Linux progress

QBasicer · Post by **QBasicer** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 4:34 pm

Hotwax: I always do hit Don't Send, because i really don't think Microsoft cares whether some program that isn't theirs crashes.

And yes, I *DO* change options.

chopkinsca · Post by **chopkinsca** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 4:51 pm

Heh, when a program crashes in XP I call the error a 'Don't send'.

"Damn, I got a don't send."

Post by **Bio Hazard** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 5:01 pm

HotWax wrote:I'm pretty sure there's also a way to disable it. If you're referring to the memory dump that occurs on a crash, it too can be disabled.

ErrorReporting: ControlPanel>System>Advanced>ErrorReporting>"Disable"
Memory dump: ControlPanel>System>Advanced>StartupAndRecovery>WriteDebuggingInformation>"None"

EDIT: this is my 666th post O_O

QBasicer · Post by **QBasicer** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 5:31 am

Heh. Well, there you go...

Who actually clicks "send".

Anyways, back to being on topic.

In Linux i'd like to point out that that there are a lot of pre-installed servers, or servers that run nativly, like SSH, sendmail (or PostFix), Apache, and ProFTPd, just to name a few. Also, Windows doesn't have the ability to compile out of the box like linux, requiring special tools from MS or other people. Ported software is never quite as good.

One thing Windows has is the UI for configuration. Take serv-u, it has a nice interface, but programs like Webmin are changing this. If you use linux and don't know what Webmin is, check it out. It's a web based configuration client.

Also, Mandrake uses the Mandrake Control Center to configure itself. Mandrake it one of the "Newbie" linuxes (what is the plural of Linux?), compared to something like Slackware that you need to text-edit to get it to work as you want.

Pros and Cons of each.

cyber-menace · Post by **cyber-menace** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 5:40 am

Heh, this is what happens when you don't use the computer for a couple of days.

I use Slackware, I used to use Mandrake, but I wanted to use something that WOULD ACTUALLY COMPILE THINGS PROPERLY! The big problem with Mandrake is that it is built for RPMs. It can handle them really well, but it can't compile basically anything without installing something.

In Slackware the roles are different, but RPMs don't seem to work at all in Slackware, but I hate RPMs anyway so I like Slackware. I think that may have been a little off topic however.

QBasicer · Post by **QBasicer** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 5:43 am

Well RPMs have something called "RPM Hell," which is kinds like Window's DLL files.... Ug, only those ard harder to find.

In Linux there seem to be more patches/versions of Libraries and tools. Although there are a lot of exceptions.

I remember problems with libraries on linux, but they are fix'd, and now i install software maybe once every two or three days.

akimmet · Post by **akimmet** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 7:53 am

Dumb and pointless flame wars on most Windows and Linux newsgroups and forums are what I don't like most about both. Since this one seems to have cooled down abit to rational thought , I'll add a few points about linux.

Linux (the kernel) is ok, but I have a problem with the userspace.

The lack of proper documentation for alot of programs makes doing some things a pain in the ass. (And GNU's abomination called info dosen't count)

Alot of programs like to do non standard things, GNU's fileutils and bash are the worst offenders.

Most Linux distros think sh and bash are the same thing.

Most Linux distros dynamicaly link most essential programs in /bin and /sbin so if things go wrong (/usr getting mangled or glibc broke yet again), the machine will not even make it to init.

Glibc is the thing I hate most about linux, the developers like to breake things every version, it is the most bloated libc in existance (dynamically linked programs using glibc are often larger than statically linked programs using another c library), and compatability between versions seems to be of no importance.

Distros like Mandrake having auto configuration programs that trash your system because you (correctly) change a configuration file somewhere. If things do work, the config program will probably strip all of your important comments.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think Linux is that bad. It just has some problems that most people seem to want to ignore and only worry about the kernel and KDE/Gnome.

I don't like windows either, but that is mostly due to not being able to do some things by a command line (when it comes to setting up a domain controller and the like, setup wizzards cause more problems then they make things easier), and Microsoft having problems not getting some things like dhcp, and dns quite right.

QBasicer · Post by **QBasicer** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 8:28 am

akimmet wrote:Dumb and pointless flame wars on most Windows and Linux newsgroups and forums are what I don't like most about both. Since this one seems to have cooled down abit to rational thought , I'll add a few points about linux.

