Started a Gentoo install again...

[Arnox]

And holy balls, the installation instructions for them just SUCK.



For example, it tells you to make a new user and switch to it. OK, that's fine. But what it doesn't tell you to do is put the user in the wheel group. Because if you don't do that and you switch to that user, you'll lock yourself out of root. I only found that out after googling it. Absolutely pathetic. HOW LONG has this distro been in heavy dev and something as basic as the install instructions are still not worked out yet.

[oppenheimmer]

maybe there key market dont find things like this taxing

[Arnox]

maybe there key market dont find things like this taxing

I didn't know it was too much to ask for to have the install instructions be, you know, complete.

[Lanny]

I don't know, I don't mean to be condescending but oppenheimmer is right. It's a safe bet that the typical gentoo user (who isn't a /g/ kewl kid) would know you have to give something an elevation mechanism before bailing out of root and that account creation doesn't do that by default. Like the ubuntu install instructions probably don't tell you how to find your computer's power button either, but that doesn't make it incomplete.

[Arnox]

It's a safe bet that the typical gentoo user (who isn't a /g/ kewl kid) would know you have to give something an elevation mechanism before bailing out of root and that account creation doesn't do that by default.

Sure, but to a new user, it's not obvious at all. Heck, even a beginning Linux user wouldn't know. The thing is, if this guide really was written for people who knew all of this stuff already instead of new users, I'd probably have to ask why it was written at all. Creating users however is a basic Linux command. So why are they telling us how to create new users but not how to assign them to the proper needed group?

[aldra]

it doesn't lock you out, it just breaks su/sudo... you can always log out and log back in as root.

wheel is oldschool BSD though, I imagine it's documented in the instructions somewhere, but given the kind of people who use Gentoo, they probably didn't think it necessary to place too much emphasis on it.

[ph0x]

AFIAK no on uses wheel anymore, I haven't touched it in a long time.

[aldra]

you really should if you operate a multi-user environment

[Σ]

It's a safe bet that the typical gentoo user (who isn't a /g/ kewl kid) would know you have to give something an elevation mechanism before bailing out of root and that account creation doesn't do that by default.

Sure, but to a new user, it's not obvious at all. Heck, even a beginning Linux user wouldn't know. The thing is, if this guide really was written for people who knew all of this stuff already instead of new users, I'd probably have to ask why it was written at all. Creating users however is a basic Linux command. So why are they telling us how to create new users but not how to assign them to the proper needed group?

A beginning linux user wouldn't know. That is not gentoos target market. Gentoo is for users who know linux and know their shit. As a general rule instructions are written for their target market and not necessarily easy to for all to comprehend. If the "basic install instructions" are beyond your current ability you can bet using and configuring the system is just as if not more complicated. I would recommend using a less complex distro. I suggest getting really into suse or something similar.