How to be a Successful Gentoo User

Posted on 18 Mar 08 at 00:04 | Tagged as , ,

image by James Gordon

This week I want to write a series of blog posts on “How to be a Successful Gentoo User.” I regularly spend time in #gentoo, our IRC support channel, as well as on the forums. Having been a Gentoo user myself for over 5 years now, maintaining a public overlay for the last few years and now recently having become a dev, I have always tried to help other users, but have seen certain types of issues coming back again and again.

The first thing you should ask yourself as a (potential) new user, is if Gentoo is right for you. It has a notoriously steep learning curve. And no, that is not a myth. First of all, you should not be afraid of the commandline. If you want something that “just works out of the box” without you having to go edit some textfiles to configure things, then Gentoo is not for you. If you like your operating system to make most choices for you, then Gentoo is not for you. If you don’t want to read manuals, then Gentoo is not for you.

But if you are a power-user, a tweaker, a bit of a geek, who loves to dive “under the bonnet” to see how things work and what can be fine-tuned, to make the system run the way you want, then Gentoo is for you! Gentoo gives you the power, hands you tools to control your system with fine-grained configuration options. With Gentoo you are the wizard! Are you up to the task?

I promise you, if that is what you are looking for, then Gentoo is very rewarding. You will need to put in some effort, read manuals, use your brain, analyse problems and be pro-active in looking for answers. But with those efforts and the tools Gentoo offers you, you can be the proud owner of a fine-tuned system. You can be a successful Gentoo user.

Of course, nothing in this universe is perfect, and both hardware and software can behave in sometimes unexpected ways. You will from time to time meet frustrating problems, that’s the nature of the beast. Then it is good to remind yourself of the saying “no pain, no gain.” And realize how happy you will be when you have mastered the tools and overcome the problems. So, do you want to be a successful Gentoo user?

Tomorrow: know your distro. Subscribe to this blog, or come back for more!

7 comments

  1. S.Goturanov on 18 Mar 08 at 05:44:

    Thank you for the good article. I have never been writing to blogs or forums (just read them :)) but your article inspired me, and i wanted to tell you THANK YOU! I think that every word in it is a true. I am not a good linux user but i am looking forward to become :). Gentoo is the only linux ditribution that i know and use and your article help me to realize why i am using it. Thank you again !
    Have a nice day.

  2. hrongyorgy on 18 Mar 08 at 05:53:

    I started using Gentoo 3-4 years ago. I managing a overlay too.
    I think, Gentoo gives a more choices than some other distro. But, the choice itself has a very-very good support in Gentoo, in other distros I didn’t find easier methods than eselect or SLOT-ting. One power of Gentoo is a choices, I think.

  3. Ben on 18 Mar 08 at 23:03:

    Thanks for your kind words, S. Goturanov! It’s always good to hear from readers that appreciate my work.

    hrongyorgy: you’re right, Gentoo does offer more choice than many other distros. Of course the downside is that people can feel overwhelmed.

  4. tangram on 19 Mar 08 at 09:14:

    Very nice article. Hope to see more like it. Keep up the good work. ;)

  5. Ben on 19 Mar 08 at 12:45:

    Thanks, tangram! I certainly mean to keep it up. :-)

  6. keymonkey-mousegrabber on 19 Mar 08 at 18:42:

    >> “use your brain”.

    excellent :-)

  7. Vince Dodge on 13 May 08 at 21:41:

    I’ve been using Linux since RedHat was 7.1, but I’ve been addicted to Gentoo for about 4 years. One reason is just as you said in your article, I am a tweeker. I like looking under the hood, I like reading the manual, I like choices, and I like to know how things work. However, the biggest reason I’m hooked on gentoo is that unlike my experience with other distributions, no matter what I’ve wanted to do with Linux, I’ve been able to find a way to do it with Gentoo.

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