Slackware 12.1 - The Newest Version of the Oldest Surviving Linux Distribution

I am a linux n00b in a sense, i´ve been using linux for two years now exclusively, and settled on slackware from the start because i found it to be foolproof :) and easely understandable. I am somewhat surprised about your review because it feels like the review of some other slackware and not mine ;). Coming from windows 2000 i had no previous linux experience but it was only system that was quick/easy to install and which didn´t brake on my hands - strange as it may seem i´ve borked ubuntus and fedoras with their user friendly automatic tools, mandriva lived a bit longer, but it refused to compile a single bit for me, how should n00b know how to set up a system to compile things(?).

Yes Slackware boots default to runlevel 3(no gui), but it is so very easy to change it to runlevel 4 from /etc/inittab if you already know how, and slackware user will soon know these things. Then it is possible to choose any window manager from kdm graphical login menu.

I am not friend with commandline, that is why i mainly use kwrite to configure my computer, and mc (midnight commander) to edit text files when i´m outside x-windowing system - no need to have coding skills. It is possible to use configuration files over and over, so you configure just once, make notes (use basket notepads :) and you won't miss GUI configuration tools.

Adduser to add new user, read what it tells so you won't miss adding your user to plugdev and other groups to hal-automount - and no more configuration needed, at least not in kde.

Localization files are already included in program packages as far as i know (except kde, koffice, k3b). I am using Estonian and never had problems with missing language files, Gimp is in my native language, as well any other program that is translated.

Also i think it is important to mention that while slackware doesn't offer custom configuration tools, it guides user to understand how and from where linux system actually reads its configuration options and to edit these files directly with any text editor. Configuration files are extensibly commented so you may often just uncomment certain lines to make your configuration adjustments.

It may be hard for newcomer to set up X with all devices, but once you have done it, you´ve got the knowledge, backup and reuse your xorg.conf files (not blindly).

I know here in Estonia, there are computer users who doesn´t speak english and on windows system they are just clicking 'yes' and 'ok' or 'next-next-fishy' without knowing what they are really doing, of course they run into problems with viruses and spyware or, mainly, computer "getting old and slowing down", if this to be called user-friendliness then, yes, Slackware is unfriendly.

Cheers,
Marek
(sorry for my bad English and mistakes if any)

>To me Slackware is a fantastic base on which to build a
> first rate distribution. It is not what I consider to be a
>good distribution in its own right.

That is very true!

And I proved it myself! A few years back, I built a custom distro for a company that made medical office management software. I first built a server distro, then a desktop version of the same, and it was called MfxLinux. It has some nifty features like the ability of the server to start applications on the client desktops already populated with the information...for example, if the doctor wanted to make a prescription, he would type the info into the app which ran on the server, and up would pop Open Office, with the client's info, and an information sheet about the medication, the doctor could then change anything if they want, and then tell it to print, and out would come the prescription and information sheet.

It was a real challenge to set up the distro to use certain defaults for the print queues, IP addresses, and SSH keys as well as still being able to configure it for the wide variety of hardware on the client systems I don't think I could have done it with something like Ubuntu, but with Slackware, it was relatively to make the modifications, and use a custom program to package everything up for the custom installer. Other than those two pieces of software, everything was either part of Slackware, or packages that I added, like Open Office.

Building MfxLinux reinforced my high level of respect for Patrick, as even taking Slackware and building a modified distro based upon it taught me a great deal about the systems level engineering that has gone into making Slack "as simple as it needs to be, but no simpler" and retaining the power that Unix promises.

ttyl
Farrell

ok, i admit I didnt read the whole review but after installing and testing around 100 Linux distributions, I believe the conclusion is wrong. I find it easy to install and setup a slackware system. In many ways it is easier to install and setup than a Ubuntu or Fedora system. It also doesnt break near as often as they do. It doesn't have a dozen daemons running to slow your system down like they do. Slackware has a solid package management system that I find to be better than others since I prefer to install dependencies by hand because it helps to prevent breakage and often reduces the amount of dependencies needed. Deb and RPM often make you install more dependencies than what is actually needed for the application. I use Slackware because it "Just works" , even compiling from source, which does not work well with other Linux Distributions. I find slackware the most reliable, easy to configure, simple, and secure Linux distributions available.

Hi,

as the other commentators I am a HUGE Slackware fan and wanted to point out that Patrick still supports Slackware 8.1! That is SIX years! What other distros brand as "long time support" or "Enterprise" is business as usual for Slackware.

I am running Slackware 12.1 on my desktop and did not run into any problems with HAL.

To me "userfriendly" means not to restrict the user. And Slackware simply works.
Another big plus for Slackware is the excellent and helpfull community at linuxquestion.org and ##slackware (at freenode.net)

I rather agree with the conclusions drawn here.
I have been a Slackware man for a long time, although recently I have also been drawn to the brilliant Arch Linux.
I second the comments about the reliability of Slackware. It was always a solid distribution.
To me, the best version so far was Slackware 11, but I am using 12.1 at the moment, and it is very good. I have moved some of the things from the boot process - fc-cache and the like - and cron'ed them for once a month instead. Now, doing this with one of the beginner-friendly distributions seems absurd, but with Slackware, it is pretty much par. It works, it really, really works.
I am glad to see your reference to Wolvix - I found it impressive, utilising the strengths of Slackware while providing an excellent desktop experience. It also has Madwifi and Wifi-Radar, so that should make you happy!
Just a note: The thing about open source purists. Slackware includes the JRE, which is as yet unfree.

@Marek: I'm glad Slackware has worked out well for you. I can't comment on Estonia but here in the United States most computer users are not technically astute and are used to a point and click interface. To the "just works" means they don't have to think about it. Working in the corporate IT world for 28+ years now I now that this applies to about 95% of the population. The single largest reason Linux isn't popular on the desktop is that it isn't sold preloaded in most places and even installing an OS, *ANY* OS, is beyond the average user.

@netfun81: Your definition of "easy" and "just works" is different to say the least. If you had actually read the review rather than just reacting to the conclusion and blindly going into Slackware defender mode you would know that I wrote that Slackware 12.1 is the ONLY distro I have ever found to be bug free.

Slackware is easy to install and configure? Hand an Ubuntu CD and a Slackware CD to a moderately experienced but not highly technical user and see which one they get through the install with and which one they toss away in utter frustration? Clue: they will never get through a Slackware install. They won't even understand the questions.

I've been using Linux since 1995 and working with it professionally since 1998. I don't find Slackware easy to configure. I find it time consuming and fiddly. It's not difficult for me because of my level of experience but most people don't have your level of experience or mine. Not correctly detecting hardware (again, actually read the review) isn't "easy".

Installing dependencies by hand doesn't prevent breakage unless you know all the dependencies. It causes breakage. Try installing AbiWord into Slackware 12.1. There are 14 dependencies if you don't install the plugins, more if you do. There is nothing easy about it.

Most users want to drive their cars without knowing how to build a car. Most users want their PCs to work without knowing why or how.

@dangerseeker: Red Hat truly offers long term support. They still officially support RHEL 3. I know from experience working there that they'll go back further than what they officially support for important enterprise customers.

