What makes Gentoo different?
Gentoo uses a BSD ports-like system called Portage. Portage is a package management system that allows great flexibility while installing and maintaining software on a Gentoo system. It provides compile-time option support (through USE flags), conditional dependencies, pre-package installation summary, safe installation (through sandboxing) and uninstallation of software, system profiles, configuration file protection amongst several other features. With Gentoo you can build your entire system from source, using your choice of optimizations. You have complete control over what packages are or aren’t installed. Gentoo provides you with numerous choices, so you can install Gentoo to your own preferences, which is why Gentoo is called a meta-distribution. Gentoo is actively developed. The entire distribution uses a rapid pace development style: patches to the packages are quickly integrated in the mainline tree, documentation is updated on daily basis, Portage features are added frequentl
