My install of redhat, apache couldn't find the ldap module. Could be I was looking in the wrong place, but I ran out of places to look. (i.e. "find" couldn't find the ldap module and it wasn't compiled in).
As for subversion, it works differently than cvs (or so the svn install docs have led me to believe). If you want LDAP and some of the more sophistocated features, it says to use apache. The standalone server is pretty limited.
Windows is in the sweet spot of how much it does without asking you, and in how many options it has. Linux does absolutely nothing without explicitly being told. Apple does a whole lot without consulting you for your opinion on the matter. Windows is in the middle, offering what many find an acceptable compromise of configurability and functionality.
Yeah, I guess that's my problem with it... not a fan of the graphical interfaces on Linux. Got used to running stuff command line, and if I have X open (which is not often) it's usually so I can have multiple terminals up. Linux is my escape from the GUI clickfest world. Most often, I'm ssh'd from another room. Having much of the configuraiton of the machine only accessible by pretty buttons while sitting at the box itself tends to hinder the whole admin-from-anywhere appeal of Linux, so I avoid it when I can.
As for reading up on it, yeah, more of that needs to be done. So many manuals (which to use?), so little time, and as a native Windows user I sometimes find myself under the misguided delusion that, once I've figured out how to run something, I should be able to run that exact same thing elsewhere by following the same steps.
...rather, a complete and utter lack of *recommended* choices is the killer. (apologies in advance for lumping Linux and Open Source together)
Every Linux app I install has a laundry list of "you must have ______ installed first" items on the list. Fine. So I go to install those, and each of those apps has its own laundry list. Fine, whatever. It's a pain in the neck, but I can deal. I should only have to install each of those new apps once (and perhaps upgrade once in a long while for security, stability, or new features), yes?
Not so fast, buddy. Most open source Linux apps have this nasty habit of having a good deal of their useful features turned off by default. Turned off, that is, meaning not compiled into the program. At install time, you can specify config options. There's usually a list of 40 or so that you can include if you like... some are harmless, others will nerf the program. But unless you've configured that particular app a half dozen times before, there are probably a few options the hapless admin neglects to specify properly, and he doesn't find out until quite a bit later, when he finds himself re-re-recompiling.
Hey, says the open source community, he should RTFM! And indeed he should. But when the documentation for "--use-feature-x" is "Enables use of Feature X", or worse, "TBD: Write a more helpful explanation," the only source of useful information is a mailing list archive where someone else has encountered your cryptic error message and gotten their problem solved in a manner that is relevant to your situation. That, or there are SO many options that signal gets lost in noise. Or those options are only relevant if he's running Python 2.4 on a version of Fedora Core (64-bit only) that is less than 6 months old and Apache 1.3 or 2.2 but not 2.0, with LDAP implementations other than OpenLDAP, or if it's Thursday.
Repeat this about 15 times as the necessary feature enablings, version upgrades, etc. percolate back to the app you actually WANT to install, and you begin to wonder about how good an idea this whole "open source" thing is.
And this is all AFTER you've made a decision. A frightening number of install docs include a phrase like "you can use one of 4 database/server/scripting implementations. They are all different. They are all good and bad at different things. We used to like option A, but now we're feeling differently about option B, ever since they made a dirty gesture at option C. Option D (the one you already have installed on your system and are familiar with) is far superior, but we don't fully support it, and there's a 1% chance it'll hose your system when used with our software. You should go sit in a corner and mull over the pros and cons for the next two hours." Would "Option B is a good choice unless you're serving a REALLY big filesystem, in which case you should use Option C. A and D are also available, in case you care" be so hard?
The open source world, in its efforts to give the consumer lots of choices, seems reluctant to give recommendations. If they TELL you that you'll save a crapload of time at the expense of a miniscule performance hit by including a few extra modules in your apache install, somehow they've done a disservice to the community as a whole by preferring one feature over another. Which client should I use to connect to my new server? "Well, there are 38 available. 15 of them will hang and leave dangling processes on the server, and another 10 don't even have the support for the most useful feature, but that's not our problem... enjoy the impartial list." The ones that DO give recommendations for packages and configurations then usually have conflicts or inconsistencies with the packages they recommend, leaving you, the admin (or, HORROR OF HORRORS, desktop-users Nana and Pop-Pop), to trial-and-error smooth the edges for the next hour/day/week.
