tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-58392708412988136472024-03-23T06:35:07.296-04:00Notes on LinuxAnything interesting regarding Linux including programming, system administration and gamescubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.comBlogger99125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-17791438633525827322017-12-17T02:32:00.000-05:002019-01-16T07:53:10.386-05:00Resetting the Linux text console<br />
I've found two different solutions to losing the linux text console or having your X11 session garbled. Initially it seemed impossible to recover from these situations but after much experimentation two solutions were discovered.<br />
<br />
First, I'll describe the original solution I found using a somewhat old version of Vector Linux that ran the 2.6.27.29 kernel. As far as I can tell ALT+SYS+K does not work on a kernel this old. Periodically the X11 session will show garbled graphics and switching to the text console via ctrl+alt+F1 just shows the same garbled graphics. I can still type and see some results (the garbled graphics shift a bit) but the computer isn't very useable in this state.<br />
<br />
After reading about framebuffers and Linux Kernel Modules I tried "/sbin/modprobe radeonfb" and then my text console reappeared. Even after shutting down the Xserver this module continues to run the text console. One can change the video resolution of the framebuffer via commands like "fbset 640x480-60" or even look at images via the fbi utility.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgraqi-iVKn-ObeNd-newz6iyDjm3tzykqnKtlu_-lzckQY2qSkLgGOjM0lfldZ74MpQq3ggwe6kWfiuF3ufXyqNigquDC8njR-cZlIEHyZNNlsKOjUZoMOu-eaItTkHOgGsVbNV4o8tlI/s1600/console-screen.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgraqi-iVKn-ObeNd-newz6iyDjm3tzykqnKtlu_-lzckQY2qSkLgGOjM0lfldZ74MpQq3ggwe6kWfiuF3ufXyqNigquDC8njR-cZlIEHyZNNlsKOjUZoMOu-eaItTkHOgGsVbNV4o8tlI/s320/console-screen.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
The 2nd case involved a severe bug in slackware 14.2 whereby exiting the Xserver would just give an entirely black screen and typing seemed to have no effect. The only way to recover seemed to be by typing "/sbin/reboot" in an ssh session from another computer. This computer had the more modern kernel version 4.4.14.<br />
<br />
So I tried:<br />
<br />
alt+sysrq+k (kills all processes running on the current virtual console)<br />
alt+sysrq+r (switch the keyboard from raw mode, which is used by X11, to XLATE mode)<br />
<br />
Now after the alt+sysrq+r key sequence I noticed that I could toggle num-lock and caps lock so clearly the keyboard was still functioning on some level even though I couldn't see anything I typed. So it seemed I was back to rebooting via ssh. Then one day I tried typing "startx" and hitting enter on the blank screen and lo and behold my X11 session worked. So what would happen if I tried exiting from the Xserver now? The text console reappeared! Tricks like loading a framebuffer LKM wouldn't work as the framebuffer is now built into the kernel.<br />
<br />
I wish I understood exactly what was happening here although I can hypothesize that some piece of memory was put into a corrupted state. This solution worked on a ASUS P5KPL-AM motherboard with a Intel 82G33/G31 Express Integrated Graphics Controller. To further complicate matters I use xautolock to suspend the computer after 10 minutes of inactivity. <br />
<br />
So there you have it. Hopefully one of these solutions will work if you find yourself with a garbled X session or a blank text console.<br />
<br />
<u>UPDATE: Jan 16th, 2019</u><br />
<br />
On Slackware 14.2 I've used one other method for restoring the X session: <br />
"sudo /sbin/init 4" which is executed via an ssh session from another computer. This will set runlevel 4 which sets a normal graphical login and also will keep ssh running (note that init 1 would kill the ssh session). One could also kill -9 the X process and run the startx script over again. This appears to be the best method to use if the X session stops working correctly.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-75764297827225012442017-10-23T09:59:00.000-04:002017-10-23T09:59:29.510-04:00CBC Streaming Radio Links For 2017<br />
Yes, the links for streaming CBC radio have changed again.<br />
<br />
Check this web page for the new links:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://http://www.cbc.ca/radio/includes/stream.html">CBC Radio URLS</a><br />
<br />
Here is an example of using mplayer with linux to listen to CBC Radio One Toronto:<br />
<br />
mplayer http://cbc_r1_tor.akacast.akamaistream.net/7/632/451661/v1/rc.akacast.akamaistream.net/cbc_r1_tor<br />
<br />
cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-35919828764593100852017-05-01T14:43:00.000-04:002017-05-01T15:24:38.031-04:00FC1 hits 1 Year Uptime (Again)<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjliw6ZLHi3s30GtaeAm7MtZ2upZymf8kmot49voKHJ9zWg2V7DUeO84W86FormQWZ52Jat93IVygxmMRupJzGUP_EWuCT4wuvspvqPSh8XYxyTU55EFT1a9EVrs-gVWn1LSeKSmTqfLmw/s1600/uptime-365-again.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjliw6ZLHi3s30GtaeAm7MtZ2upZymf8kmot49voKHJ9zWg2V7DUeO84W86FormQWZ52Jat93IVygxmMRupJzGUP_EWuCT4wuvspvqPSh8XYxyTU55EFT1a9EVrs-gVWn1LSeKSmTqfLmw/s320/uptime-365-again.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
Back in November of 2015 I couldn't resist bragging a bit about my old Fedora Core 1 machine reaching 1 year of uptime. Now it has managed to run another year without interruption.<br />
<br />
It eventually ran for 489 days in the first instance. No doubt there have been many machines with much longer uptimes than that, but keep in mind this machine was first built in 1998 and is running on home utility power.<br />
<br />
KDE was upgraded twice on this machine. Originally FC1 shipped with KDE version 3.1 but I upgraded it twice, first to KDE 3.3.1 and finally to KDE 3.4.2 which it still runs to this day. Here is the oldest surviving picture from 2005:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiYVmEQdwRqKxN7aKOqmPk5yzY9Np7fPDgG9aAr56GN-ePOT0cRbNUg4X3kT3PE8ZPWmDNZRTt7WYw5VBs7bJ_gtk-65e3u2WyozMVDNCRmjjG9cyTQU5ZY_UgyEG5DM8HYwSQOYeySl4/s1600/fc1-desktop-2005.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiYVmEQdwRqKxN7aKOqmPk5yzY9Np7fPDgG9aAr56GN-ePOT0cRbNUg4X3kT3PE8ZPWmDNZRTt7WYw5VBs7bJ_gtk-65e3u2WyozMVDNCRmjjG9cyTQU5ZY_UgyEG5DM8HYwSQOYeySl4/s320/fc1-desktop-2005.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />
For the historical record I'll list the versions of KDE I've encountered:<br />
<font color="black"><br />
<pre>KDE 4.14.21 Slackware 14.2
KDE Trinity 3.5.13.2
q4os
KDE 3.5.10 vector linux classic
openbsd 4.7
KDE 4.14.3 Vector Linux 7.1 Light (VL7)
KDE 3.1.X fedora core 1 (upgraded this to 3.4.2 back in 2005)
KDE 3.1.2 redhat 9.0 2003
KDE 3.0.3 redhat 8.0
KDE 3.0.0-12 redhat 7.3
KDE 2.2.2 redhat 7.2
KDE 1.1.2-10 redhat 6.1 oct 1999
KDE 1.1.1pre2 redhat 6.0 apr 1999
</font>
</pre>cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-28746084691729257282017-02-21T21:07:00.000-05:002017-02-21T21:13:15.222-05:00Thoughts on Slackware 14.2<br />
<br />
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<br />
tested on an intel core duo E5200 with 2 gigs of ram<br />
<br />
The main attributes are:<br />
<br />
kernel 4.4.14<br />
<br />
kde 4.14.21<br />
firefox 45.2<br />
chrome 56<br />
bash 4.3.46<br />
rtorrent 0.9.6<br />
<br />
added dosbox-0.74-x86_64-2jsc.txz<br />
for old dos games<br />
<br />
The slackware DVD will boot up and it is easy enough to run the install script. First time slackware users may find the install script to be a bit primitive and it assumes the user has some knowledge of cfdisk or fdisk.<br />
<br />
One configures the network the usual way with netconfig.<br />
<br />
Note that slackware will install and not run X automatically, so I just run X as a user via the startx script. This will bring up kde 4.14.21<br />
<br />
I was familiar with slapt-get so I was a bit surpised to see it was replaced with slackpkg located in /usr/sbin. Also gslapt has disappeared along with kpackage so I'm not sure what is available to install packages via a GUI.<br />
<br />
