Linux-Advocacy Digest #643, Volume #31 Sun, 21 Jan 01 20:13:05 EST
Contents:
Re: New Microsoft Ad :-) (John & Susie)
Re: "The Linux Desktop", by T. Max Devlin (Giuliano Colla)
Re: 10,000 to 20,000 Linux/Alphas - CLUSTERED! ("Erik Funkenbusch")
Re: X Locks up; Hell PR rep says, 'Its getting cold down here' ("mmnnoo")
Re: Why "uptime" is important. (Edward Rosten)
Re: New Microsoft Ad :-) (Giuliano Colla)
Re: Loki has trouble playiong their own games under Linux!!!!! ("mmnnoo")
Re: New Microsoft Ad :-) (The Ghost In The Machine)
Re: New Microsoft Ad :-) (Chris Ahlstrom)
Re: VMWare? (The Ghost In The Machine)
Re: New Microsoft Ad :-) (Edward Rosten)
Re: New Microsoft Ad :-) (Chris Ahlstrom)
Re: Windows curses fast computers (Russ Lyttle)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: John & Susie <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: New Microsoft Ad :-)
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:49:48 -0500
Erik Funkenbusch wrote:
>
> "mlw" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> > >
> > > http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/16139.html
> >
> > Did I read this correctly?
> >
> > Win2K: MTTF 2893 Hours? (120 days)
> > NT: MTTF 919 Hours? (38 Days)
> > Win98: MTTF 216 Hours (9 days)
> >
>
> The test covers desktop environments, not servers. The average desktop *IS*
> shutdown at night.
Nonsense. If manufacturing is running 24/7, workstations and their users
*will* be doing the same.
------------------------------
From: Giuliano Colla <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: "The Linux Desktop", by T. Max Devlin
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 23:55:27 GMT
"T. Max Devlin" wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> Sorry; pre-compiled software predates Microsoft's monopoly by some good
> bit of time. I never said I'm not capable of compiling, or even
> intimidated by it. I simply prefer to not bother with it myself.
>
You don't have to bother. Sometimes compiling source code is just part
of the installation process. It helps to produce binaries consistent
with kernel and libraries you've actually installed. It may be fully
transparent to you, but you must have a compiler present.
Just to make an example, VMware comes 90% pre-compiled, but during
installation it compiles a couple of modules in order to fit with SMB
services of your machine.
Another example are sound cards. If you have a sound card which is
supported only by ALSA project, you may get ALSA drivers, which are
distributed only as source. You just start the installation script, and
they're compiled and installed properly, but once more you need the gcc
compiler.
This is somehow the consequence of the free source situation, and of the
multi-platform support. It is much easier to distribute a single source
package, and work out a fully automatic compilation script, than
distributing and supporting a myriad of different binaries.
------------------------------
From: "Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: 10,000 to 20,000 Linux/Alphas - CLUSTERED!
Date: Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:05:59 -0600
"." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:94f20u$bf1$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Erik Funkenbusch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > "." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> > news:94chnr$esm$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> Erik Funkenbusch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >> > "." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> >> > news:94blks$5ov$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> >> Adam Warner <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >> >> > Hi "sfcybear",
> >> >>
> >> >> >>
> >> >> >
> >> >
> >
http://computerworld.com/cwi/story/0%2C1199%2CNAV47_STO56666_NLTpm%2C00.html
> >> >>
> >> >> Also, apparantly linux is able to scale to 20,000 processors.
> >> >>
> >> >> Compared to windows 2000 datacenter's alleged 32.
> >> >>
> >> >> Thats a pretty big difference.
> >>
> >> > Man, this isn't even vapor.. it hasn't even been *STARTED*. They
claim
> > to
> >> > not have the machine ready till 2004. Lots of things will change in
> > both
> >> > the Linux and Windows side before then.
> >>
> >> Alright then. 6,000 nodes on the Google linux cluster.
> >>
> >> How many nodes exactly are capable of operating on one W2K cluster
again?
>
> > Did you read the article? It's *NOT* a clustered computer. It's a
single
> > machine with 20,000 processors.
>
> You're an idiot, erik. Seriously.
>
> *No One* has built a single hyper-parallell machine where all the
processors
> share the same cache and same ram out of more than a few hundred
processors.
Who said anything about sharing the same cache? That's what cache snooping
circuitry is for.
