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Angrychile
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 3:49 am    Post subject: What do you use Gentoo for? Reply with quote

Gentoo is, as the metadistribution of Linux, as the about page says. I've found since about a year and half ago that it really is a neat distro that gives the user power and control over the entire system. In theory, that control should allow Gentoo to morph into whatever type of system you need.

I'm curious to see those types that use it. I'm curious what you people use your Gentoo for, what are some great examples of how Gentoo, a distro under one moniker, can be shaped into whatever use the user whims?

Plus points for out there stuff (mainframes, computer clusters !?)

And sorry if this is a dupe, please delete and redirect me to the right place ;) thnx pjp
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Shining Arcanine
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 8:05 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have Gentoo setup on my desktop, on my laptop and on a virtual machine on a headless Windows system.
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Frustie
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 9:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

On one laptop (which actually acts as a home server with built in ups, and consumes less power than my regular equipment would) + distcc
On another laptop but didnt have time to complete the installation yet (maybe next week)
On a VirtualBox environment
On a workstation + distcc
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Goverp
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 10:16 am    Post subject: Netboot, laptop, desktop Reply with quote

I currently have two Gentoo systems: a netbook (160 GB hard drive), set up for mobile browsing, email, watching TV via a tiny USB key, and a desktop (4-way AMD Phenom, 4 disk RAID 5) for browsing, email, games, photo library, music library, watching TV and video editing (using the same USB key) development (Java via Eclipse).
Used to have an employer's laptop, set up for Lotus notes, Eclipse development, plus all the mobile browsing, email and so forth.

I'm a long-time KDE user. Out of interest, I tried the KDE System Settings->Desktop->Workspace->Form factor=netbook switch, but gave it up as it only seemed to (a) remove the multiple desktop facility, and (b) replace the Application Launcher ("start menu") with icons. Looked nice but functionally seemed a step backwards - does anyone have a different experience?
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aCOSwt
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 10:17 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I moved my desktop from FreeBSD 6.3 to Gentoo about one year ago.

- I needed MIDI support + near to realtime capabilities + low latency + 64 bits proprietary drivers that were not available for FreeBSD.
- I needed the ability to build from sources because I have always been in a need to fiddle the code of the applications I use.

The result is some kind of DAW, far from perfect mainly because lacking support for most interesting VSTis, but I am basically happy with.
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Chiitoo
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 11:02 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I use it for everything I used windows for, which is nothing special but pretty regular stuff.
Gaming, audio/video editing, making music, anything really. Though nothing I do is on a professional level...

Nothing special but everything regular.
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drwook
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 11:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

My primary desktop (and the one before that) - so, everything really, gaming/multimedia/streaming (mediatomb)/dev/virtualisation (virtualbox lately)
My daughter's laptop (watching DVD's, playing games, web browsing)
A couple of web servers at work
a dev/test box at home

So a fair mix.
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disi
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 12:26 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here is a list, what's currently running:

Desktop - x86_64 with unstable and as cross-dev with icecream cluster to help out my netbook/Laptop - web surfing, office stuff(OOo, Gummi, Calibre etc.), gaming, listen to music
Laptop - x86 stable - watching videos (docking station or in bed), some web surfing, schleppi
Netbook - armv7a for testing and not really used (actually I learned that touchbooks are crap)
Home-Server - x86 - hardened - runs with openvz patched vanilla kernel for some containers with CentOS and router, firewall, nfs
ftp/Web-Server - x86 - stable - dedicated server, mostly for web hosting and ftp, runs my little php-proxy if I need to get onto some page around a proxy, testing (Google Wave and other stuff)
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minimaul
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 8:01 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Desktop (i7, 3 monitor, 12GB ram etc) - x86_64 - lots of development, KVM VMs, music, web surfing, video
Laptop (core 2, 4GB RAM) - x86_64 - web, video, development, KVM
Home server running Xen (from xen-testing, not from portage) and Gentoo as dom0 and domUs - i7, 12GB RAM, 8TB 3ware h/w raid - internal web hosting, file serving, VM use, distcc
MacBook Pro - x86_64, 8GB RAM - more development work, KVM, web browsing
VMs on colocated server - gentoo x86_64 vms under Hyper-V

All of the local gentoo instances are setup to use distcc - my compile times are unbelievably fast - whole network is gigabit ethernet.

