Root Access

djsmiley2k

00:08

superuser.com/review/suggested-edits/650672

meh?

Simon Sheehan

I'd deny it really

Ben N

That would have been a much better edit had it fixed the erroneous Outlook-related tag

Simon Sheehan

While the headers look nice, it's not really adding anything to the question that benefits it

Ben N

I rejected it

djsmiley2k

ty for the advice.

I was like 'Am I being harsh?' :/

Ben N

00:21

Relevant SEDE query - Suggested Edits reviewers from most permissive to strictest

Journeyman Geek

Bob

@JourneymanGeek woof?

Journeyman Geek

woof. That's a sleepy doggy.

Ben N

@djsmiley2k FWIW you're basically at the median when it comes to Suggested Edits reviewers

Journeyman Geek

and don't forget, in theory it evens out

djsmiley2k

00:57

that's cool

djsmiley2k

01:14

ok wtf

i've turned dumb

how do i cd in cmd? :/

Journeyman Geek

cd ?

I mean literally its the same command

djsmiley2k

yeah that's what I thought

it wasn't/isn't working :D

Journeyman Geek

0_0

your system is plausibly f***ed.

how dosen't it work?

djsmiley2k

it doesn't do anything @JourneymanGeek :D

i'm as confused as you are

I just worked around it.

: Preserve only the %MAXBACKUPS% most recent backups.
set "delMsg="
for /f "skip=%MAXBACKUPS% delims=" %%a in (
  'dir %backupPath%\*.7z /t:c /a:d /o:-d /b'
) do (
  if not defined delMsg (
    set delMsg=1
    echo More than %MAXBACKUPS% found - only the %MAXBACKUPS% most recent folders will be preserved.
  )
  echo rd /s %backupPath%\%%a
)

Bob

@djsmiley2k what exactly were you doing before?

djsmiley2k

01:28

@Bob oh just trying to cd "F:\file path\something"

something was a dir, yes

Bob

@djsmiley2k in what context?

djsmiley2k

just in a newly opened command prompt

Bob

you probably need a /d to make it change drive

djsmiley2k

ws in C:\users\myaccount\

Bob

alternatively, F: to set the drive

djsmiley2k

01:29

ah ok ty

didn't know that :)

Bob

beacuse there's a current path for every drive and without /d it only sets the current path for that drive

djsmiley2k

Can I test for statements interactively in the cmd prompt?

Bob

...yes?

kinda?

...don't use cmd

djsmiley2k

C:\Users\user\Desktop\Scripts>for /F "skip=2 delims=" %%a in ('dir "
F:\Path with spaces\*.7z" /t:c /a:d /o:-d /b') do ( echo %%a )
%%a was unexpected at this time.

:D

Bob

single %

Journeyman Geek

01:30

lol

Bob

%% is just a way to escape the % when in a batch file

djsmiley2k

5

Q: Batch Script to delete oldest folder in a given folder

I'm writing a simple .bat backup script, and as part of it I want the oldest backup (folder) to be deleted upon reaching a set max limit of backups. Right now I have this: %COUNTER% is based on the number of backup folders currently in the directory where backups are stored, and is calculated ...

Bob

also, STOP USING CMD for the love of god

:(

djsmiley2k

aH OK :)

oH?

still file not found, drat

Bob

you're making me dig through repressed memories :(

djsmiley2k

01:31

hehe

If you honestly don't wanna look at it, dont

Bob

FYI @djsmiley2k blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20170412-00/?p=95946

djsmiley2k

it's so NEARLY done now

@Bob wtf is this?

Bob

@djsmiley2k and yet a powershell script would be many times more reliable and would've taken all of an hour to write, if that

djsmiley2k

an hour to write, if you know how to

and it'd likely not be trusted by the company either

Bob

seriously. the very last thing I ever want to see a batch script for is file manipulation, especially for backups, while attempting text parsing

djsmiley2k

01:33

I need something I've fully understood.

