Linux-Misc Digest #609, Volume #21 Tue, 31 Aug 99 02:13:15 EDT
Contents:
Re: Linux and PPP-Compress errors (John Doe)
Re: Linux 286 (Spike!)
Python Versus Whitespace (Re: Best language for graphical apps?) (Christopher Browne)
Re: newbie questions??? (letdown)
Re: The optimization debate (was: why not C++?) (Christopher Browne)
Re: This is probably a simple one :) (Spike!)
Re: Help! Hard drive IRQ timeouts! (Adrian Hands)
Re: This is why RH 6.0 really sucks! ("Ferdinand V. Mendoza")
Re: This is probably a simple one :) (Jason Simpson)
Mounting & viewing audio CD's (Jason Bond)
mpg player for linux (Duncan Kennedy)
Re: GUI for ppp? ("Noah Roberts (jik-)")
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Doe)
Crossposted-To: redhat.networking.general
Subject: Re: Linux and PPP-Compress errors
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: 31 Aug 1999 00:48:23 -0500
Make sure that you compile ppp as modules NOT into the kernel.
Then put the similar lines into /etc/conf.modules
===============================
alias ppp-compress-21 bsd_comp
alias ppp-compress-24 ppp_deflate
alias ppp-compress-26 bsd_comp
===========================
On Tue, 31 Aug 1999 00:31:54 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>In article <7qf448$h9q$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>I am also encountering this problem with a TurboLinux distribution. I
>>have built kernel versions 2.2.11 and 2.2.12 with no relief. I keep
>>going through my configuration file to try to figure out what I've done
>>wrong -- no luck -- and I assume it's what's crashing my modem
>>connection whenever I try to access anything more than the most basic
>>web pages.
>>
>>I also see at system startup a message, "can't locate module ppp0,"
>>which I assume is related.
>>
>>In article <7pf61k$4fo$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
>> "Jeff Rosenberg" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>> I have installed Redhat 6.0 on two separate boxes and when
>>establishing a
>>> PPP link the following comes out in the message log. PPP works and so
>>does
>>> the IP-Chains but the performance from the LAN seems slower than
>>Redhat 5.2
>>> prior to the upgrade.
>>>
>>> The errors are indicative of either missing ppp-compression modules or
>>alias
>>> problems for the modules:
>>>
>>> Aug 18 15:52:25 linux modprobe: can't locate module ppp-compress-21
>>> Aug 18 15:52:25 linux modprobe: can't locate module ppp-compress-26
>>> Aug 18 15:52:26 linux modprobe: can't locate module ppp-compress-24
>>>
>>> Any help would be appreciated !
>>>
>>> --
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Jeff Rosenberg
>>>
>>> "The instructions said to install WindowsNT or better, so I installed
>>> Linux."
>>> -- Unknown Linux User
>>>
>>> Linux ...because reboots are for upgrades...
>>>
>>> 97.3% of all statistics are made up.
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>>Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
>>Share what you know. Learn what you don't.
> Make sure you've got the latest version of pppd. There have
>been some changes recently.
>
>--
>No statement is wholly true, not even this one.
> also: remove "UhUh" and "Spam" to get my real email address -----
------------------------------
From: Spike! <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Linux 286
Date: Mon, 30 Aug 1999 23:55:51 +0100
And verily, didst Jody Thigpen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> eloquently scribe:
> Is there a distribution of Linux that will run on a PC 286 Platform?
Doubtfull... You need an MMU for Linux.
Looks like you want to do a search for Minix...
--
=============================================================================
| [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Windows95 (noun): 32 bit extensions and a |
| |graphical shell for a 16 bit patch to an 8 bit |
| Andrew Halliwell BSc |operating system originally coded for a 4 bit |
| in |microprocessor, written by a 2 bit company,that|
| Computer Science | can't stand 1 bit of competition. |
=============================================================================
|GCv3.12 GCS>$ d-(dpu) s+/- a C++ US++ P L/L+ E-- W+ N++ o+ K PS+ w-- M+/++|
|PS+++ PE- Y t+ 5++ X+/X++ R+ tv+ b+ DI+ D+ G e++ h/h+ !r!| Space for hire |
=============================================================================
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Christopher Browne)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.development.apps,comp.os.linux.x,comp.lang.python
Subject: Python Versus Whitespace (Re: Best language for graphical apps?)
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 1999 02:18:17 GMT
On 28 Aug 1999 21:16:49 -0400, Collin W. Hitchcock
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> On some earlier date, Christopher Browne <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote...
