible to a broader audience, including as you wrote "less time spent installing and post install configuring": have a look at my signature for a clue.

But doing that does not imply that Slackware itself should change. And I bet[1] that it won't fundamentally change in the way you seem to suggest in a foreseeable future, so this discussion can lead to nothing.

[1] I wrote "I bet" because Patrick Volkerding is the sole decider of Slackware's evolution and he generally doesn't make public his plans.

1 members found this post helpful.

Some people want ready made furniture, some are content with flatpack and a screwdriver, and some want a full set of woodworking tools and a pile of timber. We each pick what best fits our needs. It doesn't mean the other two choices are wrong for someone else.

A clean Slackware install should be viewed as a starting-point, not an end-point. It's not the ready made furniture in this analogy.


P.S.

Last time I tried out Fedora, it took far more effort to get it how I wanted than slackware did.

2 members found this post helpful.

Same experience for me, but with other pre-digested distributions.

I suppose one reason for that is that even if you do know what to do to fix the problem, the system actually tries to prevent you from doing that.

Why would a VC even care about the community with Slackware? The community doesn't dictate where it will head. This isn't like Debian where you have a board that votes on things. There is a reason Pat has the BDFL title, he alone controls the direction of Slackware.

Maybe you should quit being vague in your posts and forcing people to jump to conclusions.

Don't you think if Pat was interested in having the most users he would've changed the distro to make it more Ubuntu like? It is stated right on the website that Slackware aims 'to produce the most "UNIX-like" Linux distribution out there', not the most Windows-like point-and-click Linux distribution.

Why do you assume you are the intended target of Slackware?

Many say that Slackware without heavy modification isn't even capable of being in most production environments due to a lack of pam and kerberos. Again, it seems like you're not the intended target for Slackware.

This is a stupid statement. The way you were intending this to end up is the same as if I, and Android fan, were to go to an iOS forum and ask why iOS is stripped of functionality and designed for the most technologically inept people to be able to operate. Of course, it can be labeled a "philosophical discussion", but in reality, my question on their forum was only posed for me to be a troll. You could say the same thing on going to a Camaro forum and asking why the Camaro is better than the Mustang. You're going to get biased opinions from people who prefer the Camaro over the Mustang. Or a Star Wars fan going to a Trekkie convention and asking why Han Solo is better than Picard. They are only done to rile people up and were never intended to have a proper discussion on the subject. We prefer Slackware over the other distros. We find it easy to use. We were willing to discuss the subject with you.

Wow. And out it comes. You come in posting vague questions stating Slackware isn't "user friendly", but don't quantify it at all. Then you get on us for "jumping to conclusions", when that was the only possible outcome (unless you were just expecting us to agree with you). We've asked what you find difficult about Slackware and you refuse to answer without beating around the bush. At that point, the only reasonable conclusion is that you found Slackware to be too difficult. You set yourself up for that (probably on purpose so you could then direct this attack at us).

You mean, thanks for answering all your questions? You came in with the conclusion that Slackware is too hard for you to use. Then when we point that out to you, so say that we're immature. Fine. If being "immature" allows us to keep our niche distro rather than some mainstream thing that tries to cater to the masses.

Why do you find it so difficult to think that users might be interested in a distro that you aren't? Have you asked these same questions on the Arch and Gentoo forums? I'd expect they'd react in a similar fashion and would determine that neither of those OSes are right for you either.

And there's still plenty of people who prefer stick shift over automatic transmissions. It doesn't make one or the other wrong. Stop implying there's only one way for a distro to behave.

No, but once I set up Slackware on my mother's computer, she never needed to access the commandline. I administered her computer for her remotely (many just keeping it up to date, since nothing else would break). If my mother, who still doesn't have a smartphone because she doesn't like technology, can use Slackware, then anyone can.

How often do you install and configure your machine? I do it whenever a new Slackware version comes out. Sometimes I even skip a version since things are still running smoothly. Or do you think that Slackware is aimed to be deployed in a professional environment? Where does it state that? Slackware doesn't state what its intended use is. Mainly because it is provided in a vanilla enough state that anyone can modify it to be what they want. Do you need PAM? Then you can add it like several different projects have. At least one has even added systemd.

Slackware is like a bundle of wood. You can use it to make a door, a chair, a table, or even a treehouse. If you want a pre-built treehouse, then why are you looking at a bundle of wood? If you want a pre-configured client for a professional environment, then as we've said many, many times, Slackware probably isn't for you.

There it is. It had to make an appearance. I'm surprised it took this long. Slackware purposefully does not resolve dependencies. If you do a full install, then there is no reason to resolve dependencies, because Pat has done it for you.

Seriously, why is it so hard to imagine that the installer is intended to be that way? Maybe it is done specifically to weed out people like you who want everything in a pretty clicky interface. Yes, that may not be what the masses want, but Slackware hasn't been used by the masses for a while, yet it hasn't changed its roots. The reason? Because Pat has a clear vision of what he wants Slackware to be. And it isn't some point and click replica of another distro. Slackware is unique, and while that may not appease everyone, it does make its users feel at home.

We were never crying about that. We were asking what you considered to be not user-friendly in Slackware. There's a lot of answers people can come up with. Some may say that trucks aren't as user friendly as cars because you have to climb up to get in them. Or they may say cars aren't as user friendly as trucks since you can't see traffic as well as a truck. Or neither are as user friendly as an SUV or minivan due to passenger and/or covered cargo capacity. User friendly is HIGHLY subjective, but you don't seem to understand that.

It's good thing I have nothing going on at work and was easily able to waste my time responding to this nonsense.

9 members found this post helpful.

That is true. Microsoft will use partitions you haven't selected and have tried to hide from Windows. I stopped using NTFS for file partitions because of that. Also you need to have drivers for important things such as internet. Also without video drivers you had like what a 640x480 browser window to go look for the binaries. Slackware will get you a running PC after setup. I was thinking about the partitioning and installation of whats on the disc. Vendors make terrible Windows install discs. The ones from Microsoft are more functional.

Anyway this thread should be locked.

1 members found this post helpful.