Gentoo gets GUI installer!

drasnordrasnor Starship OperatorHawthorne, CA Icrontian
edited April 2006 in Science & Tech
As of release 2006.0, Gentoo Linux includes a graphical installer on its x86 LiveCD. Historically Gentoo has been one of the more challenging distributions to install due to its command-line nature. The installer is fairly intuitive and includes network configuration, disk partitioning, kernel configuration, make.conf and USE flags configuration, and more. Check out the screenshots here and get the latest release here.

-drasnor :fold:

Comments

  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    Wow, pretty cool. Looks like it gives you the flexibility of the CLI install without all the muss & fuss. I'm sure Linux purists will still cry foul. :)

    No x86-64 LiveCD though. :(
  • drasnordrasnor Starship Operator Hawthorne, CA Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    Nah, the proper arch for that is AMD64. Look again :)

    -drasnor :fold:
    foul
  • macdude425macdude425 Mr. Roger's Neighborhood
    edited March 2006
    Wow, gotta try that. Impressive. Most impressive.

    (If Gentoo, one of the more difficult distros, can have a GUI installer, then why can't Ubuntu, one of the easiest?)
  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    drasnor wrote:
    Nah, the proper arch for that is AMD64. Look again :)

    -drasnor :fold:
    foul

    Found AMD64 install on the live CD, but for some reason, it doesn't recognize my NIC while the regular AMD64 installer does without any problems.
  • drasnordrasnor Starship Operator Hawthorne, CA Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    What's your NIC? I've had to modprobe the correct modules on a few of my systems.

    -drasnor :fold:
  • CycloniteCyclonite Tampa, Florida Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    This is cool. I liked Gentoo, but found it rather time consuming and difficult to install. I may give it another shot some time soon.
  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    drasnor wrote:
    What's your NIC? I've had to modprobe the correct modules on a few of my systems.

    -drasnor :fold:

    I'm using a Marvell Yukon Gb NIC, although I suppose I could easily switch to the nVidia (RealTek?) NIC. I don't even have a Gb switch, so it's pointless, it's just that I happened to have plugged my cable into that connection when setting up the computer. :)
  • drasnordrasnor Starship Operator Hawthorne, CA Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    I just helped out a Debian user that was having trouble with his Marvell Yukon a couple weeks ago. I believe the module he needed was sklin though sk98lin may also work. Modprobe each and see which one loads. After that, run the net-setup script to configure.

    My nVidia NIC uses the forcedeth driver. Not sure what the RealTek driver is.

    -drasnor :fold:
  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    Thanks for the tip. I suppose I should also check to see what module the standard install loads up for the Marvell.
  • skrykingskryking
    edited March 2006
    The gui installer is pretty cool... but I always encourage users to give the non gui by hand install a try if they get some free time... I think it helps with understanding how the OS is layed out.

    Skryking
  • GHoosdumGHoosdum Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    Thanks for posting this, dras. I have been interested in Gentoo for a while, and now I think I might pull the trigger on it.
  • JengoJengo Pasco, WA | USA
    edited March 2006
    macdude425 wrote:
    Wow, gotta try that. Impressive. Most impressive.

    (If Gentoo, one of the more difficult distros, can have a GUI installer, then why can't Ubuntu, one of the easiest?)

    ubuntu is easy to install! just doesnt have fancy pics and stuff, you just have to know a small bit about hardware to install it.
  • EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
    edited April 2006
    Kwitko wrote:
    Wow, pretty cool. Looks like it gives you the flexibility of the CLI install without all the muss & fuss. I'm sure Linux purists will still cry foul. :)

    No x86-64 LiveCD though. :(

    Yup. The whole point in Gentoo is that it's powerful but very complicated. If you can't install the OS the hard way then you're not going to be able to use the OS and should use an easier distro until you know enough about Linux to be able to install Gentoo.

    On the other hand the GUI seems quite broken anyway, due to the nature of a GUI hack over a console it fails and doesn't tell you why, or gives you a vague entry and it becomes unable to continue, which couldn't happen from the command line.

    So yeah, if you can't install it, you don't want to use it as you'll be up a certain creek without a paddle.
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