[Gllug] Re: Gllug Digest, Vol 20, Issue 33 ( - gee thanks)
Nikki Gray
NGray at novell.com
Wed Feb 9 23:59:47 UTC 2005
<best hal900 voice>I'm sorry Dave I can't do that</best hal9000 voice>
yeah, okay not funny i know. sue me
/me grins
>>> gllug 02/09/05 23:57 >>>
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When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
than "Re: Contents of Gllug digest..."
Today's Topics:
1. Re: Sluggishness and confusion (Bruce Richardson)
2. Re: Two Questions (Chris Bell)
3. Re: Two Questions (Chris Bell)
4. Re: What's that network congestion setting called? (Ian Northeast)
5. Re: help! :) ibm lappy install problem (Ian Northeast)
6. Re: Sluggishness and confusion (Martin A. Brooks)
7. Re: Sluggishness and confusion (Nick Richards)
8. Re: webcam / nightvision image capture (David Abbishaw)
9. Re: webcam / nightvision image capture (Caparo)
10. Re: Two Questions (Andrew Farnsworth)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 19:43:45 +0000
From: Bruce Richardson <itsbruce at uklinux.net>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] Sluggishness and confusion
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <20050209194345.GC21741 at phaistos.bruce>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
On Wed, Feb 09, 2005 at 06:30:14PM +0000, Tethys wrote:
> Really? If RH/Fedora is a mess, then maybe I should take another look
at
> Debian[1], because I find it to be simple, intuitive and well thought
out.
> Yes, there are a few expections to that, but on the whole I've been
very
> impressed with it. Debian must be truly outstanding if it makes that
look
> like a mess...
To take a specific example, /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts is a damn
mess and poorly considered. I'll take Debian's interfaces file (and the
associated scripts) over that any day of the month. For instance, if I
want to add some extra actions when an interface is brought up or down
on Debian I can set this up all in the interfaces file:
iface inet eth0 static
address x.x.x.x
netmask x.x.x.x
broadcast x.x.x.x
pre-up /usr/local/sbin/action-before-up
up /usr/local/sbin/action-on-up
down /usr/local/sbin/action-on-down
post-down /usr/local/sbin/action-on-down
Now, with Red Hat or Fedora I first have to read through all the many
scripts in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts, because much of it (including
what I want to do here) just isn't documented at all (and documentation
that keeps saying "Do not edit these config files, please use the GUI
tools" does not fill me with admiration). After digging, I'll discover
that I have to create /sbin/ifup-local, /sbin/ifup-pre-local,
/sbin/ifdown-local and /sbin/ifdown-pre-local. Each of these scripts
will have to parse the (mostly undocumented) parameters that the
network-scripts pass around, to work out which interface is being
changed. And after all that I still have to create my own method for
associating actions with specific interfaces (funnily enough, just
re-editing the /sbin/if* scripts isn't what I call a good solution).
I call that shit. I really do. And this isn't some obscure nit I'm
picking; adding custom actions to interface up/down events is a fairly
common requirement in a network of any scale and complexity.
--
Bruce
I see a mouse. Where? There, on the stair. And its clumsy wooden
footwear makes it easy to trap and kill. -- Harry Hill
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------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 19:54:21 +0000 (GMT)
From: Chris Bell <chrisbell at overview.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] Two Questions
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <Marcel-1.53-0209195421-566hjSf at riscpc.localdomain>
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
On Wed 09 Feb, Nix wrote:
>
> On Wed, 9 Feb 2005, David Damerell prattled cheerily:
> > OTOH the two are not directly comparable; 60Hz will boil your
eyeballs
> > on a CRT,
>
> Will it? It's fine here, as is 78Hz and 92Hz.
>
> 50Hz under fluorescent or incandescent light, on the other hand, is
> insane. :)
>
The combination of eye and brain appear to naturally work at the sort
of
frequencies known to give flicker effects, but the early cine film
workers
soon discovered that doubling the frequency by flashing the light twice
for
each frame removed most of the annoying effects.
There are different screen phosphor persistences available for
different
purposes. Broadcast TV runs on a 50Hz field interlace, 25Hz full
picture,
rate so standard TV's are usually supplied with a medium persistence
phosphor screen. Computer monitors are generally sold by size rather
than
quality, so who cares about things like gamma, colour integrity, and
phosphor persistence as long as it is cheap? Who bothers to fit
expensive
long persistence colour matching room lighting?
