Subject: Linux-Misc Digest #865
From: Digestifier <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Sun, 2 Oct 94 11:13:14 EDT

Linux-Misc Digest #865, Volume #2                 Sun, 2 Oct 94 11:13:14 EDT

Contents:
  Re: Linux mentioned in PC Week (Mats 'MaDsen' Wikholm)
  Re: New Linux Distribution (Brian T. Brunner)
  Re: How to pronounce Linux?? (Brad Pitzel)
  Re: free unix software (Thomas Aaron Insel)
  Re: SCO WordPerfect: does it run on Linux? (Brandon S. Allbery)
  GSI controller-good? (Wayne Adams)
  Re: P5-90 MHz beats SGI R4000-100MHz. (Erik Fortune)
  Re: How to pronounce Linux?? (Kevin Lentin)
  [ XFree86 ] Permissions problem (bug?) (Mike Battersby)
  Re: New Linux Distribution ([email-masked])
  Motif
  PROBLEM with console (Joerg Schoeppe)
  phone assistant card!!! (Edmund Humenberger)
  Re: Hmmm (lilo)
  Re: where to get the texbook (Jim Graham)
  Re: where to get the texbook (Jim Graham)
  Boot disk -> Root disk (Pramod Koshy)

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

From: [email-masked] (Mats 'MaDsen' Wikholm)
Subject: Re: Linux mentioned in PC Week
Date: Sat, 1 Oct 1994 21:18:12 GMT

In article <[email-masked]> Clifford Story <[email-masked]> writes:
>>I especially like the mention of high stability. Maybe this will satisfy 
>>the "it's not ready for prime time" naysayers; then again, probably not.
>Yeah, probably not.  Consider, after all, Windows:  Chicago promises to
>(someday) bring Windows up to where the Mac was in 1986 and Windows
>still has 90% market share.  Sheep follow the shepherd...

        Without DOS and Windows the  world of computing would probably
be a lot  more  developed today than   what  it is.  Everything   that
MicroSloth gets  on  the  market today  is  supposed  to  be  new  and
groundbreaking technology...although most of what  they have to  offer
has already been implemented  in the unix world  long ago. MS has been
talking  about a system where everything  you use  will be just module
that sonnect together  to form an entirety. To  me that sounds exactly
like unix, although their idea will probably include  a lot of 'nifty'
graphics and OLE aso. MS has also announced that it in MS-DOS 7.0 will
include multi-tasking   (that must be a  nightmare,  just  think about
multi-tasking in Windows),  this, if I'm not  mistaken :), is  already
included in unix.
        Since I'm bitching  at MS why not  also say somthing about NT.
NT stands  for New Technology, hah,  what's new about 32-bti operating
systems?  And now with the Pentium coming around the New Technology is
somewhat  outdated... Well OK, Linux  is 32-bit too  but I think Linux
will  be 64-bit before  Win-NT. And what  about  Chicago... isn't that
32-bit code too?

        I'm not really a big  fan of MicroSloth,  if you didn't  guess
and this was just my $.01 worth :)

-- 
 . . . .  [email-masked]   /   frantzgatan 3 E 25
  . . .  @358.(9)21.377.363    /   20380 åbo  finland
   . .  Linux, the way to get rid of boot viruses  
    .  <a href="http://at8.abo.fi/~mwikholm">my homepage</a> 

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

From: [email-masked] (Brian T. Brunner)
Subject: Re: New Linux Distribution
Date: Sat, 1 Oct 1994 04:35:09 GMT

Package should include
    1 floppy, a boot floppy that knows nothing but how to boot off of
        a CD-ROM distribution (nearly any CD-ROM drive on SCSI)
        by means of utilizing the DOS drivers for whatever hardware is present...
        this is a DOS emulator/interface, allowing you to use the DOS drivers
        to talk to the CD-ROM
    2 a CD-ROM with an unzipper and a kernel that will build a SMALL directory
        (USMSDOS) full of symlinks to the utilities on the CD-ROM...
    3 an installer that allows you to select which utilities you like, etc,
        and runs off the CD-ROM. Things that you want to be able to change (or run
fast)
        must be xferred to HD and changed/loaded from there...
        