Bob

I guarantee you'll run into some funny edge case several months later

which may or may not delete your backups and potentially the rest of your files

djsmiley2k

yeah that's fine

:D

Bob

I've seen it happen

for every poorly-written bash script with a rm -r /$UNSET_VARIABLE/* there's a dozen batch scripts that do something similar

@djsmiley2k "fully understood"

@djsmiley2k I'd trust batch about as far as I could throw it

djsmiley2k

yea, exactly

this is for a customer we really don't care about anyway

Bob

<== says the guy who wrote a bunch of early SU answers with batch/cmd

djsmiley2k

01:36

concider me fully warned

Bob

then again, you could say I'm speaking from experience and many days of frustration...

djsmiley2k

ah

/a:d was setting it to directories only

\o/ IT WORKS

Bob

I'm scared.

djsmiley2k

:)

now, I should write a bit to log wtf it's doing, eh ;)

Bob

Start-Transcript

My last major-ish batch script was written over two hours and took all of ten minutes to port to PS -_-

Rahul2001

01:51

YAY! BIRTHDAY!

Bob

And that was pretty much the first PS script I ever wrote, too.

@Rahul2001 Happy birthday!

8

Ben N

:D

Rahul2001

:D

William

anyone have any idea how to get the old Mosaic browser running? I gave up on Nexus.

Bob

@William what when where why how

Rahul2001

01:54

@William Whoahoahoo

William

@Bob I was born in the 90s so I missed a lot of the super old browsers. I would like to relive such. I would assume a virtual machine might work

Bob

@William Oh, so for curiosity's sake in a VM?

William

is there even a site for stuff like this? Like legacy hardware

Bob

That's better than what I was expecting :P

@William For the most part... install Windows 98SE in a VM, install Mosaic, done :P

Ben N

Speaking of scary scripting, I had to write a quick thing in PHP a few days back

It was every bit as horrifying an experience as I expected

William

02:00

PHP has gotten a little better if you use a library IMO

What type of script was it?

Ben N

Basically a contact form

12 lines, so I think a framework/library would have been overkill

But it made me afraid and I am very happy to be back with ASP.NET

Bob

@BenN lol. reminds me of the few times I've had to edit forum or CMS templates

shudder

Journeyman Geek

you can run mosaic on linux

William

how? link?

djsmiley2k

@BenN see I find php easy

I find other peoples php horrific

Journeyman Geek

02:04

github.com/alandipert/ncsa-mosaic

Bob

s/I find other peoples/other people find my/

It works both ways :P

William

Thank you Journeyman I will do it after finals tomorrow!

Ben N

Good luck on your exams!

Bob

17 more days till Windows Internals 7th Edition ships, hopefully

(part 1 only, unfortunately)

Ben N

PHP does have the advantage, in my experience, of not falling prey to write-only-ness

...while batch is completely incomprehensible after writing a script to do anything remotely tricky

Bob

02:09

@BenN ha. I look back at my old batch scripts/answers and... "wtf, how did that even work"

Especially if delayed expansion gets involved

especially if delayed expansion across 'function' calls gets involved

Journeyman Geek

arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/05/…

That Brazilian Guy

@William Problem is, most modern sites won't work.

There is a highly voted answer about this, IIRC it's from @JourneymanGeek.

I have to pick up my dinner from the microwave or else I'd look it up

Bob

@ThatBrazilianGuy isn't that the one for Windows 3.1?

Journeyman Geek

57

A: Why can't old PCs view modern sites?

Simply, a lot of modern HTML features we take for granted did not exist back in those days. There are attempts to build 'modern' browsers for older OSes - classilla, for example. You can easily load up linux onto a suitable PII or PIII system and still be able to handle a basic modern webpage. ...

OS/2

Bob

I am in awe, sir. You are a time traveler. I'd upvote this by the number of years between the last time OS/2 was popular and 2013 if I could, but unfortunately I can only meagerly +1 it. — allquixotic Aug 5 '13 at 15:26

Oct 29 '13 at 14:28, by allquixotic

I'm just repaying brain pain for brain pain -- you make my brain hurt by running OS/2; I'll make your brain hurt by posting stupid questions

Dec 17 '13 at 23:32, by allquixotic

OS/2 and Raspberry Pi and iSCSI... yeah.... I think I'm leaving now

Jan 24 '14 at 0:07, by allquixotic

@Bob well you're on XP, so you haven't seen the higher dissatisfaction levels yet -- if the wauzer were bringing out the OS/2 at the same time as this, I think I'd implode into a black hole

Mar 18 '14 at 15:19, by allquixotic

@Bob as long as he doesn't test it on OS/2. If he does, I'll have to get out the rolled-up newspaper.

