Get Slack (Tux Deluxe) [LWN.net]

Richard Hillesley traces the history of the Slackware distribution in a Tux Deluxe article. "At the time that Slackware first emerged as the logical replacement for the Software Landing Systems (SLS) Linux distribution, the satirical Church of the Subgenius, with its slogan get slack, was still a popular source of humour on the college campuses of the US. Slackware can be taken as a a tongue-in-cheek reference to the Church of the Subgenius, and its charismatic leader, JR Bob Dobbs, The Master of Slack, and as an assertion that Slackware was part of the zeitgeist of the youth of America."

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Get Slack (Tux Deluxe)

Posted May 3, 2007 17:05 UTC (Thu) by pr1268 (guest, #24648) [Link] (2 responses)

This article is lightweight; but I do agree whole-heartedly with Mr. Hillesley's arguments defending Slackware as an outstanding (and underrated, IMO) Linux distribution:

Slackware is stable. Very. Stable. Unusually stable.
Slackware is the most non-bloated distro I've ever used (which includes RH7/8/9, SuSE 8.2,9.0,9.1,9.2 (pre-Novell), Mandrake, and FC2/3/4).^[1]
Partly due to this lack of bloat, Slackware runs fast on relatively old hardware. It totally flies on contemporary hardware.
Slackware isn't as outdated as some may believe; Slackware-Current (as of April 20) has Kernel 2.6.18.8, GCC 4.1.2, Glibc 2.5, and Xorg 7.2. In a strange twist of irony, I cannot run Intel's ICC because the Glibc version on my Slackware computers is too new!
Slackware starts with a stripped-down collection of packages and then lets the user add on whatever he/she wants. Unlike the R______/F__C___/S___ distros - where they pile on KitchenSink-2.3.7.9-i386-4.rpm [and 999 others] and then scream bloody murder at you for stirring up a hornet's nest of dependency issues when you try to remove it (just my experiences). ;-)
The myth that Slackware doesn't have package $A or software $B is just that - a myth. A lot of pre-compiled binary and source packages custom-built for Slackware are available online (I hit linuxpackages.net often but I'm not trying to plug their page here).

Thanks to our editor for including this article.

^[1] My experience running Ubuntu lasted all of 30 minutes because it botched Grub on my SATA-drive system (choosing to install Grub MBR on one of twin IDE disks RAID'ed together). No thank you!

Get Slack (Tux Deluxe)

Posted May 5, 2007 15:52 UTC (Sat) by xma (guest, #44981) [Link] (1 responses)

I agree with you.

Though I would not recommend using linuxpackage.net packages since quality
is really random. All packages I have downloaded from there at best won't
work, at worst will break something.

I prefer to browse small community website such as
http://www.slackbuilds.net (plus we can directly download and submit our
own slackbuild scripts).

Slackbuilds.net

Posted May 5, 2007 22:29 UTC (Sat) by pr1268 (guest, #24648) [Link]

Thanks for the recommendation!

The only trouble I've had with Slackware packages from Linuxpackages.net is when I tried installing a package built for Slackware 10.0 or earlier whilst running 10.2 or 11.0 (or -current). But, now the only package I usually get from Linuxpackages.net is the OpenOffice stuff.

In retrospect, I believe my original post above sounds too much like a fanboy rant. Sorry! ;-)