Ask Ubuntu General Room

dessert

12:01 AM

@WinEunuuchs2Unix but type 20, press EE and type 12

Fabby

@dessert :D :D :D

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@dessert Typing "20, EE, 12" is not as quick (or easy) as typing "20 T" for 20 trillion. Plus when you enter "20 T / 50m" the answer is displayed as "400 K" which is easier to read than "400000" Additionally (no calculator pun intended) an answer like "512 P" is easier to read than "512000000000000000"

dessert

@Fabby plugs in second monitor

Fabby

@dessert I like more workspaces more than extra monitors.

dessert

@Fabby me too, but what if pi exceeds the monitor width?

WinEunuuchs2Unix

12:06 AM

@Fabby I love my two extra monitors! Actually 50" TV + 32" TV which are cheaper than monitors.

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix If you can turn off the overscan feature: Yes!

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@Fabby Probably all TVs over last decade allow hooking up HDMI to computer properly.

Fabby

My dad's sight has gotten worse the last couple of years, so I gave him a 50" TV as his monitor.

(running in FHD, siting 1 foot from his nose)

dessert

@WinEunuuchs2Unix but then you need a button for every prefix – that’s fine with trillion and tera, but what to do in the case of Billion vs. Giga?

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@dessert Initially I went with "B" for billion but today changed it to "G" for giga. All the keys are: E, P, T, G, M and K.

Fabby

12:10 AM

@dessert After we've told him the Americans are wrong: Million, Milliard, Billion, Billiard, ... ;-) :D

WinEunuuchs2Unix

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix shouldn't the lowest column be reversed?

(Small to large?)

dessert

the problem I want to point to is that there are different prefixes in use for the very same power

Fabby

@dessert Which he has solved by using the metric system!

:D :D :D

WinEunuuchs2Unix

E (Exa) in layman's terms is Quintrillion, and P(Peta) in layman's terms is Quadtrillion I think.

Fabby

12:13 AM

Imperial Length Units

dessert

no, there’s no “billion” button and “M” could be mega = 1.000.000 or milliard = 1.000.000.000

WinEunuuchs2Unix

I might put the billion button back instead of today's Giga button. Not sure yet.

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix I like it the way it is now...

(except the large to small, but that's taste...)

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@Fabby Thanks. Plus keys are in UTF-8 format and users can change to different languages quite easily.

dessert

so it should either be E P T G M K, that’s metrical, but doesn‘t answer the question that asks for trillion and million

Fabby

12:17 AM

@dessert While resolving an issue, you can change the scope...

dessert

or it should be Quin Quad Tril B M T

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix Quick! Edit the Q before @dessert notices!

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@dessert true the answer isn't perfect to the question. It also breaks the TiB, GiB, MiB that was in the answer script intiially.

Fabby

:D

dessert

if Fabby was right about that

Fabby

12:19 AM

@dessert Thousand, Million, Milliard, Billion, Billiard, Trillion, Trilliard, ...

WinEunuuchs2Unix

The problem with "Quin" and "Quad" is which do you pick when the user types a single "Q"?

Fabby

Except in the USA, Liberia and Myanmar.

dessert

@WinEunuuchs2Unix nothing, and the same should probably go for T = thousand = trillion

Fabby

Yup, therefore: it's good as it is...

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@dessert Currently user types "K" for Kilo

Ubuntu Questions on U&L

12:21 AM

0

Q: Command to install works in ubuntu 18.04 but not 14.04

I am trying to install some software in an old version of Linux (the updated software for 18.04 is unstable, the older version seems to be better). However, the code I used way back to install the packages for 18.04 is not working for ubuntu 14.04. The code I'm am using is copied below for pac...

dessert

that’s why there’s no calculator with that: the scientific way is just easier…

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix Give it another 100 years and the US will use the metric system too.

dessert

@WinEunuuchs2Unix and that’s a mixup, exactly!

Fabby

@dessert i disagree: @WinEunuuchs2Unix's idea is faster.

In a few year!s time, we'll tell our grandchildren:

dessert

how many zeroes can you type in the time you need to move the mouse to a button? ;)

Fabby

12:22 AM

I remember when this guy just drew up that calculator in MS Paint

:D

@dessert He needs to patent it and make it physical.