--
Chris Bell
------------------------------
Message: 3
Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 20:06:44 +0000 (GMT)
From: Chris Bell <chrisbell at overview.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] Two Questions
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <Marcel-1.53-0209200644-518hjSf at riscpc.localdomain>
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII
On Wed 09 Feb, Nix wrote:
>
> On Wed, 9 Feb 2005, Chris Bell said:
> > It is usually safe to remove the power and use a little watered
down
> > washing up liquid to clean the screen, but there is always a
continual
> > slight leakage of very high voltage charge to the front of the glass
even
> > when switched off.
>
> Out of sheer curiosity, how long does that charge take to dissipate?
> Weeks? Months?
>
The glass itself distorts under the high voltage, and the charge
rebuilds
as the glass relaxes, so an old tube stored in dry conditions can give a
very nasty shock months after it was last used. It is good policy to
leave a
permanent earth connection to the EHT connection, (it is dangerous to
drop
an old tube when the EHT connection gets too close to your body when you
are
carrying it!)
--
Chris Bell
------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2005 20:33:26 +0000
From: Ian Northeast <ian at house-from-hell.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] What's that network congestion setting called?
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <420A7396.3050209 at house-from-hell.demon.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed
Tethys wrote:
> As far as I can tell, Cisco switches are incapabale of autonegotiating
> correctly with *anything*.
They'll autonegotiate with other Cisco switches:) And presumably their
routers.
And they'll autonegotiate gigabit correctly of course, that's not
optional. Gigabit mandates autnegotiation. I know some Linux gigabit NIC
drivers allow a forced setting of gigabit, but they shouldn't really.
AIX ones don't (AIX will of course also not autonegotiate 10 or 100 with
a Cisco switch. IBM put it rather diplomatically: "IBM and Cisco
implemented autonegotiation slightly differently").
Also it's not really possible to get gigabit wrong as the link speed can
be detected independantly of autonegotiation and gigabit is always full
duplex.
Regards, Ian
------------------------------
Message: 5
Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2005 21:18:14 +0000
From: Ian Northeast <ian at house-from-hell.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] help! :) ibm lappy install problem
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <420A7E16.4080602 at house-from-hell.demon.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed
James wrote:
> Hi all , just found your fantastic community here at gllug !
> I have an old ibm 240 thinkpad which i'm trying to get linux on.
>
> I have mannaged to get debian base on it by using floppys as i dont
> have a usb or other cdr.
>
> The problem is i cant get my pcmcia slot working
I have a 365 which was a complete pig. The *only* thing I could get on
was Slackware (7 I think). Debian would probably have worked using
floppies, I didn't try, but the installer couldn't find the PCMCIA NIC
or indeed the PCMCIA bus at all IIRC. Slackware was fine, installed over
the network no problems. It was slightly tricky to get DHCP working on a
PCMCIA NIC, I had to fiddle with the scripts a bit. This is probably
fixed in later versions. I gave it a static IP for the installation.
I've also heard that X has problems with the video adapter on these, but
for my purpose I don't need X so it's not even installed.
So you might like to try Slackware.
Newer Thinkpads are much, much better. Since IBM started getting
interested in Linux their hardware has worked with it. You say yours is
only 5 years old (mine is more like 12, at least they build them well:).
I'm not familiar with the model 240. Perhaps it's only just too old.
As well as sundry Linux distros I also tried both Open and NetBSD. These
found the NIC OK and installed, but the damned thing refused to boot
them. There is a known restriction that this thing will only boot off a
hard drive if it has exactly one primary partition, but it must have
some other restriction too as this was the case - both these OSs put
their own "partitions" within a single disk partition so there was just
the one. I could boot both by booting a floppy and telling the BSD boot
loader to boot off the hard drive. Not very convenient.
Regards, Ian
------------------------------
Message: 6
Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2005 21:40:40 +0000
From: "Martin A. Brooks" <martin at hinterlands.org>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] Sluggishness and confusion
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <420A8358.3090204 at hinterlands.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Bruce Richardson wrote:
>I call that shit.
>
I also especially enjoyed the fact that the filename for each interface
doesn't have to be named according to the NIC in question because
there's an interface (or iface possibly) directive within the file
itself. Redundant, annoying and pointless but, hey, that's Redhat[0].
Mart.
[0] Blatant troll ;)
------------------------------
Message: 7
Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 22:56:19 +0000
From: Nick Richards <nick.richards at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] Sluggishness and confusion
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <767b16b805020914567a5d033e at mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
On Wed, 09 Feb 2005 17:46:46 +0000, Nix <nix at esperi.org.uk> wrote:
> On Wed, 9 Feb 2005, Jack Bertram announced authoritatively:
> > See the discussion on the list a couple of days ago. I don't know
what
> > makes it slow at all, but it's just not as responsive. I have
identical
> > applications running on top of the base setup, the same servers,
> > everything, and every activity (program launch, etc.) in Ubuntu
takes
> > perceptibly longer than in FC3. I'm guessing that it's some overall
> > configuration issue to do with compilation flags or something, but I
> > don't know what.
