Arch Linux

dhave

Arch Linux f@h Team Member

From: Outside the matrix.

Registered: 2005-05-15

Posts: 1,112

More praise for pacman

I've recently been using Ubuntu and Mandriva on a 64 bit workstation that is in my office for a few weeks. There are some aspects about both of these distros that are pretty snazzy. I *really* liked the way both Ubuntu and Mandriva found my rather goofy Linksys USB wireless device and configured it very nicely for me. And Ubuntu set up my wireless printer really easily, too. Both of these things took a bit of tweaking in Arch, and I was glad to get help from this forum.

Still, in at least one area, these very pretty distros fall far short: package management and system updating.

Pacman really strikes the right balance between ease of use and user control. The Mandriva update system, for example, is really easy to use, but it makes me feel out of touch with my system. And, for my money, it doesn't handle dependencies as well as good old pacman.

So, for those who may be thinking of using Arch, you'll likely find that pacman is the feature that sets it apart from both the mass-market distros like Ubuntu or Mandriva as well as from the hard-core *nixer distros like Gentoo and Slackware.

My 3 cents (inflation ).

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shining

Pacman Developer

Registered: 2006-05-10

Posts: 2,043

Re: More praise for pacman

apt-get isn't that bad.
And you can't really compare to emerge from Gentoo, because it's quite different (source based).
But for the rest, I agree.

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pacman roulette : pacman -S $(pacman -Slq | LANG=C sort -R | head -n $((RANDOM % 10)))

kel_p

Member

From: De Kwakel

Registered: 2007-05-10

Posts: 65

Re: More praise for pacman

Its KISS that does it.. A lot of power, but presented in such a way there isnt much of a learningcurve.