Subject: Linux-Misc Digest #959
From: Digestifier <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 94 16:13:38 EDT

Linux-Misc Digest #959, Volume #2                Mon, 17 Oct 94 16:13:38 EDT

Contents:
  Re: Commercial X servers: here's one (Fric)
  Options for backups on laptops? (Peter KOVESI)
  Re: Reverse mtools for DOS? (J.J. Paijmans)
  Re: [INFO WANTED] Memory required for 100 terminals? (Klamer Schutte)
  [** URGENT **] e2fsck/mount/partition error (Joerg Fries)
  ppp and GREAT sighups! (Dorwin Shields)
  Re: [INFO WANTED] Memory required for 100 terminals? (Byron A Jeff)
  Re: Wordprocessors (WYSIWYG,Multilingual) for Linux? (Byron A Jeff)
  Yggdrasil & Mach64 don't like each other! (Joe Janakovic)
  Yggdrasil and the SB16 SCSI card? (Joe Janakovic)
  Re: Thinking about Linux... (Byron A Jeff)
  HELP: Linux cannot be installed on 2GB HD ?! (Technology Research Division)
  Yggdrasil Fall 1994: buyers be aware (Jim Duncan)
  Re: Nailed down to 386bsd or linux, now which one? (Noses)
  Re: 540 MB drive problems, anyone? (Todd Day)
  Re: nedit for Linux? (DAVID L. JOHNSON)

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

From: [email-masked] (Fric)
Subject: Re: Commercial X servers: here's one
Date: 15 Oct 1994 03:03:00 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Shawn M Carey <[email-masked]> wrote:
>In article <[email-masked]>,
>Andrew R. Tefft <[email-masked]> wrote:
>>This may already been well known, but I thought I would post.
>>The October Uniforum Monthly has an ad for and a blurb about
>>a server from X-Inside called Accelerated X which runs on Linux,
>>SCO, Solaris, FreeBSD, and others. It is an X server only. 
>
>I can confirm this to a degree.  I was a beta tester of this server
>(for FreeBSD), and it's undoubtedly faster than the XFree S3 server:
>
>Orchid F1280+ (1MB, ISA):
>XF86_S3 (XFree-2.1)     Xaccel-1.1
>63k xStones             155k xStones

That's pretty good. I get this with my Mach32 and DX2/66.

        XFree     Accel-X
8-bit    100k      145k     (1280x1024)
16-bit    40k       84k     (1024x768)

-Fric
[email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Peter KOVESI)
Subject: Options for backups on laptops?
Date: 17 Oct 94 02:15:26 GMT

I am planning to buy a laptop. What options are there for attaching a
tape drive for taking backups under Linux?  I have searched high and
low through the FAQs and HOW-TOs but find no guidance in this area.

As I understand it, drives that connect to the parallel port are out
along with anything that might use a parallel to SCSI adaptor.

Is attaching a SCSI tape drive via a PCMCIA SCSI card a viable
option?  If so what drivers are available?

- Or should I be trying a completely different approach to backups
such as getting a 2nd hard disc?

I would be grateful for any suggestions and advice that you might have.

Peter Kovesi
Department of Computer Science,  The University of Western Australia

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

From: [email-masked] (J.J. Paijmans)
Subject: Re: Reverse mtools for DOS?
Date: 17 Oct 1994 14:18:02 GMT

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Michael) writes:
>I'm in the situation where, by convention, I have to use DOS at work, 
>although I prefer linux - which I use at home.  Most of my friends also use 
>DOS...  (They've not seen the light ;)
>
...

>I could then have, say ext2fs on my floppies, and on ocasion, when I need to 
>copy a file to DOS, I'll not have a problem...
>
>At the moment most of my floppies are DOS formatted.  When I get something 
>interesting by FTP (at work), I have to copy it onto a DOS disk. At home I 
>then have to transfer everything back to linux, renaming truncated filenames 
>as I go along!
...

Can't you make an UMSDos filesystem on the floppies and use some of those 
UMStools I've seen for copying? Never tried it myself, but it looks as
if it *should* work...?

Paai.

