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| Will you ever use any type of installer? |
| No |
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| Yes |
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[ 51 ] |
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| Total Votes : 241 |
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Naib
Watchman
Joined: 21 May 2004
Posts: 6051
Location: Removed by Neddy
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 Posted: Tue May 15, 2007 7:20 pm Post subject: |
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I used it, worked great for me
re-built my PC all nice a shiny and went ~amd64. A week later there was an update to baselayout which completely hosed the filesystem (well baselayout merge resutled in a process that just ate 100% of CPU and a hard reset was needed THAT screwed up the filesystem). Just booted teh liveCD and started teh GUI since I wanted a stage3 install ASAP and that is what I got
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wolfger
Apprentice
Joined: 09 Jun 2003
Posts: 254
Location: New Baltimore, MI
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2007 7:23 pm Post subject: |
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I would love for Gentoo to have some kind of GUI installer that actually works. I love Gentoo, and I learned a LOT by going through the manual install process back when 1.4 was in the RC stages, and that was fantastic. But... When I had to do a new install, I went with Mepis, because I just didn't have the time/patience to go through that again. Mepis has the perfect LiveCD installer. Everything works right off the bat. Mepis would be the perfect distro, if only it used Portage. 
Right now I'm trying Sabayon, which has a working LiveDVD install that's pretty slick. Unfortunately, it's buggy too, and I have a working Sabayon partition minus a functional eth0. Which is worthless, but I think I can get that fixed. The current Gentoo options don't work for me. I can either spend way too much time manually installing, or there's a LiveCD that will wipe my partitions clean and refuse to give me new partitions. 
Give me quick and easy, and let me recompile packages from portage at my leisure.
And never, ever take away the option to do a manual install from scratch.
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pandaxiongmao
Guru
Joined: 29 Sep 2003
Posts: 478
Location: USA
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2007 7:30 pm Post subject: |
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At this moment, I'd say no because I prefer to have more control over the installation. Although it might not be true that text based installation produces more optimized system, I don't care, and I still think it is better.
In the tight situation where I will not have time to type the whole damn things on terminal, I'll probably consider using the installer. |
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asturm
Developer
Joined: 05 Apr 2007
Posts: 8936
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2007 7:40 pm Post subject: |
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| Matteo Azzali wrote: | I haven't tried the actual gentoo installer, but the same exact experience can be done through a GUI
like how it's done in most of the other distros. |
You're right here, it can be done. But is there all the background information which the handbook provides? I doubt it very seriously.
| Matteo Azzali wrote: | Maybe my gentoo handbook is different, but there's no cd, no ls, no ln command in there, for sure there
are no grep, no sed and no equery, and there's just a couple of "plain and simple" emerge commands. |
With the exception of sed (and equery, which the user gehts introduced to in "working with gentoo / USE-flags"), they are all there - I guess you indeed have some different handbook. 
And as for tar - well, it just came into my mind at first. Maybe 'find' is a better example.
The learning process doesn't end with finalizing the Gentoo installation - after all this reading through the handbook, the users get further introduced into portage features and of course tools (see, equery), network configuration etc. Reading those sections is a very logical step after going through this whole process of the installation docs in the first place. Will any newbie, which let itself catch by the simple point-and-click setup of the LiveCD, have the patience (or even knowledge) about this excellent documentation? I doubt that too, and I think the first time being forced to the CLI will be frustrating.
| Matteo Azzali wrote: | | I really don't see the point in all this love for the cli, I've read Gibson (and other stories about the console wizards) too but still I see passage from the cli to the gui like the passage from the plain(dumb) cli to the tab completion (ok, ok, some of you will now tell that with tab completion "is not the real McEnroe" and that real men always disable tab completion.....) |
CLI without tab completion would be quite a pain in the ass. I wouldn't say that I love the CLI - I'm just arguing that knowledge of it is vital to mastering one's Gentoo-system. |
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NeddySeagoon
Administrator
Joined: 05 Jul 2003
Posts: 54237
Location: 56N 3W
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2007 8:05 pm Post subject: |
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Matteo Azzali,
I am not against the GUI installer. Rather, I am in favour of a consistant toolset for installing and maintaining any system, even Gentoo.
Users should be free to make their choice which is what Gentoo is all about.
