Why I'm dropping Gentoo after 4 dedicated years

[ellis]

So I've been an enthusiastic Gentoo user for four years. In that time I've installed and maintained more than a dozen systems for work, friends, and personal use.

Yesterday, I needed to install a new system at work, so I tried the 2006.1 LiveCD with the GTK installer. After several hours of compiling it failed because it couldn't download some random little file from random mirror.

Installing Gentoo is like a perverse masochistic ritual. Not always, but too often.

So good-bye Gentoo, because I need to *work* with my system, rather than go through some extended painful birthing process! I'm losing portage, and you're losing an experienced user and advocate.

Best regards and thanks to the community for the excellent help in the past
Ellis

[petrjanda]

Why does everyone feel to make a good bye thread? I was using gentoo for a 1 and half and then just moved on to BSD. For some reason all these people seem to be somewhat brokenhearted.
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[slonocode]

[isnogood]

[Q-collective]

[xglad]

I've noticed the mirror problem as well. I've just been doing emerge -f on any thing that will take longer than an hour and then tracking stuff down by hand if it can't be found. It's happened maybe 5 times in as many months. Just the same, my camel's back is a little bit more resilient than the OP's.

[tabanus]

Wow...4 years using Gentoo and only 8 posts. What a sad loss to the community you are.
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[jonnevers]

[loki99]

[vonr]

[massysett]

Why can't the mods move these to "Duplicate Threads" just like they do when people ask useful questions in the other categories that just happen to be dupes? Or have a "Gentoo Sucks" thread and make it sticky?
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[Q-collective]

[nixnut]

[jonnevers]

[tabanus]

[geniux]

[phatscum]

I can understand that people leave because they feel insecure about Gentoo's current state, but if you're leaving just because portage couldn't fetch a random file, I highly doubt you've been running Gentoo for 4 years.

On a side note, GLI is a pain in the ass and I wish it'd be discontinued as it makes more problems than it solves.
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[playfool]

[psyqil]

[thereisnospoon]

loki99, like you, I recently did an

[playfool]

[pjp]

[quag7]

In reference to more and more discussion of problems with Gentoo (See http://lwn.net/Articles/197380/ among others), I'm curious if some kind of summit or gathering is in the works to iron out some of these issues.

I've personally not noticed anything particularly different from normal, but I appear to be in the minority. I have approximately a .5% failure rate (half of one percent) when it comes to packages, and it seems to have been that way fairly consistently for the last several years (in fact, there seemed to be some periods a few years back when it was worse). I haven't been keeping track until recently (as a result of what seems to be growing discontent about Gentoo), but that sounds about right. It's an acceptable failure rate for me personally, though of course, right now I'm not missing any critical packages - ask me when something's broken

I don't want to be one of those "works for me" types (that kind of retort is always unhelpful), because clearly there seems to be a growing perception that Gentoo is having problems. I'm just curious if anything in particular is in the works to get a gameplan together going forward. I'm sure everyone has gripes about Gentoo but it would be interesting to see what the top 5 most overlapping issues are. Most of these "I'M LEAVING" threads have a litany of complaints, but none which are stated in a way which can be easily acted upon (there is often a lack of precision in these complaints which makes them unhelpful). With all of the architectures, kernel versions, compiler and library versions out there, it's not surprised that there tend to be problems from time to time, but it would be interesting to pick some patterns out of the full range of complaints.

The above link was referenced from Slashdot, and increasingly I see more and more discussion on the websites I read about Gentoo's weaknesses and problems, and less about its strengths and virtues.

On my recent upgrade to gcc 4.1.1 from 3.4.6, system compiled without problems. When I did world, I had a failure rate of 4 out of 740 packages, running mostly stable, with perhaps a dozen packages marked ~amd64 in package.keywords. Actually it was 6 out of 743, but 2 of the packages I skipped with --skipfirst merged okay at the end of the process.

The failure rate coincides roughly with the same update I made on a x86 system a few weeks ago. Also I moved that same system to modular X, and had only a few minor quirks doing that which were quickly fixed.

More and more though, if what I read on webboards is true, my experience is not typical.

---

Lastly I would like to have a "storming out of gentoo with an empassioned goodbye message" forum with a voting system so we can rate "goodbye forever" flames, with sober, detailed critiques of each. I've mentioned this before, but it seems appropriate. This one in particular disappointed a bit - I like to see bridges flare up and exploded into a giant fireball when burned, not merely sort of char over like campfire coals.

It did cover some of the basics I look for, but ultimately, I have to say that I was disappointed. This post was much like the second Matrix film in that regard.

In particular, I give points for the "I have to get WORK done" bit, which is always appreciated. I like to see a good work ethic, and it's understandable how this children's toy we call Gentoo, just isn't up to the task. As most of us just break our systems on purpose because we have childlike fun fixing them (oh the reverie is positively intoxicating!), it is important to be reminded of all of this work people have to do. This isn't just fun and games. Some people - however unreasonable and absurd this may seem - don't enjoy broken, unstable systems as much as most of us do, so a quick reminder that some people have work to do is always appreciated.