>> There seem to be dogmatic positions about the evils of Python's
>> ability to use whitespace to signify control structures;
>> unfortunately, the dogmatic positions seem more often based on blind
>> faith than on tenable arguments.
>
>A list of tenable arguments why I hate white-space syntax dependent
>languages:
>
> 1) A whole slew of trouble with code that uses tabs. Use your
> imagination. Read about the history of "make".
I've never had problems with makefiles, no, never... :-)
> 2) For bracket grouped languages I prefer the indenting style:
>
> block_start
> {
> sub_statement
> sub_statement
> }
>
> In Tcl it's a syntax error to put the opening bracket on a new
> line. In Python the brackets don't exist. So now I'm looking at
> someone else's hideous code with 240 column lines. It's written so
> that it's completely incomprehensible unless you can see whole
> lines at a time, so you have to put your editor in wrap mode. If
> the brackets exist you can first make sure the code is indented
> consistently and then look for opened and closed brackets in the
> same column. You can filter out all the line wrap garbage when
> you're looking at block structure.
Analyzing Lisp code is Pretty Easy on a similar basis; the lack of
ambiguity is indeed attractive.
> 3) If you are trying to write a code generator, white-space syntax
> dependent languages are a nightmare. So much easier to produce the
> code without worying about indenting and then run a second program
> to indent it.
This is *not* one that I see as being a big problem.
In a brace-structured language, you need some structure that counts
braces.
That parallels the need, in a Python generator, to have some structure
that counts the amount of whitespace in effect.
They're isomorphic to one another.
>4) You can introduce *hideous* bugs by cutting and pasting between
>two differently indented sections of code. When white space
>doesn't matter, you just paste and tell your editor to reindent.
>
>None of these are deal breakers -- you can work around all of them.
>They just add to the general stress level. I already have enough
>stress, thankyou.
As you say, these can be worked around.
Thank you for not merely making dogmatic comments; mere dogmatism is
more common in such discussions.
--
if (argc > 1 && strcmp(argv[1], "-advice") == 0) {
printf("Don't Panic!\n");
exit(42);
}
(Arnold Robbins in the LJ of February '95, describing RCS)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] <http://www.ntlug.org/~cbbrowne/langscript.html>
------------------------------
From: letdown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.setup
Subject: Re: newbie questions???
Date: Mon, 30 Aug 1999 19:45:50 -0400
Rotax wrote:
> i'm a newbie running phat linux (based on mandrake). and i have a k6-2
> 300 w/ 98mb ram and a viper v330 vcard.
>
> 1 of my ?s are, 'why does linux say i only have 64mb of ram?'.
>
> my other 1 is, 'how kan i get a diff. rez in x-windows'? i'm using kde
> and ran the 'xf86config' and set it to 800x600 but it still goes back to
> 640x480.
>
> ------------------ Posted via CNET Linux Help ------------------
> http://www.searchlinux.com
Edit the XF86Config file manually.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Christopher Browne)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.development.apps,comp.os.linux.development.system
Subject: Re: The optimization debate (was: why not C++?)
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 1999 02:18:04 GMT
On Sun, 29 Aug 1999 22:18:32 GMT, Stephen E. Halpin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>On 28 Aug 1999 18:07:27 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Christopher Browne) wrote:
>>On 27 Aug 1999 12:03:05 +0100, Paul Flinders
>><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>>[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Paul D. Smith) writes:
>>>> On a micro level, I believe the best way is to write the code the most
>>>> straightforward way possible first, _then_ when it all works, come back
>>>> and see where you can tweak it to be faster. Remember, slower, working
>>>> code is always better than faster, broken code.
>>>
>>>That's true unless the very slowness _is_ the breakage.
>>>
>>>Also with more multimedia stuff fast but not completely accurate can be
>>>preferable to slow but complete (i.e would you prefer speech recognition
>>>which ran in real time but which occasionally got it wrong to speech
>>>recognition which took 5 minutes to recognise 10 seconds speech but always
>>>got it right).
>>
>>Slower, working code that reads in a straightforward manner, which
>>thereby makes it easy to make code transformations, is easier to
>>optimize than slightly faster code where bits have been tuned, and
>>thereby are virtually non-modifiable.
>
>I think you missed the point of the previous poster. He is not talking
>about "slightly faster code", he is talking about a 30:1 difference using
>heuristics to produce results which are probabalistically correct. You
>cant do it everywhere, but where you can do it, its a win. Another
>example of what the previous poster was getting at is lossy compression,
>where MPEG can produce far better compression ratios for audio and video
>than lossless compression schemes can, and its an acceptable tradeoff
>in many cases. On the other hand, you wouldnt store your company's
>financial data using a lossy compression algorithm.
