Subject: Linux-Misc Digest #855
From: Digestifier <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 1 Oct 94 05:13:16 EDT

Linux-Misc Digest #855, Volume #2                 Sat, 1 Oct 94 05:13:16 EDT

Contents:
  Re: OS/2 vs Linux Speed was ( Re: OS/2 fan wants to try Linux..) (Jeff Kesselman)
  X News-reader for LinuX (Wrath Child)
  Re: Contrib. $s for Linux Dev (Ian Parkin)
  Re: Linux goes commercial (Al Longyear)
  Re: Procmail for Linux? (Andre Fachat)
  Re: Hardcard IIXL and Linux (Andre Fachat)
  Re: Editors/WordProcessors for Linux (DAVID L. JOHNSON)
  Re: New Linux Distribution (Mark J. Bobak)
  Re: PROMISE DC4030VL-2 IDE Controller (Kamal Shaker)
  Re: Emacs & latex for thesis (Floyd Davidson)
  DataBase Programs for Linux (Jason Sokolosky)
  Re: Ada Compiler for Linux (Steven Buytaert)
  Re: Nailed down to 386bsd or linux, now which one? (Joseph W. Vigneau)
  Re: NEWBIE!: How do i Print from GS (not over LPR!) (Andreas Matthias)
  Re: [Q] SW Technology (Tim Bass (Network Systems Engineer))
  Xconfig under linux (slackware) (Andrew Peter BRUNO)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Jeff Kesselman)
Subject: Re: OS/2 vs Linux Speed was ( Re: OS/2 fan wants to try Linux..)
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 1994 07:21:08 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Julian Boot <[email-masked]> wrote:
>[email-masked] (H. Peter Anvin) writes:
>
>>Followup to:  <[email-masked]>
>>By author:    [email-masked] (todd)
>>In newsgroup: comp.os.linux.misc
>>>
>>> I recently added Linux to my OS/2 machine and am quite
>>> happy, so I feel somewhat qualified to answer this post:
>>> 
>>> Jim Chisholm ([email-masked]) wrote:
>>> : Hi folks..
>>> : I'm a long time advocate of OS/2 and I am curious about Linux..
>>> 
>>> : 1)will it run on a386DX40 8M ?
>>> 
>>> Yes, but slowly.
>>> 
>
>>But not anywhere near as slowly as OS/2.
>
>Quite.  On a 8MB machine, Linux and X are quite a bit more snappy than
>OS/2 and PM.  One of the major reasons seems to be the much better handling
>of swapping in Linux - even the pacthes for OS/2 2.11 do not improve things 
>much.  Also PM is very slow.  Shame, but true.
>

On the other hand, X with Linux on my 5 meg 386-33 is unusably slowly, 
while OS/2 and PM were reasonable (though not speedy).  I have a feeling 
this has more to do with how things are tuned then any innate superiority 
of one system.  IBM has worked very hard to tune OS/2 to perform 
reasonably on low end systems. The prevailing thinking on X seems to be 
that if you can't afford at least 8 meg, then you aren't a real user.

Shame, but true.

;)

Jeff Kesselman

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Wrath Child)
Subject: X News-reader for LinuX
Date: 30 Sep 1994 17:49:53 GMT

I'm looking for an Xnews reader for LinuX.  If anyone has 
any info about something like this...I would be a very 
happy camper.

Thanx,
wrathchild

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Ian Parkin)
Subject: Re: Contrib. $s for Linux Dev
Date: Tue, 27 Sep 1994 01:35:35 GMT

: For light beers, I'd have to go with Sierra Nevada Pale,
: the Walnut Brewery's Buffalo Gold Ale, or Breckenridge Brewery's
: India Pale Ale.

For real sig-11 problems 'Orkney Skull Splitter' a non-too delicate drop
with the crippling capabilities of a chainsaw.

IAP     

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Al Longyear)
Subject: Re: Linux goes commercial
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 1994 12:00:56 GMT

[email-masked] (Champ Clark) writes:

>       My boss swears up and down that he read somewhere that Linux
>       is no longer going to be a "free" (when I say that,  I mean, 
>       you dont have to buy it.. you can FTP it) anymore.  He states
>       that the author (linus) has decided to make "linux" a commerical
>       product.  I told him that I though this was odd,  and i figured
>       I would have heard *something* around usenet about that (that
>       would be pretty big news!).  I told him there was commerical
>       *distributions* of linux,  but that was no to be confused with
>       "linux" itself (ie = kernel source).  He stated,  "nope, 
>       Linux itelf will go commerical... It will no longer be 
>       a public freeware/public domain OS,  but a commercial OS", 
>       which I took as "Similar to SunOS for x86" or "SCO"...

