NT Stuff
This is why I don't like MS. Running Win2k Server We had that problem with the server not responding after a period of no traffic. The server itself wasn't asleep it seemed that i just refused to take network traffic. I was trying to figure out why it was doing this so I went into Device Mananger and opened the propteries of the NIC. I saw something funny, a tab that said Power Management. Click on it an LOOK A freaking checkbox labeled Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power. Unchecked it and now everything is great! Well as good as it can be Is there a reason that MS feels that this is an Option? Does the power that that card uses really make THAT big a difference? What a bunch on monkeys. I'd like to meet the retard engineer that thought up that ideathen point out that 99% of W2k server installs are for web or file servers that NEED TO HAVE NETWORK CONNECTIVITY! ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: NT Stuff
On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 9:22am, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: A freaking checkbox labeled Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power. Is there a reason that MS feels that this is an Option? Does the power that that card uses really make THAT big a difference? On laptops, the power used by a PCMCIA Ethernet NIC can actually be quite significant. Not so on a server, of course. One of Microsoft's fundamental failings is that they consistently fail to consider the consequences of a given feature. This is a classic example. The power management people live in a world laptops and batteries. They figured if the computer needed the NIC, it would wake back up when the software triggered the action. They never considered the fact that an idle *server* needs to respond to external inputs from the *network*. You see this failure over and over again in their history. With MSIE and ActiveX (it would be nice if the browser could just automatically download any software it needs (until the user visits a malicious web page)). With Outlook (it would be nice if emails could be interactive (until someone sends you a malicious email)). With Microsoft Office scripting (it would be nice if documents could be interactive (ditto)). Heck, earlier versions of Windows NT ran the screen saver with system privileges, because they never thought about what would happen if the screen saved did something bad. This is what happens when a company sets out for world domination. They end up blinding themselves to the outside world as well. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: NT Stuff
I've seen something similar with my laptop Win 2k using a wireless card. Everything works fine until the laptop, running on battery, desides to go to standby mode. When the system wakes up it's pretty much impossible to revive the network connection off the wireless card. Just plain bad design AFAICT. -Alex P.S. You end up rebooting the system. For years I worked on big iron systems and rebooting was generally not an option. - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Greater NH Linux User Group [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 9:54 AM Subject: Re: NT Stuff On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 9:22am, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: A freaking checkbox labeled Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power. Is there a reason that MS feels that this is an Option? Does the power that that card uses really make THAT big a difference? On laptops, the power used by a PCMCIA Ethernet NIC can actually be quite significant. Not so on a server, of course. One of Microsoft's fundamental failings is that they consistently fail to consider the consequences of a given feature. This is a classic example. The power management people live in a world laptops and batteries. They figured if the computer needed the NIC, it would wake back up when the software triggered the action. They never considered the fact that an idle *server* needs to respond to external inputs from the *network*. You see this failure over and over again in their history. With MSIE and ActiveX (it would be nice if the browser could just automatically download any software it needs (until the user visits a malicious web page)). With Outlook (it would be nice if emails could be interactive (until someone sends you a malicious email)). With Microsoft Office scripting (it would be nice if documents could be interactive (ditto)). Heck, earlier versions of Windows NT ran the screen saver with system privileges, because they never thought about what would happen if the screen saved did something bad. This is what happens when a company sets out for world domination. They end up blinding themselves to the outside world as well. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 10:37am, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I've seen something similar with my laptop Win 2k using a wireless card. Everything works fine until the laptop, running on battery, desides to go to standby mode. When the system wakes up it's pretty much impossible to revive the network connection off the wireless card. That is likely not so much the power saving, but the card itself, or maybe the device drivers. The OS should be telling the card to wake back up, so to speak. If you Stop and then remove the card, and then reinsert it, does it start working? In general, most of the off-the-shell WiFi stuff I've played with has been rather flakey. I don't know if it is because manufacturers are cutting too many corners, or something inherent in the standard, or because the technology is immature, or what. It has made me appreciate the reliability of good old fashioned UTP, though. :-) -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
