http://cre.fm/archiv

In german, from October 2015

Lennart Poettering talking about his first experience with linux- using Slackware!
circa 1995. He did not have such an easy time with slackware.

The Slackware part of the interview starts around the 13 minute mark.

His second distro was redhat 5.0.

Hmmm ...

Many 15-year old individuals would have found Slackware Version 3.0 difficult back in 1995 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lennart_Poettering ...

I was ~40 Y.O. in 1995, and although I started using UNIX while at Berkeley in 1981 / 1982, and I was running Interactive UNIX as my main, and only OS at home, I too found Slackware Linux difficult back in those days.

But, boy hodwy ! Being a long-time UNIX User I certainly did see the HUGE potential of Linux.

Been here ever since and I've not looked back.

Just saying

-- kjh

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Translation: "I've been using Windows until 98, but at the time my buddies recommended Slackware, so I installed Slackware from all these stupid floppies, and I didn't understand anything and I found it stupid. Slackware was one of the first Linux distributions, and seen from today it's appalling and crazy, I didn't understand what was the point of it, why do people go to all these lengths to work with command lines while at the same time you can do things graphically with Windows 95 or Windows 98, so I quickly got rid of it and erased it and I concluded Linux wasn't for me, but things didn't stay that way, because after some time, I bought Redhat 5.0 with a buddy, and this already came on CD, and things were a bit more evolved, and since that day Linux has always been on my computer."

Well.

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the 90's were a rough time for documentation.

Interesting to hear the guy in his native language. A breezy talker.

Also nice to look back and see how all distros have grown into maturity.

I'm thinking back to a yesteryear when kernels were still small enough to fit on a single floppy..

His 15-year old self already showed his adult behavior in a nutshell. In short:

1. Try out $TECHNOLOGY.
2. Fail to understand $TECHNOLOGY.
3. Call $TECHNOLOGY stupid.

Cheers,

Niki (busy writing the last chapters of the new Slackware-based Linux Administration Guide for my french editor Eyrolles)

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I would like to know what he would have done if the "things graphically" done, did not work....

I also began with windows (3.10) , but after trying Microsoft C compiler (in the early 90s) I had nothing to do but flee. An intermediate step between windows and linux what MSDOS port of gcc by DJ Delorie.

I was so relieved when I discovered the Linux command line! I was already familiar with DOS's command.com, but it was so-o-o primitive compared with a proper shell. And in those days I was not comfortable using a mouse. Using bash was like finding an old friend again.

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Niki, you can not focus on facts, right, you have to put in some personal flaming against a person you do not even know personal.
It would have been too nice to just focus on the translation and keep your biased interpretation for you.
And btw, what is the largest docker farm or the most resource constrained embedded device you have to write software for that makes you confident about speaking about $TECHNOLOGY?
Niki, always having an opinion also about $PERSON, not just about $TECHNOLOGY, no matter how incompetent and arrogant it sounds.
You can move to France but you will never get rid of the Austrian Grossmaul in you :-)
Servas!

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The way the human mind works, we always find it easier to accept ideas that come from people we like and respect. Why do you think politicians are always trying to make themselves likeable? Why don't they just present their policies to the electorate and say "OK, I'm a scumbag but this is how the country ought to be run all the same". People just wouldn't vote for that.

I've read a lot of the systemd flame war literature and I've noticed how much of it is about Poetering himself rather than his ideas. He comes over as bumptious and conceited, and his partner Kay Sievers is so quarrelsome that he even managed to start a feud with Linus Torvald himself. That kind of thing puts people's backs up. Maybe it wouldn't if we were Vulcans, but we're only human.

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I started with Slackware 3.4 in 1998. Slackware wasn't particularly difficult for a Linux distro. Slackware was average.

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When was zipslack?

It was a command line linux that you could use from a Zip disk (100Mb) and I learned the (very) basics on it.

Then I paid actual money for a copy of the Sun Java Desktop which was nothing to do with Java, it was a graphical linux with Star/Open office and it came on 6 CD-Roms including source. Alas, I could not get the modem driver for the USB modem we used then to compile, so I had to go back to Windows 95 to use the Internet. Things have obviously improved tremendously post-Millennium.

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Sorry if I offended you.

Not sure what I think of LP after hearing him talk (in german). Conceited loudmouth? Perhaps.
It seemed a comfortable interview for him. His arguments have some logical consitency, even
if I don't agree much with them. Certainly there is an ego present there. He seemed relaxed
and just talking about himself & his views on things. A bit repetetive, like 1/2 a can of
Stallman light. To me, he comes off differently when speaking English. Interesting to see him
on his native turf, so to speak.

Makes some ok points about sysV. I don't agree with them, but he makes his points.

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I first tried Slackware in 1999 when I was 21. I never found it hard to use at all. I printed the Slackware How-To guide and step by step installed my system.

I had used Red Hat, it was terrible and updates broke it, and when I reinstalled, it cancelled my license.

I used Mandrake. It wasn't bad, but some of the packaging and installation was confusing.

How I found Slackware? Linux.org website. It said Slackware was a classic distribution. That alone was eye catching. I read reviews, many were so biased it was sad. I tried it, and I loved it. It was sleek, easy, and it worked.

How Lennart didn't get Slackware is beyond me. I had no IT experience and I got it. I have no coding ability, and I understood it. I'm still just a IT tech that only has a CompTIA A+ but I'm not blind to see why Slackware works.

SysV has its problems, but the tools to over come those problems have been available for years.

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it is still possible today to frighten a new Linux user by putting Slackware in his/her hands.
some of us are able to manage Slackware, some are not,
some of us are able to manage Ubuntu/SUSE/RHEL, some are not,
some of us are even able to manage Windows.
who cares, it says at the end nothing meaningfulness about the technical skills of such a person.

and it is still possible that the frighten new Linux user will be a successful open source developer tomorrow.

you may, or may not like the solutions done by this user,
but this should not stop anyone for having at least some respect for the performance and achievements of such a person

Go and make a huge open source project, earn money through your work, manage not only the technical side of such a project but also the organisation part.
This has nothing to do with the result, if you agree on code, implementation details, or usefulness of the developed solution.

It is like sport, there are some sports which I find total useless and stupid, but I can respect the hard work several people invest into their sport.
and I can apply the same principle for software projects.

I even donated money to a project like MLED, even if the author is imho a Grossmaul, and I think it is reinventing the wheel and a outcome of a NIH syndrome. But it does not stop me for having at least some respect for the work.
it is the same principle. I do not need to state my - possible even wrong - opinion in every suitable or non suitable situation or thread here.

I wish more Slackware users would apply this principle and some noise permanently repeated here in this forum would become a more productive silence. Personally I think this would make this a better place.

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