Mar 18 '14 at 15:21, by allquixotic

*picks up JourneymanGeek's dog persona and places his paws on an OS/2 PC's keyboard* Ravi. This is OS/2. OS/2 is no. *places his paws on a PC keyboard* This is Windows. Windows is OK. *places his paws on a ThinkPad running Fedora* This is GNU/Linux. Linux is good.

Mar 26 '14 at 2:59, by allquixotic

@JourneymanGeek that's different; OS/2 deserved to die

:D

Journeyman Geek

02:16

lol

yup, totally a running joke here

ls

interesting

NCSA mosaic won't even try to load SU

Aibobot

Bob

@JourneymanGeek HTTPS

Journeyman Geek

that does the same

ah!

google works. Kinda

Aibobot

William

awesome can't wait to try it out tomorrow

@ThatBrazilianGuy What is the link you are referring to?

I can create my own custom pages for the browser which will give me an idea how it work.

sorry missed the link

djsmiley2k

02:47

when you have to use IE,and put it in compatiability mode, just to get the remote console to load :/

Bob

@djsmiley2k ...and Java too?

djsmiley2k

ActiveX

:D

It won't run the java one, as our java is too outta date on this server

which it has to be, else the other thing doesn't work -_-

ANnnnnnnnnnnd they've locked down permissions so much I can't install the active x one, lul

can you get a version of firefox portable with built in java? XD

Bob

...you actually managed to find something that needs an older Java version than IPMI?

@djsmiley2k you'd first need one with NPAPI support, which means < 52 (or 52 ESR)

djsmiley2k

it wants java 1.7

but they have an app which needs 1.6.34

Bob

that's... not too old

djsmiley2k

02:56

so I can't upgrade

Bob

I had a server with iDRAC that wanted Java ... 5? 6?

djsmiley2k

and even if I didn't care about the problem, I still can't upgrade, because permissions

Bob

@djsmiley2k apparently it's doable portableapps.com/support/firefox_portable#plugins

but you must use the ESR

portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox-portable-esr

djsmiley2k

welp, here goes nothing

/me tries restarting the host server

@Bob well, that's an idea then

/me tries it

sigh, rebooting the host didn't seem to work

this portable thing is last chance.

Journeyman Geek

in theory you can explicitly tell firefox to use certain versions of java

I don't remember how I did it tho, we used to do that at job-2

djsmiley2k

03:05

yeah

been there, done that too

The problem being I can't install anything here

urgh

I just 'installed' them both @Bob but no worky in firefox

adding the site to 'safe site' to allow it to do all the naughty things

unless I need to tell firefox some how

Bob

^C^C^C^C^C^Z


^Z^A^C^Z^X^C^F^F

me trying to exit a docker thing

dammit

@djsmiley2k firefox ESR 52, yea?

must be ESR

djsmiley2k

portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox-portable-esr << this

That Brazilian Guy

@JourneymanGeek Wow, four years. And it felt like yesterday. That's it, I'm officially old.

Bob

@djsmiley2k jportable installed too?

to the correct path and all?

djsmiley2k

yup

and just set the AlwaysUse32bit

so lets see now it's reloading

Journeyman Geek

03:15

lol

@ThatBrazilianGuy I've been here for 7 years and 7 months ._.

Bob

@djsmiley2k is it an in-page java applet or does it launch a separate java window?

djsmiley2k

in page

tho i'm reloading now

so this might work this time :/

That Brazilian Guy

@JourneymanGeek And seven days and seven hours and seven minutes and seven seconds \o/

Youssou N'Dour - 7 Seconds ft. Neneh Cherry

►

Journeyman Geek

> Member for 7 years, 8 months

djsmiley2k

ok this is weird

it's actually loading worse now :D

@Bob Your current browser Java version (1.8.0.131) is supported for use with remote control.

you're awesome!

