Gentoo Celebrates 10 Years

Message

comprookie2000 · Post by **comprookie2000** » Mon Jul 13, 2009 12:49 am

Looking for suggestions on what we can do special for this Extraordinary Event.
The Chronology is here;
http://dev.gentoo.org/~dabbott/pr/2009- ... cement.xml
The screenshots are from 2002, if anyone can find some even earlier that would be great.
I was thinking of using hwoarang's screenshot contest to compare current specs/screenshots with those from the past.
http://dev.gentoo.org/~hwoarang/files/shots.xml
That page is just a draft so don't contact him, he will be away for a while, has to do his duty for his country, that is why he does not have time to do it himself.
Here is my updated version;
http://dev.gentoo.org/~dabbott/pr/shots.xml
Is there any interest in something like this?

OK, It has started

http://www.gentoo.org/news/20090722-anniversary.xml

poly_poly-man · Post by **poly_poly-man** » Mon Jul 13, 2009 2:26 am

how many people are still on their original install from back then

likewhoa · Post by **likewhoa** » Wed Jul 22, 2009 2:41 pm

w00t, looking forward to the birthday bash! Gentoo 4 life! Thanks dabbot a.k.a comprookie2000 for the wonderful screenshots and draft, you are a true gentoo tropper

To everyone else out there, start digging your boxens for old screenshots and share them. Gentoo rox ma boxenz!

comprookie2000 · Post by **comprookie2000** » Wed Jul 22, 2009 2:48 pm

The time has come to trick up that boring desktop and help Gentoo celebrate its 10 year anniversary.

http://www.gentoo.org/news/20090722-anniversary.xml

Set up a web page to post The2009 Gentoo Screenshot Contest Contestants ;
http://gentoo-pr.org/node/6

helamonster · Post by **helamonster** » Tue Jul 28, 2009 12:42 am

Congratulations, Gentoo!

This topic brings back memories....

I started using GNU/Linux around year 2000. I installed it on my primary desktop machine and have never used a different operating system since (on any computer I own).
A friend of mine turned me on to Gentoo in 2003 at which point I started playing with it.
I installed it on my primary desktop machine on January 5th, 2004.
I am still running that same installation of Gentoo on the same hardware (with a few parts upgraded) and it is kept up to date.
I have not re-installed the OS since then. There were a few times when I was behind on updates and had to spend a day cleaning/fixing things, but thanks to the Gentoo forums, I was able to resolve just about any issue I ever ran into.

And while I now use a mix of GNU/Linux distributions on the machines I own, I'm sure Gentoo will remain on my primary desktop for years to come :)

For a screenshot of my desktop and a look at my own .xinitrc:
http://white.prohosting.com/hela/

comprookie2000 · Post by **comprookie2000** » Tue Jul 28, 2009 12:58 am

helamonster, Enter it in the contest

http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/pr/2009-s ... ontest.xml

Mike Hunt · Post by **Mike Hunt** » Tue Jul 28, 2009 1:04 am

helamonster,

Interesting wallpaper, did you design it yourself?

It reminds of xsetroot -mod x y - which doesn't seem to work in Kde4.

helamonster · Post by **helamonster** » Tue Jul 28, 2009 1:31 am

Interesting wallpaper, did you design it yourself?
It reminds of xsetroot -mod x y - which doesn't seem to work in Kde4. :)

Yeah, it's actually the default X background (xsetroot -gray). I liked it so much I made a bitmap so I could put it on my Windows machine at work. Luckily, I now have Gentoo on my work machine too :)

helamonster, Enter it in the contest :)

I couldn't figure out how to submit a screenshot there. Am I missing something?
edit: I just emailed David with the link :) Duh!

comprookie2000 · Post by **comprookie2000** » Tue Jul 28, 2009 2:02 am

Don't forget the rules

Please provide the following information in your submission e-mail:

Username (if you have any, on the Gentoo Forums or IRC so that the other users may contact you if needed)
Name (optional)
Provide details (links, resources etc.) of your screenshot components such as themes, icons, wallpaper, applications, etc.
Please provide the specs of your box so we can compare it with the systems from the past

also;
One must prove the origin of their screenshot being a Gentoo Linux machine. For this, an open terminal with emerge --info |head -n 1 output is used.

mrbig4545 · Post by **mrbig4545** » Sat Aug 08, 2009 4:49 pm

Awesome, I started using it in about 2001, just after I completed a LFS install, and I thought, theres gotta be a better way of doing this, I was thinking about scripting some rubbish together to do it for me, when I found gentoo. Haven't looked back since, I love it!

I've tried to convert so many people, but all of them end up back on debian/ubuntu, they just don't have the time or skillz to make it work perfect, but I was the same, I've just got 8 years experience now!