The examples of "faster code" that have been quoted so far have
amounted to:
"reorder the loop so that it decrements rather than incrementing."
That's not a fundamental algorithmic change that would change the
order of complexity of the program.
My contention is that there is little merit to looking for those
little reorderings; better to write straightforward code, that will be
easier to mutate when analysis is done to find bottlenecks.
It absolutely is the 30:1 improvements, or 300:1 improvements, that
are the primary optimization goal.
By trying to get the 10% improvements early in the game, that is
liable to make it harder to go after the bigger gains that can come
later once the full scope of the system is known.
"Optimization hinders evolution." -- Alan Perlis
Once optimized once, it's harder to optimize the code again.
>More to the point you make, there are times when slightly faster is
>the difference between working and not working in a hard real-time
>system, and you have to live with it. Its all part of the tradeoffs
>that an engineer must make. If you havent seen the code for a box
>where 100% of code and data memory are used and it runs hard real-time
>at >98% utilization, its quite a sight :->
Some years ago, I worked on a financial system where they "optimized
too early." (A prototype that was a "6 month stopgap fix" stayed in
production for 6 years...)
The bank wanted us to mutate it into something new, when what was
truly necessary was to throw out the whole system and rearchitect
something new *from scratch.*
The notable problem with it was the date format; YYMMDD was mandated,
and when the system was managing pensions, there were ample
opportunities for *BAD* "Y2K" errors what with there being a few
people left with birthdates in the 1800's, and virtually everyone over
70 years of age.
There were a couple of "windowing" algorithms in use; once 1994 came
along, 6 year bond certificates started encountering calculation
problems, and when there is a billion dollars being managed, this is
just a bit of a problem...
The system had been tuned up several times by the time I got to it; it
was nigh unto impossible to modify. The system was retired in 1994;
replaced by something new(er).
There were lots of cases in this system of reports that ran for many
hours due to less-than-intelligent selections of database indices;
very often there were opportunities for *HUGE* performance
improvements when we changed a few loops to pick more appropriate
indices.
That was easy enough in cases where report structures had not been
tuned too much; it proved more difficult when previous programmers had
started optimizing too early.
--
"Optimization hinders evolution." -- Alan Perlis
[EMAIL PROTECTED] <http://www.hex.net/~cbbrowne/lsf.html>
------------------------------
From: Spike! <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.os.linux,comp.os.linux,comp.os.linux.help,comp.os.linux.questions
Subject: Re: This is probably a simple one :)
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 1999 00:13:20 +0100
And verily, didst Vincent Padua <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> eloquently scribe:
> Hello,
> _X11TransSocketINETConnect: Can't get address for foo.bar.com
> xterm Xt error: Can't open display: foo.bar.com:0.0
> So i thought maybe it was the xhost stuff, so I completely disabled
> anyform of authentication:
> xhost +
> However, I still get the same error.
Did you try setting the DISPLAY variable on the BSD machine to
fully.qualified.domain.name:0.0
of your local machine?
Can't help with the VIM problem? Someone maybe set it up to auto-include the
file to save on typing perhaps?
--
______________________________________________________________________________
| [EMAIL PROTECTED] | |
| Andrew Halliwell BSc |"The day Microsoft makes something that doesn't |
| in | suck is probably the day they start making |
| Computer Science | vacuum cleaners" - Ernst Jan Plugge |
==============================================================================
|GCv3.12 GCS>$ d-(dpu) s+/- a C++ US++ P L/L+ E-- W+ N++ o+ K PS+ w-- M+/++ |
|PS+++ PE- Y t+ 5++ X+/X++ R+ tv+ b+ DI+ D+ G e++ h/h+ !r!| Space for hire |
==============================================================================
------------------------------
From: Adrian Hands <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.hardware,comp.os.linux.setup
Subject: Re: Help! Hard drive IRQ timeouts!
Date: Mon, 30 Aug 1999 23:23:18 -0400
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Your hd is dying.
I'd guess the cliking sound you hear is probably coming from the head
servo mechanism.
Replace it before it quits completely.
It might keep running for quite some time, so it's a gamble.
Looks like you're using an IDE.
You can pick up a brand new 13 Gig at Office Depot for $ 250 or less or
an 8 Gig for like $ 170.
I'm using a 13 Gig Maxtor that I bought there - works great.
No doubt you can buy for much less mail-order or online.
Buy one now, while you still have time to copy the data over. If you're
a real penny pincher maybe you can use your dying drive for /tmp.
------------------------------
From: "Ferdinand V. Mendoza" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.setup
Subject: Re: This is why RH 6.0 really sucks!
