The 2 Worst Things About Gentoo Linux [Rant]
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- Опубликовано: 25 июл 2024
- Today I talk about my problems with Gentoo and a potential failure regarding the #6MonthLinuxChallenge.
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==== Time Stamps ====
0:00 Intro
0:43 Overlays
4:12 Story Time
5:21 Masking
9:25 Not Redcore's Fault
11:08 Wrapping Up
#rant #gentoo #thelinuxcast 
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Sorry about the up and down audio, I have no idea what is going on there other than it might be the update messing with things. File complaints by following me on Mastodon: fosstodon.org/@thelinuxcast
its a pulse audio bug im pretty sure. super annoying.
I'm not totally sure it's you. I've seen a couple of other creators talk about the new YT compression 'expanding' a mono signal into a stereo one. Maybe it is a YT problem?
I realy like your general attitude toward learning new things. Willing to admit your mistakes and open to the possibility that you may be wrong.👌👌
Maybe the strange stuff makes more sense if you keep in mind that Gentoo is a meta distribution. Think about this in the way of using it to build a custom distribution for dozens or hundreds of similar servers or workstations. Prominent use case: building Chromium OS.
That’s just one way of using gentoo. It’s also great for cross building packages for other targets
@@hansdampf2284 Back in the day, I used it, that was the mission statement of the distribution and the reason why it's great for cross building packages for other targets ;)
In last 10 years haven't faced issues with masked packages. But you have to understand how portage works.
1. Keyword mask (green amd64, yellow ~amd64, red -*)
Usually unmasked by package_accept.keywords
green - stable
yellow - unstable
red - keyword mask (mostly you won't use them, unless you need some live versions from git)
2. Package mask
Usually unmasked by package.unmask
red - masked (M flag, you won't use them at all, as they're mostly broken or causing breakages)
Have you given a look at the Helix text editor? Is essentially vim with kakuane selection paradigm, could be a neat video.
FWIW if any of you get that masking issue when updating or emerging packages, use --autounmask=y --autounmask-write in your emerge (both of them in the same command) for example:
emerge -av --autounmask=y --autounmask-write x11-terms/kitty
then it will ask if you wanna add changes to config files, select YES. then run dispatch-conf (as root) and press u.
Aaaah nothing Like having a cup of coffee while listening to a nice rant 💪😁
I didn't think the overlays were too hard just takes a few extra steps to get them working. I'm currently not on Gentoo as I go back and forth between Void and Gentoo. If I remember correctly how I dealt with overlays is as follows: First run eix-remote update then run eix -R name of pkg you are looking for. In the results it will show you which overlays the pkg is in. Then run eselect repository enable name of overlay you want to enable. Then run emaint -r name of overlay to sync overlay. Then emerge the pkg as normal. There may be an easier way that I'm not aware of, but this is how I installed pkgs in overlays. I hope this helps you out. There is a lot of good information on the gentoo wiki about this as well.
Doesn't gentoo have the option to unmask future version of a package by with ">=" ?
Have you heard about --autounmask and --autounamsk-write? I wonder if that works in Redcore. I've been using gentoo for about a month and a half now, and compiling the source code feels like such a waste of time sometimes. But it will be weird going back to binaries if I ever give up on it.
Yup. Used both. Didn't work.
This is not only a noob problem, trust me. I used Gentoo for about 10 years, and more than once I hit "build dependency Hell" that was so bad I was literally forced to wipe and reinstall.
And actually it gets progressively worse the older your system is. And by that I don't mean how long since you last updated, I just mean how many years it's been installed, because the older the system, the deeper you've dug the USE flag hole.
The main selling point with Gentoo is customisability via USE flags, but that same selling point is also its downfall, because eventually you paint yourself into a corner of USE flags that become unsustainable due to upstream changes in packages, and the only way to untangle that mess is to somehow figure out all the many, many USE flag and other settings you need to undo to be able to proceed, and portage/emerge is basically no help whatsoever. So unless it's something small that you can figure out easily, a lot of the time it really is easier to just give up and reinstall, and that's extremely cringe for any Linux system ... we're supposed to be better than that.