> They are NODES, dickweed. NODES. See IBM's mainframe specs for details;
pay
> particular attention to the ASCI series.
Even 8-way SMP machines use 2 4-way nodes. Note that this is SMP, ccNUMA
systems use a different architecture. ccNUMA uses distributed memory with
cache coherancy circuitry to allow one processor to know if the data it
needs is in another processors cache.
This is not the same thing as a cluster of machines.
> > Why don't you people read the articles you harp on about?
>
> > Here's a quote:
>
> > "However, the system will be a long time in coming. Bill Blake, vice
> > president of high-performance technical computing at Compaq, said the
three
> > partners hope to have a prototype machine ready by 2004."
>
> > Note the use of the singular word "machine".
>
> The same word is used for singular mainframes containing hundreds of
NODES.
But not the same thing as a clustered system of machines.
------------------------------
From: "mmnnoo" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: X Locks up; Hell PR rep says, 'Its getting cold down here'
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:06:08 GMT
I had a pretty predictable lockup under XFree86 4.0 pushing
ctrl+alt+t1 to switch to a text console. It didn't work every time,
but enough that couldn't use the functionality. By 'lock up,'
I mean the keyboard didn't do anything. I might have been
able to telnet in and kill X but didn't try. This was using
perhaps the first version of the NVidia non-free driver. After
getting an updated driver, which required X 4.0.1 (I got 4.0.2)
I experimented and haven't been able to repeat the problem.
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "Bones"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Whoa! It looks like I've had my first hard lock-up of X ever.
>
> ...So, there I was downloading junk off the gnutella network with Gnut,
> the CLI gtella client. I decided to flip over to another vt and fire up
> X to do some browsing with Netscape. Uh oh, the keyboard and the mouse
> stop responding, (I can't kill X with Ctrl+Alt+BS, and Linux won't
> respond to the three finger salute either.)
>
> I regained my senses after the initial knee-jerk panic reaction and
> noticed some things: The modem was still receiving data. Hmmm, looks
> like the kernel and all the other processes are happily humming along. I
> was downloading a large file (for a 28.8 modem connection), so I decided
> to let Gnut finish its work. In the meantime, the screen saver kicked on
> -- more proof. Damn, no working machine handy to ssh in and shutdown the
> box.
>
> I hit the power switch after the download was done and thought about the
> problem for a second. My dual boot box defaulted to Win95 in the
> process, where it proceeded to lock up with nothing but an empty desktop
> and a pointer. Ahhhh.... I'd been tinkering in the BIOS with IRQ
> settings before. I power-cycled the machine again and went into the BIOS
> setup. Just as I suspected, I had accidentally set IRQ 12 to only be
> used by
> 'ISA', so my PS/2 mouse no longer had an IRQ.
>
> I fixed the setting and booted the machine to Linux. Everything now
> works wonderfully. Almost thought I had a real Linux problem for a few
> minutes there. I feel so left out, I never have any problems with Linux.
>
>
> ----
> Bones
------------------------------
From: Edward Rosten <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why "uptime" is important.
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:07:55 +0000
"Joseph T. Adams" wrote:
>
> mlw <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> : Oh, and to address "WYSIWYG" criteria. There is no such capability in
> : HTML, and people that assume there is always make web pages with serious
> : formatting errors. The rule is write the page and try it on many
> : browsers with different fonts and screen resolutions.
>
> A few other issues with the "WYSIWYG" school of "HTML" generation:
> * Standard HTML separates content from presentation. Content should
> NEVER have <FONT> tags and that sort of thing; that's what styles
> are for.
True.
> * Opening tags MUST have matching closing tags. Most browsers will
> forgive minor violations of this rule, but some will not.
That's not true. <p> tags don't need to be closed. A second <p> acts as
</p><p>. I've been visiting the validator a lot recently, to check that
all my dynamically generated pages are HTML 3.2 compliant.
> * If it isn't HTML, then it isn't a Web page, even though it may
> seem to work in some brain-damaged version of IE. And if it
> doesn't pass the tests in http://validator.w3.org, then it isn't
> HTML.
Unfortunately, I have some automatically generated web pages that seem
more portable as nonstandard HTML. The bit in question is putting images
inside <pre> tags. If I use that for the layout, instead of tables the
pages load faster and renders properly in Lynx as well as Netscape,
since Lynx does a rotten job of tables.
> * The "Javascript" code and "Java" applets generated by many tools
> are badly broken.