One thing Windows really has going for it is that, for better or worse, applications seem to come with default configura
Wow, you had a lot less trouble with your Apache install than I did with the one I just set up. It's like the installation docs intentionally withhold useful information to increase the fun!
Yes, your system comes with apache preinstalled, like you asked for in the setup. You just want to use it to host static webpages, right? Cool, just start the daemon. Ohhhhhhh, you want it to start when the computer boots? No problem. Just set it that way in the proper location. Which location? Well, you're using RedHat, so instead of the 4 other ways you set it up before in other distros, in this case you'll have to rename a file somewhere. Got it? Cool.
Ohhhhhhhh, you wanted to use apache for SUBVERSION? Go back and recompile Apache. You'll have to get the tarball. And the things it depends on. Ohhhhhhh, you wanted to compile apache? Go back and recompile apr-utils. Cool now? Cool.
Ohhhhhhhhh, you wanted to use LDAP for authentication? Yeah, I know you have LDAP working elsewhere on your machine. If you want it to work with apache, you have to recompile apache for LDAP. I hope you wrote down the 8./configure options you used last time, because if you leave one out, you gotta do it again.
Now let's see how to set this up. More google!
Which of the 83 different ways to set up your httpd.conf (you're using the one in the right location, yes?) will work properly with your configuration? There's only one way to find out. Oh, and that's 83 hex.
Keep the tests if you must. I took them from first grade on. They took half-days of class for one week, once a year. Not world-ending waste. Ditch the test-specific prep. If the kids can do math, they can do test-math, but if all they can do is test-math, they're screwed.
Well kids can't read but at least they know how to kill space mutants.
The irony of that reality will be realized eventually, when the space mutants that have infiltrated our society and rendered our citizens completely illiterate through the creation of educational game software finally reveal their true nature, assuming control of society in its entirety quite easily due to our lack of basic literary aptitude, only to be foiled by the mutant-killing skills of the otherwise completely helpless populace.
The shame, of course, will be that nobody will actually appreciate the irony when it happens.
Indeed. I know of a lot of people that would be great teachers and are turned off by the grotesque amount of red tape involved in teaching in public schools.
Hey, the kid in the back eating the paste is losing out just as bad as everyone else. He's actually a step ahead, having determined long ago that the meaningless standardized-test facts being spewed in his direction aren't worth paying attention to. Were YOU allowed to eat in class? I think not!
Spellcheckers make people worse spellers, not better. They produce better spelling, but they make people worse spellers. Rather than reading over their own writing, people just assume the spellchecker will catch it, and so the poor spelling is reinforced.
Was getting on the 405 in L.A. on one of those 270-degree-wide-turn-to-the-right onramps. When you hit the straightaway, there's not much visibility and not much time to accelerate to match the speed of traffic. I'd gotten up to 50 to match a mergeable opening when, out of nowhere, no more than 20 feet in front of me, there are two cars in my lane. Stopped. For no particular reason at all. Without thinking, my hours of Need for Speed and Super Mario Kart had me involuntarily swerving to the left, missing the car in front of me by what couldn't possibly be more than a foot (I put it at a few inches). I thought I might have even nicked the guy, so I slowed off and waited for him to catch up. Both cars just up and drove off, though, as if nothing had happened. They hadn't hit each other or anything. The guy in front just had determined that the right lane of the 405 was a perfectly reasonable place to come to a complete stop for a while.
essentially prohibit using false information to create an e-mail account
What about using no information whatsoever to create an e-mail account? Last time I checked, you could just up and make an account on a whim. I have dozens on my domain, all of which have no false information, nor any true information. All they have is a username and password.