It's been a while since I deliberately forced the machine into standby although it would only take a few minutes. My vague recollection is that stopping/removing/reinserting the card didn't help. In fact I concluded at the time that it was YAWB (yet another Windows Bug). If I had a nickel for every hour I've spent chasing windows problem... ;^( -Alex P.S. My favorite (not) windows bugs are the ones associated with the AMD K6 processors. You end up with a very unstable machine but when you put Linux or any of the NT variants on these systems magically everything works. - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Greater NH Linux User Group [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 10:59 AM Subject: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 10:37am, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I've seen something similar with my laptop Win 2k using a wireless card. Everything works fine until the laptop, running on battery, desides to go to standby mode. When the system wakes up it's pretty much impossible to revive the network connection off the wireless card. That is likely not so much the power saving, but the card itself, or maybe the device drivers. The OS should be telling the card to wake back up, so to speak. If you Stop and then remove the card, and then reinsert it, does it start working? In general, most of the off-the-shell WiFi stuff I've played with has been rather flakey. I don't know if it is because manufacturers are cutting too many corners, or something inherent in the standard, or because the technology is immature, or what. It has made me appreciate the reliability of good old fashioned UTP, though. :-) -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Where am I (csh)
Without getting into the why are you using X to do the job: I've got a csh script in an arbitrary location. But I need to know from within the script where it exists in the directory structure. The reason for that is I need to source a file from within that same directory (where the script is). If I look for cwd or pwd, I get the directory my shell was when when I ran the script, not where the script itself is located. As an additional condition, I can't use anything on the local system, as the script will be run over NFS to various systems (hence one of the reasons it's arbitrary). And it has to be csh, no tcshisms. -Mark msg02251/pgp0.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Where am I (csh)
On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, Mark Komarinski wrote: =Without getting into the why are you using X to do the job: = =I've got a csh script in an arbitrary location. But I need to know =from within the script where it exists in the directory structure. The =reason for that is I need to source a file from within that same =directory (where the script is). If I look for cwd or pwd, I get the =directory my shell was when when I ran the script, not where the =script itself is located. = =As an additional condition, I can't use anything on the local system, as =the script will be run over NFS to various systems (hence one of the =reasons it's arbitrary). And it has to be csh, no tcshisms. = =-Mark Where to start... Never run any csh script. Go to google and read Tom Christionson's excellent paper C shell considered harmful. Having been properly chastised, you can try refering to $0. It might work. Another reason for not using csh BTW is that the equivalent construct in bash or ksh uses PATH to locate file to source in, so there's no need to specify it via any kind of pathname. -- -Time flies like the wind. Fruit flies like a banana. Stranger things have - -happened but none stranger than this. Does your driver's license say Organ -Donor?Black holes are where God divided by zero. Listen to me! We are all- -individuals! What if this weren't a hypothetical question? [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
I just read a write-up of the Ahtlon bug at http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2002-01-21-001-20-NW-KN They describe a simple workaround and perhaps the problem is fairly machine specific. I have a 900 mhz Athlon Thunderbird processor (Gigabyte mother board) and haven't seen this particular problem. AFAIK there haven't been these kinds of problems with the K6 series. AMD suffers from being the other guy in terms of their microprocessors. I have found that if you're not the dominant player (Intel) your stuff doesn't seem to get tested as well as the other guy's. -Alex P.S. This problem has been out there for a while, about a year, so hopefully the fix is readily available. - Original Message - From: Mark Komarinski [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Hewitt Tech [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 11:34 AM Subject: Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Where am I (csh)
