Auto Updating With One Command! One of the best features of Linux....

I must say, if you have a good internet connection, you can actually update your entire installation with all the packages that have been installed so far with just one command!!! swaret --upgrade -aThis is the first time I've upgraded my Slackware Installation (first time I've upgraded any installation for that matter ) and it was over in approximately 3 hours (with an average speed of 100kbps). I didn't have to do anything... I didn't have to shut down anything nor did I have to sit mum and stare at the screen. I could browse the net, listen to music while it was fetching the updates directly from the net. After the upgrade, it gave me a couple of dependency problems but that was only because the repository site ( ftp.swaret.org ) is down. I had to manually install 2 libraries from the net... but other than that, it installed everything on it's own and now everything is working great. One reboot was required to get amarok to work. Slackware 10.1 to Slackware 10.2 without any hassles .Of course Windows has it's own automatic updates, but these updates require reboots and also, each software updates only itself and not everything in the installation. Microsoft only gives windows updates, adobe gives only photoshop updates and so on....But with this... I got the latest gimp, the latest gaim, the latest libraries ... everything !I guess the only distro which can actually do better is maybe gentoo... but I haven't used it , so can't really say about it. I've also heard that Fedora and SuSE have their own upgrading tools (yum if I'm not mistaken). How do these compare with swaret? What do you guys use for upgrading?

cool.. gentoo takes the whole upgrade thing one step further.
Other distro's have versions... redhat 9, slackware 10, mandrake 10.2 etc etc etc.

Gentoo doesnt,
Gebntoo has a database called "portage"
Portage knows what versions of software you have installed,
Portage knows what the latest version is available.
and portage knows how to tweak software, to match your own sytem.

There is no gentoo versions, just a time since you last updated.
New versions of software are relased every day, and included in portage.
no need to wait for the next distro releace cycle.

You could say that i am running Gentoo Version "Tuesday 27th September 2005 1:30 PM"
and if i updated with portage now, i would be running Gentoo Version "Tuesday 27th September 2005 5:50 PM"

Okay, gentoo hasnt changed much in the last few hours, but you get the idea.

Every week or 2, i update portage, and get the latest bleeding edge stable software.

a typrical upgrade in gentoo is...

"emerge --sync"   ( update the database )"emerge -uv world ( update any out of date programs)

Portage, would them download any new source code it needs, configure and patch it, ompile it, and install it, all without any user intervention.

Recently, i wanted to pre-link my system, and add support for POSIX threads (lighting fast)
this requires a re-compile of many system porgrams including glibc, and gcc.

all u had to do, was add "prelink ntplonly" to my USE variables in /etc/make.conf

then run...

emerge --newuse -vD world

and portage knew exactly what packages to re-compile, which order, and all dependancy's that would also need to be re-compiled.

In my opinion, nothing comes close to Gentoo's package management (except maybe FreeBSD's PORTS)

you can do the same thing to debian based distros by telling apt-get to do:apt-get dist-upgradexboxrulz

But Portage does so much more.apt-get just downloads pre-compiled packages, probably optimised for i686.portage will download the source code, and configure / patch it according to your USE variables, and then compile it, optimising for your exact CPU.My machine is fully optimised for AMD-Athlon64.Other 64bit distro's are optimised for x86_64, which is general optimisation for 64bit cpu's by both AMD and INTEL.USE flags are amasing, for example, lets say i want to install Office tools, but i dont have a Printer.Pre-compiled binary's will have the dependancy "cups" (common UNIX printing system"whch you will need to install.Since i dont have a prnter i put "-cups" into my USE flags, and the dependancy , and printing support is removed from anything i install. Only possable becaus ei am compiling from source.By removing un-wanted functonality from programs in the mannger, dependancy lists are reduced, binary file size is reduced, and as a result, Bloat is removed, and performance increaces.Hands up, how many disstro's can enable luster computer compiling, even dureing initial installation with a single setting... adding "distcc" to a use flag for example

Now, that's amazing. I thought portage would just download everything from the repository in the source form and then compile it and that would be the completely optimised form. I didn't know it actually knew about what kind of computer you have and what things you've got installed and then implement flags to take care of that. That's simply amazing. Now, I've definitely got to try gentoo.

cool... It takes longer to install than most distro's but i think its worth it.

for example...

"emerge -pv mplayer" (meaning pretend, and verbose) shows....

localhost ~ # emerge -pv mplayer
These are the packages that I would merge, in order:

Calculating dependencies ...done!
[ebuild  R  ] media-video/mplayer-1.0_pre7-r1  (-3dfx) (-3dnow) (-3dnowext) +X +aac +aalib +alsa (-altivec) +arts -bidi -bl -cdparanoia -cpudetection -custom-cflags -debug -dga -directfb (-divx4linux) -doc -dts -dv -dvb +dvd +dvdread -edl +encode -esd -fbcon -ggi +gif -gtk -i8x0 -ipv6 -jack -joystick +jpeg -libcaca -lirc -live -lzo +mad -matroska -matrox (-mmx) (-mmxext) -mythtv -nas +nls +nvidia +opengl +oss +png -real -rtc +samba +sdl (-sse) (-sse2) (-svga) -tga -theora -truetype -v4l -v4l2 +vorbis (-win32codecs) -xanim -xinerama -xmms +xv +xvid -xvmc 7,397 kB

all those listings after the word "mplayer-1.0_ore7-r1" are use flags that effect the building of mplayer. +means that supposrt for that use flag is curently set to ON. "-" means the opposite....

(in the console they are also colour coded)

so for example, when i compiled mplayer gentoo added support for Xorg, DVD's, OGG Vorbis, and the MAD mp3 decoder.

gentoo also removed support for many things i dont want or use, for example direct frame buffer, mythTV, XMMS, Xinerame (dual monitors) duigital video broadcast, and many many other things, as you can see.

before you start installing gentoo, you look through a large list of possable use flags, and enter the ones you choose.

This is why i think gentoo is the most customisable, and optimisable distro out there (except for Linux from scratch)

actually, depending on the distro, it is usually compiled for i586 :sxboxrulz