Actually, it's "Presidents' Day"... note, plural Presidents. The specific Presidents referenced are George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, who both had birthdays in February. Both centuries dead, and thus obviously longer ruling, and both generally considered among the "great" American Presidents.
I think our _current_ President's day was a few days ago, when the lynch mob failed to get the votes they needed for conviction...
I like the little running guy who falls flat on his face whenever the operation it's trying to do fails. It's SMIT's only redeeming feature.
Seriously, though... it wouldn't be too bad if options were kept in some sort of sensible location. I have never been able to figure out the thinking of whoever organized all the sub-menus, though.
Yeah, but no one on Slashdot actually listens to Katz's drivel. Given the reaction every time he posts something, I'm not sure why Rob keeps him around...
The one thing here I have to disagree with is the statement that Open Source will never be user friendly. Not all geeks are coders first; there are UI geeks, too. As Linux has gone more mainstream, it's started attracting more of that type, when before it was the domain of the hard-core systems hacker. GIMP/GTK and GNOME and KDE are symptoms of this trend. Based on the reasoning you put forward here - people do their most elegant work when they're doing it for the sake of the work, not for money - it shouldn't be long before Linux has the most elegant UI in the OS world.
Looking into lasers is bad for your eyes. You think? Maybe this is why even consumer devices like CD drives have warning labels on them... (With your one remaining eye, do not look back into the laser...)
And electromagnetic pulses are bad for electronics. Umm... didn't we all learn this one in "Surviving a Nuclear War 101"? (Hide under a desk or table until the shockwave has passed. Have plenty of canned food on hand. Make sure you have a manual can opener, your electric one will not work because of EMP. Do not use elevators during nuclear attacks; use the stairs instead. Do not attempt to converse with dead bodies, it only causes psychological problems...)
And what's the KBG, anyway? Is that the new politically correct spelling of "KGB"? (Dyslexics, untie! You have nothing to lose but your chinas...)
Honestly, the mainstream media these days...
"have to use" != "love"
on
Love of Unix
·
· Score: 1
>...if you love games you have to use windows.
There's a difference, methinks, between being forced to use Windows to play the games you love, and using Windows for its own sake.
> Other people like windows so they can have 1 OS for the whole company.
Again, this isn't using Windows for its own sake... Generally, the suits that make those sort of decisions don't have personal feelings about the OSes in question (well, not positive feelings, anyway... a general fear and loathing of anything computer-related seems to be common). If it was Linux with the 90% monopoly, these same people would be enthusiastically recommending that it be their corporate standard. They don't care what everyone's running, so long as it's the same thing.
I noticed this phenomenon quite a while ago... it seems to me to be the big difference between say, Linux and Microsoft's OSes.
People use NT because it's been mandated by their employer, or it's got the program they need, or because it's the standard, or because they don't know anything else, or they've been brainwashed by Microsoft, or... and I have to say, I've even met one or two people who love the thing.
These other reasons, for the most part, don't apply to Linux. People who use Linux do it because they love it.
This is also true of other Unices, of course, and of OS/2 and the Amiga, and even the Mac, though their love is all mixed up with an unhealthy persecution complex. But no one loves Windows. At best, they tolerate it.
(And before all the moronic flamers get here, let me add that, yes, I've got a girlfriend. And yes, we do sometimes do stuff other than sit around playing with our Linux boxes.)
Yeah... the machine that I've been using for kernels from 2.1.x up through 2.2.1 hasn't even got a floppy drive, or any other removable media, for that matter, and never has. I booted the thing the first time off a 120M drive I pulled out of another Linux box that I'd upgraded to a 2.1G, changed hostnames and IPs and the like, and off she went... She communicates with the rest of the world over ARCnet... if for some reason I need some of her data on a floppy, I just transfer it to another machine and to a floppy from there.
I think a journalling file system is on the wish list for 2.3.
