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derobert
derobert
12:15 AM
We are having issues with a backend database server and will be switching to a replica in a moment.
Tweeted by StackStatus on June 21, 2014 at 12:06 AM
seems to be back now
"We apologize for any inconvenience, but an unexpected error occurred while you were browsing our site. It’s not you, it’s us. This is our fault. Detailed information about this error has automatically been recorded and we have been notified." ... or not
 
hichris123
hichris123
@derobert ... or not.
Not just you.
 
derobert
derobert
This is what you get for running your site on Windows, of course :-P
3
/me runs
 
hichris123
hichris123
@derobert Indeed. Ubuntu FTW. ;P
hides
Back up.
... ish.
 
derobert
derobert
12:30 AM
We have narrowed the issue to a new domain controller that was brought online. We're working to resolve the issue now.
Tweeted by StackStatus on June 21, 2014 at 12:27 AM
ROFLOL, it was what you get for hosting on Windows!
 
Braiam
Braiam
12:48 AM
@mikeserv huh?
@derobert wait, the problem was that it was "online"?
@Gilles I was asking me the same... it had two upvotes, so I figured I missed something...
 
Braiam
Braiam
1:04 AM
 
derobert
derobert
1:40 AM
@Braiam You missed that it only takes 15 rep to vote up
(Ok, you probably didn't really miss that, but you shouldn't worry that much about an upvote or two.)
 
Seth
Seth
@Braiam lolol
 
Braiam
Braiam
2:28 AM
@derobert that's rather preoccupying, because it means that the people that are starting out need to read better
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
2:44 AM
@Braiam - huh?
 
 
6 hours later…
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
8:39 AM
Good to know I'm not the only one who watches the IT Crowd. Though somehow the idea of the IT Crowd is funnier than the IT Crowd itself. Sorry, I felt like saying something Zen today.
 
 
1 hour later…
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
9:41 AM
@casey Another test case for preview. This works fine with tex lie 2012 and pgf 2.10, but not with tex live 2013.
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tikz}
\begin{document}
\title{Some Title}
\maketitle
\section{Introduction}\label{introduction}

\end{document}
Basically, the introduction is replaced by a full page containing only the title words. Can you reproduce this?
Looks like this is a known bug - tex.stackexchange.com/q/166023/3406
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
10:13 AM
@casey This got reported to lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-auctex/2014-03/msg00007.html which is not a real bug tracker. This will get lost. Any idea whether debbugs.gnu.org is a suitable place to repor this? In any case, would be interested to know if you can reproduce. there are threee people now who can reproduce besides the poster.
 
 
3 hours later…
Gilles
Gilles
12:47 PM
hey its urgent thats why asked here.! — Sud 9 mins ago
If it's so urgent, give us the email address of your professor, so that we can hand in your assignment directly. With one less step in the chain, it'll be faster. What time is it due? — Gilles 5 mins ago
I don't often rant against homework questions, but sometimes...
I'm thinking of posting a technically correct answer but justifying the wrong bullet point
 
Braiam
Braiam
I'm not against homework questions, but the way they are presented just makes me not wanting anyone to lose time with them
 
Gilles
Gilles
the worst thing is that the underlying question isn't stupid, isn't answered by Wikipedia, and I can't find a dupe on U&L, so it would have been well-received if he hadn't been an idiot and just dumped his assignment
 
Braiam
Braiam
that's just sad
 
Gilles
Gilles
1:11 PM
technically correct is the best kind of correct, right?
I hope he doesn't think of viewing the source, though I don't explicitly state which option is correct even there
an advantage of answering is that he can't delete his question now
impressive, his question is only the second-lowest scoring non-closed question, we have one at -12
 
Braiam
Braiam
@Gilles maybe is the time that someone gets the reversal badge :P
 
Gilles
Gilles
@Braiam I already got it
Let's get three other people to post reasonable-looking and technically correct answers, each justifying a different choice
I'm going through our worst hits, voted to delete several of them that I hadn't already
voted to reopen this because it's a reasonable question and has good answers
 
Undo
Undo
1:54 PM
2
A: Which amongst the given option is TRUE about login shell?