Technology is the one thing I can think of that, above all others, would have made kindergarten WORSE. The extent of readily-available technology we had in my kindergarten in 1986 was the cassette player for random songs for us to dance to and sing along with.
Biotech was another issue entirely. Our teacher had an extra set of eyes IN THE BACK OF HER HEAD!!!!!! And we learned of a sharp tooth snail that lives IN OUR NOSES and will cut off any fingers that end up inside.
As far as giving kids an advantage, though, I think keeping tech, especially computers, OUT of kindergarten is the best thing you can do.
after indicating they read and understood the terms and function of the SiteKey
Yes, becuase we know people read everything that they click "I read and understood" on. Heck, I don't think there are enough hours in a day to read and understand everything the average person claims to read and understand.
Yes, and what of people who make an account, then don't sign in for six months? Many people can't remember a password THEY created for very long, let alone a picture they picked out, or, more importantly, the fact that picking out a picture was important, or WHICH of the 138 sites they have accounts with is the one that had them pick out a picture.
Well, for me, I suppose I do remember that it was BofA that had me pick out a picture, because it was, by far, the most painfully arduous account-creation system I've ever used. If it wasn't for me being extremely paranoid about an issue with my credit card, I'd have bailed very early out of creating an account.
I think a more accurate analogy might be that most of the nation's roads are built with Fords in mind, and his Dodge, while far superior on roads built with Dodges in mind, has no steering or braking capability on Ford-centric roads. If the car works at all on those roads, it's likely to crash.
Slashdot Mirror
My install of redhat, apache couldn't find the ldap module. Could be I was looking in the wrong place, but I ran out of places to look. (i.e. "find" couldn't find the ldap module and it wasn't compiled in).
As for subversion, it works differently than cvs (or so the svn install docs have led me to believe). If you want LDAP and some of the more sophistocated features, it says to use apache. The standalone server is pretty limited.
Windows is in the sweet spot of how much it does without asking you, and in how many options it has. Linux does absolutely nothing without explicitly being told. Apple does a whole lot without consulting you for your opinion on the matter. Windows is in the middle, offering what many find an acceptable compromise of configurability and functionality.
Clarification: I'm most familiar with Slackware. It's not what I'm running at the moment.
Yeah, I guess that's my problem with it... not a fan of the graphical interfaces on Linux. Got used to running stuff command line, and if I have X open (which is not often) it's usually so I can have multiple terminals up. Linux is my escape from the GUI clickfest world. Most often, I'm ssh'd from another room. Having much of the configuraiton of the machine only accessible by pretty buttons while sitting at the box itself tends to hinder the whole admin-from-anywhere appeal of Linux, so I avoid it when I can.
As for reading up on it, yeah, more of that needs to be done. So many manuals (which to use?), so little time, and as a native Windows user I sometimes find myself under the misguided delusion that, once I've figured out how to run something, I should be able to run that exact same thing elsewhere by following the same steps.
And where is slackware-accustomed little me supposed to find out about chkconfig?
...rather, a complete and utter lack of *recommended* choices is the killer. (apologies in advance for lumping Linux and Open Source together)
Every Linux app I install has a laundry list of "you must have ______ installed first" items on the list. Fine. So I go to install those, and each of those apps has its own laundry list. Fine, whatever. It's a pain in the neck, but I can deal. I should only have to install each of those new apps once (and perhaps upgrade once in a long while for security, stability, or new features), yes?
Not so fast, buddy. Most open source Linux apps have this nasty habit of having a good deal of their useful features turned off by default. Turned off, that is, meaning not compiled into the program. At install time, you can specify config options. There's usually a list of 40 or so that you can include if you like... some are harmless, others will nerf the program. But unless you've configured that particular app a half dozen times before, there are probably a few options the hapless admin neglects to specify properly, and he doesn't find out until quite a bit later, when he finds himself re-re-recompiling.