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Computer users fall into two groups:-
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user118696
Apprentice
Joined: 16 Sep 2005
Posts: 276
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2007 11:56 pm Post subject: |
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| After reading all those posts about the GUI Installer, one question comes to mind : Why? Why are the devs working on that project? Where does the idea come from? Why should Gentoo be like other distros? Why should it be 'flashy' and 'easy(ier) to install'? Let Gentoo be different, stand apart. Don't be afraid to think and act the way you feel is right. Gentoo shouldn't be the kind of distro to please everyone just to boast about being toplisted amongst Linux users... |
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tanderson
Retired Dev
Joined: 11 Apr 2007
Posts: 193
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| Posted: Wed May 16, 2007 1:15 am Post subject: |
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| pascal.bolduc wrote: | | After reading all those posts about the GUI Installer, one question comes to mind : Why? Why are the devs working on that project? Where does the idea come from? Why should Gentoo be like other distros? Why should it be 'flashy' and 'easy(ier) to install'? Let Gentoo be different, stand apart. Don't be afraid to think and act the way you feel is right. Gentoo shouldn't be the kind of distro to please everyone just to boast about being toplisted amongst Linux users... |
The purpose is not neccessarily to make it *easier* to install, but quicker to install, which is a noble effort. Besides, Gentoo is all about choice, and if some devs want to work on something, let them. You'll get far less out of them if you try to tell them what to do(they are volunteers -- never forget that). Gentoo will never blend in, it will always be distinctive, but it might be less painful to install.
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user118696
Apprentice
Joined: 16 Sep 2005
Posts: 276
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| Posted: Wed May 16, 2007 1:23 am Post subject: |
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| gentoofan23 wrote: | | [...] if some devs want to work on something, let them. You'll get far less out of them if you try to tell them what to do(they are volunteers -- never forget that). |
I totally agree!
| gentoofan23 wrote: | | Gentoo will never blend in, it will always be distinctive [...] |
Not quite so sure... I'm afraid that some day in the near (not so near) future some devs and users of the Gentoo community will have to branch from the developping 'General-Distro-like' Gentoo trend. Don't make me wrong though : THAT is not what i want! |
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tanderson
Retired Dev
Joined: 11 Apr 2007
Posts: 193
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| Posted: Wed May 16, 2007 12:11 pm Post subject: |
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*sigh* I guess this is why people say Gentoo has no direction.  Gentoo is pretty much immune to be forked, because the next "emerge -uD world" they will be running Gentoo 
On the other hand, there may be more niche distributions to satisfy a particular need. This is not at all bad, because chances are that this will make it upstream to Gentoo and improve it.
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pandaxiongmao
Guru
Joined: 29 Sep 2003
Posts: 478
Location: USA
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| Posted: Wed May 16, 2007 6:53 pm Post subject: |
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| gentoofan23 wrote: | *sigh* I guess this is why people say Gentoo has no direction. Gentoo is pretty much immune to be forked, because the next "emerge -uD world" they will be running Gentoo
On the other hand, there may be more niche distributions to satisfy a particular need. This is not at all bad, because chances are that this will make it upstream to Gentoo and improve it. |
As long as the forked distro can't get rid of the superb package manager called portage, I agree that they would still be Gentoo in disguise. However, I wish the the official Gentoo LiveDVD would contain those goodies like Sabayon does, but I undestand that it is merely an installation medium.
BTW, I do think that the Gentoo installer has a good purpose because there are some situations that demand a quick & ready to use OS within a short period of time; it would be ridiculous if the admin of computer lab (which've decided to use Gentoo) plans to install Gentoo on a whole bunch of computer (let's say more than 20) by using CLI method. |
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ichbinsisyphos
Guru
Joined: 08 Dec 2006
Posts: 547
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| Posted: Wed May 16, 2007 8:05 pm Post subject: |
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i would like to see the knoppix-type-install-methods getting knocked up a notch. for now they are all in the "alternative install methods", which is another way to say: only try if youre bored and looking for something to waste time with. there is a huge effort to keep knoppix updated, it boots on more hardware then maybe any other distro.
i always read post like "forget the installer, dont do anything you cant do right ...". i thought thats ridiculous, you need a install medium, right?
no!
the more i think of it, the more i like the idea. knoppix' ego is not as big as ubuntu's.
installing gentoo with a knoppix cd will work in more cases then any other method, including gentoo's own installer
i have not tried the new 2007.0 live cd. i dont know how well it works or not, i dont know how many people work on it, if there is any progress made. theres almost no communication. but i know that gentoo was without a working install medium for several months. |
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NeddySeagoon
Administrator
Joined: 05 Jul 2003
Posts: 54237
Location: 56N 3W
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| Posted: Wed May 16, 2007 8:05 pm Post subject: |
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pandaxiongmao,
Thats what distcc, FEATURES="buildpackage" and BINHOST=" is for. So that all 20 identical PCs can share in the building of a common install for them all.
