mark rushing's writey things - Latest Comments

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Mark Rushing — Tue, 08 May 2012 09:33:17 -0000

I know! I should have known better than to even give her a chance after the first disk-wiping attempt! That'll teach me.

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Opensuse — Tue, 08 May 2012 04:49:47 -0000

Retard

Re: Out of Ubuntu’s Bed to Hairy Arch Linux in a Dark Alley

Kc-ububed — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 17:21:40 -0000

I run openbsd on my servers but you can always use a test system toavoid any issues

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

Mark Rushing — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 20:32:56 -0000

That's interesting... I got very intrigued by the Hurd many years ago, but have never once delved into it. Maybe it's time...

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

Arne Babenhauserheide — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 17:59:12 -0000

Well, the Hurd is moving nicely these days.

Yesterday I saw tests where the UDP implementation in userspace was actually almost as fast as the in-kernel one. And that’s quite some deal: The design is slowly beginning to pay off more and more.

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

Mark Rushing — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 20:18:16 -0000

Thanks Chris! Yeah, back then I can remember many times having to hunt down problems in makefiles. I'm amazed at how few problems crop up any more in the source that's out there. I used to be you could count on it with almost any given piece of software. Now it seems to be the exception instead.

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

Chris Brennan — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 18:29:15 -0000

Quite the poetic story you weave. And this is coming from a very long time Gentoo user (back around late '07/'08 when it was still fresh and running from from the citadel you mention.

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

pepoluan — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 23:28:58 -0000

Indeed! In fact I've planned to ask my new employer to provide me with 2 or 3 servers "to fool around with" ;-)

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

Mark Rushing — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 23:04:37 -0000

Oh man, Pep. I'll do what I can to keep the bonfires burning. You could always lead a double life... .... .....

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

pepoluan — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 09:33:55 -0000

This... this is so poetic that you touched something deep in my soul... something that makes me glad for I have partaken in the Gentoo initiation ritual, survived, and came out stronger... yet that something also made me sad that in the near future, I'll be leaving my beloved Gentoo servers behind and start baby-sitting the cold, heartless, borg children servers produced -- not birthed -- out of the tartarus called Richmond.

And like you, I know that some day in the future, the haunting calls of Gentoo will every now and then beckon me to step out of my nursery, and join the druids' dance under the stars, a tribute to The Source where it all began.

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

Sergio Rodríguez Inclan — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 08:19:18 -0000

Haven't you tried Sabayon Linux, is Gentoo with binaries, you should give it a try, thanks for the post :)

Re: Ubuntu and I – Beauty Isn’t Enough

Mark Rushing — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 10:30:39 -0000

Yeah, there seems to be a strange problem - the move to unified desktops seems to mean that easier customization goes out the window. Whereas if you go with something very customizable, you seem to end up sacrificing some of the niceties that come with unified experience. It's certainly a challenging architectural design problem....

Re: Ubuntu and I – Beauty Isn’t Enough

hypertyper — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 05:07:58 -0000

Very nice article. There must be a lot of people with your exact experience. I've tested a lot of distributions lately because sooner or later something about each of them started to really annoy me. Even the new Mint with its Gnome3/MATE(?) mash I found really annoying because it's not exactly straight forward to customise.

I ended up using Xubuntu but got frustrated with LightDM so I installed an extra partition with Arch which is a lot of work as you mentioned. However, if you do have the time it's a great learning experience and you do eventually end up with exactly what you want. I like fast and minimal OS so my current favourite is somewhere between Xubuntu and Arch. Give Xubuntu a try if you liked the Ubuntu-Gnome2 kind of feel.

Re: Ubuntu and I – Beauty Isn’t Enough

Rahul Dsouza — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 05:17:29 -0000

I'm sorry, while posting the previous one I completely forgot about what you said about MATE. Yes it is quite an interesting development. I would still much rather use XFCE but MATE is much better than MGSEj (though I like Gnome Shell's expose like feature). My dream though is that someone listens to Linus T and forks Gnome 2.x (but it probably will not happen).

Re: Ubuntu and I – Beauty Isn’t Enough

Rahul Dsouza — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 05:12:10 -0000

I started off with computers fairly early, my dad thought it was a great way for me to cope with my dyslexia. Now computers in Bombay in 1998 cost a small fortune and as you can imagine we all turned to piracy. Besides ethical and moral questions there was the constant threat of the computer crashing. My initial interest away from a Windows based PC was to be fascinated by Apple (I still like many things about their operating system - a system perfectly tailored to people with Learning disabilities) but at that time I had first heard about Linux. Now even though I had started of on computers fairly early I never really got into anything technical. As you can imagine the articles I came across at the time were very very technical so I thought nothing about it. Then I heard about a distro - I can't quite remember which one (Debian, Fedora, Red Hat or Mandrake are likely candidates) and it momentarily held my interest, but at the time I couldn't find anyone to help me with installation (community documentation is so much better now) and so I just kept thinking about it from time to time. Finally I saved up and bought a macbook and this completely transformed my academic life (until someone stole it). This is when I realised that I could not go back to Windows. This is when I decided to take a chance and try Linux. After I found Ubuntu it's been fairly smooth sailing and I don't think I can ever look back. Now what's left is to find a good second hand Thinkpad T series laptop and say good by to proprietary software for good.

