From Source Distros?

[sjhiller-nflug at fireswamp.net]

On Mon, Nov 17, 2003 at 08:07:55AM -0800, JJ Neff wrote:
> Installing gentoo makes me wonder, what is the true value in installing a "from
> source" distro.  I have been working on it for days and still dont have a

I use both Debian and Gentoo. Debian on a great many systems at work, and Gentoo on my personal workstations and servers.

For me, the biggest benefit is that I only have to install the packages and libraries that I actually want. I'm a huge Debian fan, but I still get irritated with it every time I want to install OpenLDAP and it 'helpfully' downloads a plethora of X libraries. That's just one example.

>Please lets discuss the pros and cons (not a fight but a discussion
> please:-)

Gentoo only installs the libraries which are absolutely required for a given package, plus whatever set you've explicity requested. Also, with USE flags, you can make sure that every package you build will have support (if it's possible) for every odd thing you're doing or have (css support, or ldap support, or any of a number of other things).

> 
> I know others here use Slackware and some gentoo so what am I gaining by having
> every last file compiled fom source?

In my experience Gentoo boots exteremely quickly. Not that we reboot our boxes except after kernel upgrades and power outages...
Very simple to choose a better syslog; metalog, say, or syslog-ng.
Not loaded down with cruft that you don't want. Don't use CUPS, or nfs? Well, don't install it.

The biggest benefits with Debian is that they're very quick with security fixes and mind-bogglingly stable (if you stick with their stable branch).

Hope that's useful to some of you.

Regards,
Stan Hiller