I'm trying to pick the best sides of both.

The lack of proper documentation for alot of programs makes doing some things a pain in the ass. (And GNU's abomination called info dosen't count)

Agreed. Usually google can help to find answers, or a grep on a man page. Everything tends to be confusingly command line.

Alot of programs like to do non standard things, GNU's fileutils and bash are the worst offenders.

What do you mean by non standard?

Most Linux distros think sh and bash are the same thing.

Anybody that reads this, bash is a propritary version of bash, SH stands for shell, and bash stands for Bourne Again Shell...by someone called What's His Face* Bourne

*I don't know his first name

Most Linux distros dynamicaly link most essential programs in /bin and /sbin so if things go wrong (/usr getting mangled or glibc broke yet again), the machine will not even make it to init.

True, but not always. Sometime a quick re-install can fix this ("AKA UPGRADE"). Slackware takes 15 mins to install anyways.

Glibc is the thing I hate most about linux, the developers like to breake things every version, it is the most bloated libc in existance (dynamically linked programs using glibc are often larger than statically linked programs using another c library), and compatability between versions seems to be of no importance.

I admit to myself I am not 100% precent sure what glibc is/does. Although I know you get it from the GTK site (or GTK from the glibc site?) Anyways, i figure it has to do with a GTK library for C.

Distros like Mandrake having auto configuration programs that trash your system because you (correctly) change a configuration file somewhere. If things do work, the config program will probably strip all of your important comments.

That's why newbies use it.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think Linux is that bad. It just has some problems that most people seem to want to ignore and only worry about the kernel and KDE/Gnome.

Yes. That's true, but I think things will get better in the coming years, not worse. Compare Mandrake 8.1 to 9.1. Looks and works a LOT better.

I just can't wait to see what will come next.

I don't like windows either, but that is mostly due to not being able to do some things by a command line (when it comes to setting up a domain controller and the like, setup wizzards cause more problems then they make things easier), and Microsoft having problems not getting some things like dhcp, and dns quite right.

I'll reply the rest later.

akimmet · Post by **akimmet** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 4:24 pm

The lack of proper documentation for alot of programs makes doing some things a pain in the ass. (And GNU's abomination called info dosen't count)
Agreed. Usually google can help to find answers, or a grep on a man page. Everything tends to be confusingly command line.

However alot of open source programs completly skip the man page, or tell you to look elsewhere. This is infuriating when all you have is the machine in front of you and no internet access.

I have no problem with a command line once you get comfortable with using pipes and other shell techniques, things can be much easier than sorting through 500 icons. Unix isn't as complicated as people make it out to be, if you have some good documentation and know the basics, doing things comes easy. Alot of things are actually simpler than the DOS command prompt.

Alot of programs like to do non standard things, GNU's fileutils and bash are the worst offenders.
What do you mean by non standard?

Exactly like I mean, alot of GNU *utils do other things than what would be expected than if you were on another POSIX unix machine. su is one popular example where RMS decided that supporting the wheel group was too much like dictatorship and stopped people from using the root account account(which is just plain assinine BTW).

If you want an example try typing rm -rf .* on both a Linux machine and on a real unix machine. This is a dumb example, but shows one huge deviation from standard behavior.

Most Linux distros think sh and bash are the same thing.
Anybody that reads this, bash is a propritary version of bash, SH stands for shell, and bash stands for Bourne Again Shell...by someone called What's His Face* Bourne

That isn't quite what I mean the standard shell called sh is the bourne shell. Bash is an extention of the bourne shell by adding alot of features, the most popular being job control (control-z, jobs, fg ,bg, etc...) and commandline completion (when you press tab). What alot of Linux distros are doing is making a symbolic link from bash to sh (it is not quite this simple but that is the jist of it). This means the small incompalities between sh and bash will caues problems for people using POSIX standard shell scripts in Linux, or Linux users accidently using bash syntax in their shell scrips then wonder why it won't work on other UNIX varients.

Most Linux distros dynamicaly link most essential programs in /bin and /sbin so if things go wrong (/usr getting mangled or glibc broke yet again), the machine will not even make it to init.
True, but not always. Sometime a quick re-install can fix this ("AKA UPGRADE"). Slackware takes 15 mins to install anyways.