Anyway, the time it takes to fsck the thing shouldn't be a problem. I mean, having to do a fsck implies that your file system may have gotten corrupt, and the most likely cause for that is that your system may have crashed. And, as we all know, Linux boxes don't crash.:) An hour-long fsck once a year when you accidentally trip over the power cord doesn't seem too bad, considering what you'd get in return.
Yeah, but you may notice a small disparity in those patchlevel numbers... It isn't 2.0.1 you're running there, after all. 2.2.* will get there... it just needs a little time to shake the bugs out.
I've put the image up on my site. Now we get to see how well a 486-66 behind a 33.6k modem handles the Slashdot effect.;)
If someone who's got some real bandwidth could grab it and re-mirror it, that would probably be good.
And I have to say... the image may not be perfect, but I've seen worse quality JPEGs of real people... If I hadn't known going in, I would have guessed that it was a real actress in a CGI scene. The one thing I did notice is that she hasn't got any finger/hand prints...
Looks to me here like Netscape keeps stuff like that in ~/.netscape/cache, which has 700 permissions. No one's about to pick my personal information out of there, unless they're root... and root would be me.;)
Just goes to show that, while having a secure OS doesn't necessarily make your apps secure, you certainly can't have secure apps on an insecure OS...
I keep a script around for doing exactly that, because a couple of my network segments have chronic problems... when they start getting flaky, I start the script up and wander around wiggling connectors until I hear the "ping!".
#!/bin/sh
while [ true ]; do echo -n "ping" ping $1 -c 1 | grep "1 packets received" >/dev/null if [ $? = 0 ]; then echo " PING!" wavplay ding.wav >/dev/null else echo "" fi done
Hmmm... I like this idea. I have name servers... maybe I'll try to implement it.
I could probably set things up so that anyone who was using my name servers could access the domains by their real names - domain.top, or whatever... and those peons who didn't see the light;) could still reference them as domain.top.tld.ci-n.com... a little unwieldy, but it'd work...
Of course, if it caught on, my name servers (and my poor 33.6 line) would be swamped in short order... would have to figure out some way to distribute the load...
Technically, I don't believe you're supposed to have names with a leading numeral. (3com.com would seem to be an exception.) Or maybe it's just you're not allowed to have names that are _all_ numerals... The existing RFCs already address this problem, anyway.
Congratulations, Katz... you just took the _first_ step towards actually _earning_ that title of "Geek" that you've been so proudly flaunting (at least) since you started posting here. See, the problem many Slashdotters have with you isn't your ignorance... we deal with a lot of ignorant people every day. It's the fact that, in the face of your ignorance, you persist on calling yourself "not just a writer for geeks but an actual geek" (very loosely quoted), when in fact you're not either (yet).
You've revealed in previous postings that you've never gotten down inside your hardware before. Now you reveal that you've never gotten down inside your software before, either. Umm... sorry. Not all geeks do both, but you can't be a geek without doing one or the other.
The defining essence of computer geeks is that they're not satisfied with the prettified UIs and the Bondi-blue cases... real geeks open things up to see how they tick. If you don't do that, you can't be a geek, no matter how much you want to be. You may have noticed that geeks have a culture (if you haven't noticed, try reading the Jargon File), and we don't take kindly to outsiders shoving their way in when they don't belong. When a recognized geek calls you a geek, then you'll know you're in... until then, stop shoving.
As for the "writer for geeks" part... well, you can't really write for geeks without being one yourself. You need to understand how we think to write for us, and that understanding will bring geek-dom, and vice versa. Some basic tips, though - lose the flowery prose and the rambling tone. Figure out what your point is, and address it clearly, concisely, and in plain English (or language of your choice - C and Perl are also popular around here). Geeks like simple declarative statements. We like high signal-to-noise ratios. We like using our tools to their maximum capability, and recognize that language is simply a tool for communication. We don't like obfuscation (except as a technical challenge). Remember, Commander Taco isn't paying you by the word.
