Really Need a Graphical Installer

[gwr]

[steveL]

[GFCCAE6xF]

The perfect installer for me would be:

Live USB/CD
Single graphical window that can be split with basic browser on one side for wiki/handbook, terminal the other.

[gwr]

[GFCCAE6xF]

[The Doctor]

A graphical installer would be so easy to make, but that isn't the problem.

The problem is the flood of new users with no idea how to maintain their system and therefore conclude Gentoo is of low quality or clog the forums asking the same questions over and over again.
_________________
First things first, but not necessarily in that order.

Apologies if I take a while to respond. I'm currently working on the dematerialization circuit for my blue box.

[gwr]

Well, to throw another of my two cents in, the problem lies with people who think Gentoo requires a graphical installer because they come from a world where they are a user, into a world of the developer. Or, at least, of a certain variety of developer and/professional for whom the command line is a not a representation of an archaic past.

The graphical installer is, for certain professional people, lock stock and barrel an aesthetic choice. It adds nothing to the process of doing an install other than a mouse and pretty windows, and in fact there are many situations where a graphical install is undesirable or impossible. For non-computer professionals for whom their use of a computer requires a simple installer, there are many distributions.

I would be disappointed if an influx of people drove the distribution towards "simplification for the masses". I am unconcerned that unprofessional users misinterpret Gentoo's worth.

[Buffoon]

For me the most convenient way to install Gentoo is over SSH, even if the computer I'm installing to is right next to me. This way I am doing it from comfort of my favorite chair using my main computer and the install is just a terminal window, while I can carry on with my activities and dedicate minimum time to the install - there are steps that take time and do not need any interaction.

[Yamakuzure]

[P.Kosunen]

+2

For install i boot SystemRescueCd from network with PXE.

[Roman_Gruber]

First time i see that topic.

may way is to waste 20gb for a noobish binary distro, like linux mint. Than chroot from the binary distro and reuse the binary distros grub2. bootloader. careful linux mint overwrites the bootloader and configs without asking the user when you update the binary distro. (when you ask me why i wrote noobish binary distros, because they tend to ruin boxes without telling the user what is really done, or ruin themself while upgrading. i managed to get several binary distros unuseable while upgrading after a few years)

these days with gparted livecds, you can expand the parttions later, so you could even get rid easily from linux mint later when you do not want it ...

[gwr]

If you wish for a graphical installer, then Gentoo may not be the distribution for you. It is a manual, source based distro and offers nothing different from the other distros for the casual user.

This is not an insult. Gentoo's mandate is different from other distros, and it takes a investment in education to use.

[Pednick]

To tell you the truth, gentoo is mainly a customization distro, if that was taken away, a lot here would be angry, as for me customization doesn't matter to me as long as I have a properly working linux distro is all that matters. A year ago I said the F with gentoo and tried different kinds of distros and learning along the way and trust me, gentoo is cake compared to others out there, now I have gentoo installed no problem, gnome systemd, very fast and efficient, I still dable with other distros cause I'm the kind of person addicted for a challenge of trying to install other distros, all that taught me quite a bit including some script editing which I was forced to use to fix things *cough* linuxfromscratch *cough*. anyway now gentoo is my main internal hd OS, I experiment on my external usb hard drives, when ever I get them to boot, LOL.

[alinefr]

I've learned a lot of things by installing Gentoo, which is for life: I don't need installers anymore, for any linux distro. When I want to install any distro the first thing I look for is "is there any LiveCD around?" I've installed debian, ubuntu, centos and arch linux by just getting an up-to-date live cd or USB linux stick.

I've spend a lot of time in order to fix things in gentoo... sometimes I saw myself stacked for days without getting any progress. But I would not say that it was time lost. Because this "time lost" has helped me to be more pacient, resilient in any other kind of trouble I would face not just in Gentoo, but any computer trouble. Gentoo requires this resilience from the user, but at the same time, their community is the friendliest, compared to other linux distro forums I've been around this years. The people here are very helpful, and doesn't matter if your problem looks stupid or how noobie you are. This topic is an amazing example about it. Probably this is one of the main things that keeps me here, in this forums, running my gentoo.

[Pednick]

Now that you mention it, they are very friendly here unlike in Arch linux, not really the people but the moderators are so self-centered and arrogant and mean, I say mean at the end cause the fore mentioned is so glaringly apparent. BTW, Arch linux is the easiest non-graphical dvd distros to install, well there is of course the AUI script but manually is just as easy.

[alinefr]