Anyway, great 10 years, hope there's at least another 10 more!

comprookie2000 · Post by **comprookie2000** » Sat Aug 08, 2009 5:00 pm

I happened to meet a Linux user in my area last year and he was/is a Fedora user.
He always heard me talking about Gentoo and was Gentoo-curious

Last week I talked him into installing Gentoo and he just did not get it. He wanted to take short cuts and not listen, needless to say he failed. He now says Gentoo is just too much work and the rewards are not that much, but he has not even experienced it really. You have to stick with it and then at some point it just becomes natural.

mrbig4545 · Post by **mrbig4545** » Sat Aug 08, 2009 5:07 pm

comprookie2000 wrote:I happened to meet a Linux user in my area last year and he was/is a Fedora user.
He always heard me talking about Gentoo and was Gentoo-curious
Last week I talked him into installing Gentoo and he just did not get it. He wanted to take short cuts and not listen, needless to say he failed. He now says Gentoo is just too much work and the rewards are not that much, but he has not even experienced it really. You have to stick with it and then at some point it just becomes natural.

I had the exact same thing with a guy at work. I chewed his ear off so much about ubuntu being total crap and fighting me everystep of the way. He was intrigued and installed gentoo on his home machine, he really liked it, however he made a complete hash of the install, so I talked him through that and he learned! now he runs it on his home comp and server! he did have it on his work comp and netbook, but the netbook died and he couldn't be bothered with the install again! and as for his work comp, he said it was too unstable, which is a lie!

there was another guy at work who tried to run it, but he messed it up so much i told him to just start again, he refused, wasted 2 weeks trying to fix it then converted back to ubuntu.

I guess the moral of the story is, some people are just too lazy!

Post by **NeddySeagoon** » Sat Aug 08, 2009 6:45 pm

I installed Gentoo in the middle of 2002 using the time honoured stage1 mehoud and the 1.4-rc4 minimal CD.
That was soon after I got broadband.

That install is still alive today. Its been migrated across two motherbaords, thee CPUs and three sets of disks but its still the same install.
In February this year, I got a whole new 64 bit box and the original system is semi retired but I still update it from time to time.
The various bits that comprised that original install are in use in various headless Gentoo systems today too.

I've come close to reinstalling. Hitting the libexpat upgrade and moving to modular Xorg at the same time was the worst, as I had to pick up the pieces with no Xorg. There were instructions for Xorg but libexpat was a surprise. Still thats the price you pay for running ~ARCH.

sbergloff · Post by **sbergloff** » Mon Aug 10, 2009 3:00 pm

I feel like such a newbie seeing how long some of you have been using Gentoo.

I went through quite a few distros before I tried this one. A few years ago, I started using Sabayon at home and I really liked it. At the same time, it seemed really bloated and I didn't like everything about it. I eventually realized that the part I really loved about it was portage! So some time in 2008 I got the minimal 2008.0 boot disc, pulled up the online documentation, and did a stage 3 install. I goofed it up and had to start over twice, but I learned so much, and call me a geek but that was more fun than I had in a long time!

I definitely took my time, and while going through the install docs I did additional research on just about every step of the way. I think it took me 3 weeks to get my system the way I wanted it, but I had a stable, quick system fully optimized for my needs that I built from source. I felt like I knew why just about every file on my system was there because I put it there. I only wish I used irc back while I was installing. I later learned the #gentoo channel is an invaluable resource! I really appreciate those of you who spend time on there helping us out.

Ever since then I've been running Gentoo as my only OS on my main PC at home, and I wouldn't have it any other way! I've never had an issue that I couldn't fix. I hope Gentoo sticks around for many more decades, as I don't want to have to use anything else.

disi · Post by **disi** » Tue Aug 11, 2009 9:37 am

Where is this thread about the less powerful machine you installed Gentoo on?

For me it was this one: ThinkPad 390X

It took like two days to bootstrap the system

sbergloff · Post by **sbergloff** » Thu Aug 13, 2009 2:14 pm

disi wrote:Where is this thread about the less powerful machine you installed Gentoo on?

For me it was this one: ThinkPad 390X

It took like two days to bootstrap the system

I installed Gentoo 2008.0 on a Sun Ultra 2 earlier this year, sparc platform with a 333mhz 64-bit risk-II processor, 256mb ram.
I had a lot of issues with the 10 year old hard drive at first, but once installed it now runs so smoothly.

I use it as an apache server. X is not installed, no keyboard or monitor. Gentoo has really breathed new life into that old box.

comprookie2000 · Post by **comprookie2000** » Fri Aug 14, 2009 10:12 pm

Here are all the entries so far;

http://gentoo-pr.org/node/6
http://gentoo-pr.org/node/7
http://gentoo-pr.org/node/9
http://gentoo-pr.org/node/11

Simple Gallery
http://gentoo-pr.org/2009-Screenshot-Co ... index.html

quag7 · Post by **quag7** » Sat Aug 15, 2009 2:57 am

I can't believe I've been using Linux for 7 years. Bought a cheap tigerdirect barebones kit to use as, basically, a shell, to "mess around" with Linux, having not used it...

