How is Gentoo for people new to Linux?

Message

nokilli · Post by **nokilli** » Wed Sep 13, 2017 10:31 am

It depends on what you want to do going forward.

If you really want to learn Linux either Gentoo or Linux-From-Scratch is the way to go. If you're just looking to run a browser or a media player, then you'd probably be happier with some other distro.

The other distros are getting better and better at hiding Linux from their users so you can just click on buttons and make things go. Don't get me wrong, that's great. It's just that it will considerably lengthen the learning curve if and when you ever decide you want to go deeper.

I don't think there's ever been a better time to get into Gentoo. There were times years ago when I questioned my own sanity by continuing to use it because truth be told there was a fair amount of pain. But I think today that mostly appears to have passed. The tools and maybe more importantly the processes have matured to the point where it's very rare today to see me yelling at portage.

And we're entering perhaps an era where having this kind of familiarity with your OS will be of enormous advantage going forward, and you're not going to enjoy that with an Ubuntu or a Fedora.

cwr · Post by **cwr** » Wed Sep 13, 2017 11:36 am

Gentoo is useful because it's pretty fixable; it has a good community and documentation,
and if all else fails you have the source. It was, in fact, the first Linux I installed long ago.

However, if you're new to Linux I'd start by installing Ubuntu 16.04, the LTS version, and
then once that boots use Ubuntu to install Gentoo. Having a separate installed Linux makes
life a lot easier for building and debugging Gentoo, and given today's disk sizes 16 GB for a
Ubuntu partition is neither here nor there.

Will

Roman_Gruber · Post by **Roman_Gruber** » Wed Sep 13, 2017 11:39 am

When you are coming from a WINDOWS audience you are far better of with Linux Mint for example.

Assuming you want to use a webbrowser and create documents with libreoffice.

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When you are a programmer, coder, when you need highly customizations, and when you are willing to spend a lot of time reading documentations you are better of with Arch linux, gentoo linux, calculate linux.

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It all depends on the time you are willing to spend on maintenance, time on learning new things, existing knowledge and your preferences

Post by **NeddySeagoon** » Wed Sep 13, 2017 12:45 pm

Adrienne224,

It all depends on your motives for wanting to use Linux in the first place.

Gentoo isn't really a Linux distro, its a set of tools you use to build your own distro. That very much puts you in control.
Gentoo in the portage package manager and the ebuild repository. Everything else is upstream projects.

For a first distro, there is a lot to learn. You must make all the decisions that binary distros make for you.
That means that Gentoo has a lot more controls than a binary distro and demands that you use them.

If you want to see what makes up a distro and do it yourself, Gentoo is a good choice.
If you don't care about the distro itself and just want to run a few canned packages, its unlikely Gentoo is for you.
There aren't any canned packages for a start. You build it all yourself.

1clue · Post by **1clue** » Wed Sep 13, 2017 3:02 pm

If you really want to know how the system works, then Gentoo is going to be a good example.

I've seen people as young as 14 come here as new-to-linux users and successfully make a working system.

The key is reading as much as you can understand, and knowing how to ask the right questions.

pr0cesor · Post by **pr0cesor** » Wed Sep 13, 2017 10:05 pm

Hi,

I am new to gentoo, pretty much easy if you understand the basics of command. I suggest to start with gentoo plasma if you want to get the feeling of a linux desktop environnment. So far I love gentoo ^^