Downloaded packages may be installed via: sudo /sbin/upgradepkg --install-new package.txz<br />
<br />
Running dmesg now requires using sudo.<br />
<br />
I found it useful to download and install flashplayer-plugin-24.0.0.221-x86_64-1alien.txz to get flash working. I also installed wine-1.9.23x86_64-1alien.txz for those few windows programs I run (mostly games).<br />
<br />
All in all I'm quite happy with slackware 14.2 on my quasi-modern computer. Old school linux and openbsd types will no doubt feel at home with slack. There's no systemd to worry about. A full install takes about 9 gigs of drive space. The slackware folks have obviously put a ton of work into this new release. A word of warning to linux newbies, this isn't the easiest distro to install and is probably best suited to linux intermediates or experts. <br />
<br />
I recommend Slackware 14.2 for the linux traditionalist.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-52520074334232870372016-10-07T18:44:00.000-04:002016-10-28T06:02:56.463-04:00BIOS Problems and Solutions<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS_SItMLYPNFb6f-KUZLuefCOhhvzAMa4pZzKz_9KtpfqFJbuIo5oFz4V7tFSmGz6SrwObuH60Klj2N259m9UOi1lpeUpY6oXcKC1rueCQf-3Pzc5OFLxb-iePBhjvcAsDhYVBgkYzF1A/s1600/thumbs-down-lenovo.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="356" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS_SItMLYPNFb6f-KUZLuefCOhhvzAMa4pZzKz_9KtpfqFJbuIo5oFz4V7tFSmGz6SrwObuH60Klj2N259m9UOi1lpeUpY6oXcKC1rueCQf-3Pzc5OFLxb-iePBhjvcAsDhYVBgkYzF1A/s640/thumbs-down-lenovo.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
When Lenovo released the Yoga 900-13ISK2 it became apparent that Linux and BSD users could not rely on closed source BIOSes. Of course while it is rather naive to think that a Microsoft Signature Edition PC would be Linux friendly, one could hope that at least it would not be Linux or BSD hostile. On further analysis one can see that this is not the case, and any would-be Linux user is in for a very difficult time trying to load any operating system other than Windows 10. <br />
<br />
The exact reasons for this problem boil down to the inability of the BIOS to set Advanced Host Controller Interface (AHCI) mode for the SSD. Now I knew long ago that closed source BIOSes could become a problem back in the mid-1990s. I've spent considerable time researching the ways one can obtain a computer with FOSS firmware. <br />
<br />
Before I go into the specifics of which computers actually have a BIOS with freely available source code allow me to recap some computer history. When we look at the original <a href="https://sites.google.com/site/pcdosretro/ibmpcbios">IBM PC BIOS</a> we can see that it's been well analyzed and that no other operating systems have been locked out. In addition to this there was no way to alter the BIOS save for swapping out the BIOS chip and putting in a different one. So for several years people didn't give much thought to the BIOS, as long as their computer booted they could load whatever operating system they wanted, be it Unix, Minix, MS-DOS, CP/M, etc.<br />
<br />
As the years went by we could see computer users have less and less control over their own machines. In the later part of 2011 users started to see "Secure Boot" appear in the BIOS. In January 2012, Microsoft confirmed it would require hardware manufacturers to enable secure boot on Windows 8 devices, and that x86/64 devices must provide the option to turn it off while ARM-based devices must not provide the option to turn it off. Thus Linux and BSD users had to be extra careful when selecting which computer to buy.<br />
<br />
There are three BIOS alternatives known to me at this time, all three are available with source code although in the case of Openboot the source is in the forth language:<br />
<ul>
<li> Lemote computers have PMON, available via "git clone https://github.com/kisom/pmon"</li>
<li> Sun Microsystem computers have Openboot, available via "svn co svn://openbios.org/openboot" </li>
<li> Google Chromebooks currently use Coreboot, available via "git clone http://review.coreboot.org/p/coreboot"</li>
</ul>
Now it is problematic for someone in North America to buy a Lemote computer. So far I know of no easy method of obtaining one. Buying an old Sun computer such as an Ultra series is an option more suitable for a retro-computing specialist. That only leaves the Google Chromebook, which I believe is the simplest option for the Linux or BSD user.<br />
<center>
<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="https://rcm-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/cm?t=domofthecub-20&o=15&p=8&l=as1&asins=B01684NGX4&ref=tf_til&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe><br />
</center>
<br />
I would caution any Linux or BSD user to at least do an online search to see if other people have had problems of this type. Even if you don't buy a chromebook one should make certain that the BIOS will not prevent them from loading the operating system of their choice. To my mind the ideal solution is to have a computer with FOSS firmware.<br />
<br />
UPDATE Oct 28th, 2016<br />
---------------------------------<br />
<br />
Lenovo releases a BIOS <a href="http://support.lenovo.com/ca/en/products/Laptops-and-netbooks/Yoga-Series/yoga-900-13isk2/downloads/DS119354" target="_blank">update</a> for the Yoga 900-13ISK2. No official support is provided for this BIOS. Better than nothing I suppose, but I still wouldn't recommend buying one. cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-32126076443996790702016-08-28T11:05:00.003-04:002016-08-28T11:18:10.680-04:00The Importance of BSD<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
The Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) is a Unix operating system developed by the Computer Systems Research Group (CSRG) of the University of California, Berkeley.<br />
<br />
The BSD operating system started as an add-on package for Unix v6 released in March 1978. There was a 2nd version which was used as an add-on package for Unix v7 which was released in May 1979. Version 2 or 2BSD as it is usually called included the ex/vi text editor created by Bill Joy. The sendmail program appears in 2BSD for the first time.<br />
<br />
In 1979 3BSD was released which was an improvement over the Unix 32V port to Vax 11/780. This was the first stand-alone version of BSD. The kernel was named vmunix (virtual memory Unix) and was 132016 bytes in size. Utilties such as whereis, uptime, and berknet appeared for the first time. Surviving disk images of 3BSD also included an APL interpreter and Lisp. <br />
<br />
In 1983 we saw 4.2BSD appear with TCP/IP utilties and the new Berkeley Fast File System.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately it wasn't until the Intel 80386 CPU arrived that a port of BSD to inexpensive PCs became possible. In 1992 William and Lynn Jolitz released 386BSD. Before this we had proprietary Unixes which could run on IBM PCs and Intel 80286 CPUs such as Venix and Xenix, but the user had no access to the source code. <br />
<br />
By 1993 Walnut Creek was offering ftp access and CDROMs with FreeBSD on them. In 1995 FreeBSD 2.0 was released which included many GNU utilties, XFree86 3.1 and many TCP/IP networking services. Best of all, everything came with the source code.<br />
<br />
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<br />
The importance of BSD is undeniable: It vastly improved Unix with the addition of ex/vi, internet capabilities and many other enhancements. Nowadays we are fortunate to have three main branches of BSD: NetBSD, FreeBSD and OpenBSD. These certainly are the first choices for the Unix traditionalist. My own preference is to use OpenBSD.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-25135907829211697192016-08-08T16:11:00.002-04:002016-08-08T16:32:27.930-04:00The Importance of Bell Labs Unix<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5yzbGm8wdI5SqCp6y9PbonYQgd5ePeWwgbj2VjcMXbG28gCq-g1ejfQMBf2e-1G5zZGA3ReQUqlRAZaBCG2pBfXJVuc6ySleFqTAyaV8nkzrlO9NYHIVZ0VwQzshjGXIYlZ1gyJfj9bs/s1600/bell-labs-unix.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="387" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5yzbGm8wdI5SqCp6y9PbonYQgd5ePeWwgbj2VjcMXbG28gCq-g1ejfQMBf2e-1G5zZGA3ReQUqlRAZaBCG2pBfXJVuc6ySleFqTAyaV8nkzrlO9NYHIVZ0VwQzshjGXIYlZ1gyJfj9bs/s640/bell-labs-unix.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
