Mike: amen. i’m continually greeted with skepticism (on a good day) when i tell folks about my experiences with Gentoo.

Danno: have to beg to differ re: the languages question. it’s infinitely harder to write your own programming language than it is to build a Gentoo stage 1 install. re: the black box question, i think they’ll always break. if they’ve built one that doesn’t, i haven’t seen it yet.

Erik: fair point, but i’m not talking about someone new to Linux. those users, i point at Ubuntu or something similar. but for users that want to learn Linux, i think Gentoo’s an excellent stop.

Florin: don’t know Lunar Linux myself, but appreciate the pointer. how’s their community?

Morten: it really is pretty rewarding. when you’ve built it yourself, it’s ideal because you really do know how everything is wired together.

Ashton: exactly right. the point here is not to diss Ubuntu, SuSE, or Fedora – but rather to say that for a particular type of user, one that really wants to learn the operating system, Gentoo’s a good choice. Ubuntu et al are excellent choices for users that want everything to just work.

François: definitely agree. i wouldn’t want to present my friends or family with the challenge of administering a Gentoo box. but for learning Linux, it’s a great distro.

But, on topic. Gentoo is great, for those willing to put up with it’s quirks. Getting into Gentoo, or LFS is basically jumping off the deep end, as far as computers go. There are only three reasons to do it.

1. Those that are very picky about their systems (I’m here)
2. Those that want to learn (I’m still here)
3. Those that need a very specialized system

That, as a high school student who has used Windows his whole life, actually having proper and total control over the system is refreshing.

Don’t get me wrong, I like Ubuntu because it tends to “Just work.” But sometimes I feel encumbered by the Kernel that’s designed to accomodate a wide range of hardware profiles, and an overall design that’s pushed more towards medium to lower end users. I don’t feel it’s built to give me the control I want, so I don’t use it. But I feel that it is a great choice for those that don’t want to go nuts over their system.

My recommendation: start with Ubuntu. It provides an easy-to-use desktop system, but you can experiment with more advanced stuff if you want to. It also has the best community hands-down. Thrusting a linux newb onto something as complex as Gentoo is a mistake, you’re only going to lose potential users recommending this path.

But it’s not practical, or particularly fun, to put all that learning up front.

And, of course, an even better way to learn about Linux than to use Gentoo would be to make your own distro.

I think the real problem is that the black boxes you’re relying on are shitty in their construction. If they were good black boxes, they would never break, they would never do anything except what they’re supposed to do, and unless you were interested in building a black box of your own for another purpose, you’d have no desire to learn how they work.

I was RHCE level when I first started with Gentoo way back when – must admit I felt like I had barely used Linux before the first time I did a Stage 1. The insights you get from installing and managing Gentoo actually builds lifelong institutional knowledge – and that’s why the community is so spectacular.

I saw Donnie’s post this morning and sent it around to a few others who don’t see why Gentoo is so cool… eventually I’ll get them.