Gentoo Forums
Gentoo Forums
Gentoo Forums
Quick Search: in
Really Need a Graphical Installer
View unanswered posts
View posts from last 24 hours

Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6  Next  
Reply to topic    Gentoo Forums Forum Index Gentoo Chat
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
krinn
Watchman
Watchman


Joined: 02 May 2003
Posts: 7470

PostPosted: Tue Jun 03, 2014 10:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

yagami wrote:
In any and no way do i think this "installer" should be "mandatory" :)

This was one problem that strike the previous installer try.

It is not because you assume the installer isn't mandatory that it will not be the de facto mandatory installation.

Anyone no matter his linux/gentoo/computer level, that will try to install Gentoo ; and even if you clearly state to him : there's two way to install Gentoo, the installer and the handbook will pickup the easiest choice for him.
It is no surprise the installer will be used instead of the handbook.

And so, installer has become mandatory naturally.
That was one big mistake of previous installer try, installer was release in non finish state with all the problems we saw ; and yes, it was taken mandatory by all users.


It's not anyone is against an easy way to install Gentoo, but it becomes a problem when your installer start trashing user hdd, it is a problem when the installer works half time only, it is a problem when the installer fail to even start because the user have raid arrays...

When your installer doesn't work/fail ; then you offer the other way to install Gentoo ; but the user that start with a "click, wait, no brain need" installer method is now being driven to a "read, type and understand" method.
Users like hasufell friends that have what they need to do it, get back to the previous "i don't want think or interreact to install it, even i could"
Users with no knowledge of basic commands, get back to : "WTF that book is speaking about?"

As you see, the result is still the same, users that don't/can't use the handbook, cannot install Gentoo. But there's a difference, instead of "What a bunch of elitists wanker distro" or "that distro is too hard" feeling, those users that try and fail with the installer are now saying : "what a crappy distro, installer doesn't even work". This time it is not their fault, nor because the distro aim at "more skill user/elitists" users... But because the distro sucks.

It's a bit sad to be tag as elitist by people that can also install Gentoo just by reading the handbook but think it's over them, but it's better than been tag as a shitty distro when the first tool of the distro they try to use doesn't work !
So your installer is causing more damage to Gentoo than promoting Gentoo.... What a failure!

And like i said earlier, even when some users that succeed at installing Gentoo with the installer were sad finally ; as once the graphical installer step was done, they were booting to a console that is the first strike for them, and when they ask : "how do i install gnome then?" they were bring to portage usage : Eeerk, portage, the console command line tool... the thing they don't like that was preventing them to install Gentoo.
So you just cannot provide a GUI installer, you must also provide portage GUI with it, like porthole, to at least gives them the primary tool to use the distro with also a GUI.

I won't repeat what i said ealier, but anyone wishing to make such installer must learn from previous mistakes at least.
So yes, it's better to not have an installer.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
nenemsis5
n00b
n00b


Joined: 23 Oct 2007
Posts: 72

PostPosted: Tue Jun 03, 2014 11:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

i was some years ago also a noob and tried to install gentoo. it was a hard work to understand all, even english is not my motherlanguage. i am seriously also not really clever, but with the help of the community and the well documented handbook it was possible.

a installer is really wasted of time for gentoo. if you one time really read and understand the philosophy of gentoo and its infrastructure you are able to install it easily. in addition to this you will learn a lot how processes are working under linux.

so keep trying to install it... its really worth. dont give up. try it over and over until u get successful in whatever u gonna do.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
yagami
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 12 May 2002
Posts: 269
Location: Leiria, Portugal

PostPosted: Tue Jun 03, 2014 12:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

tox2ik wrote:
yagami wrote:

really : an iso ( systemcdrescue ) with a stage3 + comunity stage with desktop or specialized apps in binary would be enough for me.

One would only need to boot it, do the fdisks , the copy's, the chainroots , the emerge @world -k ( would pick up the already compiled bin's ) , instant full desktop, the grub2-mkconfig and grub2-install's , reboot , change make.conf , emerge -uDN @world : done !


