"Stuck in the 1990's" ?
 

Sometimes I really wonder what Slackware did to some folks to get such a bad press.

http://lxer.com/module/forums/t/34210/

Her comments are ridiculous; lack of security in Slackware?! She spends all her time tinkering with Slackware? Slackware is wonderful in that once you get it set up it runs perfectly without incident.

Ms caitlyn has always had a burr in her saddle over Slackware. Maybe her hairdresser or bartender knows why.

My experience with her comments is that she is always wrong - that bodes well for Slackware!

How did I know that the "some folks" was Caitlyn Martin? ;)

If you really don't know what Slackware did to her, read the following threads and follow the links you find. Have popcorn handy:

• Slackware Review 12.1
• www.slackware.com Website Down?

If something's gone bad here, it's the press, not Slackware.

I wouldn't care about that. Caitlyn Martin just doesn't like Slackware, although she was distro developer for over four years, for a distro based on Slackware.
The server outage last year somehow not only shattered her view of Slackware as a stable base for her distro, she also began to spread FUD about Slackware's death, for whatever reason. I think that she has done this instead of contacting PV to find out what actually is happening says all about the attitude of that person.

My personal opinion: The opinion of this person is totally irrelevant to me and I can only second your words:

While i mostly disagree with CM's comments again, i disagree more strongly that Slackware is a distribution to watch out for in 2013.
While Slackware is the best linux distribution, even today, it is true that is partly stuck in the 90's. It contains many applications, like xxgdb for example which haven't been touched since 1995, while at the same time lacking some modern applications/features most other distributions have had for years.
IMO this is the most important fact that prevents Slackware from reaching a wider user base which would lead to much better and more frequent press coverage.
It is a fact that Slackware today is a follower of every innovation or advancement that comes out of linux. While most things that happen today are leading towards Windows or Mac behaviour emulation, Slackware is eventually forced to incorporate some of them. Due to the fact that Slackware is diverging more and more from every other linux distribution, it makes it harder and harder to maintain, not to mention its slowly but gradually moving away from its roots, goals and philosophy, without it being entirely its fault.
That's why Slackware as it is now is not 'watch out' material, but the exact opposite.

Also Slackware has many minor bugs that for some reason don't get fixed, like conflicting files in packages or packages that don't get rebuilt when some gets changed in the distribution (eg. look at the /usr/share/hal/ directory)

I also disagree about Slackware being a distro to watch in 2013. But only because the most recent release was late in 2012 and we might well not get another one until 2014.

Given the devolutionary trend that seems to permeate modern OS/software design, being stuck in the 90s is something I look forward to. :)

I don't get the fuss over Caitlyn's comment on that thread. Caitlyn doesn't like Slackware, so what? You might have well just posted something along the lines as "someone on the Internet has a different opinion than me".

Slackware is great, I love it, but of course it isn't a distro to watch in 2013. Part of the reason people like Slackware is because radical changes aren't forced upon users, yet often times radical changes are what make you "one to watch".

Thank You Catilyn
 

I will immediately
su -
rm -rf
apt get install ubuntu
or maybe click the mouse 1000 times to install win8
This nearly 65 year old TRS-80 user certainly does not want to be stuck in the 90's


john

I did manage recently to run Slackware on a very old PC from the late 90s, I installed everything (I always do this) and even KDE loaded even though it was a 350Mhz PII system with 128MB RAM. It had a 160GB HDD and 2 CD-RW drives, but I installed it from USB drive. I had to use plop boot manager that was on a floppy I had to boot to the USB. I might go out and get some parts for a P2/P3 "franken-computer" and do more linux experiments with it.

I disagree with you, if there is no release then we watch the Slackware-current change log
:-)

+1 I used to read lxer for a while and agree about her comments there at least. I don't go there any more because the lxer site appears to be devoted mainly to Ubuntu and it's derivatives, so FUD about another distro is not surprising.