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

From: [email-masked] (Klamer Schutte)
Subject: Re: [INFO WANTED] Memory required for 100 terminals?
Date: Mon, 17 Oct 1994 13:59:13 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Harmon Seaver) writes:

:    I'm doing a class project to try to convince various grade and high
: school officials that they would be much smarter to buy a 586 and 100
: dumb terminals and run Linux/Xwindows/Motif than buying 100 macs. Or even
: just running Linux in text mode, since mostly what school computers are
: used for is just word processing anyway, and have a few macs or whatever
: for the other stuff. 
:    So here's my question: How much RAM and how much swap space does a 586
: need (or a 486 even) to run 100 terminals, either in text mode or Xwin
: mode?  And can I even run Xwin on dumb terminals? Also, does anyone know
: of any good cheap vga res terminals w/color? Last time I looked, a few
: years ago, the cheapest was about $800. Also, what would you use for 
: ports for that many terminals?

This depends very much on the applications which are run on those 100
terminals. 100 people reading mail will need 100 * 0.5 - 1 Mb.
A class of 100 people compiling big C++ programs will need about 5 Mb per
user.

But having 100 users on one 586 host is a bit much -- this might lead to
very high respons times. A better apporach might be to have a couple of
computer servers (say one for every ten users -- depending on the type
of applications) and some file servers. Or you could go for placing simple 
machines at every work place (a 386 sx with 4-8 Mb, for easy applications)
with a few file servers in a network.  so that you have X access everywhere. 

Ordinary terminals can't be used to run X windows.

Klamer
-- 
Klamer Schutte  -- +31-15-786054 / +31-15-692000
[email-masked] / [email-masked]
http://www.ph.tn.tudelft.nl:2000/People/klamer/Klamer.html

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

From: [email-masked] (Joerg Fries)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help,comp.os.linux.admin
Subject: [** URGENT **] e2fsck/mount/partition error
Date: 17 Oct 1994 15:03:34 GMT

This is an urgent call for help, because I have probs to repair my
var-partition! (Yes, there is all my configuration ... >>:o

My system broke down (HD hangs, X down) and I had to reboot. After
that, e2fsck finds an error in my partition /dev/hdb1 (using e2fsck
and fs version 0.5a):

"Block bitmap 0 for group 0 not in group"

All other partitions were mounted correctly. When I tried to fix the
problem with "e2fsck -v -r -b 8193 /dev/hdb1" and then mount the
partition, (other values like 16385 didn't worked either...)

"EXT2-fs error (device 3/65): ext2_check_descriptors:
 Block bitmap 0 for group 0 not in group (block 0)

 EXT2-fs: group descriptors corrupted!"

appears. When I make fdisk for this HD, verifying tells me

"Warning: bad start-of-data in partition 1
 271 unallocated sectors"

WHAT CAN I DO? Is there a new e2fsck which could repair that fault?
What kind of fault is that (fs,partition,HD)?

Any help via email would be greatly appreciated..

Thanx in advance, Joerg

PS. Please excuse the crosspostings but I'm in great trouble because I
can't proceed in my thesis.
--

==============================================================================
Joerg Fries
Department of Computer Science
Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany

email: [email-masked]
==============================================================================

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

From: [email-masked] (Dorwin Shields)
Subject: ppp and GREAT sighups!
Date: 17 Oct 1994 14:57:11 GMT

     I'm having trouble getting ppp to work.  The chat calls, I get logged
in and as soon as the ppp says connection made it dies of a sighup.  

   The same thing happens when I run great.  The system starts but just as
it's about to finish I get a sighup.  ppp works fine under windows. I'd
much rather run Mosaic on linux.--I also get a lot of errors using zmodem
under linux that I don't get under dos...I'm using a kind of old system--
Slackware 1.2 that I've upgraded to a 1.1.49 kernel.  I upgraded bdflush
too.---Is there something else I should do--I think I still got the 
bad routing request error even after upgrading bdflush.

Thanks,
Dorwin

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

From: [email-masked] (Byron A Jeff)
Subject: Re: [INFO WANTED] Memory required for 100 terminals?
Date: 17 Oct 1994 15:06:25 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Klamer Schutte <[email-masked]> wrote:
-In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Harmon Seaver) writes:
-
-:    I'm doing a class project to try to convince various grade and high
-: school officials that they would be much smarter to buy a 586 and 100
-: dumb terminals and run Linux/Xwindows/Motif than buying 100 macs. Or even
-: just running Linux in text mode, since mostly what school computers are
-: used for is just word processing anyway, and have a few macs or whatever
-: for the other stuff. 

Problem one. How exactly are you going to connect 100 terminals to a PC?
Terminal servers cost more than the machines themselves.

Putting serial lines on the PC will limit the number of terminal connections.
Bet on 32 ports per machine.