Yuk. There is far too much IE only java out there.
> * Properly generated HTML is human-readable and editable. Tools that
> spew nonreadable HTML are in my opinion worse than useless.
Unmaintainable.
> * The "HTML Tidy" program (http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/tidy/)
> can help fix the broken HTML generated by bad "WYSIWYG" HTML editing
> software.
>
> Joe
-Ed
--
Did you know that the reason that windows steam up in cold|Edward Rosten
weather is because of all the fish in the atmosphere? |u98ejr
- The Hackenthorpe Book of lies |@
|eng.ox.ac.uk
------------------------------
From: Giuliano Colla <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: New Microsoft Ad :-)
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:09:00 GMT
"T. Max Devlin" wrote:
>
> Said JS PL in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sun, 21 Jan 2001 11:58:47 -0500;
> [...]
> >Just trying to explain it would be revolting.
> >"O.K. grandma, to play the cd you'll have to mount the cd drive." NO NO
> >STOP!! Step away from the computer granmdma!!
>
> I would expect that Linux has had automount for a number of years. Can
> somebody confirm this?
>
I can confirm only from november 1999, when I installed my first Linux.
It is called autorun.
------------------------------
From: "mmnnoo" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Loki has trouble playiong their own games under Linux!!!!!
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:10:38 GMT
Games are a pretty new area for Linux, as so few games have
been available. This seems to be slowly getting better. I was
glad to see Unreal Tournament work so well on X, and with
the 2.4.0 kernel setting up my joystick on the usb port was easy.
Linux is definitely playing catchup in this area but the progress is
real.
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/2000/4/ns-13122.html
>
> Here's a snippet:
>
>
> "Even our developers have trouble getting (games) going," said Scott
> Draeker, president of Loki, during a conference session at the
> LinuxWorld show here, emphasising the difficulty of setting up Linux
> platforms for gaming. "(The Linux situation) is reminiscent of the bad
> ol' days of DOS."
>
>
> But this one is my favorite!
>
> "How bad, exactly? Ray Schwamberger, a Linux technician for Atipa
> Linux Solutions, spent two hours tweaking and configuring a dozen
> computers at his company's LinuxWorld booth so they could adequately run
> Quake 3 and demo Atipa's Linux PC. "
>
>
> This stuff is HYSTERICAL!!!!!!!
>
>
> Flatfish Why do they call it a flatfish? Remove the ++++ to reply.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,alt.linux.sux
Subject: Re: New Microsoft Ad :-)
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:11:04 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote
on Sun, 21 Jan 2001 19:15:39 GMT
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>On Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:25:54 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Charlie
>Ebert) wrote:
>
>
>>How sad the Microsoft supporter is these days.
>>
>>He's loosing market share to a ghost OS which can't die,
>>and he just keeps on trying to plug the holes in the dam anyway
>>he can.
>
>The ghost is already dead, Linux that is, at least on the desktop.
He's right, of course. Despites Window's unreliability,
difficulty of installation (to the point that most systems are
"preimaged"), quirky behavior, and cutesy icons, Windows is the
dominant desktop today, with over 90% of all desktop computers by
one count having an installed version of either Windows 98, Windows NT,
Windows 2k, or Windows Me. This makes Windows the most wildly
successful and profitable operating environment ever, and everyone
should use it. (Spot The Flaw.)
I suspect this will not be a situation that will change in the near
future, unless everyone, say, dumps their PCs for iMacs (unlikely)
or IA-64 hardware which is incapable of running Windows (ditto),
or a mass-market sealed unit (call it PlasticOffice2002 :-) )of some
sort becomes available.
>
>>This is incredibly funny.
>
>I'm glad I made your day a little brighter. Sure beats reading
>How-To's now doesn't it?
Well, Montgomery Scott (Jimmy Doohan) did like to read reference
manuals.... :-) :-)
>
>>When will you EVER learn that COLA is hardly read by anybody.
>>People don't go to newgroups first to get their information
>>about operating systems.
>
>Better talk to all your Linvocate partners who keep telling me how
>easy it is to find information on the net to repair a defective out of
>the box operating system like Linux.
I might quibble about that. While finding the information once
one has narrowed down the search a bit (does one really expect
to find useful information about CAT scans on a pet website,
for example?), a rank newbie is probably going to have difficulties
no matter what he does.
