CGOG1: Why did you choose Gentoo

[TheLexx]

This poll is mainly aimed at people who have been using Gentoo for a number of years as either there primary distro or as a distro they use frequently. I would like to know why you have chosen Gentoo as opposed to other Linux distros.

I would hazard to guess that the vast majority answers given would fall into one of two main categories. Category 1 would appeal to people wanting to keep there system current. Category 2 would appeal to people who wish to build a highly customized system. A third category would consist of people who install Gentoo because they wish to understand the inner workings of *nix systems. However, I would hazard to guess that those people use Gentoo as a 'play' system rather than a system to 'get stuff done on'. If you disagree with this assertion, feel free to respond to this post.

Category 1 -- timeliness reasons

1. I want to upgrade my applications and libraries as soon as they are available, instead of having to wait for a standard distro upgrade.
   
2. Security is a priority on my system. I need to apply security patches as soon as vulnerability are discovered and fixed.
   

Category 2 -- Customization Reasons

1. I want to compile on my system, so that the software is optimized for the hardware I am running
   
2. I want to customize my system and choose the applications and subsystems include.
   
3. I want to avoid the bloat that is found on other distros, thereby avoiding wasted memory, processing power and drive space.
   
4. I want to install a collection of programs and libraries not found on any distro (including Gentoo), and I need the flexibility to create my own portage overlays.
   
5. I am running on unusual hardware, only a custom system like Gentoo can handle my needs.
   
6. I want to build from scratch, so that I can use a system built from known sources.
   
7. I find Gentoo to be the best system for running customized Linux kernels.
   

I am conducting this poll to see why you all have chosen Gentoo. I know there are many different reasons for doing so, but try to fit your answer into one of those two categories. Also I would be interested in your comments on why you have chosen Gentoo over other distros.

[shazeal]

The only other distro I actively use is Debian Stable for my file server/HTPC. I have tried other distros as my desktop, but I feel claustrophobic with them.

The timeliness you put, well any fixed release distro screws with this. Need a bug fix/feature release? Have to compile it yourself, or find some dodgy 3rd party repo. I hate this and it almost always leads to system instability/breakage. I tried using debian stable for a time as my Desktop, and what I ended up doing was creating a Gentoo chroot and running everything from there

Customization, I dont care about "stream lining" my system, I am not using Gentoo to rice. But the ability to use a local overlay and apply patches of my own. Or to remove flags which cause instability is invaluable.
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[depontius]

I began testing the waters with a friend's copy of RedHat 4.0, after some time of glancing at books that included RedHat 3.03. Then when RedHat 4.1 came out I installed it on one of my systems for good. For some time after that I was on the RedHat bandwagon, with every .0, .1, .2, and boy do I remember RedHat 5.0. In those days I had dialup, so CheapBytes was the name of the game, and it was not unusual to buy CheapBytes refresh CDs in between point releases. Those were also the days when, though it was a binary distribution, you had to compile your own kernel to get sound and cdrom support. Configuring X was an adventure. But I was happy with it.

Then they announced "RedHat 8", with no ".0", and I knew something was up. By that time everything in the house was running Linux, and I may have had my mother running it, 600 miles away. I started looking for a distribution to migrate to, thinking in terms of support and all that.

Then I realized, "This is supposed to be a hobby - it's supposed to be fun!" I went looking for the geekiest distribution I could find, and found Gentoo. Ironically I also find it quite supportable, with the rolling model. I've been Gentoo ever since, at home and at work, up until recently. Last year at work they went on a "security standards" binge at work, so now I run the standard Linux desktop there. The recent feeling of "Shove systemd down everyone's throat" mess last December had me reluctantly looking around again, but that seems to be settling down in favor of choice. I may eventually choose to migrate to systemd, but I want to choose, not be part of someone's World Domination desire.
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.sigs waste space and bandwidth

[TheLexx]

A was first introduced to Gentoo around 2005 when I was using a virtual private server. Back then, the server ran User Mode Linux. In order to run under UML many packages required special compiling instructions. I was most impressed by Gentoo, it was able to handle this situation with something called "use flags". The more I looked into Gentoo, the more I liked because it is infinitely customize-able.

I had given up on Redhat and Mandrake/Mandrive because they were always forcing me to include a whole load of crap I did not need on my computer. I also experiment with SUSE, but I was not impressed with it.

I would classify my main reasons for using Gentoo now as reason 2c from my list (avoiding bloat associated with other distros). I would not classify my intent to rice-up my system. My main computer is a few years old, but it has enough power to get the job done. My backup computer is even slower. I just don't like to be forces to add on a lot of bloat for options that I will never use. I compile to the leased common denominator so that everything runs on both computers, so my setup is defiantly not riced-up.

