I did something kind of dopy today in my pre-coffee hours. Luckily, my officemate helped me find some clarity in dealing with a bit of a dodgy issue: partition tables. Operating systems like Linux keep track of where different partitions start on your drive by placing “super blocks” at the beginning of each partition that…
Category: Linux
All Linux Desktop Environments Suck…
….Some just look better doing it. Honestly, I’m at the point where I don’t even care what desktop environment I use. I use fluxbox at work (mostly), KDE on one machine at home, and GNOME on my laptop. They all suck to some degree, so choice of desktop, if you plan on sticking to just…
Linux as Stock
I think people relate to money a lot better than they do technology. Money has been around much longer, and knowledge (or perceived knowledge) has been passed down about money for generations, and truthfully, it hasn’t changed a whole heckuva lot. Most people know the basics of the stock market. “Buy low sell high”, undervalued…
The debian apt-get utopia myth
Debian users love the apt package manager. In fact, I’m pretty sure that *every* time I’ve asked a Debian user why they use Debian, they’ve answered with one word: “apt”. They take great joy in picking on Red Hat newbies who have no clue what they’re doing and are subsequently taking their lumps in RPM-land….
Tannenbaum Speaks at Princeton
Andrew Tannenbaum is a highly acclaimed lecturer, researcher, and author on various topics in computer science, most notably operating systems. His volumes on the design of modern operating systems are used in many if not most university systems courses. This is not to say he isn’t controversial, however. His public debates with Linus Torvalds on…
Does this get factored into the TCO numbers?
This morning, I’ve now spent 30 minutes googling, testing, and troubleshooting for a guy who was having trouble getting outlook to talk to our outbound mail server. I suggested various things, of course asked for more information, and while waiting for responses, went off to see if others had seen this issue. Of course, every…
Linux Distributions Suck
Almost all distributions of Linux suck. The good news, though, is that as more people get into Linux, they inevitably ask for things, and they ask for them in larger numbers. Nobody wants to work on a project that is only used by four people in the world, so large groups asking for stuff is…
"Which distro do you recommend?"
I get asked, by more junior Linux users, and people just looking to try it out, which distribution of Linux I use or recommend. It occurred to me that I never actually published an answer to this question, even though it is, by far, the question I am asked most often. I think my stock…
Happy level toward redhat on the rise with RHEL4
Redhat released Redhat Enterprise Linux 4 last week. It was only two weeks ago that I completely slammed Redhat, and for that point in time, I think that was perfectly valid. Now with the release of RHEL4, there are very extremely large changes, and Redhat’s intent going forward is solidified and made much more clear….
Tired of Redhat’s Crap
Redhat has really been grating my nerves as of late. Undocumented features that are advertised but unusable, recommended updates that are thoroughly broken, failure to update packages with high-impact problems, and a poor software packaging and distribution policy have me testing other distributions with a goal of taking my business elsewhere. This heightened level of…