Know your distro: Gentoo documentation sources
19 Mar 08 at 01:22 | 
documentation, gentoo, google
image by worak
Of course the first step to being a successful Gentoo user should be to get to know the distro you’re using. This may seem self-evident, but the opposite human tendencies of curiosity and laziness may battle over this. You may dive into the handbook just enough to get the operating system installed and running, without grasping the finer points of Gentoo system administration. To really know how it works, and to get the most out of it, you should familiarize yourself with the various sources of documentation.
The Handbook really is the best start. It contains all the information you need for a normal installation. But apart from that, it also introduces you to the workings of portage, the package manager. That is important knowledge for system administration and daily usage. Furthermore, it has a “comprehensive guide to Networking in Gentoo.” What cannot be stressed enough, is that you really should get to know what is probably the single most powerful and defining feature of Gentoo: USE flags. Not grasping the concept of useflags, is like rowing a boat with a teaspoon.
Apart from the Handbook, there is a lot more documentation on the Gentoo website. You should take the time to go through that list, so that you have at least an idea of what is to be found there. It contains a wealth of information, so use that to your benefit! For example, for desktop users it has a guide on X configuration, nVidia and ATi guides, howtos for the most common desktop environments, the KDE Split Ebuilds howto (another important Gentoo feature), as well as guides for sound configuration, localization and using unicode. There are also introductions to vi and zsh, guides for databases, kernel configuration, security, and so on.
Do not forget you also have a lot of documentation right there on your system! Man pages are an important source of information, as is the documentation (in plain text or HTML form) installed by many packages in /usr/share/doc/. There are even manpages for configuration files, such as make.conf!
The forums are also a source of knowledge, as many problems have already been discussed there. Also, there is a “Documentation, Tips & Tricks” subforum, where users share their insights. And most subforums have stickies with important information on often recurring problems.
More user-generated documentation and tips can be found on the unofficial Gentoo Wiki. There is a lot of useful information on there, but you have to realize some of it is outdated. You could help by flagging such problems and possibly editing articles to bring them up to speed with the current realities. Sharing what you’ve learned is the life-blood of the free software movement.
Then there is also the friend of every online person: Google. Knowing how to use search engines is a very important skill, and one that you should continue to refine, as the wealth of information (as well as rubbish) online is growing explosively. Familiarize yourself with Google’s features and smart ways to refine your searches. I could probably devote a whole series on this topic alone. And indeed, books have been written on this. In this day and age, no education can be considered complete without learning how to find useful information. (Can you tell I’ve been a teacher?)
With these tools at hand, you should be well on your way now to become a successful Gentoo user. Please tell me if you’ve found this useful or if you have anything to add that is missing here.
Tomorrow we will continue on the subject of “Know Your Distro,” looking into some of the features and inner workings of Gentoo Linux. So come back for more, or subscribe if you haven’t already done so!
Dirk Gently on 19 Mar 08 at 03:02:
Well done. Definitely the type of article I’l like to see on the front page of the Gentoo website.
energyman on 19 Mar 08 at 09:24:
you are missing the mailing lists, which are even better than the forums. More signal, less noise ;)
Ben on 19 Mar 08 at 12:46:
Dirk, thanks for your compliments!
energyman: you’re absolutely right. Good tip!
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