-- 
.sig under construction, please hold.

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

From: [email-masked] (Brad Pitzel)
Subject: Re: How to pronounce Linux??
Date: Fri, 30 Sep 1994 20:57:10 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Jin S. Choi <[email-masked]> wrote:
>Actually, if you want to be downright canonical about it, you can pick
>up english.au from nic.funet.fi and hear how Linus himself pronounces it.
>"Hi, my name is Leenoos Torvahlds and I pronounce Leenooks as Leenooks."
>

Or better yet, grab "rawseq v0.1" by Christian Bolik, from sunsite.unc.edu:
/pub/Linux/apps/sound/mixers/rawseq-0.1.tar.gz

..and you'll get to hear Linus himself rap the proper pronunciation to a
techno-beat :-)

How many other operating systems have a techno song in its honor?

cheers,
--brad
[email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Thomas Aaron Insel)
Subject: Re: free unix software
Date: 1 Oct 1994 22:02:44 GMT
Reply-To: [email-masked]

[email-masked] (Rick Reilly) writes:

> I am looking for free software which I can compile and/or run on linux.
> The packages I am interested in are CAD, speadsheets, and word processors.
> Applications running under X are preferred.  I would appreciate either the
> location of a particular package or a site containing many packages.

There are text editors for X which approximate word processors, I
don't use any of them, so I won't comment on them.  For technical 
writing (Math/CS at least), TeX is in general easier and more flexible
to use than any word processor on any platform, and is more convenient
on Unix than for DOS/Mac.  Unlike some, I don't think that it replaces
a general-purpose word processor, but I don't do enough writing
writing to justify using another program.  There are no shortage of 
text-editors aimed at any & every sort of user.

SC is a general-purpose text-based spreadsheet, and there is a GNU
spreadsheet, OLEO, that runs under text or X.

I don't know about heavy-duty CAD, but xfig is a good drawing program
on the MacDraw level, and integrates well with TeX.  Xfig can produce
PostScript output, or drawing commands for LaTeX or FigTeX.
-- 
Thomas Insel ([email-masked])
  "Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing." -- A. Einstein

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

From: [email-masked] (Brandon S. Allbery)
Subject: Re: SCO WordPerfect: does it run on Linux?
Date: Wed, 28 Sep 1994 02:38:53 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] says:
+---------------
| I have WordPerfect 5.0 for X/Ultrix at work.  It is ghastly.  Quite 
| probably the worst written piece of software I have ever seen.
+------------->8

You didn't have the honor(?) of getting to use WordPerfect 4.2 for SCO and
Altos System V (Series 1000) (character mode only)... you want badly written
software?

WPcorp has a better grasp of *ix with each version they release; 5.1 is quite
reasonable (aside from weird bugs in the SunOS4.1 version, not present in the
SCO version) and 6.0 for Solaris 2 is quite nice.  Assuming you like
WordPerfect, of course; I'm rather ambivalent toward it, since every time I
want to do something useful I seem to always end up doing it in LaTeX instead
because of limitations in WP.  ---I haven't tried 6.0 in this context yet,
though, and haven't even had a chance to study the manual yet (have to steal
it from the office :-) so things may well have changed.

++Brandon
-- 
Brandon S. Allbery KF8NH         [44.70.4.88]           [email-masked]
Linux development:  iBCS2, JNOS, MH                                      ~\U
Daily dreading Nehemiah Scudder^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^HRush Limbaugh

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

From: [email-masked] (Wayne Adams)
Subject: GSI controller-good?
Date: 1 Oct 1994 00:58:36 -0400

        I'm considering upgrading my ide hard drives (Maxtor 345 and WD 
Caviar340) and want to upgrade my generic ide controller. GSI boards seem very 
reasonably priced, but was wondering their compatibility w/Linux and OS/2?
        My system: 486/66 VLB, 8 meg, Colorado 250 floppy tape, and Texel 
DM-3024 cd-rom attached (SCSI) to my PAS sound brd.
                                TIA,
                                Wayne

