[plug] distro non-wars: Debian vs Gentoo vs LFS for specific purposes

[Denis Brown]

Dear PLUG list members,

This is *not* an attempt to start a distro war :-)

I am usually a died-in-the-wool Debian user thanks to good experiences in 
the past in terms of stability, suitability for the task, etc.   My recent 
activities in neuroimaging software, the majority of which is open source 
(well, limited to researchers in the field, but same 
compile-from-source-tarball deal) have made it obvious that Debian woody is 
not cutting edge in terms of support packages (gcc and many graphics 
support apps for example).   Cutting edge stuff is pretty much expected for 
the majority of the neuro software that comes my way.   I have not faced 
problems with driver support since I'm not using bleeding edge laptop or 
desktop chipsets in the hardware.

I have been solving these (software) issues by taking a Debian woody, 
salting it with a few packages from backports and doing the graphics 
support stuff from source.   I recently added a gcc-3.3.3 from source, 
too.  So my security issues are mainly taken care of through Debian and 
backports via apt-get assuming I don't break it :-(   An incentive with 
using Debian is that if I retire, go on long service leave (oh, yeah??) or 
fall under a bus, another Linux-aware person can easily take over the 
reins.   I also like the Debian policy and would much rather go with 
something that is aggressively open and non-commercialised.   (flames > 
/dev/null please)

But looking at what I have, an increasing amount is compiled from 
source.   So is there a case for compiling the whole shebang from source 
and avoiding a "distro" per se?   I'd thought, as per the subject line, of 
gentoo which from recollection of some topics here is a from-source distro 
and Linux From Scratch which by definition, is from sources.   The only 
down side would be keeping up to date with security issues - to do that 
"manually" would mean subscriptions to the security lists for pretty much 
all packages!   But then I need to keep my eye on developments in the 
graphics apps, anyway, so maybe not such a big deal.

I think the beast I manage here is a little different from the Linux in the 
Office / School / Library / Local shop environment where if you don't have 
the latest stuff under the hood, no one is going to care very much.   I 
could, of course, be entirely wrong :-)   I'd appreciate any thoughts you 
may have to offer, especially from gentoo users (eg. Bill?) and anyone who 
used or is using LFS.

If I did ever move away from Debian I would need to be satisfied that the 
"audit trail" for what was installed and how, was clear enough for someone 
to step into my role and be productive quickly.

TIA,
Denis