I liked the bit about how we were losing an experienced user and advocate, just to remind us all of how our own lives are in decline. This is why communes in the 60s all wound up failing. It's pretty sociological when you think about it.

Anyway I read this sort of thing and I remember the closing theme from "The Incredible Hulk," where, in this case, the user wanders slowly down a deserted highway, with the lonely piano theme playing. So that's good; it's a pretty image, and I give plus points here.

The various amateurs who have left "I'm leaving" rants could learn something here. Rather than go for a boorish insult - which is still preferable to nothing at all, I might add - the poster suggested that we were all losing something precious and dear, and that - one must read between the lines for this next part - we ought to feel some sadness at that. And I did. Perhaps it is as a result of the clear subtlety, professionalism, and skill of this part of the post that makes me expect so much more from the rest of it. Clearly the poster is capable of better than this. That being said, I would point out that the act of making me feel as if I'm losing something personally, is *masterful* and the young people coming up in this "storming out of here" business could learn something. Fine form.

And this gets me to my next point.

I didn't like the general "you" in the "you are losing" bit. I'd give higher points if he blamed either the developers, or users, or was otherwise more specific on who was losing (or being blamed).

I am a bit jealous of the Slackware crowd. I imagine they've had people storming out with "Damn you Patrick Volkerding" and so on. And this is far more...cinematic, blaming one person. It's very sort of John McClane and Hans Gruber in "Die Hard" when it's man vs. man as opposed to man vs. online community. Not only that, but "Damn you Patrick Volkerding" is just one of those catch phrases people can say to each other and put on tee shirts. But in this particular storming out post, I cannot find a single thing to say for dramatic effect in the office on Monday. I guess I will have to once again resort to tired Monty Python quotes. A major opportunity was lost here.

Also the last bit about "best regards and thanks" really sours me on this particular "I'm leaving" post. It's either one of two things - a cheap trick to reduce our annoyance at reading the message by being a decent fellow, or else, it's an honest sentiment, but in either case, we're cheated out of our own outrage. This is cruel, bordering on sociopathic. Never, ever fail to outrage everyone in an "I'm leaving post" if you can avoid it. Any Borscht Belt comic will tell you that you have to work the crowd.

Clean, well-chosen language which directly insults every potential reader of your post, is a crowd-pleaser every time, as indicated by the number of responses such flames receive. Profanity makes your post easier to dismiss. Since the poster did not even attempt to insult everyone, this isn't really relevant but I mention it here for posterity.

Lastly, there is no direct allegation that "GENTOO IS DIEING (sic)." This is like being served a pizza with no cheese. Some people like pizza that way but I don't trust 'em.

Dough hounds, I mean.

Insulin junkies.

I like cheese on my pizza and the cheese in any "I'm leaving" post is the direct accusation that the project in question is "DIEING" (sic). No such allegation was made. In fact, the poster kept his problems quite personal. "I needed to install a new system" and "because *I* need to work with my system."

A broad declarative would have punched this up quite nicely. Such as, "People need to get work done and portage constantly fails and Gentoo users are getting angry" is much better. Always insist that your experience matches that of the whole (this works in both ways - if it fails for you, just say it sucks. If it works for you, say something constructively provocative like, "people smart enough to understand their systems don't have this problem." Never personalize it because it suggests a subjectivity which complicates the true desire of every reader to be outraged. When you make broad declarative statements, it involves the reader personally, and often inappropriately. Which is what you want.

I take the act of leaving me out of an "I'm leaving" post as a direct personal affront.

If I say "Gentoo sucks and everyone knows it," well, it's possible a lot of people don't agree with that statement but they've been included as part of "everyone." Therefore, they become outraged at the presumptiveness of the statement - something we all appreciate.

Once again, you need to work the crowd (up into a lather). I for one do not appreciate not being involved and presumptively included in categorical statements about anything. As an American, I've become used to being stereotyped and blamed, and I've grown to enjoy the outrage I experience from that (I won't say addicted - it's more like needing that morning cup of coffee. I can live without it but it gives me a headache now).

Being left out in posts like this is insulting. Please inappropriately include me in your sentiments unless I agree with you, in which case there is no point.

I won't even go into minor quibbles about the reasonable grammar and spelling. Again, back to the outrage deficit; always - ALWAYS, storm out with bad grammar and spelling, preferably with a LOT OF CAPITALS AND EXCLAMATIONS WITH TONS OF EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!!1!

I feel cheated and insulted at the relatively measured, moderate, literate nature of this post.

Anyway just my two cents on the matter.
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[loki99]

[syouth]

'Tis quite strange argument, dropping Gentoo after 4 years, when you say, that I tried graphical installer and some file wasn't found in some random mirror.

[whine]And please make a special subforum for those goodbye letters. If anyone is in the mood for such things, (s)he can go and read.[/whine]
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