Bob

03:27

@allquixotic the really sad thing is, I can launch an lxd container and apt install a package in the time it takes to launch the equivalent docker container

djsmiley2k

rofl

the on call guy just arted giving me random passwords to try

Journeyman Geek

anyone really bored and want to read some hipstery garbage?

djsmiley2k

no? :D

Journeyman Geek

Ok ;p

Bob

@JourneymanGeek kinda

Journeyman Geek

03:39

boingboing.net/2017/05/01/the-glorious-inelegance-of-the.html

> Comparatively, the only time a cat has used a Microsoft product was when it was hooked up to a bunch of electrodes, an unwilling participant in some sort of Russian space experiment.)

I think its supposed to be a humour piece, trying to be folksy

Bob

CONTAINER ID        IMAGE                 COMMAND                  CREATED             STATUS              PORTS                    NAMES
c5cf16a8430d        guacamole/guacamole   "/opt/guacamole/bin/s"   50 seconds ago      Up 30 seconds       0.0.0.0:8080->8080/tcp   guacamole
e7e54a1be366        postgres              "docker-entrypoint.sh"   16 minutes ago      Up 12 minutes       5432/tcp                 postgres
76e9eb952473        guacamole/guacd       "/usr/local/sbin/guac"   32 minutes ago      Up 31 minutes       4822/tcp                 guacd

\o/

djsmiley2k

Never 4get.

So after spinning off passwords at me, all of which didn't work

he's now not called back wit hte correct password.

he's calling

Gypsy Spellweaver

03:59

djsmiley2k

hurrar it's all fixed.

thanks @Bob even if it was basically pointless in the end :D

@GypsySpellweaver retro.hackaday.com iirc

Journeyman Geek

the fun part about mosaic is that its the oldest browser that will run on a modern OS

Gypsy Spellweaver

@JourneymanGeek WorldWideWeb became Nexus and ran on the NeXT. Did enough of the NeXT OS make it into OS-X to support Nexus?

Journeyman Geek

prolly not

Gypsy Spellweaver

@JourneymanGeek That might be and interesting project, porting WorldWideWeb to Linux, Win, or OS-X. Not this week though.

Wonder where the original source is

It is under the MIT license :D

Bob

04:42

why are VNC servers so hard

Journeyman Geek

05:06

0_0

vnc is usually easy and terrible no?

Bob

@JourneymanGeek no, there's a million different server options

djsmiley2k

05:39

but but netscape navigator

Journeyman Geek

@djsmiley2k is relatively recent

djsmiley2k

:O

94?

so i see

Journeyman Geek

05:55

;p

Burgi

07:30

morning

Journeyman Geek

07:53

hi

jokerdino

hi

user226528

Hi!

Journeyman Geek

how goes?

Bob

08:15

@JourneymanGeek about vnc being hard.

It somehow makes me miss RDP.

how.

Journeyman Geek

ah

xrdp?

Bob

how can something be so bad that it makes me miss rdp?!

@JourneymanGeek which runs a tightvnc backend

maybe it's more that X as a whole is just horribly screwy

next up: virt-manager

>
Documentation

Read the FAQ or view screenshots.

...because actual documentation is too hard

Journeyman Geek

lol

Bob

the FAQ:

>
What license is virt-manager distributed under?
It is distributed under the GNU General Public License, see the file COPYING in the distribution for the precise wording.
What is the process to build & install virt-manager?
Instructions are in the virt-manager.git INSTALL file.
What other libraries are needed prior to installing virt-manager?
The best reference for up to date dependencies is the virt-manager RPM spec file. Look for any line with ‘Requires:’ in it.
How do I contribute to virt-manager?

Journeyman Geek

in Tavern on the Meta on Meta Stack Exchange Chat, 7 hours ago, by Gerry

StackOverflow is useful because programmers are bad at writing readable documentation with proper examples.

Bob

08:18

Has anyone ever asked these questions? Like, ever?

> The best reference for up to date dependencies is the virt-manager RPM spec file. Look for any line with ‘Requires:’ in it.

w. t. f.

suddenly I get this sinking feeling that libvirt is held together with tape and prayers

Journeyman Geek

@Bob its possible

but its been pretty solid so far

Bob

help.ubuntu.com/community/KVM/Installation

so, as part of the "Pre-installation checklist", you're supposed to run kvm-ok, which of course does not exist until after installation...

> Karmic (9.10) and later (but not 14.04 LTS)

but not ... what?

what if I'm running something after 14.04?

ugh

I should go back to Debian

wait I don't even need to do this. I'm running as root.