As an example for removing bloat, I think pulseaudio is a cool idea, but personally, I have no use for it. With my two computers nearby, I will just use speaker for both. If I use a remote computer, I doubt I will be doing computing where having sound will be an enhancement. When I kept getting errors in my log, I simply removed it.

[Chiitoo]

My reason(s) is/are probably the more uninteresting one(s).

I had been wanting to try Linux for a long time, but there were so many choices that I never got to it in the end.

Early 2010, I finally installed Ubuntu (I think it was the first time I managed to get to it, but I may remember wrong...). It was just-a-box that I put together from old parts (into a drawer) so as to test things with. Ubuntu didn't quite feel right... something about it just didn't click with me. I suspected it was Gnome, but more than that, it seemed difficult to learn Linux with it.

So that test didn't go too far, but a bit later that year, I stumbled upon Gentoo (I have no recollection of how and why it came to be). Immediately from the start, I was very interested. The installation process probably reminded me of when I got my first PC and some MS-DOS diskettes. That, or even my more active Commodore 64 times.

So rather quickly, I was hooked, and installed Gentoo on my main machine as well. I consider that to be my first installation, even though I did some on the test-box already. This is the same installation I'm still running and typing this on.
Most appealing to me is probably the customisation aspect of Gentoo. It gives cool tools for creating my own operating system, so to speak (ebuilds/local overlay\etc.). I like to strip KDE quite a bit (no console and other kits, no nepomuk, etc.), I'm going to try out setting up static dev to get more familiar with those parts, and I simply like tinkering with stuff, I maybe guess.

I have installed Mint on a laptop to see what they're like, and I definitely can't see myself ever switching to full-timing anything like that, but I have recommended it to several people who had a light of interest into trying out Linux. I sometimes suggest Gentoo as well, but I haven't got anyone to jump into that just yet. ^^;
Another reason for keeping that around is to help me troubleshoot any issues down that doesn't quite affect Gentoo because of reasons, and thus grants me the ability to help more people; some of whom use Ubuntu for example, or something similar to it.

As for what I use the machine for: I play games, browse the Internets, watch videos, edit/create videos and/or audio, play games, and try to learn more and more programming. Especially when it comes to the gaming part, I have always been surprised how I have not had the need to boot up Windows for that. Surprised and thankful.
Mainly been using KDE, although it has been feeling more and more heavy somehow after version 3, and ever since I went 'kitless', it occasionally feels like those things are more and more difficult to keep away, along with nepomuk and friends. Enlightenment (0.17) is another one I've been mainly using on my laptop, and as a secondary session on the main machine, but that's starting to show some signs of the above in that 'efl' has 'ethumb' and 'emotion' and all that in one lump, which I never had installed before...


In the end, I guess I didn't choose Gentoo, but Gentoo chose me...

That, I probably guess, is my little story. And that is, as they say, that.
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Kindest of regardses.

[Anon-E-moose]

I've been using linux for a long time, back before 1.0 days (the kernel).
I was playing with minix when Linus made the announcement about starting a kernel.

I early on played with with many linux and bsd distros, still have a lot of them on old cd's with the cases gathering dust.

Don't know what version of RH I was using (long time ago), but I installed it last
and then just started upgrading my system package by package,
till it basically was just a roll my own system. That was back in the
2.0/2.2/2.4 kernel days.

I remember looking at gentoo when it first got started, but not having
a great dialup ISP, I didn't install it then. I have been using it for years
now. I was using it for several years before I joined the forum.

I like customization, being on the bleeding edge isn't as comfortable (to me)
as some might want it, I prefer a system that works properly vs has the latest
gizmos. I also like to choose which pieces of pkgs to add, thus I was (more or less)
happy with installing things from source anyway. I have no problem with configure

I do appreciate the ebuild, though I'm still a neophyte in creating an ebuild from scratch,
I've modified a few to do what I want or to add my own flags to fine tune the install or
runtime behavior of the software I install.

I don't jump on the latest kernels, and sometime don't even upgrade to the latest of
a particular version, I'm still running 3.9.1 as it works well for me. I do keep up with
the zen patches, and probably will leapfrog to the 3.12 series one of these days.
But for now, what I have works, it's modern enough, and if there are some flaws in it
I haven't run across them.


Edit to add: was curious, so I looked, got some cds with redhat, suse, bsd, tcl/tk, perl from 94 and up.
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PRIME x570-pro, 3700x, 6.1 zen kernel
gcc 13, profile 17.0 (custom bare multilib), openrc, wayland

[augury]

Installing software took so long. I wanted main stream, so I try to install Redhat. Software comes in a box. Fuck.