In essence you are talking about having a set of standard binaries ready for installation. I bet very few people are willing to maintain a huge "build host" that builds "everything" and hosts that publically. However, there are LiveCDs and at least one binary distro based on gentoo. So some one is willing. Have you considered looking at what they do and proposed a similar solution for Gentoo? Perhaps it's not even necessary. The binaries form calculate Linux and sabayon could be compatible with standard gentoo. Have you checked?

If no one offers what you are looking for, I think an "official" binary host could go a long way toward making installation easier. It would support only the most used arches (x86, amd64, one-two more). And it would support the most commonly used 1500-3000, stable packages for those arches with a standard profile. If something like that was offered officially, one would be able to get up and running in no time.

Am I reading you correctly? Did you have something else in mind?


rereading the thread, i think i missed this reply :(

yes ... that is really what i am thinking. maybe even not so many packages.

after running in no time, at night, it would be emerge -e @world time :)

thanks... :)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
1clue
Advocate
Advocate


Joined: 05 Feb 2006
Posts: 2569

PostPosted: Tue Jun 03, 2014 3:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

@krinn,

By that logic nobody would use Gentoo anyway. By definition, the people using Gentoo right now have chosen a more difficult path than those who stick with Ubuntu.

FWIW, this is not Ubuntu hate, because I have more Ubuntu images than anything else. It's just a fact that currently the gentoo install is not so simple as other distros.

Distros like Ubuntu choose the easiest route, and you are certainly correct that MOST people will choose that easier path as evidenced by the estimated number of installs from sites like distrowatch.com.

But everyone here, assuming that they've actually installed Gentoo at least once, have chosen a more difficult route. Personally, I choose the easiest route that gets the desired results. If the installer doesn't do that, then I want to do it another way.

That last statement is the key to my whole position on this. I also don't want to have an influx of people who insist that easier is the only way that matters, because that threatens the command-line install and sets Gentoo on the same inane route that every other distro is going. There are lots of those other distros, not nearly so many source-based ones.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
yagami
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 12 May 2002
Posts: 269
Location: Leiria, Portugal

PostPosted: Tue Jun 03, 2014 4:13 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
It's just a fact that currently the gentoo install is not so simple as other distros.


I think its more like : Its not as simple as it could be !

I think nobody here wants a next/next/next installer.

But there are common tasks that dont need to be done everytime ( forget the learning, think about people who have to do it tons of times ).

The "Easy Gentoo Installer" that was referenced could be a good solution, at least in my book. ( having "profiles" , configurable and then setting portage to do the work )

Another one, could be like Metro from funtoo...

Seems there are alot of good tools available but it seems like an unwanted / forbidden project.

I guess we can all try to improve this : https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-950912.html .

I will try :)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
steveL
Watchman
Watchman


Joined: 13 Sep 2006
Posts: 5153
Location: The Peanut Gallery

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 5:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

yagami wrote:
tox2ik wrote:
In essence you are talking about having a set of standard binaries ready for installation. I bet very few people are willing to maintain a huge "build host" that builds "everything" and hosts that publically.
..
If no one offers what you are looking for, I think an "official" binary host could go a long way toward making installation easier. It would support only the most used arches (x86, amd64, one-two more). And it would support the most commonly used 1500-3000, stable packages for those arches with a standard profile. If something like that was offered officially, one would be able to get up and running in no time.

Am I reading you correctly? Did you have something else in mind?


rereading the thread, i think i missed this reply :(

yes ... that is really what i am thinking. maybe even not so many packages.

There are two already.

Nothing like that many packages, but certainly enough to install from; I know as that's how we tested update /etc/warning and later the installer: by doing lots of chroot installs from binpkg. That's also what led to multiple-binhost support (since it was much easier with the combination.)