Undo1) is incorrect because the kernel doesn't decide the availability of the shell, it's actually the hard drive that does that. If the shell doesn't exist on disk, it is deemed unavailable. 2) is also incorrect, as different users can have different login shells. 3) also is incorrect. One doesn't...

I haven't had a chance to troll someone for like a whole week.
 
Ramesh
Ramesh
2:37 PM
@Gilles, to change login shell what will we do? chsh command? I thought if we just change it in /etc/passwd file as well, it might work.
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Ramesh /etc/passwd usually does the trick, but you should use chsh when possible because it does some safety checking like making sure the entry is valid. It's just less likely you'll break things if you use it. Also on systems that use LDAP or other auth systems, it stands a chance of doing the right thing where-as your file edit may be ignored.
 
Ramesh
Ramesh
@Caleb, ok so I guess it is just like editing /etc/sudoers using visudo command?
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Ramesh Sure.
 
Gilles
Gilles
2:57 PM
@Caleb post an answer justifying 2 or 3? (I've already written a complete answer which I'll uncomment when the assignment is past due)
 
Caleb
Caleb
3:11 PM
0
A: Which amongst the given option is TRUE about login shell?

CalebLets break it down: Process ID numers (PID's) are numbered sequential based on the order they start up in. This it is not possible for two processes to share the same PID and each time you login you will get a new instance of a shell with a unique PID chosen by the kernel based this sequence. Y...

I can switch it up to be just 2 if you like, it's all pure FUD anyway.
 
Gilles
Gilles
@Caleb hmmm, I don't like it so much
your answer isn't technically correct
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Undo That must be frustrating.
@Gilles I hope it was ok to edit your answer. If you don't like it, feel free to revert.
You guys are having a round of leg pulling with unix.stackexchange.com/q/138440/4671, right?
Dumb question, but there are college courses where one is taught Unix? I've never come across there. Maybe I should get out more. Or is this (high) school?
@Gilles You do realise other people will be reading this, right? Do you really think it is a good idea to propagate misinformation?
 
Gilles
Gilles
3:36 PM
@FaheemMitha Both Undo and I posted answers that are technically correct
read the chat transcript from today
Also, you may want to look at the source of my answer
I'll edit it in a few days
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Gilles Ok, color me stupid, but what source?
God, I'm using American spelling now.
@Gilles I'm not sure why anyone would want to know this. It does smell like a hw scripting question (or something).
 
Gilles
Gilles
@FaheemMitha It was asked as a homework question, but listing or counting files that match certain criteria is a common enough practical problem. Since the question has good answers, it should be reopened and not deleted.
@FaheemMitha the markdown source
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Gilles Hmmm, that is a different game. How about this?
0
A: Which amongst the given option is TRUE about login shell?

CalebLets test it: Test it. echo $SHELL. Now logout and login again. echo $SHELL. Rinse, wash, repeat. Same answer every time. The login shell is fixed based on the contents of /etc/passwd for all users. The value set in that file will be the value of the login shell for each user on the system. It ...

 
Caleb
Caleb
4:11 PM
Um, me thinks this is backwards:
> I'm not interested in Linux as a hobby, I'm interested in Linux for production. Therefore I'm not interested in the philosophy of excessive and overwhelmingly redundant security.
 
Braiam
Braiam
@Caleb I'm not sure if doing headdesk or facepalm so I think I will do both at the same time... twice
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Braiam From the about me profile of the author of the question I pulled the last quote from:
> Its not about being right, its about giving my clients what they need and want and doing it right the first time may seem to take a long time but try doing it badly the first time and then starting from scratch again.
> Disclaimer: many of my questions are edited by prissy users who care about enforcing their reputation instead of helping people with questions gain answers. People with a lot of reputation who mass-answer low quality questions have more power than people answering few high quality questions so if you see a question/answer of mine edited by someone else and it does not make sense then look at the revisions to see my original post.
 