[Tony0945]

I started with Caldera, switched to RedHat (5.0 I believe) continued with Fedora through Core 5 but Fedora was too bleeding edge. I built an AMD k6-III+ system and tried Gentoo. The ability to optimize for the k6 was like doubling the clock speed. Fedora was optimized for the Pentium which, I'm told, de-optimizes the K6. This ability to optimize for the processor is important to me. I too value the freedom to customize the system. I installed Ubuntu in a partition because people were always answering questions about "Linux" when they really meant "Ubuntu". Although both distros are derivative of Debian, the command structures are so different that I installed Ubuntu just so that I could research their problems. I really hate Ubuntu. It feels like Windows with the "Daddy knows best for your system" attitude. I'm getting that from Gnome which I have used since those RedHat 5.0 days. I've switched to Mate and am thinking about (starting to play with, actually) rolling my own GUI interface with wxGTK, but the GNOME3 stuff is starting to creep in so I'll have to switch to another toolkit.

Anyway, optimization is a third major reason for me.


P.S. Notice how the distro named "freedom" doesn't want you to have any?

[dambacher]

I use linux since kernel 0.99s4, first unifix linux, then suse linux up to version 9.
Then I found gentoo and I am using it for production server as well as desktop (gnome 3.10!)

Reasons for server use:
* stable, continous update strategy:
update only what is needed when needed,
no need to renew the whole system at once,
no end of life
* security: run dedicated software and nothing else
* setup: no one fumbles with package configuration files, highly configurable setup
Reasons for desktop use:
* continuos update strategy: use new software as it is availiable, install own ebuilds, no end of life

The only other distro i use - if I want to save time during installation - is sabayon...

[shuuraj]

Im using gentoo because im masochistic

[depontius]

[greyspoke]

I like tinkering "under the hood" as you USAians say, but had never really done so with operating systems. That's why I tried Linux, but got a bit frustrated with Ubuntu (can't remember why), so tried Gentoo.

+ the masochist bit, obv.

[slugggerzzz]

I'm using Gentoo because its simple and there is no bloat you get what you ask for and these forums are great support for it.
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Slugggerzzz ...

[mrbassie]

[Angrychile]

There is already a lot of monologuing here, so for TL;DR: I use Gentoo because I've always used Gentoo--more seriously, I am most familiar with it compared to other distros, and therefore, use it.

I've mentioned this before but my first install was back around 2004 when I was 14. I started actually using it back in 2008 or 2009 I think and it was my first distro. I still use it because I know portage best and am most comfortable with it--this simply is for no other reason than that I used it first, and so, I know it best. Even during my short stint with Ubuntu, I could barely use aptitude because it felt was so unintuitive. The whole "different package by version" thing was really confusing since I grew up with portage's slots.

The compiling times suck though. When I had a PC and a mini-cluster, distcc saved my life. I do have a i7 laptop though, so only certain massive builds are an issue today (hurray 2014), but I put up with it because of the said familiarity. The small extra speed is helpful too, but when plugin-container dominates the CPU most of the time, I hardly notice the small boost.
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hola

[Jaglover]

Because Gentoo is the most user friendly GNU/Linux I've ever seen, you just have to make friends with it.
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My Gentoo installation notes.
Please learn how to denote units correctly!

[ShadowHawkBV]

I hate reinstalling from bare metal to get updates. This beast has had almost everything replaced over the last 13 years, and is still based off of the original Gentoo install. Oldest kernel still on the drive linux-2.6.39-gentoo-r3, current kernel linux-4.4.75-gentoo. Have to replace the video card to use kernel 4.9+

Note to self: Duplicate OS hard-drive some day soon.
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Lost Linux Neophyte
Intel i7-1065G7
Intel i7-8565U
Intel Atom Cherry Trail
AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955
Pure 64bit frustration

[Listat]

I first started using Gentoo because it was the only good implementation of linux on the Amiga1.
Amiga1's came with a distribution of Debian, that would install, but that was about it.
Yellowdog (PPC) became available, but due too the non-compliant memory in the Ami1 (Something to do with the awful hardware build - thank you Eyetech!!), it also did not stay for very long.
Then some guy showed us how to install Gentoo - It worked and when other systems were breaking all around me - including 0S4, which didn't even have Joystick support at that the time - (Thank you Eyetech....), (We also had to use up the pci slots for ide that worked, usb ports, and sound, cos the motherboard components didn't work either).
When I gave up using the Miggy and bought myself a PC, I just stayed with Gentoo.

[tuggbuss]

Because it's fun. No more, no less. To be productive i can use almost anything out there