Patrick, however brilliant, is one man. He can't possibly offer corporate support to large enterprise customers en masse around the world. Comparing Slackware support to Red Hat or Canonical or Novell is a bit ridiculous.

@Morten: Thank you for the correction on JRE. You are, of course, correct and I will modify the article accordingly.

@Caitlyn: Your definition of a moderately experienced person and mine are totally different. Any moderately experienced person should be able to install Slackware with no trouble. Even a person completely new to Linux can get through a Slackware install by reading a bit before installing. I agree that if you are new to Linux you might like Ubuntu better at first, because its more like Windows. However, In my opinion Linux is mainly for Technical users and those that want more control over their system. If someone can't install and setup Slackware then maybe they should stick with Windows, because even Ubuntu will frustrate them.

@Netfun81: Well, I don't think much of anyone in the Linux community will agree with your opinion that Linux is mainly for technical users. That's the line used over and over again by those spreading Microsoft FUD. Clearly many thousands of Linux Eee PC users who were handed a box with Xandros (based on Ubuntu, BTW) didn't agree with you based both on sales of that box and on reviews written by some of those users. I don't think Linus Torvalds, the creator of Linux, would agree with you either. His famous "world domination" quote was only half-joking.

If you read my posts over on the old O'Reilly Linux Dev Center blog (unlikely, since you didn't even read my review before disagreeing with it) you'd know that I've introduced Linux to many non-technical users including members of my own family. My brother, who had never used Linux before in his life. recently went to a dual boot configuration with Linux Mint and Windows Vista. He found Mint to be easy. My 70 year old mother had no problem sitting down at my desktop running Xubuntu and doing what she wanted to do.

There is nothing intrinsically hard about Linux for most users. There is a whole lot that is hard about Slackware for the same sort of user I'm talking about. My review is certainly not the only one that has come to this conclusion. Someone pointed me to this review today which is a whole lot more negative than mine.

This is why I use Slackware,

"During my first three weeks running Slackware I have yet to find a single bug. That is something I've never been able to write in a review of a Linux distribution before and it is truly impressive."

That person is a tool,

"Someone pointed me to this review today which is a whole lot more negative than mine."

I just want to say that I disagree with Ms Martin's opinion that Slackware is not for newbies. I'm one and I had tried Red Hat and Suse first. Both had problems with my hardware. Slackware installed properly the first time, and every time. I've removed it for various flavors of Windows, but it keeps coming back. Some of the changes in Slackware 12 threw me. Specifically the change from Xfree86 to X.org was annoying. I have found that emailing Mr. Vockerman or anyone involved with Slackware has been easy and the turn around time on responses far better then what I get from Microsoft (I'm a partner), or IBM. The manual is written so even a CEO can understand it. (Lots of pictures, etc.)

@Caitlyn: That's the real the beauty of Linux: Choice. We don't have to settle for one distribution or Window Manager or Desktop Environment. There are loads of different opinions in the Linux Community and different needs. It's hard to convince a Ubuntu user that Slackware is better, and vice-versa. For me, there are more difficult distributions to install and configure than Slackware, ie, Gentoo, Arch, Crux, etc. Their users would probably say I'm not enlightened yet :)

you forgot to mention http://gnomeslackbuild.org/

Choosing a distro is very much like choosing a religion. There will be people who would tell you:-

I have been searching for the truth since year xxxx and in the end I found religion (distro) Y.

Slackware is like distant religions e.g. Mormon, Shinto or Shaolin. While it is not for everyone, it has its own strength. And its followers find peace in practicing this distro.

In the end the majority of people are ignorant about religion. They don't care about the distro as long as it solves their daily problems

Thanks for this useful article.

It's important to understand that Caitlyn's review defines "user-friendly" as software that is either auto-configured or at least configured with a GUI. And there's nothing wrong with that, except that she overlooks the other meaning of "user-friendly", one that applies more to slackware: predictability, stability, simplicity, familiarity, and adherence to standards. This is the slackware philosophy of "vanilla-ism", and this is actually the ultimate in user-friendliness for the system administrator or programmer.

You could say is that slackware is indeed user-friendly -- but only for those who already know what they're doing. It is not, however, user-friendly for those who are new to the whole thing. Another way to look at this is that slackware is very much command-line user-friendly, but not GUI user-friendly.

One more thing...

Quote from the article:
The lack of a package management system with proper dependency checking is pretty much inexcusable in 2008.

I disagree, and this is one of the main reasons why slackware still exists. From the perspective of system administration, this can be a very *good* thing. You just have to understand why, and the answer is (as I stated above) predictability, stability, and simplicity, all of which are very desirable characteristics for those who need them.

I think the bottom line is that slackware is not an ideal "newbie" distro, however it is a very ideal distro for those who already know what they're doing.

You know, there is a widely accepted definition of usability. It's what's easy and intuitive for most people to use, not what people are used to. Slackware doesn't meet that definition in the slightest.

I've been a professional system administrator for 28 years. You will never convince me that not resolving dependencies is simple or desirable or good in any way. Sorry, except for the Slackware faithful I think you'd be very hard pressed to find much of anyone who agrees.

I have never understood the religious devotion to one distro or another. To me a distro is a tool. If it serves my needs or the needs of my customers then it's good. If it doesn't it isn't good.

No, I didn't mention GNOME Slackbuild or Freerock GNOME or any other third party build of GNOME for Slackware. I debated whether it was appropriate to mention third party sources at all. In the end I decided that Slackware is the distro where users are most dependent on third parties and that some of the prominent ones had to be mentioned. I left out a whole lot more that could have been included. BTW, I consider the dependency on third party sources to be a major drawback of Slackware.

Slackware fills a niche and fills it well. A lot of other distros are equally reliable. There is a reason Red Hat Enterprise Linux has captured in excess of 90% of the corporate server market in the U.S. If it wasn't a really solid distro nobody would buy it. Does RHEL/CentOS have disadvantages? Yep, it sure does. Does Ubuntu have disadvantages? Let's just say fans of Ubuntu don't want me writing a review of their favorite distro. There is NO perfect distro, Slackware most certainly included. For me there are others that far better serve my needs -- and believe me, in the corporate world I need reliability and stability. Those are strong points for Slackware but they are hardly unique to Slackware.

On the overall I consider Slackware to be a hobbyist distro. It's great for those who want to configure and tweak their system to the nth degree. It's great for the Linux fanatic who wants to get under the hood. It's a great base from which to build a decent distro. In and of itself, to me, Slackware leaves a lot to be desired. I expect that the vast majority of people who haven't tried Slackware would come to a similar conclusion irregardless of what the obviously passionate Slackware faithful have posted here.

This article brought up memories from back in 1998 / 99 (I was then just starting out with computers) a computer mag published out here (India) carried Slackware on floppy images of the same on the free CD they gave with the mag. Me and a friend tried installing it, but at that time could not make head or tail of it. Subsequently the same mag provided a 'bootable' CD with RedHat 5.0 and my continuing affair with GNU/Linux was born.

