VectorLinux

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VectorLinux
Website	http://vectorlinux.com/
Company/ developer	Robert S. Lange; Darrell Stavem
OS family	Slackware
Source model	Open source
Latest stable release	5.9 / 23 December 2007
Kernel type	Monolithic
License	Various
Working state	Current

VL 5 SOHO Lilo boot screen

VectorLinux is a Linux distribution for the x86 platform based on Slackware which aims to be user-friendly. VectorLinux is a Canadian distribution, and is now an international community. The Canadian founders steer the distibution. The latest versions (as of January 11, 2008) are 5.9 Standard Edition and 5.8 SOHO Edition.

Vector aims to cater to the diverse needs of its user base. For this reason, Vector retains legacy drivers for such hardware and the forum actively supports users of equipment that would be considered outdated by today's standards.^{[citation needed]} Vector has even been used for software development and web serving, although none of these is the primary focus of the distribution.

1 Releases
2 Differences between SOHO and Standard
3 Live CD
4 Prominent features
5 Graphical frontends
6 Vector and Slackware similarities
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Releases

VectorLinux, abbreviated VL, was started by Robert S. Lange and Darrell Stavem in 1998 and released version 1.0 on 28 June 1999.^[1]^[2] The SOHO edition was introduced on 21 August 2002, based on VectorLinux 2.5.^[3]

On 2006-12-18, Standard edition version 5.8 was released. It is based on Slackware 11.0 and contains Linux 2.6.18. There are several major improvements, to name some: full read/write NTFS support, new package format (LZMA instead of TGZ) which allowed developers to push more software on the setup CD, graphical enhancements and much more.^[4]

The experimental Dynamite releases (unofficial) are billed as the most lightweight distribution in the Vector family of products, and were also the first Vector releases to offer a flexible partitioning scheme during installation. Intended as a testing platform, Dynamite developed into a more stable environment, with the Fluxbox, IceWM and Xfce window managers as well as Linux 2.4.29 and 2.6.10.

[edit] Differences between SOHO and Standard

SOHO and Standard differ in a number of respects. SOHO assumes fairly modern hardware and includes larger applications, notably the KDE suite and OpenOffice.org. Moreover, choice of certain application versions is conservative in terms of stability, so as to prevent difficulties with newer and potentially immature software. SOHO chose to stay with the 2.4 series kernel, considered more stable than the newer 2.6 line of kernels, until 5.0.1. SOHO 5.1.1 was released with Linux 2.6.13. The Standard Edition includes Linux 2.6 since version 4.3 and chooses less resource-intensive applications, omitting KDE in favor of IceWM and Xfce, and OpenOffice.org in favor of programs like AbiWord.

[edit] Live CD

Live-CD VectorLinux releases have been occasional experiments. The first was a live-CD version of VL Standard 4.0. Later, VL 5.1.2 SOHO and 5.1 Standard were also released in this fashion. Live-CD versions are expected to become official for future VL releases, due to the popularity of the 5.1.x live-CDs.

[edit] Prominent features

One prominent feature that all VL versions have in common is the standard installation of system administration applications: VASM handles system configuration, while slapt-get with its GUI front-end Gslapt provides manages software installation and removal.

VASM stands for 'Vector Administrative and Services Menu', and it configures everything from disk partitions to X.Org Server. In addition to offering a GUI interface, a text mode parallel to the GUI VASM is available. VASM has been available since Vector 2.0 was released and has been upgraded continually over the years, with the addition of GUI functionality in SOHO 3.2. It is comparable to tools like YaST and DrakConf, though more lightweight in keeping with the distribution's goals. Configuration tools like netconfig and alsaconf are also available in Vector.

Gslapt is a GUI front-end to the slapt-get software management tool. Combined with lzma-compression and dependency tracking, the inclusion of Gslapt offers VectorLinux users the ability to quickly install and remove software while avoiding so-called 'dependency hell.' File compression via lzma allows low and high bandwidth users alike to minimize download times.

[edit] Graphical frontends

Two graphical frontends have been written for slapt-get, the backwards-compatible dependency-tracking extension to Slackware's package tools used by VectorLinux. VL-APT was the first, written originally by the Vector developers to serve the need for GUI package installation and management, while gslapt was written by the original developers of slapt-get for the same purpose. Until recently, either option has been viable; however, recent changes in the slapt-get packaging format have made VL-APT obsolete, and the developers of Vector have consequently promoted gslapt as the preferred method of graphical package management.

VL-APT (now deprecated) and gslapt are configured by default to use Vector's repository, which offers the majority of most users' needs. However, alternative sources, including mirrors of the official archives around the world, can be added through their respective configuration menus, or directly, through the textual slapt-getrc configuration. There is criticism, at least partially justified, regarding the size of the Vector package selection. However, these deficiencies have stimulated significant volunteer and developer response, and many desired software packages have now entered the Vector repository.

[edit] Vector and Slackware similarities

In fact, it is not uncommon to use the information in /etc/slackware-version in Vector to download and install Slackware packages from LinuxPackages.net and Slackware's official repository.^[5]