I used to run a mix of Fedora (when it was still Fedora Core ;)) Ubuntu and CentOS. The sheer customisability of portage is why I use it.
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Dammital
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 17, 2011 8:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Home desktop: GNOME-light, mm, games, 841 packages
Work desktop: GNOME-light, mm, 786 packages
501(c)(3) web/mail server: 194 packages

All three systems absorb cycles running F@H in background.
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Jimini
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 18, 2011 5:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

1) Server / Router / Firewall: Atom D410, headless. Function: HTTP- / IRC- / Mail-Server
2) Fileserver: Atom N270, 2x1,5TB diskspace (RAID1), headless (will be replaced by a 12TB-RAID6-system during the next months). Function: Stores my data and my backups, HTTP- / IRC- / NFS- /Mail-Server
3) Desktop: Core i5 750, 8GB RAM, for work, for playing around with Gentoo, from time to time for games (StarCraft 2) or some other stuff
4) Laptop: Core 2 Duo iirc, 2GB RAM, for work and stuff
5) Second Laptop: Celeron 1333, 512MB RAM, just for testing and playing around

I plan to build a HTPC with Gentoo in 2011 - but this project depends on money ;)

Best regards,
Jimini
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Trog Dog
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 18, 2011 8:06 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

8 desktops various flavours but mostly 64bit. Their primary role is crunching for BOINC, one also acts as the local gentoo mirror and four others also serve up my digital media library.
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keet
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 19, 2011 3:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here are my Gentoo computers:

ASUS laptop, i5, 4GB RAM, NVidia GTS360M: Internet browsing, email, chat, listening to and occasionally composing (or trying to compose) music, playing games, research, virtual machines for testing

Panasonic Toughbook T2300, 1GB RAM: Basically the same, but fewer games. Sometimes my children play with it.

Toshiba Satellite: Boots Windows Vista in four minutes from its built-in hard drive, or Gentoo in about 45 seconds from an old external hard drive. It's my wife's, and she claims that there aren't any drawing programs good enough for her to use in Linux, though I installed about a dozen, then a few Windows ones in Wine. My son plays Tux games on it, and some Popcap games in Wine.

Fujitsu Lifebook PIV 1.6Ghz, 512MB RAM: I gave this to my parents, with XFCE4 on it. My mother uses it more than their dual-core desktop computer with 1GB RAM and Windows Vista. I administer it remotely using SSH. I would say that I troubleshoot it, but it doesn't really need troubleshooting. :)

Toshiba Tecra PIII 128MB RAM: Back when it worked, my son used it for Tux Paint and other games, and I used it to customize Android, plus occasional web surfing. It stopped turning on at all about a year ago.

Home-built Q6600, 4GB RAM, NVidia 9800GTX+, other nice hand-picked hardware: Before I sold it to buy my ASUS laptop computer, I used it for the same things as that one. This is the first computer that I installed Gentoo on, and I remember how much trouble I had installing it before I found that I needed to copy the wifi card's firmware to /lib/firmware for it to work.
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The Doctor
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 19, 2011 5:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I use Gentoo for a kde and fluxbox desktop.
I use it to use the web, run physics programs I write, and I try to do all my school work on it. (still trying to get used to root from CERN...).

I really like the bit were I can play with the system and make it work without extra stuff on it.

Also, I made a laptop with a sort of cross between Sabayon and Gentoo for some nuns to use. (Sabayon installation with portage upkeep.)
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niick
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 19, 2011 1:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Current
Main desktop - unstable amd64, q6600, 8GB, 120GB ssd, dualboot win xp - Used for everything, tinkering, learning, breaking, work, fun
Home server - hardened amd64, cheap intel proc, 2GB, many TB of disk space although no RAID - file, web, ftp, ntp, asterisk, rtorrent, nzbget, etc

Previous
HTPC - Was another cheap intel w/ nvidia for vdpau running gentoo - but has recently been replaced with Atom+ION MiniITX, but I've put Arch on it (figured compiling would be unrealistic, but thinking about distcc)
Router - Old P4 w/ nice network cards running gentoo. After many years of crash free running was replaced with WRT54GL running dd-wrt. O where for art thou cheap electric and silent P4 cooling.
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JuNix
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PostPosted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 10:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

We use Gentoo as a PostgreSQL database cluster. We have two quad core Xeon boxes running the stable branch of Gentoo/x86_64. We are using IBM's EVMS to manage volumes on a hardware RAID of 6 x 36GB SAS drives using EXT4 filesystems. We are also using in-kernel DRBD block device replication between the database nodes. It was a Stage 1 install, and everything on the boxes was compiled with -march=native and then prelinked. The kernel is compiled specifically for the Xeons. We have no problems running Gentoo in a production environment. It's fast and reliable. The database cluster runs several busy web-based forums. These boxes are seriously fast, and the Gentoo builds actually benchmarked twice as fast using pgbench as the previous build on them which was Debian Sarge.