This is why Windows is so attractive -- and so seductive.
It is touted as "easy to use" and "for beginners".
There's an old saying: "teach a child the proper way while he
is young and he will not depart from it later in life"
(admittedly, this is a paraphrase).
Microsoft has successfully shown us their version of "ease of use",
to their advantage. This doesn't mean it's easy to use,
we just think it is! (I'm disheartened to see all the
imitators, as well; Borland's JBuilder, for instance,
has folder tabs. Ugh! Even Wine (http://www.winehq.com)
may have been affected, to copy the "look and feel" of Windows
for various reasons. I'd have to see what their COMMDLGs
(the non-native ones, that is) look like.)
>They call me names for NOT turning to the groups for help.
>The recent "Font De-Uglification How-To discussion is one example.
And what are we supposed to do, post the entire solution whenever
a newbie asks for it? :-)
Get real. That's what webpages are for -- reference. We post
a URL, let him read it, and get enlightened. Mind you, we
could also petition Netscape to use saner defaults and XFree to
use better fonts, as well; this would not be unreasonable.
(I'm not sure I've seen this particular problem, however, and
it's easy enough to change the fonts in any event within Netscape.)
Or we could pitch out Netscape entirely and use a different
browser, such as konqueror (which comes with KDE). I'm not
sure what Gnome uses for a browser (mnemonic?).
>
>So which one is it Charlie? Look to the net for help or not?
>
>By the way that How-To only takes care of the fonts, is there a system
>wide de-uglification How-To for Linux somewhere?
If you can be more specific, perhaps. Is CreateProcess(x,y,z,z,y,...)
beautiful? Is fork()/exec() ugly? Is 'mv' ugly? Is any CLI ugly,
and GUI beautiful? (I've seen some wretched GUI behavior, alas,
from Netscape on Unix [regrettable].) Is Visual Basic beautiful?
Is Java ugly? Is C++ beautiful? Is Smalltalk ugly? Is the multiconsole
behavior of Linux beautiful or wretchedly ugly? How about fvwm's
or olvwm's capability of screen scrolling, or HP X's CDE's or
Linux KDE's capability of flipping from one workspace to another?
How about Sun's ability to flip from a monochrome monitor to a color one?
(This one was awhile ago, and I never used it myself.)
See also
http://www.iarchitect.com/mshame
(The Interface Hall Of Shame) for some other examples of truly
bad decisions -- a fair number of them by Microsoft's development
team(s).
But don't worry, everyone, Microsoft is still easy to use, even
if their interface is not. :-)
>
>
>>Business's don't give a damn about your feelings about Windows
>>as they already know better.
>
>Yep and that is why it is the number one system.
Exactly. Windows is the best system for business, because
most other businesses use Windows. This is a vicious cycle.
Quick -- what do recruiters want for resume formats? Why,
Word format, of course! (I'm not making this up, either.)
I doubt this is because Word is the best format; it's merely
the most prevalent. (It's probably the most flexible, too,
but it's not the most open. However, as I understand it,
Word is OLE-based, which means it's a "container format";
other file formats can be swallowed by Word, such as MS Paint
pictures, and even animations.)
Side note: Wordpad -- and Write before it -- can also generate
Word-format documents (or at least documents that Word can read).
Those of us who don't have Word, but who do have Windows, at least
have that option. (Personally, I used SGML last time I needed to
send my resume anywhere. :-) )
[rest snipped]
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- insert random misquote here
EAC code #191 0d:00h:22m actually running Linux.
This is the best part of the message.
------------------------------
From: Chris Ahlstrom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: New Microsoft Ad :-)
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:17:25 GMT
J Sloan wrote:
>
> JS PL wrote:
>
> > "Why I stay away from Linux as much as possible!
>
> > As root, mount the VMware Tools floppy, copy the contents of the floppy to
> > /tmp, and unmount the floppy.
> > cd /
> > mount -t vfat /dev/fd0 /mnt
> > cp /mnt/vmware-linux-tools.tar.gz /tmp
> > umount /dev/fd0
>
> Actually, those are the instructions for the mentally challenged.
> If you knew anything about Linux, you'd simply type:
>
> mcopy a:* /tmp
>
> Jokes on you, wintroll!