But if things were done properly you wouldnt have to reinstall because of someting important getting trashed.

Glibc is the thing I hate most about linux, the developers like to breake things every version, it is the most bloated libc in existance (dynamically linked programs using glibc are often larger than statically linked programs using another c library), and compatability between versions seems to be of no importance.
I admit to myself I am not 100% precent sure what glibc is/does. Although I know you get it from the GTK site (or GTK from the glibc site?) Anyways, i figure it has to do with a GTK library for C.[/qoute]
Nope, it has nothing to do with GTK or Gnome. Glibc is the name of the C library for Linux. http://www.gnu.org/software/libc/libc.html

Distros like Mandrake having auto configuration programs that trash your system because you (correctly) change a configuration file somewhere. If things do work, the config program will probably strip all of your important comments.
That's why newbies use it.
I guess but I still see people using these programs and wondering why their install screws its self up.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think Linux is that bad. It just has some problems that most people seem to want to ignore and only worry about the kernel and KDE/Gnome.
Yes. That's true, but I think things will get better in the coming years, not worse. Compare Mandrake 8.1 to 9.1. Looks and works a LOT better.

I just can't wait to see what will come next.

But things are still rough around the edges and people are ingoring these real problems and oogle over transparent windows and other completly useless shit.

I don't like windows either, but that is mostly due to not being able to do some things by a command line (when it comes to setting up a domain controller and the like, setup wizzards cause more problems then they make things easier), and Microsoft having problems not getting some things like dhcp, and dns quite right.
I'll reply the rest later.

I'd like to hear more, don't take this post as me saying I hate you and all Linux users...

QBasicer · Post by **QBasicer** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 5:56 pm

akimmet wrote:

The lack of proper documentation for alot of programs makes doing some things a pain in the ass. (And GNU's abomination called info dosen't count)
Agreed. Usually google can help to find answers, or a grep on a man page. Everything tends to be confusingly command line.
However alot of open source programs completly skip the man page, or tell you to look elsewhere. This is infuriating when all you have is the machine in front of you and no internet access.

I have no problem with a command line once you get comfortable with using pipes and other shell techniques, things can be much easier than sorting through 500 icons. Unix isn't as complicated as people make it out to be, if you have some good documentation and know the basics, doing things comes easy. Alot of things are actually simpler than the DOS command prompt.

Right. Piping is your friend, and the most effient way of doing things. I spend more time in konsole then I do in Konq. Right now i have 3 differen konsole windows open, on 4 desktops, with about 4 tabs each. When I start using Linux my workspace becomes fragmented and I find myself doing many things at once, mostly unrelated.

The big thing is you need to get comfortable with command lining.

Alot of programs like to do non standard things, GNU's fileutils and bash are the worst offenders.
What do you mean by non standard?
Exactly like I mean, alot of GNU *utils do other things than what would be expected than if you were on another POSIX unix machine. su is one popular example where RMS decided that supporting the wheel group was too much like dictatorship and stopped people from using the root account account(which is just plain assinine BTW).

I don't know anything about that. I don't use su anymore, just sudo.

If you want an example try typing rm -rf .* on both a Linux machine and on a real unix machine. This is a dumb example, but shows one huge deviation from standard behavior.

What would happen? I know Linux would delete itself.

Most Linux distros think sh and bash are the same thing.
Anybody that reads this, bash is a propritary version of bash, SH stands for shell, and bash stands for Bourne Again Shell...by someone called What's His Face* Bourne

That isn't quite what I mean the standard shell called sh is the bourne shell. Bash is an extention of the bourne shell by adding alot of features, the most popular being job control (control-z, jobs, fg ,bg, etc...) and commandline completion (when you press tab). What alot of Linux distros are doing is making a symbolic link from bash to sh (it is not quite this simple but that is the jist of it). This means the small incompalities between sh and bash will caues problems for people using POSIX standard shell scripts in Linux, or Linux users accidently using bash syntax in their shell scrips then wonder why it won't work on other UNIX varients.

I though sh was just "shell". Anyways, bash is like version 2 of sh, hence the bad pun Bourne Again SHell. I'm not really savvy on the differences, all my scripts are in Perl, but that won't work too well will it? Some systems don't have *gasp* perl.