Download the goddamn patches, people!
on
Linux 2.2.1
·
· Score: 1
You could always try using the full mirror names... that way you can find one you like that gets the kernel quickly and keep going back there. I've had good luck with ftp4.us.kernel.org. ftp2 also seems to get them early, but only as.bz2, and I haven't got enough RAM in this machine to decompress those in anything like a reasonable amount of time, so I don't go back to that one any more.
This also solves the ncftp weirdness you get when two hosts with the same alias don't have the same directory structure.
So we've established here that you're incapable of reading READMEs and INSTALLs to figure out how to type:
$ configure $ make $ su # make install
Also, we've established that you've apparently never seen X.
You then go on to say that Unix administration is a "no-brainer". So which is it? So easy that it's a no-brainer, or so difficult that you can't do it? You can't have it both ways, unless you're just too stupid to handle a "no-brainer". I'm beginning to suspect the last, myself.
And that's "Get A F*cking Clue", incidentally. (That's my guess, anyway... I'm not the guy who wrote that.)
The bitmap is in logo.sys. You can edit it with MS Paint or whatever. The "Please wait" and "Your computer is now safe to shut down" screens are in logow.sys and logos.sys.
Perl *is* a mess... it has the advantage, though, that most of the messiest bits are redundant (TMTOWTDI). You can forget about 'em without affecting your ability to program in the language at all. You can write Perl that looks like just about anything you want. For example, I've been programming C for ages, and just recently picked up Perl... my Perl programs tend to look like C with regexps. It's also possible to write Perl that does exactly the same thing, but looks like the diff of two sendmail.cfs. Most people's code, from what I've seen, is somewhere between.
> I know everyone is all excited about the 2.2 release of the Linux kernel
My guess is that that's exactly why they went to the 2.2.0pre* releases. The more people get excited about these pre-patches, the more people will try them out, and the faster the remaining bugs will get squashed, and the faster we'll have a final 2.2.0. Hopefully, it'll also help reduce the *.0 version syndrome...
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, it's "Presidents' Day"... note, plural Presidents. The specific Presidents referenced are George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, who both had birthdays in February. Both centuries dead, and thus obviously longer ruling, and both generally considered among the "great" American Presidents.
I think our _current_ President's day was a few days ago, when the lynch mob failed to get the votes they needed for conviction...
I like the little running guy who falls flat on his face whenever the operation it's trying to do fails. It's SMIT's only redeeming feature.
Seriously, though... it wouldn't be too bad if options were kept in some sort of sensible location. I have never been able to figure out the thinking of whoever organized all the sub-menus, though.
Yeah, but no one on Slashdot actually listens to Katz's drivel. Given the reaction every time he posts something, I'm not sure why Rob keeps him around...
The one thing here I have to disagree with is the statement that Open Source will never be user friendly. Not all geeks are coders first; there are UI geeks, too. As Linux has gone more mainstream, it's started attracting more of that type, when before it was the domain of the hard-core systems hacker. GIMP/GTK and GNOME and KDE are symptoms of this trend. Based on the reasoning you put forward here - people do their most elegant work when they're doing it for the sake of the work, not for money - it shouldn't be long before Linux has the most elegant UI in the OS world.
Looking into lasers is bad for your eyes. You think? Maybe this is why even consumer devices like CD drives have warning labels on them... (With your one remaining eye, do not look back into the laser...)
And electromagnetic pulses are bad for electronics. Umm... didn't we all learn this one in "Surviving a Nuclear War 101"? (Hide under a desk or table until the shockwave has passed. Have plenty of canned food on hand. Make sure you have a manual can opener, your electric one will not work because of EMP. Do not use elevators during nuclear attacks; use the stairs instead. Do not attempt to converse with dead bodies, it only causes psychological problems...)
And what's the KBG, anyway? Is that the new politically correct spelling of "KGB"? (Dyslexics, untie! You have nothing to lose but your chinas...)
Honestly, the mainstream media these days...
> ...if you love games you have to use windows.
There's a difference, methinks, between being forced to use Windows to play the games you love, and using Windows for its own sake.
> Other people like windows so they can have 1 OS for the whole company.