My policy as to portage health on them is to sync portage once per month, and then to update the system set. The world set is mostly left alone. The only other thing on them is to be on the ball with GLSAs.

Only 3 of the systems we run out of hundreds runs Gentoo though. I would wonder how to manage hundreds of them, and having experience of repairing the portage health of a Gentoo build that wasn't maintained for years makes me know to never leave a Gentoo build to rot for too long.
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pingufunkybeat
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PostPosted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 2:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I use Gentoo at home for my main computer. It is a multi-seat setup, which I share with my girlfriend. We have two monitors and two sets of peripherals, so we can both use the same computer at the same time (it's a relatively powerful PhenomII quad, so it has plenty of power for both).

We do almost everything on it, but we have an old PowerBook and an even older Dell Windows machine, which we keep for occasional compatibility needs. I was thinking about turning the Dell into a cheap Linux netbook for travelling, but I've been too busy lately.
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disi
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PostPosted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 3:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

And the installations started with a stage and portage :)

We should start calling it:
Eentoo enterprise for servers
Gentoo for Gnome edition
Kentoo for KDE edition
Xentoo for Xfce4 edition
Lentoo for Light edition
etc.
:twisted:
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keet
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PostPosted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 5:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

disi wrote:
And the installations started with a stage and portage :)
We should start calling it:
Eentoo enterprise for servers...


And then we can append versions: 1500,31/12/2010,~gnome

means that it's software that was current as of 1500 on that date with some keyworded gnome packages.
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ndbg2
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 23, 2011 11:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I am currently running two gentoo systems.
A Desktop for everyday use.
The other one used to be my former desktop with KDE and is currently transforming to an HTPC for testing purpose. I kicked KDE and installed XFCE with MythTV. To be honest, I have not succeeded yet. The goal is to run an HTPC with a Gentoo Basis in the near future.
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 23, 2011 11:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Currently run two desktops (one at home, one at work) and a laptop for picture editing, browsing, servers, media-streaming, video, music server.

Previously installed Gentoo on a Linksys NSLU2 and the PS3 (before Sony bar-stewards removed OtherOS :x ).

Incredibly flexible system.
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PostPosted: Sun Jan 30, 2011 1:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Two servers, headless. One Apache and samba IRCd and eggdrop., other backup samba server.

One Soekris running Gentoo as a router.
Originally used embedded Gentoo but uclibc was too restrictive so full install.
Runs Arno's IPTables script, dyndns client, failtoban, DNS cache, DHCP server.
After boot uses 13 megs RAM.

Takes forever to emerge though even with distcc.
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d4rkwingduck
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 10, 2011 2:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

At home main and only desktop OS. Soon will be replacing Windows 7 on my new work laptop.

Upcoming projects new atom fileserver with encrypted backups to S3. New seperate Zoneminder server (we were recently burglared :-( but luckily they didn't take any computers/laptops) and new general purpose atom server (mail, web, ftp, ssh, voip etc ....).

At work I have 3 vms on an ESXi cluster. One running Squid, another DNS services for DMZ servers and another VM running Cacti for network monitoring. Will also have it as workstation OS once things quite down a bit. Unfortunately all other application/web/database/mail servers have to be M$ based.
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 11, 2011 6:42 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gentoo is my primary OS here. I use it on my Lenovo T500. There is another machine running Ubuntu at the moment - it will be migrated to Gentoo stable in the next weeks.
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 12, 2011 4:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I use it as the only OS on my laptop, vmware for stuff like visio and iTunes. I use my laptop for general purpose, transcoding, network discovery.

I have a Dell 1950 that hosts bigbrother, cacti, nfs, snort.
I use ssh on it for general network troubleshooting and monitoring.

I am in the process of converting some older Dell 2950 servers into 12TB iscsi mini sans for vmware esxi data stores.

All systems are running amd64 or ~amd64 hardened+nomultilib.
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