You'll have to build your DE, but you can get a real speed-up with those binhosts, and it's kinda spooky to watch emerge's happen at the same speed as a bindist mangler like apt. :P
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
yagami
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 12 May 2002
Posts: 269
Location: Leiria, Portugal

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 8:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

steveL wrote:

You'll have to build your DE, but you can get a real speed-up with those binhosts, and it's kinda spooky to watch emerge's happen at the same speed as a bindist mangler like apt. :P


About that... is amazing how GOOD!!! emerge is with binpkgs! its really fast and even installs bin's or recompiles them based on USE flags match with your system or not !

sincerelly ....makes me wonder why there are not many distro's using this ( winks at sabayon )
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
szatox
Advocate
Advocate


Joined: 27 Aug 2013
Posts: 3104

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 10:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Makes me wonder when portage employs some p2p feature that would turn the whole gentoo network into one huge buildhost pulling packages straight from other users who have already built it with the same use flags
Just thinking about this makes my network laggy :roll:
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
yagami
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 12 May 2002
Posts: 269
Location: Leiria, Portugal

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 12:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

szatox wrote:
Makes me wonder when portage employs some p2p feature that would turn the whole gentoo network into one huge buildhost pulling packages straight from other users who have already built it with the same use flags
Just thinking about this makes my network laggy :roll:


Or maybe not ....

Think : Gentoo , no need for mirror servers :)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
system_exit
n00b
n00b


Joined: 07 Jul 2011
Posts: 22

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 1:04 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

szatox wrote:
pulling packages straight from other users


Would be nice, but it would be impossible to ensure some meaningful level of security this way.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
system_exit
n00b
n00b


Joined: 07 Jul 2011
Posts: 22

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 1:17 pm    Post subject: been there ... Reply with quote

I sincerely hope Gentoo will not turn to be more like RedHat or Debian - I've been there and the tools that tend to complicate things, the users that behave like on Windows (universal answer to any problem is "reinstall") are exactly the reason I ended with Gentoo.

Although the maintenance it's sometimes painful for me, the community is huge help and I learn things on the way, sometimes. And I can shape the system to my needs in any way I wish. I would not trade the smallest bit of that for any fancy tool.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
steveL
Watchman
Watchman


Joined: 13 Sep 2006
Posts: 5153
Location: The Peanut Gallery

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 5:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

yagami wrote:
steveL wrote:

You'll have to build your DE, but you can get a real speed-up with those binhosts, and it's kinda spooky to watch emerge's happen at the same speed as a bindist mangler like apt. :P


About that... is amazing how GOOD!!! emerge is with binpkgs! its really fast and even installs bin's or recompiles them based on USE flags match with your system or not !

sincerelly ....makes me wonder why there are not many distro's using this ( winks at sabayon )

Yup yup, it's lovely :-) I actually thought downstreams were already doing exactly that, when we did the work, and only found out 2 or 3 years ago that sabayon has its own mangler (entropy iirc.) However the binpkg format is independent of any package mangler. (You prob'y know all this already, but others might not.)

It is in fact one of the things that kept me with Gentoo, in that it's a sound technical basis, imo. The format is designed to be used in recovery situations, and is essentially just a tar.bz2, but it has some extra data at the end, which gives you a warning when you decompress it. That is ofc the mangler metadata (the "xpak"), but in the meantime it means you can just use standard command-line tools, since they're essentially a mini-rootfs. See man qtbz2 (from portage-utils) if you need to work with them.

They also open in desktop file-managers like Konqui or Dolphin (last I checked, on latter; I switched back to former as it's much quicker) which makes them even more convenient, since you can just double-click, and browse or extract individual files/directories.

You occasionally read someone whinge that it's a "hackish" format because it uses embedded data, past the bz2 eof. But the advantages are too overwhelming, imo. The primary motivation is ofc recovery in emergency situations, especially in embedded scenarios, which clearly covers the bases for a standard Gentoo install. Desktop browsing is pure gravy :)

szatox wrote:
Makes me wonder when portage employs some p2p feature that would turn the whole gentoo network into one huge buildhost pulling packages straight from other users who have already built it with the same use flags

Well there's no way I'm pulling packages from someone I don't know, and I imagine we all feel the same. So you end up needing "trusted users" whose signatures we can verify; aka developers.

There's no reason we couldn't hire infra and bandwidth from Patrick/bonsaikitten who runs gentooexperimental.org, especially if we only wanted him to use it to up his tinderbox testing (ie build more packages, in more combinations, and we'd be paying for the resource.) Additionally ISTR NeddySeagoon wanted to do some builds for his Olde-Fashioned Gentooee, but IDK where he is with setting up the backend for it (haven't seen him on IRC for a couple of weeks.)