To go back to the original reason my dad bought me a computer, I do find the libre office dictionary to be lacking in quality correction, unlike the one on word, something that I hope will change as it goes from strength to strength (hopefully with that beautiful Citrus UI mockup)

Re: Ubuntu and I – Beauty Isn’t Enough

Mark Rushing — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 08:11:57 -0000

I'm really happy you decided to try Linux out, whichever way you came to it! I think Ubuntu has been especially good at bringing people to something "friendly" to use, and even better in many ways, than proprietary alternatives like Windows and OSX. Were you just curious when you first decided to try it out?

Actually, I just installed Linux Mint on a laptop last night, and plan to write about it. I have to install it on the workstation, though, for the evaluation, since the rest have been installed there. They have done a great job.

You know, I'm going to go back when I have some time and at least put Arch on the laptop, to play around with it. With a simple setup like that (one drive) the install shouldn't be a hassle at all. I'm curious about MATE in Mint, too - I had never heard of it before. It seems an awful lot of trouble to go to, just to "undo" stuff that was done in the direction of gnome-shell.

Re: Ubuntu and I – Beauty Isn’t Enough

Rahul Dsouza — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 02:33:17 -0000

Mark,
Wonderful read. It's been little over a year since I first installed Ubuntu (I had wanted to try Linux out for 5 years but lacked the drive then). I must have spent a good 6 or 7 months completely enamoured with it and then its charm slowly began to fade away. What stayed with me, though, was that I began to absolutely love Linux (the freedom, the ability to tweek so much and most importantly the philosophy behind it).

There are several reason for why I began to fall out of love with Ubuntu. The primary one was Unity. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure Unity has its takers, it isn't so bad, it's just not for me. I loved the old Gnome and I was happy that I could continue to use it in 11.04. When 11.10 came along I discovered the new Gnome shell and decided that it was better for me than Unity. After a while though I began to feel that Gnome shell + Ubuntu just feels wrong. It was natural, since Canonical only concentrated on building 11.04 and 11.10 around Unity, and completely ignored the Gnome Shell.

This is when I decided to switch to Linux Mint. It seemed like the obvious choice, and without thinking I went ahead and installed the Ubuntu version (rather than the Debian one). Now I can see why LInux Mint appeals to so many people - it is a beautiful distro. My main problem is that the only difference (for me) is the addition of the bottom bar (a welcome addition). Everything else is like Ubuntu. This is when I started paying attention to KDE and XFCE (let me tell you, I don't like MATE at all) and I seriously thought of installing the Debian version instead.

Now however I am enthusiastic about Arch Linux and will be installing it instead. I actually understand your reason for not wanting to go with it. I, on the other hand, am just enthusiastic about being able to assemble the whole system together. I have time and I do no important work on my desktop (so far) so I am really happy to give it a go.

I hope that LMDE works for you. It looks like a better way to use XFCE than Xubuntu, though the differences are minimal, the added Mint goodies clinch it. Oh and one last thing, I can't understand why the Mint Menu repeats the favourites list found in the Gnome Shell list. Just doesn't make sense and it irritates me every time!

Best wishes,
Rahul

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Belphe — Mon, 12 Dec 2011 07:49:51 -0000

Obviously this isn't the right place for you. In case you missed it (you know - reading and such silly things), not everyone agrees with the author. However, none of the above felt the need to insult anyone.

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Mark Rushing — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 08:38:56 -0000

I know Fedora is from the Red Hat people mostly, who do the enterprise stuff, but I have no idea if Red Hat and Fedora distributions are the same. It's been a very long time since I've tried actual Red Hat. I know the new Mint just came out, too, and I'm going to give that a test drive as soon as I get this project wrapped up. But from my understanding, Mint's based on Debian (like Ubuntu is), but isn't exactly Debian in the more abstract user experience. Plain Debian has always been fairly minimal. I'm curious what Mint's done, keeping Gnome back as it has, apparently... Very curious....

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Anthony Youngman — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 04:25:41 -0000

Oddly enough, my feelings about RH/Debian and SuSE are the reverse of yours ... :-)

The little network I support is now entirely SuSE, me having wiped mint because (a) I couldn't get on with it, and (b) the upgrade trashed it. I've never liked Red Hat.

But then, both my home systems are gentoo - one of them an old K7 1GHz athlon. Now that IS torture, when KDE or LibreOffice are updated ... :-)

Re: The Pan Pipes of Gentoo Linux, Always at the Source

Jack Byer — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 14:28:31 -0000

That's exactly the route that I came to Gentoo. I don't remember when exactly it happened but somewhere around 2000-2002 I switched from using regular distributions to Linux From Scratch. Then after six months to a year of doing that and accumulating a large collection of Bash scripts to automate to compilation process I started hearing about a distribution that already did all that so I switched to Gentoo and have been there ever since.

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Mark Rushing — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 19:19:39 -0000

Hey, thanks so much Simon :) - I'm honored. :)

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

simon — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 14:27:42 -0000

Hi,

I've found you through a link somewhere. Always fickle those links - appearing, catapulting you into the future and then disappearing behind you.

Your blog is very entertaining - you have a new subscriber you lucky devil you! :)

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Mark Rushing — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 18:43:37 -0000

Thanks Grant! Don't listen to me, though. I mean, well, you can if you like. I'm just saying it's always best to try something for yourself. (I'm trying to be nice to Suse) ;)

Re: Psychotic SUSE 12.1 Linux – A Mythological Nightmare

Grant Galbraith — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 03:57:12 -0000

Many years ago, before it is was OpenSUSE, I used SuSE for about 12 months. It is comforting to know that there is no need for me to revisit the nightmare that is yast and the green monster in general. Nice write-up :)