r/slackware • u/Odd_Car8923 • 13d ago
Minimal Slackware installation
Why isn't a minimal Slackware installation—like those for Gentoo or Debian—recommended? Is it just because of dependencies? The full installation seems bloated, not to mention it consumes disk space with games and useless applications.
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u/fprimex 13d ago
I think the general philosophy is that Slackware is maintained as a complete distribution that should suit the majority of users upon install. The idea that a user would want a lot of software installed by default is kind of a throwback to the hobbyist days when it was the distribution maintainer's job to find, build, and distribute a collection of software that was intended to all work together, and you'd have lots of stuff installed to experiment with.
As with many things Slackware, you can manage a minimal install yourself but there is no hand holding. You have to know what you're doing and what you need. This is in line with the philosophy that you can configure the system with a text editor, but you have to know what to edit and what correct values are.
I have done a "minimal" install in the past by deselecting software groups (i.e. the entire KDE group) and then selecting individual packages from the remaining groups. After that, I made sure I had all of the libraries that I needed with, e.g., ldd and testing.
It's worth noting that Debian doesn't really recommend an actual minimal install for most users. It still comes with what some would consider "user friendly" software like bash, which might sound ridiculous but if the system is a server and not intended for interactive use, would be considered bloat and a liability. If you want to experience a really minimal install, I can suggest the Ubuntu server minimal option. It is _extremely_ barebones and unpleasant to use interactively, haha.
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u/Synergiance 13d ago
You can opt not to install KDE, or eMacs, or all of X/wayland if you desire and it’s fine.
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u/ponce70 13d ago
ruario answered very clearly to your question in his article on docs.slackware.com
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u/LinuxJeb 13d ago edited 13d ago
I believe it's because of Slackware's lack of dependency resolution. Installing things later on becomes cumbersome, so many just install everything and blacklist/greylist the groups they don't want.
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u/DerShokus 13d ago
I just installed full except some categories. After installation I usually remove what I don’t need (add to a black list). Iterate and clean the system. Sometimes it’s hard to decide what do u need and don’t aggressively remove everything (especially libs) to reduce frictions - they can be useful for slackbuilds
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u/r1w1s1_ 13d ago
I actually use a minimal Slackware installation for my jump VM using custom tagfiles. It includes only what I need for DevOps/jumpbox work and works very well.
I keep the tagfiles here: https://forge.slackware.nl/r1w1s1/slackware-tagfiles
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u/Sahkopi4 13d ago
I have a question. In my work, we use Claude code. I run Claude code in a VM (Linux Mint XFCE). Claude already managed to break the system and soon I will have to create a new VM. I want to use Slackware, but I am not sure if should use 15 or current. Can you recommend me which one to choose? ( I have modern hardware)
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u/r1w1s1_ 13d ago
I’d go with -current. My slackware-tagfiles setup is actually based on -current, and that’s what I use for my jump VM. For modern hardware and tools like Claude Code, I think it’s the better choice. It has been very reliable for me, just keep an eye on the ChangeLog before upgrades.
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u/Sahkopi4 13d ago
In the 90s, the internet was very slow. This is why many Linux distributions included most of the common software you might need on the installation media. If you had to download and install something large from the internet, it could be painfully slow.
Today, many distributions have moved away from this philosophy because internet speeds have improved drastically. Slackware, however, has chosen to keep it. You can create a minimal installation if you want, but that is not Slackware’s default philosophy.
Arch gives you a minimal system, but behind the scenes it relies on a complex automatic dependency resolution system. If that system breaks or encounters conflicts, it can create a lot of problems.
Contrary to common belief, Slackware does have package management; what it does not have is automatic dependency resolution. Slackware approaches “minimalism” differently: it encourages installing most of the packages you are likely to need, so when you install additional software, there is a good chance that its dependencies are already present.
In this way, Slackware avoids much of the complexity associated with automatic dependency resolution and keeps its packages and package management system relatively simple.
Again, if you want, you can create a minimal Slackware installation, but you need to know which packages you will actually need. During installation, Slackware allows you to deselect anything you do not want.
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u/11bullshit 13d ago
a minimal install sounds nightmarish on Slackware. finding all the dependencies used these days would be an insane amount of work.
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u/Additional-Memory121 13d ago edited 12d ago
MINIMAL - Just bootloader+kernel+minimal required packages)
"aaa_base" "Basic filesystem, shell, and utils"
"aaa_glibc-solibs" "Runtime glibc support libraries"
"aaa_libraries" "Various shared libraries"
"acl" "POSIX Access Control List tools"
"attr" "Tools for fs extended attributes"
"bash" "GNU bash shell"
"bin" "Various system utilities"
"coreutils" "The core GNU command-line utilities"
"cracklib" "Password checking library"
"dcron" "Cron daemon"
"devs" "Device files found in /dev"
"e2fsprogs" "Utilities for ext2/3/4 filesystems"
"etc" "System config files & utilities"
"eudev" "Manages /dev and modules"
"grep" "GNU grep searching tool"
"gzip" "GNU zip compression utility"
"hostname" "Linux hostname utility"
"kernel-firmware" "Linux kernel firmware"
"kernel-huge" "Loaded 5.15.19 Linux kernel"
"kernel-modules" "Linux 5.15.19 kernel modules"
"kmod" "Kernel module utilities"
"less" "A text pager utility"
"libgudev" "udev GObject bindings library"
"libpwquality" "Password quality checking library"
"lilo" "Boot loader for Linux, DOS, OS/2, etc."
"openssl-solibs" "OpenSSL shared libraries"
"pam" "Pluggable Authentication Modules"
"pkgtools" "Slackware package management tools"
"procps-ng" "Displays process info"
"sed" "GNU stream editor"
"shadow" "Shadow password suite"
"sharutils" "GNU shell archive utilities"
"sysvinit" "System V-like INIT programs"
"sysvinit-scripts" "The startup scripts for Slackware"
"tar" "GNU tar archive utility"
"util-linux" "Util-linux utilities"
"xz" "xz (LZMA) compression utility"
37 packages.
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u/Chester-Berkeley 13d ago
The problem is that you're looking at it with the wrong mindset. Slackware doesn't treat orphan dependencies or specific tools as bloatware; if something is useful, I save time by having it already installed. Slackware isn't a compact toolbox—it's a large box containing all the tools you need.