A couple of points that were brought up:

User Friendly User-friendly as defined from the user point of view does not mean easy to install. User-friendly means that when the user logs into the computer, it runs, doesn't do things it's not supposed to, and does thing it's supposed to. Since over 80% (probably closer to 95%) of the users wouldn't even know how to start an install, talking about an OS that is user-friendly from an install/administrator function is just FUD.

Case in point - last year (2007) I installed Slackware 12.0 on a computer for a 65+ y/o, replacing Windows. The only complaint he had was running a single windows-only program for making greeting cards. Last month, I installed KUbuntu thinking it would be easier for him to work with. Last week, he asked me to reinstall Slackware for him because it was more user friendly for him.

@Anonymous: As an administrator, I would expect you to keep up on dependencies for company programs and not blindly rely on 3rd party software to dictate what is required. As the administrator, your job is to make sure that the company required software works properly - especially if programX requires one version of a dependency, but programY requires an newer/different dependency that may break reqired programX. That's what you (the administrator) get paid to do - ensure properly working software - as well as Q/A validating.

Given a couple of days (it's been a while for me, so I would have to refresh a few old skills [G]), I would have a Slackware repository on the local company server that would rival RH KickStart in doing remote installs on new systems, and updates to installed systems (I did that once, back in Slackware 9.x days as a hobby). And it would properly work at keeping the company machines up-to-date without the user having to worry about it.

@Caitlin: Interesting review, and you highlight several key points about what I love about Slackware -- stability and control. From a sysadmin point of view, Slackware is a dream to administer for a company once it's properly setup for the end-users. Just today, I was upgrading some of the security updates for a machine across the room from my desk. I administer a 13-machine small office, with 12 Slackware installs and 1 Apple OSX (the boss - of course he has to be different). The main server is still chugging along (dual-cpu machine from too long ago with 128M ram running Slackware 9.0). No fancy graphics, just the main core stuff that remote terminals connect to for the company software. Hasn't missed a beat in 5 years of service. And that includes moving the whole company to another building last year. I did upgrade the desktop machines to Slackware 12.0 and just this morning installed 12.1 on another desktop, but that's the beauty - I don't have to learn anything new to upgrade to the latest and greatest. It just works.

OK, I wasn't going to touch this, but figured I would since someone else advised me to post my comments here. This was originally posted in the Slackware forum of linuxquestions.org by a user of the same name (me). I would suggest doing some research before writing an article with so many negative points. I'm not here to argue that Slackware is the best distro (if such a thing exists), but some of the stuff you wrote is pure fiction -- so here goes. You should note that my tone is rather sarcastic, and the opposite of what I've written is generally (though not always) the truth. You should check out the LQ thread (http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/slackware-14/slackware-review-12.1-646255/) for some nice comments on why this article is garbage. One key point is your method of responding to comments in an attacking manner, while no one has responded the same way to you.


"I should also note that Slackware includes only one piece of non-free software: JRE."


Wrong. There are more non-free apps included, like xv.


"To have HAL correctly add and remove icons on my Xfce desktop I had to create the .hal-mtab file in /media. It wasn't done automatically as is the case in most distributions."


You probably screwed up, since that most certainly isn't required. You need to add yourself to the plugdev, cdrom, audio and video groups (either using gpasswd, editing the /etc/group file, or just by pressing that UP arrow when running adduser, as suggested) for HAL to work properly. If you did that and still needed to create the file, then something was seriously weird -- because it isn't, and never has been, required. This is mentioned in CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT, which can be considered official documentation.


"Slackware does not include a display manager which allows you to choose your session at login unless you install KDE as part of the initial installation process."


What's XDM, anyway?


" Slackware 12.1 is the first release to include HAL support."


Really? I guess 12.0 was fake HAL then.


"There is only a tiny repository called "Extra" which contains things like international aspell libraries. There are no additional applications to speak of."


Absolutely correct. Bittorrent, ktorrent, GRUB, jdk, mpg123, parted...they're not REAL apps, anyway, right? (There aren't many apps included, but this could have been stated correctly instead of flat out lying)


"It's very easy to add a piece of software only to find it won't run due to some missing library."


You know, I've never had this problem. I usually just check the app's site to see what else I need to install. I guess I'm doing things incorrectly.


"Once you start adding software from third party sources this becomes particularly messy if you don't do your homework and track down all the dependencies on your own."


Correct. Because slackbuilds.org and slacky.eu, the two biggest (and most useful) repositories, ignoring linuxpackages.net, don't list dependencies, right?


"It's a recipe for dependency hell that's rarely seen on other major distributions in 2008."


You obviously don't know what dependency hell is. I will agree that with multimedia apps, especially video editing apps, it can be frustrating. Otherwise, however, it really isn't.


"Even advanced users will find Slackware time consuming to install and configure properly."


Takes me longer to install Ubuntu [and OpenSUSE, etc.] than Slackware, but OK. (And I'm as far from an expert as it gets)


"The fact that Slackware is largely developed and maintained by one person and offers no commercial support makes it inappropriate for the corporate or institutional server room."


Yeah, Slackware sucks with servers. It even had that openSSL bug and such, right?
[ADDED: Since Slackware is maintained PRIMARILY, though not entirely, by one man, Pat must understand the entire system and how everything works together. This is a benefit compared to Debian, etc. in my opinion, where incompatibilities may arise because of the high fractionation of jobs to different areas. In addition, Slackware maintains vanilla sources unless absolutely necessary, and so apps are not altered by anyone that did not write the app in the first place -- and therefore avoiding harmful bugs like the openssl fiasco, when someone who *thinks* they know what they're doing makes modifications to the source code]


"Nothing is made to be easy or user friendly."


I personally disagree with that -- if I know what I'm doing in Slackware, it will work 100% of the time. If I'm fiddling with a GUI in Ubuntu, it works 70% of the time. But I understand this point I guess if you're incapable of learning, or unwilling to.


"If you want your computer to "just work" then Slackware is certainly not for you."


Again, I disagree. Once set up, Slackware "just works". Once set up, Ubuntu etc. works -- but not as in Slackware. This is more subjective, so take it with a grain of salt. I much prefer OpenSUSE to *buntu, but even still I think AFTER setting everything up, Slackware "just works" at least as well as other distros.


You make some good points about Slackware, but ultimately this article can safely be considered journalistic garbage since many facts are incorrect, incomplete, or biased. I don't think Slackware is for everyone -- but I don't think that this article presents it in a fair light. I've struggled more trying to get other distros (primarily *buntu, but some OpenSUSE) to do what I want. Slackware's simplicity and transparency makes tasks easy once you know what you're doing. Also, since the setup of an OS constitutes merely a fraction of the actual usage, it should barely be considered an obstacle. Slackware was my first Linux distro (starting with 11.0) and all I did was follow a nice install guide found on the internet -- and I had no trouble whatsoever. Upgrading Slackware is also WAY faster than other distros with a lower chance of failure since it's done manually -- as long as you read the documentation (UPGRADE.TXT and CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT especially).

First of all, yes, Slackware expects the user to either know what he is doing OR be willing to learn without the system (or another person) making all of the decisions for him. It's okay if you or any other reviewer doesn't like that, but it's not appropriate to "take away points" for it simply because it doesn't fit within your view of how things ought to be.

