Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

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Themis
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Joined: 27. Feb 2016, 22:17
Location: France

Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by Themis »

Thank you very much!
Right now I’ve installed it on a VM, just to get used to it before the “real” installation (one with MATE, one with Openbox), and it seems to be pretty clean. I’ll just have to figure out whether I can easily install the bunch of software I use on a daily basis or not, such as SublimeText (yeah, not open source, I know, but not bad software) or Quassel.

Anyway, that’s going to be a good experience!
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mimosa
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Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by mimosa »

Code: Select all

mimosa[~]$ spi quassel
Available packages:
quassel [Not installed]: quassel (A cross platform IRC client)

Available SlackBuilds:
None
mimosa[~]$ spi sublime_text
Available packages:
None

Available SlackBuilds:
sublime_text [Not installed]: sublime_text (A sophisticated text editor)
mimosa[~]$
:D
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Themis
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Joined: 27. Feb 2016, 22:17
Location: France

Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by Themis »

Awww, I definitely have to learn how to use the CLI properly. :D So it seems that almost everything I need is already there. Well, thank you, mimosa! This will definitely be my new laptop OS.
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Papasot
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Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by Papasot »

Themis wrote: I’ve seen that Salix OS doesn’t use systemd. Is that right? I’ve heard some things about it, so I’d like to thy something that doesn’t use it, just to see. But that’s not mandatory for me.
Some of us (me included) migrated to Salix just because of that, Themis. I actually found Salix while looking for a distribution that doesn't use systemd - not even optionally. I stayed because Salix is more than that. it's rock-solid and very convenient, plus it doesn't devour your computer's resources (as Ubuntu does). I recently installed Salix on an old computer for a friend. He had Ubuntu installed, and it was literally unusable, because it was extremely slow due to limited system resources. That very computer now runs Salix very well.

You mentioned that Ubuntu is "easy to use without needing tweaking" etc. It is a myth that other distributions aren't "easy to use". In fact, installing, maintaining, and using Salix is a piece of cake. It basically goes like this: you install it, and you forget it is there, because it works flawlessly. I can't think of anything more convenient than that.
As for programming tools, I found everything I wanted (and more) in Salix repositories. I do all my programming (which includes development in C/C++ and Fortran 2008, with or without OpenGL contexts) on Salix. Since Salix is not a rolling distro, it includes GCC 5.3.0 by default - which is actually what most stable distributions use. You probably won't need anything else. If you happen to need a more recent version of the GCC compiler, you can do as I did and either install a second GCC suite (it's pretty easy), or use Slackel, which is the "brother distro", and includes latest versions of compilers.

In any case, give Salix a try, preferably on a real spare partition. Install all your personal applications/work and see how it goes. You will probably end up deleting your "main" Ubuntu partition. I was using Debian some years ago, and once I tried Salix for a few days, I knew there is no return.
A pleasant detail in this forum: several people pick a picture of their pet as their avatar. Who am I to do otherwise? ;-)
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Themis
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Location: France

Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by Themis »