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@Fabby it's not drawn up in MS Paint. It's a real working calculator you can run in Python: python calc.py

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix :D :D :D Our grandchildren will not know what a "design on the back of a paper napkin" means...

dessert

lol

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix I think you're onto something. Look if you can patent it, have it made in China and when you're rich and famous, send your jet over and invite us to Caviar and Vodka!

dessert

I would rather see a button that adds three zeroes :D

WinEunuuchs2Unix

12:25 AM

I'll put it on github to make it easier for people to find. Do you agree with the name "Human Readable Calculator"? Maybe name the script "hrc.py"?

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix Patent it first.

dessert

hr = human resources for me

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@dessert Internal the buttons had 3, 6, 9, 12 and 15 zeros before the math is executed.

Fabby

(I'm serious: this could be something physical. Will be upheld in the EU as well, whereas software patents are limited to the US of A)

dessert

bustatech.com/casio-fx-570es-scientific-calculator-tweak

knows the prefices

WinEunuuchs2Unix

12:29 AM

Doesn't really matter @Fabby. I developed new technique of creating ISAM B-Tree indices off of flat files. A few years later Google came out with indexed search engine for internet. Stole my idea :(

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix Ideas are cheap: implementing them is hard...

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@Fabby I wrote the software. It wasn't just an idea.

@Desert your link confirms my design:

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix Do you still have the source?

Then you can contact Google and have them pay you a royalty.

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@dessert They use E,P,T,G,M,K as well as symbols in the illustration.

Fabby

(Otherwise, you have their patents invalidated through prior art)

WinEunuuchs2Unix

12:34 AM

@Fabby The software was copyrighted and sold around the world. But it wasn't "patented".

Fabby

@WinEunuuchs2Unix so, it's still "prior art"

dessert

@WinEunuuchs2Unix yes, but it‘s nothing with trillion or billion, and you don’t say 15 Tera dollars – that’s not human readable when talking about dollars, people, cars, …

Fabby

01:35 here! I'm going to bed!

Good night all!

dessert

here too, me too! g’night!

WinEunuuchs2Unix

@dessert but you do say 15 Terabytes :)

ok guys, have a good night!

Ubuntu Questions on U&L

12:51 AM

0

Q: "apt update" error on GPG signatures for archive.canonical.com repository

Background I'm running a Dell XPS with Ubuntu LTS 18.01 (Bionic) Objective Run sudo apt update to update my packages Problem I get the following error: ... Ign:12 http://archive.canonical.com precise Release.gpg Reading package lists... Done W: GPG error: http://archive.canonical...

ubuntu apt repository gpg

Ubuntu Questions on U&L

1:52 AM

0

Q: apt-key fails when key server does not include protocol and port

I am trying to run an install script for Gazebo, which first tries to get the gpg key from keyserver.ubuntu.com. This fails with the following message: gpg: keyserver receive failed: Server indicated a failure Other answers online suggested this error occurs when accessing the keyserver from b...

ubuntu gpg

Zanna

9:17 AM

@PerlDuck indeed, being allowed to review tag wiki edits is a very boring privilege

@dessert only 5... 10k to see deleted posts

Fabby

9:45 AM

Increasing the value of AU chat

Fabby

9:56 AM

@karel If you would be a lower-rep user than me, I'd give you 100 rep for this one!

Thanks for making this a better place to be!

Fabby

10:09 AM

@karel :D :D :D

karel

11:24 AM

@Fabby Please help to reopen this question. I got the accept vote for answering it, and it was bogus closed as off-topic anyway.

I also got a comment below the same question that says it was bounty worthy. Bounty worthy from my commenters often equals automatic close votes from my reviewers.

I got the bounty worthy comment below my accepted answer obviously because I didn't ask that question, only answered it.

Fabby

11:41 AM

@karel voted.

Thanks for the VTR.

@karel Really???

I'm scuffed.

@karel Well, not in my book..

(though my book does not contain any Python: That's for Jacob...)

;-) :D

@vidarlo Have you cast a reopen vote too?

@Benny ----^

@karel What do you do in real life?

(No need to answer if you don't feel like it)

karel

I'm an engineer.

Fabby

11:56 AM

:-) You make real-world stuff :-)

FYI: I used to be technical, but unfortunately, I've become a generalist (aka "a suit")

I still keep up with technology though and that's why I'm here...

Videonauth

3

@Fabby @karel :)

Fabby

@Videonauth Starred!

Gaurang Tandon

12:12 PM

Hello, I need help closing a named pipe. Can anyone please help? So, I created a named fifo via mkfifo myfifo, then some C++ executable files wrote/read from myfifo, and now I wish to close it (so I can cat its contents). However, I read the man page and also googled around but cannot find any specific command to close the fifo (even after all executables are done)

Fabby

@GaurangTandon Can you post a link to your question on the site?

