Arch Linux Update On The Status Of Its Toolchain

[enihcam]

Funny, I also switched from Gentoo in late 2009. Gentoo was my Linux of choice since 2003, but after a period of several months of trouble after updates. Especially failing to boot, X11 not coming up or not unable to log in, almost every time I ran emerge. I was using Gentoo for more than seven years, over six of these years were good. But not able to use it as the tool I wanted and needed, frustrated me. The constantly tinkering to get things to work was too much. So, I switched to Fedora. But two years in, I got to fed up with the update cycle every half year, missing packages, searching or waiting for repos, etc. Then I found Arch Linux. I use Arch for more than 10 years now. It is by far the most painless experience I had with Linux.

wow, you are another me. I switched to Gentoo (from FreeBSD) in 2003. I tried Fedora, Mandrake, and in the end Arch. I believe we have same feeling - wasting time in maintaining a stable state of Gentoo packages while tuning USE flags and having pains. Arch is such a clean distro - pacman really does a great job. I only have one AUR package, yes the kernel package optimized + compiled for the hardware (FYI, linux-xanmod-lts); I kept my system tweaks in /etc folder version-controlled by etckeeper; I use lostfiles to track garbage files; other than those, i follow standard systemd practices as much as i can.

[bug77]

BTW distrohopping is a cool thing - checking out different flavours of the experience.

It gets tiresome after a while. You just end up linking 2-3 distros that fit your main use cases and settle on those. Miss some nifty things happening in other other distros while you're at it, too :P

[foolishgrunt]

Ubuntu was my introduction to Linux, and I used it happily from 2007 to 2010. When I decided I didn't like Unity, rather than simply switching DEs, I decided to try my luck with a rolling release distro, having heard good things about the model. I settled on Arch, and I still consider my first install from the command line as my "Linux birthday." Haven't had any reason to second guess my decision.

[lano1106]

is it just me or the maintainer explanation is a bit lame?

I mean was he the only option for the position? When you end up waiting 6 months before telling publicly that you don't have time to take care of the tasks that comes with the role, wasn't it an option to figure that out faster and quit to give the opportunity to a more motivated candidate to do it?

Does someone know the guy? What has he done to get the position? No idea what is the ArchLinux maintainer nomination process but I know that they should also have a follow-up process. I don't care much about the quality of the package maintenance for some small obscure package... but when it comes to one of the top 5 core packages used by pretty much all the other packages, for the sake of all users, they should ensure that the job gets done

[TemplarGR]

This is a pathetic response. The packages in question haven't been updated since last summer... And he only bothered to tell us that he is busy and can't maintain them NOW, several months after the fact, just because Phoronix bothered to make an article about it and they can't censor Phoronix like they routinely censor dissent in their forums, mailing list and subreddit....

This is pathetic behavior. I can totally understand that he is a volunteer donating his free time into a project. And that real life comes first. No one in the Linux world ever denies that. We get it. But he is totally irresponsible in not taking care of the issue much sooner. He should have asked for help from the start, he should have notified everyone that he is busy and can't do the job. This is a total failure. I often see Arch-apologists telling us that they can't recruit more arch devs cause they need to be filtered first, yet the current devs are totally irresponsible towards the community and can't be bothered for months to at least seek a solution for a key toolchain of the distro... They are waiting until many people complain and can't be silenced to bother with a lame apology.

If the Arch distro wants a future, they need to make a huge button in their frontpage that leads to a page detailing how a person can join the project in a clear and precise manner and no BS. Stop excluding people that can help. You are not better than us, smarter than us, better programmer than us, or more responsible than us. If you still want to treat Arch like your pet project, don't act surprised when after a while no one will bother with using it. And then it won't matter as much if you put it in your CVs....

[lano1106]

I agree 100% with what you are saying. It is volunteer work and they are quick to remind you that fact when you dare point out issues. It is stunning to me that it is a guy that has no motivation doing the job that got the position. I am sure that there are plenty of talented students in CS departments across the world that would love to have the role for the fun of it and to be able to put that prestigious position in their resume...

[TemplarGR]

I agree 100% with what you are saying. It is volunteer work and they are quick to remind you that fact when you dare point out issues. It is stunning to me that it is a guy that has no motivation doing the job that got the position. I am sure that there are plenty of talented students in CS departments across the world that would love to have the role for the fun of it and to be able to put that prestigious position in their resume...

Yes. Current Arch devs like the prestige that comes with their position, but don't want to put the work into the project, all the while they discourage people from joining and make it difficult and complicated to become an Arch dev, because they don't want competition and a danger to their positions from more eager new recruits....

I even read that in the case of a GNOME maintainer who took 2 months to update to GNOME 41, that he didn't do it earlier cause he was busy playing Fortnite or something like that. Someone wrote that he said it in the irc. Perhaps a lie or a rumor, but i wouldn't be surprised, seeing as it was a trouble-free upgrade and it took 2 months....

There are many people, especially CS students like you said, who would want to have the chance to contribute and place it in their resume. That is one of the main reason to join volunteer projects like this for many people. If they really cared about their distro, they would create a clear way to trial/recruit new people, and not the BS that exists currently.

[HighValueWarrior]

This is a pathetic response.

If the Arch distro wants a future, they need to make a huge button in their frontpage that leads to a page detailing how a person can join the project in a clear and precise manner and no BS. Stop excluding people that can help. You are not better than us, smarter than us, better programmer than us, or more responsible than us. If you still want to treat Arch like your pet project, don't act surprised when after a while no one will bother with using it. And then it won't matter as much if you put it in your CVs....

Excellent - so of course prepare your hagis for flames from the cli warriors who fight to keep Arch 'exclusive'

[onlyLinuxLuvUBack]

wow, you are another me. I switched to Gentoo (from FreeBSD) in 2003. I tried Fedora, Mandrake, and in the end Arch. I believe we have same feeling - wasting time in maintaining a stable state of Gentoo packages while tuning USE flags and having pains. Arch is such a clean distro - pacman really does a great job. I only have one AUR package, yes the kernel package optimized + compiled for the hardware (FYI, linux-xanmod-lts); I kept my system tweaks in /etc folder version-controlled by etckeeper; I use lostfiles to track garbage files; other than those, i follow standard systemd practices as much as i can.

is there an arch linux without systemd ?

[Quackdoc]

Glad to see some transparency finally, not glad that it seemingly took you and other popular news distributors publishing an article on it to get it.