How about backward compatibility up to 90's?
Agree, the necessary "bloat" may fool some newbies into using old,unmaintained applications.
However, it should be a corner/minor issue.
To think anyone would eager to touch any application which is far from "modern",
he/she must have some knowledge on behalf.
User-friendliness shouldn't be a problem, it is just marketing fail.
Maybe i miss something but tetex->texlive is the only one i can think of.
I guess that the policy(if any) of the official package tree is to add the general purpose applications only.
If you want "modern" but profession-specific tools,
say,if you want CAD,Blender,Sage..etc. These can be done in slackbuilds.org.
The official tree seems to provide something like DE,emacs,*nix-ish tools,
common setup of mail/http/ftp server and such,that is,general purpose.
On software development,it shouldn't be lacking.
First of all,it is the most friendly source distro you can have.
Secondly,cant we see the trend today?
python->pip, ruby->gems, Common lisp->quicklisp, Haskell->Cabal, Emacs lisp->ELPA ...etc.
Jeez,doesn't a package manager become far more friendly for rigorous development/testing if it is more "barebone"?
At the end of the day, Slackware maybe a perfect solution for modern development.
Package manager like Nix, the complete opposite, while trying hard on consistency,
not only complicate the management even further, but may also show add more constraint or unnecessity.

Yet, cant agree more with that,
On the marketing point of view, completeness is crucial.
Regardless, it is so uncool to keep bringing up this matter...
Squeezing out as much good,slackware-ish applications as we can, seems to be the best strategy?

Edit: grammar

You can't blame her for that thread. Slackers went into meltdown for nothing over that. It was quite entertaining to watch actually.

Haters gonna hate.

So more people installing Ubuntu makes it better than slackware? Cool.

"Distro to watch" is akin to saying one song is better than another because it is higher up on the top 40.

I have no sarcastic 90's meme to close this post, sadly.

Just because there is not a release version since 1995 doesn't mean the version you run in Slackware is from 1995, in fact it is patched by patches sourced from other distros. So if other distros have it then shouldn't we have it also?

Gnome can stay dead, along with anything from Pottering.

I have to agree. The over 30 page thread may have some entertainment value.
However, it was also uplifting.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ml#post4692445

But I liked the 1990s. :( Well, at least when I was a kid.

With the improvements in auto-detection of hardware and the auto-configuring of X, Slackware really isn't that difficult to use. I remember when I first used it and I had to edit /etc/fstab to mount a USB drive. Nowadays, Slackware with KDE pretty much auto-detects everything.

The original source is still from 1995 no matter how many patches you apply to it.
Have you tried using xxgdb by any chance? When i execute it, from a terminal because desktop files weren't used back then get an error message about 'no available ptys' or similar.

Your argument is very logical but lets not forget that the other distros you are referring to are offering other options along with xxgdb. In Slackware it is the only one. And its ugly, old and featureless comparing to modern alternatives.

Slackware is missing more than just GNOME.
Come to think of it the most exciting thing that happened during the 13.37 -> 14.0 release cycle was the inclusion of NetworkManager and GTK+3 which are both GNOME technologies, maybe along with the XFCE split.

edit: Talking about press coverage i just bumped into this: http://igurublog.files.wordpress.com.../mag-cover.jpg
, the cover of the next issue of a linux magazine in the UK.
It doesnt even have the Slackware logo on it while theres some derivatives there in those ~30 distributions.

I'm impressed with how well Kikinovac and Caitlyn's discussion is going. Keep it up, both of you.

LOL

More of Kiki delivering well written comments and then been labeled a fanboy because the other side disagrees.

This isn't the first time such a discussion between those two has gone down this path, I'm surprised Kiki hasn't given up on her yet.

I give up. Lesson learned. :redface:

:) im almost 60 and i love slackware. As far as being stuck in the 90's it was a good decade for linux, lots of possibilities and tools that allowed you to use linux the way you wanted to and to build it into something personal that fit your needs. And slackware still has that, along with the latest and greatest available in the linux world. I guess all that flexibility just confuses some of these younguns.
Imo slackware needs more cartoony icons as an aid to youngsters with limited attention spans.

EDIT: geez, thinking about it, maybe slackware is the codger distro, maybe i should switch to ubuntu and start lying about my age.

