/dev/chat

strugee

01:27

@barlop yeah, good point. I'd just refrain from asking

sorry

@AsheeshR you should have asked this on Unix & Linux

Faheem Mitha

15:43

Possible candidate for closing

0

Q: How can I update dpkg on DSL?

I'm trying to install nodeJS on Damn Small Linux. I've got DSL working on a virtual machine and I think apt-get is working now too. I had to update the sources.list file because it was pointing somewhere that doesn't exist any more but it seem to let me do an apt-get update ok. It said on the ...

casey

18:58

@FaheemMitha I VTC'd that one as off-topic, un-reproducable since it he seems to have given up and can't provide any details

Faheem Mitha

20:00

@casey Ok, I've voted to close too.

Patrick

I was reading the [Let's get rid of the 10K flag queue](http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/226092/lets-get-rid-of-the-10k-flag-queue) post and clicked the link for [the stackoverflow flag queue](http://stackoverflow.com/tools/flagged)
http://i.imgur.com/mCHsbHj.png
Do they really have 9,300 pending close questions?

hey, markdown links don't work? I could have sworn they did :-(

strugee

@Patrick they're supposed to. no idea what's wrong with yours

Faheem Mitha

20:17

@Patrick Hi, thanks for the answer. I don't think I've seen you in here before.

strugee

hey @slm ever get that blog post written? :)

Patrick

I don't frequent the chat much :-(

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick So it seems.

Patrick

I should, but the tab just ends up getting accidentally closed all the time

Would be nice if you could see the chat in a kind of popup thing on the main U&L site

Lots of whitespace on the sides to stick something...

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick well, if you did frequent this chat, you'd learn all sorts of exciting things. Such as that, @slm, for example, apparently likes big butts.

Patrick

20:20

That's probably more than I want to know

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick being system architect sounds like a responsible, important position. you have time to answer questions here?

Patrick

Not as much as I'd like :-(

I usually just get in an answer or two a day

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick That's a lot. Are you a Unix expert then?

Most of the time I have no idea.

Patrick

I like to think I am

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick yes, then you should probably spend more time here. Plus there aren't a lot of Gentoo experts here. So you have an specialities? Kernel stuff?

Patrick

20:25

Well I wouldn't consider myself a gentoo expert any more. I used to be once upon a time, but these days I don't mess with the OS much any more. I still use it, but I focus more on general linux than the stuff specific to Gentoo

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick I see. So you mostly use Linux based systems? Does that include say Android?

Patrick

The specialties would be the stuff at the very bottom of that answer on your meta question. Scripting, automation, cluster computing.

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick I see.

Patrick

i use android. have an android phone & head unit in my car. have an SSH shell installed on both, but i don't do any development or such for it

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick Ok.

@Patrick there are a lot of people here who do scripting. you mean shell scripting, i assume.

Ok, i guess not necesarily.

Patrick

20:28

Scripting in general. Some shell, but also a lot of ruby. Shell just often isn't powerful enough

Faheem Mitha

Since you mention Ruby scripting

@Patrick Right. I'm a Python user. Never used Ruby.

Patrick

Used to do a lot of perl, but after learning ruby I much prefer it

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick Yes, I've heard good things about ruby.

Though there don't seem to be that many ruby users.

Patrick

I really should learn python, just never have. I've dabbled in python scripts that have come my way, but never used it for a new project

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick Well, the two are not dissimilar.

AFAIK.

Patrick

20:31

yeah, similar in power and functionality to perl. just different syntax

Answering your question has kinda rekindled my interest in setting up a blog. I've had several people ask me why I havent, and usually the answer is "not enough time to maintain it". But I've got a lot of information rattling around in my brain that I think might be beneficial to get out there.

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick Well, this site is a little more organized than a blog. Unfortunately the questions are often crap. You could ask some good questions, and then answer them. The advanced users do that occasionally.

Patrick

I've done that on occasion, but some things just aren't the Q/A type

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick True.

The Q/A format is definitely restrictive, but it's SEs raison d'etre.

Patrick

Not disagreeing. I think it works beautifully.

Just perhaps setting up a blog of "this is the story of how I accomplished such and such". Or, "I ran across this undocumented and fascinating behavior of product foo".

