Hey everyone, I’ve been using an Arch system for the past 2 months and I’ve had an absolute ball learning more granular details about my hardware. Never in my life did I think I’d be looking at kernel modules and contemplating swapping out init systems and trying different kernels.

I write this post somewhat open-endesd because I’m clueless as to where Gentoo can take me in terms of hardware acceleration and help me learn development of software/firmware deeper. To my understanding, everything must be compiled from source code, which I’d like to learn more about as well. Ive dipped my toe in a myriad of programming languages too and found a more terminals focused work flow was ideal.

My major use cases for my computer are to benchmark hardware and pick more features in software that I’d have to compile from source anyways. I do work in molecular dynamics from time to time and have used software distributions like GROMACS and LAMMPS. Any advice that could be wouldbbe greatly appreciated. The thoroughness in the Gentoo Wiki’s documentation is amazing, but its a overwhelming lol

My foundation is a little like swiss cheese though. Don’t know what I don’t know! Looking forward to becoming a part of the Gentoo community. I’d love to develop software like DWSIM someday.

  • Red@reddthat.comMEnglish
    3·
    1 year ago

    While Gentoo does build from source, it is abstracted away by the package manager just like every other distribution. Portage.

    If you can install arch you can easily install Gentoo because you can successfully follow instructions. 😜

    If you are worried you can always try installing on a VM first to understand it without feeling the pressure and just nuke it if you make a mistake.

    Once you understand how to install it don’t forget the next steps and reading about USE Flags and how they can act globally or on a single package

    • gronjo45@lemm.eeOPEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      Portage sounds great! The wiki has great documentation and a fair amount of it is familiar from my Arch system. I’m going through the install on a VM first and then I plan on getting it on my old Chromebook from 6 years ago.

      I believe it is a Dell 3380 but I’m not even sure if my model is able to have its OS switched? I’ll putter around with it today and make a post if I manage to get Gentoo onto it lol

      Thanks for the tips :) Loving the detail in this distribution!