I started with RedHat 5.2 in '99. I think the distro I put on the G3 at the high school was LinuxPPC.
SuSE 6.3 was great - there was so much software on all the CDs.
I liked how the dev version of Mandrake had really current packages so I upgraded my live running system from SuSE to Mandrake Cooker. This was a terrible idea especially since that was still before the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard. I made it work.
I rebuilt and modified Mandrake and made my own version which I called Malcolm Linux (with the Malcolm X Window System of course)
After I while the folks at the Rice Linux Users Group sold me on Debian
Debian ran too well - I missed fixing things that broke. So I installed Gentoo, which provided countless hours of fun.
When I wanted things to work well again I switched to Ubuntu and that's where I'm at now. I maintain a PPA of a few modified packages, but mostly it does everything out of the box.
Your motorola runs Linux, huh? Well sure, I guess that's cool.
I mean that's great and all, but is there hardware documentation and source code for everything? Is there any possibility of hacking it to record conversations in progress? Can I install a instant messenger program that supports the protocol my coworkers use, and integrates with the phone's existing UI? What about deleting all the pre-installed themes and ringtones to free up memory for the stuff I actually want? If I want to pay someone to write a plug-in to sync it to my favorite PIM, will I be able to provide them with the needed information to do it?
Linux phones are a novelty. Open source, open design phones, Linux or otherwise, are a godsend.
There are some things in there we still can't do today that he had working over 15 years ago on 33mhz hardware.
But still, more than the cool features, I'd like to actually own my own phone. You see right now, I don't have any control over the way my phone works. If there's some little thing I want to be different, I can't even pay someone to change it. I don't have the final say on what's on my phone; the manufacturer and service provider do. So it's not really my phone, is it?
They're discounting this edition of the phone since it's for developers and doesn't have all the bits. Here's a quote from the openmoko mailing list:
The delays have been expensive for us and annoying for you. We've decided that instead of setting up a complicated return or tracking system to remember who gets a discount for GTA02, we going to give you _all_ a discount on GTA01.
We're going to sell the Neo Base for $300. The Neo Advanced will be $450.
GTA02 (AKA: The Mass Market Neo 1973) is on schedule to go on sale in October. It will have the following new hardware components:
I'm on their mailing list. I get the announcement e-mail. Maybe I'll get one and get in on the dev action. That's weird, the site's not responding. I wonder what killed their web server; I don't think there's that many people on the list. Oh well, I wonder what's on slashdot...
A lot of people confuse the package formats with package managers
These are the major package formats 1. rpm - redhat/fedora/centos, suse/opensuse, mandriva,... 2. dpkg - debian, ubuntu, xandros, linspire,... 3. tarball - slackware, gentoo,...
Each of these have tools that let you perform basic operations - install, uninstall, upgrade. On top of this we add package managers that handle dependency resolution.
1. rpm - yum, apt, urpmi, zypper... (yes you can use apt with rpm) 2. dpkg - apt 3. tarballs - swaret, portage (note that with gentoo one usually skips the binary package part, but you can create and use them)
And each of these package managers has its gui frontends which either call the command line tool or use its library functions
1. yum - pirut/pup,.. 2. apt - synaptic, aptitude.. 3. zypper - yast (though they reverse the naming; they say zypper is a command line version of yast, rather than the other way around) 4. urpmi - rpmdrake 5. swaret - kswaret,.. 6. portage - porthole, kuroo,..
It seems like that's a lot of fragmentation, but compare to windows which DOESNT HAVE A SOFTWARE REPOSITORY or package management tool of any utility
So they're already having to do some significant processing on the source data. If they drive by 2-3 times they can combine the runs to produce a final image that only has things that don't move in it.
Gentoo isn't so much a distro as an educational game. If your system works better than an Ubuntu box, you're winning.
There's always a way to fix these problems.
1. Use 'quickpkg' to save important things like Python before you break them 2. Plow over broken dependencies with 'emerge -C' 3. revdep-rebuild when needed 4. If it doesn't work, try the ~x86 package 6. emerge -uDNv world 7. wait a day, emerge --sync, try again 8. update often!! stale systems are harder to update
And the craziest trick of all.... 9. backup your/etc and unpack the latest stage3 tarball on top of your installation
One of those things should fix just about any update problem you encounter
Some friends of mine and I and ran this experiment too. For calculations (not graphing) the hp scientific calculators are the fastest (we were using 32sII's) because all the functions could be accessed quickly and the buttons were such that you did not have to look at the device to know they were pressed. For complex calculations with lots of parenthesis, RPN meant typing about half as many keys, but this didn't seem to be quite as big of a factor as having all the functions available quickly.
