Partitions

[deadly7]

So, I might be getting a laptop with 320gb hard drive space.

Unfortunately, it comes preloaded with Vista. Therefore, I'm going to scrap the entire drive and just install XP and Slackware (). I'm wondering how I should partition the drive so that I can have a Windows NTFS partition, a Slackware ext-3 partition, and a swap partition for both to share documents/music/movies.

Thanks all!

[Sidoh]

fuck slackware.  seriously... what's the god damned point?!

a 'swap' partition is a partition that Linux uses to 'swap' memory to.  It's kind of like pagefile.sys in Windows.

A shared partition is easy, but it's probably easier to just have the Windows partition serve that function too, since Linux can do fine with reading/writing NTFS.

[iago]

Depending on where you get it from, you might have a hard time finding XP drivers -- my parents laptops are forever distorted because none of the new video cards have XP drivers.

[Chavo]

Are you sure you aren't thinking of an older version of Windows? In my recent experience, XP has had better driver support than any other OS, especially from major chip manufacturers such as Intel, NVIDIA, and AMD/ATI.

[iago]

No, I'm quite sure it's Windows XP.

I've talked to a lot of other people who noticed the same thing, too -- many manufacturers aren't writing drivers for XP anymore.

[deadly7]

fuck slackware.  seriously... what's the god damned point?!

a 'swap' partition is a partition that Linux uses to 'swap' memory to.  It's kind of like pagefile.sys in Windows.

A shared partition is easy, but it's probably easier to just have the Windows partition serve that function too, since Linux can do fine with reading/writing NTFS.

For the purposes of the laptop, Slackware more than meets my needs. And I've noticed on my friend's laptop that running *nix gets better battery life out of his computer as opposed to XP.
So I'd have Windows partition a segment during install that would serve as C:\ for Windows. Once Windows is installed I would partition part of the unpartitioned drive and just have it NTFS? And then I'd install Linux on the remaining partition?

I haven't installed Linux in a while, but that's how it goes right? Or does Slackware require 2 partitions?

Depending on where you get it from, you might have a hard time finding XP drivers -- my parents laptops are forever distorted because none of the new video cards have XP drivers.

Well my entire chipset is Intel, and I think HP has drivers online, but this is all stuff I must research. I realllly don't want to be stuck with Vista.

[iago]

Depending on where you get it from, you might have a hard time finding XP drivers -- my parents laptops are forever distorted because none of the new video cards have XP drivers.

Well my entire chipset is Intel, and I think HP has drivers online, but this is all stuff I must research. I realllly don't want to be stuck with Vista.

Install Linux (which has drivers for everything), then install VMWare (which runs nicely on Linux), then install Windows XP (which has drivers for VMWare). Problem solved!

(Kidding, of course )

[Sidoh]

For the purposes of the laptop, Slackware more than meets my needs. And I've noticed on my friend's laptop that running *nix gets better battery life out of his computer as opposed to XP.
So I'd have Windows partition a segment during install that would serve as C:\ for Windows. Once Windows is installed I would partition part of the unpartitioned drive and just have it NTFS? And then I'd install Linux on the remaining partition?

I haven't installed Linux in a while, but that's how it goes right? Or does Slackware require 2 partitions?

I was suggesting you use a distribution other than slackware, especially for a laptop.  I'd recommend Fedora, Ubuntu, Debian, etc.  One of the ones that has an officially maintained package repository.  It makes updates so much easier, and installing new software is about as easy as it can be (usually).  I'd steer clear of Slackware for a laptop... it's just way more trouble than it's worth for something like that. (imo).

Linux generally likes to have a swap partition, but it's a trivial amount of space if you're going to be using a 320GB hard drive.  I think the swap partition on my desktop is only 5GB or something like that.  It's generally easier to install Windows first, since you'll want to have grub (or something) on your MBR, and Windows overwrites the MBR every time it's installed.  I'd give Windows most of the space (say 290 GB).  You won't need much space for Linux if you're going to be putting files on the Winders partition.

Then, after you've installed Linux, you can just mount the Windows partition and use that as the 'shared' partition.

Also, I've liked Windows 7.  It's worth checking out, anyway.

