Hello All,

So yesterday I finally finished upgrading my Gentoo machine which hosts all of my services to the latest stable software. I hadn't updated for well over 6 months and knew when going into it there would be headaches.

Basically, I started checking into what needed to be updated last Sunday. "Wow,
over 6 months and only ~130ish packages to upgrade? Not too bad, new GCC, new kernel version, let's go for it!"

Started compiling.. after about 5 packages it breaks on something stuipid. Had to etc-update and merge a config file. Okay, not bad. Good thing I didn't walk away from the computer yet. Continue compiling.. walk away.

Monday morning before work I check on it.. It only went about 3 more packages into the upgrade, and broke on gcc (which takes the longest to compile, somewhere around 1.5hrs). Didn't have time to mess with it till I got home from
work. Upgrade stalled..

Get home from work, don't want to see gcc fail again, so continue the upgrade with the --skipfirst option, so as to not compile gcc. Before work Tuesday, I check on it. Everything is upgraded except gcc. Great, I'll leave it alone till
I get home from work again.. lol

Get home, decide I'm going to compile the kernel before messing with gcc. Kernel fails to compile. They added new options that I needed to turn off, basically "64-bit kernel" is now an option, and I had to disable it. Try again,
kernel fails on some wireless modules. I completely remove wireless options in the kernel (that computer doesn't have any wireless anyways), and try again. Success! Had to recompile glibc due to some modules being broken.

Wednesday after work, it's time to try to compile gcc. Sure enough, it fails again. Fuggit, I'm not messing with it anymore.

To Mercyful Fate: You remember the past couple years of me having an issue compiling gcc, well.. had I looked into it back then, lol..

Thursday I get off work early. Nice. Got some time to look into this. Realized I only originally specified like 512mb of swap space for this machine when it has 2gb of ram. So look into any decent options to resize partitions. SystemRescueCD seems to be the only option nowadays that can at least make you feel secure about doing it without messing up your data. Downloaded, but while downloading I found some threads on creating a swap file. Hell, no need to resize my partitions? Bonus!

Created a 2gb swap file as /var/swap.img. Okay, let's give it another go..

GCC compiles perfectly. Heyo! Finally! After 3 unsuccessful compiles, and when you start them, you don't stick around.. you leave and come back after 12 hours
or more, to find out it failed an hour in..

When I started this, I told myself if there was a problem I couldn't fix, I had
backed up my entire BBS machine, and had the latest Archlinux ISO burned to CD and ready to switch. Well, looks like Gentoo is sticking around for awhile longer. :)

As much as I despise it at times, it was my first jump into Linux, and is still
to this day the most challenging Linux distribution out there. I guess I like the challenge too much to move on. LOL

Regards,
Nick

--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20151129
* Origin: thePharcyde_ telnet://bbs.pharcyde.org (Wisconsin) (46:1/701)

On 01/01/16, Accession said the following...

Hello All,

So yesterday I finally finished upgrading my Gentoo machine which hosts all of my services to the latest stable software. I hadn't updated for well over 6 months and knew when going into it there would be headaches.

Basically, I started checking into what needed to be updated last

I'm a former big Gentoo user. I ran it for years, but my time became very
slim. I ended up moving over to debian to minimize the compiling wait
times.. :)

I do miss Gentoo... I should roll out a VM of it just to take a look at it. It's been a good 4-5 years since I ran it.

--- Mystic BBS v1.10 (Linux)
* Origin: Clutch BBS * telnet://clutch.darktech.org (46:1/108)

Hello niter3,

On 01 Jan 16 22:05, niter3 wrote to Accession:

So yesterday I finally finished upgrading my Gentoo machine which
hosts all of my services to the latest stable software. I hadn't
updated for well over 6 months and knew when going into it there
would be headaches.

Basically, I started checking into what needed to be updated last

I'm a former big Gentoo user. I ran it for years, but my time became
very slim. I ended up moving over to debian to minimize the compiling
wait times.. :)

I've ran it for over a decade now. The BBS has ran on it for a good 7-8 years or more. I used to do the unstable branch and broke shit all the time, so when I finally went stable.. I'd curse at it all I could, but was able to actually fix it and keep things running smoothly.

Hate the compile time, but fighting the problems is a huge benefit when you win. lol

I guess I still have a soft spot for it, as it's still chugging along wonderfully on my Athlon64 3700+ 2.2ghz one core with 2gb ram.

I do miss Gentoo... I should roll out a VM of it just to take a look
at it. It's been a good 4-5 years since I ran it.

Not much has changed. If you enjoy the binary installs now, then stick with what you're liking. I personally can't stand the compile times, but the fixing shit that's broken stuff is what I'm a fckn die hard at. Love it or leave it, I
guess. Hell, I talked Mercyful Fate out of Gentoo years back and he's the one that got me started on it! lol

How's that for "pie in the face"?