I really don't understand why portage can't just figure this stuff out programmatically, tell you "I need to change X and Y, OK to proceed?", and just do it and shut the hell up. Whatever it does, it can't possibly be any worse than wiping and reinstalling, right?
This is why I no longer use Gentoo. It's literally unmaintainable.
Been using Gentoo since the early 2000s on a 500mhz PIII. Oddly enough I can't get into other distros.
Did like using the *BSDs, but still always find myself back with Gentoo.
Ah. I see you are a man of culture as well
It is like looking in a mirror Matt! This is where I was about 3 months in on Gentoo. But I don't remember having this much of an issue. Don't quote me, but I do think eix does work with overlays. Since eix is a tool of Portage. I do think if you wanted the challenge, moving your current setup into vanilla Gentoo.
Masked packages was the bane of my existence. I think you should ask some questions on the Gentoo forum. Great final statement. Lol
I do applaud you for this tho. I want to go back to Gentoo... But I still have to live in Void for 5 more months. I think by the time I get my Framework laptop comes in, I can install Gentoo again. Void might... just might be the Framework OS. Or Pop!OS depending on how well I like COSMIC. I just like how much I can mess around with Gentoo.
I’m sure once cosmic is released I will not take long and we will have it on gentoo as well.
The compile times of rust though…
@@hansdampf2284 As long as your niceness is set, who cares about compile times. It will just run in the background. That being said, I am using a desktop with overkill for cooling. So, laptop users will have a different exp.
You are right tho. j-14 can only go so fast. I do like that both my desktop and future laptop have 16 threads. Bench-marking shenanigans might be in store.
@@wyfyj I'm on desktop as well. But it really depends and the beefiness of the hardware you're using. I went for the binary firefox for example because leaving the update run over night every time was just to much for me.
We could always opt for the stable versions which get fewer updates, though.
great video matt
another great video
I agree. Overlays are junk and can break your world. If there is something that is masked that I want. I'll just go to the programs web page, ect. Then I'll install from the developer's source install option outside of portage. The program I did this the most was 7 kingdoms ancient adversaries (7KAA). I always had to make directories, download, read the make file, then compile.
good rant. I gave up on gentoo about 10 years ago when I realized ubuntu was just as fast. I learned a ton about linux and OS' in general along the way though. Let me offer some context to some noobs that dont understand why we have gentoo: back in the early-mid 00's, CPU's were way slower than what we have today. So if you recompiled the apps tuned to match your architecture capabilities, you could get real, noticeable speedup. Nowadays you can do it but the juice ain't worth the squeeze. I admire the Gentoo crew for keeping up on it, and thank you for the many years of learning and fun.
The worst thing about Gentoo is what once used to be the greatest thing about Gentoo: it's updates.
It used to be great, because whenever you wanted to update some piece of software, or even an entire system, it was super easy: just sync the Portage and emerge the updated version. And it was always about the choice: it was the user's decision entirely about _what_ to update and _when_ to update it.
It's the worst thing now, because if you don't update pretty much everything once in a week, your system becomes deprecated very quickly and every attempt at updating just one piece of software that you want to update brings a fuckton of dependencies, which in turn cause shitloads of conflicts that cannot be resolved automatically, and they're almost impossible to resolve by hand without breaking the system. It literally became easier to just erase your disk and start from scratch than update it piece by piece. And when you complain about it on Gentoo forums, instead of helping you, they make snarky remarks about you bringing it upon yourself by not updating often enough.
Gentoo used to be about choice. Now the only choice you're often left with, is the choice of another distro.
do u still like MLP
@@georgewbush152 I do, but not the latest generation (G5) which cannot compare to G4 as of yet.
Not a Gentoo user myself (Arch), but it seems that in the Linux world, the word 'choice' has come to mean 'complexity,' and I don't understand why this is. Why can't you have both 'choice' and (relative) simplicity? I'm sure there's something I'm not getting. I'll go RTFM.
Any alternative that keeps this choice?