Unix was first developed by Ken Thompson in the summer of 1969 on the DEC PDP-7 minicomputer. By 1979 Unix version 7 was making the rounds at universities all over the world. Bell Labs Unix has enormous importance: It was the basis for many operating systems that followed including BSD, and the template for Minix and Linux. <br />
<br />
In 1987 Andrew S. Tanenbaum created Minix version 1 which was system call compatible with Unix v7.<br />
<br />
Richard Stallman made note of the importance of the C compiler (it's importance can not be exaggerated): an efficient way to compile programs. That was the reason why he wrote gcc, perhaps one of the most vital parts of GNU. We must remember though that the template for gcc is the original cc created by Dennis Ritchie.<br />
<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/vERIL4JpFPU/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vERIL4JpFPU?feature=player_embedded" width="320"></iframe></div>
<br />
On Jauary 23rd 2002 Caldera released a license for people to use Unix versions 1 through 7 and also the early 32-bit 32V Unix. Nowadays folks can use the computer emulator simh and run early Unix on modern computers.<br />
cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-4180207634676436222016-06-16T22:02:00.003-04:002016-06-16T22:02:57.107-04:00Mygica Media Streamer First Impressions<br />
As many of my computers are too old to play 720P or 1080P video I decided to buy a media streamer: The Mygica ATV520E.<br />
<br />
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The ATV520E has an ARM Cortex A9 CPU, 1GB of Ram and 4GB hard drive with 2 USB 2.0 slots, an ethernet port and one micro SD slot. It also supports Wifi. Inside the box you get the manuals, a remote with two AAA batteries, one HDMI cable and the DC adapter. The version I bought had Android 4.4 (Kitkat) preinstalled. Connecting to the HDTV was easy enough via the HDMI cable.<br />
<br />
First I'll talk about the manual which is very poor. The black and white pictures inside the manual are mostly unreadable due to the lack of contrast in the images (they look like rectangular blobs of black). The text is very tiny and you'll probably need a magnifying glass to read it. Basically the manual lacks important information one should know about operating this device. For one thing you can reboot the box by holding down the red power button. I found this to be necessary as certain button sequences may leave you with a blank screen. The manual shows an older version of the software and will probably not match what you see on the screen.<br />
<br />
I found the device to be easy enough to operate after a bit of experimentation. The (9) or exit button allows one to exit the current program. It would have been a good idea if Mygica put VCR style buttons on the remote but there are buttons for controlling the sound volume, muting, and the usual left/right and up/down functions. Linux users will probably want to install some sort of terminal from the Google Play store which is a digital distribution service operated by Google.<br />
<br />
The 4GB hard drive included with the device will fill up quickly so it's recommended to buy a micro SD card. The manual says sizes up to 32GB will work but I think it's possible that larger sizes will also work with a suitable software upgrade. <br />
<br />
On the positive side I was able to watch quite a lot of media. Some of it was streamed from my other Linux computers, some was streamed from CBC (shows like Murdoch Mysteries and The Nature of Things were readily available). Russia Today also streamed without any problems. Some of the media from outside Canada like ESPN3 was not available probably due to my Canadian IP address. I did have some trouble with the Wifi reception when the microwave was operating, evidently they operate at similar frequencies.<br />
<br />
Since the device is Android based one can play many Android games on it, although you'll find that some games are optimized for smartphones and tablets. I was able to play Pinball Arcade and Zen Pinball without any problems. There are numerous other "Apps" and one can read ebooks or pdf files once one becomes familiarized with the user interface which I found to be very different from using a GUI under Linux. I would recommend the Kr-301 Air mouse with keyboard as using the remote to do certain things is very sub-optimal or even impossible, although it should be possible to just use a USB mouse and keyboard assuming one's cables will reach from the couch.<br />
<br />
All in all the Mygica ATV520E seems an adequate device for my purposes. The poor manual aside, I was basically happy with it. Some power users will probably not be happy with the Intel Duo Core CPU and the device can't do 4K video but most people don't yet own a 4K TV. I see this device as a supplement to my existing computers. Users probably won't want to use this device to do actual work, but it's fun streaming Youtube videos while relaxing on the couch and for $99 it's inexpensive entertainment. The device measures 100x100x15 mm and weights only 160g so moving it to a different room is very easy.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-87386933581459604772016-02-09T21:15:00.001-05:002016-02-09T21:29:20.984-05:00Vector Linux 7.1 Light<br />
Ok, I took Vector Linux 7.1 Light for a spin and I mostly liked what I saw. One can download the 32-bit ISO here: <a href="http://vectorlinux.osuosl.org/veclinux-7.1/iso-release/VL-7.1-LIGHT.iso" target="_blank">Vector Linux 7.1 Light</a>.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtutvGo3yJ99BxVx4CxeSlFRTCtnvUY_AsY_2KEJUk_libI9OXoZhiUrANJMdCvqKfpyJd6GZlIH7eDto-3T0fIFapbLddYZAQhPp4gmLgKNDtkSzaNX6J26qzNqo8QdbUif3ksirw55g/s1600/vector-linux-7.1-classic-2016.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtutvGo3yJ99BxVx4CxeSlFRTCtnvUY_AsY_2KEJUk_libI9OXoZhiUrANJMdCvqKfpyJd6GZlIH7eDto-3T0fIFapbLddYZAQhPp4gmLgKNDtkSzaNX6J26qzNqo8QdbUif3ksirw55g/s320/vector-linux-7.1-classic-2016.png" title="Vector Linux 7.1 Desktop" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
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Based on Slackware Linux and released in August 2015, this distro will work reasonably well on an older computer such as a Celeron 1.8 ghz machine. It has the 3.18.16 version of the Linux kernel. The init is sysv compatible. There is no systemd and systemd is not available in the vector linux repositories.<br />
<br />
<br />
Vector Linux 7.1 light comes with:<br />
<ul>
<li>the icewm window manager </li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>a light web browser xombrero</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>leafpad text editor</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>mtPaint 3.40 paint program</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>geany a lightweight IDE</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>evince document viewer</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>parcellite a lightweight GTK+ clipboard manager </li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>firefox 43</li>
</ul>
<br />
As for the parts I didn't like as much... firefox 43 runs more slowly than firefox 16 on the earlier version of vector linux classic, and parcellite seems to need a faster click than most other programs. A slower single click seemed to open the clipboard manager and then close it again. Older users will no doubt wish to make the fonts a larger size in firefox and icewm. <br />
<br />
The package manager is slapt-get or gslapt (slapt-get with a GUI) as is usual for slackware based distros.<br />
<br />
One program I really liked was the YouTube Browser for SMPlayer. I required some fine tuning but after this my older computer was able to watch youtube videos with ease. It certainly worked better than the flash plugin for firefox or html5 (which was just far too slow).<br />
<br />
Ctrl-Alt-D gets one to the desktop as expected. Icewm is my preferred window manager so all was well there. The KDE4 desktop is available in the repo for KDE fans, although I avoided that as the KDE4 desktop will be noticeably slower.<br />
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If you find yourself needing a new firefox but your computer and glibc is too old, Vector Linux 7.1 light will fit the bill. People who are more comfortable with a SysV style init over systemd will breathe a sign of relief. All in all VL 7.1 is a viable choice for users who wish to continue using their older computers with a modern web browser.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-75131240222544432872016-01-12T18:58:00.002-05:002016-01-12T18:59:50.666-05:00A Brief Guide to Alternatives to Windows: 2016 Edition<br />
First of all, I have a lot to say about avoiding Microsoft Technologies here:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.maxhost.org/other/foss-matrix.txt" target="_blank">FOSS Matrix</a><br />
<br />
The following info should be useful for the folks that don't like Windows 10. Does Microsoft control your computer? Are you tired of Windows? Read on....<br />
<br />
Now the easiest and simplest route for people who are ready for a change is to buy the Google computer also known as a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chromebook" target="_blank">Chromebook</a>. For folks that want a full Linux there is Crouton, which enables one to run ChromeOS and Linux at the same time. <br />
<br />
The other choices I would recommend are the following:<br />
<br />
Debian Linux and it's Wheezy based derivatives such as AntiX and Q4OS.<br />
Slackware Linux and derivatives such as <a href="http://www.vectorlinux.com/" target="_blank">Vector Linux.</a><br />
The three BSDs: OpenBSD, FreeBSD and NetBSD.<br />
For the more adventurous there is <a href="http://opensxce.org/" target="_blank">OpenSXCE</a>.<br />
For the more adventurous (who use old hardware) there is Plan 9 :)<br />
And finally there is HaikuOS and Minix. I don't really like those two but it would be remiss of me to not mention them. <br />
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There are many other distros and <a href="http://distrowatch.com/" target="_blank">DistroWatch</a> does a good job at keeping track of them. To put things simply the Linux and BSD distros do a much better job at protecting your privacy (on Windows 10 you have none) and are also more efficient in the use of your computers resources, e.g. OpenBSD can run quite nicely on a P3 with 256 megs of ram. cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-79707067588758548552015-11-08T15:04:00.003-05:002015-11-08T15:21:17.482-05:00Fedora Core 1 Computer Reaches 1 Year Uptime<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Well it finally happened, my old Fedora Core 1 server has reached 1 year of uptime and counting. <br />
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The server was built in 1998 and Fedora Core 1 was installed on May 12th 2004. I wish I could say that I always ran Linux or BSD on this box but the truth is it was originally a Windows 95 box and later on a Win2K box. One of the reasons why the uptimes weren't longer was due to utility power failures. Currently the server has a decent <span style="color: black;">APC ES 725 UPS connected via USB cable, but this will be upgraded in the near future.</span><br />
<span style="color: black;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: black;"> This computer has turned into somewhat of an experiment in longevity. The question is how long can I keep it going? Certainly 20 years does not seem out of reach. The ATX power supply has been replaced twice. I can't remember exactly how many hard drives there have been but it was replaced at least once. I have placed an insulating mat under the tower and I think this has helped improved the computer's reliability. </span><br />
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This particular install of FC1 has seen many an upgrade, including a KDE upgrade to version 3.4.2. It has been without a doubt the longest lasting work computer (17 years) and longest continuously used distro (11 years). Also I can say that there have been no problems at all using the old SysV Init. <br />
<br />
The specifications of the computer are now quite old but still useful: it has a <span style="color: black;">Tyan Tiger 100 S1832DL Motherboard with dual P3 550 Mhz CPUs. On the other hand every P4 computer I've owned has developed some problem, I suspect due to excess heat. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: black;"> I'm sure Vance Packard and Ralph Nader would approve of this computer. I wrote previously about my old Dell reaching 1 year <a href="http://cubexyz.blogspot.ca/2013/05/openbsd-on-dell-gx110-hits-1-year-uptime.html" target="_blank">uptime</a> running OpenBSD back in 2013. </span>cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-11319607631002795342015-10-24T05:13:00.001-04:002015-10-24T05:14:47.761-04:00The Web is Gummed Up <br />
This is a sad story to write, but it's been percolating in the back of my mind for months if not years: The World Wide Web is gummed up with crap. This realization came into sharp focus today when I visited some media sites like <a href="http://cbc.ca/">cbc.ca</a> and my CPU utilization when up to 100% and stayed there. Exactly why firefox was using so much CPU was a bit of a mystery. I had autoplay in firefox turned off, and there didn't appear to be any reason why the CPU should be maxed out. <br />
<br />
Looking at my processes I could see that firefox was using about 65% of the cpu, and X was using the other 35%. There was a banner ad at the top of the screen, and a few other ads were also present. All the images appeared static so there was no apparent reason why the CPU needed to be running at 100%. Once I exited firefox my CPU use went down to 1.5% to 3%, so there was no doubt that firefox was to blame.<br />
<br />
It's not unusual for firefox to hit 100% CPU usage for brief periods of time even on web pages I've designed myself but the CPU use always goes back down to around 3% after a brief period of time. This seems normal to me. Using the CBC web site made the CPU hit 100% and stay there indefinitely, or at least for as long as I felt like waiting. As an experiment I tried the dillo web browser on CBC's site, and the CPU level was about 3% although things were not rendered as nicely (it is very doubtful there are many web designers who test their sites using dillo).<br />
<br />
Media web sites seem to be the most problematic when it comes to firefox's use of one's CPU. In fact I've seen web sites that not only use 100% of the CPU, but also become completely unresponsive. Clearly there are design practises which are making the situation worse. When I view a web page's source sometimes it looks like an indecipherable snarl of code. To say that the code is overly elaborate would be a huge understatement. One might even say there's an amount of deliberate obfuscation going on.<br />
<br />
On the other hand some sites don't use a lot of CPU, blogger sites and gmail are two examples. Fortunately Google has offered a "Basic HTML" mode for older computers. It would certainly be nice if media sites also had a Basic HTML mode to fall back on. No doubt SSL is partly to blame for the increasing slowness of the web, but what can one do about these other sites? Surely using 100% of the CPU on certain computers for long periods of time will make them over-heat or damage themselves in a worst case scenario.<br />
<br />
Possible solutions include using Dillo or a text based browser. While this is not ideal it seems more palatable to me now that certain media sites are so slow. It doesn't seem to be a problem on my chromebook, so that is another possible solution. Tumblr and Facebook seem ridiculously slow, although I am probably aggravating things by using older P3 systems. I have a kill script at the ready to clobber any sites which paralyze firefox.<br />
<br />
In any case my suggestion to web site designers is to have a Basic HTML mode for your sites. It's only fair to your users with older computers. For the rest of us we can at least turn off auto-play for videos and consider using alternative web browsers. The problem doesn't seem limited to older computers as I've seen firefox hit 100% CPU on faster systems as well. Videos should not be auto-played. One can imagine how frustrated an older computer user would be if an HD video automatically started up (paypal I am looking at you!).<br />
<br />
cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-27581266329067990342015-10-17T22:44:00.001-04:002015-10-21T06:13:28.486-04:00Internet Biase Against Older Computers<br />
In the march towards greater security there is a downside that affects older computers and older software. Older web browsers that support older versions of SSL are often locked out of certain web sites. Naturally web browsers that don't support SSL at all won't work either.<br />
<br />
Recently I tried to access <a href="http://forums.freebsd.org/">forums.freebsd.org</a> and <a href="http://osdisc.com/">osdisc.com</a> and always got the message "The connection was interrupted" in firefox 16.0.2, the newest version which would run on an older version of Vector Linux. At first I tried to disable IPV6 within firefox but that made no difference. Then I wondered 'could the version of SSL supported in firefox be too old?' so I tried again using Q4OS with iceweasel 38.2.0 and it worked.<br />
<br />
To my thinking the extra security for web sites is rather nullified by the result of locking out many systems. Even my online banking worked on firefox 16.0.2 and surely the freebsd forums are not more important than that. Web site developers need to be aware that by locking out older computers they are reducing the utility of their sites.<br />
<br />
Older computer users face another more serious problem which can't be fixed by newer versions of software: As encryption becomes more elaborate it requires more and more computing power to make use of it. To put it another way an older computer like a MicroVAX or an Amiga running NetBSD would run the security layer so slowly as to make it unuseable.<br />
<br />
Informational web sites or forums should not lock out older computers. I don't see the necessity for using new versions of SSL on such sites. With online banking obviously there is no argument, the strongest security should be implemented, but for sites like wikipedia or forums I see no need for https.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-31717479755262468332015-10-14T19:21:00.001-04:002015-10-14T19:30:54.623-04:00CBC Changes Radio Streaming Link Yet Again<br />
I still like to listen to CBC radio on the internet on occasion and once again I see they have changed the link for CBC Toronto Radio. <br />
<br />
Currently I am using this script for CBC Toronto Radio:<br />
<br />
ffplay http://1721.live.streamtheworld.com:80/CBC_R1_TOR_H_SC<br />
<br />
One wonders why CBC changes their links so often.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-58161636863784596852015-08-14T19:51:00.000-04:002015-08-14T20:12:59.886-04:00A Brief Review of Q4OS Linux<br />
I'm ready to make some provisional comments about Q4OS and Trinity.<br />
<br />
Q4OS Linux is based on Debian Wheezy so it is similar to AntiX in this regard. If you like KDE 3.5.10 then you'll like Trinity 3.5.13.2 which is what Q4OS uses.<br />
Basically package names for q4os trinity are of the form:<br />
<br />
kooka-trinity, ksnapshot-trinity, kolourpaint-trinity etc.<br />
<br />
So in q4os you would basically do 'apt-get install kdestuff-trinity'.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.maxhost.org/other/q4os-trinity-2015.png">Q4OS Linux Desktop</a><br />
<br />
It fixes a lot of the old KDE 3.5.10 bugs. On the down side the GUI eats about 8% of the cpu when idling and 30% of the cpu while kdm_greet is running. This is due to the fact that Q4OS's version of kdm_greet runs an analog clock with a hand that shows the seconds. Q4OS has something called libsystemd-login0 which I assume is from debian wheezy which isn't removeable without also removing trinity.<br />
<br />
Both AntiX and q4os use init and I don't see any processes that use systemd.<br />
<br />
A basic install uses about 2 gigs of hard drive space. Q4OS doesn't load many programs from the initial install. The Q4OS install disk is one CD with about 300 megs worth of files.<br />
<br />
Early conclusion: if you want to have an up-to-date system running a desktop similar to KDE 3.5.10 then <a href="http://q4os.org/" target="_blank">Q4OS Linux</a> with Trinity 3.5.13.2 isn't a bad choice.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-68073934917303537412015-07-25T21:12:00.003-04:002015-07-25T21:18:20.796-04:00Not Learning Unix is a Mistake<br />
Back in 1986 my first exposure to Unix was Venix on an IBM XT which was made by VenturCom. <br />
<br />
It wasn't a great experience but I learned about awk (we called it awkward at the time) and most of the basic Unix commands. Venix for the IBM XT was based on Unix version 7 with some programs from BSD such as vi. I still run Venix 2.0 on xhomer on Linux via the magic of emulation. In this case xhomer is emulating a DECPro 350. There was almost zero source code for Venix.<br />
<br />
I realized that closed source software was very undesirable from a programmer's point of view after I discovered Unix version 7 (much much later) on the PDP-11/45 also via the magic of emulation. Unfortunately my initial exposure to Unix consisted of various closed source variants of Unix such as Venix and (in the SCO era) Xenix. Xenix was actually the second version of Unix I encountered and although I learned about Unix System V there was still mostly no source code available.<br />
<br />
There was little enjoyment to be had with these closed source Unix versions, but learning elements of Unix System V ended up being important as Linux had largely modelled itself on SysV. For reasons of cost we didn't see Personal Computers with the ability to fully run Unix with an MMU until later. MicroVaxes and Sun workstations were well over $10K in price. It wasn't until the appearance of the Intel 80386 that we started to see affordable Unix machines. By the late 1980s most folks could afford such a machine.<br />
<br />
It has occurred to me that not learning Unix is a grave mistake. My relatively early exposure to Unix was important. I may not have appreciated Linux as much or even at all if I hadn't had that ability to experiment at home with Xenix. Learning about Unix develops new mental muscles like playing a musical instrument or learning a new language. But learning these new processes becomes more difficult with age. To me the exact technical details are less important. It does not really matter if you are a Linux user or if you use one of the BSDs or even something more exotic like Plan 9. The important thing is you can learn new concepts from what I will broadly refer to as the Unix/Internet Community. <br />
<br />
One way to metaphorically dip your big toe into the Unix Pool is to set up Linux (or some other FOSS operating system) on a second computer. The secondary computer can be an old Pentium 3 machine with 256 megs of ram, a new machine is not necessary. The major advantage to setting up a Linux computer is that you have access to tons of source code and tons of application software. The process of learning Unix is similar to physical exercise only in this case your brain is getting the exercise. Although this process will require considerable effort on your part it will be worth it. <br />
<br />
My first exposure to Unix wasn't ideal, in fact I could even say that I disliked Unix initially. Part of that was due to the lack of source code. The big realization of the benefits of Unix came later: Unix is the thinking person's operating system and you will find many scientific utilities available. If your interests include physics, mathematics, chemistry, or astronomy then you will find something of interest.<br />
<br />
After using Xenix on my computer at home in the late 1980s I made several attempts to use other operating systems. In 1994 I tried Darkstar Linux but I didn't make it my main operating system. Around the same time I tried Minix 1.5 but it seemed quite difficult to use. It wasn't until I had broadband internet access that I finally made the transition to Linux in 2003 by using Red Hat Linux version 8 as my main operating system.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-28572766345652653312015-03-09T21:32:00.000-04:002015-03-09T21:53:42.176-04:00Easy Way to Get Coreboot<br />
Replacing the proprietary BIOS firmware on most computers is a process that often can be frustrating. It's possible that your computer could be rendered unuseable in the process. Back in 2010 I managed to get <a href="http://coreboot.org/" target="_blank">coreboot</a> working on the Gigabyte GA-6BCX motherboard and although the process went fairly smoothly it did consume a fair bit of time. Fortunately we now have an inexpensive way of obtaining a ready to go coreboot computer.<br />
<br />
There are sites that now offer Thinkpad X60, T60 and X200 series laptops with coreboot installed, although it seems that they are often out of stock. The simplest alternative to obtain coreboot is to buy a chromebook or a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chromebox" target="_blank">chromebox</a> which are readily available from most computer stores. <br />
<br />
If you wish to replace ChromeOS with a Linux distribution you should read the info <a href="http://kodi.wiki/view/Chromebox#Put_in_Developer_Mode" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
<br />
I had an occasion to use a Chromebook and I thought the keyboard was rather cheap so I recommend getting a Chromebox and supplying it with a good quality keyboard. The ASUS CHROMEBOX-M115U has an Intel Celeron 2955U Processor, 2GB DDR3 memory, 16G SSD for storage and Intel HD Graphics and sells for as low as $200 Canadian. <br />
<br />
There is also a Coreboot on Chromebooks community <a href="https://plus.google.com/communities/112479827373921524726" target="_blank">here</a>. cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-3453822475761903312015-02-21T15:01:00.001-05:002015-02-21T15:05:36.437-05:00AntiX Linux: A Brief Review<br />
Certain factors like systemd are polarizing the Linux community. It seems that either you like it or you hate it. Some of the Debian developers are getting nervous and so a fork of Debian called Devuan has been announced.<br />
<br />
I'm always looking at other distros that emphasize compactness and the ability to run on old hardware. I was also intrigued by the Debian controversy with systemd so when I saw <a href="http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=antix" target="_blank">AntiX</a> 13.2 was based on Debian Wheezy I had to give it a try. AntiX comes on a single CD so installing it was easy enough.<br />
<br />
Now the hardware used to test AntiX was an old IBM R30 Thinkpad with 1 gigabyte of memory. It ran fairly well on this hardware, good enough to run fbreader and iceweasel. It had a lot of good attributes like fast boot speed, and it used icewm which I was already familiar with (fluxbox and JWM were also available). It also comes with libreoffice and some multimedia software. It has a fairly modern kernel: 3.7.10.<br />
<br />
As for the systemd issue, yes Debian Wheezy has systemd on it, so this version of AntiX has it as well. All you need to do to remove it is:<br />
<br />
apt-get remove systemd<br />
<br />
What could be simpler? Things get a bit murkier with future releases like Jessie which will have systemd on it by default.<br />
<br />
I don't want to get into empty histrionics about systemd. I don't like it because I feel it's too big a departure from Unix principles. People are worried that systemd is "taking over" but so far that's not really the case. If you don't like systemd try AntiX, Slackware or one of its derivatives, or if you like a more traditional Unix try one of the BSDs. cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-37513536517132718692015-01-20T00:30:00.003-05:002015-01-20T07:35:49.559-05:00Mind Pollution<br />
The time has come to talk about a different kind of pollution. I'm not talking about the pollution that is created by manufacturing computers. This time I'm talking about pollution of the mind.<br />
<br />
Mind pollution has permeated the internet. Computer articles are mostly written from the point of view of a person who uses Microsoft products. The assumption is that everyone uses Microsoft Windows and Windows software. To be fair there are a few OSX and Linux articles. Heaven help you if you use something really unusual like Plan 9 or HaikuOS. I can only assume those folks have a lot of patience and a strong will.<br />
<br />
When I was in high school Microsoft Windows did not exist and we just used what was available at the time which was a Commodore PET. For the folks too young to remember a Commodore PET was an 8-bit computer with a 6502 CPU and 32 kilobytes of memory. This was in the early 1980's. So my perspective is different. Moving from one computer ecosystem to another is relatively easy since I've done it so often. I naturally think in more abstract terms such as "software presentation program" rather than thinking of "PowerPoint".<br />
<br />
Back then no one would have thought of using a specific software package for word-processing. You either used a dedicated machine that only did word processing or you went to the computer store to find some software that would run on the computer you owned. Since everything was so new no one had any preconceptions about which software package was the "best". One usually went along with what their schools used, e.g. if your school happened to use a Commodore computer you probably would have bought a Commodore computer.<br />
<br />
Even in the mid-90s when people were running to the mall to buy Windows 95 the computer articles on the net didn't have the overbearing assumption that you owned a Windows box and now you type "format c: /s" or "ipconfig" (it was ifconfig in the Unix world since 1982). Or my personal favourite "Get your friends off XP" which initially sounds good until you realize the article is about installing Windows 8.1 on your computer.<br />
<br />
That's not to say there aren't articles about Linux and BSD, there's lots of them. And even with articles about Firefox there's enough similarities between the Windows and Linux versions that one can often extract useful information from them. I suppose one could still complain about the assumption that everyone uses Firefox. <br />
<br />
It's really all about mind share. You might think "Microsoft doesn't control me" but what about the computing masses? What about the schools and the governments and the banks? We should have platform independence and people should be able to do their online activities with the platform of their choice. The media should NOT assume that all their viewers use Microsoft software because that is certainly not the case.<br />
<br />
Mostly I can use my Linux and BSD machines to do everything I want to do. There are a few edge cases where it takes quite a lot of effort to do certain things, but for the most part there are no serious problems. Once one walks into a computer store it reaffirms that you're in the Windows World. There are Microsoft stores now but I haven't bothered checking them out as there's just nothing there for me.<br />
<br />
I'd like to think that with the internet we have bypassed rigid and inflexible thinking as people are free to tap into any part of the web. Still, it behooves journalists and teachers to write about computer topics in a platform independent way to the greatest possible degree. If one must write about things which are platform dependent they should at least make it immediately clear that their article is platform dependent in the article's title. It is the general concepts and the broad interchange of information that is the most important thing.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-69485247516740542702015-01-02T21:13:00.000-05:002015-01-02T21:16:23.075-05:00BSD Community is Too Insular<br />
First of all let me say I really like BSD. I enjoy studying it's history which extends back to 1978 when it was a mere add-on to Bell Labs Unix version 6. The longest uptime I've ever had on a computer was with OpenBSD. It's a fine piece of work.<br />
<br />