Again, this isn't using Windows for its own sake... Generally, the suits that make those sort of decisions don't have personal feelings about the OSes in question (well, not positive feelings, anyway... a general fear and loathing of anything computer-related seems to be common). If it was Linux with the 90% monopoly, these same people would be enthusiastically recommending that it be their corporate standard. They don't care what everyone's running, so long as it's the same thing.
I noticed this phenomenon quite a while ago... it seems to me to be the big difference between say, Linux and Microsoft's OSes.
People use NT because it's been mandated by their employer, or it's got the program they need, or because it's the standard, or because they don't know anything else, or they've been brainwashed by Microsoft, or... and I have to say, I've even met one or two people who love the thing.
These other reasons, for the most part, don't apply to Linux. People who use Linux do it because they love it.
This is also true of other Unices, of course, and of OS/2 and the Amiga, and even the Mac, though their love is all mixed up with an unhealthy persecution complex. But no one loves Windows. At best, they tolerate it.
(And before all the moronic flamers get here, let me add that, yes, I've got a girlfriend. And yes, we do sometimes do stuff other than sit around playing with our Linux boxes.)
Yeah... the machine that I've been using for kernels from 2.1.x up through 2.2.1 hasn't even got a floppy drive, or any other removable media, for that matter, and never has. I booted the thing the first time off a 120M drive I pulled out of another Linux box that I'd upgraded to a 2.1G, changed hostnames and IPs and the like, and off she went... She communicates with the rest of the world over ARCnet... if for some reason I need some of her data on a floppy, I just transfer it to another machine and to a floppy from there.
I think a journalling file system is on the wish list for 2.3.
:) An hour-long fsck once a year when you accidentally trip over the power cord doesn't seem too bad, considering what you'd get in return.
Anyway, the time it takes to fsck the thing shouldn't be a problem. I mean, having to do a fsck implies that your file system may have gotten corrupt, and the most likely cause for that is that your system may have crashed. And, as we all know, Linux boxes don't crash.
Yeah, but you may notice a small disparity in those patchlevel numbers... It isn't 2.0.1 you're running there, after all. 2.2.* will get there... it just needs a little time to shake the bugs out.
I've put the image up on my site. Now we get to see how well a 486-66 behind a 33.6k modem handles the Slashdot effect. ;)
If someone who's got some real bandwidth could grab it and re-mirror it, that would probably be good.
And I have to say... the image may not be perfect, but I've seen worse quality JPEGs of real people... If I hadn't known going in, I would have guessed that it was a real actress in a CGI scene. The one thing I did notice is that she hasn't got any finger/hand prints...
Looks to me here like Netscape keeps stuff like that in ~/.netscape/cache, which has 700 permissions. No one's about to pick my personal information out of there, unless they're root... and root would be me. ;)
Just goes to show that, while having a secure OS doesn't necessarily make your apps secure, you certainly can't have secure apps on an insecure OS...
I keep a script around for doing exactly that, because a couple of my network segments have chronic problems... when they start getting flaky, I start the script up and wander around wiggling connectors until I hear the "ping!".
#!/bin/sh
/dev/null /dev/null
while [ true ]; do
echo -n "ping"
ping $1 -c 1 | grep "1 packets received" >
if [ $? = 0 ]; then
echo " PING!"
wavplay ding.wav >
else
echo ""
fi
done
Hmmm... I like this idea. I have name servers... maybe I'll try to implement it.
;) could still reference them as domain.top.tld.ci-n.com... a little unwieldy, but it'd work...
I could probably set things up so that anyone who was using my name servers could access the domains by their real names - domain.top, or whatever... and those peons who didn't see the light
Of course, if it caught on, my name servers (and my poor 33.6 line) would be swamped in short order... would have to figure out some way to distribute the load...
Technically, I don't believe you're supposed to have names with a leading numeral. (3com.com would seem to be an exception.) Or maybe it's just you're not allowed to have names that are _all_ numerals... The existing RFCs already address this problem, anyway.