[deadly7]

I was suggesting you use a distribution other than slackware, especially for a laptop.  I'd recommend Fedora, Ubuntu, Debian, etc.  One of the ones that has an officially maintained package repository.  It makes updates so much easier, and installing new software is about as easy as it can be (usually).  I'd steer clear of Slackware for a laptop... it's just way more trouble than it's worth for something like that. (imo).

Ah. The reason I'm picking Slack is because I'm the most familiar with it out of all of the Linux distros, so it would be easier for me to troubleshoot if something went wrong. I don't plan to update the distro every time a major update is released, unless it fixes something super important. It's not worth the time, regardless of distro.

Linux generally likes to have a swap partition, but it's a trivial amount of space if you're going to be using a 320GB hard drive.  I think the swap partition on my desktop is only 5GB or something like that.  It's generally easier to install Windows first, since you'll want to have grub (or something) on your MBR, and Windows overwrites the MBR every time it's installed.  I'd give Windows most of the space (say 290 GB).  You won't need much space for Linux if you're going to be putting files on the Winders partition.

Then, after you've installed Linux, you can just mount the Windows partition and use that as the 'shared' partition.

Also, I've liked Windows 7.  It's worth checking out, anyway.

I'm just thinking in terms of "if I fuck Linux/Windows up", but wouldn't it be 'safer' to have a separate partition for my important documents and things? I'll be attempting to do regular backups of all of my data, but just in case I get a virus on Windows or drastically fuck up a command in Linux (I have been known to rm /* by accident...) then I don't lose everything?

[deadly7]

Well, chillin' on Vista right now. Vista makes doing some things a huge pain in the ass, and the fact that this has preinstalled software makes it another pain in the ass, but overall I'm digging the laptop experience. SPent a while getting a lot of my old settings from my desktop onto here.. and next will be to transfer music.

Might not end up installing XP but I'll buy it for sure, since student price is $10.

[dark_drake]

Hrmm... what other software do you get really cheap on your campus?

[deadly7]

Hrmm... what other software do you get really cheap on your campus?

Free matlab, mathematica, etc. for IT students. Office 03/07 cheap rates. I could look them up exactly but I don't intend to buy much :p

[Sidoh]

Ah. The reason I'm picking Slack is because I'm the most familiar with it out of all of the Linux distros, so it would be easier for me to troubleshoot if something went wrong. I don't plan to update the distro every time a major update is released, unless it fixes something super important. It's not worth the time, regardless of distro.

It's doubtful, lol.  In most cases, troubleshooting well-supported distros is going to be easier regardless of previous experience of Slackware.

I'm just thinking in terms of "if I fuck Linux/Windows up", but wouldn't it be 'safer' to have a separate partition for my important documents and things? I'll be attempting to do regular backups of all of my data, but just in case I get a virus on Windows or drastically fuck up a command in Linux (I have been known to rm /* by accident...) then I don't lose everything?

Separating it would prevent that, but it also makes some things slightly more inconvenient.

[iago]

Ah. The reason I'm picking Slack is because I'm the most familiar with it out of all of the Linux distros, so it would be easier for me to troubleshoot if something went wrong. I don't plan to update the distro every time a major update is released, unless it fixes something super important. It's not worth the time, regardless of distro.

It's doubtful, lol.  In most cases, troubleshooting well-supported distros is going to be easier regardless of previous experience of Slackware.

Slackware is well supported, and has better library support than any distro I've tried.

As long as you don't mind compiling from source, you'll likely have little trouble with Slackware.

[Sidoh]

As long as you don't mind compiling from source

This is a rather significant caveat.

Compiling X...
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCK I NEED Y

Compiling Y
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCK I NEED Z...

etc... with something like Ubuntu, it's

sudo apt-get install X

FUCKING DONE!

Not that I always find this significantly more convenient than installing from source, but quite often, it is.

This is just one thing, though.  If there's a specific issue, it's uncommon to not turn up a few results on the internet with people having the same problem (and subsequently solving it).  This is true of Slackware too, but it happens less frequently, in my experience.

I definitely prefer something like Ubuntu or Fedora to Slackware for desktop.

[iago]

As long as you don't mind compiling from source

This is a rather significant caveat.