Drool ... what a compile farm
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NeddySeagoon
Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail. |
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pandaxiongmao
Guru
Joined: 29 Sep 2003
Posts: 478
Location: USA
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| Posted: Thu May 17, 2007 12:01 am Post subject: |
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| NeddySeagoon wrote: | pandaxiongmao,
Thats what distcc, FEATURES="buildpackage" and BINHOST=" is for. So that all 20 identical PCs can share in the building of a common install for them all.
Drool ... what a compile farm |
Wow, I can't imagine how fast the compiling process is gonna take with distcc and 20 computers. |
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wolfger
Apprentice
Joined: 09 Jun 2003
Posts: 254
Location: New Baltimore, MI
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| Posted: Thu May 17, 2007 9:11 am Post subject: |
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| pandaxiongmao wrote: | | As long as the forked distro can't get rid of the superb package manager called portage, I agree that they would still be Gentoo in disguise. |
Actually, with the use of overlays, it can be quite different and still use portage. If it doesn't use portage, why bother? B-)
| Quote: | | However, I wish the the official Gentoo LiveDVD would contain those goodies like Sabayon does, but I undestand that it is merely an installation medium. |
I love Sabayon's ease of installation, and their desktop theme (very slick!). But now I'm beginning to experience the down side: upgrading/maintaining. It's a real mess. First off, Sabayon includes a lot of cruft I don't want or need. Adding what you want is easy. Finding/removing what you don't want can be a pain. Second, the distro is ~amd64 based, and I want to be more stable, and that's causing a real headache. Third, the USE flags are a mess, not sorted alphabetically, I've found multiple duplicates, and again things I don't want are there by default. So not only to I have to hunt through a long line of flags to find "gnome" and insert a "-" in front of it, but I also have to make sure there are no second or third instances of that flag hidden elsewhere in the morass.
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xanas3712
Guru
Joined: 15 Oct 2004
Posts: 455
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| Posted: Thu May 17, 2007 7:53 pm Post subject: |
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| I may try it again later. I probably should. But last time I screwed up my partition table which I didn't like at all. I shouldn't need to backup to install gentoo, it's not required for the manual install, I've never had a fear of this installing debian/slackware/mandriva/ubuntu/etc but burning me once made me not too happy with the installer. And before that it was just a pain to actually get to do anything at all. |
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steveL
Watchman
Joined: 13 Sep 2006
Posts: 5153
Location: The Peanut Gallery
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| Posted: Fri May 18, 2007 3:07 am Post subject: |
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| xanas3712 wrote: | | I may try it again later. I probably should. But last time I screwed up my partition table which I didn't like at all. I shouldn't need to backup to install gentoo, it's not required for the manual install, I've never had a fear of this installing debian/slackware/mandriva/ubuntu/etc but burning me once made me not too happy with the installer. And before that it was just a pain to actually get to do anything at all. |
Yeah but it's a whole new version now, and others are reporting success. Thing is there's no need to re-install with gentoo. The most you need to do is change your profile and emerge -uDN world && revdep-rebuild (or just run update ;) |
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thepigs
n00b
Joined: 04 Aug 2004
Posts: 6
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| Posted: Mon Jul 02, 2007 11:42 am Post subject: |
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| worst installer ever! |
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Telexen
Apprentice
Joined: 09 Oct 2005
Posts: 189
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| Posted: Sun Jul 08, 2007 8:41 am Post subject: |
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| I would never use it because I'm comfortable doing it by hand, but I think it would make things easier to have it - just to save time on support for people who want to try Gentoo but can't grasp the installation...so it's not a waste of time to develop an installer |
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foxmike
n00b
Joined: 07 May 2007
Posts: 5
Location: Québec, Canada
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| Posted: Tue Jul 10, 2007 7:10 pm Post subject: |
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| NeddySeagoon wrote: | To answer a few earlier points,
If you need to do a network install, using wireless, use Knoppix as your liveCD, or any liveCD that provides ndiswrapper.