Then tell him to buy it and use it. It seems that this is one of the
major complaints from the 'business' people that "since it did not
cost me anything then it can't be good." You should be happy with your
boss' misconception.

I would think that your boss is getting things confused. Linux will
support commercial software in the form of iBCS and Wine. However,
that has nothing to do with the operating system itself nor the status
of its availability or distribution.

p.s.: There is an old saying "the customer is always right". In business,
there is another old saying "the boss is always right." DON'T ARGUE. And
don't point out the mistake. It really doesn't matter.

-- 
Al Longyear           [email-masked]

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Andre Fachat)
Subject: Re: Procmail for Linux?
Date: 30 Sep 1994 17:53:49 GMT

Don Rubin ([email-masked]) wrote:
: I was looking for a package to handle automated response Email
: (eg. [email-masked]), some kind person suggested I use the
: Procmail package (which I retrieved the source for) unfortunatly
: I can't get it to build under Linux. Does anyone have this working
: under Linux?
I also tried to compile this and it worked so far (I don't remember
any problems) But after that it always wants to use "dotlocking"
on the mail folder in /var/spool/mail to append and this requires
the sticky bit set and wordl write for this directory, which I will
never grant. 
And this seems to be incompatible with smail :-( (as smail seems
to use some other method)

Andre

--
Andre Fachat              mail me!             [email-masked]
For some it is MS-Windows, for others it's the longest batch file on earth...

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Andre Fachat)
Subject: Re: Hardcard IIXL and Linux
Date: 30 Sep 1994 17:56:51 GMT

Bill Jaeger ([email-masked]) wrote:
: Howdy!

: I was wondering if anyone knew of a driver that would allow a Plus Hardcard 
: IIXL to be used with Linux?

: I'd like to bring Linux up on an old 386 which has a Hardcard in it.

: Thanks in advance!
I also have a Hardcard II XL with 50 MB.
I use the Atdisk2 kernel patch and it works very well.
If you get problems mail me at home (see below)
Andre
: -Bill

--
Andre Fachat              mail me!             [email-masked]
For some it is MS-Windows, for others it's the longest batch file on earth...

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (DAVID L. JOHNSON)
Subject: Re: Editors/WordProcessors for Linux
Date: 28 Sep 1994 19:56:14 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] (Sergei Naoumov) writes:
>In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (MacGyver) writes:
>>TeX...I've got a few questions about that.  Is there a good TeX editor?  If
>>so, WHERE?  Are there TeX converters from say ASCII to TeX or vice versa?
>>If so WHERE?  I'd like to find a good TeX editor (preferrably X based) and
>>get it running, however, I seem to be running into brick walls whenever I
>>try to find any information about it.
>
>Hey, TeX is a typesetting system. There is NO WAY of converting FROM
>ASCII to TeX's code just because there is nothing to convert. I presume,
>though that you have an ASCII file that you want to print using TeX. Then
>you have to read a good book about TeX and look for a basic structure of
>a document.
>
Not at all.  Try dvi2tty (or its variants).  Does what the guy wants, 
takes TeX output (a dvi file) and turns it into ascii text, losing all bells
and whistles.

David L. Johnson                        [email-masked] or 
Department of Mathematics               [email-masked]
Lehigh University
14 E. Packer Avenue                     (610) 758-3759
Bethlehem, PA 18015-3174                (610) 828-3708

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Mark J. Bobak)
Subject: Re: New Linux Distribution
Date: 28 Sep 1994 20:02:25 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Juana Moreno <[email-masked]> wrote:
>I have been thinking of putting up a new Linux distribution especially
>oriented to DOS-Win dummies. I have taken a nontraditional approach and
>am willing to sacrifice many of the sacred cows of Unix. I really think 
>that many features of traditional unix are not very useful in a typical
>home pc context. However, clearly Linux has many advantages over Dos-Win
>if care is taken for keeping a reasonably small distribution. That way,
>Dos-Win users can discover the power of Linux without feeling overwhelmed.
>I'd like to include a short and concise guide that highlights the major
>differences between dos-win and Linux-Xfree86, something of the sort of
>the book "Unix in a Nutshell" but much shorter. A possible title could be
>"Unix (Linux) in a Pinhead: an introduccion to Unix for Dos users" (grin).

