i have to *choose* between graphical desktop and S/W dev?

[Bruno Wolff III]

On Mon, Mar 15, 2010 at 17:13:14 -0400,
  Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> The software development tools is a particular pain point:  I've found
> it easier to reinstall a system that missed that option rather than
> endure a never-ending battle with missing packages.   "No C compiler?!
> wtf?  Okay. Gcc installed. ... C++ doesn't work? argh!"

Groups might be a help here. For example in the above case,
yum groupinstall "Development Tools"
might solve most of the problem.