An advanced user who is familiar with Slackware can have a new installation done, configured, and in production use in less than an hour for many typical chores, and that's largely due to the simplicity that you seem to be so against. As others have indicated, "user friendly" does not necessarily mean "beginner friendly." There's almost always a trade-off involved there - making something easier for a beginner often makes it harder for an advanced user. Since users don't stay beginners forever, you actually make things worse on them later and you annoy the already advanced users.

The X lockup you encountered is actually a bug in the vesa driver shipped with Xorg in 12.1. The default xorg driver used in Slackware is vesa because it "just works" on the vast majority of hardware, but that bug obviously throws a kink in the works. It was an oversight that it didn't get documented in CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT, but one solution is to run "X -configure" and let X autodetect your hardware, then use the xorg.conf generated by that.
Anyway, the Slackware-HOWTO document on the cdrom has a section on configuring X.

Loading acpi modules and such is discussed in CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT.

Slackware 12.1 was NOT the first release to include HAL, and had you read the information in CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT, it would have "just worked" for you. The text that displayed when adding a new user account with "adduser" would have hinted at the required group membership as well.

The command line tools to change window manager, change network settings, add/delete user accounts, etcetera work just fine, so why do you insist that they're not good enough? Since they WORK, how are they not "user friendly" enough?

In regards to a package manager that supports automatic dependency resolution: for an experienced user who is familiar with the system, what sustantial advantage would it provide? I suspect that the answer is "none."

Why is it important that $OTHER_DISTRO offers $INSANE_NUMBER of packages? How many of them do you use? How often do you have to install them?
Let's face it - the typical user will need less than twenty packages not included with Slackware, and they'll only need to be installed once, so all the whining about "I have to find all these dependencies... blah blah blah..." has to be done exactly once. SlackBuilds.org (yes, shameless plug) even takes away that hassle for the apps that are available there. If compiling isn't for you (even though the SlackBuild script automates it), then it's not hard to find a few package resources who are obviously trustworthy - they have @slackware.com mail addresses. :-)

I got my first computer at the age of 58, no interest in them before then. Messed around with Windows XP for about a couple of years, read about GNU/Linux and dual-booting. Bought Linux Format magazine, Sept. '04, with Slackware 10 on two CDs. Had no trouble installing it. All you need is average intelligence, the ability to read, and the ability to think for yourself. Since then I've tried other distros: Debian, the *buntus, Fedora, OpenSuse, etc. But always returned to Slackware, now using 12.1. New Linux users are often warned not to expect Linux to be exactly like Windows. Don't go into it with preconceived ideas. That's where this review fails, in not judging Slackware on its own merits, in wanting it to be just like a few other distros. What would be the point in having 300+ distros if they were all the same?

I've had to chuckle reading some of the comments. I wonder if some of the Slackware faithful are even on the same planet I'm on. Slackware is great to administer in a 13 computer office? What about a 13,000 computer enterprise? I've worked in such places (government, large corporations) and I can tell you it would be a nightmare in the enterprise.

Patrick Volkerding's official release announcement for Slackware 12.1 claims it;s the first version with HAL support. That's my source. I will freely admit that I ran Slackware 11 and 12.1 but not 12.0. I guess I was wrong to assume that anything official from Slackware/Patrick was going to be 100% accurate. I do apologize for making such an assumption.

xv is long unmaintained shareware but you are correct that it isn't Open Source. However, my point still stands. Most of the actually useful non-free stuff, specifically device drivers, is missing from Slackware. Please tell me how not having support for popular video cards or wireless chipsets is "user friendly" or how it's Slackware "just works" when it lacks hardware support included in most major distros. Those are the claims that are "pure fiction", not what I wrote.

"The X lockup you encountered is actually a bug in the vesa driver shipped with Xorg in 12.1. The default xorg driver used in Slackware is vesa because it "just works" on the vast majority of hardware, but that bug obviously throws a kink in the works. It was an oversight that it didn't get documented in"

Default vesa *NEVER* works on a significant percentage of laptops, including every Toshiba model I've tried. It doesn't work on my flat panel monitor either. This is why most distributions have a hardware detection routine and X configuration in the installer. I am not denying that there may be a bug in this version of X. Supporting "the majority of hardware" means you are leaving out a significant minority. Most distros support much more video hardware correctly than Slackware does.

Anyone who claims I don't know what dependency hell is after going through the move from libc5 to glibc in Red Hat Linux circa 1998/99 is attacking me with no basis in fact.

Yes, the Slackware documentation covers configuring X. That doesn't make it easy compared to most major distributions where it's automated and just works.

"if I know what I'm doing in Slackware, it will work 100% of the time." -- That is true of any number of distributions I could name. No, Ubuntu isn't one of them. The problem is that Slackware requires a much higher level of knowledge than most other distros. This is why I say it's primarily for the advanced user and nobody else. Yes, some bright people who wanted to learn how Linux works under the hood succeed with it as newcomers to Linux. I never said it isn't for newcomers. I said it isn't for *MOST* newcomers who don't want to go through a very steep learning curve. Big difference.

"Correct. Because slackbuilds.org and slacky.eu, the two biggest (and most useful) repositories, ignoring linuxpackages.net, don't list dependencies, right?"

No, that's not correct. Slacky.eu both lists dependencies and supports slapt-get/gslapt. You've absolutely got that wrong. However, depending on third party resources of variable quality is a bad idea in any distro, not just Slackware. Slackware, with it's tiny software selection, forces anyone who isn't compiling from source to do just that. It's a major weak point of Slackware.

"Why is it important that $OTHER_DISTRO offers $INSANE_NUMBER of packages? How many of them do you use? How often do you have to install them?
Let's face it - the typical user will need less than twenty packages not included with Slackware, and they'll only need to be installed once, so all the whining about "I have to find all these dependencies... blah blah blah..." has to be done exactly once."

This is the most inane and ridiculous argument of the bunch. Sure, nobody uses all the packages in Fedora or Ubuntu or Debian or Mandriva or even the Vector Linux repositories. I'd bet dollars to donuts that most users, probably well in excess of 95%, use multiple programs not included in Slackware's itty bitty repository. The idea is that these distros offer choices. They offer a large selection of maintained and supported packages so that users can find what they want without hassle. Slackware doesn't.

In my work I have to try new software all the time. How often do I run into having to track down dependency issues if I run Slackware? All the time. What about security updates and bug fixes for software not included in Slackware? Most users, if they want to keep their system secure, have to go through the Slackware dependency nightmare on a regular basis.

"Absolutely correct. Bittorrent, ktorrent, GRUB, jdk, mpg123, parted...they're not REAL apps, anyway, right? (There aren't many apps included, but this could have been stated correctly instead of flat out lying)"

I didn't lie. I said "none to speak of". A handful for Slackware, thousands for other major distros. By comparison "none to speak of" is very accurate.

"You probably screwed up, since that most certainly isn't required. You need to add yourself to the plugdev, cdrom, audio and video groups..."