Well, this is just my opinion, but.....

The way I see it, Unix is so powerful because it has all the utilities that
it has.  It is not for the faint of heart.  There is a lot to know and there
is a lot to learn, just to be a good user.  And if you're talking about a
system for home use, then, presumably, the user will also be the system
administrator, which entails a whole lot more.
>
>My distribution, tentatively called "WIn-dos Transition" (WIT), would have
>the following features:
>       - Defaults to SINGLE USER mode. No need to show the complications
>               of multiuser accounts to newbies who will likely use it
>               personally.
This could be a problem, as single-user-mode is, by definition, root access.
Root access is something that even an experienced user should only login with
when necessary.  

>       - Only one shell: bash, with lots of aliases that match as closely
>               as possible the COMMAND.COM commands and the utilities in
>               the DOS directory. Maybe it won't be very difficult to 
>               include a .BAT->.sh translator.
I suppose that this is doable, but why?  If the point is to get people to
start learing Unix, the last thing you want to do is disguise it.

>       - Only enough utilities to match the functionality of the DOS
>               standard utilities plus the major unix winners like 
>               grep, awk and sed. (But not vi or emacs!!!).
Again, the utilities that Unix has are what makes it so powerful!  Don't
cripple it.
>       - NO NETWORKING, except for maybe a terminal program (minicom) and
>               a mostly configured SLIP (client side only). In that case,
>               maybe Mosaic should be also included.
This is probably fairly harmless.  That's probably all the home user would
want anyways.

>       -NO SCSI. Most home dos-win users don't even know what SCSI is.
They may not know what it is, but certainly, there are lots of dos/win home
systems out there that have SCSI drives and other devices.
>       -XFree 3.1 configured to use the VGA16 server (mono or color) with
>               a generic (low resolution) Xconfig.
Why VGA16 low-res?  If you want to convince them that it's better than dos/win,
you ought to configure their system to the max posible resolution and colors,
right?  (Pretty pictures impress people! ;-))

>       - Utilities to match the standard Windows applets:
>[list of applets deleted]
Many of these and hundreds more X programs and utilities are available now...
no problem there.
>       - Only one window manager: FVWM
Also not a problem for your average user.
>       - No developing tools.
Probably not needed, for your intended audience.
>       - The binaries should fit (gzipped) in 10 1.44 floppies.
>
>The idea is that this will not be the final Linux distribution that 
>the users will have, but only a "transitional" distribution that lets
>them get the feeling of the power of Linux in an environment as much familiar
>to them as possible. Therefore, the distribution will be compatible with
>Slackware "packages", so that an upgrade (when the fear is left behind) will
>be very smooth.
>
>Well, that's my idea. I'd like to hear comments before I start packaging 
>everything, because if you think this is useless I'd like to know before
>I waste my time. All suggestions will be appreciated.
>

Well, I'm not sure you'll find an intended audience.  The average Joe,
non-power-user, non-hacker, will likely not see the need for an OS such
as Unix.  And, for his use, he'll probably be right.  As for setting up a
distribution that is easier to install and get off the ground, well, that's
tough to do, simply because there are so many different cdrom/mouse/drive/
controller/video card and monitor options out there.  The installer is forced
to know something about the hardware and in many cases may have to get to the
level of knowledge where he knows the difference between IRQ5 and IRQ7. 

Here at work, we have quite a large Sun workstation installation, and lots of
users of varying levels of expertise.  Many folks, when they just start using
Unix, know enough to login and start X.  Their default startup starts X.desktop,
and they know how to use a mouse and click icons.  However, it doesn't take long
for them to find the command line, and they start picking up on basic commands
within a week or so.  (cd,mkdir,pwd,lpq,etc,etc)  My point is, these users also
have a staff of help desk folks ready to answer any questions they have, and
fix the system when things get screwed up.

In short, Unix is not an entry level OS.  It was not intended to be, and I doubt
it ever will be. 