Congratulations, Katz... you just took the _first_ step towards actually _earning_ that title of "Geek" that you've been so proudly flaunting (at least) since you started posting here. See, the problem many Slashdotters have with you isn't your ignorance... we deal with a lot of ignorant people every day. It's the fact that, in the face of your ignorance, you persist on calling yourself "not just a writer for geeks but an actual geek" (very loosely quoted), when in fact you're not either (yet).
You've revealed in previous postings that you've never gotten down inside your hardware before. Now you reveal that you've never gotten down inside your software before, either. Umm... sorry. Not all geeks do both, but you can't be a geek without doing one or the other.
The defining essence of computer geeks is that they're not satisfied with the prettified UIs and the Bondi-blue cases... real geeks open things up to see how they tick. If you don't do that, you can't be a geek, no matter how much you want to be. You may have noticed that geeks have a culture (if you haven't noticed, try reading the Jargon File), and we don't take kindly to outsiders shoving their way in when they don't belong. When a recognized geek calls you a geek, then you'll know you're in... until then, stop shoving.
As for the "writer for geeks" part... well, you can't really write for geeks without being one yourself. You need to understand how we think to write for us, and that understanding will bring geek-dom, and vice versa. Some basic tips, though - lose the flowery prose and the rambling tone. Figure out what your point is, and address it clearly, concisely, and in plain English (or language of your choice - C and Perl are also popular around here). Geeks like simple declarative statements. We like high signal-to-noise ratios. We like using our tools to their maximum capability, and recognize that language is simply a tool for communication. We don't like obfuscation (except as a technical challenge). Remember, Commander Taco isn't paying you by the word.
You could always try using the full mirror names... that way you can find one you like that gets the kernel quickly and keep going back there. I've had good luck with ftp4.us.kernel.org. ftp2 also seems to get them early, but only as .bz2, and I haven't got enough RAM in this machine to decompress those in anything like a reasonable amount of time, so I don't go back to that one any more.
This also solves the ncftp weirdness you get when two hosts with the same alias don't have the same directory structure.
So we've established here that you're incapable of reading READMEs and INSTALLs to figure out how to type:
$ configure
$ make
$ su
# make install
Also, we've established that you've apparently never seen X.
You then go on to say that Unix administration is a "no-brainer". So which is it? So easy that it's a no-brainer, or so difficult that you can't do it? You can't have it both ways, unless you're just too stupid to handle a "no-brainer". I'm beginning to suspect the last, myself.
And that's "Get A F*cking Clue", incidentally. (That's my guess, anyway... I'm not the guy who wrote that.)
I see a blue Mac and I want it painted black...
Um. Sorry.
Gods! It's... it's... it's.... JERRY POURNELLE!
Except without the computer knowledge...
The bitmap is in logo.sys. You can edit it with MS Paint or whatever. The "Please wait" and "Your computer is now safe to shut down" screens are in logow.sys and logos.sys.
... at least, I just applied something that called itself "patch-2.2.0-pre8.gz" to my kernel tree, and I've got it compiling now...
ftp1.us.kernel.org, at least, has the patch.
Perl *is* a mess... it has the advantage, though, that most of the messiest bits are redundant (TMTOWTDI). You can forget about 'em without affecting your ability to program in the language at all. You can write Perl that looks like just about anything you want. For example, I've been programming C for ages, and just recently picked up Perl... my Perl programs tend to look like C with regexps. It's also possible to write Perl that does exactly the same thing, but looks like the diff of two sendmail.cfs. Most people's code, from what I've seen, is somewhere between.
Wow... all that typing and you didn't say a thing...
> I know everyone is all excited about the 2.2 release of the Linux kernel
My guess is that that's exactly why they went to the 2.2.0pre* releases. The more people get excited about these pre-patches, the more people will try them out, and the faster the remaining bugs will get squashed, and the faster we'll have a final 2.2.0. Hopefully, it'll also help reduce the *.0 version syndrome...