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

From: [email-masked] (Erik Fortune)
Subject: Re: P5-90 MHz beats SGI R4000-100MHz.
Date: 1 Oct 1994 22:03:53 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] writes:
> Running an Indigo with 16 Megs is just like driving a Porsche
> with an engine of a VW Bug. Put some more ram into this poor box
> and you *will* have a fast machine. What you do is just like
> running Linux on a P-90 with 4 Megs. Would you then say that Linux
> is a slow and bad OS and that a P-90 is slower than a 68008/8 ???
> Regarding the network stuff: I don't know which OS you're running
> but you should try Irix 5.2 before blaming SGI. 

Run a P-90 with eight megs (binaries are about 1/2 the size)
and *no external cache* and see how speedy it is.  

-- Erik

p.s. Opinions are mine alone

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

From: [email-masked] (Kevin Lentin)
Subject: Re: How to pronounce Linux??
Date: 30 Sep 1994 11:57:44 GMT

Jim Graham ([email-masked]) wrote:

> It used to be....but it isn't now.  Linus settled the issue once and for
> all early this year.  Ftp a copy of english.au or swedish.au from sunsite
> (I don't remember the exact path...sorry).  Then cat this file to
> /dev/audio (assuming you have your sound card and drivers installed).

The issue Linus settled was how _he_ pronounces it by posting those files.
He settled the issue of other people saying it by saying that people should
pronounce it as it is natural in their language/culture. Having been to a
talk by Linus, I think his response would be that of apathy. I'm sure he
doesn't really mind at all how you pronounce it as long as it's close. 

Personally, one thing that does get on my nerves is people pronouncing it
'Linix' which just seems completely non-sensical.

-- 
[==================================================================]
[ Kevin Lentin                   |___/~\__/~\___/~~~~\__/~\__/~\_| ]
[ [email-masked]  |___/~\/~\_____/~\______/~\/~\__| ]
[ Macintrash: 'Just say NO!'     |___/~\__/~\___/~~~~\____/~~\___| ]
[==================================================================]

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

From: [email-masked] (Mike Battersby)
Subject: [ XFree86 ] Permissions problem (bug?)
Date: 30 Sep 1994 12:32:51 GMT
Reply-To: [email-masked]

With Xfree86 under Linux the /tmp/.X11-unix directory which holds
the X connection socket is created with mode 0777.  This seems (at
least to me) to be a major problem.  I don't know whether it creates
any security holes, but any user on the system can then go and delete
the socket, and kill your X connection.  I checked the Ultrix and
Irix 4.0.5 boxes here, and although the SGIs have the same problem
the Ultrix boxes create the directory with mode 1777.

Can somebody give me a ruling on whether I'm talking crap or not?

 - Mike

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

From: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: New Linux Distribution
Date: Fri, 30 Sep 1994 12:34:55 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).

>       - Defaults to SINGLE USER mode. No need to show the complications
>               of multiuser accounts to newbies who will likely use it
>               personally.

This is really dumb.  Windows is going towards user accounts, and most 
people at University have used networked machines, so they can surely cope 
with the idea of a multiuser machine.

>       - 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.

This is silly as well.  BASH is too big, and too slow - the performance 
gains achieved by replacing bash with ash are very noticable on your 
standard DOS-Windows setup (486 with 4 megs, ISA bus and IDE drives).

>       - 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!!!).

This seems silly.  Just because it works for DOS doesn't mean that removing 
all the standard UNIX stuff is a good idea.

>Possibly perl, and an emacs clone (jove possibly, as it is small, and
>it is still a text editor), or even pico so that they have a
>text-based editing program..

JED.  At least that can be made to behave like a DOS editor.

>       - 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.

Great.  What about all these spods who play MUDs?  I've lost count of the 
number of people who have switched to Linux over here just so they can play 
with their very own MUD ...