With fedora 38 officially released, I'm finding it very difficult to not distro hop (may put try it on an alternate device so I stay within the rules). The main problem I'm experiencing in my challenge is that my Endeavour laptop will freeze when i have 3 or 4 webpages open. Now a ram upgrade can solve the problem, but the thing is the hardware in the Gateway laptop isn't upgradeable (seriously Gateway, whiskey tango foxtrot). Anyway Matt, great work and if you're an idiot, then I should be wearing a helmet out in public and riding a short bus to work. Great work again!
I thought really hard about Fedora. I may still end up there. Redcore is done, I failed. Sadly. I chose Archcraft for now, we'll see if it sticks.
@@TheLinuxCast Sorry to hear that, Matt.
I'm surprised Terry Daktylus didn't comment, given that you're talking about Gentoo. When you started talking about overlays I was also expecting a joke like "they're "overlay" complicated". Would've been really funny.
I think you're technical enough for Gentoo. It's just that there's a lot to learn. And sometimes, the learning is forced, when something breaks. That, indeed, is not nice. But if you're (almost) never in the mood for learning something, then, yeah, Gentoo for sure is not for you.
Unfortunately, I cannot give you tips on the masked issue, as I haven't dabbled with that. But, seems something that should be learnable. It's easier to do when you're not feeling the pressure like if your computer will boot or not.
@@seancondon5572 wow that was deep. Thanks
yep... overlay is a bit messed up compared to AUR... I wish one day gentoo will have only 1 overlay only
regarding packages masking,
most of the overlay packages needed ~amd64
so if you set your make.conf as none ~amd64
then you need to set that packages in package.accept.keywords
for example
gui-libs/ ~amd64
and if you need to unmask packages
you can add it on your package.unmask file / or folder
Yeah I tried that too, still didn't work. I followed the wiki, but nothing worked.
@@TheLinuxCast weird.. lately I have to unmask like 5 packages (qt-base, qt-wayland etc etc because gentoo masked the qt6 stuff) and was trying to install xdg-desktop-portal-hyprland. If I could see the actual message is, maybe I could help.
Not an expert with gentoo, but I slowly learn about gentoo stuff for using it like a year already
Hi Matt,
Thanks for your Video.
It's been great help for me to give up installing Gentoo. Unless until I see more friendly comments.
Anyhow, congratulations to all Colleagues happy with it!
Matt this is my mess up, I think I forgot to tell you about eix.
Which is a tool that can search repositories and even overlays.
I do use eix. That does overlays?
Interesting video, think I should try vanilla Gentoo
overlays are daed simple to use. eselect-repository is just frontend which edits file /etc/portage/repos.conf. That file is just simple ini configuration file. Add few lines to add overlay
I tried Gentoo in 00's. I hated it, constantly compiling and I had first gen Pentium super computer. Or was it first gen. Athlon super computer.. memory fades. But Gentoo was pain in the ass.
precisely why i left gentoo. its needlessly complicated. I ran it for a year, and finally got sick if wasting time hunting down these type of things and went back to Arch....BTW
It's not Gentoo making things complicated it's the nature of compiling source code from thousands of different code sources. It's the reason distros have their own specific changes for packages incorporated in when they are deployed for general consumption. Everyone fits on a scale between having a system that is pre-configured for them and wanting to have absolute freedom to control their system at every point, and Gentoo falls on that latter side of that spectrum.
Don't get me wrong, I love Gentoo. It's a fascinating distro with endless capabilities. If your personality is such that you are willing to tolerate the time that requires maintaining it, then it's the best distro you could possibly have. I moved to NixOS which has its own koibles.
I came to the similar conclusion when i was distro hopping. I had a mission though. I wanted everything that kde and debian have (esp Debian 12). I use virtual machines to load up minimal os and use it for testing purposes. I tested dwm in one. Another i tried the archinstall with success. but my perferred is debian running kde. So i don't distro hop anymore, because i found my perfect os. ;D
I started using Gentoo in 2001 and was a hard core enthusiast. Moved to Arch two years back, and haven't looked back. Gentoo is good, but it is a timesink. If you really want to learn about Linux and how to troubleshoot problems, then Gentoo is your distro. If you still want bleeding edge with much less dicking around, then go for Arch/Arch-based. Added advantage, as you listed, is no overlays to use/try some of the more obscure or newer software.
using gentoo as main system more than a year with custom patched kernel , sometimes its frustrating when packages breaks but I have learned to avoid such common stuff. I update system 2 times a month running overnight. And a package maintainer, once u learn ebuild any package u see can be installed.