On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 02:43:42PM -0500, Mark Komarinski wrote: On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 02:34:28PM -0500, Kevin D. Clark wrote: Mark Komarinski [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Without getting into the why are you using X to do the job: I've got a csh script in an arbitrary location. But I need to know from within the script where it exists in the directory structure. The reason for that is I need to source a file from within that same directory (where the script is). If I look for cwd or pwd, I get the directory my shell was when when I ran the script, not where the script itself is located. As an additional condition, I can't use anything on the local system, as the script will be run over NFS to various systems (hence one of the reasons it's arbitrary). And it has to be csh, no tcshisms. Doing this, in the most general case, is very difficult. It doesn't matter which shell you're using either... Is `dirname $0` good enough? (even though in certain strange situations (that you will probably never experience) it might not be correct). echo $0 in the script in both irix and linux gives: -tcsh -Mark (not a shell) Ahh. This is because I'm sourcing the file. If I run the script itself, I get the expected response. Bleah. -Mark (still not a shell) msg02257/pgp0.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Where am I (csh)
Mark Komarinski [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: echo $0 in the script in both irix and linux gives: -tcsh How about $_ instead of $0 ? (I just tested this; it works for me) Regards, --kevin PS It's unclear to me as to why your system is printing out tcsh instead of csh. -- Listen, this old system of yours could be on fire and I couldn't even turn on the kitchen tap without filling out a 27b/6... Bloody paperwork. Harry Tuttle, Brazil ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Where am I (csh)
On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 02:44:44PM -0500, Derek Martin wrote: -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 02:20:12PM -0500, Mark Komarinski wrote: Without getting into the why are you using X to do the job: Who, us? ;-) I've got a csh script in an arbitrary location. But I need to know from within the script where it exists in the directory structure. The reason for that is I need to source a file from within that same directory (where the script is). If I look for cwd or pwd, I get the directory my shell was when when I ran the script, not where the script itself is located. I'm not that familiar with csh, but AFAIK this can not be done; at least not directly. The only way the script will know where it lives is if you tell it explicitly on the command line, either by specifying the full path (it'll be in the equivalent of argv[0] if csh makes that available), or by including the directory as a command-line option. A possible solution is to use the which command from within the script to determine the path to the script. Obviously, if the path to the script is different from within the script as compared to when the script is started (though I can't imagine why this would be), then it won't work. As an additional condition, I can't use anything on the local system, as the script will be run over NFS to various systems (hence one of the reasons it's arbitrary). And it has to be csh, no tcshisms. I'm not sure I understand why this is a problem... the script is still going to run on machine X, wherever it lives; it should be able to use any of the commands local to machine X. I could do that, but I don't want to configure 30+ machines every time I need to make a change. Perhaps I should go into more detail of this script. We have an internal project which combines a bunch of software used by people with very long sets of initials after their names (PhD, BS, MS, MD, etc.) doing things I will never understand (xray crystallography - did I even spell that right?). There is an existing collection of software available for Linux and SGIs being distributed by a different lab and most of the labs I administer are either using it, or want to. The problem with said distribution is there is a 35k cshrc file that has to be sourced when the user logs in to set up the various environmental variables and paths to let them use the applications. The problem is that as the software is distributed now, you have to create a link in the root directory to the location of where the software actually sits (which is arbitrary due to NFS and how things are configured). So on each machine that each user needs access to the collection, I have to make the symbolic link. That's annoying. There has to be a way for a script to know where it is and take advantage of that fact. But the cshrc file has to remain as it is, as the distributors of the software will change it as new versions of software packages come out. So I have have the script know where it's located when it runs so it can load up a configuration file for that instance of the collection of software, which again is at an arbitrary location. For reasons beyond my (current) control, this is all done in csh. Can't change it, but I may be able to write a bash version, but that won't help the existing users who don't want to change from csh to bash. Whew. Did I ever mention that life in academics is a lot different from life in the business world? -Mark msg02259/pgp0.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Where am I (csh)
