Calculate and Gentoo

Discussions & Opinions
1

Surely this has been asked before but I coudn’t find a link.
Where can I find a comprehensive analysis of how Calculate Linux differs from Gentoo and in which ways is identical.

2

I’ll kick off, but people more knowledgeable then me might correct me or add to this!

  • Calculate Linux is Gentoo Linux with the Calculate overlay added.

  • Using Calculate the installation is much easier than with Gentoo, including providing a compiled Linux kernel.

  • Calculate gives you various desktop environments to choose, as well as a server editions and “scratch” editions so that you can build your own desktop or server.

  • Calculate provides binary packages so updates do not involve compilation of packages.

  • Calculate adds many admin tools.

See the review in Distrowatch this week: http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20170724#calculate

Cheers, Bill

3

Hi Bill,
thank you for your prompt reply.
Excuse me if my questions are a bit dumb, but I am fairly new to Linux in general and to Calculate Linux and Gentoo in particular.
I have read the Distrowatch review and I am clear about the fact that Calculate Linux provides a friendly install of a Gentoo based distro.
Besides that, correct me if I am wrong, and I probably am, my understanding is that Calculate Linux provides a repository of precompiled binaries optimized for a certain profile (ex. i686, desktop user) which are installed by default when you use emerge.
So the “overlay” means that when I use #emerge foo in Calculate Linux it installs the “foo” binary from the Calculate Linux repository, and when I use #emerge -uN foo it compiles “foo” from the sources from the Gentoo repository, according to a default Calculate Linux profile, unless I modify the parameters in the Portage configuration.
What I am a bit confused about is the extent of the customizations in Calculate, because reading the Calculate Linux manuals I found references to some configuration files which are not there in my installed Calculate Linux (for instance /etc/make.conf).

Thanks Antonio.

4

Yes, there are differences in portage folders (custom, 0-base, …), package_accepts_words and others. I’m also interested in an article clarifying the differences with Gentoo.

5

Quoting: I’m also interested in an article clarifying the differences with Gentoo.

Sounds good to me as well.

By the way, I just signed up out of renewed interest in Calculate (I’ve run it before), after the untimely apparent death of Manjaro OpenRC.

https://forum.manjaro.org/t/incipient-diaspora/28438

6

https://forum.manjaro.org/t/manjaro-openrc-will-be-discontinued/28387

7

Put simply, Gentoo is a constructor, Calculate is one of the solutions. We left full compatibility by adding customization tools. There are a lot of small things. They are not easy to describe.