>
> jjs
Plus, if /etc/fstab is set up properly, you can reduce it to:
> > mount /dev/fd0
> > cp /mnt/* /tmp
> > umount /dev/fd0
Plus, if you have the floppy icon on the desktop, you just have
to insert the disk and double-click the icon, then do the Windozzzzz
drag'n'drop thingie, then right-click to unmount. Not at the difficult.
About as easy to get used to as Windozzzzzzzz telling you the floppy
is missing when you didn't expect it to be needed anymore.
Or waiting for Windozzzzzzzz to read the exe's from the floppy just so
it can put the right icons in the Explorer display. Yeesh.
Chris
--
Flipping the Bozo bit at 400 MHz
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Subject: Re: VMWare?
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:20:26 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, T. Max Devlin
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote
on Sun, 21 Jan 2001 18:32:16 GMT
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>I'm considering the VMWare Express package to help me over "the
>application barrier". I'm wondering if the performance hit that I've
>heard about is just with the Windows apps, or will the 'thin layer
>between hardware and OS' that VMWare talks about slow down Linux itself?
As I understand it, the performance penalty may be anywhere from
5 to 15 percent. And yes, it will slow down Linux, if there's
lots of I/O or CPU involved -- but that makes it no different from
any other app, as far as I know. :-) I don't know if it
consumes CPU just sitting there refreshing its display, though.
I'll admit, VMWare sounds cool, though. I just wish it were freeware.
[.sigsnip]
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- insert random misquote here
EAC code #191 0d:02h:55m actually running Linux.
The EAC doesn't exist, but they're still watching you.
------------------------------
From: Edward Rosten <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: New Microsoft Ad :-)
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:21:38 +0000
JS PL wrote:
>
> "mlw" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > JS PL wrote:
> > > But you would have no way of knowing that I lie when I say that in
> approx.
> > > 11 months my Win2K OS has crashed exactly "once".
> > > Give me a way or method to crash Win2k, I've yet to find one on my own.
> >
> > Here is the problem, when you say 11 months, that may mean that you turn
> > it off every night and boot it every morning. It is unlikely that you
> > will see a problem. If, as you say, you have seen it crash once, then
> > this is significant in this configuration, and falls well within the
> > MTTF study.
>
> I don't turn it off every night. It runs constantly, it usually runs for
> 10-30 day spans before being shut down for one reason or another.
> Now if my dial up to a Unix server could be so stable. I usually can't stay
> connected for more than 48 hrs!!
> Last time I shut it down was to install a modem that Linux could understand.
> Sometimes it's just because I fucked it up the network settings so bad that
> it's easier to just bring back the HD mirror from a spanned 3 cd set (1hr)
> than to fix it. Sometimes its just that I'm bored and install a different OS
> on the one HD. Last week for instance I (attempted ) an install of
> windows1.1 for shits and giggles.
Did you get it to work?
I tried (for much the same reason) btu it didn't much like dos 7. I
tried to back install dos 6.22 so that i could load it with "previous
version..." but I buggered up so badly that I needed to re-install
everything on that drive.
Which DOS version do you need?
Ta
-Ed
> So it was rebooted then too. The things I
> do to this system aren't what I'd call "best practices" for ANY operating
> system. But so far Win2k has withstood the most abuse, and the actual
> operating system has crashed ONCE. I've had the CD stop responding a couple
> times trying to read a dirty disk or trying to burn to on poor media. I just
> kill the process and move on. Outlook used to stop responding until logoff
> and back on until I fixed the (non-os related) problem.
>
> > > You've never had any experience with Windows 2000 in your life except
> what
> > > you've read.
> >
> > Actually the term "in your life" is at best hyperbole, 2K has only been
> > released for a short time.
>
> And Max acts at least two years old. So that would fall within his lifetime.
--
Did you know that the reason that windows steam up in cold|Edward Rosten
weather is because of all the fish in the atmosphere? |u98ejr
- The Hackenthorpe Book of lies |@
|eng.ox.ac.uk
------------------------------
From: Chris Ahlstrom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: New Microsoft Ad :-)
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:21:38 GMT
JS PL wrote:
>
> Why I stay away from Linux as much as possible!
> Doing four times as much key pounding as is needed under Windows, just to
> accomplish the same thing.
>
> Case in point, after installing Linux to run under VMware here's the
> directions for improving the graphics et. al.by installing the VMare tools:
>
> <paste>
>
> As root, mount the VMware Tools floppy, copy the contents of the floppy to
> /tmp, and unmount the floppy.