Hey, says the open source community, he should RTFM! And indeed he should. But when the documentation for "--use-feature-x" is "Enables use of Feature X", or worse, "TBD: Write a more helpful explanation," the only source of useful information is a mailing list archive where someone else has encountered your cryptic error message and gotten their problem solved in a manner that is relevant to your situation. That, or there are SO many options that signal gets lost in noise. Or those options are only relevant if he's running Python 2.4 on a version of Fedora Core (64-bit only) that is less than 6 months old and Apache 1.3 or 2.2 but not 2.0, with LDAP implementations other than OpenLDAP, or if it's Thursday.
Repeat this about 15 times as the necessary feature enablings, version upgrades, etc. percolate back to the app you actually WANT to install, and you begin to wonder about how good an idea this whole "open source" thing is.
And this is all AFTER you've made a decision. A frightening number of install docs include a phrase like "you can use one of 4 database/server/scripting implementations. They are all different. They are all good and bad at different things. We used to like option A, but now we're feeling differently about option B, ever since they made a dirty gesture at option C. Option D (the one you already have installed on your system and are familiar with) is far superior, but we don't fully support it, and there's a 1% chance it'll hose your system when used with our software. You should go sit in a corner and mull over the pros and cons for the next two hours." Would "Option B is a good choice unless you're serving a REALLY big filesystem, in which case you should use Option C. A and D are also available, in case you care" be so hard?
The open source world, in its efforts to give the consumer lots of choices, seems reluctant to give recommendations. If they TELL you that you'll save a crapload of time at the expense of a miniscule performance hit by including a few extra modules in your apache install, somehow they've done a disservice to the community as a whole by preferring one feature over another. Which client should I use to connect to my new server? "Well, there are 38 available. 15 of them will hang and leave dangling processes on the server, and another 10 don't even have the support for the most useful feature, but that's not our problem... enjoy the impartial list." The ones that DO give recommendations for packages and configurations then usually have conflicts or inconsistencies with the packages they recommend, leaving you, the admin (or, HORROR OF HORRORS, desktop-users Nana and Pop-Pop), to trial-and-error smooth the edges for the next hour/day/week.
One thing Windows really has going for it is that, for better or worse, applications seem to come with default configura
Wow, you had a lot less trouble with your Apache install than I did with the one I just set up. It's like the installation docs intentionally withhold useful information to increase the fun!
./configure options you used last time, because if you leave one out, you gotta do it again.
Yes, your system comes with apache preinstalled, like you asked for in the setup. You just want to use it to host static webpages, right? Cool, just start the daemon. Ohhhhhhh, you want it to start when the computer boots? No problem. Just set it that way in the proper location. Which location? Well, you're using RedHat, so instead of the 4 other ways you set it up before in other distros, in this case you'll have to rename a file somewhere. Got it? Cool.
Ohhhhhhhh, you wanted to use apache for SUBVERSION? Go back and recompile Apache. You'll have to get the tarball. And the things it depends on. Ohhhhhhh, you wanted to compile apache? Go back and recompile apr-utils. Cool now? Cool.
Ohhhhhhhhh, you wanted to use LDAP for authentication? Yeah, I know you have LDAP working elsewhere on your machine. If you want it to work with apache, you have to recompile apache for LDAP. I hope you wrote down the 8
Now let's see how to set this up. More google!
Which of the 83 different ways to set up your httpd.conf (you're using the one in the right location, yes?) will work properly with your configuration? There's only one way to find out. Oh, and that's 83 hex.
Ohhhhhhh, you want to use python??
Keep the tests if you must. I took them from first grade on. They took half-days of class for one week, once a year. Not world-ending waste. Ditch the test-specific prep. If the kids can do math, they can do test-math, but if all they can do is test-math, they're screwed.
But now they make no claim to having proper spelling and grammar. It's when it's bad and you claim it's good that it goes down the tubes.
Well kids can't read but at least they know how to kill space mutants.
The irony of that reality will be realized eventually, when the space mutants that have infiltrated our society and rendered our citizens completely illiterate through the creation of educational game software finally reveal their true nature, assuming control of society in its entirety quite easily due to our lack of basic literary aptitude, only to be foiled by the mutant-killing skills of the otherwise completely helpless populace.