Again he's using patrick's setup, so it'd make sense to collaborate around that imo, since there's already tinderboxing going on, with signed binpkgs, and that'd definitely cut down the network load. Quite a few other devs have accts on patrick's boxen as well, eg for IRC bouncers.

But it'd take at least 3 people who wanted to collaborate on it; I guess I'd count as one, but I can only help with bash or shell scripting, and am not a QA person. Decent bug-wrangling and expectation-setting is required, as well as people who actually want this done enough to contribute toward the infra, and people to feedback reports and fixes (ie Gentoo users).

So for now, just a nice idea to muse on :)

In the meantime, if you're not already, make sure you use FEATURES=buildpkg to start building your own binpkgs that you can roll back to in case of trouble. See: you're maintaining your own distro, and could roll those out across a LAN, given compatible hardware and CFLAGS. ;)

You'll see that some of your environment leaks to the binpkgs, which is ofc not a problem when it's done on an automated tinderbox.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
yagami
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 12 May 2002
Posts: 269
Location: Leiria, Portugal

PostPosted: Wed Jun 04, 2014 6:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

steveL wrote:

It is in fact one of the things that kept me with Gentoo, in that it's a sound technical basis, imo.


THIS is exactly why i believe so much in an installer ( gui or script for me ... its indiferent... i never missed a gui "portage manager" ).

In a normal bin distro ( pick fedora or ubuntu or whatever ) ... if you do a bad instalation, a bad file, bad configuration ... you are doomed! Only solution is a reinstall.

In gentoo, portage is able to pick up from whatever situation. There are so many amazing tools in portage / gentoolkit .... you can basicly can break /etc/portage ( enalyze is there for you ), you can break your /var ( er ... more or less :) ), you can misconfigure the instalation ( just dont format the wrong partition ) ... well , whatever, Gentoo can pick up and fix it.

I really believe in this, although i am not going to do a new instalation in the near future.

About new users, they would be great. And i dont rate users who are expert in linux, but users who like to learn and help.

Would really be something, a way to install gentoo and up and running in 15 minutes... ( and then only at night do the recompilation ).

People are talking here about "having an installer is a trade for the features that gentoo has". If that was so, there are millions of distros one could go. I think those here dont want to lose a single feature of Gentoo.

I for one, would really like to see someone/some group do to gentoo what manjaro did to arch. The installer and testing are really nice. Maybe something like Sabayon, but without it never stopping being gentoo ( i guess that is why i was 2/3 years in funtoo, but eventually got back ). Kinda like not a new distro, but a "Gentoo version/release".

My desktop is running perfectly, but still i am in dire need of sharing things ( my gentoo ) and having the community sharing their gentoo with me. ( dunno if this makes sense... )
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
steveL
Watchman
Watchman


Joined: 13 Sep 2006
Posts: 5153
Location: The Peanut Gallery

PostPosted: Thu Jun 05, 2014 3:58 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

yagami wrote:
steveL wrote:

It is in fact one of the things that kept me with Gentoo, in that it's a sound technical basis, imo.

THIS is exactly why i believe so much in an installer ( gui or script for me ... its indiferent... i never missed a gui "portage manager" ).

I'm not following this precisely. Even with a good format you need the package manager in normal usage, and will have to deal with conflicts as well as hardware drivers.

I have much less issue with a console installer than a GUI one, though as stated I think if you have a decent console one, a GUI is much simpler to build afterwards, and in that sense may be inevitable.
Quote:
In a normal bin distro ( pick fedora or ubuntu or whatever ) ... if you do a bad instalation, a bad file, bad configuration ... you are doomed! Only solution is a reinstall.

In gentoo, portage is able to pick up from whatever situation..

I really believe in this, although i am not going to do a new instalation in the near future.

In fact it's better if your first Gentoo install isn't smooth, imo: if you have to get your hard-disk drivers built-in, say and forget your fs, that teaches you, in a way that an installer doing everything for you simply cannot.