Um... no. There was a similar thread on lxer.com. I'm not the only one who had to "touch /media/.hal-mtab" It's something others have run into as well. It isn't a screw up or fiction as you claim as I did have the users in plugdev. This also makes my point. Other saner distros setup users in groups to make HAL work automatically, Slackware doesn't. Slackware is the ONLY distro I've seen that doesn't. That's part of not user friendly and doesn't "just work".

You can setup Slackware in an hour? You must not use many apps that aren't included. To get Slackware installed, configured, all apps installed and configured, took me days compared to hours in most distros. I do Linux for a living. I do know what I am doing.

"There's almost always a trade-off involved there - making something easier for a beginner often makes it harder for an advanced user."

I don't believe that for a minute in a well designed distro. How does having proper dependency resolution, something every last major distribution except Slackware, make things harder for anyone? Clue: it doesn't. Similarly, having a GUI configuration tool doesn't stop you from doing anything the old school way at the command line or by editing configuration files. Most professional systems administrators, myself included, do a huge percentage of our work at the command line no matter which distro we're supporting. Having user friendly tools doesn't detract from that one little bit since we're free to ignore those tools and do things in whatever way we find most efficient. It's all about choices that all other major distros have and Slackware lacks.

"ince Slackware is maintained PRIMARILY, though not entirely, by one man, Pat must understand the entire system and how everything works together. This is a benefit compared to Debian, etc. in my opinion, where incompatibilities may arise because of the high fractionation of jobs to different areas."

By your logic all larger organizations do a poor job or are largely disfunctional. The fact that Slackware almost entirely equals Patrick is a HUGE disadvantage. I'm sure you remember Patrick's health scare a couple of years back. Thankfully he recovered. What if, G-d forbid, something happens to Patrick someday? What future does Slackware have then? With a large organization of competent engineers that companies like Red Hat, Novell/SuSe, Turbolinux, or Canonical have the future is pretty well assured. That's also true in large community projects. While I certainly wish Patrick a long, healthy, and happy life I wouldn't want my business to depend on a distribution that in turn depends on one individual.

I didn't do my research? I ran Slackware 12.1 almost exclusively for three weeks and did all my work from a Slackware box. 10+ hours a day of Slackware every single day is more than enough to write a review.

All the arguments add up to either "I like Slackware" or "Slackware works for me" so everybody else has to feel the same way. Anyone who challenges the religious devotion to Slackware must be an idiot. Sorry, folks, it doesn't work that way. I stand by my review and I still believe that Slack is for the hobbyist, not for the majority of Linux users.

Folks, let's not get aggressive here. Caitlyn did get most of it right, after all. She correctly identified most of the strong points of slackware.

After reading through the comments, I just have a few more points:

- Slackware is not just a "hobbyist" distro. It may be considered a niche distro (the niche being "vanilla-ism"), but that doesn't mean slackware isn't for professionals. As a system administrator and database programmer, I can say in all honesty that slackware is my first choice to run on my servers. Yes, in a production environment. It is the simplest and easiest to administer, and lets me spend more time where I need to (database programming). It's also in the top 15 on distrowatch, if that counts for anything.

- I don't notice any idealism or fanaticism in the slackware community. There are always a few who are more "vocal", but they don't speak for everybody. The majority of the slackware community is practical, helpful, and level-headed, just like the distro.

- As for slackware being the least newbie-friendly distro, I have to disagree there. Gentoo wins by a mile. Not only is the install more complex, the administration is more complex. You not only have to learn linux, you have to learn gentoo and all of its complexity. With slackware and its vanilla-ism you only have to learn linux.

Overall I think the review was good, except for one or two comments which were off-base (like stating that lack of dependency checking is "unexcusable", when clearly in some cases it is desirable).

Hmm, I notice that Caitlyn is still banging the "religious devotion" drum. Please, let's not resort to strawman arguments (on either side). Again, one or two people cannot possibly speak for the entire slackware community.

Above all, there is a reason why slackware is the oldest surviving distribution. The reason is because it serves its purpose, and serves it well. The fact that its purpose benefits a minority, and not a majority, does not make it "hobbyist". A production server whose uptime can be measured in years is far from "hobbyist".

@Jim Grant: Some responses and a couple of clarifications:

I can say in all honesty that slackware is my first choice to run on my servers. Yes, in a production environment. It is the simplest and easiest to administer, and lets me spend more time where I need to (database programming).

The absolute control Slackware gives is indeed desirable for building servers, particularly one-offs. In the lxer.com thread I even said that it's probably my favorite distro for building a server for that reason. I actually have two objections to Slackware in the corporate server room. The first is that I once again have to turn to third party tools to do large scale automated server builds. Yes, I can get kickstart to work with Slackware but it's not included nor directly supported. The second objection is that I don't feel that the support offerings (again, all from third parties) are anywhere near what the big corporate distros can offer. For a small business or a n small organization this really isn't an issue since they can't afford and won't have the level of support offered to large enterprises in any case. As a consultant, though, Slackware is a tough sell even to small customers because many business owners feel reassured by large corporate backing. Neither of these points is a reflection on the quality of the distro, of course, but it does affect the level of acceptance its likely to receive.

It's also in the top 15 on distrowatch, if that counts for anything.

Distrowatch self-selects for Linux enthusiasts. It does mean something, of course, but I'm not sure how well it translates to Slackware being suitable for large numbers of users. There is no doubt that Slackware has a sizable and loyal following.

I don't notice any idealism or fanaticism in the slackware community. There are always a few who are more "vocal", but they don't speak for everybody. The majority of the slackware community is practical, helpful, and level-headed, just like the distro.

You may be surprised to learn that for the most part I agree with this. There was a similar thread on lxer.com after my Entropy blog post with my first impressions was picked up by that site. It was entirely respectful. Nobody called what I had written "garbage", there were no personal attacks, nobody called me a liar, etc... There were honest exchanges of opinions and ideas. There were points on which we agreed to disagree.

In this thread some of the comments were of a different quality. I had my conclusions challenged by someone who admitted they didn't even bother to read the whole review. There has been name calling. There are specific commentors that clearly have a "my way or the highway" attitude (no, not you) that smacks of fanaticism. Anytime we reach the point where anyone who voices a differing opinion is labeled as an ignorant idiot (or other words to that effect) we are dealing with closed minded devotion that I find disturbing.

As for slackware being the least newbie-friendly distro, I have to disagree there. Gentoo wins by a mile.

Gentoo is another distro that is decidedly user unfriendly. Whether it's better or worse than Slackware in a given area is a matter of opinion. I last used Gentoo in 2004 when I was brought in by a company where the admins had installed Gentoo into production without getting management sign-off. I haven't touched Gentoo since while I have come back to Slackware, which should tell you something. Perhaps if I took the time to use Gentoo extensively again I'd end up agreeing with you. Perhaps better language would have been to say that Slackware is among the least user friendly major distros. I did qualify my statement with the words "may be" since it's obvious that nobody can try every distro out there or even all the big ones frequently enough to keep track of them all. That would be a full time job.

Overall I think the review was good, except for one or two comments which were off-base (like stating that lack of dependency checking is "unexcusable", when clearly in some cases it is desirable).