What recourse do they have? They can look around for their frikken SLA. If they don't have one, then it's time for them to realize they aren't paying for guaranteed connectivity.
6 verio.dfw03.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.10.30) 7.682 ms 7.723 ms 7.283 ms
7 pop1-dls-p3-2.atdn.net (66.185.133.93) 7.515 ms 6.929 ms 6.793 ms
8 bb1-dls-p0-0.atdn.net (66.185.133.80) 8.176 ms 66.393 ms 13.965 ms
9 pop2-dls-p0-0.atdn.net (66.185.133.97) 7.083 ms 6.703 ms 7.292 ms 10 rr-houston.atdn.net (66.185.132.18) 7.571 ms 7.125 ms 7.943 ms
or at least it's been fixed for roadrunner cogent in Texas
If you're not a roadrunner user, and you don't have people on roadrunner who expect your site to be up all the time, then it's no surprise you didn't notice.
I used to administer 4 computer labs of 25 systems each at a major university. This involved untrusted users having unsupervised anonymous physical access.
Here's what I had set up: 1. Set the machines to power themselves off in the afternoons and on in the morning. 2. Set up a reasonable security policy; enough to prevent the lesser script kiddies from installing anything. 3. Here's the key: Ghost the labs on a regular basis. Since it uses multicast, if you've got a box of floppies and a couple of monkeys to help you put the disks in, it doesn't take much longer to ghost a whole lab than it does to do 1 machine.
a friend of mine recently put up a discussion of vodka on his lj, and it's worth a look Vodka 101 Here's the short version: 1. Don't drink anything that comes in a plastic bottle 2. If you must drink domestic Vodka, make it Skyy 3. Priviet is awesome if you can find it, and not very expensive
Slashdot Mirror
Does this mean next year will be the year of the Linux desktop?
I started with RedHat 5.2 in '99. I think the distro I put on the G3 at the high school was LinuxPPC.
SuSE 6.3 was great - there was so much software on all the CDs.
I liked how the dev version of Mandrake had really current packages so I upgraded my live running system from SuSE to Mandrake Cooker. This was a terrible idea especially since that was still before the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard. I made it work.
I rebuilt and modified Mandrake and made my own version which I called Malcolm Linux (with the Malcolm X Window System of course)
After I while the folks at the Rice Linux Users Group sold me on Debian
Debian ran too well - I missed fixing things that broke. So I installed Gentoo, which provided countless hours of fun.
When I wanted things to work well again I switched to Ubuntu and that's where I'm at now. I maintain a PPA of a few modified packages, but mostly it does everything out of the box.
I guess that puts an end to the phrase "when Debian freezes on a regular schedule"
Your motorola runs Linux, huh? Well sure, I guess that's cool.
I mean that's great and all, but is there hardware documentation and source code for everything? Is there any possibility of hacking it to record conversations in progress? Can I install a instant messenger program that supports the protocol my coworkers use, and integrates with the phone's existing UI? What about deleting all the pre-installed themes and ringtones to free up memory for the stuff I actually want? If I want to pay someone to write a plug-in to sync it to my favorite PIM, will I be able to provide them with the needed information to do it?
Linux phones are a novelty. Open source, open design phones, Linux or otherwise, are a godsend.
Watch this video through to the end and tell me Jobs doesn't innovate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j02b8Fuz73A
There are some things in there we still can't do today that he had working over 15 years ago on 33mhz hardware.
But still, more than the cool features, I'd like to actually own my own phone. You see right now, I don't have any control over the way my phone works. If there's some little thing I want to be different, I can't even pay someone to change it. I don't have the final say on what's on my phone; the manufacturer and service provider do. So it's not really my phone, is it?
I'm on their mailing list.
I get the announcement e-mail.
Maybe I'll get one and get in on the dev action.
That's weird, the site's not responding.
I wonder what killed their web server;
I don't think there's that many people on the list.
Oh well, I wonder what's on slashdot...
A lot of people confuse the package formats with package managers
... ... ...
... (yes you can use apt with rpm)
.. .. ..
These are the major package formats
1. rpm - redhat/fedora/centos, suse/opensuse, mandriva,
2. dpkg - debian, ubuntu, xandros, linspire,
3. tarball - slackware, gentoo,
Each of these have tools that let you perform basic operations - install, uninstall, upgrade. On top of this we add package managers that handle dependency resolution.