On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 02:47:56PM -0500, Kevin D. Clark wrote: Mark Komarinski [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: echo $0 in the script in both irix and linux gives: -tcsh How about $_ instead of $0 ? _: undefined variable. (I just tested this; it works for me) Regards, --kevin PS It's unclear to me as to why your system is printing out tcsh instead of csh. the system I'm testing on happens to have tcsh installed. But I can't guarantee that across all machines. -Mark msg02260/pgp0.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Where am I (csh)
Mark Komarinski [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: The problem is that as the software is distributed now, you have to create a link in the root directory to the location of where the software actually sits (which is arbitrary due to NFS and how things are configured). Perhaps you could solve this problem by using the automounter? Regards, --kevin -- Kevin D. Clark / Cetacean Networks / Portsmouth, N.H. (USA) cetaceannetworks.com!kclark (GnuPG ID: B280F24E) alumni.unh.edu!kdc ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Where am I (csh)
Mark Komarinski [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 02:47:56PM -0500, Kevin D. Clark wrote: How about $_ instead of $0 ? _: undefined variable. (I just tested this; it works for me) I'm not trying to make an incendiary comment here. If whatever csh-flavored shell you're using doesn't fill in $_ appropriately, then I think that this is another csh incompatability that needs to be dealt with. Regards, --kevin -- Kevin D. Clark / Cetacean Networks / Portsmouth, N.H. (USA) cetaceannetworks.com!kclark (GnuPG ID: B280F24E) alumni.unh.edu!kdc ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 11:34am, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: P.S. My favorite (not) windows bugs are the ones associated with the AMD K6 processors. You end up with a very unstable machine but when you put Linux or any of the NT variants on these systems magically everything works. To be fair, Linux had some problems with the Athlon (and K6s?) for a while. I presume you're talking about the stability issue mentioned here: http://www.geocrawler.com/lists/3/Linux/35/175/7626960/ Basically, the problem was with Linux. The kernel was improperly managing memory caching. This happened to work on Intel's chips, but the Athlon tripped over it. It only occurred with the Athlon, not the K6. That combined with the long process of getting windows (re)installed on an Athlon convined me to get a P4 this time around. First time I've owned an Intel desktop in 13 years. *shrug* Intel's stuff is hardly immune to problems. FDIV bug, anyone? There's no such thing as a perfect CPU. If I were buying a new system today, I might buy a P4, because the P4 processors are currently out-pacing the Athlon by a significant margin, and the Athlon *has* forced Intel to keep their prices down (we can thank AMD for that, if nothing else). The Athlon is actually a better processor design, but the P4 is so much faster it doesn't matter for most things. On the other hand, dual-processor Athlon rigs are comparatively cheap. On the gripping hand, my 1.2 GHz Athlon is faster than I need already. :-) -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
Thing is though Ben, the machine I had the most trouble with was manufactured by a now merged PC company called Compaq. With the original factory installation the machine wouldn't run more than an hour or so without crashing or blue screening. You're probably quite right about a lot of systems not being on the HCL but there were at least two AMD K6 specific fixes in Windows 9x and neither quite did the trick. In fact I don't remember ever seeing a stable AMD K6 based system. On the plus side, Linux is running on most of them! ;^) -Alex - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Greater NH Linux User Group [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 12:00 PM Subject: Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 11:21am, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If I had a nickel for every hour I've spent chasing windows problem... ;^( Amen to that. P.S. My favorite (not) windows bugs are the ones associated with the AMD K6 processors. You end up with a very unstable machine but when you put Linux or any of the NT variants on these systems magically everything works. Keep in mind that the HCL (Hardware Compatibility List) for Microsoft Windows is a lot shorter than the pool of available hardware. If it is not on the HCL, Microsoft makes no promises as to whether Windows will work. In the case of many K6 motherboards I've used, they were not on the HCL, and for a good reason -- Windows crashed constantly on them. My point here is not to defend Windows, but rather, to promote Linux: Many people point to the fact that vendors always provide Windows drivers, but not always Linux drivers. However, once you start installing third-party drivers, what stability Windows has goes right down the toilet. If you instead confine yourself to the HCL (like Microsoft tells you to), the hardware support picture becomes much more balanced. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