-:    So here's my question: How much RAM and how much swap space does a 586
-: need (or a 486 even) to run 100 terminals, either in text mode or Xwin
-: mode?  
-: And can I even run Xwin on dumb terminals?

No you cannot. However a cheaply speced 386/486 can. And probably not even
double the price of a terminal.

-: Also, does anyone know
-: of any good cheap vga res terminals w/color? 
-: Last time I looked, a few
-: years ago, the cheapest was about $800. 

That's still in the right price range. Consider:

- Low end 486    $130
- 8 Meg RAM      $330
- ethernet card   $40
- Video card      $50
- Monitor        $115 (VGA monochrome. Cost sensitive here.)
- Floppy          $40
=====================
                 $705

This station could load Linux over the network and could support additional
terminals connected via a 4 port serial card (another $110). So you could have
an Xterminal and 4 dumb terminals in each group.

-: Also, what would you use for 
-: ports for that many terminals?

Serial ports - Few ports (4-16) . Needs a PC. cheap.
terminal servers - More ports (16-32). No PC needed. Expensive. 

That's about it.

-
-This depends very much on the applications which are run on those 100
-terminals. 100 people reading mail will need 100 * 0.5 - 1 Mb.
-A class of 100 people compiling big C++ programs will need about 5 Mb per
-user.

I'm not so sure about these numbers. I have a 486-66 with 20 Megs of ram and
16 Meg of swap for student use. I've seen as mant as 23 people doing
simultaneous edits and compiles and the machine didn't even go into swap.
Linux's shared memory and buffer cache system is truly awesome.

-
-But having 100 users on one 586 host is a bit much -- this might lead to
-very high respons times. A better apporach might be to have a couple of
-computer servers (say one for every ten users -- depending on the type
-of applications) and some file servers. Or you could go for placing simple 
-machines at every work place (a 386 sx with 4-8 Mb, for easy applications)
-with a few file servers in a network.  so that you have X access everywhere. 

Agreed. You may even wish to look into low end Xterminals and a few servers.
The servers won't need a keyboard or video system which can save quite a few
bucks.

Keep us posted. This is an interesting problem.

BAJ
-- 
Another random extraction from the mental bit stream of...
Byron A. Jeff - PhD student operating in parallel - And Using Linux!
Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332   Internet: [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Byron A Jeff)
Crossposted-To: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Wordprocessors (WYSIWYG,Multilingual) for Linux?
Date: 17 Oct 1994 14:53:28 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Richard L. Goerwitz <[email-masked]> wrote:
[email-masked] (Byron A Jeff) writes:
->
->And we all have our pet peeves. Richard demands multilingualness while mine
->is that if all I have is a VT100 terminal and modem I should still be able to
->WordProcess (not format. The interface is the real difference) without having
->to resort to buying an ISDN line and an Xterminal.
-
-It's not so much a matter of what capabilities are included as what
-capabilities are *pre*cluded by sloppy or narrow design.  The multi-
-lingual "problem" 

It's not a "problem" quotes or not. It's a valid issue that has been 
inadeqately address by current systems. By peeve I mean that it's the
issue that you trumpet. It's not a bad thing. Just like my text only
wish is not a bad thing.

-is really only a problem because so many packages
-have been designed without any thought that anyone would be using
-them with up-down or right-left languages, and without any thought
-that millions (billions?) of people on the planet are multilingual.

Agreed. Now the question becomes "How to design with multilingual support?"

Do you have any clues, Richard?

Also we need to discuss if the complexities of multilingual support
precludes building a simple WordProcessor. Even to the point of maybe having
a UniLingual and a MultiLingal application, each which is different, as a
better way to attack the problem. This is my current inclination. However
I honestly don't know enough about the process to make a solid judgement 
on this.

Note that I'm adding the WYSIWYG and multilingual tags to the subject.
Anyone replying to this please change the tags to reflect the type of
discussion. In fact start a new thread. Use (Text/WYSIWYG,English/Multilingual) 
so we can distinguish which application we're talking about.

But let's get beyond the lack of Multilingual support. It's needed. Linux
could be a leader in the area. Let talk about how to do it.