I deliberately ran this by a couple of other Linux professionals I'm friendly with this morning. They couldn't see your point at all. Neither can I. I can't think of a single reason why having no dependency checking in a distro would be desirable especially considering you can turn it off in any distro package manager I've ever used. I'll stick with my strong language here even if you consider it "off base" since it's one of the major reasons I'm not comfortable recommending Slackware to much of anybody. We may just have to agree to disagree on this one.

Hmm, I notice that Caitlyn is still banging the "religious devotion" drum. Please, let's not resort to strawman arguments (on either side).

That description refers to two or three people who have commented, not the Slackware community as a whole. As I already pointed out I didn't see that at all in the longer (80 or so comments) thread on lxer.com.

Again, one or two people cannot possibly speak for the entire slackware community.

Agreed. A few over the top zealots can make an entire community look bad, though. Some may remember my experience with the Puppy Linux community which included a death threat for saying that I couldn't get their distro to run on five different machines in my household. Does what happened reflect the entire Puppy Linux community? Of course not.

Some of the name calling here and some of the comments do strongly resemble blind devotion, hence my reaction. I do not think those comments are reflective of the Slackware community as a whole, nor do I intend to paint the Slackware community with a broad brush.

Fair enough. I just want everybody to get along. ;)

I think where dependency-awareness really shines is on often-updated or often-changed installations. After all, if your system never changes, there's not much point in adding the complexity of dependency resolution. But often-updated and often-changed isn't what slackware is meant to be. There are already many distros which do this well. Slackware is meant to be a stable, predictable system, upgraded between releases, not between weeks. For that purpose, the lack of dependency resolution is a feature, not a flaw. It's about following the KISS principle, not about turning up one's nose to fancy features. ;)

"Correct. Because slackbuilds.org and slacky.eu, the two biggest (and most useful) repositories, ignoring linuxpackages.net, don't list dependencies, right?"


No, that's not correct. Slacky.eu both lists dependencies and supports slapt-get/gslapt. You've absolutely got that wrong. However, depending on third party resources of variable quality is a bad idea in any distro, not just Slackware. Slackware, with it's tiny software selection, forces anyone who isn't compiling from source to do just that. It's a major weak point of Slackware.
I even warned about my sarcasm and you still didn't get it. I know slacky.eu and slackbuilds.org check dependencies. That was my point. And I will say that slackbuilds.org at least is definitely not of variable quality, and I would consider it at least as good as official repos in other distros. It is maintained and contributed to by a few people that are actual Slackware contributors. That's official enough for me. I build everything from source using SlackBuilds, which are easily transferable to other machines. I don't see how this lacks automation features -- you compile the app on one machine, test to see if it works, and either install the package on all other machines or run the SlackBuild on other machines. I will agree that it adds the burden of manually tracking security fixes, but if I were running an important server I would personally try and keep my third-party sources to a minimum regardless. I STILL don't understand the dependency hell argument -- you may need to compile a few extra libs to get it working, but they're almost always listed at the site (and always listed at slackbuilds.org if you're using a SlackBuild from there).


Other saner distros setup users in groups to make HAL work automatically, Slackware doesn't.
That's the thing -- it DOES work in Slackware automatically. I still don't know what you, or that other person, did to your installation, but I've never had to touch that file and HAL has always worked out-of-the-box for me. It even recommends you to add your user to the required group using adduser, as Robby said -- but you seem to have ignored this fact.


xv is long unmaintained shareware but you are correct that it isn't Open Source. However, my point still stands. Most of the actually useful non-free stuff, specifically device drivers, is missing from Slackware. Please tell me how not having support for popular video cards or wireless chipsets is "user friendly" or how it's Slackware "just works" when it lacks hardware support included in most major distros. Those are the claims that are "pure fiction", not what I wrote.
Yep, you're right. I had to download the nVidia proprietary drivers unless I wanted to use the generic nv driver included with X. Likewise with ATI cards unless you want to use the included radeon driver. I guess this just doesn't seem like the end of the world to me to download one thing and install it (and it is an automatic installation process too) -- but I guess our opinions differ. I must admit, however, that I don't have a laptop and I've never had the need to use WiFi in Slackware. Getting drivers to work with that is a little more manual than some would like, and I will completely agree with you there -- but again, it shouldn't take more than half an hour (if you're taking your time) to set up the network along with X. It's hardly "days".


Yes, the Slackware documentation covers configuring X. That doesn't make it easy compared to most major distributions where it's automated and just works.
I've tried a few distros that didn't just work even though it should have. I had to manually edit xorg.conf to get the resolution to work properly (it was trying to use a resolution and refresh rate higher than my monitor supported). A simple `xorgconfig` in Slackware makes it work 100% of the time as long as I know how to answer questions. You can also copy the xorg.conf from a previous installation or another distro if you want. Again, once you know what you're doing, this will take an extra 5 minutes of your installation procedure. I still don't understand what the big deal is, but I guess our opinions differ.


By your logic all larger organizations do a poor job or are largely disfunctional. The fact that Slackware almost entirely equals Patrick is a HUGE disadvantage. I'm sure you remember Patrick's health scare a couple of years back. Thankfully he recovered. What if, G-d forbid, something happens to Patrick someday? What future does Slackware have then? With a large organization of competent engineers that companies like Red Hat, Novell/SuSe, Turbolinux, or Canonical have the future is pretty well assured. That's also true in large community projects. While I certainly wish Patrick a long, healthy, and happy life I wouldn't want my business to depend on a distribution that in turn depends on one individual.
I understand this point. I'm sure someone else would attempt to take on Slackware, but even in the worst case scenario, keeping current would just require that you watch security updates. Still too much work, but at this point it's not something I seriously consider. Also, there are other people (including Robby Workman, who posted above) who contribute to Slackware. As for me thinking that ALL large organizations do a poor job, this isn't the case. I'm just stating one possible advantage to a one-man show. This means that most other distros don't have THIS advantage. Slackware also doesn't have OTHER advantages, as you stated. I don't understand why it has to be an all-or-nothing thing, but apparently you're a fan of that.


I didn't do my research? I ran Slackware 12.1 almost exclusively for three weeks and did all my work from a Slackware box. 10+ hours a day of Slackware every single day is more than enough to write a review.
The fact is, you got some stuff wrong, as I explained. Therefore, you didn't research enough of what you posted about. In a well-written article there should be few, if any mistakes. Simply using Slackware isn't enough to know everything about it. Stating that you need KDM to have a session manager is flat-out wrong. Not enough research. Get it?


All the arguments add up to either "I like Slackware" or "Slackware works for me" so everybody else has to feel the same way. Anyone who challenges the religious devotion to Slackware must be an idiot. Sorry, folks, it doesn't work that way. I stand by my review and I still believe that Slack is for the hobbyist, not for the majority of Linux users.
When did I say anything about everyone having to feel the same way? I said Slackware is not for everyone. I just don't think you've presented it in a fair light. If you don't like Slackware, that's fine. I couldn't care less. But as someone in the media, you shouldn't let your bias show. Just present the facts, what you like about Slackware, what you don't. But you seriously seem to be attacking everyone that posts any criticism of your review.


