Linux distros (was Re: RH9 disks on the net.)

[Thomas D. Ward]

Hi, Adam. As I mentioned in another post we are really comparing apples to
oranges, or two different approaches.
You must enjoy compiling kernels, editing files, and spending lots of time
customizing every little detail on your Linux os.
Sorry, to say but I personally as well as several others around the world
hate spending unneccessary time recompiling kernels or whatever. I would
just assume install an os, get everything working, and leave it alone.
RH/Mandrake have kernels which fit just about every and any situation which
means I've grown vary use to never compiling kernels. Why should I really
have to spend three or four hours of time doing that when I can already be
setup and enjoying my os.
Mandrake also has some edditions to their kernel source which are vary nice.
You can put the kernel in secured mode, and the supermount allows you to
automatically load floppies, cdroms, just by cd into that mount point.
It is something specific to <Mandrake, and I don't know of another distro
which has supermount.
I think many Slack users forget one slight problem. Many average computer
users would never be able to compile a kernel, and would find the task way
too complicated. I don't, but I know of people who would not make it through
make config.
Thus an all purpose kernel  works fantastically for such users. Thus
utilities like supermount simplify everyones lives when you never have to
use mount to mount and unmount drives.

----- Original Message -----
From: Adam Myrow <amyrow at midsouth.rr.com>
To: <speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
Sent: Wednesday, April 09, 2003 9:44 PM
Subject: Linux distros (was Re: RH9 disks on the net.)


> The idea of a utility confuses me.  How does it deal with floppies?  It's
> possible that what is actually happening is that it is using automount
> which is an optional feature of the kernel and was originally designed for
> NFS.  It apparently has been used with CD ROMs as well, but I've never
> played with it.
>
> That's funny that you say that the Slackware kernel doesn't have enough.
> I find it too bloated still.  It has support for RAID, PCMCIA, and other
> things I don't use.  The first thing I do when I get a fresh copy of
> Slackware installed is to build a custom kernel.  I like how Slackware
> encourages you to do it, where Redhat has a hands-off approach of
> automatically loading modules and assuming that you are leaving the kernel
> alone and will never compile one yourself.  If you compile the drivers for
> your network card straight into the kernel in Redhat, it will get upset.
> Even in Slackware, it is possible to load modules for all sorts of
> drivers, and I can get a Slackware system working fine without a kernel
> build.  However, I noticed that after building a custom kernel, I was able
> to shave several seconds off the boot time mainly by eliminating modules
> for stuff I don't use.  My approach is to build almost everything into the
> kernel, but make modules out of things I will seldom use.  For example,
> since I have Roadrunner, I build my network card's drivers in, and I keep
> PPP as a module in case I have to revert to dial-up.  I also keep support
> for the Minix filesystem and loopfs as modules since I occasionally need
> loopfs and run into a Minix disk image here and there.  About the only
> other modules are Alsa.  The result is that my kernel is under 1MB and my
> system comes up pretty fast even on this ancient computer.  To me, being
> able to tweak things to perfection is part of the beauty of Linux.  You
> can't simply remove support for hardware you don't have in windows like
> that.  BTW, the new hotplug support didn't detect anything on my computer,
> but I suspect it may do more on modern computers.  It's probably a good
> compromise between the sluggish Kudzu of Redhat and no attempt at all to
> find hardware.
>
>
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