Re: [rock-user] Installation report drock 2.0.1 rev. 2585 (incoming)

Hi Rene,

yes, there are some well-working older boxes around, that make pretty good
fax and mail and file servers and office desktops.

That brings me to another question/idea. Old boxes aren't well suited for
source-based operating systems. Compiling from sources takes quite a long
time even on modern systems, it's therefore not really an option on a K6-200
class PC. On the other hand, these systems have to be kept up-to-date,
nevertheless; at least, there must be patches and/or updates for security
issues. But for these older machines binary packages would be the preferred
way to keep them up-to-date.

So: Do you have plans to provide pre-built binary install packages for ROCK
as an alternative to source packages?

I think of a scenario like this: I use ROCK to create a system that is
optimised for some old box in my mom's cellar. With only the software
packages I want and need for the particular purpose I intend to re-activate
the machine for. I build this individual distribution, burn it on CD and
install it the next time I'm home.
But how can the system be kept secure after that? It's old hardware, and
internet is 56kbps. It isn't really fun to download and recompile everything
under such circumstances.
You get the idea?

BTW: I finished a 2.1.0-DEV bootdisk build yesterday. Build host: Slackware
10RC1. Only few problems with that rev:

Log file: 5-xfsprogs.err
<snip>
checking for msgfmt... no

FATAL ERROR: msgfmt does not seem to be installed.
xfsprogs cannot be built without a working gettext installation.
</snip>


Output on stdout:

<snip>
-> `- Extracting eject.tar.bz2 ...
!> `- Not found in $package_map: ethtool
!>     ... fix target/bootdisk/build.sh
-> `- Extracting findutils.tar.bz2 ...
</snip>

<snip>
-> `- Extracting tcpdump.tar.bz2 ...
!> `- Not found in $package_map: uml_utilities
!>     ... fix target/bootdisk/build.sh
-> `- Extracting util-linux.tar.bz2 ...
</snip>

<snip>
Creating initrd data:
-> Create linuxrc binary.
./scripts/Build-Target: line 8: diet: command not found
./scripts/Build-Target: line 9: diet: command not found
./scripts/Build-Target: line 10: diet: command not found
./scripts/Build-Target: line 14: diet: command not found
/home/alex/ROCK/trunk/build/bootdisk-2.1.0-DEV-x86-bootdisk/ROCK/logs/*.log:
No such file or directory
</snip>

Maybe that's because Slack has no mkinitrd, but I don't know.

Regards

   Alex



> Hi,
> 
> On: Wed, 26 May 2004 11:06:17 +0200 (CEST),
>     Rene Rebe <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> > I'm used to pentium-mmx since the old dRock days. But you are right I
> > might update the optimization setting used for my official desktop
> > ISOs.
> 
> I just found out why I considered optimizing for Pentium-Pro back in
> those days when I choose this:
> 
> "The K6 does not support the new P6 ISA instructions, specifically,
> the conditional move instructions. It also does not appear to support
> the set of MSRs that the P6 does (besides the ever important TSC
> register.) So from a programmer's architecture point of view, the K6
> is more like a Pentium than a Pentium-II. Its not clear that this is a
> real big issue since all the modern compilers still target the 80386
> ISA."
> 
> I see no reason why do prevent the official desktop builds to run on
> all those fine older Super7 AMD boards. They still make reasonable
> desktops when the graphical environment is choosen carefully.
> 
> Sincerely yours,
>   René Rebe
>     - ROCK Linux stable release maintainer
> 
> --  
> René Rebe - Europe/Germany/Berlin
>   [email protected] [email protected]
> http://www.rocklinux.org http://www.rocklinux-consulting.de
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> rock-user mailing list
> [email protected]
> http://www.rocklinux.net/mailman/listinfo/rock-user
> 

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