And more importantly what it's teaching you is how to setup your system: so while you also know how to do it for the next one, it is nonetheless specifically useful to your situation. For rollouts on the same hardware, that's invaluable. For a linux administrator, it's also valuable experience, if they've never done it; far more important basics than a certificate in administering a bindist, imo; as that's how Unix was developed: by people compiling it for their systems, and sharing patches and tips.
Quote:
About new users, they would be great. And i dont rate users who are expert in linux, but users who like to learn and help.

Would really be something, a way to install gentoo and up and running in 15 minutes... ( and then only at night do the recompilation ).

People are talking here about "having an installer is a trade for the features that gentoo has". If that was so, there are millions of distros one could go. I think those here dont want to lose a single feature of Gentoo.

When something does go wrong, as it inevitably will, if you've done the install yourself, you have no issue at all in fixing whatever it is, as you know how to install the system from the ground up. While you're not arrogant, as you know how many things are involved and you know you don't understand half of them, you also have the confidence to get in there and sort out whatever it is, as it's your system: you sweated to get everything you needed, and wanted, and no more.

The person who's come to Gentoo with everything done for them, simply doesn't have that background. That's not elitism, it's simple fact: they're perfectly able to learn it but for whatever reason they can't make the time commitment. That's okay: not everyone wants to become a RHEL-certified admin either, but if you don't do the groundwork, you cannot maintain the system. krinn has outlined this much better.

It's not about losing "features", so much as wasting everyone's time, including the people who end up with a 15-minute install and no idea how to maintain or administer the machine, which becomes a painful exercise in how long they last before they stomp off, resentful and annoyed at Gentoo. Meanwhile we've wasted loads of effort and time helping people who were never going to stick it out, only to make things worse for external relations, as we now churn out loads of angry ex-"users".

Don't get me wrong: I understand the desire for a script, especially when you've done it over and over. Personally I find the checklist approach pretty good, though clearly I've used an installer too. It was more because it was a low-hanging fruit, and an application for lib code we were working out; maintaining it becomes an issue.

WRT paid admins, typically they have specific things that they need to setup, to fit in with an organisational network. In that regard, they should bear in mind that we already have people who can do an install, on real hw, in half-an-hour, over the net. So again, if they're serious, and they want to become the equivalent of RHEL-certified, then imo they can spend the time and learn Gentoo properly. After all they're getting paid for it. I don't see why we should care, apart from making things work right for the Gentoo admins who already use it profitably.
Quote:
I for one, would really like to see someone/some group do to gentoo what manjaro did to arch. The installer and testing are really nice. Maybe something like Sabayon, but without it never stopping being gentoo ( i guess that is why i was 2/3 years in funtoo, but eventually got back ). Kinda like not a new distro, but a "Gentoo version/release".

My desktop is running perfectly, but still i am in dire need of sharing things ( my gentoo ) and having the community sharing their gentoo with me. ( dunno if this makes sense... )

Well the binpkg approach makes sense to me; as for other things, I think you should get involved with writing ebuilds (you'll want to learn #bash properly, as it's the implementation language), and maintain an overlay if you don't already. And make documentation/howto posts, as well as wiki edits. It's fun doing that on the forums, as people who use similar things help you improve it, or you find better ways, and before you know it you are sharing with people who really understand the purpose of whatever it is you're up to.

I note you're already helping out with the easy installer, so good luck with it :)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
1clue
Advocate
Advocate


Joined: 05 Feb 2006
Posts: 2569

PostPosted: Thu Jun 05, 2014 7:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

OK so speaking from my perspective, what could make this install process easier? Not necessarily in order:

In a word, transferring my preferences to a new system.

For starters, I almost always install from ssh, and I almost always do it as a background task while I'm doing something else. So, setting a root password and starting sshd and have screen on there in case I lose the connection I don't lose my spot.

Next, formatting the disk. Not all my systems are formatted the same way, but there's a common thread: They're GPT partitions, they all have the boat loader partition, they all have a 512m /boot and a root which is usually 10g just in case. Then there's an lvm2 partition which takes up the rest of the disk, and I put on a swap and anything else I want in that, usually a /home at least.

Mounting, I almost always want a swap that's 150% of RAM and use tmpfs for the portage tmp. I pretty much always set up fstab with UUIDs, and use grub2.

I'll probably have a kernel config I used last time, so probably a chance to copy that over.