Braiam
Braiam
that user is not SE material
 
polym
polym
hehe :D
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Braiam 1.2k over on SO, just barely over the assoc. bonus on U&L. And I agree, they just aren't cut out for this. And whatever servers they run are almost certainly part of some bot-net.
 
polym
polym
4:21 PM
@Gilles isn't "(3) is not true since /etc/passwd is not the place to configure the login shell." technically wrong? I know you guys want to troll him and post technically right answers, but isn't this not even technically correct?
 
Braiam
Braiam
@Caleb have you check out his website?
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Braiam No. I was too scared.
@polym I think the key there is "not THE place". It's technicality only "A place on MOST systems".
 
polym
polym
Oh haha :D
It's now at -13 btw.
 
Caleb
Caleb
Some systems have that info in a directory server like LDAP or even a DB. And the option also does not speciy what configuration is being done. Maybe they want to change the AVAILABLE shells. That would be in a different file.
 
polym
polym
Wouldn't it be also great, if one posts a really long, but correct, answer. I bet the author won't bother to read such a long text anyway.
that first period should be a question mark in my last sentence
line*
also ninja :)
@Caleb you got a small typo in your answer, "mater" instead of "matter"
and substitute, i'll just edit it, if you don't mind
 
Caleb
Caleb
4:40 PM
@polym Fixed substitute already, just added matter.
But thanks, and always feel free to fix my (not very reliable) spelling.
 
polym
polym
:). can you add a comma before because and but after the get-shell lines? Sorry I am annoying :D
also why does an edit have to be at least 6 characters long? it's quite annoying if you want to format a question/correct some grammar :(
 
Braiam
Braiam
5:01 PM
so, I heard that emacs is the best editor
 
polym
polym
shhh
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Braiam That would explain the downotes on my questionnaire answers. <sigh> The things one has to lean the hard way...
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Caleb What would?
 
Caleb
Caleb
So my big accomplishment for the day (it's not been dud otherwise) was finally fixing something that has always bugged me in tmux, but my solution is a kludge. I'm wondering if it's worth asking on main if there is a less brain twisting way to do that.
@FaheemMitha If emacs actually was the best editor that would certainly give people a valid reason to downvote me. On the other hand they may just not appreciate ① poetry, ② humor, or ③ my harder line stances on a couple issues.
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Caleb Or maybe they are just jerks.
 
Braiam
Braiam
5:11 PM
@Caleb people never agrees with hard lines, they are too hard
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
I must have missed the poetry. Also, how to you get the little numbers with the circles?
 
Braiam
Braiam
@FaheemMitha UTF-8
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Braiam Ooh, fancy.
 
Caleb
Caleb
@FaheemMitha I pretty sure that's not the reason they think they have for DV'ing. I can understand why some things I said would be less attractive to a lot of users actually.
@FaheemMitha Do you have a Compose key enabled?
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Caleb Yes, people tried to tell me how to do the UTF8 thing. I never figured it out - don't worry about it.
 
Caleb
Caleb
5:14 PM
If so try hitting these in order (not together, sequentially) <Compose> ( N ) where N is the number you want.
 
Braiam
Braiam
@Caleb and you have another handicap that your are not attractive :P
①②③⑬
⑳
wee
 
Caleb
Caleb
@Braiam Huh. Voting on those answers is inversely proportional to how much of our real face is showing.
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Braiam That's kind of (a) rude, (b) uncalled for (c) irrelevant (what does his appearance have to do with anything?), and anyway, you don't know what he looks like.
 
Braiam
Braiam
@FaheemMitha well, I've said several times already that I never intend being rude, and is not even directed to you
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Braiam Well, it came across as a bit rude. Maybe it is meant jokingly, but it is very easy to misunderstand things in an electronic medium, so one should be careful.
 
Braiam
Braiam
5:25 PM
@FaheemMitha I recommend that people read better: I can understand why some things I said would be less attractive to a lot of users actually
I just twisted it a bit to make the joke
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Braiam Don't follow.
But don't mind me - I'm a bit dense. Plus I probably don't get enough sleep.
 
