Hello,

Sorry if this is a stupid question but here goes. I just installed Slackware 12.2 and searching these forums for tips I noticed people mentioning that you shouldn't use some of the graphical tools in KDE like Knetworkmanager with Slackware. I knew that using Slackware would help me learn how to configure my system manually but its not obvious to me which other KDE tools I would want to stay clear of. Also why is it that wicd would be acceptable to work as a graphical front end for managing wifi, but KDE's tool would not be alright to use? If anyone can point out other KDE tools to stay clear of I would appreciate it.

I am really looking forward to learning more about Slackware and Linux in general. My first two tasks, get a firewall running on my laptop, then get wireless going. Thanks in advance for any additional info and tips.

Thanks

With Slackware you should not use any GUIs for the purpose of system administration. Slackware is meant to be wholly administered by manually editing the config files. For tips on wireless network configuration search this forum.

I beg to differ somewhat. For example:

wicd
netconfig
xwmconfig
pkgtool
sbopkg

In my opinion, whats nice about slackware is that everything "can" be configured, as you say, by manually editing config files. But that does not exclude using graphical tools, provided they edit the same files in the expected manner and don't make assumptions about the installation that may not be true, or overwrite the config files unexpectedly.

I think this is what the OP may be getting at. KDE comes with some generic tools that in many instances don't provide the same results as they might in another distribution. In some cases it's the fault of the tool having been developed with a particular package management system or file system setup in mind. In other cases, it might be because that particular service was not included in the compile options in the slackware KDE slackbuild scripts. Other times, the tool is just a piece of crap that is not maintained but still included for some reason.

In the case of Kwifi manager vs. wicd, the Kwifi manager does not - in KDE 3.5 - support WPA and wicd does. wicd is a fantastic tool for laptop wireless management and to not use it because it isn't forcing you to manually edit a config file is just being pig-headed.

my 2 cents.

Service manager
Edit /etc/rc.d/* on your own. It's quite easy, much easier than looking and editing different symlinks through different init numbered folders.

Package manager
Use pkgtools, sbopkg, slackpkg

User manager
Use adduser, useradd

Yeah, the main point here that maybe the OP missed is that knetworkmanager is not included by default in Slackware, is difficult to compile as it has several requirements and in general its development status is a bit weird. On the other hand, wicd works out of the box and is included in Slackware, so that's why it's a much better option.

Users are free to use Slackware as they see fit, and the scripts in /etc/rc.d are no replacement for wicd or knetworkmanager in many situations, where they become a mess and you need to build something on top of them, or apart from them, so it's not like using a GUI tool like wicd is less Slackware-ish than other options.