Some LFS users claim they learn things about linux when they build LFS, while installing Gentoo means they have to learn things about Gentoo, not linux. I have tried LFS before, but I don't think I really learned that much. I certainly learned a lot about the contents of and the relationship between those system packages, but as a user I don't feel this kind of knowledge will be of much use. While LFS gives users more control over their systems, Gentoo gives enough IMHO.
I didn't really use the LFS I built, so I cannot say much about what it is like to maintain a LFS, maybe experienced LFS users here could give us a more complete picture?
Gentoo vs LFS: from which you learned more about linux?
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Gentoo vs LFS: from which you learned more about linux?
Last edited by Hauser on Wed Feb 01, 2006 8:16 am, edited 2 times in total.
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The only thing gentoo specific I can really think of is portage (and its related packages).
What they provide is the ability to learn linux without the hassle of manual compulation. IMHO.
Take php for example. in gentoo u can set lots of different USE flags for databases mcrypt etc etc etc. In LFS you would have to dl php then look at its compile options then get (and compile) the ones u want (plus looking at their compile options to make sure u have all the functionality u want) before u compile php. That is 50%+ more effort for <10% gain (from the learning perspective)
What they provide is the ability to learn linux without the hassle of manual compulation. IMHO.
Take php for example. in gentoo u can set lots of different USE flags for databases mcrypt etc etc etc. In LFS you would have to dl php then look at its compile options then get (and compile) the ones u want (plus looking at their compile options to make sure u have all the functionality u want) before u compile php. That is 50%+ more effort for <10% gain (from the learning perspective)
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Lol, yes, I found that out myself. First I thought I didn't need one. But after a few weeks I ended up writing one myself. I didn't like it, because it was still hard to keep everything up to date. Switched back to Gentoo for an obvious reason: PortageMaedhros wrote:I learnt a lot about how the components in a GNU/Linux system fit together because of LFS. I also learnt that package managers are a good thing, and that trying to run a system without one quickly becomes very frustrating.
I choose the second possibility.
Of course i love Gentoo, it´s everything i need and Portage is really great
Nevertheless i´ll try to understand LFS and may i´ll use it for a while.
But i can imagine how hard it would be without a package mangager.
Do i need a very well memory ? Or learn writing my own package-manager ?
I am glad if i know which software is being installed without the knowledge of portage
tost
Of course i love Gentoo, it´s everything i need and Portage is really great
Nevertheless i´ll try to understand LFS and may i´ll use it for a while.
But i can imagine how hard it would be without a package mangager.
Do i need a very well memory ? Or learn writing my own package-manager ?
I am glad if i know which software is being installed without the knowledge of portage
tost
Well, I started by writing everything I installed in a file, by hand. This way you at least know what is installed and what versions. Next thing I did was keeping al the source files, so I could run make uninstall or similair to uninstall packages or to upgrade.tost wrote:I choose the second possibility.
Of course i love Gentoo, it´s everything i need and Portage is really great
Nevertheless i´ll try to understand LFS and may i´ll use it for a while.
But i can imagine how hard it would be without a package mangager.
Do i need a very well memory ? Or learn writing my own package-manager ?
I am glad if i know which software is being installed without the knowledge of portage
tost
To use it, an LFS is not enough, you need to proceed to BLFS as well.tost wrote:...
Nevertheless i´ll try to understand LFS and may i´ll use it for a while.
...
AMD Athlon XP 2600+; 512M RAM;
nVidia FX5700LE; Hitachi 120Gb
2.6.9-nitro4, reiser4, linux26-headers+nptl
Do I like to compile everything?
Positive definite!
nVidia FX5700LE; Hitachi 120Gb
2.6.9-nitro4, reiser4, linux26-headers+nptl
Do I like to compile everything?
Positive definite!
Same here, including all the commands. When you finish, you will actually get a collection of scripts which you can use to reinstall the system semi-automatically.frenkel wrote:...
Well, I started by writing everything I installed in a file, by hand. This way you at least know what is installed and what versions.
...
AMD Athlon XP 2600+; 512M RAM;
nVidia FX5700LE; Hitachi 120Gb
2.6.9-nitro4, reiser4, linux26-headers+nptl
Do I like to compile everything?
Positive definite!
nVidia FX5700LE; Hitachi 120Gb
2.6.9-nitro4, reiser4, linux26-headers+nptl
Do I like to compile everything?
Positive definite!
I think there is a common misconception here.
Let's be honest.
You don't actually gain knowledge by building LFS (copy/paste is all you do at your first build or even the second one) ,but is when you finally decide to maintain an LFS system,which is a pretty hard at the beggining,i have to confess.
Then you have to face the cruel reality,because suddenly you realize that you can't rely to portage to build the system for you,or you have noone to depend on him to update the packages,so what you do?
1.You have to write your own scripts.That's a gain,considerable maybe but not an important one (I wrote my own bash scripts -quite effective to be honest - but that doesn't make me a bash expert,ok).
2.You have to learn the use of every single package,to grep the Makefiles for dependencies and to choose what you actually want,to read the changelogs etc... but things that everyone who is willing to learn,can do in every distribution (oh well in almost every distribution)
3.Then you have to find ways to monitor the packages for updates,but you can't really consider it like an educational task,can you?