> cd /
> mount -t vfat /dev/fd0 /mnt
> cp /mnt/vmware-linux-tools.tar.gz /tmp
> umount /dev/fd0
>
> Untar the VMware Tools tar file in /tmp, and install it.
> cd /tmp
> tar zxf vmware-linux-tools.tar.gz
> cd vmware-linux-tools
> ./install.pl
>
> Start X and your graphical environment if they are not started yet.
>
> In an X terminal, launch the VMware Tools background application.
> vmware-toolbox &
>
> The VMware Tools background application may be run as root or as a normal
> user. The application will have additional capabilities if run as root.
>
> *****
> *****
> And now the instructions for Windows:
>
> Double-click the My Computer icon on your desktop.
> Double-click the A: device.
> Double-click VMwareTools.exe and follow the instructions.
>
> </paste>
Two things here. First, you're actually complaining about VMware writing
a better installer for Windozzzzzzzz than Linux. Second, you're assuming that
the Windozzzzzzz user has admin setting, or that he's running a crap
Windozzzzzzzz like 98/ME.
Oh, a third thing is you're deliberately padding the Linux steps and stripping
out some Windozzzzz steps.
@#$%
--
Flipping the Bozo bit at 400 MHz
------------------------------
From: Russ Lyttle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Windows curses fast computers
Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 00:21:52 GMT
spicerun wrote:
>
> Pete Goodwin wrote:
>
> > spicerun wrote:
> >
> >> I suspect, in his case, he wasn't an Electronics Engineer long enough to
> >> really understand devices (and got very frustrated)
> >> ....in fact, that's probably the reason he switched to Software, so that
> >> he wouldn't have to understand Hardware.
> >
> >
> > Naaah.
> >
> > I did design and build my own 6809 machine, write my own bios, create a 64k
> > dynamic RAM board and it worked first time, put together a floppy disk
> > controller (hardware and software)...
>
> Why would someone write a bios for a 6809 Machine? Apple didn't even
> have a bios per se on their 6502 machines.....
> They did however have firmware and some embedded routines and drivers
> (never guaranteed to be resident at the same
> location) running on their machine, but they never made those routines
> (at least intentionally) accessible as would be seen
> in a 'bios'. In fact, on Apple's old machines, drivers weren't in their
> OS until you plugged in the interface card to the
> peripheral (ie - driver was on a rom on the card).
>
> I get the distinct feeling that what you are calling a bios is really
> boot code and embedded drivers. It isn't the same
> thing.
>
BIOS stands for "Basic Input Output System". At its core, a BIOS is the
boot code and enough embedded drivers for the system to start accepting
input from some source : panel switches, keyboard, tape drive, or disk
drive. The smallest BIOS I ever worked with was 30 bytes: it kicked off
a tape drive to read in everything else. BIOS is usually stored in ROM.
The dividing line between BIOS and the OS proper has always been a grey
area. All commercial small computers, AFIK, have had a BIOS of some
sort. Both my 6800 from Heathkit and first TRS-80 had a BIOS with ROM
BASIC. The Intel machines put *lots* more stuff in the ROM with the BIOS
than was strictly necessary.
> What has gotten you into the mode of thinking only in bioses and only
> the Microsoft way (Especially if you were building
> your own Motorola-type platform machines that have no similiarities with
> the intel-type platforms)? I gotta tell you,
> it makes you look really bad as a microprocessor hardware/software
> person, and, reflects badly on other engineers who also
> build their own processor hardware and write the firmware for them.
>
> Just for your Info...before you start flaming....I'm one of those guys
> that make a living designing Microprocessor systems, building,
> troubleshooting, and writing the firmware for them...and, depending on
> the customer, either make a proprietary OS or use an available
> OS specified by the customer. I've designed 6502, 8086, 68020, and 604e
> PowerPC Systems, and wrote the firmware for them.
> I think mlw has done all of this too.
>
> > You seem to be equating Windows fan with inferior mind.
>
> All I have to do is see the Windows Fans/Advocates around my place at
> work. Interesting as an NT machine freezes up how they
> say there's something wrong with the machine because NT doesn't do
> that. Only problem with that is that just about every
> machine at work has froze at one point or another. These Winvocates are
> arrogant, loud, and pathetic and it is a pain to have
> to deal with them in person.
>
> >
--
Russ
<http://www.flash.net/~lyttlec>
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