I have Ryzen 8 core thats why I tried It im not as patience as other waiting for days .
Life is sometimes fun living on the bleeding edge.
Use a mac and your problems will be solved , life doesn't have to complicated.
@@soutchicken7250 and have 0 choice. if there is a group of people that don't want to use mac that's linux userbase
What problems did you have with overlays that you say it’s not easy? It’s basically adding the repo with eselect repository. Then emerge -sync to update your package index and then emerge the package.
They often are poorly maintained, that’s true. But think of overlays as a way of users to exchange their packages. On other distros you would get the source, so configure, make, make install. And this software wouldn’t be managed at all. If you delete the sources you wouldn’t have a way to uninstall it. To make a package out of this instead, gentoo users tend to write an ebuild (a build script that interacts with portage so to speak). The ebuild will often just contain the same configure, make, make install commands or similar. So it’s easy to write. But it makes it so that portage manages the software as a package. It remembers which files it installed, so it can be easily uninstalled and you can also manage different versions and updates with it.
Now, gentoo people came up with overlays as a way to share those ebuild scripts. People have their collections of ebuilds on GitHub (or anywhere else) and other people can download them and use them. So you don’t have do go there and download them manually portage has a mechanism build in to sync then automatically. (You basically add the link to a text file) what eselect repository essentially does is automating adding that link or removing it.
I search overlays using this gpo.zugaina.org/Overlays
For future reference there is an auto-unmask option in emerge
I'm aware. I used it. It didn't work. I went through everything on the wiki.
@@TheLinuxCast Did it say "Files in /etc/ need updating" after you used it?
Autounmask works only for keyword masking. (When you put ~amd64 for your package into package-accept.keywords.)
If a package is masked by a gentoo dev you would unmask it /etc/portage/package.unmask. But packages are usually masked by devs for a good reason. And unmasking them carelessly could easily mess up your system. So it’s reasonable for portage not to offer an easy way to do that.
@@hansdampf2284 yup I did that.
It's not Gentoo making things complicated it's the nature of compiling source code from thousands of different code sources. It's the reason distros have their own specific changes for packages incorporated in when they are deployed for general consumption. Everyone fits on a scale between having a system that is pre-configured for them and wanting to have absolute freedom to control their system at every point, and Gentoo falls on that latter side of that spectrum. People who go "distro hopping" are more inclined to be the former on that spectrum because generally they either don't care or don't want to know how to do X that distro Y does and then replicate that onto their current system.
yea, realizing that being a tech savy guy is not a on/off thing, but rather a kind of spectrum, and i'm at a light grey considered white to be noob and black the ultra pros, was one of the hardest pills to swallow in my adult life
Thanks for fair opinion. Yeah, masking it horrible.
8:19 i don’t know the exact error message with the masking here, but I think you problem is your mindset here. I know it can be nagging to see that there is an update for your package and it can’t be installed because it’s masked. But keep in mind that this is not a big problem. If you are on gentoo unstable (the ~ branch, as we call it) this happens all the time. It just means that the gentoo dev pushed the update for his package already because they wanted testers to be able to install that version for example but they didn’t want to push this onto users yet. Because it doesn’t fit with other package versions in the repo currently for example.
Just ignore it for a few days.
If the package is still masked for several days it’s worth investigating further and looking into that exactly is the reason for it being blocked.
Just one more thing: throw that thinking over board that you could just unblock a package and outsmart portage. When portage blocks packages against each other it always has a good reason to do so. Then you update a library and it’s Abi changes, all packages using that lib are going to break. With important libs this could easily break your system. Portage manages to update even the most important core libraries on the fly in a running system (by rebuilding all depending packages against the new lib for example). Trust me, you don’t want to mess with this process.