Bob

08:42

@JourneymanGeek now I just need to find a 98SE ISO :P

funny story there being I actually have a valid licence and a CD sitting somewhere but it's not immediately accessible

Journeyman Geek

@Bob i think you may also need display doctor

Virtualbox needs it

Bob

@JourneymanGeek for KVM?

I seem to remember running it in a VM... dunno if VMware or VBox now... without anything extra

Journeyman Geek

08:58

VMware has drivers

Bob

@JourneymanGeek I know I needed a HLT TSR :P

I love how this keyboard suggests 🔥 for HLT

though that's more of a HCF thing

Journeyman Geek

09:28

Lol

Burgi

09:50

woo! i got xdebug working!

Boris_yo

10:10

Young Steve Jobs on how to hire, manage, and lead people - MUST WATCH

►

Manager versus leader...

Bob

10:30

@JourneymanGeek did I mention VNC sucks?

now my monitor has gone to sleep and I can't wake it up -_-

mesg: ttyname failed: Inappropriate ioctl for device
XIO:  fatal IO error 11 (Resource temporarily unavailable) on X server ":1"

O_O

Journeyman Geek

10:50

@Bob only a few times

satibel

@Bob vnc is good when it works.

Bob

@satibel so it's never good?

satibel

@Bob I have no problem running it.

Journeyman Geek

theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2017/5/2/15513200/…

this is pretty rediculous. It has ALL THE PORTS

satibel

11:05

@JourneymanGeek pretty nice if you have a server, a tower, a laptop, and a pi to monitor.

user226528

We have a guy who wants to have his cake and eat it too:

user226528

1

Q: Install applications without admin privileges - GPO

I have problem, must create GPO on windows server 2008r2 Enterprise with allow user(domain user) without administration rights , mean basic user allow on installation any programs, and custom some part of systems like install printer drivers. I know some way to allow install any programs without...

windows-7 windows networking administrator group-policy

Journeyman Geek

@satibel heh. My crossover does 3x HDMI 2.0, 1x DP and VGA

hah. I got to use my non mod account ;)

user226528

You have a non-mod sockpuppet?

DavidPostill

@FleetCommand I don't think anybody has a mod sock puppet :)

user226528

11:14

@DavidPostill Non-mod

Bob

@JourneymanGeek oh, this morning they had 42 xc ssds and sc ssds

almost all gone :P

DavidPostill

@FleetCommand Exactly. non-mod is redundant

Burgi

@FleetCommand @DavidPostill's is @llitsoPdivaD and has a goatee (like all good villians)

user226528

There is a guy in our department that makes people uncomfortable by censoring innocent words. For example, in "I am going to f*** you and tickle you until you beg for me to stop", f*** = find.

Burgi

what a card

user226528

11:22

She sent me this email with all instance of "to be" verb censored. Too bad I can't show it to you. It's hilarious.

DavidPostill

Hmm. "There is a guy" ... "She sent me"?

user226528

What about it?

Bob

All long help threads should have a sticky globally-editable post at the top saying 'DEAR PEOPLE FROM THE FUTURE: Here's what we've figured out so far ...'

^ that's me right now

Journeyman Geek

@FleetCommand aibobot

Bob

also. the file command is incredibly frustrating to google

user226528

11:26

@Bob by any chance, isn't it Ham from Toy Story?

Burgi

loving the avast HNQ :)

12

Q: What exactly does the Avast "remind me next century" option actually do?

When Avast needs to restart your computer after a program update, it provides an option to remind you "next century": Based on anecdotal responses to it that I've come across, it definitely doesn't wait an actual century, so just what exactly does the option do, and how long does it wait?

reboot avast delayed-execution

Journeyman Geek

Lol

Bob

11:43

@JourneymanGeek I installed xrdp. It worked. Flawlessly.

sigh what a waste of time

VNC can go burn

user226528

Since our room is called "Root Access", shouldn't we include a picture of Root from Person of Interest as its logo?

