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Twitch Viewers Will Try To Collaboratively Install Arch Linux (twitchinstalls.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Early last year, an anonymous developer had the idea to try to crowd-source a game of Pokemon using Twitch.tv. 16 days of continuous play later, they were victorious, with an estimated 1.17 million people participating. A new experiment is now trying to ramp up the complexity: the goal is to install Arch Linux. "Every ten seconds, the most popular keystroke in Twitch chat will be entered into an Arch Linux virtual machine." The launch page recommends taking a look at the Arch Linux Wiki, beginner's guide, and a list of bash commands. People in the video stream chat are already discussing strategy.

55 of 103 comments (clear)

  1. rm -rf trolls? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Won't it just end up broken with an rm -rf at some point?

    1. Re:rm -rf trolls? by tehlinux · · Score: 1

      yes

      --
      Most linux users don't know this, but the man pages were named after Chuck Norris. Chuck Norris fsck'ing hates noobs!
    2. Re:rm -rf trolls? by Joe_Dragon · · Score: 1

      sudo rm -rf /

    3. Re:rm -rf trolls? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

      This is an ingenious way to demonstrate to 1.17 million users why they have Windows on their computers.

    4. Re:rm -rf trolls? by iONiUM · · Score: 2

      Yes, there is no way this is going to work. The reason Twitch plays Pokemon is so popular is because one person can't really mess it up. Sure, there were hours of Ash being stuck in the wall because everyone was saying go in the wrong direction, but that's totally different than deleting the entire pokedex (which would be equivalent to sudo rm -rf) and having to start completely over.

    5. Re:rm -rf trolls? by kthreadd · · Score: 1

      Unless they already run as root.

    6. Re:rm -rf trolls? by kthreadd · · Score: 1

      If it's GNU dd you might want to add the oflag=direct option. Otherwise writes will just buffer up in memory before Linux decides to actually write them to disk.

    7. Re:rm -rf trolls? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Do you forget the battles over releasing all of Ash's pokemon?

    8. Re:rm -rf trolls? by fisted · · Score: 2

      that hasn't worked with GNU rm in a long time, sudo or not.

    9. Re:rm -rf trolls? by djnforce9 · · Score: 1

      The number of trolls attempting to execute this command would need to outnumber the ones trying to continue the installation. I wouldn't worry about it.

    10. Re:rm -rf trolls? by Not-a-Neg · · Score: 1

      Finally, an insightful response! Love it.

      --
      -==- Buy a Mac and leave me alone!
    11. Re:rm -rf trolls? by iONiUM · · Score: 1

      No, but the pokedex being filled out is one of the requirements to "beating" Twitch plays Pokemon. If you release the Pokemon, your Pokedex still stays intact, which is not the case with rm -rf /. While it may inhibit them from beating the Elite 4 in the interim, they can always go catch more, which I suppose is sort of akin to rm -rf / except that you don't lose your experience and current place in the quests and such.

    12. Re:rm -rf trolls? by chmod+a+x+mojo · · Score: 1

      Isn't it distro specific? I.E., if I remember correctly, most distros set an alias "rm" to "rm --preserve-root" in .bashrc so the command gets called to preserve root by default and needing --no-preserve-root explicitly called if you REALLY want to delete / for some reason?

      --
      To err is human; effective mayhem requires the root password!
    13. Re:rm -rf trolls? by Bengie · · Score: 2

      Modern implementations of rm reject that.

    14. Re:rm -rf trolls? by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 1

      Won't it just end up broken with an rm -rf at some point?

      Lol, that'd be my guess. I'd put money on it.

      --
      Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
    15. Re:rm -rf trolls? by kthreadd · · Score: 1

      that hasn't worked with GNU rm in a long time, sudo or not.

      So, rm -rf /* then?

    16. Re:rm -rf trolls? by The+Wild+Norseman · · Score: 2

      This is an ingenious way to demonstrate to 1.17 million users why they have Windows on their computers.

      Yeah, and Windows 10 is an ingenious way to demonstrate to 300 million users why they shouldn't.

      --
      "A government is a body of people usually -- notably -- ungoverned." -Shepherd Book
    17. Re: rm -rf trolls? by morgauxo · · Score: 1

      when dd is part of systemd it isn't going to allow that.

    18. Re:rm -rf trolls? by JSG · · Score: 1

      As the input is from /dev/zero they will get written quite quickly, depending on how much RAM is available.

    19. Re:rm -rf trolls? by JSG · · Score: 2

      "Ugh, installing Arch in itself, is an ingenious way to demonstrate"

      So you don't like to know how your OS works or care about having the choice about what is on your PC/laptop. Perhaps you should not hang around a site with the strap line "News for nerds".

