What is exactly the difference between Source Mage and Lunar

[Mandor]

Hi all,

Can somebody explain me in short what are the differences between Source Mage and Lunar. I've read the history about Sorcerer, Lunar and Sorce Mage, and this is not what I mean.

I want to try one of these source based distros and I will have hard time trying both (at least because of the download time - my Internet connection ouside my country is too thin). Besides, they seem pretty alike at first glance.

I don't want to start confrontation in any way, and I'm not asking which is better. I just want to know what actually is the difference. I beleive that many of you are familiar with both distros, at least in principle.

Thanks for the replies in advance

[ElllisD]

my favorite difference so far's the <TAB> autocomplete when typing a partial module name

[sofar]

This is actually quite hard to say! Although the SourceMage and Lunar people often exchange experiences and even packages, we do not monitor our code closely vice versa. This actually lead to the interesting fact that the same type of code was developed in a completely different way - but this makes sense:

Lunar and SMGL forked around 3 years ago from SGL, and so they stem from the same code base. Both groups actually rewrote most (if not all) of that code, and while doing so, fixed the same problems that the original code had, which were many.

In a later stage, things like modular code, download problems etc. were rewritten and developed differently, but mostly with the same code ideal in mind - so the effect is that SMGL (codewise) is still very similar to lunar

However! All is not the same. Some things were developed quite differently, and one of those things is the lunar ISO. This is something you don't get in that way at all in SGML - it's obviously very different there. The same goes for packages - SGML has quite some more packages and for a reason - they have a larger group of developers to maintain it.

On the other hand there are some features (compile from SVN trunk, CVS checkout, etc) that don't exist or didn't exist in SGML because development processes were different.

The only way to see the real difference and compare them is to try them both tho!

[lunar_mike]

I was under the impression that all the projects as such were forked from sorcerer linux ? or am i wrong

[sofar]

SGL stands for 'sorcerer GNU Linux' - the original name of that distro lunar and sgml forked from. After the fork 'SGL' was renamed to 'Sorcerer Linux' - we never forked from that codebase as the license was changed to an inacceptable one.

[Striker]

* pokes sofar's unnacceptable grammar *

[lunar_mike]

yeah sorry , its been a while since i looked @ the licences , been too busy with work n whatnot , but good to hear people still remember it
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[sycomonkey]

I am pretty close to picking up either this or Sourcemage. I have dabbled in Gentoo in the past, but the installation is so difficult and complicated (and I'm not a complete newbie, I've used Slackware for a while now), that I usually screw it up. I hope and assume that it's easier with Lunar and Sourcemage, but in what ways are they different from each other?

[sycomonkey]

Also I'm a security worrywart. I understand "TheEdge" is your more bleeding edge system, but does the stable get security updates fairly quickly anyway? Compared to Source Mage?

[sofar]

lunar's package management code is developed asynchronocally, which means that there are two codebases, almost 99% the same, but one gets patched with experimental CODE.

There are no differences in which packages 'lunar' or 'theedge' installs - if you have theedge installed, you get all the exact same security patches and updates as when you install 'lunar'. Only the package MANAGEMENT code is different.

lunar only has ONE database with packages, called 'moonbase'. There are no plans to make something like 'debian stable' vs 'testing' in lunar ATM. Our moonbase is updated quickly enough when security is concerned, and we try to keep all packages completely up2date as much as possible. Sometimes this even includes development versions of packages (cvs or svn). Most of the time this is the stable version of that package

[RedKennedy]

so just how stable is 'theedge' compared to 'lunar'?
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In Soviet Russia, ISOs install you.

[RedKennedy]

Here's some differences:
-Lunar doesnt use dumb names...Like spells=programs, etc.
-Lunar seems to be a good bit further in development and status.
-Source Mage has a PPC port, and a testing x86_64 port.
-Lunar has a sweet logo.
What's Sorcerer's license differences, anyway? I can't find it on their website.
_________________
In Soviet Russia, ISOs install you.