Slackware Anyone????

[blackhawk714]

Does anyone here use slackware and know a fairly good amount about it? I'm thinking about trying the software, so if anyone has any suggestions please feel free to post. Thanks :D LaTeR

PS : Will it run on a 300 mhz k6 96 mb ram? Thanks :)

[nameless_v2]

slackware is so sexy....i have been running it since 7.1, and it is damn good stuff. I am planning on trying the new slack 9 pretty soon.

My webserver is running slackware 8.1, and it is only a 166mhz with 64mb of ram, and it has been running for the last 6 months straight. (kde runs like.......win xp)

But yeah, if you have any specific questions......fire away.

[blackhawk714]

Thanks a bunch man, plz check back here soon! Thanks again:D

[o0zi]

From what I remember, Slackware's printer support wasn't so good, but in all other respects it's great.

[GhostDawg]

I recently installed Slack 9.0 and it went very well on my AMD 1700 XP system. I don't have a printer so I can't speak on that, but everything else went great!

[mr orion77]

i had slackware for a bit but didnt stay, mainly because of the package management scared me off. how do some of you slackers deal with it? do most packages install broken without notice??

it seemed ok, but i just never got into it.

[motub]

Yes, I had a similar problem to mr orion77 after installing College Linux 2.3 (which is really a great distro, even though it's still a work-in-progress).

The whole package management really confused me, plus as mr orion77 mentioned, it doesn't handle dependencies, and I couldn't find any documentation on the 'Net to help me. So even though I really liked the distro (and even though Dropline Gnome is the most gorgeous DE I've seen yet), I had to give it up.

But if anyone does know a good set of docs to help me get a handle on Slack, I'd love to give it another try.

[ricstr]

Slackware is my favorite linux distro.
I dont use the package managment i usualy install from source insead.

Slackware will run fine on your machine but KDE or GNOME might not run so fast.

[isamoor]

I can't speak about older versions, but printing is a cinch in 9.0. You do need to go ahead and install in the optional cups package from the oficial slackware ftp's. I think checkinstall is in that group too, and I always love having that too.

Once you install cups, you might have to change a setting in your startup scripts to use it instead of the default, or it might be set up to load cups if it's there. Once cups is going, it has it's own web based setup interface. You just point your browser to http://127.0.0.1:631/ and choose your printer and away you go.

If you have an exotic printer, you might need to go grab a driver from somewhere, but the cups package already supported my printer.


Slackware isn't entirely easy though, just to warn you. You do have to do a lot of configuration by hand. There is good help around, and it is worth it in my opinion. Once you get Slack going, it's hard to give up. And it's not like it's as difficult as gentoo or anything.

And lack of dependency checking kinda stinks, but if you just install everything to begin with you won't hit much of that. And I agree that you should generally install from source. Slack is very good for installing from source.

Best of luck!

Isamoor

[hyp_spec]

I use slackware right now and i have to say that it is the best distro I have ever used. I will say though that slack 8.1 and olders printer support is very lousy, but slackware 9's hotpluggin made my printer install very easy. Just install cups and go to localhost:631 and you're set.

I prefer package management in slackware than RPMs because with RPMs there usually a normal package and a -devel package which is a real pain. http://linuxpackages.net is a GREAT repository for packages. Just download an app install it and if doesnt work, just go there and search. You should find everything there!

There are somet things in slack that a newbie wouldnt know, but if you've used RH or MDK for a long time then you shouldn't have too much trouble with slackware. Try if you want, but once you get Dropline GNOME installed...you shouldn't have to EVER go back!

Oh btw, there is swaret -> similar to apt-get that is supposed to download dependecies too... but compiling from source is always better...

[janet loves bill]

Originally posted by mr orion77
do most packages install broken without notice??



HUH? I had no probs with slackware 9, 8.1, 8.0
you must have done something wrong!!

[serz]

I'm having some probs with Slack 9. What type of installs do you guys make? I did the menu install.

[hyp_spec]

i just did the normal install select the groups of pkgs u want and go. I only install selected groups though -->

a
ap
d
k
l
y

i choose not to install X/KDE/GNOME/EMACS or documentation. THen i use Droplines installer to get gnome/x :-D

[JeffBarge]

I'm currently using 8.1....tried 9.0, but...I don't know...it just didn't feel right....I really like 8.1....and printing's never really been a problem for me....I just use lprng with apsfilter, no sweat...

[Lemming]

I had an absolute nightmare trying to get my Audigy 2 to work in slack. Just a word of warning...

[hyp_spec]

I love slack8.1. But i found that slack9 ran MUCH MUCH faster on my 533MHz celeron...so i switched...;

[YingYang]

My webserver is running slackware 8.1, and it is only a 166mhz with 64mb of ram, and it has been running for the last 6 months straight. (kde runs like.......win xp)

If you can get kde running like WinXp on a 166mhz please tell me how you did it. I'm using Slack9 on an AMD K6-450 + 128Meg Ram and it don't run to good, for example in the menus if you move the mouse pointer to fast through the menu the highlight bar trail behind it (quite far behind). I recompiled my Kernel for the AMD K6 and i think it made a slight improvement, not much tho'.

Anyway i'm now using WindowMaker and i love it...not much point and click going on there, i mostly use command line.

Getting to the question tho', i've learned alot from using Slack, basically because i had to, as pointed out in previous posts, alot has to be done by hand. On the subject of package management, i don't know how to do anything else but to use source...i've been doing that from the start. Once you get the hang of it it's quite easy.

Good luck, you won't go far wrong with Slackware.

YY

[hyp_spec]

he's probably using kde 3.0.1, which runs better than XP on my system, but as soon as i load up kde 3.1.x its slow as hell...

[z0mbix]

Slack's OK...Debian's much better. Make the switch ;)

[hyp_spec]

eh, i think i'll stay with slack, i've tried installing debian 3 times and each time i get some apt-get error about libpam_modules... Slackware IS better and WAS first so :-P

[saturn-vk]

slackware is printer friendly out of the box. just run /usr/share/apsfilter/SETUP, no cups. no anything. It's a very simple dialog and it has tons of printers supported. And I still have figure out how to make cups see the printer port.

[hyp_spec]

usb or parallel? if its usb you have to
modprobe uhci
modprobe hid
modprobe printer

that should work, but you might have to mount a usb filesystem, i dont quite remember. Last time i used cups, installed cups first then gimp-print over that and it worked...

[hkctr]

Painless way to try Slackware 8.1 is to install College Linux or Vector SOHO. Both are Slackware based with a few configuration apps that will help the uninitiated. Play and learn with these for a while and you will be able to make the jump to 9.0 in no time.

[Gaxus]

What z0mbix said. :cool:

I used to be a slacker (well, still am... :D ) but got tired of having to compile a ton of stuff and do most of it that way... not to mention dependancy hell.

Switched to Debian a while back, and now those problems are gone (using unstable). While SLACK IMO has a cleaner install, you can do the same with Deb, just takes a while longer.

However, if you have say a 56k and just want a basic, clean, functioning system -- i.e. don't want to be bleeding edge or want to update 100 times a day, and don't require a lot of 'alternative' software -- slack is the way to go. By far one of the best distros out there.