You can setup Slackware in an hour? You must not use many apps that aren't included. To get Slackware installed, configured, all apps installed and configured, took me days compared to hours in most distros. I do Linux for a living. I do know what I am doing.
If I save the SlackBuilds from a previous Slackware installation, installing it on another box isn't hard and doesn't take long. Even if I use other apps that aren't included with Slackware.


The first is that I once again have to turn to third party tools to do large scale automated server builds.
I will admit that I do not know much about large-scale automated server builds. However, isn't a SlackBuild a fairly automated process? (Feel free to criticize this, as I truly do not know what I'm talking about -- curiosity got me on this one)


In this thread some of the comments were of a different quality. I had my conclusions challenged by someone who admitted they didn't even bother to read the whole review. There has been name calling. There are specific commentors that clearly have a "my way or the highway" attitude (no, not you) that smacks of fanaticism. Anytime we reach the point where anyone who voices a differing opinion is labeled as an ignorant idiot (or other words to that effect) we are dealing with closed minded devotion that I find disturbing.
It's not your difference of opinion that makes you look like an idiot -- that's the thing you don't understand. You present your findings as if they are fact, without question. And some things you said are incorrect. That's what makes you look foolish, not your difference of opinion. If you simply did not like the distro, that's fine. However, again, you're in the media -- you should present it fairly and accurately and let others make up their minds.


I deliberately ran this by a couple of other Linux professionals I'm friendly with this morning. They couldn't see your point at all. Neither can I. I can't think of a single reason why having no dependency checking in a distro would be desirable especially considering you can turn it off in any distro package manager I've ever used. I'll stick with my strong language here even if you consider it "off base" since it's one of the major reasons I'm not comfortable recommending Slackware to much of anybody. We may just have to agree to disagree on this one.
The fact that you can turn off the other dependency-resolving package managers is nice, but if you don't need them in the first place I don't see why it is a requirement for a distro. If you want a dependency-resolving package manager, either don't use Slackware or use slapt-get or some such thing. As for not understanding why you wouldn't want dependency resolving, have you ever had an application break because another app needed a newer version of a library? It's possible, and it's difficult to account for. Once it DOES break, you have to either compile the app yourself to restore its function (destroying the purpose of the dependency resolving) or get stuck not using an app that you want. Neither is a good solution. This can be avoided in Slackware if you compile your apps yourself.


Some of the name calling here and some of the comments do strongly resemble blind devotion, hence my reaction. I do not think those comments are reflective of the Slackware community as a whole, nor do I intend to paint the Slackware community with a broad brush.
I don't have 'blind devotion' in any way. Again, if you don't like Slackware, that's fine. However, AGAIN, you presented fiction as fact -- and you're not willing to accept that. You also STRONGLY biased this article against Slackware. You sneak in a positive comment or two, followed by a paragraph of why you think it is ancient and stupid.


I will also say that you consider yourself a Linux expert, from what I can tell, and you seem to be very 'worthy'. You do Linux for a living -- you MUST know what you're talking about, and better than me too! That fact is, I hope I NEVER consider myself to be an expert in Linux, because I don't think such a thing can happen. No matter how much you know about Linux, you'll get something wrong sometimes. And that's OK. But when you refuse to admit that, that's not OK. Also, Linux != Slackware. Just because you know 'Linux' SO very well, you may know nothing about Slackware. It definitely doesn't take me days to set up Slackware, even with a fair number of third-party apps. And I DON'T 'do Linux for a living'. It's taken me longer to set up other distros (especially *buntu, but OpenSUSE as well. I don't know much about Debian, so I can't comment on that) than Slackware. I still think you're either exaggerating or just not very good at setting up Slackware.


I could say more, but I won't. I will just hope that in future reviews, of ANY distro, application or product, you will be more objective, and at least get the facts right. Spending one day reading posts at linuxquestions.org would tell you how many things you got wrong -- and also why your review isn't up to par, in my opinion. Slackware isn't, wasn't, and never will be perfect for everyone. Neither will ANY distro. However, discouraging users from even attempting it is just plain bad journalism. Slackware isn't difficult if you read documentation. If you read said documentation and learn a little, not even a lot, about Slackware, future use and installation (and upgrades) are dead-easy and take little time. I think it's easier to become proficient with Slackware than with other distros -- and I actually get MORE done because of Slackware's simplicity (like having to edit text files) than fiddling with a GUI. But to each his or her own.

First of all sorry for my poor english ..
Second thanks for link to http://www.slacky.eu .. !

I' ve tried many distros ... Slackware is the best !

You 've to read man pages and o lot of docs ... you've to understand ... you've need to know what is Linux, the kernel, SAMBA, ext3, dns, lilo, resolv.conf fdisk / man X bash and so on ..

Sometimes you need to compile a 3.5Mb driver from source, now it is simple with the 64bit 4GHz Quadcore processor ...

... if you don' t want understand e learn something please don' t try to install Slackware ...
use some other buggy not-Operating System instead !

But really install and use Slackware is easy for me!

:-)

I was objective. I was not biased. I did try to put myself in the place of ordinary users, not just write things from my own perspective. Also, after all the diatribes, I don't see at all where I got my facts wrong. I DO understand. If I don't write a shining review of how wonderful Slackware is I must be a biased idiot.

I have NEVER written a shining review about ANY distro. All have strong points and all have flaws. All my reviews are mixed. If you don't like my conclusions I am an idiot in the eyes of some. Believe me, I get it. Looking at your link to linuxquestions confirmed that I get it. More people who dismissed me as inexperienced, a tool, an idiot, a couple of which admitting that they hadn't even read the reviews. I do understand. I've challenged the cult of Slack. Jim Grant: I may have to take back part of what I said before. The Slackware community DOES have a zealotry problem to deal with. TechiMoe complained of it after writing his not entirely shining review as well.

Oh, and kdm is still the only graphical session manager in Slackware. xdm does let you login at the GUI but there is no menu for different session types. Sorry, I did get that one right.

Slackckbuilds.org is not a repository of ready to go packages. It's a collection of scripts for compilation. That's hardly a substitute. You don't seem to get that. Having to compile everything is decidedly user unfriendly. My point about the lack of a decent sized official repository is valid even if you don't agree. It certainly isn't fiction.

I still don't like Slackware much and I am not afraid to say it. I am also not afraid to say that a community that doesn't tolerate criticism is a good reason not to use a distro. I certainly have good, solid, technical reasons for not liking it much even if some in the Slackware community can't understand why.

I stand by my review.

oh, well that's so sad... bickering over a distro!

at the risk of swelling the ranks of the so called zealots i'd just like to throw in something from Pat, for me it just explains what slackware is about whether you use it at home (i do) or at work (i do that too), whether you've been using it for years (in my case since ver3.6) or whether you just started:

"Have fun!"

these are the words that Pat signs off his release notes with, and i find them kind of reassuring, it's akin to printing Don't Panic on the cover of a book.

Slackware is still live, Slackware don't need apt-get and dependency check, automated udpdates and so on ... to work perfectly !!