1. rpm - yum, apt, urpmi, zypper
2. dpkg - apt
3. tarballs - swaret, portage (note that with gentoo one usually skips the binary package part, but you can create and use them)
And each of these package managers has its gui frontends which either call the command line tool or use its library functions
1. yum - pirut/pup,
2. apt - synaptic, aptitude..
3. zypper - yast (though they reverse the naming; they say zypper is a command line version of yast, rather than the other way around)
4. urpmi - rpmdrake
5. swaret - kswaret,
6. portage - porthole, kuroo,
It seems like that's a lot of fragmentation, but compare to windows which DOESNT HAVE A SOFTWARE REPOSITORY or package management tool of any utility
So they're already having to do some significant processing on the source data. If they drive by 2-3 times they can combine the runs to produce a final image that only has things that don't move in it.
No, if the program uses gksu to ask for a root password, then entering the root password should actually make it come up as root.
oh, and
emerge -ev world
That one's lots of fun
Gentoo isn't so much a distro as an educational game. If your system works better than an Ubuntu box, you're winning.
/etc and unpack the latest stage3 tarball on top of your installation
There's always a way to fix these problems.
1. Use 'quickpkg' to save important things like Python before you break them
2. Plow over broken dependencies with 'emerge -C'
3. revdep-rebuild when needed
4. If it doesn't work, try the ~x86 package
6. emerge -uDNv world
7. wait a day, emerge --sync, try again
8. update often!! stale systems are harder to update
And the craziest trick of all....
9. backup your
One of those things should fix just about any update problem you encounter
I suppose you're posting this comment via a snail-mail to http gateway.
Some friends of mine and I and ran this experiment too. For calculations (not graphing) the hp scientific calculators are the fastest (we were using 32sII's) because all the functions could be accessed quickly and the buttons were such that you did not have to look at the device to know they were pressed. For complex calculations with lots of parenthesis, RPN meant typing about half as many keys, but this didn't seem to be quite as big of a factor as having all the functions available quickly.
What recourse do they have? They can look around for their frikken SLA. If they don't have one, then it's time for them to realize they aren't paying for guaranteed connectivity.
gorram it, I will mispronounce things how I want
[insert goat-seeks link here]
btw, this problem has already been resolved
6 verio.dfw03.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.10.30) 7.682 ms 7.723 ms 7.283 ms
7 pop1-dls-p3-2.atdn.net (66.185.133.93) 7.515 ms 6.929 ms 6.793 ms
8 bb1-dls-p0-0.atdn.net (66.185.133.80) 8.176 ms 66.393 ms 13.965 ms
9 pop2-dls-p0-0.atdn.net (66.185.133.97) 7.083 ms 6.703 ms 7.292 ms
10 rr-houston.atdn.net (66.185.132.18) 7.571 ms 7.125 ms 7.943 ms
or at least it's been fixed for roadrunner cogent in Texas
Does this make sense?
Oh, I'm sorry, now.
But we do have a parting gift for you.
[insert gote-see link here]
heh, guess he called the wrong helpdesk
I work support for a hosting company on cogent, and knew about it the moment I arrived at work Wednesday
replied to wrong comment, oops
I will now go commit seppuku
Right, since one can just get dozens of gigabits of satellite bandwidth for free, that solves everything.
If you're not a roadrunner user, and you don't have people on roadrunner who expect your site to be up all the time, then it's no surprise you didn't notice.
I used to administer 4 computer labs of 25 systems each at a major university. This involved untrusted users having unsupervised anonymous physical access.
Here's what I had set up:
1. Set the machines to power themselves off in the afternoons and on in the morning.
2. Set up a reasonable security policy; enough to prevent the lesser script kiddies from installing anything.
3. Here's the key: Ghost the labs on a regular basis. Since it uses multicast, if you've got a box of floppies and a couple of monkeys to help you put the disks in, it doesn't take much longer to ghost a whole lab than it does to do 1 machine.
I love me some arachne
on a good connection, arachne on a 386 is actually not bad
From the guy who brought you the AK-47: Kalashnikov Vodka
a friend of mine recently put up a discussion of vodka on his lj, and it's worth a look
Vodka 101
Here's the short version:
1. Don't drink anything that comes in a plastic bottle
2. If you must drink domestic Vodka, make it Skyy
3. Priviet is awesome if you can find it, and not very expensive