I pretty much always choose the same logger, same cron scheduler, that sort of thing.

I ALWAYS put vim on there.

The chroot part, we could definitely improve on that. I usually wind up doing that several times on any given install.

The thing is, other than copying over maybe a stage4 instead of a stage3, and maybe some smoothing of the edges on what I mentioned, I can't really see that much of an improvement. And what I call an improvement the next guy certainly won't, unless we define our own profiles or scripts for installs, which is basically what people do anyway.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
cwr
Veteran
Veteran


Joined: 17 Dec 2005
Posts: 1969

PostPosted: Sat Jun 07, 2014 3:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

1clue wrote:

The thing is, other than copying over maybe a stage4 instead of a stage3, and maybe some smoothing of the edges on what I mentioned, I can't really see that much of an improvement. And what I call an improvement the next guy certainly won't, unless we define our own profiles or scripts for installs, which is basically what people do anyway.


Yes, that's the sticking point. I install with pretty much the sequence of commands you do, but my choices are entirely different. I can't see any way to keep a simple, flexible install and not have human intervention - so much intervention, in fact, that it's easier to just follow the handbook.

Will
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
1clue
Advocate
Advocate


Joined: 05 Feb 2006
Posts: 2569

PostPosted: Sat Jun 07, 2014 8:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I guess that's kind of my point.

There could be a sort of scripting mechanism for individual preferences (we can do that ourselves I guess), some way to handle all the chroot stuff, and other than that it's just the handbook.

There's always room for improvement, but realistically what are you going to put into this GUI installer? I can't think of anything. The installer will either be tiny/nonexistent, or it will be so huge as to be unmanageable due to the rate of change of software over time. Or, third option, it'll make your system look just like Ubuntu.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
OmegaSW
n00b
n00b


Joined: 30 Apr 2014
Posts: 9

PostPosted: Sun Jun 15, 2014 6:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If you need Gentoo with an installer, isn't Calculate Linux pretty close to a vanilla Gentoo install with an overlay and some theming?

I was thinking of going this route, but I wanted to prove to myself that I could do this, so I did it the old fashion way. I think there's also a way to convert Sabayon from entropy to full portage as well, but I hear that it's unsupported and much more complicated than doing a regular Gentoo install from scratch.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Anthony7E
n00b
n00b


Joined: 18 Mar 2015
Posts: 10

PostPosted: Sat Mar 21, 2015 3:21 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I only read the OP but I have to disagree.

I learned Gentoo in 2004 and it was my 2nd Distribution (SuSE was my first).

The amount of Linux knowledge I gained just from the install put me miles past any of my friends using the other distributions. The installation was an EXCELLENT learning source.

If anything, I would object and propose the bring back the Stage 1 and Stage 2 installs to give everyone a change to understand their system even more.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
totony
n00b
n00b


Joined: 03 Dec 2014
Posts: 40

PostPosted: Thu Apr 02, 2015 4:16 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I agree that installing Gentoo is too complicated, why not make an installation CD with @system on it?
Remove all the documentation, all the uneeded stuff and pack this into an iso.

With portage, it's easy to install Gentoo (basically one command or two + editting of config).

Would anybody care if I made this? I think it could fit on a 700MB CD (maybe not a 5M floppy like all Gentoo users use tho).
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
szczerb
Veteran
Veteran


Joined: 24 Feb 2007
Posts: 1709
Location: Poland => Lodz

PostPosted: Thu Apr 02, 2015 12:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

If you've done it before, it's not complicated. If you haven't, then you should go through the process. Otherwise there is little chance of not breaking the system quite soon.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
ct85711
Veteran
Veteran


Joined: 27 Sep 2005
Posts: 1791

PostPosted: Thu Apr 02, 2015 7:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

totony wrote:
I agree that installing Gentoo is too complicated, why not make an installation CD with @system on it?
Remove all the documentation, all the uneeded stuff and pack this into an iso.