Regards,
Nick

--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20151129
* Origin: thePharcyde_ telnet://bbs.pharcyde.org (Wisconsin) (46:1/701)

Accession wrote to All <=-

So yesterday I finally finished upgrading my Gentoo machine which hosts all of my services to the latest stable software. I hadn't updated for well over 6 months and knew when going into it there would be
headaches.

Sounds like the exorcism I had to do to our video PC today :)

... Pros are those who do their jobs well, even when they don't feel like it. --- MultiMail/Darwin v0.50
* Origin: Neptune's Lair BBS ~ Memphis TN ~ winserver.us (46:1/152)

niter3 wrote to Accession <=-

I'm a former big Gentoo user. I ran it for years, but my time became
very slim. I ended up moving over to debian to minimize the compiling
wait times.. :)

I believe Janis Kracht runs gentoo as well these days.

... Is fire supposed to shoot out of it like that!?
--- MultiMail/Darwin v0.50
* Origin: Neptune's Lair BBS ~ Memphis TN ~ winserver.us (46:1/152)

Hello Robert,

On 02 Jan 16 20:23, Robert Wolfe wrote to Niter3:

I'm a former big Gentoo user. I ran it for years, but my time
became very slim. I ended up moving over to debian to minimize
the compiling wait times.. :)

I believe Janis Kracht runs gentoo as well these days.

She runs Ubuntu these days, but apparantly had mentioned that she ran Gentoo years ago.

Regards,
Nick

--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20151129
* Origin: thePharcyde_ telnet://bbs.pharcyde.org (Wisconsin) (46:1/701)

$ niter3 was quoted saying . . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I do miss Gentoo... I should roll out a VM of it just to take a look at
it. It's been a good 4-5 years since I ran it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I never understood the fascination with distro hopping. What is so fun about "trying a distro" ? Its just a bunch of broken linux slopped together in various ways.

So many fun things to do on computers, apt-get/pacman/emerge update is not one of them.

--- Enthral BBS v.635 (PI/2 Linux armv7l)
* Origin: haunting The chapel >>--> htc.zapto.org <--<< (46:1/140)

Hello dingo,

On 30 Jan 16 11:46, dingo wrote to niter3:

I never understood the fascination with distro hopping. What is so fun about "trying a distro" ? Its just a bunch of broken linux slopped together in various ways.

I think it's more of something to do when you're getting into Linux. You try as
many as you can to find the one that suits you best to start off with. Then you
venture onwards in difficulty and less redundancy.

Oddly enough, I took the opposite approach. I started out with Gentoo over 10 years ago and am still trying to run away from it. :)

So many fun things to do on computers, apt-get/pacman/emerge update is
not one of them.

Very true. But being *very* familiar with any one of those helps you in your decision on what distro to stick with, that's for sure.

emerge still gives me nightmares, though. So I don't think I'll be using BSD and ports any time soon either. Compiling was fun when I had time to do it, but
now I just want the shit installed and ready to use in minutes, if not seconds.
So I've grown fond of Archlinux these days for it's staying up with the times as well as ease of use.

... and who in the world never liked pac-man (punny)? :) :) :)

Regards,
Nick

--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20151129
* Origin: thePharcyde_ telnet://bbs.pharcyde.org (Wisconsin) (46:1/701)

Re: Re: Gentoo strikes again!
By: dingo to niter3 on Sat Jan 30 2016 11:46 am

I never understood the fascination with distro hopping. What is so fun about "trying a distro" ? Its just a bunch of broken linux slopped together in various ways.

..Especially when they all have the same back end. Comparing various low-overhead distros can end up being nothing more than changing eye candy on an Ubuntu distro with LXDE.

--- SBBSecho 2.27-Win32
* Origin: Sent from my iPhone (46:1/115)

on 01/30/16, dingo said...

I never understood the fascination with distro hopping. What is so fun about "trying a distro" ? Its just a bunch of broken linux slopped together in various ways.

Every distro is broken in some manner. The trick is finding one that isn't broken in the manner you care about at the moment, because fixing what you
have would take entirely too much effort because Penguins. Thus anyone who tries linux ultimately is doomed to try one new distro after another.

On that note: As of yesterday my laptop now dual-boots FreeBSD and ArchLinux.

--- Mystic BBS v1.10 (Windows)
* Origin: d i s t o r t i o n // d1st.org (46:1/145)

Re: Re: Gentoo strikes again!
By: Digital Avatar to dingo on Mon Feb 01 2016 14:22:07

Every distro is broken in some manner. The trick is finding one that isn't broken in the manner you care about at the moment, because fixing what you have would take entirely too much effort because Penguins. Thus anyone who tries linux ultimately is doomed to try one new distro after another.

On that note: As of yesterday my laptop now dual-boots FreeBSD and ArchLinux

I don't think it's always that the distro is broken. It may also depend on the system and what you need it to do. On lower spec computers I have used Puppy Linux becuase it's light and fast and yet still has some good applications. It was also very easy to set up dial up back when I was using it. In fact I believe it recognized modems that no other disro did out of the box.