Most Linux distros dynamicaly link most essential programs in /bin and /sbin so if things go wrong (/usr getting mangled or glibc broke yet again), the machine will not even make it to init.
True, but not always. Sometime a quick re-install can fix this ("AKA UPGRADE"). Slackware takes 15 mins to install anyways.
But if things were done properly you wouldnt have to reinstall because of someting important getting trashed.

Right. But sometimes weird things happen like a mis-behaving script you run as root. Or a command mistake. Or a hacker (heaven forbid) or some idot family member.

Glibc is the thing I hate most about linux, the developers like to breake things every version, it is the most bloated libc in existance (dynamically linked programs using glibc are often larger than statically linked programs using another c library), and compatability between versions seems to be of no importance.
I admit to myself I am not 100% precent sure what glibc is/does. Although I know you get it from the GTK site (or GTK from the glibc site?) Anyways, i figure it has to do with a GTK library for C.[/qoute]
Nope, it has nothing to do with GTK or Gnome. Glibc is the name of the C library for Linux. http://www.gnu.org/software/libc/libc.html

Then why's the g there? Wait...I know...gnu. I admit to not knowing a lot about C, or any of it's libraries as I am a C++ programmer, but i suspect it has a different lib...maybe it even uses glibc.

Distros like Mandrake having auto configuration programs that trash your system because you (correctly) change a configuration file somewhere. If things do work, the config program will probably strip all of your important comments.
That's why newbies use it.
I guess but I still see people using these programs and wondering why their install screws its self up.

Well, i always prefered to edit configs manually, except when I don't know how to do it, but Webmin is pretty good with keeping the comments in tact.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think Linux is that bad. It just has some problems that most people seem to want to ignore and only worry about the kernel and KDE/Gnome.
Yes. That's true, but I think things will get better in the coming years, not worse. Compare Mandrake 8.1 to 9.1. Looks and works a LOT better.

I just can't wait to see what will come next.
But things are still rough around the edges and people are ingoring these real problems and oogle over transparent windows and other completly useless shit.

Right. But that's a major attraction for some people...if it looks nice it's awesome...people like eye candy. Also, not everyone can code on the kernel. The people at KDE probably don't even know that much C, as KDE is QT.

I don't like windows either, but that is mostly due to not being able to do some things by a command line (when it comes to setting up a domain controller and the like, setup wizzards cause more problems then they make things easier), and Microsoft having problems not getting some things like dhcp, and dns quite right.
I'll reply the rest later.
I'd like to hear more, don't take this post as me saying I hate you and all Linux users...

Well, what I was going to say before the class ended was that it does have it's strong points. But It all boils down to what you want to do. Most gamers like Windows, because Linux doesn't have the graphical system that Windows has (X is REALLY slow in comparison), also, people want not have to reboot. People sometimes don't like to learn new things either. They're just happy using whatever they learned on. I use Linux because it's stable, fast, and does everything I need and want to do faster then I can do it in Windows. I do not play any Windows games for the most part, but I *do* enjoy BZFlag. It would be icing on my cake to play ZDoom maps and not Legacy maps.

http://vectec.net/kde-screenshot-19.png

My desktop, and proud of it. (Desktop 1 that is

)

akimmet · Post by **akimmet** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 7:28 am

charris wrote:
akimmet wrote:
Agreed. Usually google can help to find answers, or a grep on a man page. Everything tends to be confusingly command line.
However alot of open source programs completly skip the man page, or tell you to look elsewhere. This is infuriating when all you have is the machine in front of you and no internet access.

I have no problem with a command line once you get comfortable with using pipes and other shell techniques, things can be much easier than sorting through 500 icons. Unix isn't as complicated as people make it out to be, if you have some good documentation and know the basics, doing things comes easy. Alot of things are actually simpler than the DOS command prompt.
Right. Piping is your friend, and the most effient way of doing things. I spend more time in konsole then I do in Konq. Right now i have 3 differen konsole windows open, on 4 desktops, with about 4 tabs each. When I start using Linux my workspace becomes fragmented and I find myself doing many things at once, mostly unrelated.

The big thing is you need to get comfortable with command lining.

If you want an example try typing rm -rf .* on both a Linux machine and on a real unix machine. This is a dumb example, but shows one huge deviation from standard behavior.
What would happen? I know Linux would delete itself.