>
> Well, 2.4 versus 2.6 kernels will do that, but I'm not sure what
kernel
> Ubuntu provides by default (Debian provides 2.4, but Ubuntu is not
> exactly Debian...)
Ubuntu provides a 2.6.8 kernel in Warty Warthog and a 2.6.10 (so far
but will almost certainly be upgraded prior to release) kernel in
Hoary Hedgehog. Although it should be noted that RH pretty much
distribute the -ac patchset on top of everything. I'm unsure what
Ubuntu's kernel team adds although I know they're currently looking
for volunteers in that area.
Nick
------------------------------
Message: 8
Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 23:01:42 -0000
From: "David Abbishaw" <David at Abbishaw.com>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] webcam / nightvision image capture
To: <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <PR0001yL64pUTgcCKc600000031 at pr0001.ats-ltd.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Excuse my lack of luck with google but I cant find the homepage for
webcamd
anywhere or any lists to whats supported. Can someone please post a
link?
Thanks
Message: 5
Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2005 18:12:38 +0000
From: "Martin A. Brooks" <martin at hinterlands.org>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] webcam / nightvision image capture
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <420A5296.6030604 at hinterlands.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Mike Leigh wrote:
>Thanks for the info. Will any usb webcam work with debian or are there
any
>brands I should stay clear of.
>
It's what will work with Linux, not any specific distro. I've stuck
with ov511 based cams, check yours is supported before buying.
------------------------------
Message: 9
Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2005 23:10:19 +0000
From: Caparo <caparo at saltmine.org.uk>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] webcam / nightvision image capture
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <200502092310.20184.caparo at saltmine.org.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Links to webcamd
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/net/webcamd
man page for webcamd:-
http://www.informatik.uni-leipzig.de/~pantec/robotik/webcamd.html
On Wednesday 09 February 2005 18:12, Martin A. Brooks wrote:
> Mike Leigh wrote:
> >Thanks for the info. Will any usb webcam work with debian or are
there
> > any brands I should stay clear of.
>
> It's what will work with Linux, not any specific distro. I've stuck
> with ov511 based cams, check yours is supported before buying.
--
TTFN
Caparo
www.saltmine.org.uk
------------------------------
Message: 10
Date: Wed, 09 Feb 2005 23:58:26 +0000
From: Andrew Farnsworth <farnsaw at stonedoor.com>
Subject: Re: [Gllug] Two Questions
To: Greater London Linux User Group <gllug at gllug.org.uk>
Message-ID: <420AA3A2.60802 at stonedoor.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Chris Bell wrote:
>On Wed 09 Feb, Nix wrote:
>
>
>>On Wed, 9 Feb 2005, David Damerell prattled cheerily:
>>
>>
>>>OTOH the two are not directly comparable; 60Hz will boil your
eyeballs
>>>on a CRT,
>>>
>>>
>>Will it? It's fine here, as is 78Hz and 92Hz.
>>
>>50Hz under fluorescent or incandescent light, on the other hand, is
>>insane. :)
>>
>>
>>
>
> The combination of eye and brain appear to naturally work at the
sort of
>frequencies known to give flicker effects, but the early cine film
workers
>soon discovered that doubling the frequency by flashing the light twice
for
>each frame removed most of the annoying effects.
> There are different screen phosphor persistences available for
different
>purposes. Broadcast TV runs on a 50Hz field interlace, 25Hz full
picture,
>rate so standard TV's are usually supplied with a medium persistence
>phosphor screen. Computer monitors are generally sold by size rather
than
>quality, so who cares about things like gamma, colour integrity, and
>phosphor persistence as long as it is cheap? Who bothers to fit
expensive
>long persistence colour matching room lighting?
>
>
The other issue is that the florescent lights run at 50hz too so between
the screen and the lights running at 50hz you get a heavy flicker affect
on a CRT monitor. With LCD you don't have this problem. Note that in
the US the AC frequency is 60hz which also makes it worse. That is why
most people set the refresh to 72 hz or higher. Interestingly enough
the 1/60 of a second is the speed that a camera shutter is set to so
that it synchronizes with the flash which is why when you take a picture
of a TV or monitor you get strange banding in the picture. The
Macintosh used to have a tool that would fix this problem, one of the
many reasons that the Macintosh was used in to many movies, this tool
basically set the monitor refresh rate to 60 hz.
Amazing the trivia you pick up over the years.
Andrew Farnsworth
------------------------------
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End of Gllug Digest, Vol 20, Issue 33
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