To those who haven't heard about LFS before:
You really should also check out Gentoo which is basically the same thing but more elegant and easier. :)
Welcome to Linux From Scratch
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Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#22I’m being cynical but my experience of building from source even with automated tools is one where things going wrong and being very difficult to resolve: there’s a cyclic dependency here; this things compiles but won’t link; this thing just segfaults; you need a new version of X to build Y but Z, which is a part of X, needs an old version of Y; I know you wanted to run the latest version of X but author of Y didn’t update it to work with that new version of X so you can’t but that was the whole point of doing this thing in the first place; etc.
Nowadays I avoid building anything from source if there is a binary I can download and everytime I have to build from source I cringe in apprehension as to whether it will work or not. Too often, if something fails, I just give up.
OK, I’m not really this aiming this criticism at the LFS project. I’m really just griping about shitty this aspect of software development in general. People should be working on solutions to these problems. Or maybe this is a problem with me. I’d be interested other’s opinions.
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
Arch Linux deserves a mention here. http://www.archlinux.org/
Am I right in saying that Arch still doesn't have package signing by default? I know they've been working on adding it. Until it has that it can't really be used imo.
It has package signing. A quick Google search would have answered your question - http://linux.slashdot.org/story/12/01/17/1446248/package-sig.... Voila!
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#24LFS definitely provides an excellent learning opportunity to the beginner. However, I think, considering the clarity of the available documentation, there is little to "think". Having said that, I have always considered LFS to be a kind of personal linux. For running on servers, I think Gentoo would be the closest to LFS and having well matured tools and package management.
Gentoo is indeed a very nice option in between a bog-standard distro like Ubuntu and LFS. It's easy to customize and tinker with, but still usable on a day-to-day basis. If you want something in between Gentoo and LFS, you could consider OpenEmbedded, which is a distro builder primarily intended for specialized embedded/low-power hardware, but can easily be repurposed and extended to also build your own x86 desktop d…
I ran Archlinux for over 6 months. Gentoo is more hacking. I am back to "bog-standard" distro Ubuntu because once you have learned basics you just need a complete user experience and stop wasting time on trivial things.
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#25Hate to post a comment just to be negative, but, I seriously can't believe this has appeared on the front page of a site like HN. "Welcome to"?. LFS is so old that I would assume any self proclaimed geek/hacker would've already been aware of it. It has existed for over ten years.
I gently agree. Linux from Scratch has had several mentions on HN before though.
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#26I’m being cynical but my experience of building from source even with automated tools is one where things going wrong and being very difficult to resolve: there’s a cyclic dependency here; this things compiles but won’t link; this thing just segfaults; you need a new version of X to build Y but Z, which is a part of X, needs an old version of Y; I know you wanted to run the latest version of X but author of Y didn’t…
I've build a few LFS systems, knowing for sure I won't use it as a primary system. Nevermind : it's great for educational purpose, and I'm surely more confident in my sysadmin skills since I've did it.
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#27I’m being cynical but my experience of building from source even with automated tools is one where things going wrong and being very difficult to resolve: there’s a cyclic dependency here; this things compiles but won’t link; this thing just segfaults; you need a new version of X to build Y but Z, which is a part of X, needs an old version of Y; I know you wanted to run the latest version of X but author of Y didn’t…
I think it ha a lot to do with almost all of the software being open source. Instead of having management and organized teams we have.. binary based distributions, package management, and other tools like configuration management.
In that context we're really just solving a management problem with engineering! Machines are pretty great at following procedure and ensuring consistency after all.
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#28Hate to post a comment just to be negative, but, I seriously can't believe this has appeared on the front page of a site like HN. "Welcome to"?. LFS is so old that I would assume any self proclaimed geek/hacker would've already been aware of it. It has existed for over ten years.
> It has existed for over ten years. So? I haven't heard of it before, and I doubt if many of my friends have either. Programming landscape is very big now and everyone has a finite amount of time for exploring it. I could use your argument to whine about how so many self proclaimed geeks/hackers don't know about Lisp and keep reinventing wheels all the time.
You're one of today's lucky 10,000. :)
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#29Looks interesting if niche. Somebody should take all the documentation and create gamification experience around it. With levels and all. Maybe even as a submission to the currently running Gamification Coursera class....
I can just imagine: Level one: you managed to download all sources. All the way to "You are the master, you can now serve your own ??? (ruby on rails app?) from your own server".
Then build a community with badges and pledges and things around it. Have a side quest or two for the adventurous players.
Re: Welcome to Linux From Scratch
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Arch Linux deserves a mention here. http://www.archlinux.org/
Am I right in saying that Arch still doesn't have package signing by default? I know they've been working on adding it. Until it has that it can't really be used imo.
Yeah, that work has been completed.