# What's using Slackware like?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-using-slackware-like/612052>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [February 7, 2012, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-using-slackware-like/612052 "2012-02-07T05:16:50Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![what\_do\_I\_type\_here](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a5b964/32.png) [@what\_do\_I\_type\_here](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/what_do_I_type_here)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-using-slackware-like/612052/1 "2012-02-07T05:16:50Z")

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I realized the other day that I have tried pretty much every Linux distro but Slackware. I understand that it lacks automated package management. That sounds like a pain in the neck. How does that work, anyway? When you want to install something or upgrade your system, do you download each package in a web browser or is there a command line tool of some sort?

I understand the appeal of minimal distros (I use Arch currently) but I don’t think I could live without pacman/apt/portage or something like that.

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**Author:** ![blindboyard](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blindboyard/32/2833_2.png) [@blindboyard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blindboyard)\
**Post date:** [February 7, 2012, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-using-slackware-like/612052/2 "2012-02-07T21:11:21Z")

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There’s slackpkg which will update the packages on the system, but adding to the (extensive) installed software normally means compiling from source code. [Slackbuilds.org](http://Slackbuilds.org) has a command line tool to automate that a bit, sbopkg. There’s also slapt-get, which I believe comes from Salix, a Slackware derivative but completely compatible.

You’d have to install and configure slapt-get, though, which I’ve never done. Sbopkg expects you to manually resolve dependencies and also compiles from source (except with a few packages, like flashplugin and libreoffice), so slow. slackpkg only upgrades the standard packages, and installs a few others like wicd, bash-completion and recordmydesktop. You can always make your own packages and use installpkg or upgradepkg.