      Me, I like choice: I like being able to decide for myself whether I want MS, Apple or Linux or BSD or whatever. As it turns out, I like the Linux way of doing things. I also like to mess around and tinker. So I choose Arch and Gentoo for my own stuff and Ubuntu, Centos and SLES in general for work. I also make quite a lot of use of FreeBSD via pfSense and am tempted to get in deeper.

      I love having choice. Would you rather a monoculture?

      BTW: My wife's laptop runs Arch - she doesn't know and she doesn't care. It just works and magically updates every now and then - again she doesn't know this, it just works. OK I'm a consultant but I have the tools given to me by the best and I no longer have to explain why that bloody yellow shield keeps on pestering her nor what the hell is Windows 10 and why it wants to install all the time and then suck her eyes out.

    20. Re: rm -rf trolls? by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      "I can't allow you to do that, Dave."

    21. Re:rm -rf trolls? by MerlynEmrys67 · · Score: 1

      Ubuntu thing

      Why is a decades old utility (originally 1980) an Ubuntu thing. Frankly if a normal arch linux thing is to login as root and just use root... I would never touch it

      --
      I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them
    22. Re:rm -rf trolls? by f3rret · · Score: 1

      sudo rm -rf /

      sudo rm --no-preserve-root -rf /

      rather

      --
      Admit nothing. Deny Everything. Make Counter-accusations.
    23. Re:rm -rf trolls? by kthreadd · · Score: 1

      Seams suboptimal to make such operation depend on how much RAM is available.

    24. Re: rm -rf trolls? by allo · · Score: 1

      SystemDave

    25. Re:rm -rf trolls? by MoarSauce123 · · Score: 2

      This discussion shows nicely why Linux based OS are still only niche solutions for the common user. Can't even agree on what the right command is to destroy an install.....

  2. Easy by jwymanm · · Score: 3, Informative

    Step 1: Install Antergos - https://antergos.com/

    1. Re:Easy by Amouth · · Score: 1

      nothing says you can't, hop on and try

      --
      '...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
  3. Re:install gentoo by buchner.johannes · · Score: 1

    Gentoo has a graphical installer these days. I know, shocking!

    Besides, Gentoo and Arch are similar in complexity to install; difference is only internals and USE flags.

    --
    NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
  4. Fork bombs by Rataerix · · Score: 1

    My moneys on it ending with a fork bomb

  5. What's the over-under.... by MAXOMENOS · · Score: 1

    ...on how long it takes 'em to brick the box?

  6. Re:... read the article ... by Penguinisto · · Score: 1, Funny

    Maybe someone has a "million monkeys" research grant riding on this...?

    --
    Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
  7. root password by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    enter twice, good luck!

  8. "Twitch goes to /pol" by cfalcon · · Score: 2

    This is pretty great, but there's a lot of keystrokes to average out. Is it just plurality? Wouldn't there always be enough first-past-the-post votes to jam backspace, on pretty much any command?

    I'm more wondering at this point, what if twitch goes to 8 chan, which has some content that is illegal in some jurisdictions? Or what if twitch goes somewhere even less moderated and downloads illegal-almost-everywhere content? Who has the legal liability on that?

  9. How do they enter an enter? by damn_registrars · · Score: 1

    I see that they take the most popular keystroke from the chat. But how do you enter an enter - or how do you distinguish an enter from a space? It is supposed to go one stroke at a time, every 10 minutes. This could be really interesting.

    Does anyone have an idea of how many key strokes are required to install Arch Linux? Take that and multiply by 10 to get the minimum amount of time to complete this in minutes. It will be interesting to see how far off the end product is, both in terms of time and final components. I expect some people are trying to figure out a way to install another OS on top of (or somehow in place of) Arch Linux.

    --
    Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
    1. Re:How do they enter an enter? by Tyrannosaur · · Score: 1

      From the twitter feed:

      Instructions
      Avaliable commands:

      Letters
      Most special keys
      'space'
      'enter'
      'backspace'
      'system_reset'

      So to have a space or enter, you actually have to type it out.

  10. It actually doesn't accept full commands by iONiUM · · Score: 4, Informative

    So my previous post about how this won't work is actually wrong. I've been on the actual twitch channel, and the instructions are as follows:

    Instructions
    Avaliable commands:

    • Letters
    • Most special keys
    • 'space'
    • 'enter'
    • 'backspace'
    • 'system_reset'

    So how it actually works is that everyone types 1 letter (or I suppose it takes the first letter you've typed) and it uses that. So to type 'sudo rm -rf /' it would require people to type those exact letters in that sequence. Considering there will probably be many people there at once, some of whom don't want that typed, it will be significantly harder to troll.

    1. Re:It actually doesn't accept full commands by KGIII · · Score: 1

      I might have been checking if one can curl the chat as I read this... Might have to scrape it. Ah, the things I do out of love for you guys.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    2. Re:It actually doesn't accept full commands by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 1

      So how it actually works is that everyone types 1 letter (or I suppose it takes the first letter you've typed) and it uses that. So to type 'sudo rm -rf /' it would require people to type those exact letters in that sequence. Considering there will probably be many people there at once, some of whom don't want that typed, it will be significantly harder to troll.