For my more powerful machines I have usually used Ubuntu or some variant to get a nice desktop with all the bells and wistles. This works well for my general use systems. My old Gateway laptop and this G3 run plain Debian because it is a litte lighter, but still makes a nice Desktop.

DSL out of the box would make a very crappy desktop, but makes a nice utility or rescue disc.

- Mr. Cool

on 02/01/16, Mr. Cool said...

For my more powerful machines I have usually used Ubuntu or some variant to get a nice desktop with all the bells and wistles. This works well
for my general use systems. My old Gateway laptop and this G3 run plain Debian because it is a litte lighter, but still makes a nice Desktop.

Ick. I can't stand Ubuntu. The userbase is too stupid for words, so if
anything breaks you're pretty much on your own as far as support goes. Same problem with Mint.

DSL out of the box would make a very crappy desktop, but makes a nice utility or rescue disc.

DSL's actually a pretty good lightweight desktop. I used that for about two years or so a decade back (-ish). There wasn't much in the package system, though, so I left it behind.

I abandoned my attempt at FreeBSD since the average user thinks of it as
being a server-only system and whenever anything Desktop-related breaks they just shrug and point you at DesktopBSD. ArchLinux, meanwhile, I abandoned pretty quickly once I realized they'd drunk the systemd koolaid. So now I'm going back to Gentoo after 15 years... only this time I'm doing a hardened setup. This should be fun.

--- Mystic BBS v1.10 (Windows)
* Origin: d i s t o r t i o n // d1st.org (46:1/145)

On 2016-01-01 06:27 PM, Accession wrote:

Hello All,

So yesterday I finally finished upgrading my Gentoo machine which hosts all

of

my services to the latest stable software. I hadn't updated for well over 6 months and knew when going into it there would be headaches.

Basically, I started checking into what needed to be updated last Sunday.

"Wow,

over 6 months and only ~130ish packages to upgrade? Not too bad, new GCC, new kernel version, let's go for it!"

Started compiling.. after about 5 packages it breaks on something stuipid.

Had

to etc-update and merge a config file. Okay, not bad. Good thing I didn't

walk

away from the computer yet. Continue compiling.. walk away.

Monday morning before work I check on it.. It only went about 3 more packages into the upgrade, and broke on gcc (which takes the longest to compile, somewhere around 1.5hrs). Didn't have time to mess with it till I got home

from

work. Upgrade stalled..

Get home from work, don't want to see gcc fail again, so continue the upgrade with the --skipfirst option, so as to not compile gcc. Before work Tuesday, I check on it. Everything is upgraded except gcc. Great, I'll leave it alone

till

I get home from work again.. lol

Get home, decide I'm going to compile the kernel before messing with gcc. Kernel fails to compile. They added new options that I needed to turn off, basically "64-bit kernel" is now an option, and I had to disable it. Try

again,

kernel fails on some wireless modules. I completely remove wireless options

in

the kernel (that computer doesn't have any wireless anyways), and try again. Success! Had to recompile glibc due to some modules being broken.

Wednesday after work, it's time to try to compile gcc. Sure enough, it fails again. Fuggit, I'm not messing with it anymore.

To Mercyful Fate: You remember the past couple years of me having an issue compiling gcc, well.. had I looked into it back then, lol..

Thursday I get off work early. Nice. Got some time to look into this.

Realized

I only originally specified like 512mb of swap space for this machine when it has 2gb of ram. So look into any decent options to resize partitions. SystemRescueCD seems to be the only option nowadays that can at least make

you

feel secure about doing it without messing up your data. Downloaded, but

while

downloading I found some threads on creating a swap file. Hell, no need to resize my partitions? Bonus!

Created a 2gb swap file as /var/swap.img. Okay, let's give it another go..

GCC compiles perfectly. Heyo! Finally! After 3 unsuccessful compiles, and

when

you start them, you don't stick around.. you leave and come back after 12

hours

or more, to find out it failed an hour in..

When I started this, I told myself if there was a problem I couldn't fix, I

had

backed up my entire BBS machine, and had the latest Archlinux ISO burned to

CD

and ready to switch. Well, looks like Gentoo is sticking around for awhile longer. :)

As much as I despise it at times, it was my first jump into Linux, and is

still

to this day the most challenging Linux distribution out there. I guess I like the challenge too much to move on. LOL

Regards,
Nick

--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20151129
* Origin: thePharcyde_ telnet://bbs.pharcyde.org (Wisconsin) (46:1/701)

Oh yes, in gentoo you compile everything right?
--- SBBSecho 3.00-Linux
* Origin: Electronic Warfare BBS | telnet:\\bbs.ewbbs.net (46:1/107)

Hello Deavmi,

On 19 Nov 16 21:26, Deavmi wrote to Accession:

Oh yes, in gentoo you compile everything right?

Yeah. For people that have a LOT of time on their hands, it's great. I just want a running machine that doesn't break every other week.

Regards,
Nick

... "Не знаю. Я здесь только работаю."
--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20160827
* Origin: thePharcyde_ distribution system (Wisconsin) (46:1/100)