And isn't PPP a better idea to SLIP these days?

>       -NO SCSI. Most home dos-win users don't even know what SCSI is.

This is silly.  SCSI hardly costs you anything, and you're completely 
locking out everyone with SCSI-only setups.  Plus a lot of people hang CD-
ROM drives off the SCSI port of their soundcards ...

>       -XFree 3.1 configured to use the VGA16 server (mono or color) with
>               a generic (low resolution) Xconfig.

Get real.  Having to put up with 256 colour mode with X is bad enough, but 
do you really expect anyone to take X Windows running in 16 colours 
seriously?  (Never mind the idea of low resolution)

>       - Utilities to match the standard Windows applets:
>               Winfile -> Xfm-1.3
>               Progman -> Xfm-1.3

Erm, sorry - Xfm imho is not yet remotely comparable to either of the above.

>               Notepad -> Axe (?)
>               Write   -> Ez
>               Terminal -> Minicom (Seyon?)
>               Mediaplay -> ?????
>               Dos windows -> Xterm,rxvt (of course !!!)
>               Whatelse??? 

>       - Only one window manager: FVWM

This is the first good idea in this entire file.

If you do this, then I sincerely hope that you don't call it Linux - hell, 
don't even call it UNIX, because you'll just give both a very bad name.

Stuart

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

From: [email-masked] ()
Subject: Motif
Date: Sun, 2 Oct 1994 13:28:02 GMT

You can get Motif from the ACC Bookstore 800-546-7274

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

From: [email-masked] (Joerg Schoeppe)
Crossposted-To: de.comp.os.linux
Subject: PROBLEM with console
Date: 30 Sep 1994 12:58:46 GMT

Hi!

I've a problem to get the xconsole run properly.  I wan't something
like on my SUN.  I've added the following Line to my
/etc/syslog.conf:
*.=info;*.=notice                               /dev/console

and I've run 'MAKEDEV' to create the console
crw--w--w-   1 root     tty        4,   0 Sep 30 14:35 /dev/console

but when I start 'cmdtool -C' nothing happens.  When I start 
'xconsole' as root 'echo foo > /dev/console' works.  But as nonroot
I only get the error message "Couldn't open console" when starting
'xconsole'.

Two questions

Why doesn't the 'cmdtool -C' work?

Why does 'xconsole' only work for root?

Thanxs in advance

Joerg

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

From: ed@PROBLEM_WITH_INEWS_DOMAIN_FILE (Edmund Humenberger)
Subject: phone assistant card!!!
Date: 30 Sep 1994 11:57:26 GMT

Do you want to use your linux machine as

answering machine
block people not having the code to contact you
have a automatic calling machine
. 
. 
 I have a comany that offer me all the information to
program their phone card which you can put into your pc
and connect to the phone line. It can do everything you can 
imagine (and more). You can put in your Linux PC 4 cards and
it costs for one card 200 USD.

But i dont know if it is worth to write a device driver because
i saw that there are modems that can do voice service too and cost
only 200 USD.

Is there any interrest? Suggestions!

ed

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

From: [email-masked] (lilo)
Crossposted-To: alt.fan.linus-torvalds
Subject: Re: Hmmm
Date: 2 Oct 1994 13:52:17 GMT

On 29 Sep 1994 08:34:35 GMT, Mitchum DSouza ([email-masked]) wrote:
> In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] (Bjorn Kihlberg) writes:
> |> Chris ([email-masked]) wrote:
> |> : Jeez - I hadn't realized that Linus had such a loyal following ;)
> |> 
> |> : Chris
> |> 
> |> But of course! Not anyone would get the idea to start a new .NIX (*NUX?) and
> |> manage to make it better than all the others combined! :)
> |> 

> Hey I'm a fan. Have been so since 0.10. Im sure everyone else joined a bit more
> recently. 

Much more recently....just after the version number change, in fact....I
guess it must have been 0.95....

lilo

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

From: [email-masked] (Jim Graham)
Subject: Re: where to get the texbook
Date: Sat, 1 Oct 1994 13:21:44 GMT

NOTE:  followups to comp.text.tex (for obvious reasons).