Sorry if I sound like I blew you out of the water, but that's my opinion.  Take
it for what it's worth! ;-)

-Mark

-- 
Mark J. Bobak
Application Developer
Truck Operations, Ford Motor Company
[email-masked]

------------------------------

Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux,comp.os.linux.development,comp.os.linux.help
Subject: Re: PROMISE DC4030VL-2 IDE Controller
From: [email-masked] (Kamal Shaker)
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 1994 05:58:51 GMT

Christian Nelson ([email-masked]) wrote:
: I also have one of these controllers, though I only use two drives
: with it... so I'm not going to be much help.  I'm almost positive
: you'll need to acquire the patch that allows you to use two IDE
: controllers simutaneously.  The promise card, as far as using a 3d and
: 4th drive is concerned, acts like two controllers.

Nope... I have one of these cards with the at2disk or whatever
patches and it doesn't work, the kernel complains about not
being able to resest the controller...

: Have you have any trouble with your controllers, ie: system locking-up
: when doing intensive (disk intensive) activities?  Mine does, but ONLY
: when I have it set on defered write.  Let me know if you also have
: this problem.  I think it might me related to my drive
: configuration... That Promise controller doesn't like WD drives in a
: two drive configuration.

Well it crashed under OS/2 last night when I was copying ~50meg
from the CD, that and the fact I can't get anything to boot in
fast ( read cache only ) mode.

: -- 
: Christian                 |
: [email-masked] |
: [email-masked] |

Kamal.
-- 
==============================================================================
Kamal Shaker,        | [email-masked] or [email-masked]
Student Vax Cluster, | %SYSTEM-F-EXQUOTA, alcohol quota exceeded,
La Trobe Uni,        | stomach dumped.       (Using OS/2 2.1, and loving it!)

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Floyd Davidson)
Subject: Re: Emacs & latex for thesis
Date: 29 Sep 1994 07:26:33 GMT

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Jeffrey  Nipp) writes:
>Ok, so what have we learned here?  The software package you are used to 
>is the best package for doing productive work, as long as it can handle 
>the task at hand.  Simple enough. 

Only if the task at hand is relatively insignificant, and not
repeated often.

A clerk typist or secretary using emacs and TeX all day every day
to write business letters is not producing at maximum efficiency,
no matter how well the programs are known.  The purchase and
learning time expended on a proper word processor will quickly pay
for itself with higher productivity.

And a programmer would be well advised to learn editing with emacs
not because the next project will be done faster, but because over
a period of time productivity will be increased by matching the
best tool to a job that will be repeated many times.

However...  the secretary might once in a while want to whip out a
small program, and the word processor will handle it just fine
because it is available and well known.  Likewise a programmer can
write a single business letter with emacs a lot faster than with
some unknown fancy word processor.  Both tasks are relatively not
a significant part of what makes each person productive.

I wouldn't think that a thesis is an insignificant project to be
done up using whichever tools are familiar just because it can be
accomplished.  Learning emacs and TeX would be worth the effort to
make a thesis just that little shade higher in quality.  It would
not be something one could switch to a month before the final
version is due.

  Floyd
-- 
[email-masked]   A guest on the Institute of Marine Science computer
Salcha, Alaska           system at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks.

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Jason Sokolosky)
Subject: DataBase Programs for Linux
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 1994 19:32:28 GMT

I was wondering if there were any DataBase Programs/Systems (e.g.
like Oracle), that use SQL, available for Linux????

Thanks,
--
Jason Sokolosky                       
[email-masked]             
[email-masked]            
                                      
-Long Live the INTERNET!!!!           

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Steven Buytaert)
Subject: Re: Ada Compiler for Linux
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 1994 07:34:09 GMT

Shujaat Siddiqui ([email-masked]) wrote:
: I am looking for Ada compiler on linux. I read somewhere, there is such thing
: but I missed to save the information. I will really appreciate it, if someone
: will post information for how to get the Ada compiler for Linux.

  Use archie to find GNAT, the gnu frontend for a translator. It doesn't
  compile to C (despite the 'translator' in the name) but goes 
  directly over to the RTL used in gnu compilers. 

  Anyway, GNAT is the name to look for. Any other experience with
  GNAT for me is 0, i just happen to now the name...