BAJ
-- 
Another random extraction from the mental bit stream of...
Byron A. Jeff - PhD student operating in parallel - And Using Linux!
Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332   Internet: [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Joe Janakovic)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: Yggdrasil & Mach64 don't like each other!
Date: 16 Oct 1994 19:45:26 -0400

I finally got yggdrasil Fall '94 installed on my machine (thank's to the
erratta sheet!).  Now I'm having problems with X and the Mach64 card (ATI
GPT).  When I startx and the card goes into 1024x768 all I get is monitor
pops and fizzles; the image is there but it appears four times (ie. I get 4
screens; two on top and two on the bottom; if you move the mouse there are
four arrow cursors that move with it)...

Somebody told me to pick up the Mach64 X-server from sunsite.  This file is
dated 06/94 (quite a bit older than the fall '94 Yggdrasil package) and it
didn't make any difference anyway.

So what do I need to do to get my Nec3d/Mach64 combo working under X?  I've
tried different clock settings and toggling around with ctrl-alt-+/- but all
that gives me are different squealing sounds from the monitor...

Thanks...

-- 
Joe Janakovic                      Internet: [email-masked]
Software Developer                           [email-masked]
Gold Disk, Inc.            
Toronto, Ont., Canada      "ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI!"

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

From: [email-masked] (Joe Janakovic)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: Yggdrasil and the SB16 SCSI card?
Date: 16 Oct 1994 19:56:06 -0400

I'm using the SoundBlaster SCSI-II card to control a CD-ROM and Syquest
removable drive.  All work well under Linux except that I've got to type the
following at the LILO boot: prompt:

    linux aha152x=0x340,11,7,1

Is there anyway of automating this?  I really hate to have to type all this
whenever I want to boot Linux.  BTW, the Yggdrasil manual says that you can
add an "append=" entry to your lilo.conf file; I did this but it still
doesn't recognize my SCSI card.

And while I'm on the topic, does anyone know how to setup LILO to accept
something shorter than "hda3" for the partition to boot?  I'd like to just
type "1" for example to boot DOS and "2" to boot Linux...

Also is there a way to change the default boot partition?  Right now if I
hit enter at the boot: prompt, it will boot /dev/hda1 (my Linux partition). 
What do I need to do to change this so that it boots a different partition
by default?
-- 
Joe Janakovic                      Internet: [email-masked]
Software Developer                           [email-masked]
Gold Disk, Inc.            
Toronto, Ont., Canada      "ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI!"

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

From: [email-masked] (Byron A Jeff)
Subject: Re: Thinking about Linux...
Date: 17 Oct 1994 14:14:21 GMT

In my extremely biased opinion SLS is really out. Slackware in all of its
Ultra-Cool forms is in the in Crowd. So I'll substitute Slackware for SLS.

In article <[email-masked]>, Feinstein <[email-masked]> wrote:
>I have a few questions, which probably wouldn't be answered in manuals:
>1) In order to use Slackware, it REQUIRES 4 MB RAM, how much is *really* needed?

It's real tough to use anything less than 4 MB. The way to do it if it's
absolutely necessary is to get a kernel that doesn't build a RAMDISK, mount
the floppy, and create a swap partition/swap file as quickly as possible.

>2) What is the latest version of Slackware (I tried the announce newsgroup,
> but there were no announcements) - I am currently downloading v1.02?

2.0.1. The latest version always exist on ftp.cdrom.com:/pub/linux/slackware

>3) I have a DOS system with plenty of DOS apps.   Can I get the DOS emulator
>up & running w/o installing Slackware on my hard drive?

Well you can but it's really like kissing your sister. If you're not going to
actually install and use Linux on your system, then for now you'd be better
off using actual DOS.

How about you tell us about your system (CPU type and speed, RAM size, Disk
size and amount available) and then we could better help you determine how
to proceed.

If you're really working on SLS 1.02 then we desparately need to pull you from
what's essentially the Linux Dark Ages. Almost like reading Gutenburg ;-)

Later,

BAJ
-- 
Another random extraction from the mental bit stream of...
Byron A. Jeff - PhD student operating in parallel - And Using Linux!
Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332   Internet: [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Technology Research Division)
Subject: HELP: Linux cannot be installed on 2GB HD ?!
Date: 15 Oct 1994 03:04:42 GMT

Hi :
  We try to install the Slackware Linux 2.0.1 (1.1.1)
  on a 80486 pc with the AHA1542CF SCSI card and 2 GB
  hard disk.
  During the installation, somethings happened:

# fdisk /dev/sda

  The number of cylinders for this disk is set to 2006
  This is larger than 1024 , and may cause problems with
  some software.

  command (m for help) : p

  Disk /dev/sda : 64 heads, 32 sectors, 2006 cylinders
  Units = cylinders of 2048 * 512 bytes

  Device  boot  Begin  Start  End   Blocks  Id  System
/dev/sda1   *     1      1    200   204784   6  Dos 16-bit >= 32M
/dev/sda2        201    201  2006  1849344  83  Linux native

  Partition 2 has different physical/logical endings :
        phys = (1023, 63, 32)   logical = (2005, 63, 32)

  Can anybody suggest me how to solve this problem?
  Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for
  your help.