Ben Scott pointed out: Keep in mind that the HCL (Hardware Compatibility List) for Microsoft Windows is a lot shorter than the pool of available hardware. If it is not on the HCL, Microsoft makes no promises as to whether Windows will work. We had the same sort of issue on Digital UNIX/Tru64 UNIX for quite a long time. There are a lot of devices out there that could conceiveably been plopped into a PCI slot on our systems, but actual device driver support was a different issue entirely. In fact, there was a fair amount of well-known hardware that we eschewed because it wouldn't work at the speeds we were going, even though they worked under Windows. I don't want to get into a debate over the comparison of the various OS environments, but I will say that we were capable of pushing hardware a lot harder/faster than Windows could back then. Also, sometimes some vendors used to have very imaginative interpretations of the PCI spec, and didn't realize that we could assemble test systems that would easily bring their design inadequacies to light. One major Ethernet controller vendor lost a large account up in Canada many years ago when we proved that their cards could not sustain multiple back-to-back transfers at full Ethernet (10 Mbits/sec back then) speed, but ours could, like the Ethernet (Blue Book) Spec said it should. Several hundred PC's tied to our VAXen had their Ethernet cards ripped out and replaced with ours, and the customer was delighted thereafter... B. ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 12:16pm, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thing is though Ben, the machine I had the most trouble with was manufactured by a now merged PC company called Compaq. That's nice. Was it on the HCL? :-) With the original factory installation the machine wouldn't run more than an hour or so without crashing or blue screening. I would have had some strong words for the vendor in that case. Actually, *I* wouldn't, because I wouldn't buy a Compaq if someone else paid for it. But that's another issue. ;-) In fact I don't remember ever seeing a stable AMD K6 based system. I have. I have also seen plenty that are *not* stable. There is one infamous motherboard, the FIC VA-503, which I have *never* seen run Windows successfully (sample = four units, three vendors, two different sites). It does run Linux well, but as near as I can tell, Windows simply will not run. The same processors worked fine in other motherboards, but not that one. Come to think of it, I have also seen motherboards for Intel chips which never ran right, either. Point being: You're quick to point the finger at the CPU, but I suspect the problem lies elsewhere. There *are* a disproportionately higher number of crap motherboards (and core logic chipsets) for AMD's chips, because AMD is a much bigger presence in the low end sector of the market. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
I wouldn't say quick to point the finger. It took me quite a long time to come to the conclusion that there was a CPU/Windows interaction. And yes, now that you mention it I've see a few Intel boards be unstable under Windows. Truth is, there really is engineering involved in building a stable robust system. A lot of the cheap clones use really cheap power supplies which can easily result in instability. Another issue is the power handling of the motherboard itself. At least one motherboard I've used had an accessory card that was used to help filter the onboard power to the CPU. Basically, aside from a regulator, it had quite a few big capacitors to try to smooth out the spikes resulting from the processor jumping from milliwatts of consumption to 30-50 watts under heavy load. I'm not sure if that particular Compaq model was on the HCL. Microsoft has an HCL for every version of their OS and it even changes from service pack to service pack. But Compaq being in bed with Microsoft, you would have thought they wouldn't have problems this egregious. I certainly felt burned from my purchase of that particular box. I've had a laptop as well that I've found hidden flaws in long after the warranty expired. Bottom line, caveat emptor! -Alex - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Greater NH Linux User Group [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 12:41 PM Subject: Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 12:16pm, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thing is though Ben, the machine I had the most trouble with was manufactured by a now merged PC company called Compaq. That's nice. Was it on the HCL? :-) With the original factory installation the machine wouldn't run more than an hour or so without crashing or blue screening. I would have had some strong words for the vendor in that case. Actually, *I* wouldn't, because I wouldn't buy a Compaq if someone else paid for it. But that's another issue. ;-) In fact I don't remember ever seeing a stable AMD K6 based system. I have. I have also seen plenty that are *not* stable. There is one infamous motherboard, the FIC VA-503, which I have *never* seen run Windows successfully (sample = four units, three vendors, two different sites). It does run Linux well, but as near as I can tell, Windows simply will not run. The same processors worked fine in other motherboards, but not that one. Come to think of it, I have also seen motherboards for Intel chips which never ran right, either. Point being: You're quick to point the finger at the CPU, but I suspect the problem lies elsewhere. There *are* a disproportionately higher number of crap motherboards (and core logic chipsets) for AMD's chips, because AMD is a much bigger presence in the low end sector of the market. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
I think a really sad thing about our technology is that name brands don't necessarily mean the system will be all that good. For every pissed off Compaq customer I've found a pissed off Dell customer. That goes for most of the vendors out there. They mostly provide support from the same third party call centers. I was working with a Dell box a few nights ago and tried to call them to ask a question. After being on hold on my cell phone for 10 minutes I hung up and figured out a workaround on my own. I can't think of one brand name computer that I haven't also run into a disgruntled customer. A big part of the problem is that the customer's expectations are too high for what any company doing end-user support can afford to supply. Commercial customers expect a high level of service and pay for it. Retail customers expect that same level of service but have purchases hardware with what is often a 10% margin. Recently this has been less - like maybe 6-7%. The first support call wipes out the company's profit margin on that box. No wonder the companies try to off-shore their support... -Alex - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Greater NH Linux User Group [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 12:41 PM Subject: Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 12:16pm, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thing is though Ben, the machine I had the most trouble with was manufactured by a now merged PC company called Compaq. That's nice. Was it on the HCL? :-) With the original factory installation the machine wouldn't run more than an hour or so without crashing or blue screening. I would have had some strong words for the vendor in that case. Actually, *I* wouldn't, because I wouldn't buy a Compaq if someone else paid for it. But that's another issue. ;-) In fact I don't remember ever seeing a stable AMD K6 based system. I have. I have also seen plenty that are *not* stable. There is one infamous motherboard, the FIC VA-503, which I have *never* seen run Windows successfully (sample = four units, three vendors, two different sites). It does run Linux well, but as near as I can tell, Windows simply will not run. The same processors worked fine in other motherboards, but not that one. Come to think of it, I have also seen motherboards for Intel chips which never ran right, either. Point being: You're quick to point the finger at the CPU, but I suspect the problem lies elsewhere. There *are* a disproportionately higher number of crap motherboards (and core logic chipsets) for AMD's chips, because AMD is a much bigger presence in the low end sector of the market. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
Having worked support before, I can say that it is one of the few areas that is considered a money sink. Thus, interaction with customers always gets the short end of the stick (think: voice mail hell). Unfrotunately, that leads to the situation you describe - customers hate vendor X and don't buy from them anymore. Vendor X's sales drop as a result, and they have to cut somewhere - customer support! A nasty vicious cycle. Toss in the additional fact that the vendor doesn't know how smart you are. I would guess a majority of their calls can be solved by having the customer RTFM. But when you call in knowing that the video card is toast, they can't believe you until they go through their little script (is it plugged in?, what OS are you using..). NOW toss in the massive price competition between vendors. Prices for PCs have dropped like a rock in the past few years, dropping the margin, and increasing the customer base that then needs help. But vendors can't charge what they should, or else they would be out of business. In addition, the vendor has to support a braindead OS in order to keep their sales. How many of the remaining support calls deals with an OS quirk? How to stop it? That's hard. Find a vendor that is good and make sure you tell them when things go right and when they go wrong. My decisions on vendors usually is a result of the quality of the hardware rather than the quality of tech support, but that's only because I'm usually doing things with the hardware (install Linux) that isn't supported by the vendor in the first place. For example, I don't like buying Dells because a laptop I had a year ago was a piece of junk, whereas my IBM laptop still runs like a champ two year later. When I wanted a new laptop, I chose another