Braiam
Braiam
fun fact: people are more edgy when they lack sleep
 
Gilles
Gilles
@polym What @Caleb said, plus even if the information is in /etc/passwd the right way to edit it is with chsh
@polym look at the source of my answer
I'll edit it in a few days
 
polym
polym
5:44 PM
@Gilles Yes yes :)
 
polym
polym
6:05 PM
stackoverflow.com/questions/24341686/… I don't know what he is trying to tell me, can anyone tell me?
 
Caleb
Caleb
@FaheemMitha This might be a cultural thing, but I didn't think it rude. At least in the places I've hung out in the world it's quite normal to pick on males (esp ones that keep beards) with jokes like that and nobody would assume it's a personal insult (and incidentally he does know what I look like because that's really me in my profile pick).
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
@Caleb- I dunno about tmux doing it, but since you've indicated you use zsh anyway: zsh.sourceforge.net/Doc/Release/…
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Caleb Well, it's good you aren't offended. I've lived in different cultures, and of course cultural norms differ quite greatly. So, I personally try to be careful to avoid giving offense. I didn't use to be like that, though. I also don't think it is my business to police anyone's behavior, but like I said it did seem a bit rude to me.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
It might be worth looking at the source for that module anyway if you want to incorporate it elsewhere.
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
Actually, middle class American cultural norms are quire conservative in that respect. Compared in many places in Europe, say.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
6:16 PM
@FaheemMitha - what'd you say about my ma?
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@Caleb Profile pick? You mean the so-called avatar? By your name?
@mikeserv ?
 
Caleb
Caleb
@mikeserv Hm, that would not serve my use case at all but it is interesting.
 
polym
polym
@Caleb you got a really cool beard, wish i could achieve a wizard status like you. and that's no offense :)
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
6:40 PM
@polym - I recommend not shaving. It's how most of us bearded types come by one.
But you should be careful drawing attention to it - some beards exist only to counteract congenital flaws. For instance, my beard is primarily a device to counteract my dreaded cold-chin disease - something I was unfortunately born with.
I first read the latest question as: Upvotes needed to ensure successful dual-boot
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@mikeserv Beards itch.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
That is coming from someone who has never worn one longer than a month, then, I bet.
They only itch at first.
And after that you can weave them into all sorts of fun ropes and games.
It's how the jump-rope game was first conceived actually.
 
Faheem Mitha
Faheem Mitha
@mikeserv You're making that up.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
Me? NEVER
Perish the thought!
 
Caleb
Caleb
@mikeserv Confound it all, I actually googled that and it didn't click until the results came up dry.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
6:53 PM
Ahh yes, cold-chin is a very hush-hush affair.
Double-dutch was born of an especially talented bearded gentleman.
Your confound it all reminded me of this:
 
Caleb
Caleb
7:27 PM
@mikeserv it all, here is where I was going with that last question. I guess "clone" is really a misgnomer, what I am doing is un-linking two clients that share a session.
0
Q: Is there a more elegant way to clone a tmux session?

CalebThis is almost a code-review question, but very *nixy and more about configuration than code. For years since I switched to tmux from screen I've had a couple of nagging issues that I could note make work the way I wanted them to. Since I setup my shell to exec into a tmux session I finally decid...

configuration tmux dot-files
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
@Caleb: There are a couple of scripts here that can manage that:
Can't help much more. it's movie time.
 
Caleb
Caleb
@mikeserv I've been through all of those, but I'm not sure you understand what I was trying to get at. Those are great for LAUNCHING tmux into various configs, but none of the script there help you change gears once you are in one.
You are expected to stick it out or drop back out and try again, or manually tell it the way to your intended config. I wanted a one-key binding that just DID the one thing I was doing most: unlinking two clients using the same session. As far as I can tell none of these scripts does that.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
Those launch it that way because it can't be done otherwise as far as I know.
 