Include the version of ubuntu you're using.

Gaurang Tandon

Hi @Fabby, sorry i did not post this on the mainsite because I think this is a very short query, and I am afraid someone will point me to an existing resource that i cannot find with my poor google-fu. I am using Ubuntu 18.04

Fabby

@GaurangTandon Please post a question on the site, include all relevant information and then post the link to your question here pinging me and I'll ping some other people if I can't resolve the issue.

Gaurang Tandon

ok thanks :)

that's odd...the site has no tags for a fifo

what do i do @Fabby?

is it ontopic?

Fabby

@GaurangTandon use "pipe"

Gaurang Tandon

12:19 PM

0

Q: How to close a named pipe (thereby enabling it for cat)?

I need help closing a named pipe. I created a named fifo via mkfifo myfifo, then some C++ executable files wrote/read from myfifo, and now I wish to close it (so I can cat its contents to read them). However, I read the man mkfifo page, and also googled around, but I cannot find any specific com...

bash pipe

vidarlo

@Fabby Yep

Fabby

(I can see from your questions you're young: if no specific term is available, use the general term ;-)

@GaurangTandon looking

Gaurang Tandon

@Fabby sure, I was just afraid of a offtopic VTC :P

Fabby

@GaurangTandon What's the name of the pipe?

Gaurang Tandon

@Fabby myfifo

that's what i did: mkfifo myfifo

Fabby

12:23 PM

does cat < myfifo work?

Gaurang Tandon

@Fabby nah. both cat myfifo and cat < myfifo remain stuck at the command line :(

Fabby

@GaurangTandon what's the output of lsof | grep --ignore-case myfifo ?

Gaurang Tandon

dessert

stuck at the command line? that’s exactly the expected behaviour, no?

Gaurang Tandon

idk why but zsh just displays a red cross

@dessert well that's what i thought too...

Fabby

12:30 PM

@GaurangTandon close all programs in the GUI and then post the output of lsof

@GaurangTandon That probably means you've got a nifty Unix admin.

terdon

cat myfifo

@GaurangTandon What do you mean? Why don't you just cat it?

Fabby

@terdon He can't: probably one of his applications is still running in the background.

he'll probably need to kill it.

dessert

@GaurangTandon did you try writing to it? echo something >myfifo

Gaurang Tandon

@Fabby it's my own pc :O

@Fabby i closed all programs (except the terminal) and ran the same command. got same output (red cross)

terdon

Ah yes. I should learn to read the transcript more closely.

@GaurangTandon please show us all the commands involved. We need to see mkfifo myfifo, then whichever command you used to write to it and then the cat you tried.

Fabby

12:33 PM

@GaurangTandon Forget about the red cross. What is the full output of lsof?

Please note: Whenever Terdon says something and I say the opposite, please ignore me @GaurangTandon

Gaurang Tandon

@terdon that's all

terdon

@Fabby Wait, what? Where did you say the opposite?

Fabby

@GaurangTandon lsof all by itself.

Gaurang Tandon

@Fabby o.O

Fabby

@terdon Not yet! I'm just pointing out that * You're a giant and I'm a gnome!*

Gaurang Tandon

12:35 PM

@Fabby doing

terdon

@GaurangTandon I mean, pelase add these commands to your question. And make sure to just paste the commands, not a screenshot of them, so we can read them easily and copy them.

Gaurang Tandon

@terdon ok sure

@Fabby 1000s of lines

what do i show?

Fabby

@GaurangTandon copy-paste the text here.

terdon

But why are you reading from the fifo, then piping to another program?

Fabby

@GaurangTandon Actually: Let's take a room as not to pollute this room.

@terdon here

vidarlo

1:01 PM

@terdon I disagree somewhat with your edit

:)

Scientific notation is the standard for numbers.

and thus the correct :)

Fabby

@vidarlo link?

terdon

@vidarlo I really felt it read as very pretentious and condescending.

Feel free to roll back, but it was the main reason I objected to your answer. It reads like "what you want is pointless, listen to me I know what is correct".

vidarlo

@fabby askubuntu.com/posts/1099283/revisions

@terdon That may very well be, but that doesn't really change the fact that scientific notation is the correct way - and the pretentious and condescending nature probably has more to do with me than numbers... :)

Fabby

@vidarlo You have another edit on top of Terdon's. Feel free to roll back too.

I've got a BE keyboard.