IBM. -Mark On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 01:01:09PM -0500, Hewitt Tech wrote: I think a really sad thing about our technology is that name brands don't necessarily mean the system will be all that good. For every pissed off Compaq customer I've found a pissed off Dell customer. That goes for most of the vendors out there. They mostly provide support from the same third party call centers. I was working with a Dell box a few nights ago and tried to call them to ask a question. After being on hold on my cell phone for 10 minutes I hung up and figured out a workaround on my own. I can't think of one brand name computer that I haven't also run into a disgruntled customer. A big part of the problem is that the customer's expectations are too high for what any company doing end-user support can afford to supply. Commercial customers expect a high level of service and pay for it. Retail customers expect that same level of service but have purchases hardware with what is often a 10% margin. Recently this has been less - like maybe 6-7%. The first support call wipes out the company's profit margin on that box. No wonder the companies try to off-shore their support... -Alex - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Greater NH Linux User Group [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 12:41 PM Subject: Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 12:16pm, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Thing is though Ben, the machine I had the most trouble with was manufactured by a now merged PC company called Compaq. That's nice. Was it on the HCL? :-) With the original factory installation the machine wouldn't run more than an hour or so without crashing or blue screening. I would have had some strong words for the vendor in that case. Actually, *I* wouldn't, because I wouldn't buy a Compaq if someone else paid for it. But that's another issue. ;-) In fact I don't remember ever seeing a stable AMD K6 based system. I have. I have also seen plenty that are *not* stable. There is one infamous motherboard, the FIC VA-503, which I have *never* seen run Windows successfully (sample = four units, three vendors, two different sites). It does run Linux well, but as near as I can tell, Windows simply will not run. The same processors worked fine in other motherboards, but not that one. Come to think of it, I have also seen motherboards for Intel chips which never ran right, either. Point being: You're quick to point the finger at the CPU, but I suspect the problem lies elsewhere. There *are* a disproportionately higher number of crap motherboards (and core logic chipsets) for AMD's chips, because AMD is a much bigger presence in the low end sector of the market. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Where am I (csh)
The short answer is: it can't be done, at least not in any manner that won't cause projectile vomiting, so just remember that you asked... A hack like this might start with the understanding that scripts are not, in themselves, executable. What's really happening when you execute a script is that the appropriate program (like bash or perl or tcl or whatever) is secretly launched and the script is fed to it for interpretation. That, in turn, usually means that (at least) one of that interpreter's file descriptors will refer to the file that the script is coming from. So, if you're truly twisted you might rummage around in /proc/pidOfInterest/fd/ and see what you can find. For example, I note that descriptor 255 seems to refer to the script in question on my 2.4.18 Debian system when I'm executing bash scripts. [ Note that pidOfInterest will be that of the interpreter (csh in your case) that's executing your script, typically available as $$ ] Of course, there's a whole lot a ways this approach can fail - one (of many) that immediately comes to mind is if the script is being piped to you as stdin from another process. For the record: trickery like this is ugly, guaranteed to be non-portable and causes cancer - you should be forced to swim 50 laps in a septic tank if you ever attempt to put a hack like this into service. ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Where am I (csh)
Another solution, albeit extremely fugly, would be to 'exec somenewscriptname' from csh that would have #! /bin/sh or whatever defined and then have that script execute in a bash environment and do whatever machinations you need. I don't envy - the constraints are obvious, and obviously painful... HTH, Bayard ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