Meanwhile Slackware quietly sits at the #10 spot on distrowatch.

It's not scientific, but it's also not meaningless. There is a reason it's sitting up there in the top 10.

There is a patch (blogspot.com) to correct the issue. Anyway I think it is a nice decent small X front end to gdb for c programing :)
Not sure how good it is for other languages though.

John

@kikinovak: Is the illustration on the cover of "Linux aux petits oignons" by Ayo73? :) He has pretty recognizable style. I used to use his wallpapers extensively in 2005/2006. :)

@all: sorry for offtopic.

No, it has KDE.

Good point :)

Yes, indeed. Ayo73 (Alexis Younès) works for Eyrolles, my editor. I also like what he does, and when I asked specifically about a cooking penguin (since it's a "cookbook"-style book), I was very pleased with the results.

BTW: I'm currently very busy working on the Slackware edition of the book. Guess I'll have finished it before summer, if everything goes well.

Notice the "still" in the article title though. If memory serves me well xxgdb has been behaving that way at least since pre 13.37 but apparently noone noticed.
I can only think of three reasons why: a) noone bothered reporting it b) noone bothered fixing it or c) noone uses it.
Anyway, xxgdb is just an example here.

Careful there with the wYNd0z3 John, you might end up with carpel tunnel from all that clicking ;)

OMG UNIX is stuck in the 70's - it still uses a file system!
-- iOS user

Am I the only one who keeps flashing the opening of Portlandia, S01E01?

"The dream of the '90s is aliiiiiive, in Slackware ..."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVmq9dq6Nsg
"It's like the Bush administration never even happened."

Couldn't help it.

:D

Geez! I almost spilled my coffe over my screen :D

Sole developer crossing in front of busses for relaxation ... genius!

As a newcomer to Linux and to Slackware, I found that kikinovak was much less respectful and more off-base than caitlyn in the LXer comments. I don't really know what it is that fascinates me about Slackware. I think, in part, it's the learning curve. I want to understand how Linux works, and so running Slackware helps me apply some of my learning. I had been running Slackware on a "junk" laptop, just for the tinkering that caitlyn talked about. This morning I loaded it onto my good laptop, my System 76, but I dual-boot with Linux Mint, which was the OS I was using on the laptop before. Learning is great, but when I do want the laptop to "just work," it's nice to start up Linux Mint and have some confidence that it will. I *think* I have my Slackware system fairly well configured, with much thanks to the flash SlackBuilds and to alienbob's multilib notes, but I still can't play DVD movies on Slackware and can't figure out why not. In the rare event I'll want to watch a movie on my laptop, I know I'll be able to with Linux Mint.

I also agree with sahko's remarks. I noticed this week that Slackware has a pilot package that is used so the system can communicate with Palm Pilot devices. I'm wondering how many other anachronisms remain.

Yes, Slackware runs well, but it does require "tinkering" and know-how. It does not run beautifully "out of the box" like I've found Linux Mint and Mac systems do. It is not a distribution "to watch" in 2013 because it isn't the distribution that is going to make Windows and Apple users decide that Linux is a great alternative. Linux Mint might do that, and so might some of the distributions listed in the LXer article.

When thinking about which distribution to load onto a friend's netbook, which he would want to use just to quickly surf the internet, I didn't give Slackware much consideration. Instead, Peppermint Linux looked perfect. It comes with little more than Google Chrome and the ability to use Google Docs. He could start it up really quickly, do his completely flash-enabled web surfing, and not have to "tinker" or even know he was using Linux (though of course he would know it).

As things stand for me, my iMac is getting a bit old, at seven years or so. I really love the iTunes functionality. I can download movies, music, or TV shows on my iPad and they'll also seamlessly be loaded onto my iMac. I wish I could replace my iMac with a Linux system, but I don't think I can. Apple "just works," and works really well, even if there is a bit of a pay premium. I can buy a Mac Mini, hook it up to my TV, and watch or listen to my iTunes library with hardly no thought or time expenditure. I'm not sure anything in Linux works quite that well. Even the Amazon cloud services aren't extremely Linux friendly. If any particular Linux distribution is going to bridge those gaps, I really doubt it will be Slackware. This doesn't make Slackware a bad operating system. It certainly has its uses.