                           Lawrence Lu
                           [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Jim Duncan)
Subject: Yggdrasil Fall 1994: buyers be aware
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 1994 21:57:38 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>,
Lee Crawford <[email-masked]> wrote:
>In article <[email-masked]>,
>[email-masked] (Yan Xiao) wrote:
>
>> The current yggdrasil CD is our second buy, and I can
>> see the decline in quality. 

I noticed this also.  The file system rearrangement was sloppy. Some
scripts don't run without complaints about missing files and
directories. I was never sure whether there was a problem with the
CD-ROM install, my machine, or me. The Fall '94 is half-baked.   

I used the Fall '94 for a whole day - Columbus Day, which I had off.
Then, giving up on this possibly bogus product, I blew up the install
and went back to Summer '94, which, in my opinion, seems to be a better
quality package. Next time I go to my favorite UNIX reseller, Promox
Systems in Sunnyvale, I'm going to bitch about it.  I have two Linux
machines which were supposed to be Summer and Fall, respectively; at
this point, they're now both Summer '94.      
-- 
K-FOX|      w  ["]                              | WA6MBV      
94.5 |...   [email-masked]  | Jim Duncan  
KUFX |          H                               | 408.297.5977   
********  \_____I_____/  37 3 10N/121 59 10W    ************** 

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

From: [email-masked] (Noses)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.386bsd.misc
Subject: Re: Nailed down to 386bsd or linux, now which one?
Date: 16 Oct 1994 13:19:48 GMT

Peter da Silva ([email-masked]) wrote:
: LINUS IS NOT SYSTEM V BASED.

Of course not. He's made of C, not of Si...

Noses.

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

From: [email-masked] (Todd Day)
Subject: Re: 540 MB drive problems, anyone?
Date: 16 Oct 1994 17:15:50 -0700

I have a Quantum LPS540AT IDE drive.  It has 1120 cyl, 16heads,
and 53 sectors.  I initially lied to the BIOS and said it only had
48 cyl.  I was able to use DOS fdisk to make a first partion of
48 cyl.  Then I used Linux fdisk and went into expert mode and changed
the number of cylinders to 1120.  Apparently, this trick is only good
for each time you run Linux fdisk, because it always comes up with
48 cyl initially.  I proceeded to make 3 Linux partitions.

LILO was not happy with this.  It wouldn't deal with the fact that
the first Linux partition was beyond what the BIOS said was the
end of the disk.

So, I went into my BIOS config and said the drive had 1023 cyl.
This did nothing to upset the DOS partition, as it still booted.
I went back to Linux and was then able to get LILO to install.

In conclusion, the trick for drives that have more than 1023 cyl
is to tell the BIOS there is only 1023.  Do your DOS partitioning
(if needed) and then when you set up Linux partitions, make sure the
one you plan to boot from is completely containted within the first
1023 cyl.  Use the expert mode in Linux fdisk to change the
number of cyl to what they are in reality and you can recover
all the the hard disk that you paid for.

-todd-
-- 
Todd Day
[email-masked]
[email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (DAVID L. JOHNSON)
Subject: Re: nedit for Linux?
Date: 17 Oct 1994 15:48:54 GMT

In article <[email-masked]>, [email-masked] (David E. Fox) writes:
>Brian Lane ([email-masked]) wrote:
>
>:   in the contrib directory is a Makefile.linux, so it's already been 
>: done(pretty trivial).
>
>:   The catch is that it needs Motif, which isn't free. Anyone want to 
>: tackle a free Motif compatible X library?
>
>It should be easy enough for someone with Motif to build a static binary
>of this (hint hint) :).
>
Is there anyone else willing to do this?  If not, I will.  But I have to 
re-install all my static lib's, so may not do it for a couple days.
>-- 
>David Fox                       [email-masked]
>5479 Castle Manor Drive
>San Jose, CA 95129              Thanks for letting me change
>408/253-7992                    magnetic patterns on your hard disk.

-- 

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

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

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