10¹ 10² easily typed as ^ is a dead key.

so I type 10^1 and out comes 10¹

terdon

@vidarlo It is a correct way, not the correct way. It's the correct way if you're working in science, but not if you just want to calculate millions. Don't get me wrong, I use scientific notation daily, but telling someone that the answer to their question of how to use X notation is to use this completely different notation isn't very helpful IMO.

vidarlo

1:08 PM

@fabby I considered it, but favoured ^ as you may type 10^15 into most calculators, and they will understand it :)

Fabby

@vidarlo Roll back!

;-)

vidarlo

I won't touch that answer! :P

Fabby

Going to eat something...

vidarlo

wise.

Fabby

1:24 PM

@vidarlo :D

Ubuntu Questions on U&L

0

Q: Buffering issues while playing videos from local/remote machine on Ubuntu 18.04

I installed Ubuntu 18.04 on my old laptop and whenever I want to play a downloaded movie, it will stop around the middle, start buffering and continue from way earlier. I tried with SMPlayer, VLC, Baka MPlayer and even with Kylin Video (which as I see is a fork of Deepin Movie) but none of them w...

ubuntu multimedia

cl-netbox

@Fabby I suggest you better tell us when you're NOT eating ... :D :D :D Good afternoon my friend ! :)

Fabby

1:39 PM

@cl-netbox I knew you were going to show up if I started eating!

:D ;-)

cl-netbox

@Fabby I've placed a spy in your Google account ... he notifies me when you take an "eating break" ! :D :D :D

Fabby

@cl-netbox :D :P

cl-netbox

@Fabby :D :D :D

Rinzwind

2:15 PM

\o boxy

someone broke reddit

PerlDuck

3:34 PM

@cl-netbox Well, I find those announcements refreshing.

Ubuntu Questions on U&L

3:47 PM

0

Q: I need to close/kill a specifc tab using Ubuntu terminal

Is there any way to close a specific tab using an Ubuntu terminal? I have read that Firefox treats all tabs under one process so I have switched over to Chrome for more flexibility since each tab is treated as its own process. I am creating the tabs also in terminal using -xdg and I see they are ...

ubuntu terminal process kill wmctrl

cl-netbox

4:56 PM

@Rinzwind Hi Rinzy ! Good evening to you ! :)

@PerlDuck Do you ? Nice ! Good evening ! :)

PerlDuck

5:08 PM

@cl-netbox Sure. The last hour I prepared a soup and now it's boiling and I'm looking forward eating it.

cl-netbox

@PerlDuck Seems you follow the habits of our (always hungry) friend @Fabby : always think about what can be eaten next ... hahaha ... no, joke aside : Bon Apetite ! Enjoy the soup ! :)

PerlDuck

@cl-netbox I'll hopefully do. It's a typical German winter meal: savoy. Sounds glamorous but is just a kind of cabbage. Why did they name a hotel after a cabbage after all?

cl-netbox

@PerlDuck I've no idea ... :D :D :D

MathCubes

6:37 PM

Am I the only one that miss the beige color of computers

I actually quite like that color.

TheWanderer

isn't the beige color a discolor?

they're supposed to be white

MathCubes

No

NO

They were actually beige!

To comply with a law

@TheWanderer What color do you see?

IBM PS/1 commercial - 1990

looks pretty white

@The

this is beige

6:43 PM

What color was windows xp, and before user interface

?

Beige!

There was a reason for it

TheWanderer

Windows XP is software, and it was blue

what are you on about?

MathCubes

No the background

@TheWanderer Here is beige, youtube.com/watch?v=FrxY6BCflXU

Windows ME Commercial

►

Not white but beige

TheWanderer

what's beige?

the OS?

MathCubes

BOTH!

The hardware and the software

TheWanderer

Windows 2000

that's not beige

Zanna

6:47 PM

@MathCubes taupe at the warmest...

MathCubes

Yes it is, its like a off gray

@The

@TheWanderer Just ask anyone that live during that time

@TheWanderer Take a look at this. This clearly shows there were beige. Beige is just a term for light brown geek-mag.com/posts/71154

geek-mag.com/posts/71154

TheWanderer

but you said "when computers were beige" as if it were a trend

and nothing in that magazine looks beige to me

MathCubes

It was a trend

Thought out the 80-early 2000s I think

Why are old computers beige?

►

There were made beige

I live during this time. I remember exactly

I was quite young but I still remember it strongly

Cause I was stock to see any color other than that beige for a pc

After beige came light gray

Than black and white

@TheWanderer Here we go

The Computer Chronicles - Laptops (1989)

►

Video from that time era

Beige!