Compiling X...
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCK I NEED Y

Compiling Y
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCK I NEED Z...

etc... with something like Ubuntu, it's

sudo apt-get install X

FUCKING DONE!

Not that I always find this significantly more convenient than installing from source, but quite often, it is.

This is just one thing, though.  If there's a specific issue, it's uncommon to not turn up a few results on the internet with people having the same problem (and subsequently solving it).  This is true of Slackware too, but it happens less frequently, in my experience.

I definitely prefer something like Ubuntu or Fedora to Slackware for desktop.

I rarely get your issue on Slackware. When I'm on Redhat or Ubuntu or any other package-based distro, I run into dependency problems all the time. When I compile on Slackware, it's rare.

The times when I DO run into it (like Pidgin), it's pretty straight forward to install the dependencies.

[Chavo]

I'm reasonably sure that Debian/Ubuntu and Fedora (and possibly OpenSUSE) have comparably (even better) comprehensive packages available.  If dependency chain issues are your biggest problem with Slackware, try Arch.  pacman is amazing and the only package manager I have liked better than apt.  I don't have anything against Slackware, but it's not exactly a bleeding edge or super-stable distro.  It's hard to advocate middle-of-the-road

[Sidoh]

As long as you don't mind compiling from source

This is a rather significant caveat.

Compiling X...
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCK I NEED Y

Compiling Y
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCK I NEED Z...

etc... with something like Ubuntu, it's

sudo apt-get install X

FUCKING DONE!

Not that I always find this significantly more convenient than installing from source, but quite often, it is.

This is just one thing, though.  If there's a specific issue, it's uncommon to not turn up a few results on the internet with people having the same problem (and subsequently solving it).  This is true of Slackware too, but it happens less frequently, in my experience.

I definitely prefer something like Ubuntu or Fedora to Slackware for desktop.

I rarely get your issue on Slackware. When I'm on Redhat or Ubuntu or any other package-based distro, I run into dependency problems all the time. When I compile on Slackware, it's rare.

The times when I DO run into it (like Pidgin), it's pretty straight forward to install the dependencies.

The type of dependency issues I'm referring to are solved automatically by the package manager...

[iago]

Assuming the program (and version) you want has been packaged by the team. And also assuming you don't need any special patches to the source, and that you have no intention of ever modifying the source.

I've been in a case (fairly recently) that I ran into all of the above -- the Ubuntu package manager didn't have a program I needed, and I had to write a patch anyways (to remove some protection I didn't want -- I needed the ability to send illegal character sequences).

Another example -- I help out with a project (Nmap). Therefore, I need a) the bleeding edge svn and b) to modify/recompile the code frequently. That was excessively difficult on RHEL and Ubuntu -- neither compiled the code without resolving a bunch of dependencies manually.

But yeah, a package manager is good at what it's good at. But it falls short for my needs.

[Sidoh]

But yeah, a package manager is good at what it's good at. But it falls short for my needs.

You do dirty things to your computer that deadly wouldn't dream of.

you whore.

[iago]

But yeah, a package manager is good at what it's good at. But it falls short for my needs.

You do dirty things to your computer that deadly wouldn't dream of.

you whore.

Are you calling deadly a n00b?

[Sidoh]

But yeah, a package manager is good at what it's good at. But it falls short for my needs.

You do dirty things to your computer that deadly wouldn't dream of.

you whore.

Are you calling deadly a n00b?

no, i'm calling you a whore. : )

[Joe]

Assuming the program (and version) you want has been packaged by the team. And also assuming you don't need any special patches to the source, and that you have no intention of ever modifying the source.

I've been in a case (fairly recently) that I ran into all of the above -- the Ubuntu package manager didn't have a program I needed, and I had to write a patch anyways (to remove some protection I didn't want -- I needed the ability to send illegal character sequences).

Another example -- I help out with a project (Nmap). Therefore, I need a) the bleeding edge svn and b) to modify/recompile the code frequently. That was excessively difficult on RHEL and Ubuntu -- neither compiled the code without resolving a bunch of dependencies manually.

But yeah, a package manager is good at what it's good at. But it falls short for my needs.

Ubuntu's software repositories contain about 30GB (compressed) of stuff, all with it's dependencies met in the repositories. It comes standard with the "main" and "security" repositories enabled. Main is set in stone when a release comes out (every 6 months) and "security" can override "main" for when things need to be fixed. That's your core, stable system.

