Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

theregister.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 128 posts

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#91

Post by pjmlp »

akoster wrote: post #64
0xbs0d wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had the same book and Slackware 2.0 was also my first distro. I think the book is still in some box at my parent's house. I remember trying to figure out how to compile the kernel for everything in my desktop.

That must have been painfully slow but rewarding if and when everything finally worked! I definitely was spoiled trying Fedora Core 6 on a Pentium III with 512MB of RAM, a SoundBlaster Live!, an ATI Rage 128 graphics card, a WD Caviar 40GB IDE HDD, 2x IDE optical drives (a SONY DVD-ROM drive and a SAMSUNG CD-RW drive) and a 3Com Ethernet PCI card without any major (if any) hiccups! (The machine had a 3Com 56k PCI mod…

Spoiled indeed.

The computer I used Slackware 2.0 on, was a Pentium 90 with 32MB RAM, 512MB HDD, Trident with a 1024x768 max, IDE CD-CDROM and Sound Blaster. Alongside a 14" monitor.

Getting Linux and BSD stuff had to be via Walnut Creek CD-ROMs, as going to the university computer lab and splitting across multiple floppies didn't scale.

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#92

Post by sillywalk »

Corrado wrote: post #31

My first Linux distro was Slackware. I tried downloading it but my modem was too slow and people in the house kept picking up the phone. So, I supported OSS by purchasing a copy from, I want to say, Walnut Creek sometime around 1995. I still had the 7 disks 10 years ago or so. They are probably still around here somewhere. I learned so much from Slackware and basically owe my livelihood to it. Everything from compili…

I remember X11 modelines were not that fun.

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#93

Post by sillywalk »

pjmlp wrote: post #8

My first Linux distribution was Slackware 2.0, bundled with Linux Unleashed book in 1995's Summer. I had to copy all the floppy images from the CD-ROM into the hard disk and then boot the installation from floppy, as my IDE CD-ROM still wasn't supported by the Linux kernel 1.0.9, and my Trident card was downgraded to 800x600, as X couldn't do 1024x768 with it. Happy birthday Slackware. EDIT: kernel version.

I also think I had that book, or another one that was 4 inches or so thick..

X11 MODELINES, ipfwadm, BNC network cards, and PPP, tcl/tk shell scripting..

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#95

Post by darthrupert »

My first Linux experience was downloading Slackware installation images from a BBS, writing them to floppy disks and then jumping into the unknown.

I believe I destroyed a lot of important data that day (what is "a backup"?), but other than that, good times. :-|

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#96

Post by pkulak »

jmclnx wrote: post #3

Congratulations on the 30th I am posting this from Slackware 15.0 right now, my main driver, but I do boot a BSD once in a while. If not for Slackware, I would have left Linux for a BSD years ago. I hope Slackware can avoid all what I believe are crazy changes occurring in Linux Land. Already Slackware was forced to import PAM, but in good Slackware fashion PAM stays out of my way, so not a big deal.

What do you like about Slackware? Is it super bare bones? Have they resisted Systemd? If that’s it, why not something like Void? Are “packages” really just tarballs that you extract into /? I have so many questions! Haha

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#97

Post by herewulf »

Corrado wrote: post #31

My first Linux distro was Slackware. I tried downloading it but my modem was too slow and people in the house kept picking up the phone. So, I supported OSS by purchasing a copy from, I want to say, Walnut Creek sometime around 1995. I still had the 7 disks 10 years ago or so. They are probably still around here somewhere. I learned so much from Slackware and basically owe my livelihood to it. Everything from compili…

Very good point about owing your livelihood. Same here. I learned a ton from installing Slackware 8.1 in the early '00s (from printing out the manual no less -- something I would be aghast to do today). I should probably cut Patrick Volkerding a check!

Anyway, happy birthday, Slackware!

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#98

Post by Corrado »

sillywalk wrote: post #92
Corrado wrote: post #31

My first Linux distro was Slackware. I tried downloading it but my modem was too slow and people in the house kept picking up the phone. So, I supported OSS by purchasing a copy from, I want to say, Walnut Creek sometime around 1995. I still had the 7 disks 10 years ago or so. They are probably still around here somewhere. I learned so much from Slackware and basically owe my livelihood to it. Everything from compili…

I remember X11 modelines were not that fun.

OMG! I think I still have nightmares about X11 modelines! I spent so much time changing one thing and restarting X. Definitely not one of my favorite things about my Slackware experience.

Re: Slackware Linux distribution turns 30 years old

#100

Post by richardjam73 »

lelanthran wrote: post #62
akoster wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can only imagine in that era there was quite a bit more learning forced upon you than these days with our plethora of (somewhat) standards-compliant hardware and in-tree drivers. Though I'm definitely going to be channeling some of those experiences as I got a kernel-panic during the first boot after installing Slackware 15.0 on a newly built AMD B550 chipset / AMD Ryzen 5700G -based PC. I'm thinking its likely som…

> I can only imagine in that era there was quite a bit more learning forced upon you than these days with our plethora of (somewhat) standards-compliant hardware and in-tree drivers. It's romanticized a lot, but boy was it painful! hear my story and weep. In 1995 I got slackware with a textbook from the university library. I had a brand-new 486 paid for by a dad with 2 other kids in college and nothing more than a fa…

I also used Slackware in the same period and remember having to edit the code of the Kernel to get the CD-ROM to use the correct IRQ/IO to get it to work. This was CD-ROM that used the sound card (Creative Labs) not IDE.
Post reply on HN