Per Christensen
2021-02-04 04:28:56 UTC
You have heard it before from other "grandpas", but it has been a great
journey to follow Slackware on and off for the last quarter of a
century.In the start modems were howling, computers a months wage and
online plans exorbitant.
I still remember my first encounter when online and facing nothing but a
blinking prompt after logging in - I was frightened - darkstar!!
Soon things was much better and a Windows Manager came up running, with
Xman, Xclock and a terminal window from where all the compilation was
made.The kernel was at that time not modularized in the same way as
today and to maximize memory one had to build a custom kernel with only
the relevant hardware drivers embedded.
Something similar applied for applications where the mid -90s Slackware
CD-rom set shipped from the USA included all sources and extras, as far
as I remember.The time consuming build of apps was often unsuccessful,
but slowly a system adapted to the particular PC emerged - browser,
e-mail, a long abandoned office suite etc.
And making synergy between hardware and operating system is perhaps the
main power of Slackware.A similar thing is the marvelous iPhone with
it's tailored operating system, but Slackware can be trimmed, slimmed,
tailored and adapted to almost any PC configuration.
The rant above is just an offspring of a for me new but nice discovery.I
look forward to the next installment of Slackware and appreciate the
developers continued support of 32bit.I'm writing this on an old laptop
with a nice 17`` screen, 2Gb of ram and Slackware 14.2 32bit
installed.The "discovery" I was talking about is the SlackBuild of the
Chromium based Vivaldi browser, running flawless on this humble machine.
journey to follow Slackware on and off for the last quarter of a
century.In the start modems were howling, computers a months wage and
online plans exorbitant.
I still remember my first encounter when online and facing nothing but a
blinking prompt after logging in - I was frightened - darkstar!!
Soon things was much better and a Windows Manager came up running, with
Xman, Xclock and a terminal window from where all the compilation was
made.The kernel was at that time not modularized in the same way as
today and to maximize memory one had to build a custom kernel with only
the relevant hardware drivers embedded.
Something similar applied for applications where the mid -90s Slackware
CD-rom set shipped from the USA included all sources and extras, as far
as I remember.The time consuming build of apps was often unsuccessful,
but slowly a system adapted to the particular PC emerged - browser,
e-mail, a long abandoned office suite etc.
And making synergy between hardware and operating system is perhaps the
main power of Slackware.A similar thing is the marvelous iPhone with
it's tailored operating system, but Slackware can be trimmed, slimmed,
tailored and adapted to almost any PC configuration.
The rant above is just an offspring of a for me new but nice discovery.I
look forward to the next installment of Slackware and appreciate the
developers continued support of 32bit.I'm writing this on an old laptop
with a nice 17`` screen, 2Gb of ram and Slackware 14.2 32bit
installed.The "discovery" I was talking about is the SlackBuild of the
Chromium based Vivaldi browser, running flawless on this humble machine.