I disagree in Gentoo having a graphical installer. I've always seen Gentoo as a distro that is NOT for people that don't know on how to use their system, it's meant for people already familiar with linux and command line. Every person I recommend linux to, I intentionally tell them not to use Gentoo, as I know they know nothing about how to use Linux. The people that is comfortable in linux, I do direct them to Gentoo. Quite frankly, I feel people that want to mindlessly use a linux system are better off using a bindist (like Ubuntu or RedHat/Fedora). You need to actually pay attention to what your system is doing in Gentoo. Even for my mom's system that I have to maintain, I won't put Gentoo on it (even though I like using Gentoo) because she has no idea what she is doing. I am not saying if you don't know/understand something not to use Gentoo (you should ask if you don't know something).
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
John R. Graham
Administrator
Administrator


Joined: 08 Mar 2005
Posts: 10587
Location: Somewhere over Atlanta, Georgia

PostPosted: Thu Apr 02, 2015 7:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

totony wrote:
I agree that installing Gentoo is too complicated, why not make an installation CD with @system on it?
Remove all the documentation, all the uneeded stuff and pack this into an iso.

With portage, it's easy to install Gentoo (basically one command or two + editting of config).

Would anybody care if I made this? I think it could fit on a 700MB CD (maybe not a 5M floppy like all Gentoo users use tho).
Well, the things in the @system set are packaged in the separate downloadable Stage3 tarball because they (in theory) need to be updated way more often than the Installation CD. Do you think you really save a lot of steps by having to download the Stage tarball separately? I don't.

- John
_________________
I can confirm that I have received between 0 and 499 National Security Letters.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
totony
n00b
n00b


Joined: 03 Dec 2014
Posts: 40

PostPosted: Thu Apr 02, 2015 7:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

John R. Graham wrote:
totony wrote:
I agree that installing Gentoo is too complicated, why not make an installation CD with @system on it?
Remove all the documentation, all the uneeded stuff and pack this into an iso.

With portage, it's easy to install Gentoo (basically one command or two + editting of config).

Would anybody care if I made this? I think it could fit on a 700MB CD (maybe not a 5M floppy like all Gentoo users use tho).
Well, the things in the @system set are packaged in the separate downloadable Stage3 tarball because they (in theory) need to be updated way more often than the Installation CD. Do you think you really save a lot of steps by having to download the Stage tarball separately? I don't.

- John


Oh, never thought about it like that.

But I do believe it saves the longest step, and programs in the iso still need to be updated as much (what's in it, binutils, coreutils, util-linux, kmod, kbd, openrc, some deps and some network tools? Why not just add portage + some dev tools?).

For now, you have to:
- Download the iso, checksum it, check signature
- Check for mirrors while installing, download the stage, checksum it, check signature
- Install.

Also, from the handbook, you install the stage3 directly to your new system, which really changes nothing from every major distribution (we're still fed binaries and have to hack quite a bit to tune up the compile options of binutils and al.). i.e. from our running system, we'll have to rebuild, breaking our newly installed system if something fucks up.

I do believe the advantage of not having to set up gnupg on the install media to check the stage3 after looking for a mirror using unfamiliar browser to be a net gain (even if we have to update the iso a bit more).
Also, being able to have a temporary stage3 is way better than just extracting the stage3 to our new system (for now, we need to have a special partition for this or play with ramfs).
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
pjp
Administrator
Administrator


Joined: 16 Apr 2002
Posts: 20054

PostPosted: Fri Apr 03, 2015 3:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

John R. Graham wrote:
Well, the things in the @system set are packaged in the separate downloadable Stage3 tarball because they (in theory) need to be updated way more often than the Installation CD. Do you think you really save a lot of steps by having to download the Stage tarball separately? I don't.

- John
Are they not built using the autobuild method? Seems like an ISO could be autogenerated. I'm not familiar with how the autobuilds are generated, so it may not be appropriate.


@totony: In the years I've been here (since 2002), I've seen many, many threads on a GUI installer. The main "problem" I consistently see is that people discuss it, but rarely develop one. The technical problem I've heard with an official tool is being able to support all platforms with a single installer. Personally I think a One Size Fits Most solution would be fine.

The main thing I'd like to see more than a GUI installer is something like kickstart.
_________________
Quis separabit? Quo animo?
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Reply to topic    Gentoo Forums Forum Index Gentoo Chat All times are GMT
Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6  Next
Page 4 of 6

 
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum