Miscellaneous Operating Systems/Hardware

hamei, don't lump BSD in with BeOS or Loonix please. Netflix, Juniper and Sony all use BSD, and without BSD, GNU/Linux wouldn't have had a network stack.

TeamBlackFox wrote: hamei, don't lump BSD in with BeOS or Loonix please.

But it's the same. You are missing the real problem.

I'm not trying to stir up trouble here, honest. There really is a big problem in non-commercial computing. Back to ajw's original question : he feels the newer Linuces are getting crappy and wanted input.

The real question is, what is he going to do with it ? If the answer is ftp, write and compile code, check on the work network from home, or run gimp, then a lighter version of Linux or a BSD is a good answer.

But if he wants to run applications, then forget it. There ain't shit, there's never been shit, there's never going to be shit. Non-commercial operating systems haven't got doodly for applications and they are never going to have any applications. It's done. Toast. Stick a fork in it. She's never going to fuck you again. Move on.

Now, about security ... this is another huge problem and one which is soon going to make the web useless for any serious tasks. Two firewall rules will totally cover your security needs with the exception of the browser .

There is the hard smelly stone in the privy. ALL browsers are written to be as porous as a colander. As soon as we got past Mosaic, the browser-writers understood the real power of the web. It wasn't that pie-in-the-sky schtuff that Berners-Lee envisioned. From the days of Jimmy-boy Clark in his unbuttoned gold-coke-spoon shyster Miami real estate developer uniform with that fascist creep Andreesen as his leading general, the browser wars have been fought over money and control. You can paint a cat brown and glue floppy ears on it but it's never going to hop. It's still Netscape and they have exactly the same plan for world domination that they always had.

This vision which people have of "security" is a joke. All you are trying to do is keep out the small-time shysters while allowing the major players to set up transmitting stations in your underwear drawer. That's a full-time job because the small-time players are just as smart as Boogle. Every trick that Boogle invents to get naked photos of your girlfriend is going to be exploited by acne-riddled Shawn living down the street in his Mum's basement, and there's no way around it !

A secure browser and a secure operating system would be simple : but that's the very last thing that the people who write them want. Between the operating system, the browser, and the websites, they are all out to shear us sheep.

The end result will be that the unwashed masses take over the web and the rest of us get a new hobby / life. I'm thinking tree house, British Columbia, fishing, because there is no way to stop this.

something like WAIS may have had fewer holes, but the problem is we really don't know. security isn't that easy, what you actually need is proof-by-construction that the system is secure, and this means you have do everything from scratch using secure operations. no library convenience allowed.

the interactions between WWW browsers and routers are even more insidious than you paint it:
https://www.defcon.org/images/defcon-18 ... outers.pdf
Don't use routers that allow configuration from the browser.

Or, don't use routers period. My firewall is Slackware box with a kernel that I configured, running a firewall with rules that I wrote, no one from the Great Beyond is getting inside my lan. I'm pretty sure. Knock on wood...

ARE YOU ASKING FOR A CHALLENGE?!?!?!?!?!1

ClassicHasClass wrote: ARE YOU ASKING FOR A CHALLENGE?!?!?!?!?!1

I have thought about doing a miod at times, too - put a /myPhPadmin/pwn_my_kmptr.dare file up with "har har fooled you idiots !" as content but maybe flying under the radar is safer

I still have to wonder about this 'security' fetish tho. If you run Windows and dedicate an entire core to an anti-virus program, you're about as safe as you're going to get. All the other security measures are easily defeated by stupidity. If grandma and grandpa are using the computer and they insist on doing stupid stuff, there's not a damned thing you can do about it.

More to the point, anyone who does online banking is an imbecile. Period. End of discussion.


So what's the point of all this security paranoia ? No one is going to stop this :

http://blog.sfgate.com/crime/2014/09/12 ... hc-bayarea

if anyone thinks this is an isolated incident, please join the online banking group in the fools' corner. Don't forget your dunce cap.

If you are going to assume it's systemd that is slowing down your system, you might as well make your decisions with dice or by sacrificing chickens. If you don't want to make choices based on superstitions, then examine and monitor the system performance and see for yourself what is causing all the problems.

Use htop and iotop to see what is gobbling up CPU time, memory, and I/O. Is there swapping going on? How much? Do you have enough swap space, or too much? If you are swapping, how is your hard drive performance? Try installing FVWM and running it, and see if you still have the same problems with sluggish performance. Try to get some perspective on where the performance loss is coming in, and narrow down the possibilities.

The basic thing, though, is that it shouldn't be a matter of ripping out an entire operating system just because your computer seems "slow." Look into the matter and see where the problem is coming from.

hamei wrote: But if he wants to run applications, then forget it. There ain't shit, there's never been shit, there's never going to be shit. Non-commercial operating systems haven't got doodly for applications and they are never going to have any applications. It's done. Toast. Stick a fork in it. She's never going to fuck you again. Move on.

What are those applications that you miss?
For me, I've been using FreeBSD and Linux for the last 10 - 15 years at home, and I have all the applications that I need.

tingo wrote: What are those applications that you miss?

I need to create documents. Stuff that you do on Windows with Word, or Ami Pro if you are stubborn. On Irix I use Ted but it's a struggle. Luckily, Word is awful also so I don't feel like I'm being persecuted. I have Framemaker, should use it more and become more skilled with it but it's cumbersome for small jobs. There's no Framemaker for Linux so no problemo there Maybe Abiword would do the job. Open Office is awful. Even Akkana Peck who loves Linux can't stand the thing. It's like a second-rate bad copy of Mickeysoft Office, ugh.