      By the same token, any command will require people to type the right letters in the right sequence. I will be surprised if the project in its current form manages to issue a single successful command.

  11. WTF???? by gstoddart · · Score: 1

    "Every ten seconds, the most popular keystroke in Twitch chat will be entered into an Arch Linux virtual machine."

    Holy fuck, so we're literally just going for the million poo-flinging monkeys and you'll arrive there by random chance??

    This isn't crowd sourcing or harnessing the wisdom of crowds.

    No, I didn't RTFA ... but this sounds like an utter waste if time. But, hey, if you want to waste your time on crap like this, go ahead .. just don't pretend it's newsworthy.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    1. Re:WTF???? by Tyrannosaur · · Score: 1

      It's Twitch. I don't know if you've been there, but you don't go there to do useful things, you go to do fun things. And this looks like it will be pretty entertaining

  12. Exceptionally useless by SecurityGuy · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This really seems like an exceptionally useless thing to do.

    "Hey, everybody! Let's take something that one person can do well in minutes and have a million people do it badly over a few days, if it ever works at all!"

    Just...why?!?

    1. Re:Exceptionally useless by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Silly them, all they need is 1 virgin. Instead they'll have to settle for a bunch of people enjoying something you don't.

    2. Re:Exceptionally useless by TheWindBlows · · Score: 1

      Yes it is, but it's best to think of this as a live comedy sketch.

    3. Re:Exceptionally useless by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      Just...why?!?

      For the lulz? I wonder if it is more useful than talking about how useless it is on Slashdot? This article itself will have many thousands of words poured into the comment field and to what end? At least they may have a working Linux install at the end. All we have is that empty feeling your get when you think someone is wrong on the internet.

    4. Re:Exceptionally useless by iONiUM · · Score: 1

      Marketing. It's working.

  13. Next level: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Accomplish the following task using crowd input:

    Write from scratch a Twitch emulator and an AI that emulates a Twitch user. Millions of instances of that AI shall give aggregated input to the Twitch emulator, with the goal of conducting this experiment inside that emulator.

    It goes on.

    1. Re:Next level: by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      And in the end, we have a fresh new play by Shakespeare?

  14. Re:Exceptionally useless, indeed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Can't hear you, busy playing monopoly alone.

  15. Dear cockroaches/meerkats/squid by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    Dear cockroaches/meerkats/squid/whatever

        If you've reached the point where you can read this you've probably discovered plenty of evidence of our existence. If we had an idea what questions you'd ask, we'd have left answers. But we didn't. Because we were always way too focussed on trivial shit.

        So all there is to say is this: we're sorry we fucked it up. Try to be better than us.

        Yours sincerely,
                the apes.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  16. Re:install gentoo by JSG · · Score: 1

    "The point of Gentoo, after all, is extreme configurability. It's not so much a question of tweaking for speed (a common misconception about Gentoo--and a common accusation about the motivations of its users); the big thing is that it lets you add or exclude features according to your own needs and desires. In Gentoo, you have to know what you are doing."

    "A complaint we hear about Arch is that its developers drive many of the choices, choices that Gentoo leaves open to the user."

    They are both fabulous distros as are all the rest. They have different focuses. I think the Gentoo ricer thing was laid to rest years ago - it was pretty old when I started with it in 2002. With Arch, you do tend to get what you are given and that is an awful lot, but you still have lots of choice - far more in general than other binary distros. Even then you still get far more choice than say with Windows or iWotsit. Moving back to Arch, you always have the AUR for your guilty fixes and Ubuntu has PPAs and frankly you can always get at the source and compile your own.

    FFS - we have so much choice now it is an embarrassment of riches. Revel in it and enjoy a golden age. Did I mention *BSD? Sorry: more freely available choice - fantastic.

    Cheers
    Jon

  17. Re:TERMS OF SERVICE? by KGIII · · Score: 1

    You have, obviously, never seen me game nor seen me install Arch. I dare say, they're not entirely dissimilar. A bit of poke and hope here, a guess there, a hope there's a save feature here, and tada! Somehow, I rescue the princess - while playing Zork.

    --
    "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  18. Re:TERMS OF SERVICE? by zAPPzAPP · · Score: 1

    Just now 60k people are watching Bob Ross paint happy trees on Twitch.
    Their definition of 'gaming' is not very strict and is only enforced when it suits them.

  19. "Twitch compiles Gentoo" by cfalcon · · Score: 1

    "Twitch compiles Gentoo" would probably end up with compiler flags optimizing for a Commodore 64 or something.

  20. Re:install gentoo by Ash-Fox · · Score: 1

    I think the Gentoo ricer thing was laid to rest years ago

    I can confirm that Gentoo is still for ricers.

    --
    Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.