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick Sounds reasonable.

slm

20:41

@strugee on my todo list still, sorry...

Faheem Mitha

@Patrick have you used any of Common Lisp, ocaml, haskell?

Patrick

negative

Faheem Mitha

ok

slm

21:36

@Patrick Braiam like's big buts (correct spelling) I was making a word play on that.

@Patrick @strugee - see if @Patrick wants to write for the U&L blog

strugee

21:56

@slm ok

@slm I was just about to say that!

11

Q: Call For Papers: the blog is ready!

A little while ago, the new design for our blog went up. I've now published the first post, so let's write! Remember that even if something would be closed on the main site, it might still make a really good blog post (or series of blog posts)! This is an awesome community; we can come up with lo...

discussion featured blog

Braiam

o/

Patrick

I might be willing. My blog entries would unfortunately be about very specific stuff that few people would benefit from. The stuff you don't find elsewhere on the interwebs. But if a good subject comes to mind, I'd consider it.

mikeserv

Can this go into a canonical answer list somewhere? I'm tired or writing it over and over.

2

A: Path independent shebangs

NOTE: @jw013 makes the following unsupported objection in the comments below: The downvote is because self-modifying code is generally considered bad practice. Back in the old days of tiny assembly programs it was a clever way to reduce conditional branches and improve performance, but ...

slm

22:20

@terdon - where's your canonical list you started? I think it was on meta if anyone wants to look.

Ah here it is

14

Q: Let's compile a list of canonical Q&As

A few of us were talking about this the other day in chat, as we are now quite a bit larger and with several thousand Q&As, there are certain questions that are asked very often. Things like redirecting output, process substitution, batch renaming of files, fixing/reinstalling grub, etc. Let's c...

discussion

mikeserv

@slm - should I put something there or... someone more qualified or something?

slm

23:16

@mikeserv - nah you're qualified, go for it

strugee

23:35

@Braiam you should write!

@Patrick go for it anyway

Patrick

I could write about understanding Linux's memory management. but that could fill up a book

strugee

sounds interesting

really interesting actually

perhaps a primer

Braiam

in The Bridge, yesterday, by LessPop_MoreFizz

What is a Photocopier?

^ that is quite ridiculous...

strugee

@Braiam yeah our legal system is lovely

as is the Flash-based technology powering that video. I only made it through a minute or two...

slm

@Patrick make it a series of posts

foundation is what's missing here

strugee

23:42

yeah, +1 for a series

slm

many ppl do not understand the details down below. Gilles had done the post (Q&A) recently for how keyboard key presses get into X. Those types of Q's go a long way to helping others understand the basics which is generally the problem w/ many of the things we're dealing with in Unix/Linux

@Patrick - how many Q's have we answered where someone's asking how does swap and things work and can I turn it off. If you understand the foundation then you begin to understand that some of the Q's you're asking make now sense, but w/o foundation ppl are basically ignorant of the whole affair.

Braiam

@strugee is it really flash?

is pure HTML5 here

strugee

@Braiam yeah

let's see what happens how that I've blocked it with Click-to-Play

Braiam

@strugee you have flash installed right?

slm

@Patrick A good walk through even if it's a high level one would be welcomed additions here. Much of the info on the internet is dated and confusing since it's from kernel's 2.2, 2.4, 2.6, etc. Explaining how the VMM works and what buffers and cache are in the free command would really help a lot of our Q's build off of them. I get tired of having to try and lay foundation in a Q enough to A this or that,

@Patrick if I could point to a good article and then A it would save a lot of time and be extremely appreciated.

strugee

23:49

@Braiam yeah

I should see how it does with Shumway

but also, #lazy

Braiam

@strugee you just killed a kitten :(

every time you install flash you kill a kitten :/

strugee

@Braiam you're thinking of goto calls

of which there are many in the Linux kernel

fun fact

Patrick

@slm I'll consider writing it.

@strugee goto is not evil

it just allows you to commit evil

Braiam

null pointers are, huh?

strugee

heh

I do hate Flash though and I do my best to not let it do anything at all

I use Shumway on most of my boxes and on all of my boxes I keep Flash on either click-to-play or disabled

Braiam

23:58

again, I do not have shumway nor flash nor another flash player and I was able to reproduce that video

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