No that is what a POSIX rm would do, GNU rm tries to save your butt by pretending .. (previous directory) dosen't match your glob.

Yes. That's true, but I think things will get better in the coming years, not worse. Compare Mandrake 8.1 to 9.1. Looks and works a LOT better.

I just can't wait to see what will come next.
But things are still rough around the edges and people are ingoring these real problems and oogle over transparent windows and other completly useless shit.
Right. But that's a major attraction for some people...if it looks nice it's awesome...people like eye candy. Also, not everyone can code on the kernel. The people at KDE probably don't even know that much C, as KDE is QT.

I'll reply the rest later.
I'd like to hear more, don't take this post as me saying I hate you and all Linux users...
Well, what I was going to say before the class ended was that it does have it's strong points. But It all boils down to what you want to do. Most gamers like Windows, because Linux doesn't have the graphical system that Windows has (X is REALLY slow in comparison), also, people want not have to reboot. People sometimes don't like to learn new things either. They're just happy using whatever they learned on. I use Linux because it's stable, fast, and does everything I need and want to do faster then I can do it in Windows. I do not play any Windows games for the most part, but I *do* enjoy BZFlag. It would be icing on my cake to play ZDoom maps and not Legacy maps.

http://vectec.net/kde-screenshot-19.png

My desktop, and proud of it. (Desktop 1 that is :D)

Thats is about right, of all the pre-canned distros the only one I kind of like is Slackware, mostly because of the cleanliness of the install, and dosen't mind you doing whatever the hell you want to your config files. I think the userland from *BSD is much better than Slackware, but some times I am forced to use a linux kernel due to some kind of strange hardware. Although I don't like to spend much time on PC hardware I like to spend time using my SGI and NEXT machines.

Post by **Chris** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 2:40 pm

No that is what a POSIX rm would do, GNU rm tries to save your butt by pretending .. (previous directory) dosen't match your glob.

Either that, or it takes . (current directory) as a higher priority, and by the time it would get to .. (previous directory) it's already gone..

arioch · Post by **arioch** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 10:09 pm

After I pulled the USB keyboard, that machine dropped network connectivity.

Plugging in the keyboard once more restored connectivity.

Hirogen2 · Post by **Hirogen2** » Sun Apr 25, 2004 4:15 am

You can also restart X by pressing CTRL+ALT+BACKSPACE.

1. No, that kills X. 2. I can't use it since Ctl+Alt+Bksp is caught by my BIOS to switch off the power. I hate that.

Ported software is never quite as good.

Well. That holds true 50% less if you are using MSYS/MINGW.

but it can't compile basically anything without installing something

Someday, you will have all -devel packages installed, making compiling a 5-second task.

Well RPMs have something called "RPM Hell," which is kinds like Window's DLL files.... Ug, only those ard harder to find.

What?

The lack of proper documentation for alot of programs makes doing some things a pain in the ass. (And GNU's abomination called info dosen't count)

Try the Linux Documentation Project (TLDP) which also provides manpages for applications who have a hard-on for GNU info.

Most Linux distros think sh and bash are the same thing.

They do so because BASH is the default for them. If you change /bin/sh (symlink) to /bin/ash, well, then expect some trouble. You are safe if /etc/init.d/* have #!/bin/bash at their header, though.

Most Linux distros dynamicaly link most essential programs in /bin and /sbin so if things go wrong

Code: Select all

(suse) 12:06 io:/bin # find . -type l
./sh
./vi
./awk
./csh
./mail
./pidof
./psfstriptable
./domainname
./dnsdomainname
./lsmod.static
./lsmod.old
./psfgettable
./psfaddtable

Glibc is the thing I hate most about linux, the developers like to breake things every version,

That is why they invented versioned symbols. Like fgets@@GLIBC_2.0.

dynamically linked programs using glibc are often larger than statically linked programs using another c library

I doubt that. Linking to glibc dynamically only requires a "I want libc.so.6" entry, which is about less than 128 bytes.

My screenshot entry 2004-04-25

Risen · Post by **Risen** » Sun Apr 25, 2004 6:42 am

arioch wrote:After I pulled the USB keyboard, that machine dropped network connectivity.

Plugging in the keyboard once more restored connectivity.

I've seen this happen on Windows. Could be hardware related.

ZDoom

Linux progress

Addendum

Re: Addendum