Installed Mandrake in 2002. Liked it. But things would break and I couldn't figure out how to fix them. Eventually, on this "cheapo" system I bought to mess around on, I had to reinstall Mandrake.

But there were all these articles about Gentoo at the time, about how it was really hard to install and you had to really know Linux. I had 2 months of clicking around in (KDE maybe on Mandrake? I forget) and almost no shell...I thought for joke before I reinstalled Mandrake, after I wiped the hard drive I would see how far I got with Gentoo.

Here I am. I made it through without many problems at all. I have installed maybe 20 OSes (many Linux distros, most of the xBSDs, OpenSolaris, even Plan 9) in virtual machines and played with them.

Every time I get annoyed at Gentoo and think about leaving...I think about what I'd gain.

Then a cooler head prevails and I think about what I'd lose.

I am a Linux user full-time today (Mandrake was a "secondary system" to my Windows 2000 desktop when I first installed it) because Gentoo just made sense. I have since railed at the idea that Gentoo is only for experienced users.

Here's my first Gentoo screenshot. I think I was in a state of shock that it worked. You can see the Mandrake banner on the little personal web server I was running; hadn't found a replacement for it yet. Never, ever expected to be running this for 7 years. I expect I shall be running it as long as it is viable. Still really like it, even though occasionally it drives me batty.

http://www.dataswamp.net/colin/2002-07- ... esktop.png

AutoBot · Post by **AutoBot** » Sat Aug 22, 2009 6:50 pm

sbergloff wrote: I hope Gentoo sticks around for many more decades, as I don't want to have to use anything else.

I'm sure with a community like this the old purple g will be kicking for years to come.

zez · Post by **zez** » Sun Aug 23, 2009 1:44 am

A little over seven years ago I installed Gentoo on my then-new AthlonXP desktop, and I had a blast. Coming from Slackware I appreciated Gentoo's flexibility and minimalist approach to configuration, but I also greatly appreciated Gentoo's modern package manager. After compiling new kernels and managing modules and conf files, I really felt like I knew that machine inside and out. Sadly, that system began showing its age, and compiling some of the larger packages became fairly tedious. I avoided a lot of updates and my install became stale until I got my hands on the Core2Duo laptop I use right now.

For the past year or so I've been running Debian Sid on this laptop and have Fedora 11 on another machine. Everything works fine in Debian, but it's been a bit boring as of late. I ordered a laptop cooler since UT2004 almost made my machine overheat, so I've decided it's time to get back into Gentoo again now that heat won't be an issue. Low and behold I come back to the Gentoo forums and find this thread.

Up until last month I also had a Gentoo box acting as a router/print server at my parents' house that I setup back in 2004. It was a low-power VIA EPIA system that I'd just perform some security updates on 1-2 times per year. That thing would have kept on chugging had it not been made obsolete by a wifi router and network printer that my parents' recently bought.

Anyways, I think it's time for a clean install before grad school starts

valkyrite · Post by **valkyrite** » Sun Aug 30, 2009 1:45 am

I am a gentoo user since 1.2

durian · Post by **durian** » Sun Aug 30, 2009 7:56 am

The oldest install I have running is an install I did in 2005. Four years!
-peter

onexused · Post by **onexused** » Wed Sep 02, 2009 9:32 am

I've only been using Gentoo for two years, and I've had to reinstall a couple times because of my own idiocy : \. I used Fedora for a year before that. I switched to Gentoo because of a conversation I heard between a couple of guys waiting for a computer science class at a college I was visiting.

quag7 wrote:Here I am. I made it through without many problems at all. I have installed maybe 20 OSes (many Linux distros, most of the xBSDs, OpenSolaris, even Plan 9) in virtual machines and played with them.

What virtual machine did you use for Plan9? Did you have to do anything special to get it to work? I can't get it to install in VirtualBox.

I managed to get Gentoo installed on a Pentium-166 laptop with 40MB of RAM. I eventually started building all the packages on my much faster desktop, though, so that probably doesn't count.

gregool · Post by **gregool** » Wed Sep 02, 2009 8:14 pm

comprookie2000 wrote:Here are all the entries so far;

http://gentoo-pr.org/node/6
http://gentoo-pr.org/node/7
http://gentoo-pr.org/node/9

Simple Gallery
http://gentoo-pr.org/2009-Screenshot-Co ... index.html

wow excellent stuff in there !!!

comprookie2000 · Post by **comprookie2000** » Wed Sep 02, 2009 8:56 pm

One more page I forgot to update my post;
http://gentoo-pr.org/node/11