NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #26/NN_1992_26.iso/spool/comp/os/linux/16118

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Subject:  Linux-Activists Digest #490

Linux-Activists Digest #490, Volume #3            Fri, 6 Nov 92 03:30:14 EST

Contents:
  Re: Some interesting Novice Questions (not found in FAQ) (H.J. Lu)
  Re: SLS distributed kernel compiled with TCP/IP enabled? (Peter Clark)
  Re: 486SXs as Unix Iron? (fred j mccall 575-3539)
  Re: MAXTOR (Andy I. Liaw)
  HD timeout (Russell J. Price)
  Re: Port of new Linux math emulator to 386bsd? (Nate Williams)
  Re: linux-0.98.3 termcap problem (Mika Liljeberg)
  YES!!! (Steeve McCauley)
  Maxtor ([e-mail])
  NEC MultiSync 3FGx, Orchid ProDesigner II, need info for Xconfig (Tim Miller)
  tip  and  cu  for  linux (Carlos.Canau)
  [Q] Problem with cursur... (Da Hubster!!!)
  Re: Problems booting SLS package (seen this problem before?) ([e-mail])
  Re: uucp/mail/news FAQ (Ed Carp)
  Re: uucp/mail/news FAQ (Ed Carp)
  Re: uucp/mail/news FAQ (Ed Carp)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (H.J. Lu)
Subject: Re: Some interesting Novice Questions (not found in FAQ)
Date: 5 Nov 92 18:34:53 GMT

In article <dingelde.720952611@jocki>, [e-mail] (Dennis Dingeldein) writes:

[....]


|> 5) Is it a good idea to use one singe efs-partition of lets say 200 MB
|>    for all the Linux stuff ? Are there disadvantages for this efs solution
|>    (efs=extended file system) compared to a set of "usual fs" partitions ?

Please never, ever do this to yourself. Give you a hint. I had one of my fs,
/users, was trashed a week ago. But I could still manage to recover from my
/ and /usr fs's. Think about you have /, /usr and /users in one fs and that fs
is trashed.

[...]


H.J.

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Peter Clark)
Subject: Re: SLS distributed kernel compiled with TCP/IP enabled?
Date: 5 Nov 92 19:49:09 GMT

Can Linux TCP/IP through a modem or does it have to be through Ethernet?

--
============================================================================
Peter Clark         + Empire is not a game, its a state of mind.
[e-mail].  + EMACS is computerese for torture device.
northeastern.edu    + MUDding into the 21st century!

------------------------------

Crossposted-To: comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit,comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware
From: [e-mail] (fred j mccall 575-3539)
Subject: Re: 486SXs as Unix Iron?
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 18:06:49 GMT

In <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Tim Pierce) writes:

|In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (fred j mccall 575-3539) writes:

|>The only way to keep
|>companies from doing silly marketing cruft like this is if people let
|>them eat all those chips.

|I'm not complaining; it sounds like I'm getting all of the DX power I
|need from a machine that costs several hundred dollars less.  That's
|extra money that can go toward memory -- and you remember the problem
|with memory these days, don'tcha? :-)

Well, you get all that machine until you find you need a math
coprocessor and have no good way to add one cheaply.  You'd have been
better off (as would we all) if they had simply dropped the price of
the DX parts.

There's a problem with memory?  Don't look at me.  I build stuff to
kill people and have nothing to do with semiconductors (other than
stuffing them into weapons and writing software for them).

|>There is no way
|>I'm going to believe that the price difference between the 486SX and
|>the 486DX can be explained by the cost of testing the math unit in the
|>latter.

|Maybe also the cost of junking flaky math units?  Maybe it's the money
|they're losing on marketing SX chips that no one is buying?  What do
|you think the price difference is the result of -- general silicon
|shoddiness?

Arbitrary marketing decision, with no justification in cost.

--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live
 in the real world."   -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden
==============================================================================
[e-mail] - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me.

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Andy I. Liaw)
Subject: Re: MAXTOR
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1992 02:58:18 GMT


I posted a question about installing dos, os2 and linux on combinations of
maxtor 7213A (210MB) and seagate 1144A.  I called tech support at both
maxtor and seagate and here are the answer I got:

maxtor: the two drives are incompatible and therefore should be used together.
        sometimes putting the maxtor as slave might work.

   seagate: the incompatibility is dued to the difference in timings in both drives
              (after I told the guy I was using the drive with a maxtor, he
begin to sound pretty rude, just for your info.)

So I decide to sell my seagate and get a maxtor 120MB drive.







------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Russell J. Price)
Subject: HD timeout
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 15:47:12 GMT

Every once in a while, my Linux 0.98pl3 system give me a "HD timeout" message.
No harm seems to be done, but it's rather obnoxious.  I'm using a Western
Digital RLL controller (I forgot the model number, maybe WD1006-something?) on
a 386DX-25 motherboard with 4 MB of RAM.  Is there a parameter I can tweak to
fix this?
--
Russ Price                      [e-mail]
====================================================
"Bus error - passengers dumped"

------------------------------

Crossposted-To: comp.unix.bsd
From: [e-mail] (Nate Williams)
Subject: Re: Port of new Linux math emulator to 386bsd?
Date: Wed, 4 Nov 1992 19:55:34 GMT

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Linus Torvalds) writes:
|In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Steve Hocking) writes:
|>
|>      Looking at the latest Linux release and user comments on it, it
|>appears that a new math emulator has been written which is more complete and
|>accurate, plus about 2x faster. Does anybody have plans to port this to
|>386bsd (since we got the original emulator from Linux anyway)?
|
|The problem is the copyright: it's copylefted code by Bill Metzenthen,
|so you cannot distribute it under the 386bsd copyright.  The original
|emulator I wrote was also originally copylefted, but I gave Bill and
|Lynne the right to use it under 386bsd (the copyright was changed to
|something like "freely usable for the 386bsd and linux projects").
|You'd have to ask permission from Metzenthen - his email address can be
|found in the sources.

Since 386BSD already has GNU-copylefted code in it, I don't see why
using this emulator would be a problem, since :

1) The code will always be distributed with 386BSD
2) The code is only in the kernel.  The only time this code comes
   into play is when a non-FP machine executes FP code.  None of
   this code is compiled into binaries.

The only kicker I see in this is that maybe the Jolitz's don't want
any GNU code in the kernel itself, and don't mind the copylefted
utilities since they can be taken out as a whole w/out any loss of
functionality in 386BSD (other than the loss of that utility)

Comments?  Bill or Lynee?



Nate
--
[e-mail] |  A hacker w/out a home.
work: [phone]         |  Keeper of the Unofficial 386BSD Bug Report
home: [phone]         |  Please send bugs and/or fixes you find.

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Mika Liljeberg)
Subject: Re: linux-0.98.3 termcap problem
Date: 5 Nov 92 20:22:26 GMT

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Greg Wettstein) wrote:
| Speaking of TERMCAP problems I am wondering if anyone has noticed this yet.
|
| According to the discussions here and on the mailing list I decided to
| always refer to our Linux machines as VT220's when I logged onto other
| systems which use TERMCAP style entries.  console is great for Linux but of
| course unknown to other systems.
|
| After logging into a couple of systems I suddenly noticed that the virtual
| console was restricting itself to 24 lines.  For example if less is used
| to view a file and the sh prompt is on the bottom line of the screen the
| entire output gets displayed on the bottom line of the screen.  Using
| less with the prompt at the top of the screen causes less to use the
| console as if it had 24 lines.

Yes, this is because the remote host _knows_ a VT220 has only 24
lines.  The reset (rs) or initialization (is) string in the remote
host's termcap probably does something like this: "\E[1;24r". This
sets up the vtxxx scrolling region. 24 lines. Ugh.

I usually handle this problem by putting the following line into my
.login (on the remot host, of course):

eval "`resize`"

Resize comes with X11. It resets the scrolling region, finds out the
size of a VTxxx compatible display and sets the TERMCAP environment
variable and the tty settings accordingly. Nota that this _only_ works
for VTxxx compatible terminals. If you frequently use something more
exotic, you should let tset recognize the terminal first and then do
something like this:

if ($TERM == "vt100") eval "`resize`"

The Linux console will identify itself as a vt102, if asked. Some tset
programs set the TERM variable to vt100, some set it to vt102. Check
out what yours does.

| Just a quick comment, perhaps the setterm code/console driver needs to be
| modified to recognize some type of absolute reset sequence.  I would
| envision this sequence resetting the virtual console from which it was
| invoked to the same condition it would be in after a boot sequence.  This
| would be helpful in this case and also in the case when garbage gets
| dumped to the screen causing selection of the alternate character set.

There already is one. Even a dumb vt100 knows how to reset itself. The
control sequence is ESC c. Put this into your (linux) termcap:

rs=\Ec

Now "setterm -reset" will reset the virtual console to the power-on
defaults (except for some colour settings, which are not really part
of the terminal emulation). If you only want to reset the scrolling
region, the sequence for that is "\E[r".

Well, I hope this helps.

        Mika
--
Mika Liljeberg                  Email:  [e-mail]
Helsinki University                     [e-mail]
Dept. of Computer Science

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Steeve McCauley)
Subject: YES!!!
Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 21:45:32 GMT

   Just want to say that after 5 days as a linux user "I'm am fucking
impressed!".  I got the SLS 0.98 version from tsx-11 and I've got it
running with X and tcpip on two 486's.  I'm almost ready to stop
using my HP720 in favour of this fantastic operating system.  I want
to thank Linus and all of the other contributors for giving us such
a ... ok enough.

        Ha I just managed to ftp rcp, rsh and ftpd from tsx-11.  I'm going
to go and play.

--
Cheers et salut,
Steeve McCauley
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|     McGill University ~~~ Earth and Planetary Sciences ~~~ FDA 209A      |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|    A Short Short Short Short Story      |  [e-mail] |
|    -------------------------------      |  [e-mail]   |
|   And then he said to me, "Dollar sign  |                                |
|colon slash pooh slash bin", and I knew. |     Tel: [phone]        |
|             The end (by a friend)       |                                |
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+

------------------------------

From: [e-mail]
Subject: Maxtor
Date: 5 Nov 1992 20:55:25 GMT
Reply-To: [e-mail]

Well I have a brand new Maxtor 7213 IDE hard drive.  It works great.  I
am running a DOS partition and a Linux partition, and have had NO
problems period.  I have not looked to see what the number on my
prom is, but then I haven't had any reason to.  I think it is a great
drive, and very well priced.  I would recommend it to anyone.

                        Jeff Swartz

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Tim Miller)
Subject: NEC MultiSync 3FGx, Orchid ProDesigner II, need info for Xconfig
Date: 5 Nov 92 21:25:20 GMT


        Subject says it all.  I couldn't find entries in modeDB.txt for
this particular monitor, and I managed to get myself lost in the
calculations trying to build an entry for Xconfig.

        Anyone have them all done?  Or a program to help me crank these
values out?

-- Cerebus <[e-mail]>
"Tearing my hair out, screaming for mercy; whatta day."

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Carlos.Canau)
Subject: tip  and  cu  for  linux
Date: 5 Nov 92 18:12:28 GMT
Reply-To: [e-mail]


  Hello.

  I'm looking for the programs tip and cu for linux.
  Can anyone guide me to a site that have them ?

  Thanks in advance,
  Please e-mail me at  [e-mail]
  by(e) khanau


--
|----------------------------------------------------+--------------------
----<
| -@-                                            -@- | Carlos Canau
<
|  I      I've just started looking for the       I  |                 ,
,  <
|  I      Big Nothing were I can melt down.       I  |                  9
3   <
| -@-                                            -@- |  [e-mail]      '
<
|----------------------------------------------------+--------------------
----<

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Da Hubster!!!)
Subject: [Q] Problem with cursur...
Date: 5 Nov 1992 15:34:25 -0600

I am not able to use the cursur keypad to controll curser
movement unless I am logged on as the root.  Is there something
I need to add to my user .profile ???


--
ADIOS!!!!!!                                            -----------------------
                                                      | Da  Hubster!!!        |
                                                      | [e-mail]  |
                                                       -----------------------

------------------------------

From: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: Problems booting SLS package (seen this problem before?)
Date: 5 Nov 92 15:03:17 CST

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] writes:
| Hello all,
|
| Well, after gathering some information, it seems that I've dived into
| Linux.  Neat stuff.  Except for the problems. :)
|
[deletia of some stuff]

| In other words, I'm seeking help!
| However, when I try to boot the SLS 0.98 from tsx-11, it makes it through
| the boot disk, and then gives me the "select your disk" message.  AFTER
| inserting disk a2 (utilities), and selecting 3.5/A drive as my "working
| drive"....I get this neat little message about "magic number mismatch"
| and something about "dev/fd01440 busy".  *sigh*

[deletia of some more stuff...]

Ok, funny to be following up to my own message, but here goes.
It seems that I've solved my own problem.  I performed an 'fdisk'
on my harddrive using the root/bootdisk combo, and then tried it
again.  Presto.  It worked.  :)

However, I went and re-FTP'd the SLS stuff from tsx-11.  However, even with
the new copies, I had to 'fdisk' first.  Go firgure.

Just a little update.

Later,
"Crusher" Joe.

  *-----------------------------------------------------------------------*
  |  "Crusher" Joe Beddoe * President, Shampoo International Fan Club *   |
  |      Academic Support Guy, SFASU * Partner, Datamagic Computers       |
  *-----------------------------*-----------------------------------------*
  |       [e-mail]  *  [e-mail]        |
  | [e-mail]  *  NeXT mail:  [e-mail] |
  *-----------------------------------------------------------------------*

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Ed Carp)
Subject: Re: uucp/mail/news FAQ
Date: 5 Nov 92 21:25:58 GMT

Robert Kiesling (rak@loft) wrote:

: In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Vincent D. Skahan) writes:

:    once again, I see no reason to write (and have to support) a c.o.l.
:    FAQ for things that are already either documented in FAQ's or in books
:    you can buy.

: Agreed.  I've seen them, but maybe others haven't.  There is a FAQ,
: for example, with an overview of all these packages that was written
: by Chris Lewis.  A c.o.l. FAQ (or possibly Meta-FAQ, which I had in
: mind intially) would have a listing of these documents.  And some of
: the documentation can be very vague and confusing for beginners when
: the docs don't include system-specific information.

I have to agree with Vince on this one, too.  Linux isn't for DOS weenies,
at least not yet.  I remember a lot of whining when Linus released anything
prior to 0.95, because there were a lot of things in the kernel that weren't
supported, etc.  Linus' position (which I agree with, BTW) was, "hey, the
source is out there, it isn't *that* tough to understand -- go for it!"

And a lot of people did.  Sure, I'd like to see the kernel hacker's guide when
Michael et. al. get finished with it, but I'm not whining about it. :)

Remember, Linux is a *hacker's* unix.  If you don't like to tinker, then maybe
you ought to go with 386BSD. :)

Yes, uucp/elm/mail isn't a breeze to set up and use - but the configuration that
I include with mailpak should cover most people's setups.  But I also understand
that there are a *lot* of people that would like the uucp/mail interface to
have sendmail, procmail, pine, mush, etc. - but there's only so much stuff you
can stick into a package.  I'm also becoming concerned that tsx-11 and other
FTP sites are becoming repositories for multi-megabyte source distributions,
with only a few lines changed to make it work under linux.  A *massive* waste
of space and resources, IMHO.  I'd personally like to see tsx-11 contain binary
distributions, Linux-specific stuff, and cdiffs+pointers to where to find other
packages.  Because linux+gcc is becoming more mature, I'm considering making
the next mailpak a binary-only distribution, with cdiffs and FTP sites where
one can get the complete source distribution.  It's just too much stuff for
people to download, especially when they can get the sources elsewhere, feed
the diffs files to patch, and do a 'make'.

: Again, agreed.  However, what are the chances that another reader of
: one of those groups is going to be able to provide specific pointers
: for Linux?  These are groups for net packages in general, not specific

Linux is getting generic enough so that stuff written for generic unix will
compile and run with no problems.

: In his uucp internals FAQ, Ian Taylor wrote, "(This FAQ) does not
: describe how to configure UUCP, nor how to solve connection problems,
: nor how to deal with UUCP mail.  There are currently no FAQ postings
: on any of these topics, and I do not plan to write any."

Like I said, Linux isn't for weenies. :)  uucp *especially* isn't for those
with a weak stomach.
--
Ed Carp, N7EKG          [e-mail], [e-mail]         801/538-0177
"There is nothing to seek and nothing to find.  You're already enlightened, and
all the words in the world won't give you what you already have.  The wise
seeker, therefore, is concerned with one thing only: to becaome aware of what

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Ed Carp)
Subject: Re: uucp/mail/news FAQ
Date: 5 Nov 92 21:38:20 GMT

Vince Skahan ([e-mail]) wrote:

: you're not supposed to do this stuff if you're clueless.
: USENET is not for kiddies.