Papasot wrote:
Themis wrote: I’ve seen that Salix OS doesn’t use systemd. Is that right? I’ve heard some things about it, so I’d like to thy something that doesn’t use it, just to see. But that’s not mandatory for me.
Some of us (me included) migrated to Salix just because of that, Themis. I actually found Salix while looking for a distribution that doesn't use systemd - not even optionally. I stayed because Salix is more than that. it's rock-solid and very convenient, plus it doesn't devour your computer's resources (as Ubuntu does). I recently installed Salix on an old computer for a friend. He had Ubuntu installed, and it was literally unusable, because it was extremely slow due to limited system resources. That very computer now runs Salix very well.
I understand. Well, to be honest, right now, I see no difference between a distro that uses systemd and a distro that doesn’t. Like I said in a previous message, I’m not really a Linux noob since I’m not afraid of CLI, etc., but I definitely don’t master Linux (even a little bit) at the moment, so the road is still pretty long. As a matter of fact, I could just put aside this systemd thing, but I’ve read some stories about it, and I don’t like what I’ve learned. So getting a new computer was the perfect time to try something else.
Papasot wrote:You mentioned that Ubuntu is "easy to use without needing tweaking" etc. It is a myth that other distributions aren't "easy to use". In fact, installing, maintaining, and using Salix is a piece of cake. It basically goes like this: you install it, and you forget it is there, because it works flawlessly. I can't think of anything more convenient than that.
I don’t know. What is true is that since it has become very popular, with a big and active community, and since it’s based on Debian (sometimes useful since there are .deb archives available here and there, just like for non-open source software), it has become kind of user-friendly. It’s also the Linux distro that has seen me introduced to the Linux world back in 2005, and I’ve always had a main workstation and a new time to handle installation and all, so that may explain why I’ve finally been stuck on Ubuntu for so long. But it’s pretty heavy now, drains resources… As for the “ease of use”, well, I’ve read that some distro are more easy to use than others. Friends have told me that Arch Linux, for example, is difficult to handle for beginner/intermediate users.
Papasot wrote:As for programming tools, I found everything I wanted (and more) in Salix repositories. I do all my programming (which includes development in C/C++ and Fortran 2008, with or without OpenGL contexts) on Salix. Since Salix is not a rolling distro, it includes GCC 5.3.0 by default - which is actually what most stable distributions use. You probably won't need anything else. If you happen to need a more recent version of the GCC compiler, you can do as I did and either install a second GCC suite (it's pretty easy), or use Slackel, which is the "brother distro", and includes latest versions of compilers.
I’ve seen that Python3 is available in the repositories (is it still the appropriate word, in the Slack universe?), so that’s good, and I’ll have to figure out if Android Studio is easy to get (need it for some upcoming projects and school assignments), but if something is missing, that would also be a good start for me to learn how to install from sources and create packages for Salix (when the time has come :) ).
Papasot wrote:In any case, give Salix a try, preferably on a real spare partition. Install all your personal applications/work and see how it goes. You will probably end up deleting your "main" Ubuntu partition. I was using Debian some years ago, and once I tried Salix for a few days, I knew there is no return.
I’ll make you happy: Salix will probably have its very own SSD pretty soon (this week-end, if I have time), since I’m about to choose it as my laptop distro. :) For now I’m just giving it a try in a VM, but it will have its real partition. The only thing I couldn’t figure out was how mimosa has found Sublime Text in the repos. I personnaly got that:

Code: Select all

$spi quassel
Available packages:
quassel [Not installed]: quassel (A cross platform IRC client)

Available SclakBuids packages:
 [Installed]:

$spi sublime_text
Available packages:
None

Available SclakBuids packages:
 [Installed]:
I mean I’ve installed the 14.2 (XFCE, 64 bits), updated almost everything (I guess), and I can’t get the same result. Also is the “SclakBuids” a typo? This is what I get in my Terminal, but I’m fr_FR, so I don’t know what to think about it (I thought it should be “SlackBuilds” or something like that, but I’m probably wrong).

Anyway, I mentioned this because we’ve talked about it in this thread, but for technical questions I’ll open specific threads, I think it would be better. :)
djemos
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Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by djemos »

Edit /etc/slapt-get/slapt-srcrc and make it to look like this.

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djemos[~]$ cat /etc/slapt-get/slapt-srcrc
BUILDDIR=/usr/src/slapt-src
PKGEXT=txz
SOURCE=http://download.salixos.org/slkbuild/14.2/
SOURCE=http://download.salixos.org/sbo/14.2/
SOURCE=https://slackbuilds.org/slackbuilds/14.2/
then

Code: Select all

 sudo slapt-src -u

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djemos[~]$ sudo slapt-src --search quassel
quassel:0.12.4 - quassel (A modern, cross-platform, distributed IRC client)

Code: Select all

djemos[~]$ sudo slapt-src --search sublime_text
sublime_text:3.1.26 - sublime_text (A sophisticated text editor)
sublime_text:3.1.26 - sublime_text (A sophisticated text editor)
To build from source and install both

Code: Select all

sudo slapt-src -i quassel

Code: Select all

sudo slapt-src -i sublime_text
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gapan
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Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by gapan »

djemos wrote:Edit /etc/slapt-get/slapt-srcrc and make it to look like this.

Code: Select all

djemos[~]$ cat /etc/slapt-get/slapt-srcrc
BUILDDIR=/usr/src/slapt-src
PKGEXT=txz
SOURCE=http://download.salixos.org/slkbuild/14.2/
SOURCE=http://download.salixos.org/sbo/14.2/
SOURCE=https://slackbuilds.org/slackbuilds/14.2/
No. Definitely do not do that. You should not add the slackbuilds.org source, unless you really know what you're doing.

You just need to update the package/slackbuild cache. You've never done it before, that's why you get no results.

Code: Select all

sudo spi -u
You could also use gslapt and sourcery if you want a GUI. You should really take a look at the Startup Guide, linked from the main page.
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Themis
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Re: Newbie willing to discover the Slackware universe

Post by Themis »

Thank you, gapan. I’ve started to read the guide. It’s just a little bit confusing since I realized I’ve really been locked in the Ubuntu universe for a long time. It’s like I was rediscovering the Linux world.
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