On the other hand when I look at the BSD community I see a less than friendly environment. It is rather like a gated community where you need to be invited in. Often when one goes to BSD forums one gets some mysterious error message and no access. IRC channels related to BSD are also invite only.<br />
<br />
When I re-entered the Linux community in 2003 there was a strong feeling I was less than welcome. As an old Xenix user I thought I would be treated well enough, instead I was barely tolerated. Eventually I felt I was accepted, at least to a certain degree (I also developed a tougher skin). Some of the rudeness seemed to be part and parcel to being online. Manners on the internet have never been very good, but lately things have really deteriorated.<br />
<br />
In the case of the BSD community things really do need some improvement. While in the Linux world it's true that people are treated with faint rudeness and a certain amount of condescension, it's still preferable to being utterly locked out of the BSD community. One wonders what rites of initiation are necessary to be accepted into the BSD world and if it's worth the trouble.<br />
<br />
I consider the various BSDs to be closer to the original Bell Labs Unix. In some ways I prefer the BSD way of doing things. It's good that we have a varied ecosystem of software. Nevertheless the BSD community really needs to try to become more welcoming to newcomers. This is also true of the Linux community to a lesser degree. <br />
<br />
The original programmers of Bell Labs Unix were undoubtedly writing an operating system for other programmers. Programmers are not the friendliest group of people in the world and sometimes this can be very discouraging for young people who are getting used to Unix type operating systems for the first time. An extra effort needs to be made for the BSD and Linux communities to be more welcoming and less insular. cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-79885074661188601662014-12-07T01:27:00.003-05:002014-12-07T01:36:09.242-05:00Order Linux Discs<br />
Avoid Systemd by trying AntiX, Slackware or OpenBSD.<br />
For older computers try Puppy Linux.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.osdisc.com/index.html?affiliate=cubeman"><img src="http://cubeman.org/images/osdisc1.jpg" /><br />
Buy Linux and BSD Discs</a><br />
<br />
cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-39422756492211504192014-11-19T11:51:00.001-05:002014-11-19T11:56:09.881-05:00Thoughts on Systemd<br />
First a short description of systemd:<br />
<br />
Systemd is a collection of system management daemons, libraries, and utilities designed for Linux.<br />
<br />
One of the main reasons why some folks don't like systemd is it stores logs in a binary format. This goes against the Unix philosophy of storing data in flat text files. The old method was sysvinit which is described here:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Init#SysV-style">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Init#SysV-style</a><br />
<br />
Of course we can go further back, all the way back to Research Unix v5 from 1974:<br />
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/goog_1134679346"><br /></a>
<a href="http://www.maxhost.org/other/text/original-unix-v5-init.c.txt">http://www.maxhost.org/other/text/original-unix-v5-init.c.txt</a><br />
<br />
BSD init was, prior to 4.3BSD, the same as Research UNIX's init and after that things<br />
diverged so there was a BSD and AT&T SysV way of running init. In the ancient days<br />
of Unix v5 there were no runlevels. Unix v5 simply ran /etc/rc in the Thompson shell and<br />
then launched getty.<br />
<br />
Some folks say that systemd is the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svchost.exe" target="_blank">svchost.exe</a> of Linux, saying it is essentially making <br />
Linux more like Microsoft Windows. It is a monolithic entity that hides what's happening<br />
behind the scenes. It stomps on the Unix Philosophy (again) of doing one thing and<br />
doing it well. With systemd we have one large Swiss army knife of a tool that isn't <br />
very good at anything in particular. <br />
<br />
For people who want a modern distro that stays much closer to the original Unix Philosophy<br />
we have the BSDs: NetBSD, FreeBSD and OpenBSD. Another solution would be to fork an<br />
existing Linux distro into sysintv and systemd versions but that is hardly ideal.<br />
I'm not sure which Linux distros will avoid systemd in the future as it seems many<br />
of them are jumping on the systemd bandwagon. Slackware appears to be resisting the <br />
systemd tide and "Patrick has stated he intends to stick to the BSD-stylized SysVInit design."<br />
<br />
Another solution to this problem is to do what I do, i.e. to use an older Linux distro<br />
that still uses sysvinit and upgrade it as necessary. This method isn't very popular but<br />
there are many retro-computing specialists who use older versions of Linux and Research<br />
Unix. Some distros we use include FC1, 2.11BSD and Unix v5,v6 and v7. Of course I do<br />
expect there to be more forks of distros appearing in the future. There's just too many<br />
different opinions on how things should be done in the Linux community.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-90845765105892410602014-10-25T01:28:00.004-04:002014-10-25T01:44:17.187-04:00Using Older Software and Hardware<br />
If we look at the history of Unix we can see that the kernel, libraries and userland programs have all increased in size as time passes. Here is a summary of the sizes of libc.a, the main library for C language: <br />
<br />
Unix version 2 from 1972: 31 functions and 5,242 bytes<br />
Unix version 5 from 1974: 85 functions and 21,542 bytes<br />
Unix version 6 from 1975: 74 functions and 22,042 bytes<br />
(note that with v6 the math functions were moved to liba.a)<br />
Unix version 7 from 1979: 154 functions, and 77,690 bytes<br />
<br />
2.11BSD from 1992: 347 functions, 233,788 bytes<br />
<br />
Slackware Linux 4.0 from 1999: libc.so.5.44 has 580,816 bytes<br />
<br />
Vector Linux Classic from 2007: 1,425 functions and 2,979,634 bytes<br />
<br />
Similarly we can see that basic commands like ps for process status have also increased in size:<br />
<br />
ps for Unix v5: 2,660 bytes<br />
ps for modern linux: 63,948 bytes (a 24-fold increase!)<br />
<br />
One could easily wonder "at what point does the feature set of a given part of an operating system reach completion"? It seems we never reach that point. On the other hand we don't necessarily have to continually upgrade our operating systems. We could reach back into the past and pick an older starting point and upgrade that distro as needed.<br />
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
Over a decade ago I started running a web server based on Fedora Core 1 which still runs to this day. There's no doubt in my mind that FC1, while leaner than the most of the current distros from 2014, is still bloated with tons of functions I never use. In other words the ideal operating system, one in which does exactly what I need and no more, does not exist. I will give an honourable mention to OpenBSD though.<br />
<br />
There has been some good work done to counter the bloat. Tiny Core Linux does a reasonably good job of being lean and mean. It isn't what I would call low memory use though, it still needs at least 46 MB of RAM (compare this to Unix v5 which can run easily in 256K of ram).<br />
<br />
Others will argue that as the feature set of an operating system increases it is inevitable that its size will also increase. That is true but I can't help wonder exactly why libc.a has to be almost 3 megabytes in size. There has been work done to make a leaner libc with the MUSL project. MUSL libc.a is a mere 1.6 megabytes which is significantly smaller. <br />
<br />
What else could one do to improve the ever increasing bloat of their operating systems? Well, you could roll your own software distribution or even write your own operating system. You could pick a distro based which uses the MUSL version of libc, e.g. Snowflake and Sabotage.<br />
<br />
