Re: linux

["Robert G. Brown" <bob@xxxxxxx>]

>hey, what version of linux do you all use? ....
Many people in this group use one of the versions of Redhat; there are some
versions of Slackware and Debian out there; at least two people have SUSE
in addition to other distributions.

>i started with slackware and that's pretty much all i've used, but i've 
>heard redhat is alot better in some ways.
Some people beleive Red Hat is packaged in a superior way, and that it's 
easier to install. In general, distributions differ primarily by how they 
are packaged and installed, and more recently, by what basic run-time 
libraries are required.  This second difference is largely viewed as a 
problem which needs fixing, and Linux distributors are moving towards consen-
sus on this issue.

>what exactly are the differences between redhat and slackware, 
RH and SL use different packaging and install procedures. Slackware (last
time I looked) gives you a fairly wide choice of kernels, from which you
pick one that fits your system best. Redhat is packaged with a much smaller
number of kernels, but compiled with more features, so it's bigger. I don't
know what libraries Slackare uses, RH 4.2 uses libc, 5.x may still, or
they've moved on to glibc. If the libraries are different, an executable
compiled under RH may not run in Slackware, and vice-versa. That's why this
is viewed as a big problem.

Red Hat appears to come with a broader selection of software; 4.2 and 5.0
ship as 2 CDROMS, 5.1 ships as 3. SUSE ships as FOUR, with a full install
taking up to 9 Gb!

>i'm thinking of downloading redhat 5.1 tonight....
Well, it's going to be a long night; you're looking at downloading something
over 1 Gb if you want EVERYTHING, maybe more like around 220-300 if you
want what RH calls a "standard install".

Now if you come to a meeting and hand a couple of blank CDROMs (or money in 
lieu of plastic) someone, that someone will make you a copy, which will be
brought to the next meeting. In fact, this person downloads all the updates
from the RH site and includes them, so not only do you get RH Linux, but you
get allthe known bug fixes as of the date your CDROM was made.

>can redhat be installed from a fat32 partition like slackware can with a
>certain bootdisk?
No, RHS decided not to support this, although RH Linux does support reading
and writing of all FAT partitions. You must run RH Linux from an ext2 par-
tition.