From there, you can enable "backports" if you run an older core system but want newer software than what came with "main". Also, you can enable "restricted", "universe", and "multiverse" for packages of varying non-free-ness. Main and security are 100% free software.

[iago]

Assuming the program (and version) you want has been packaged by the team. And also assuming you don't need any special patches to the source, and that you have no intention of ever modifying the source.

I've been in a case (fairly recently) that I ran into all of the above -- the Ubuntu package manager didn't have a program I needed, and I had to write a patch anyways (to remove some protection I didn't want -- I needed the ability to send illegal character sequences).

Another example -- I help out with a project (Nmap). Therefore, I need a) the bleeding edge svn and b) to modify/recompile the code frequently. That was excessively difficult on RHEL and Ubuntu -- neither compiled the code without resolving a bunch of dependencies manually.

But yeah, a package manager is good at what it's good at. But it falls short for my needs.

Ubuntu's software repositories contain about 30GB (compressed) of stuff, all with it's dependencies met in the repositories. It comes standard with the "main" and "security" repositories enabled. Main is set in stone when a release comes out (every 6 months) and "security" can override "main" for when things need to be fixed. That's your core, stable system.

From there, you can enable "backports" if you run an older core system but want newer software than what came with "main". Also, you can enable "restricted", "universe", and "multiverse" for packages of varying non-free-ness. Main and security are 100% free software.

Ok... so?

[deadly7]

Vista question:
Anybody know of any good [preferrably free] firewall programs? I'll be on an open network a lot and don't want to risk my computer. Firewall is more important than antivirus, just if it makes a difference.

[iago]

If you're just concerned about people connecting to you, Vista's firewall will do fine.

If you want to do stuff from untrusted networks, I recommend the following:
a) Use SSH to connect to a system that's more trusted, and create a tunnel (-D with console ssh, PuTTy has an option somewhere)
b) Set your browser to proxy everything through localhost (FoxyProxy helps with that, letting you quickly switch proxies)

For example, on Linux, I do the following:
$ ssh -D8080 www.myhomecomputer.com

Then, in Firefox, I set my proxy to localhost:8080.

Effectively, all traffic is tunnelled over the ssh session and encrypted till it comes out at www.myhomecomputer.com.

You can redirect your instant messengers, browser, email, and everything through the tunnel.

Whenever I'm on an untrusted network (Hotel, mall, Starbucks, anywhere in the USA) I do that.

[deadly7]

I have no system like that to which I could connect.. And yes, this is for doing any sort of activity on an unsecure network. I'll be on a public non-encrypted connection most of the time I'm on my laptop.

[iago]

I can give you an account on the box I use for IM and such, if you want to be paranoid like that. It's the box I proxy through.

(Disclaimer: as long as you don't waste a ton of bandwidth on videos and stuff )

[deadly7]

I can give you an account on the box I use for IM and such, if you want to be paranoid like that. It's the box I proxy through.

(Disclaimer: as long as you don't waste a ton of bandwidth on videos and stuff )

Will you be on AIM later tonight? We can figure it out then until I find a more local solution.

[iago]

I can give you an account on the box I use for IM and such, if you want to be paranoid like that. It's the box I proxy through.

(Disclaimer: as long as you don't waste a ton of bandwidth on videos and stuff )

Will you be on AIM later tonight? We can figure it out then until I find a more local solution.

I should be on.

[Hitmen]

try not to download too much child pron through iago's computer

[iago]

This is why I don't give Hitmen access -- this is always the first thing he thinks of!

[Camel]

Gentoo's package manager (portage) is designed for compiling programs from their source code. In the rare cases that apps that take forever to compile (firefox), or that are not open-source (sun-jdk), there are binaries available.

It allows you to configure GCC to compile such that the produced machine code is optimized for your processor, instead of relying on generic x86 optimizations, and restricted instruction sets. Admittedly, the difference is not great, but it's also not insignificant when you compile everything from the kernel down (including the compiler!).

The system has USE flags, which allow you to opt in or out of certain features at compile-time. For example, enabling the MySQL USE flag compiles MySQL support in to programs that have the flag configured in their ebuild.