Derek, I think you just made my point! For every happy user you can find one almost equally unhappy. As another data point I helped someone out with their problem about a year ago. They had purchased a shiny new HP Pavilion desktop system. They tried and failed to reliably connect to 3 different ISPs with the built-in Rockwell/Conexant winmodem. They spent hours on the phone with the ISPs and HP. Finally the guy's brother asked me to call him. I discussed it with him for a few minutes and suggested he run down to his local Circuit City/Best Buy/Staples and pick up a new external modem (~$50). Voila! End of problem. I explained to him that the built-in v.90 modems although standard conformant did not necessarily interoperate with many ISP's modem arrays. I had been through this previously with other users and always fixed the problem by adding or replacing the modem. But this guy can't say anything nice about HP. It's only their problem in a backhanded way. Worse, at some point they shipped him an entirely new box which of course worked no better than the first one. And the icing on the cake? AFAIK he kept the second box because he was so PO'd at HP! Talk about a losing proposition... -Alex P.S. You may recall the giant p'ing contest between the K56-Flex advocates and the X-2 advocates. They compromised on the v.90 standard but deliberately chose to forgo interoperability testing. The rest, as they say, is history. - Original Message - From: Derek Martin [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 1:42 PM Subject: Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 On Wed, Jan 15, 2003 at 01:16:50PM -0500, Mark Komarinski wrote: For example, I don't like buying Dells because a laptop I had a year ago was a piece of junk, whereas my IBM laptop still runs like a champ two year later. When I wanted a new laptop, I chose another IBM. Funny, my experience was exactly the opposite... In fact, the CD-ROM drive plate on my Thinkpad fell off after about 6 months of normal use... - -- Derek D. Martin http://www.pizzashack.org/ GPG Key ID: 0xDFBEAD02 -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.0.7 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQE+JauwHEnASN++rQIRAkddAJ9YEdQU6k4OlWhb2XRV3OP7W1gWGACbBWVF pHv4QIYWVjNOfAeIcv/vS7Y= =sbql -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Where am I (csh)
Some followup examples, with the last one showing how it can fail: shrapnel:/tmp 165--- cat /tmp/nastyHack ; chmod a+x /tmp/nastyHack cd $* # Stand in specified directory ($HOME if none), echo PWD is $PWD# confirm our location, ls -CFl /proc/$$/fd # demo the concept. shrapnel:/tmp 166--- cd / ; /tmp/nastyHack PWD is /home/mod total 0 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 0 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 1 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 2 - /dev/pts/3 lr-x--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 255 - /tmp/nastyHack* shrapnel:/ 167--- cd / ; /tmp/nastyHack /etc PWD is /etc total 0 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 0 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 1 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 2 - /dev/pts/3 lr-x--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:39 255 - /tmp/nastyHack* shrapnel:/ 168--- cd /tmp ; ./nastyHack /usr/local PWD is /usr/local total 0 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:40 0 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:40 1 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:40 2 - /dev/pts/3 lr-x--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:40 255 - /tmp/nastyHack* shrapnel:/tmp 169--- cd /var/log ; bash /tmp/nastyHack PWD is /home/mod total 0 lr-x--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:40 0 - /tmp/nastyHack* lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:40 1 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:40 2 - /dev/pts/3 shrapnel:/var/log 170--- cd /var/log ; cat /tmp/nastyHack | bash PWD is /home/mod total 3 lr-x--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:45 0 - pipe:[364424] lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:45 1 - /dev/pts/3 lrwx--1 mod mod64 Jan 15 17:45 2 - /dev/pts/3 ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Where am I (csh)
On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 2:57pm, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Did I ever mention that life in academics is a lot different from life in the business world? Yah, in the business world, they want you to do everything you have to do in academia, and make a profit, too. -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff)
Geez Ben, don't hold back, tell us how you really feel! ;^) And remember those damned things were built specifically so the manufacturer could save $2 or $3 on the cost of the modem. -Alex - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Greater NH Linux User Group [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 5:54 PM Subject: Re: Wireless weirdness (was: NT Stuff) On Wed, 15 Jan 2003, at 1:56pm, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: They tried and failed to reliably connect to 3 different ISPs with the built-in Rockwell/Conexant winmodem. RANT SUBJECT=software modems PRIORITY=obligatory I hate those fscking things. My usual recommendation on what to do when you have trouble with a software modem is to bash it up with a hammer and then burn it. Those things have no redeeming features what so ever. They are very proprietary. They often cause system instability. They frequently don't work at all. In the cases where they do work, performance usually suffers. /RANT -- Ben Scott [EMAIL PROTECTED] | The opinions expressed in this message are those of the author and do not | | necessarily represent the views or policy of any other person, entity or | | organization. All information is provided without warranty of any kind. | ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss
