A proposal for Recommended Packages (PROD & PROS)

[Sir No]

EDIT: I created a page in Gentoo Wiki for this proposal. I'd like to encourage all interested users to post their ideas in this thread or enhance the Wiki page themselves. As I will be getting my new laptop soon (with AMD64 Turion processor), I'm planning to synchronously update Wiki with my tested-in-fire experience.


Hello Gentoo users, devs & all your pets

Today one thing really struck me. Even though Gentoo has its Handbook which is of finest quality, it later leaves all the newcomers on their own. I mean, if one is a newbee to Linux and doesn't have any clues about what to emerge after system, kde and firefox, how can one get to know the best and the greatest Linux applications?

In other words I would like to open discussion on the following idea of my own:

Packages Recommended fOr Destop
(PROD / PRO-Desktop)

and

Packages Recommended fOr Server
(PROS / PRO-Server)

"PRO" of course stands for "professional"

I know there are many happy Gentoo users, who have its own set of "the-best-of" applications. I know there are many packages to choose from. But selecting them straight from Portage tree is troublesome for someone not knowing what to look for. I just would like to hear your opinions on what applications / packages you think one should emerge and how to configure them to have The Best, Gentoo Driven, Professional Desktop Installation (TM) and Professional Server Installation (TM).


I can identify some needs for a typical desktop installation, just for the ordinary user like me:

* fast and optimized base system (which is Gentoo, of course)
* compatibility with most 32-bit applications (because I run on amd64)
* autodetection of devices, if possible
* autoconfiguration of network cards, having DHCP as a default
* reconnecting network cards properly if cable unplugged and replugged
* perfect USB handling
* hotplugging and automounting of USB devices (e.g. pen drive)
* automounting for CDs and DVDs
* best multimedia experience: sound drivers, audio & video codecs
* apps for playing DVD movies
* printing support, easy adding printers, both local & networked
* easy sharing of files and printers
* burning CDs and DVDs
* CD-ripping and sound encoding
* support for 3D graphics cards
* hints for gaming (yes, you knew it was coming )
* text processing utilities
* recommendations for office suits
* system localization

For programmers also:
* recommendations for compilers, interpreters and libs + docs
* recommendations for IDEs for different languages / environments

For server I don't have that amount of experience yet, as I did only some installations involving Java+Tomcat and Apache+MySQL+PHP.
So I would really love to hear a voice of server veterans here!

And let's not forget notebook users, too! I really can't recommend here anything, because I'll be getting my first notebook next week


This is possibly a big effort, but that shouldn't stop anyone from proposing its own set of categories or packages. I mean, if this could evolve into some kind of official or semi-official recommendation, all new users would at least have a vision of what Recommended Gentoo Desktop could look like.

Quite a bit of other distributions have some notion of installing predefined set of applications for different needs, or even 'all' applications they provide. I know about and I love the flexibility (and power!) that Gentoo gives to the end user. But if one knows at least some milestone points, he or she will more quickly get to the destination. Which in this case is a fully working, beautiful desktop for fast, power-user machine.


The target is The Best Desktop Experience and Usability(TM).
Now let the discussion begin.

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"If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." - Sir Isaac Newton

[Gherald]

Among other preexisting threads, this one would be a good place to start compiling a list from.

I highly recommend using a wiki to actually store the list (and use this thread for discussion, of course)

Many packages can be made much nicer or more useful just by changing some config settings, so at some point including links to a sample config file (where appropriate) might be nice.

[Sir No]

[ecoffey]

For stuff like 'autodetection of devices', and 'perfect USB handling' it involves a lot more then a simple emerge command, that and there are already docs avaible for it. So maybe linking to those.

As for 'autodetection of devices' apart from installing and setting up udev, HAL is pretty fun too

[shash]

Well, let me try to fill in some of your requirements...

[griffinme]

What is the difference between openoffice and openoffice-ximian? I see both listed in portage.

This sounds like an excellant idea.

[Gherald]

[Sir No]

Ok, people. It's time to start!
My new notebook arrived and now I'm ready to install Gentoo on it. The Right Way.
That's right! Full-blown desktop experience.

Gentoo on desktop shouldn't be any worse than Ubuntu.
We can even do better!!!

You can expect a stream of updates to this thread and to wiki page as well. Of course, you know how much time building a Gentoo from scratch can take... So, please be patient.

First I'm going to study what settings (especially USE flags) apply to Stage 1/3 Installation for Gentoo 2005.0 process.
Updates to be expected in several hours (or maybe a day, or even two)..........
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The geeks | Recommended Packages fOr Desktop & Server | Read BBCode Guide!

[Sir No]

Ok. I'm proceeding with Stage 1 NPTL on Stage 3. Very interesting.

I've downloaded stage3-athlon-xp and the latest portage snapshot. Partitioning was already done. Now swap has been created. Partitions have been mounted. The same goes for /proc. I think I'm ready.

I modified /etc/make.conf and after reading this post on the forums I decided to put only one flag there:

[Sir No]

Well, first step:

[Sir No]

Ok, no additional USE flags at this point. Just rebuilding the system toolkit.

After that I'll set additional USE flags before executing emerge -e system.

Then I'll go to configuring and compiling kernel, setting fstab, configuring services, etc.
This will include alsa and usb utilities, as the goal is to have a full support for these.
Finally, I'm going to document all the involved packages on the wiki.

At this point I hope to have a base system with a lot of potential. So, the enhancement process
in order to get "The Best Destop Experience and Usability" goal can begin. Thi will include
configuring xorg, kde and gnome and emerging additional packages (e.g. multimedia,
usb, printing, cdrw, dvd, and similar packages.)


Edit:
There are already some valuable additions on the wiki page.
Thanks a lot guys! Whoever you are...
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The geeks | Recommended Packages fOr Desktop & Server | Read BBCode Guide!