Journeyman Geek

Hmm. Oddly.... I think the room predates the show

Bob

ok, found my 98SE disc

let's see... let's give it a nice beefy 64 MB of RAM

a huge 2 GB HDD

DavidPostill

Chat rooms don't have individual logos. They inherit the one of their parent site.

satibel

@FleetCommand seems like you'd use a sandbox for that.

user226528

11:48

@satibel Do you know of any sandbox that can do that?

user226528

I don't.

satibel

@Bob I actually managed to have windows 95 not want to install because I had too much ram. It said I had too little ram with 4GB XD

Bob

@satibel Yea uh... 98 won't either

@satibel blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/oldnewthing/20030814-00/?p=42903

The hard limit is 1 GB, the soft limit is a bit under 512 MB

but the recommended was 24, so I'll just do 64 :P

64 MB... far more than enough to run Win98SE + all programs, or not even close to enough to run a modern <anything>

let's see. rtl8139 is probably the safe NIC

I suspect this "EvTouch USB Graphics Tablet" won't work on win98 :\

crap

I'm gonna need to find a boot floppy

2

satibel

12:06

I have a "beefy" server from 97-98 with a dual pentium II at 1ghz each, a whooping 2gb of ram, and upgraded with 2 37.5GB drives@10krpm. (and win NT 4 server)

also 3 redundant 400w PSUs.

@Bob it's been years since I read/heard that.

*pentium III

and after checking, it's probably from 2000

compaq proliant

Burgi

12:27

wtf.... bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-39780444

i think it is weird news story day...

bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-39628629

Seth

Astonishingly 37.5 GB @ 10k RPM sounds like almost half of what you use in modern SCSI systems from what I heard. :/

user226528

I think my kids are going to have computers with 1 molFLOPS CPU power.

Seth

@FleetCommand why would I not have cake and eat it? I might become cake!

user226528

@Seth If you become the cake, you still can't be both kept and eaten at the same time.

user226528

12:44

Anyway, 1 molFLOPS powers needs to come with tremendous I/O speed too. Hmmm...

Seth

But if you put me in a box with a cat that you can't look into I would exists and not exist, maybe? :D Sorry, I know the cake is a lie.

user226528

@Seth If you are expecting me to beg you to explain that seemingly nonsensical sentence, I am afraid I am not gonna.

Journeyman Geek

@Seth vaguely.

Seth

Schrödinger's cat and Portal 2.
It would be nice to have faster I/O but it wouldn't actually be necessary, would it? After all FLOPS would only be operations on data already in the registers? Didn't some manufacturer at some point count "senseless" operations to get high value or was that MIPS?

user226528

Could be like this: Intel makes a 1 molFLOPS CPU and sells it for decades until the storage and memory speed finally match.

Seth

12:50

Meanwhile everyone will be waiting for AMD to at least catch up. In order for prices to drop so everyone can afford Intel?

user226528

Alright. 1 molHertz then. Hopefully with far less than 1 mol of cores.

user226528

Since I am imagining already, let's make it this way: It is the AMD that makes the 1 molFLOPS CPU because Intel has gone broke and was acquired by AMD, due to Ryzen effect.

Seth

I didn't want to be a smart-ass. Just in case I gave of the vibe. :( It's impressive to think back about one and a half decades and compare that time to now. To image how unimaginable it was to have the processing power in out pockets we got today is really awesome. On the other hand it was also unimaginable to tell someone you couldn't be called because your phone had to reboot.

DavidPostill

@Seth It's easier to blame a phone company outage - most people will understand that :)

user226528

13:05

@DavidPostill Actually, it is easier to blame no one because the other person just receives "line busy" beep. He or she'd think we're talking to someone at the moment.

user226528

That's auto-explained.

DavidPostill

@FleetCommand Wouldn't it just go to voicemail?

user226528

@DavidPostill Huh! You are right. Just because I don't have voicemail, doesn't mean that other people don't have too.

user226528

In fact, I know it from good authority that most phone calls in U.S. go to voicemails.

Journeyman Geek

@Seth I thought the cake is a lie from the first one...

Seth

13:11

Damn it @JourneymanGeek you got me. It's been some time since I played those games.

Journeyman Geek

;)

(I would have you know, In addition to being a terrier of a moderator, I'm also a trivia hound....)

DavidPostill

@JourneymanGeek MOS is kicking off again ...

NM. Flagger has said it was a mistake.

Journeyman Geek

13:49

@DavidPostill tbh from what I've seen most is probably more trouble than its worth from my point of view ;p

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