It also has it fans, and getting back to that back and forth with caitlyn, it seems to have some very devoted fans. So why isn't there more of a development base and effort going on? Why is there that "sole developer?" I'm not sure huge changes are needed, but it seems like the Slackware "fanboys" have more than enough love for Slackware and knowledge of it to make it more user-friendly from the get-go. I'm going to keep using Slackware until I find, like caitlyn evidently has, that there's too much extra work involved to make it worthwhile.

There is a lot of effort going on, see the SlackDocs project or SlackBuilds.org. There is only the "sole developer" (which is not quite true, there is a small team of chosen developers) because this sole developer invented Slackware and decided not to give up control. That is actually a good thing, this way Slackware does not loose focus on its main goals.

And that is implying that Slackware would not be user-friendly. In fact it is, but it is not "newbie" friendly, as long as that newbie is not willing to do his homework. For the typical Slackware user Slackware works as intended and is as friendly as it could be. There is no change needed, just because it is already at the point where it is intended to be. It is all about choice: If you feel that Mint is the right OS for you, and there is nothing wrong with that, then by all means, use it. I feel that Slackware is the right choice for me, I don't want a distro like Mint on my systems and I don't want Slackware to become such a system. Like most Slackers. This is why most of us are not even trying to make Slackware more "user-friendly" (of course I mean "newbie" friendly here).

Two of your comparisons are a bit unfair here, I want to point that out:
1. Comparing Mint with Slackware with regard to pre-installed software for DVD playback. Other than Slackware, Mint's "headquarter" is not in the USA, but in Ireland. They simply don't have to care about software patents on codecs and other software needed to playback a DVD. So of course Slackware (like most other distros, even Ubuntu, which is similarly newbie-friendly as Mint) do not come with the ability to play DVDs out of the box. To change this Pat Volkerding would have to move to Ireland, which I would assume is unlikely to happen.

2. Comparing OS X with Slackware (and Linux in general) with regards to iTunes integration. Of course iTunes will always be much better integrated in an Apple environment than in an environment that is totally unsupported by Apple. But this is not Linux fault, it is Apple's fault, they have decided to not support Linux (one could think in fear of competition), so ask the next time in your Apple store why you can't use iTunes on Linux.

Regarding time needed to have a working system: If I make a fresh install of Slackware I need 2-3 hours to get the system installed and customized to my needs (I now have 67 packages installed additionally to the base system, but some of them are already marked for deletion in my list, since I don't use them anymore). After that I have a rock-stable system ready for my everyday work. The casual user, only surfing the web, doing some multimedia and maybe office stuff, will not nearly need this amount of packages and will also have a rock-stable system for everyday work. You don't have to tinker with Slackware, but you can, if you want.

From my experience Slackware is the most easy distribution if you want to tinker with it (straight forward and easy package format/management, as close to upstream as possible, adherence to Unix principles, ...), so at least by my definition Slackware is user-friendly. Very user-friendly, because it does not stand in my way if I want to try something.

Edit: I would like to add two links from the blog of fellow LQ member ruario, regarding Slackware and ease of use:
http://my.opera.com/ruario/blog/2011...x-distribution
http://my.opera.com/ruario/blog/2011...ncy-management

I guess, once you go slack, and you get to understand Slackware, there's really no going back to anything. Because the tinkering will give you so much understanding in other fields as well. And you will never go back, because you will understand that other things are just so wrong in the first place, and all the automation of things just gives you a headache in the long run.

I see more and more of these topics. But i guess 13 years of Slackware experience just made me a guru :-)

Perhaps you haven't been tinkering with things in Mint or Debian, but when something breaks in these it's hard to have knowledge of stuff never being done.

I guess it makes no sense to give you a scenario, you will probably come there yourself one day, and understand that things are so much more clean in slackware than what it is in anything else. :)

Nice having you atleast trying and i hope you get to develop your skills in understanding the concept.