  Success,

--
Steven Buytaert 

WORK [email-masked]
HOME [email-masked]

        'Imagination is more important than knowledge.'
                        (A. Einstein)

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Joseph W. Vigneau)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.386bsd.misc
Subject: Re: Nailed down to 386bsd or linux, now which one?
Date: 29 Sep 1994 07:34:38 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, Po-Han Lin <[email-masked]> wrote:
>Ok, I didn't know QNX costs major money.  So I am considering
>either 386bsd or linux.  One person said I should get linux because
>386bsd is monolithic (controlled I guess), while linux is non-monolithic.
>Now the question is, which os better?  Better as in...

Hopefully, this won't become YAFW (Yet Another Flame War), but here goes: 
(BTW: I'm Linux person.. I don't claim to know much about *bsd..)

>1) least bugs, and stable IMPORTANT!

Linux is *extremely* stable... If you choke the display somehow, you can log
in via serial or network and fix the problem remotely...

>2) more software available that runs on it

Wordperfect and MapleV run on Linux, as well as commercial database
software...

>3) faster

I have no idea.. Linux runs pretty damn fast, though..

>4) more compliance to POSIX (I think standards are good, or am I wrong)

Again, don't know..  Linux will run pretty near anything you can throw at
it... 

>5) more people using it.

Linux. Without a doubt.

>6) more support for third-party hardware (VLB, EISA, modems, etc) IMPORTANT!

I'd have to go with Linux, because more people (with lots of different
hardware) use and contribute to it..

>7) platform for programming.

Probably equal...
-- 
[email-masked], [email-masked]          WPI Computer Science     Linux!
    <a href="http://www.wpi.edu:8080/~joev"> Click Here! </a>

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Andreas Matthias)
Subject: Re: NEWBIE!: How do i Print from GS (not over LPR!)
Date: Thu, 29 Sep 1994 18:56:13 GMT

Hi,

[email-masked] wrote:

: I have a PostScript File that's over 1.6 Megs great, and if i
: try to Print over the LPR Daemon, i got after some time and many
: Pages an errormessage like:

: "Spoolfile to great", or so... (Sorry, I haven't noticed it,
:                                 and now i'am sitting in my office :/(  .)

Use "lpr -s filename", which should not copy the file physically
to the spool directory but make a link to it instead. Of course you
must NOT modify the file while it is printed.

Ciao,

Andreas

--
Andreas Matthias <[email-masked]>

Zehntenstr.9 
D-37120 Bovenden

Voice: +49/551/81377

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Tim Bass (Network Systems Engineer))
Crossposted-To: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.systems,comp.os.linux.help
Subject: Re: [Q] SW Technology
Date: 30 Sep 1994 05:25:38 GMT

SW Tech ' has been vary fair and reasonable with my company.

A.R.R.Torres ([email-masked]) wrote:

: I am about to order a system from SW Technology.
: I am planning to run dos/windows and Linux.
: Does anyone have any experience dealing with 
: them? 
: -- or would anyone recomend another dealer with 
: a similar price?
: They are offering a P90 (intel plato), 8MB, 540 M Quantum  HD, NCR SCSI,
: 2x CD-Rom for $2499.

: Thanks 

: Ana

------------------------------

Subject: Xconfig under linux (slackware)
From: [email-masked] (Andrew Peter BRUNO)
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 1994 16:42:23 GMT

Hi,
  Can anyone help me??...

I have been trying to configure my monitor, so that I can run X, but it 
has just been a nightmare.

This is what I have:

o       Microsoft Bus Mouse  (2 buttons)

o       32-bit VESA VL-Bus Accelerator card with 1Mb ram
        Chip: TVGA9400CXi

o       15" XGA (1280x1024) non-interlaced, Flat Screen, Digital Monitor
        Monitors Brand name is Bridge - CAS Model: CAE-364
        60/50 Hz 1.6A

If anyone knows an address I can try, could you please let me know.....

Thanx

- Andrew B.    ([email-masked])

------------------------------

** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **

The service address, to which questions about the list itself and requests
to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, is:

    Internet: [email-masked]

You can send mail to the entire list (and comp.os.linux.misc) via:

    Internet: [email-masked]

Linux may be obtained via one of these FTP sites:
    nic.funet.fi				pub/OS/Linux
    tsx-11.mit.edu				pub/linux
    sunsite.unc.edu				pub/Linux

End of Linux-Misc Digest
******************************