[Bendug] Playing with Crux Linux

[Tim Howe]

So I decided to play around with Crux Linux.  For those who haven't heard of it,
it's not for beginners.  It's a lot like Linux from Scratch I think.  I chose to
install it on my laptop because it has a ports tree for installing apps from
source with a few easy commands (very BSDish), and it was simplistic enough that
it leaves a lot for the user to do, so I would get up to speed with Linux again
- I haven't run a Linux distro in about 7 years.

The install was suprisingly easy.  Boot the CD, play with fdisk, create file
systems, mnt them, chroot to your newly created file system, run an install
program to install base system components and libraries, compile a kernel, set
up fstab and lilo.  For anyone familiar with doing these things with other
unix-like systems, it shouldn't offer much challenge.  There is a simple
step-by-step doc on the website to walk you through it.  If you have never
compiled your own kernel, and don't have some intimate knowledge of your
hardware, this distro isn't for you.

Once installed, system configuration is in easy to use flat files that are just
scripts with command line arguments in them mostly.  If you can configure a
system from the command line, you can get Crux ready to go pretty quick.  I
really liked the no-nonsense, no-frills configuration philosophy.

The ports tree was almost too simple...  There isn't any dependancy checking, so
if another port exists that the one you want depends on, you will need to go
over there and build it first.  I call it "Ports Tree Junior".  You will also
need to remember to run ldconfig between builds for dependancies and apps.  If
you don't you may discover some things don't quite work completely.  I ran into
this problem when I compiled Sylpheed with GPG support.  When I launched
Sylpheed it complained of a incorrectly installed PGP.  I had to uninstall
gpgme, uninstall gnupg, and build them all in order again running ldconfig
between each one.  Then Sylpheed was happy.

I mostly have a happy laptop at this time.  I haven't played with my wireless
card or modem yet, but everything I have played with has worked pretty well.

FYI, my laptop is a Panasonic Tough book, with a 366Mhz Pent II.  Model cf-47.

--TimH