The shame, of course, will be that nobody will actually appreciate the irony when it happens.
If the game can teach people the difference between "everyday" and "every day", I'm all for it!
For posterity:
"everyday" = ordinary, commonplace.
"every day" = daily, once per day.
You played Madden 2000 when you were a kid.
You, sir, have just succeeded in making me feel older than dirt.
Indeed. I know of a lot of people that would be great teachers and are turned off by the grotesque amount of red tape involved in teaching in public schools.
Hey, the kid in the back eating the paste is losing out just as bad as everyone else. He's actually a step ahead, having determined long ago that the meaningless standardized-test facts being spewed in his direction aren't worth paying attention to. Were YOU allowed to eat in class? I think not!
Spellcheckers make people worse spellers, not better. They produce better spelling, but they make people worse spellers. Rather than reading over their own writing, people just assume the spellchecker will catch it, and so the poor spelling is reinforced.
Another similar experience here.
Was getting on the 405 in L.A. on one of those 270-degree-wide-turn-to-the-right onramps. When you hit the straightaway, there's not much visibility and not much time to accelerate to match the speed of traffic. I'd gotten up to 50 to match a mergeable opening when, out of nowhere, no more than 20 feet in front of me, there are two cars in my lane. Stopped. For no particular reason at all. Without thinking, my hours of Need for Speed and Super Mario Kart had me involuntarily swerving to the left, missing the car in front of me by what couldn't possibly be more than a foot (I put it at a few inches). I thought I might have even nicked the guy, so I slowed off and waited for him to catch up. Both cars just up and drove off, though, as if nothing had happened. They hadn't hit each other or anything. The guy in front just had determined that the right lane of the 405 was a perfectly reasonable place to come to a complete stop for a while.
This could explain the intense physical reaction to fingernails on a chalkboard. Hits just the right frequency, perhaps...
essentially prohibit using false information to create an e-mail account
What about using no information whatsoever to create an e-mail account? Last time I checked, you could just up and make an account on a whim. I have dozens on my domain, all of which have no false information, nor any true information. All they have is a username and password.
Glue? We had no need for such newfangled technology in kindergarten. We had PASTE!!!! (i.e. a bottle of GlueStick) And we were THANKFUL!!!!
Technology is the one thing I can think of that, above all others, would have made kindergarten WORSE. The extent of readily-available technology we had in my kindergarten in 1986 was the cassette player for random songs for us to dance to and sing along with.
Biotech was another issue entirely. Our teacher had an extra set of eyes IN THE BACK OF HER HEAD!!!!!! And we learned of a sharp tooth snail that lives IN OUR NOSES and will cut off any fingers that end up inside.
As far as giving kids an advantage, though, I think keeping tech, especially computers, OUT of kindergarten is the best thing you can do.
That's all fine and good, except for one minor issue...
We're cutting down the trees faster than they can regrow.
after indicating they read and understood the terms and function of the SiteKey
Yes, becuase we know people read everything that they click "I read and understood" on. Heck, I don't think there are enough hours in a day to read and understand everything the average person claims to read and understand.
Yes, and what of people who make an account, then don't sign in for six months? Many people can't remember a password THEY created for very long, let alone a picture they picked out, or, more importantly, the fact that picking out a picture was important, or WHICH of the 138 sites they have accounts with is the one that had them pick out a picture.
Well, for me, I suppose I do remember that it was BofA that had me pick out a picture, because it was, by far, the most painfully arduous account-creation system I've ever used. If it wasn't for me being extremely paranoid about an issue with my credit card, I'd have bailed very early out of creating an account.
I think a more accurate analogy might be that most of the nation's roads are built with Fords in mind, and his Dodge, while far superior on roads built with Dodges in mind, has no steering or braking capability on Ford-centric roads. If the car works at all on those roads, it's likely to crash.
Not incredibly spectacular, but the prices are predictable and fairly low.
You buy the phone. ($70 up)
25 cents per minute.
$25 for 100 minutes, expires only if you haven't filled it in 90 days.
Ends up costing me about $10-15/month.