Braiam
Braiam
7:46 PM
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
@Caleb - maybe reptyr or dtach could be leveraged? Specifically look at the way reptyr uses gdb to reown a process.
 
Caleb
Caleb
@mikeserv Well my question has a working solution for doing it the way I wan't, so "it can't be done" isn't the answer either. Did you even read what I was asking or is this just off the top of your head?
@mikeserv What? No that's entirely a different subject. I don't have a problem with processes or parenting to terminals here.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
I read it and it was off the top of my head. But I also appended as far as I know to that statement - which isn't all that far in many cases. I'm very often wrong.
 
Caleb
Caleb
@mikeserv The only real problem seems to be that tmux's config file parsing is inconsistent about when it does and does not make certain expansions available, and #S is unavailable at a key moment. Forget about processes and parenting and terminals, this is an issue of how it parses a config file and how it scopes/escapes strings.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
What does cat <<EOF >/dev/null do? Is it any different behavior than : <<HEREDOC?
 
Caleb
Caleb
8:00 PM
@mikeserv No, same effect.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
Oh, well, your solution looks really good to me. Why wouldn't you just use it?
 
Caleb
Caleb
@mikeserv I answered that already in the question.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
It doesn't look at all ugly to me though.
Heredocs are portable and effective means of letting the shell handle creation of and deletion of temp files.
And the shell is always there.
They're especially useful when it comes to saving information while switching sessions - file permissions can be a major problem when you're trying to save state then drop privileges - heredocs make that simple.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
8:15 PM
@Caleb - I use heredocs to simiilar effect here:
4
A: Path independent shebangs

mikeservNOTE: @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 ...

And I put a lot of research into exactly how and why they work in that scenario.
 
Caleb
Caleb
@mikeserv I'm aware of how heredocs work (note I am already using it to solve this issue) but this question is not about heredocs. I don't even care that much thath that stays in there. The point is I'm resorting to using a shell function and spawing processes to do something that can be entered manually in tmux command mode but cannot be linked to a key binding.
 
mikeserv
mikeserv
Well, that's a limitation of tmux - not your own. You seem to have solvd it as simply as can be.
I guess tmux source-file didn't work?
 
dawud
dawud
8:35 PM
guys, I involuntarily downvoted unix.stackexchange.com/a/48113/39456, is it good form to make a dummy edit to revert the vote?
not a big deal but...
 
Gilles
Gilles
@dawud make a useful edit: remove the “edit: blah blah” bit, which belongs in the revision history, not in the answer
 
dawud
dawud
@Gilles I did, it still doesn't let me revert the vote ("you voted this answer 9 hours ago, it is locked in unless this answer is edited") :/
but thanks for the hint. Maybe must be someone else who edits?
 
Gilles
Gilles
@dawud you suggested an edit, but it's still pending
 
dawud
dawud
ah OK :)
 
Gilles
Gilles
8:50 PM
needs one more accept vote
 
dawud
dawud
I forgot I have low rep in here, I'm kinda used to Server Fault, a have a little more rep in there and my edits go live immediately.
Vote corrected! thank you.
 
 
2 hours later…
Gilles
Gilles
11:09 PM
2
Q: Do parentheses really put the command in a subshell?

Ross CharetteFrom what I've read, putting a command in parentheses should run it in a subshell, similar to running a script. If this is true, how does it see the variable x if x isn't exported? x=1 Running (echo $x) on the command line results in 1 Running echo $x in a script results in nothing, as expec...

bash shell-script subshell
ugh, four answers, all of which answer the title, and none of which answer the actual question
 
Gilles
Gilles
11:39 PM
3
Q: Can we configure different shells for different users on a single Linux/Unix distribution?

AnkitSablokWell, this is not something that I want to do but I ask this question to know more about Shell configuration in Unix/Linux systems. So, the situation that I want an answer to is the following -: As we have different shells made available to us by a Unix/Linux system is it possible for us to conf...

shell login accounts
I wonder if this guy is a classmate of our buddy Sud
 

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