Note that Knoppix does not provide the Windows drivers you will need
If you want to install (and even maintain) Gentoo from the minimal liveCD with no network connection, you need Sneakernet
Its difficult to vote in this poll, I'm a fairly experianced user, so I've not used the GUI installer and see no need to switch now.
Indeed, I do most of my installs via ssh, so emerge can run 24/7. The people you really need to get to vote here are the ones who have never installed Gentoo.
Looking back over my years with Gentoo, I would say that the GUI installer robs users of a valuable learning experiance. The stage installs are more than a Gentoo rite of passage, they teach you how to maintain your system too.
Oh, how did I vote - I spoilt my ballot paper |
Actually, I'm a newcommer to Gentoo world...
I learned and got my hands on Linux with Ubuntu (as many of Linux newcomers I guess).
Since I already have a fairly complete/stable Linux OS, I was looking for something completly new and different, mainly to learn more about Linux and (who knows?) make it my main distro. Here comes Gentoo! That was exactly what I was looking for!
I did the stage3 install and I must say, that was plain fun! Even if I had to retry it, what an experience! Of course, I still have my Ubuntu install so I can afford letting portage working 24/7 in a chroot environment. At the end, if I break something in Gentoo, who cares? I still have my Ubuntu install...
To me, if I get to the point that I am really satisfied of my gentoo install, I might decide to use it on a day to day basis. But then if I ever need a quick'n dirty install, I'll install Ubuntu, even if it is temporarly. In other words, I try to use the tool that better suits my needs depending of the situation I am in. I like the gentoo install just with command line, so I don't think I'll ever use a graphical front-end to it.
Best regards,
-FM
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hattable
n00b
Joined: 05 Jun 2007
Posts: 11
Location: NEC
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| Posted: Wed Jul 11, 2007 6:12 pm Post subject: Never! |
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| Amazing command line installation is the one reason that kept me on Gentoo when I became restless. Ubuntu,debian, etc, it didn't matter people just get attached to the control of original (and only true way imho) that anything else just seems unnatural. |
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ahurst
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 23 Oct 2006
Posts: 88
Location: Sheffield, UK
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Jadedoto
n00b
Joined: 24 Dec 2006
Posts: 3
Location: Lexington KY
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| Posted: Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:30 am Post subject: |
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| richard.scott wrote: | | dahranis wrote: | Pain in the frickin arse to do a networkless install
<waits for link to oh so obvious solution> |
Yes, but in reality, how often do you do a totally networkless install? I tried it once, but don't see the point anymore as anywhere I want to install gentoo has some form of fast connection like broadband. We already know that whatever we have on the CD will be out of date by the time we get to use it so by default we have to get online at some point to update it all! 
Perhaps this should be another Poll? i.e
Do you ever do a networkless install? Yes/No? |
I just bought a new machine, and while waiting for my cat5e to come in, I'm trying to install gentoo. I installed Windows XP fine. But I did set aside 100GB out of 120GB for Gentoo. For peace of mind I want a base system, but the installer doesn't agree with me.
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Lucipher
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Posts: 78
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| Posted: Sun Feb 03, 2008 12:58 am Post subject: |
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| I'll give a try, so the answer is yes! Although I feel comfortable with command line installation. |
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NathanZachary
Moderator
Joined: 30 Jan 2007
Posts: 2605
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| Posted: Sun Feb 03, 2008 1:31 am Post subject: |
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Going back to the issues presented on the first page of the thread, I personally think only developing the CLI-based minimal installation disc is the way to go. As others have stated, the CLI installation is what first attracted me to Gentoo. Also, for the concern of networkless installation, maybe there could be a version of the minimal installation disc that has a portage snapshot, a stage tarball, and maybe some drivers needed for wireless networking (it would be the not-so-minimal installation disc ).
My understanding is that a GTK+ GUI installer is quite time consuming, and in my personal opinion, I think the time saved by abandoning the GTK+ installer could be used for other endeavors.
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madisonicus
Veteran
Joined: 20 Sep 2006
Posts: 1130
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| Posted: Sat Feb 09, 2008 9:26 am Post subject: |
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I used to get nervous doing the manual Gentoo install because it didn't have a nice GUI. Now, I get nervous doing GUI installs, because I don't know exactly what they're doing.
So, I would probably never use any kind of Gentoo installer on my personal systems, regardless of how successfully it works.
However, I think a GUI makes perfect sense for doing multiple identical installations particularly at the enterprise level.
-m
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