And btw, with -autounmask or -autounmask-write emerge will solve many masking problems for you (at least the easy ones)
My issue isn't that it was masked but it prevented all other updates from completing.
@@TheLinuxCast I can only guess here but one of the reasons why this could happen is the following:
AppA depends on libB-1.0.0, and 120 other packages depend on libB. The next versions of those 120 packages could be updated but they depend on libB-1.1.0. But appA has a blocker against anything with a bigger version number then libB-1.0.0.
And we can’t install libB-1.0.0 and libB-1.1.0 in parallel as slots because they have similar files.
In this case, just wait for the update of appA to work with the newer libB. Or throw it off your system if you don’t need it. Portage will not offer you an easy way to do “yes do as I say” with this because it would break appA.
But your red core did boot, didn’t it? I have been on gentoo for years and portage never failed me. As long as you do things from inside of portage and don’t work around and outsmart it your system will not break.
I think you've completely misunderstood masked packages, they aren't masked because they are broken, its because they aren't "stable" and when I say stable I mean stable like Ubuntu, the masked packages are generally rolling release or testing. Also the update pulling a masked packages could be a package from an overlay requiring a rolling release update of a non overlay package as a dependency thus requiring you to unmask the package
Also to unmask the package try adding the package atom into the package.accept_keywords file/directory and you should be good to go
I literally said the exact words that are in the gentoo wiki about why things are masked. So if I got it wrong...
@@TheLinuxCast Perhaps that's what it says although that's not really how it's used in practice. Anecdotally I haven't experienced any broken functionality when unmasking ~arch packages
Don’t be so quick. You don’t know his error message. There are two ways of masking packages, keyword masking is what you talk about. You unmask those in /etc/portage/package-accept-keywords.
The other way is atom masking and unmask in /etc/portage/package.unmask.
Genthree
gentoo is extremely easy because you know whats going on while unmasking or whatevr
I love the idea of Gentoo, but i honestly really hate the package management. Yes it is good, but it is not smooth. Too much time spent on flags, unmasking etc. I can't deal with it.
Also in short, Gentoo portage packages are designed not to be dependent on Masked packages (if you're talking about some bad overlay, where somebody have made, but using worst possible practices of doing it, it's a different story and not a Gentoo issue). Redcore is everything else but not a Vanilla Gentoo at all. So, maybe you're doing bad things on both, Gentoo and Redcode, and they behave just the same way.
Overlays do work but is a lot of work
I am technically minded but I don't see the point in making life more complicated than it needs to be.
Gentoo and Gentoo based distros need to offer some wow factor to make it worthwhile.
I don't know what that is at the moment so won't use it
If you don't break your Gentoo system at least once in your first year of running it. You did your self a disservice. Repairing it is a learning curve. Knowing you have to stay on top of your updates. Knowing what to do if grub doesn't boot because you forgot to configure it after a kernal update. Gentoo has a learning curve. I believe you can do it. Remember Gentoo is 100 percent Linux YOUR way. It gives you a perspective about the other distro and the hell that the other distro's devs have to go through to make everyone happy.
Gentoo should be easier than it is, I don't care what the gentoo elitist say! Because in the end, its just linux. Gentoo is a good side projected.
There is a saying among some knife collectors that the knife is never really yours until it tastes your blood (cuts you).
You're never really a Gentoo user until it has REAPED YOUR SOUL AND OBLITERATED YOUR PATIENCE.
I love Gentoo, but man I hate Gentoo.
I hope it will boot XD
Gentoo isn’t for me. I’ll stick with other Linux and BSD OSs with fewer specialized, complicated functions that either don’t exist or aren’t apparent anywhere else. I have plenty to learn in the “regular” Unix based OSs. Gentoo lovers are welcome to it. Have fun!
I have been considering BSDs. Yet I don’t know a thing about them only that they have a similar source based package manager called ports. Which was the inspiration for gentoo portage apparently.
Do all BSDs have that? Can you recommend a BSD for Someone with a gentoo background?