So what is the reason i am staying in LFS for more than one year now?
Although unquestionable gentoo is the most flexible distribution out there (USE FLAGS),LFS clearly wins in that regard (although i am always considering LFS most like a research project,rather as a distribution), for the simple reason that the choice is all and *only* yours (portage can be a really pain sometimes,especially when you mix stable/unstable branches).
Common LFS moto:Your distro,Your rules.
The development process is rather quick,especially in the development Books (they are in gcc-4* series since the middle of summer),and without a simple breakage so far,in almost 20 builds in various branches I made.
And there is this very personal reason.
I like the L(B)FS croud,editors (quite knowledgeable) and userbase.
Sometimes friendly,sometimes extreme and rude (well sometimes),but always enjoyable and to the point.
To sum it up,you don't gain more knowledge doing LFS more than gentoo already gives you,is just a personal preference,i guess and nothing more.
Let's be honest.
You don't actually gain knowledge by building LFS (copy/paste is all you do at your first build or even the second one)
,but is when you finally decide to maintain an LFS system,which is a pretty hard at the beggining,i have to confess.Then you have to face the cruel reality,because suddenly you realize that you can't rely to portage to build the system for you,or you have noone to depend on him to update the packages,so what you do?
1.You have to write your own scripts.That's a gain,considerable maybe but not an important one (I wrote my own bash scripts -quite effective to be honest - but that doesn't make me a bash expert,ok).
2.You have to learn the use of every single package,to grep the Makefiles for dependencies and to choose what you actually want,to read the changelogs etc... but things that everyone who is willing to learn,can do in every distribution (oh well in almost every distribution)
3.Then you have to find ways to monitor the packages for updates,but you can't really consider it like an educational task,can you?
So what is the reason i am staying in LFS for more than one year now?
Although unquestionable gentoo is the most flexible distribution out there (USE FLAGS),LFS clearly wins in that regard (although i am always considering LFS most like a research project,rather as a distribution), for the simple reason that the choice is all and *only* yours (portage can be a really pain sometimes,especially when you mix stable/unstable branches).
Common LFS moto:Your distro,Your rules.
The development process is rather quick,especially in the development Books (they are in gcc-4* series since the middle of summer),and without a simple breakage so far,in almost 20 builds in various branches I made.
And there is this very personal reason.
I like the L(B)FS croud,editors (quite knowledgeable) and userbase.
Sometimes friendly,sometimes extreme and rude (well sometimes),but always enjoyable and to the point.
To sum it up,you don't gain more knowledge doing LFS more than gentoo already gives you,is just a personal preference,i guess and nothing more.
I used LFS for about 6 months before finding out about Gentoo. The one thing that I learned from LFS that I was not able to learn on any other distro was how to correctly build the tool chain. The lack of a package manager is the main reason that I left LFS. LFS is a great system once you get every thing built, but udating the system was in a word, painful. Now I am a dedicated Gentoo user that has writen my own install guide using what I learned from LFS and Gentoo. (Link to my guide is in my sig.) Now I have the best of both worlds, a tool chain built according to the principles that learned with LFS, and the power of portage to manage all of my packages. 
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Are you saying that you emerged your tool chain packages one by one manually according to the order presented in the LFS handbook instead of using Gentoo's bootstrap script?warrens wrote:...Now I have the best of both worlds, a tool chain built according to the principles that learned with LFS, and the power of portage to manage all of my packages.
AMD Athlon XP 2600+; 512M RAM;
nVidia FX5700LE; Hitachi 120Gb
2.6.9-nitro4, reiser4, linux26-headers+nptl
Do I like to compile everything?
Positive definite!
nVidia FX5700LE; Hitachi 120Gb
2.6.9-nitro4, reiser4, linux26-headers+nptl
Do I like to compile everything?
Positive definite!
Yes, using the --nodeps option for the LFS book, chap. 5 packages.Hauser wrote:Are you saying that you emerged your tool chain packages one by one manually according to the order presented in the LFS handbook instead of using Gentoo's bootstrap script?
[The bigger the government, the smaller the citizen.
Don't tread on me!!!
The best government is the government that governs least.
Don't tread on me!!!
The best government is the government that governs least.
LFS is a great learning experience and I encourage everyone to try to build one at least once because it teaches how the seperate components that make up Linux system come together to form an operating system. I've built it a couple of times on x86 boxes and will probably try it again sometime on my opteron machine.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
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I've started with LFS once and quickly gave up. I've started one day with Gentoo and never gave up. The former one frustated me, the later one motivated me. My experience is that there is usually a tradeoff between suffering and learning. The one for Gentoo payed off for me, the one for LFS didn't. Basically I believe that with Gentoo, some compilation will eventually crash one day and you will learn somehow the idea of package dependencies. In LFS, you will not just learn it, you will agonize with it.
As someone pointed out, you will learn more with LFS, but the question is whether is worth it. For me, <10% return is not worth the 200% more time invested. Bit in the end, it's all a matter of personal choice and how you use your time and how deep you want to get on things...
As someone pointed out, you will learn more with LFS, but the question is whether is worth it. For me, <10% return is not worth the 200% more time invested. Bit in the end, it's all a matter of personal choice and how you use your time and how deep you want to get on things...
