Spec: Athlon XP 2ghz+, 256mb ram shard with prosavage 4 video, 60gb hd, genaric sound, cdrw, 19" flat screen, wacom, yadda yadda...

I've tried Fedora, Mandrake, Red Hat 9 - I found them clunky and at times full of issues.

I got as far as slapping the gentoo cd in and I looked at it dumbly, not knowing what to do.


This is my only computer, windowsXP is too bloated for me...

I use my computer for some, I think, simple things. I make websites, so I edit html, css, php, perl, and javascipts. I do digital art - paintings, web graphics, icons, skins for applications, doodles, scan art and photographs for touching up or repair. Download Digicam pics, I even make custom fonts for things.

My reason for liking Linux is twofold - Great community, and my input on software I may use can help it improve.

I need something that will teach a semi-beginner Linux, I need something I can do my web/art stuff with, as well as play music and chat in gaim (or equivilant), browse the net on firefox... Maybe find a game to play or something if I am bored. But most importantly I need to do my art.

Is Slackware for me, and if so, how should I go about doing this?

I think you might have come to the right place - I have just moved to Slack from Mandrake and find the learning curve very constructive. At the same time it seems to do all the things that Mandrake did, but makes you work a bit harder in the process. However, I would suggest that you re-post with a different subject, more descriptive of what you are asking for. At the moment, not to put too fine a point on it, it sounds like the sort of pornographic emails that I delete without further ado.

did. thanks.

Gentoo's website actually has very simple step by step documentation to install. It has a printer friendly version. I would suggest trying gentoo for several reasons. First, you actually have to do some stuff to install, which helps you learn how it is set up. It is probably the most lengthy install, but it is also very educational. Second, package management is much easier with gentoo. If you know your CLI extremely well, and enjoy typing ./configure, make, make install everytime you want to install a new program, then slack is okay. HOwever, gentoo's portage is an easy way to take care of all of that for you. Gentoo's forum is awesome too. Just some thoughts.

Hmm, so the things I read about Gentoo being akin to pulling teeth are unfounded? :P

Gentoo is a hard install, actually not so much hard, but long, if you want to install gentoo with xf86 and kde it could take over a week! I do recommend slack for you, for Web pages use quanta ( included with slack), for editing css perl java javascripts etc use kwrite (comes with KDE included in slack), and for art use The GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program) also included in slack. I think slack would be a perfect distro for you to use, more stable than mandrake, and easier than gentoo.

Slack's installpkg installation system is a doddle - even easier than rpms I reckon. The more time I spend with Slackware the better I like it - small, fast, simple, solid and instructional. Even rpms and tarballs can be easily converted to slackware packages so they end up in the package database with personalised explanations. rpm2tgz and checkinstall do those jobs.

You need more knowledge than for Mandrake but once you have it I think running the distro is actually easier as you have a much clearer idea of what you are doing. You do not need a huge knowledge of command line as a lot can be done by simple editing of plain text config files.

PS I have found this forum to be very useful, with lots of helpful folk.

I agree with everything you guys have said, but for me it still came down to package management. It is difficult to track and to uninstall some things. Not everything installs using slacks installer. Granted, slack is cool and you can learn a lot from using it. As long as package management isn't an issue, go with slack. But if you never try gentoo, you'll never know.

Slack has SWareT which works in a similar way to apt-get. That is pretty invaluable for upgrades and installs.

i was having the same impression on Gentoo too. It's portage system really shine here. But the time taken to compile stuff is really something to surmount. I feel that Gentoo is ahead of it's time, it's a distro built for the future, where broadband and fast machines like the Athlon64 3400+ or higher are a common sight. Otherwise, Slack is the one that fits into the middle ground, the other one is Debian that have APT and uses binary. Just my

Well said. Gentoo does have its GRP install which takes about 30 minutes. Then all you have to do is update your system if you want to. I don't like debian because the installer is a monster and it's way behind (stable is anyways--go ahead, flame me). Slackware is a good middle ground though.

Wow, swaret looks a lot like portage in it's ability. Is it a hassle to set up?

swaret is a cool dude. only gripe i have is why cant slackware include it into it's fold? why it is a separate developement? make it a std within Slackware (i don't know how it can be done maybe partnership or just get the swaret guys to come onboard as a sub team of slack). Slack by itself is cool, KISS is cool but swaret can make it cooler

sorry, spiffdoodle, i am not going to post anymore on these as it is not answering your question.