Apr 03, 2004

Trying OneBase Linux

By Timothy R Butler | Posted at 8:35 PM

I've been meaning to try a source-based Linux distribution for some time. For those of you who aren't sure what that is, it's a distribution where you build all of the software from the source (and thus it is all optimized for your hardware). Josiah is a big fan of Gentoo, which is one such distribution.

My problem with Gentoo and other previous source based distributions is that they leave all of the configuration work for you to do yourself. I never have that much time. I'll admit it — I like my operating system to do most of the work for me. I'll tweak things when and if I have time, thank-you very much. Thus, up until today, I never even bothered trying a source-based distribution.

Then I started reading about OneBase Linux. OneBase is a source-based distribution that autodetects most of your hardware for you. It allows you to choose between source and binary packages at any time. This sounds pretty nice, I think. So, I fired up my test box (the Shuttle XPC I mentioned last fall) and gave it a freshly burned OneBase 2004-R2 CD. I booted the system up just about three and a half hours ago. The initial installation and compilation process took about two and a half hours. A few minutes ago I told it to start the next set of compilations (insanely simple to do — I want GNOME, so I typed olm -s gnome, and it does the rest).

At any rate, I'm anxiously awaiting the finish of these compiling tasks to see how usable this system turns out to be.

Tags: Comp/Tech
Article Path: Home: Computers and Technology: Trying OneBase Linux

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3 comments posted so far.

RE: Trying OneBase Linux

Eek.

I gave up on linux for a personal box. Love it for webhosting and other server applications. Just not into it for personal use, though. I guess I’m not really a geek. I don’t want to know what’s going on inside the magic box. I just want to plug it in and have it work.

Posted by kevin - Apr 04, 2004 | 5:49 PM- Location: Milwaukie, OR

RE: Trying OneBase Linux

I’m running Gentoo at home now in addition to all my Gentoo boxes at work and my wife is quite happy with it. She doesn’t have an option really, but has become quite good with it. She was already using OpenOffice.org.

I’m interested to hear what you think of OneBase. I haven’t heard of it before. It seems similar to Gentoo with the addition of hardware detection. The LiveCD does that though. Zynot is another project that is still being worked on in this area. It’s being geared for more corporate use, but not released yet.

Posted by Josiah Ritchie - Apr 04, 2004 | 9:22 PM- Location:

RE: Trying OneBase Linux

Kevin: Well, I’m not usually much for all this work. Fedora is pretty easy to setup, which is what I like. These kinds of distros I just run on a test box to see what happens.

Josiah: Yeah, Zynot sounds interesting. I’ll let you know what OneBase goes. So far I’ve had mixed results.

Posted by Timothy R. Butler - Apr 07, 2004 | 11:44 PM- Location: St. Peters, MO

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