Graphics, you've got GIMP. Decent enough but won't do cmyk so there goes printing. Okay for home but not for work.

Vector graphics like Corel or Illustrator, Inkspot doesn't work.

Layout like Indesign or Quark, nothing. Scribus doesn't work. Indesign 4 (aka CS2) is nice. Serif PagePlus was good. There's several choices on Windows, on Linux nothing.

CAD, nothing at all. Not a single program that's worth squat. In fact, the one that does exist is useless. In my case, that's a killer.

No CAM programs, for most people that's not a problem but the fact still is, there aren't any. None.

I do use CDRTools but it is painful. It does work well though.

Sound and video applications, nothing that works. Luckily MPlayer is good for playback but half the Linux distributions are 'deprecating' MPlayer now for some retarded reason.

The desktops themselves - what a pile of disgusting spooge. Not one single well-thought-out good-performing desktop. Twenty years after 4Dwm they are finally discovering vector icons. Be still, my heart. Even Windows 2000 is head and shoulders better than any Linux desktop. What year did is it now ?

I'm sure you can live with it - hell, I survive on Irix, although at least Irix has some good commercial apps - but why ? Every single one of these major projects has gone nowhere for years. And now they are all just like the Mickeysoft fanboys with their stewpid, "Just use gcc !" chant. What happened to cross-platform, standards-compliant, inclusive, all that good stuff ?

It's just totally discouraging. All these good intentions and big plans but it's all gone nowhere. What was the platitude about "genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" ? Well ... somebody in fossyland needs to sweat some details. Maybe fix some real problems for a change instead of switching toolkits.

For me, I've been using FreeBSD and Linux for the last 10 - 15 years at home, and I have all the applications that I need.

I use Irix ... but if I had to change to Linux, I'd quit. Unless you are a mas0chist, the applications are awful. Of course people should use what they like but at this point, I think I'd rather run Windows 98 than Linux. It's less hassle and works better.

As for CAD, I use Dassault's Draftsight. On windows I prefer it to Autocad 2008. On Mac it is no contest because mac autocad sucks a lot. Supposedly they have a linux version but I never got it going on last year's version of ubuntu (pooping penguin?) If you are more stubborn than me you could probably, maybe, hopefully, get it to work. I just wanted to try it so spun ubuntu up on a spare disk.

Unlike autocad, it's free so you don't need a torrent and crack to use it.

guardian452 wrote: As for CAD, I use Dassault's Draftsight.

Really ? thanks, I'll go take a look just for the knowledge. I hunted and hunted for ages, the best Linux had to offer was that Qt thing, I forget the name but it's useless.

Unlike autocad, it's free so you don't need a torrent and crack to use it.

Ahem, well, yes, umm, err ....

Ah. 2d. Better than nothing but not exactly Catia ... even Bobcad is 3d and that was a DOS program. Cadkey, 3d wireframe, nice program, ran on DOS 7 very nicely. That was in the mid-eighties ? You're kind of proving my point

If you're looking for 3D cad then I got nuthin. My background is as an EE and our mechanist does not use a computer

guardian452 wrote: If you're looking for 3D cad then I got nuthin.

How about Siemens NX.
Also, it's not CAD but Maya runs great on Linux...

vishnu wrote: How about Siemens NX.

Cool ! Siemens buying those companies was probably the best thing that ever happened to them. Some neat stuff :

http://www.plmworld.org/index.php?mo=cm&op=ld&fid=239

1984, 3072x2304 display ...

This is a trip down memory lane also ...

http://www.plmworld.org/index.php?mo=cm&op=ld&fid=240

Also, it's not CAD but Maya runs great on Linux...

No drawings No dimensions Peculiar to use, too, if you are used to making a box 10 x 10 x 10 ... but it is cool that it runs on Linux. Forgot about that. And there is Ayam, too, which is free and works okay.

Doesn't make up for no word processor tho

I have very (very) little CAD experience, but I like to tinker some, and maybe 6 months ago I tried out this software:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/free-cad/

It has some rough edges, and at first the workflow was a little strange, but after I got used to it, I was able to get some work done. My end goal was to create some .STL's for a friend to print out on his high end 3D printer at his work. Mostly just some mock ups of parts for some instruments in a car I'm restoring.

And yes, the lack of a decent word processor on linux is a damn shame. But it gave me an excuse to get my company to buy me a Macbook Air to supplement my linux workstation so I could run MS Office...

Linux has something better than a word processor, LyX the document processor!

vishnu wrote: Linux has something better ...

And the Space Shuttle is an excellent vehicle for a trip to the grocery store

hamei wrote:

vishnu wrote: Linux has something better ...

And the Space Shuttle is an excellent vehicle for a trip to the grocery store :P

Eh, I think the Crawler-Transporter that used to take the shuttles out to the launch pads works better. At least parking isn't a problem...

Okay you smarites, how about Arbortext then...

Web browser: Firefox
Email: Thunderbird
Music player: Audacious
Video player: VLC
Image editor: GIMP
Office: LibreOffice

These are the normal everyday GUI applications that most people would use. If someone needs to do CAD, 3D modeling, etc., then their requirements may be different. Since I use my system for normal desktop stuff, programming, and TeX, I'm fine... For me, the "Year of the Linux Desktop" happened over 10 years ago. There will definitely never be a time when everything is perfect and when everyone can switch over without a single hitch. Nobody will roll out the red carpet anytime soon with perfect binary compatibility, so it's all a personal matter if people want to make the leap.

I do think that for most normal tasks, the basic applications needed are already there. Besides those, most applications that people use are on the Web. When my parents were switched over to Ubuntu, they barely noticed the difference. "How do we get to Google? Oh, it's still the Firefox icon..."