Thomas Ward

9:08 PM

@vidarlo askubuntu.com/posts/1099283/timeline - it received undelete votes heh

vidarlo

9:22 PM

@ThomasWard I was made aware of it... didn't know self deleted answers could be restored :P

TheWanderer

every deleted answer can be restored

Thomas Ward

9:45 PM

@TheWanderer This.

... except mods watch the things we delete, because if we deleted it we had a reason lol

TheWanderer

well we can't undelete a mod-deleted post

but mods can

I'm really annoyed that SE is killing off the mobile app

apparently they want us to use the mobile version of the website

but the mobile version of the website is pretty bad

dessert

please VTD this

dessert

10:01 PM

done, thanks!

dessert

10:36 PM

@Zanna “Drive safe!” or rather “Drive safely!”? The latter is correct in my perception, but the former could be interpreted as an elliptic “Drive staying safe!” or the like.

Ubuntu Questions on U&L

-1

Q: Persistence of home directory after deleting all partitions and reinstalling

Perhaps I should file this as a bug report, but at the moment I would just like to hear some theories on how this might have happened, as I'm not even sure it is a bug or just me misunderstanding things. I was running Ubuntu Server on an mdadm RAID1 volume, and because ran into some problems I d...

ubuntu system-installation mdadm home

Fabby

11:02 PM

@PerlDuck I want the recipe (CC @cl-netbox

Fabby

11:14 PM

@TheWanderer Most were until about 2000.

Only the Olivetti was grey with a bit with yellow, but it has an amber screen.

That's why it didn't sell in Germany.

TheWanderer

11:38 PM

who here has a OnePlus phone?

I know @NathanOsman does

or did

@Fabby do Germans hate amber?

Fabby

@TheWanderer No, the yellow plastic wasn't allowed: it had to be beige by law...

Lemme look if I can find pics...

TheWanderer

weird law

Fabby

@TheWanderer Ever heard of "white goods"?

TheWanderer

nope

but amber isn't white

Fabby

Kitchen utensils used to be all white.

(That's why Kitchen Aid wasn't allowed to be sold in Germany and if you couldn't have the German market, you just didn't go for Europe...)

TheWanderer

11:45 PM

what

Fabby

The funny thing is: I cannot find any pics of the yellow M24 any more...

TheWanderer

you're not giving a reason why things need to be beige

Fabby

It is nowadays, but back in the 80s and 90s it wasn't...

@TheWanderer Because it was a stupid law in Germany: White for kitchen utensils, beige for office equipment.

TheWanderer

so there is no reason

Fabby

@TheWanderer No logical reason.

TheWanderer

11:47 PM

I thought you were going to say something like kitchen utensils were white and Germany was afraid that it would incite a Nazi uprising or something

Fabby

@TheWanderer like there is no reason why you should be able to drink alcohol by the time you're 18

TheWanderer

oh yes there is

you shouldn't be able to drink or smoke until 25

Fabby

@TheWanderer Blow or smoke? (Marijuana or tobacco?)

TheWanderer

wut

you shouldn't be able to recreationally use any addictive substances until 25 imo

that's the current age we have when the brain is mostly finished developing

and not abusive, addictive

Fabby

OK, when I was a kid in Belgium the legal drinking age as 14 for beer, 16 for hard liquor and 18 to drive a car.

There were very few DUI incidents with teens

nowadays? Drive a car at 17, drink beer when you're 16, hard liquor when you're 18.

TheWanderer

11:50 PM

there were also fewer cars

Fabby

@TheWanderer So? Nowadays there are more kids taht can't hold their liquor and still drive, so more deadly accidents.

The problem ages ar 20- and 40+

seemingly when people are parents, they don't drink&drive...

TheWanderer

yeah 20-

so 25 makes sense

Fabby

25 to drive a car? I would say 20

TheWanderer

no

25 to drink

Fabby

@TheWanderer You don't get it:

Teach people to drink first, then drive! ===> fewer accidents.

TheWanderer

11:53 PM

I don't think the order matters

you should be taught both

Fabby

I'm very simple: you drink, you don't drive; you drive, you don't drink.

none.

But then: I lived in Russia where you're not allowed to drink 24h before you are going to drive.

Riding horses while you're drunk is allowed, as long as the horse isn't drunk

(which makes sense too, but not allowed in the US)

@TheWanderer anyway: Good night! 1AM here.

Transcript for

Ask Ubuntu General Room