Slackware is not only a simple GNU/Linux distribution ...
You know, that the tune up of Slackware is done with the reading of some documentation and editing some .conf file.
In Italy everyone can get some help from http://www.slacky.eu/forum and a lot of compiled packages, enthusiastic users, can help in finding documentation or solve some troubleshots.

The being of this community is the real difference from the other GNU/Linux distribution.

La vera differenza dalle altre distribuzioni GNU/Linux é proprio l' esistenza di tale community.

... again sorry for my english !
Ciao ... :-)

"An alternate 2.4.x kernel, included in Slackware 11 and 12, has been dropped."
Slackware Linux 12.0 was the first release which support the 2.6 kernel series exclusively (2.6.21.5). So, Slackware 12 didn't include "an alternate 2.4.x kernel".

Caitlyn, first of all, I like the new format. You'll probably get a lot more traffic here than at the LinuxDevCenter portion of the site.

There's been so much talk about this review and Slackware in general at LXer.com that I'm glad to see the actual piece itself.

As always, the writing and observations are excellent.

While I agree with you that Slackware is a bit too hard to use, for me the Slackware tools like xwmconfig and netconfig are really useful. They're just about as easy as using the standard GUI tools for the same job.

Slack's ancient package management is probably it's worst feature. And as I said over at LXer, I have a hard time trusting slapt-get/Gslapt.

And you did touch on the fact that to get some basic things working in Slackware, such as HAL, you have to do a little tweaking. In Slack 12, just getting access to the CD drive for k3B meant a trip to /etc/groups (or is it /etc/group ??) to add myself to the wheel group.

And again, you're right about the KDE-centric nature of Slackware. Just like you, I did an Xfce install once and found myself with very few apps. That's addressed in Vector, Zenwalk and Wovix, but not in Slack itself.

I wish that you had tried one of the many GNOME add-on projects for Slackware so I wouldn't have to do it myself. Adding one of those packages/products/whatever-you-call-its should give you OpenOffice, Abiword and Gnumeric, a few decent non-KDE text editors, the GUI tools for networking ... basically civilizing Slack for those of us not in love with KDE ...

But as I say, by the time you do that, why not just use Debian, or even (horrors!) Ubuntu?

Even though I'm a big proponent of Debian (OpenSSL debacle notwithstanding), Ubuntu works a lot better on my Gateway laptop, so that's what I'm using.

I still don't like Slackware much and I am not afraid to say it. I am also not afraid to say that a community that doesn't tolerate criticism is a good reason not to use a distro. I certainly have good, solid, technical reasons for not liking it much even if some in the Slackware community can't understand why.
Well, I'm done. I'm still being labeled a zealot. If this review praised Slackware 100%, it wouldn't be a good review either. The community must tolerate criticism -- we get a lot of it. ;-)


If you go look at the Slackware forum at linuxquestions.org, you will find one of the most helpful communities around. Newbies are generally given a plethora of help, and there isn't much of an elitist attitude, despite what others want you to think. The only time people get bitchy is if they ask questions that are specifically addressed in CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT, which answers 90% of the newbie questions and is official documentation. Seriously -- it's one of the most helpful communities you'll find. The only better resource is the Gentoo Wiki, in my opinion.


I will say that I hate Slackware fanboy threads as much as I hate biased reviews. I tend to gloss over those threads without adding anything. Yes, some people will argue that Slackware is the greatest. I'm not one of those people. It's right for me. I still think you exaggerate or stretch the truth to make Slackware sound worse so it fits in line with your (negative) opinions, and I also think you make it sound 10 times harder than it really is. The time it takes to administer my box is basically non-existent now that everything is set up.


Having to compile everything is decidedly user unfriendly.
./appname.SlackBuild; installpkg /tmp/packagename.tgz


It's not difficult for me because of my level of experience but most people don't have your level of experience or mine.
I do Linux for a living. I do know what I am doing.
I didn't do my research? I ran Slackware 12.1 almost exclusively for three weeks and did all my work from a Slackware box. 10+ hours a day of Slackware every single day is more than enough to write a review.
I wish you luck with your future endeavors, and sincerely hope that YOUR elitist attitude mellows out before writing a review of another distro/app/product.


Good luck, and goodbye.

This "comment" form screams "Movable Type" ... and I feel for you. I run a bunch of MT blogs, and it's been a big ol' blast.

For some reason, it looks like this form is coding the linefeeds as <br> instead of <p> ... so commenters need to hit two returns instead of one to get proper spacing of the paragraphs.

Sorry, just thought I'd respond to this (trying to be helpful, not spiteful):
In Slack 12, just getting access to the CD drive for k3B meant a trip to /etc/groups (or is it /etc/group ??) to add myself to the wheel group.
In CHANGES_AND_HINTS.TXT, which is considered mandatory reading before installation, it says this:


If you have permission errors when attempting to burn a cdrom or dvd image,
such as the following:
/usr/bin/cdrecord: Operation not permitted. Cannot send SCSI cmd via ioctl
then cdrecord almost certainly needs root privileges to work correctly.
One potential solution is to make the cdrecord and cdrdao binaries suid root,
but this has possible security implications. The safest way to do that is
to make those binaries suid root, owned by a specific group, and executable
by only root and members of that group. For most people, the example below
will be sufficient (but adjust as desired depending on your specific needs):
chown root:cdrom /usr/bin/cdrecord /usr/bin/cdrdao
chmod 4750 /usr/bin/cdrecord /usr/bin/cdrdao
If you don't want all members of the 'cdrom' group to be able to execute the
two suid binaries, then create a special group (such as 'burning' which is
recommended by k3b), use it instead of 'cdrom' in the line above, and add
to it only the users you wish to have access to cdrecord and cdrdao.

Slackbuilds.org is not a repository of ready to go packages. It's a collection of scripts for compilation. That's hardly a substitute. You don't seem to get that.

No, you're quite right. It's not a substitute. However what it is, is an alternative approach to that of a package repository. And it's an alternative that some of us prefer.

Need to know what compile time options were included in the software you just installed? Or maybe even change them. With a Slackbuild it's there in the script in plain text for all to see. What options was the package from the package repository built with? You've no idea. Want to change it? Tough luck.

Need to know what patches were applied and built into the software package? Exactly the same thing.

Want to be sure that the package maintainer hasn't slipped something nasty in there? Same again.

Slackbuilds give you a level of visibility that binary package repositories do not. Now, maybe not all users will want or need this visibility, nevertheless, its there for those that do need it and have the knowledge to take advantage of it.

Personally, I think that the target audience for a distro like slackware will find slackbuilds quite user friendly. Download a script and run it. It's not exactly rocket science.

The problem I have with your review is that it is looking at Slackware through RedHat tinted glasses. You look for features that you expect to see, such as a package repository and dependency checking and then when you don't see them you declare that:
"It is not what I consider to be a good distribution in its own right."

For people who prefer the way slackware does things, and judging by its longevity there must be a good number of us, its a very good distribution in its own right. But, it's also a very different distribution to something like RedHat, and that difference won't suit everyone and