@@hansdampf2284 There isn’t a BSD version of Gentoo. Both FreeBSD and Openbsd have good port trees. However, there are both subtle and dramatic differences between any of the BSDs and any Linux distribution. If you wish to continue to use Linux based software, then FreeBSD may work for you with its linuxulator. Be prepared for a learning curve and a different way of thinking.
If you still want to dive in, then either use a virtual machine or, better yet, an older desktop. Play around with it and watch some RUclips videos. I would recommend looking into some of Robonuggies and Gary H Techs videos. I don’t know you. However, most Linux users wouldn’t like to use any of the BSDs as a daily driver. There are exceptions. Good luck.
@@donaldmickunas8552 actually there is a subproject for running Gentoo on a bsd kernel, but getting it installed can be quite a challenge... at which point, why not just run FreeBSD? 😅
@@omfgbunder2008 I wasn’t aware of that. Thanks! I am currently running FreeBSD as my daily driver. I’m also running Void Linux on another PC as a backup/experimental system.
skill issue (my wife left me)
Hi there, I've been using Gentoo for 20 years now and wanted to give you a hand with some things...
I can understand your confusion about overlays, but you have to keep in mind that they are user controlled. Gentoo has no control over them or what goes in them, except for ones they do control (like the dotnet overlay).
I believe the arch AUR is somewhere in the middle, more akin to the Gentoo proxy maintainership. (Continued...)
Regarding package masks, there can be a few reasons a package can be masked.
Usually they are masked because they are labelled as unstable, or straight out incompatible.
There are times a package is masked because your configuration needs to be changed, like a missing use flag. I'll admit this wording can be confusing.
Ideally this type of change should be done before installing other packages, but there are times where it has to be done to install upgrades, and it can get tedious. You can avoid this for the most part if you don't play with use flags, stick to stable packages, and use the use flags provided by profiles.
I've never tried redcore personally, but it sounds interesting... one of these days I'll probably give it a try.
Although I do have to wonder how much of all of this gets abstracted away by using their package manager.
I've tried porthole before, but because Gentoo has so many packages (like many distros), it's kindof like wading through a sea of checkboxes... editing /etc/portage files is pretty easy in comparison as long as you can keep track of what packages need use flag changes (and remove them when you no longer use said packages)
If you ever want to give Gentoo another try and want to chat, send me a message or something, I'm always glad to help where I can.
Gentoo and Gentoo based, no thanks.
If you don't understand something, is that a bad thing? You see, Gentoo is not for former Windows users. Gentoo is supposed to read manuals. In Unix, you read the manuals. Google what "RTFM" means.
Good attitude, but I am getting tired to listen that Gentoo is bad, or whatever. Gentoo is user friendly if you really know how Linux works. If you use other distro which support the user as windows etc.. and in that way you do not learn how a file system work, how to configure ad build your systems than gentoo is not good for you cause you are not a linux user afterall. Slackware, Pentoo, Kali Linux, Fentoo those are distros for Linux users.
Gentoo is a waste of time. Just use arch or alpine.
You’re crazy. Arch is very different to gentoo. Arch is binary based, so when you install arch you essentially get a very unstable normal distribution with less default apps. Gentoo is source based, so you get better performance than a regular distro, and the install is more customizable than arch’s.
Not sure about your specific issue, but there is a section on unmasking packages in the Gentoo wiki. Essentially you create a file in /etc/portage/package.unmask/ that references the file you want to unmask. The wiki gives the example if, for instance, you wanted to unmask xorg, you would run: echo "=x11-base/xorg-server-1.11.99.2" > /etc/portage/package.unmask/xorg-server.
Although, you are right. Gentoo isn't for everybody. I would never recommend it to anyone, unless they were already expressing interest in it. It can seem very onerous to normal users, but for those who like to tinker and control their system it is simply amazing.
Yeah I followed the wiki. Tried both ways of unmasking.
redcore might not even use those files and directories. funtoo doesnt...well the funtoo documents warn not to touch them....not even make.conf. it really depends on how far redcore is from vanilla gentoo.