YES!!!!!  Thanks for reiterating this, Vince!

: But you already get HDB if you run Ed Carp's mailpak, which uses the
: HDB configuration.  You don't have to do anything...it's done for you.
: [...Ed, do I get a royalty every time I tell somebody you did good?...]

Sure, Vince - if anyone ever sends me any money, I'll give you a cut... :)

: Care and feeding of smail is a reasonably non-issue if you grab the
: smail3.1.28 I provide as part of 'newspak'.  I have about 4 lines of
: total configuration files to set system-specific stuff.  The incredible
: things you *could* do with smail are well-documented in the smail docs
: and in the comp.mail.smail newsgroup. I asked a question via email to
: Steve Robbins who provided excellent info that I included when I uploaded
: newspak (in the smail stuff).

I set up smail 3.1.28 in about an hour - time well spent reading the docs that
came with it.  I groan every time I see someone post a question that is
covered in the documentation... :(

I can understand someone posting "what does mailpak/newspak/X/<whatever> do
for me?" before they download it - these packages take time and space to
download.  I can't understand someone posting "I just downloaded mailpak -
*now* what do I do?"  There's a README, and simple instructions on how to
get it going.  For those who want to delve further in the inner workings of
elm, uucp, or smail, I include all the docs that I received with the respective
packages, and I'm sure Vince does the same.

: there IS NO system-specific stuff to be done any more.
: Grab newspak.  Grab mailpak.  Grab vixcron.  type make.  Miller Time.

How true!  Thanks to Linux and H.J. and all the other folks that have donated
their time and effort (and $$$, for some - SVGA cards and monitors and SCSI
cards and drives aren't cheap!), Linux has turned into a system that can give
the best commercial unixes a run for their money, both in terms of performance
and in terms of features!  It's pretty compatible with most unix systems
around - no more 200K+ files to feed to patch. :)

: A person getting started running news gets news/mail fed from
: somewhere.  If they have no clue, and they don't try to get a clue, they
: live with the implications of their lack of action.  Everybody is a
: beginner once.  Everybody screws up.  No biggie. If a rookie admin
: doesn't get in touch with his uucp neighbor(s) to help prevent him from
: screwing up BIG deserves what he/she gets.

I've had my hand slapped by fellow sysadmins more than once, too.  Shit
happens, you know.  But if you don't learn from your mistakes, you are bound
to repeat them.  Eventually, you'll piss off all your neighbors, and they'll
cut you off at the knees.  Then, I suppose, they'll be posting about that
evil Ed and Vince and Linus and H. J. who got them in the mess in the first
place. :)
--
Ed Carp, N7EKG          [e-mail], [e-mail]         801/538-0177
"There is nothing to seek and nothing to find.  You're already enlightened, and
all the words in the world won't give you what you already have.  The wise
seeker, therefore, is concerned with one thing only: to becaome aware of what

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Ed Carp)
Subject: Re: uucp/mail/news FAQ
Date: 5 Nov 92 21:41:21 GMT

Robert Kiesling (rak@loft) wrote:

: No real disagreement, IMHO.  Just a matter of how to do this.  Would
: you consider including one or two of these many docs in newspak?
: Newspak is a necessary and important part of Linux -- thanks.  I admit
: to not having looked at it (yet).  I've had too many other things to
: do.  Soon, though.

I would be more than pleased to include information on generic uucp/smail
setup in mailpak, if someone sent me the docs.
--
Ed Carp, N7EKG          [e-mail], [e-mail]         801/538-0177
"There is nothing to seek and nothing to find.  You're already enlightened, and
all the words in the world won't give you what you already have.  The wise
seeker, therefore, is concerned with one thing only: to becaome aware of what

------------------------------


** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **

The service address, to which questions about the list itself and requests
to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, is:

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You can send mail to the entire list (and comp.os.linux) via:

    Internet: [e-mail]

Linux may be obtained via one of these FTP sites:
    nic.funet.fi                pub/OS/Linux
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    tupac-amaru.informatik.rwth-aachen.de    pub/msdos/replace

The current version of Linux is 0.97 released on August 1, 1992

End of Linux-Activists Digest
******************************