Cheers :-)

I am sorry, but deprecating Palm Pilots seems like overkill to me.
After all, they did work OOTB. Let's assume they do still. :)

This comment highlights a gulf of conceptualization that I think we as a community will never bridge; It will always divide us.

If this is the deciding factor in whether or not a distribution is one "to watch in 2013," then we'd all better stop watching, because it will not happen, at least not en mass.

Linux is not and was never intended as a replacement for flowery little mincing consumer operating systems like those; It is intended as a replacement for UNIX. Distributions like Mint and Ubuntu are really great at achieving their aims of becoming a consumer desktop stand-in, but it's comparable to someone taking an F-350, lowering it, and putting ground effects and a body kit on there -- That's not what it is meant for, it's meant to do industrial heavy lifting. A big, powerful vehicle like that is also not really meant to be driven by someone who just got their license; It could be if that new driver is willing to pay close attention, but that's not the target audience.

In this sense, I find Slackware to be one of the most successful Linux distributions. It's very UNIX-like, perhaps the most UNIX-like in the "UNIX in the 1990s" sense: reliable, predictable, ready to be easily configured to whatever role, and intended for use by someone who knows what they are doing. You know where else you'll find programs that are "anachronisms?" Solaris, NetBSD, AIX ... You know, other real UNIX systems.

To the (seemingly endlessly growing) segment of Linux users who truly believe that the operating system's raison d'être is to be the ultimate drop-in Windows replacement for noobs, I guess most Slackware, Gentoo, BSD, and CentOS users along with myself will always seem hopelessly impossible to understand. So be it; such users should stick with Mint and Ubuntu anyway.

libdvdcss
libdvdnav

Should cut down on the reboots.

Started using Slackware because I did not want to buy Windows 98.
The best computer decision I ever made except possibly when I bought my TRS-80 Model One

If you don't like Slackware or can't do the things you you want to do on Slack. You have three options
1. Spend more money
2. Take the time to learn.
3. Be a cry-baby

To be honest, I couldn't care less what distros or OS other people use - Slackware is fine for me.

Well Slackware beats Caitlyn's non-existant Yarok distro by leaps and bounds, as one to watch. Her distro seems to be stuck in the future. On the upside, Yarok is totally secure, because your computer's hard drive will be blank and unable to boot.

@TobiSGD -- Thank you. This is the best explanation I'd seen as to why DVDs don't play. From my reading, I had thought that most other people, in both Slackware and other distros, had no problem with this.

This is also true. However, this gets to a chicken and egg issue. For Apple, Amazon, and other content providers to make their products more Linux-friendly, there needs to be a critical mass of people using Linux and buying their content for use on Linux. This won't happen without the more "newbie-friendly" systems.

I certainly don't want a Windows replacement. I moved from Windows to Mac in 2006, and I don't plan to ever go back to Microsoft.
I like Slackware and I think it will be my primary OS for the near term. I'm hoping I'll be able to stick with it and I intend to keep learning, with a little help. But I'm not sure any Linux distro, could ever be my sole system. Apple's functionality is just so amazing, I'll probably end up stuck at least partly in the Apple universe. I'd rather buy a good non-Apple desktop system to house my digital movies and music, but I just can't have enough faith that Linux will be able to play it and provide some of the other functionality I may need. I think Banshee is the best music software I've found for Linux, and I can't find a SlackBuild for that.

At the same time, I chose Slackware when I decided to learn Linux because it claimed to be the most UNIX-like, and I do consider that to be a benefit, proudly "stuck in the 90s" though it is. I appreciate how Slackware is put together, and I understand where you're coming from, @foodown. (And thanks for the SlackBuild links!)

I would also add in FreeBSD and OpenBSD as additional real Unix systems. When I run a BSD I prefer OpenBSD.
Well-said. Slackware being UNIX-like also has added benefits when you're using other distros that are point-and-click. Things will break on graphical distros and it is nice to be able to roll up your sleeves and fix things under the hood with an editor on the command line. Slackware is perfect as is.

roflol !!!!