Unfortunately even the so called light distros seem bloated to me. The true champion of lightweight distros is Basic Linux 3.5 which is based on Slackware 3.5 from 1999. It can run within 16 megs of memory and it can use Slackware 4.0 packages. There are still folks that use it on older hardware. Of course we can rule out Firefox or Chrome or most other modern web browsers while constrained with such a severe memory limit, although we can still use text based web browsers like lynx.<br />
<br />
Using a truly ancient operating system like Unix v5 would seem too restrictive to all but the most hard-core PDP-11 aficionados. We can safely assume that everybody would want an operating system that supports ethernet and TCP/IP. Also a working PDP-11 is a rarity and they wouldn't be efficient in terms of power use.<br />
<br />
It seems to me that bloated operating systems go hand in hand with corporations who want to sell everyone endless updates of software and hardware. Computer users need to make a judgement call on just how often they want to upgrade and how much money they want to spend. I've already reached the point of upgrade fatigue and I'm putting most of my efforts into maintaining and repairing my existing computers. The truth of the matter is chip fabrication pollutes the world with caustic chemicals like Trichloroethylene. The endless production of plastic isn't doing our environment any good either.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-16789712433190193992014-10-01T13:38:00.001-04:002014-10-05T00:46:36.264-04:00Why I don't use tablets<br />
The world is filled with tablets and smartphones. I've resisted the temptation to jump on the bandwagon (mostly, I did buy a used zaurus).<br />
<br />
My main computer activities consist of running a server, programming and researching information on the internet. Now writing programs on a tablet just seems silly. There's no tactile feedback from an on-screen keyboard and even if it did have a real keyboard it would be no where near the full size. The grunt-and-point interface just doesn't cut it.<br />
<br />
I've always wondered just how difficult it is to repair a tablet. Fortunately the engineers at ifixit.com have ranked the tablets by repairability:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.ifixit.com/Tablet_Repairability" target="_blank">Tablet Repairability</a><br />
<br />
The Microsoft Surface Pro ranked the worst and the Dell XPS 10 took top ranking as the most repairable device on the list. <br />
<br />
The advantages of using a desktop or tower computer over a tablet are numerous: no battery life to worry about, proper keyboard, repairable (replacement parts are easy to come by), large monitor, and it's just nicer to sit at a desk with a good chair. Last but not least: you're probably not going to drop your desktop computer.<br />
<br />
Portable devices such as cameras and ereaders do have their uses, but to my mind tablets have far less utility that a standard desktop. One can not help but wonder what the sociologist Vance Packard (author of the Waste Makers) would make of tablets. It's hard to imagine he would be in favour of them.<br />
<br />cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5839270841298813647.post-54907197031748915132014-09-05T23:59:00.000-04:002014-09-07T01:55:34.824-04:00Why the Computer Experience is Often Poor<br />
HEAT<br />
<br />
The most common reason computers become damaged is due to heat. A lot of <br />
computers are not designed well enough to deal with 100% CPU use over long<br />
periods of time. This has been a problem that computers had since their<br />
beginnings using vacuum tubes. The problem remains to this day as a lot <br />
of modern laptops still overheat and there are many examples of video cards<br />
in desktop machines becoming damaged due to excessive heat.<br />
<br />
Intel has tried deal with this problem with their speedstep technology.<br />
If the sensors say the computer is getting too hot then the CPU scales the clock frequency to a lower value. Other solutions for overly hot laptops include cleaning out the fan vents and buying a cooling pad, of which there are active and passive types.<br />
<br />
Generally a desktop with good air flow should not overheat. <br />
<br />
Note: I've never had a Panasonic Toughbook CF-48 overheat.<br />
<br />
COMPONENT FAILURE<br />
<br />
Unfortunately just about all computer components fail at some point. It's<br />
a good idea to watch for signs of impending failure. One can make <br />
component failure less likely to happen by using high quality parts such<br />
as power supplies, motherboards and hard drives. Some external hard drives<br />
are rugged and have anti shock capability. <br />
<br />
The DC adapters used with a lot of routers and cable modems are cheaply made <br />
and are a common point of failure. It's possible for a cable modem to fail<br />
and not fail completely, instead there is increased packet loss. The<br />
easiest solution for this problem is to completely swap out the cable modem<br />
for another one. In the case of routers merely swapping out the DC adapter<br />
(or wall wart) will usually fix the problem. Be sure to match the physical<br />
connector, polarity, voltage and amperage to the original unit.<br />
<br />
LACK OF KNOWLEDGE OF DEVICE PROTOCOLS<br />
<br />
It's one of the oldest tricks in the book for hardware manufacturers of<br />
printers and scanners: Make the protocol the device communicates in a <br />
secret, thus making life difficult for software programmers (especially FOSS<br />
ones). Often there is little or no technical documentation to support development of free and open-source device drivers for their products.<br />
<br />
REPAIRABILITY<br />
<br />
As computer motherboards become more and more integrated they become less and<br />
less repairable. In the days of the IBM PC the motherboard had no disk controllers<br />
or IO ports, just the memory chips, the CPU, and external ports for the keyboard and cassette deck. Thus it was a relatively simple matter to replace defective components. Not so with a modern motherboard that has sound capability, networking, hard drive controllers, USB, and who knows what else. <br />
<br />
One wonders what repair level is possible with tablets and other tiny devices which<br />
use surface mount technology. On the other side of the coin often it is quite easy to repair a modern LCD HDTV. The large case size ensures that there is a reasonable distance between components. One can at least do part replacement at the component level. <br />
<br />
The road to unrepairable computers started with Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) technology in the 1970s. Before the microcomputer appeared the CPU was a collection<br />
of separate cards. In the case of the DEC PDP-11/20 it had integrated circuit flip-chip modules. Individual flip-chips could be repaired.<br />
<br />
SOFTWARE CREEP<br />
<br />
The final issue is software creep. By this I mean the continual replacement of older <br />
software with newer software. It seems unavoidable but it's usually unnecessary.<br />
How often does one need to update their word processor? I'm using abiword on<br />
Linux and it seems adequate for my purposes. KDE versions after 3.5.10 do not intererest<br />
me. In fact I've switched to the lighter IceWM and I'm quite happy with it. <br />
<br />
CONCLUSIONS<br />
<br />
In conclusion we can clearly see why the computer experience is often poor, and this <br />
is mostly due to poor design and lack of knowledge of computer maintainance. It's not<br />
the user's fault as the manufacturers want unknowledgeable users and unrepairable devices so they can keep selling you a new computer or television or $ELECTRONIC_DEVICE every 4 years or so. It's bad for your pocket book and it's bad for the environment. All that ewaste has to go somewhere and somewhere is usually a landfill site. <br />
<br />
The solutions to these problems are somewhat unclear but I favour using older more<br />
repairable computers as part of the answer. I've seen Panasonic Toughbooks last over ten <br />
years and there's no reason why one couldn't keep it working for at least another decade.cubexyzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06334616051847604357noreply@blogger.com0