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked]
(Hans Petter Fasteng) writes:

>  thank you all for your help, strange that it is not anny doc with tex
>latex or texinfo distributions since all other GNU software is so well
>documented.  I will look around and see what I find.

Several points....  First, I know I'm being picky here, but if you are
in an environment where you can't spell TeX with the lowered 'E', DEK
specifically says it's spelled ``TeX''.  See chapter 1 in ``The TeXbook''.

Second, TeX is not GNU software.  It may be redistributed with other GNU
software, but that's as far as the relationship goes.

Finally, TeX is very, very well-documented.  You've just been looking in
the wrong places.  If you're interested in plain TeX, try the following:

   *) ``First Grade TeX''
   *) ``The TeXbook'' by DEK himself
   *) ``TeX by Topic'' by Victor Eijkhout
   *) check with the TeX User's Group (TUG) for the rest---there's a lot
      more!

``First Grade TeX'' is a very nice beginner's book, but you'll out-grow
it rather quickly.  Fortunately, at least when I bought it (a long, long
time ago), it isn't very expensive.

``The TeXbook'' is, of course, a must.

``TeX by Topic'' is a great book, once you've advanced your TeXnical
skills.

Again, check with TUG (e-mail:  [email-masked]) for more details.

Also check the FAQ and FAQ Supplement on comp.text.tex.

If you're looking for docs on LaTeX, check with TUG.  I use plain TeX, so
my answers are obviously geared in that direction.  :-)

Later,
   --jim

--
73 DE N5IAL (/4)                           < Running Linux 1.0.9 >
      [email-masked]                 ICBM: 30.23N 86.32W
  ||  [email-masked]          Packet:  N5IAL@W4ZBB (Ft. Walton Beach, FL)
E-mail me for information about KAMterm (host mode for Kantronics TNCs).

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

From: [email-masked] (Jim Graham)
Subject: Re: where to get the texbook
Date: Sat, 1 Oct 1994 13:27:08 GMT

NOTE:  followups to comp.text.tex (for obvious reasons).

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked]
(Michael Rogero Brown (Sys Admin)) writes:

>From a bookstore.  Knuth's TeXBook is not available on-line.

Actually, it is, but you're not allowed to run TeX on it---it's for use
as example code, only.  I don't recall where it's available for ftp, but
that's probably in the FAQ or FAQ Supplement (for comp.text.tex, obviously).

Either way, though, if you want a printed copy, your only choice is to
go to a bookstore or contact the TeX User's Group (see my previous post
in this thread and/or the comp.text.tex FAQ or FAQ Supplement).

Later,
   --jim

--
73 DE N5IAL (/4)                           < Running Linux 1.0.9 >
      [email-masked]                 ICBM: 30.23N 86.32W
  ||  [email-masked]          Packet:  N5IAL@W4ZBB (Ft. Walton Beach, FL)
E-mail me for information about KAMterm (host mode for Kantronics TNCs).

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

From: [email-masked] (Pramod Koshy)
Subject: Boot disk -> Root disk
Date: 1 Oct 1994 18:27:11 GMT
Reply-To: [email-masked]

        I am trying to load Slakware Linux 2.0.0 which I obtained from the
sunsite.unc.edu site. The README associated with this distribution says this
..
This version contains libc 4.5.26, Linux kernel 1.0.9 and 1.1.18 (plus source
for many other versions in the source tree, including version 0.01 :^), and
XFree86 2.1.1.

The problem I am having is that the boot disk makes a Ram disk and then
boots the system from RAM. Then it tells me to load the root disk which also
works fine. After this when I try to run the fdisk , it says "out of memory"
.Having only 4 MB of RAM , i need the command that disables the ram disk and
                                  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
loads the boot, root from the floppy. The information accompanying the
distribution  I have does not give me any information on how to do it. Can
somebody please help me.

Thanks ,

Pramod Koshy.

E.Mail - [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
******************************