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 1999 09:37:38 +0400
Hal Burgiss wrote:
> On Sun, 29 Aug 1999 09:27:45 -0500, Joe Laffey <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> >On Sun, 29 Aug 1999, Jack Zhu wrote:
> >
> >>I also find out that RH likes to invent some
> >> stupid stuff. For examples: everyone know there's a 'resolv.conf' file, and it
> >> exists in RH 5.0, but in 6.0, RH uses other file to replace it. I think this
> >> is very good example to show how stupid RH is. I mean, it's not RH 'invent'
> >> linux, it's just a distributor. This is common knowledge that 'resolv.conf'
> >> file is very important, RH should NOT try to change this. I don't know if
> >> Debian or Slackware has the file. But I believe they do have.
> >>
> >
>
> This is because you forgot to inform RH of your nameservers before they made
> your personalized CD. Otherwise this is just an empty file and wouldn't
> do you a whole lot of good anyway. Is it so hard to create this file?
> Jeez ...
>
>
Agree. The reason is that with kppp properly configured for the correctnameservers
and the domain name, it will fed this information to
the empty resolv.conf file -if there is one, once you start dialing to your
ISP via kppp.Just try,
$ less /etc/resolv.conf
when you start to dial using kppp
and you'll see what I mean.
Ferdinand
> >My RH6 install has a resolv.conf in /etc where it belongs...
> >
> >Joe Laffey
> >LAFFEY Computer Imaging
> >St. Louis, MO
> >
>
> --
> Hal B
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> --
> Linux helps those who help themselves
------------------------------
From: Jason Simpson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.os.linux,comp.os.linux,comp.os.linux.help,comp.os.linux.questions
Subject: Re: This is probably a simple one :)
Date: Tue, 31 Aug 1999 05:46:31 +0000
Vincent Padua wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I'm not looking for the specific answer, however, I'm curious about
> what's broken here and then i'll hunt it down how to fix it. :) I'm
> trying to learn!
>
> Okay, I've got RH 6.0 on my box. I telnet into a bsdi box (4.0.1) and
> then try to open an xterm from there and i get this error:
>
> _X11TransSocketINETConnect: Can't get address for foo.bar.com
> xterm Xt error: Can't open display: foo.bar.com:0.0
>
> So i thought maybe it was the xhost stuff, so I completely disabled
> anyform of authentication:
>
> xhost +
>
> However, I still get the same error. Can someone lend me an explanation
> of what is broken here? Also, here's another whacky one. After I have
> telneted intot he bsdi box and try to vi a file on that box, everything
> looks good. however, when I try a vim filename, I get crap like this:
>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/param.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/types.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/conf.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/proc.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/user.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/malloc.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/systm.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/ioctl.h>
> ^[[35m#include ^[[31m<sys/reboot.h>
>
> Any hints on what is happening here? Oh yeah, this occurs in either
> tcsh or bash shell's ^shrug^
>
> All help is appreciated,
>
> -J
I'm no expert, but just from what I see here, it looks like the bsdi box
might be running an X-server?
and set to boot to GUI mode?
which it is trying to send you to over telnet but cannot?
Jason
------------------------------
From: Jason Bond <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Mounting & viewing audio CD's
Date: Mon, 30 Aug 1999 22:28:44 -0700
I've never really though about it till now, but how does
one mount a cd drive that contains audio tracks? Usually
when I do it it says:
(root@blah: /cd-roasters/keasycd/keasycd/keasycd) mount /dev/scd1
mount: block device /dev/scd1 is write-protected, mounting read-only
mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/scd1,
or too many mounted file systems
If I wanted to use a cd burning program I would need to
be able to mount and examine these audio files. Thanks
much in advance for any ideas,
Jason
------------------------------
From: Duncan Kennedy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: mpg player for linux
Date: 31 Aug 1999 15:39:21 +1000
Is there an mpg player available for linux and if so where is it
possible to get a download from??
------------------------------
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.linux.networking,comp.os.linux.networking,comp.os.linux.setup,comp.os.linux.x
Subject: Re: GUI for ppp?
From: "Noah Roberts (jik-)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: 30 Aug 1999 16:37:04 -0700
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
> Is there a way to configure the ppp client to pipe output received by a
> remote ppp server to an xterm? I need to loginto the remote server
> using a secure ID password which changes every 30 seconds. It is
> impossible to use a scripting method with this password. I need to
> physically type a new password at the remote prompt every time I log
> in.?????
use minicom and then attatch pppd to that serial port and exit minicom
without hanging up.
------------------------------
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End of Linux-Misc Digest
******************************
