On the rare occasion software needs to be installed yes, it has to be built from source and it takes a few extra minutes. But you know what? Ubuntu package managers have failed me more than a couple of times. Slackbuilds.org has never once failed to produce a working package for me.

I know people don't want to have to know about every corner of their system. But you don't necessarily need to. Set it up and it works. But if you ever need to you can with Slackware. All the way down without a lot of cruft on top. And that's worth a lot when it's needed.

I guess the point is... I don't spend a lot of time screwing around with my Slackware systems. They are stable, simple and they work. Not dissimilar to the Slackware web site. Lacking over-engineered cruft.

"Slackware is designed around the idea that the system should be a complete installation kept updated with any official patches. This avoids the mess of dependencies that some other Linux based GNU systems face."

Why remake the website? The website is clear enough, has links to the Slackware Book and to a mailing list.

Also I am sounding like a downer... I'm sorry about that. My strong opinions can often be too much, and I get that because they might sound negative. I am saying the things as a long time Slack user that gave up.

So what is missing from what Slackware currently offers that would make have 'the community' to you?

What would you like them to do differently in their approach? What could they do differently that would engage you better?

There is an owner's manual and a community of other enthusiasts. If you want more convenience, your best bet is to try a different make and model.

I'd appreciate it if next time just you would just say "I'm just complaining" so I know not to waste my time.

It was announced in Tue Sep 16 11:20:30 PDT 2003 that it's a part of 'extra' repository. So, not installed by default, but it's there.

Announcent on Fri Nov 21 13:51:57 CST 2008 says it was moved from extra/ to ap/, meaning installed by default on all except the most stripped down installs.

Also, there's nothing special in using third party tools as package managers, they all use slackwares pkg tools under the hood. Think (apt<->slackpkg, dpkg -i <-> installpkg, dpkg -r <-> removepkg, etc etc etc).

I certainly ground my teeth while using Slackware in the 90s too, which is why I switched to Mandrake and then FreeBSD. :P

At least 2 years ago when I ran it exclusively, it was accurately described as Ubuntu-based, not Ubuntu, just like Ubuntu is Debian-based, not Debian. But the similarities are (or at least were) much closer between it and Ubuntu than Ubuntu and Debian.

I often said I ran Ubuntu when I ran Mint, because there was basically no difference worth making.

edit: I have spent a lot of time bouncing between debian, mint and ubuntu as my main distros. To me the differences are huge, and if I could go back and re-write my original comment. I might ask why you switched from mint to ubuntu. I recently moved from mint xfce to xubuntu, and now i am happily using debian xfce.

I loved my Slackware times for the learning experience. But it was hell of a lot of work to use it.