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PostPosted: Fri Oct 25, 2013 11:53 am    Post subject: GUI installers need CLI fallback. Reply with quote

wizardaeon wrote:
This is not a trolling, or flaming message, but I just wanted to comment on what would otherwise be an awesome OS for me.

I find it very educational to install from command line, but to be perfectly honest I have yet to install gentoo with a graphical UI.

I totally understand that this OS is built with volunteers, but do you have to be a computer programmer to use it? Would you install this on a friends computer because he coudnt afford windows or because he wants something more stable? Why would anybody who doesnt have the level of skill recquired to install Gentoo want Gentoo?

I really want to say, I appreciate all the hard work that people put into Linux, but from a PC tech point of view, you really need something to automate the process. Even if all it does is install a base system like Archbang.

I feel like there would be more people to donate to and support Gentoo if more people had a reason to use it.

I cant use a OS for what I use it for without a GUI.


Textbook TROLLING title.

I don't want to go at lenght explaining why this is a bad idea. But bad is it, and you have to become more familiar with the process of installing to fully understand why. Dunno, become familiar with partitioning and GRUB and other stuff such as fstab. Is not very hard.

As a matter fact, I'd argue the opposite, that mainstream distros should have the option of making an install purely by CLI, like gentoo.

Yes, GUI installers need a cli fallback.

Still I've come accross the best GUI installer so far, and 100% compatible with gentoo, is Calculate distro (gentoo based). Possibly the most elegant installer out there.
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1clue
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PostPosted: Fri Oct 25, 2013 2:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yes it is a textbook trolling title. And if you'll look, the original poster still has exactly one post on this forum. Look at the date he made the post, and you'll realize exactly what's going on.

The rest of us can stop expressing why a graphical installer is a bad idea, we've all been taken for a ride.
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LoTeK
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PostPosted: Fri Oct 25, 2013 4:09 pm    Post subject: Re: gentoo needs a graphical installer Reply with quote

PaulBredbury wrote:
wizardaeon wrote:
but do you have to be a computer programmer to use it?

Yes, pretty much.

Normal people should be using a *distro* (where other people choose software combinations which work well together, and which have already been tested), not a *meta*-distro (where you have the power to break things in weird ways, so weird that sometimes even Google doesn't know the answer).

I don't think you have to be a programmer to be able to use Gentoo, at most an enthusiast that is prepared to invest some time in his system. And only at the beginning (for example thanks to genkernel I could boot the first time, so it had its value). after you are familiar with it, it's easier than other systems (at least for me). Moreover all tools to compile a kernel etc are already installed. If you want to compile your kernel in Mint, you have to install ncurses first (if you want to use menuconfig). (of course thats not hard, just saying.. :) )

I know this is a boring and old topic, but I just want to say, NO, gentoo doesn't need a graphical installer :)
Gentoo is the only Distribution that is useful for work (unlike for example LFS), while remaining a non-bloated and simple system (of course only in relation to other systems)!

I would be really sad, if Gentoo would abandon it's principles! Lately I've installed debian and it was a pain! on my yeeloong I didn't manage to install it, because during the "software installation phase" something went wrong and I didn't know what. With Gentoo you can't get into a situation like this! (ok, maybe pebcak, but anyway...)
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Last edited by LoTeK on Fri Oct 25, 2013 4:13 pm; edited 1 time in total
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ddriver
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PostPosted: Fri Oct 25, 2013 4:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I don't care whether or not a graphical installer is available for Gentoo as I would never use it.
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steveL
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PostPosted: Fri Oct 25, 2013 11:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

No. (underlines added):
albright wrote:
the installation process is immensely instructive

Jaglover wrote:
If you cannot install it you cannot maintain it. But this has been recited on these forums gazillion times.

1clue wrote:
The idea of installing it on a non-expert's computer is ludicrous. If it were MY computer and a non-expert was using it, that's fine. But to install it and then hand it over to someone who can't maintain it? Not a good way to do business IMO.

Clad in Sky wrote:
As others already mentioned, a Gentoo install must be maintained, and if you don't learn some stuff during install, you'll probably not know how to do that. You can easily break things in Gentoo - mostly you can easily fix them, too, but you need to know what you're doing or at least what you have to ask to get the right answers.
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666threesixes666
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PostPosted: Sat Oct 26, 2013 2:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

what about corporate usage of gentoo, and deploying it to 100s of computers at a time? by hand every single time?
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1clue
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PostPosted: Sat Oct 26, 2013 4:42 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

666threesixes666 wrote:
what about corporate usage of gentoo, and deploying it to 100s of computers at a time? by hand every single time?


You mean for workstations? Build a standard image and then use some sort of network boot and centralized management, just like any other big company OS.

Corporations don't buy one computer at a time, they buy 10 or 50 or more. They don't buy random stuff, they choose one model and punch in a number for how many.

For servers, I'm sure they have a handful of relatively standard builds to do certain types of things. Again, build it once and clone it.

They do that sort of thing for binary-based operating systems, why would they go any other route for Gentoo? dd if=/path/to/my/source.img of=/dev/sda1 ...
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PostPosted: Sun Oct 27, 2013 12:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

666threesixes666 wrote:
what about corporate usage of gentoo, and deploying it to 100s of computers at a time? by hand every single time?


100x the fun :D

(but as someone said dd should take care of that)

use this over a network should be hilarious:

dd if=/dev/sdX | tee >(dd of=image1) >(dd of=image2) >(dd of=image...) >(dd of=image100)
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cnnx
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 3:04 am    Post subject: Recommendation for a gentoo installer Reply with quote

Why hasn't gentoo ever released an automated installer for the OS? like debian and most other Linux distros have? I remember when I was starting out with gentoo finding it very diffcult to install everything for a working installation. Now that I've used getntoo for several years I no longer wish for that installer but I'm wondering how current new users might feel? Any thoughts?

check out my website! [-- Obvioulsy not related to this contribution => reedited by aCOSwt 2014/04/15--]
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John R. Graham
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PostPosted: Tue Apr 15, 2014 5:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Merged above post.

- John
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