September 2001 - main

RealTime Linux
by Paul 15 Sep '01

15 Sep '01

Hi Folks Is there any expertise within the group on using real time linux - I'm having some spectacular instant cold boots when I try to run one application. Currently trying a 2.4.8 kernel with the RTAI extensions on a RH7.1 platform. Clutching @ straws ! Regards, Paul.

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Re: [Alug] XSL Formatting Objects Question - Setting Document Defaults
by MJ Ray 15 Sep '01

15 Sep '01

Neill Newman <neill(a)entora.co.uk> writes: > > problems, for there are many: Java still doesn't have closures, > > continuations, first-class procedures... > This may be true, but how many of us know what those mean, how many of > us care ;) Now who's the person with the CS degree? What's wrong with this picture? ;-) Alexis Lee <alexis(a)turton.com> writes: > The advantage of a huge standard library is it keeps things standardised. > Instead of a zillion vendors each doing their own thing to look up, you > just need to flip thru the API. You still have the manual open when programming, the same as for extension libraries. Of course, you abstract away the platform-specifics if you can, no matter what language, so I guess that's a little work done for you. Depends how good the abstraction in the standard API is (eg *argh* Polygon and co-ordinate pairs... now what happens when not working in 2d?) > [...] I quoted Scheme instead of Prolog primarily to bait you, and > secondarily because I thought more people might have heard of it. > If Scheme is nothing like either L or P I will go and hide under a rock. Normally a plonking offence, but Scheme is a lot tidier than Lisp in that a lot of the old stuff that's there for compatibility is gone, as well as some Lisp features not being in the core of Scheme. The standards are 50 pages for Scheme and 1500 pages for Common Lisp... guess which is generally faster to run ;-) > Off the list, Mark, are there any instances where a task can only be done > using closures, or using a closure enhances efficiency? [...] It's just a quick one, so I'll put it in here. Closures make caching easy, eg (pseudocode gratis): (define cachedretr ; want more scheme? http://www.schemers.org/ (let ((cache '())) ; oooh, a variable initialised to be an empty list (lambda (id) ; the variable is in-scope in here but nowhere else ; get data and add it to the cache if it's not there and fresh ; return data from cache ))) cache is something more than a per-function private variable, I think. > And what the heck are continuations and first-class procedures? Continuations are the future of a program at a given point. Procedures being first-class means being able to treat them as any other variable. Both features can be used for very neat tricks. No, it's not an everyday thing, but they're useful to have in the toolbox. Anyway, I suspect Scheme is on at least as many Linux boxes as Java... -- MJR Thesis watch: 27% This is my personal web site =-> http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ http://www.alug.org.uk/ <-- This is the LUG I go to I work for this clever internet developer ==> http://www.luminas.co.uk/

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Re: [Alug] CS students vs Engineers
by MJ Ray 15 Sep '01

15 Sep '01

Adam Bower <abower(a)thebowery.co.uk> writes: > I am not an authority on this either and could someone please correct > me if I am wrong but I think people should only be using the > main(a)lists.alug.org.uk address as the uea one is no longer supported? Indeed. I found out yesterday that stu.uea.ac.uk will cease to be before the end of the year. UEA's computing service has changed its position on a number of issues, so removing the need for it. > Anyway on with my reply :) No. Please reply twice. The reply to main should just say that you are replying to social and people should follow the discussion over there. This is now wildly off-topic for main. -- MJR Thesis watch: 27% This is my personal web site =-> http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ http://www.alug.org.uk/ <-- This is the LUG I go to I work for this clever internet developer ==> http://www.luminas.co.uk/

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Re: [Alug] Intro & Linux CD question
by MJ Ray 15 Sep '01

15 Sep '01

First up, welcome to the group. Maybe we'll see you at Syleham on Sunday? I think the Debian talks are postponed until UEA, when we should be able to sink our claws into a Debian developer too. "Edenyard" <mail(a)edenyard.co.uk> writes: > My problem is that I can get neither the new Slack or Debian to > install. Booting from CD, they both get to a stage early on where the PC > locks up solidly with the CD and HDD lights on permanently. I can swithc > consoles (Alt-F2 etc.) and one of the consoles sometimes says 'hdc > interrupt lost'. [...] Well, it sounds like a hardware problem, or at least the boot kernel being incompatible with your hardware. The debian CDs should each have different kernels on and I think it might be worth your while trying the one with the "compact" or "idepci" kernels to see if that gets you any further. I've not seen this error before, I'm afraid. > So my question really is: has anyone else ever had this problem and, > if so, was it fixable? Or should I just stump up for a proper boxed set > of Slack 7.1 from a reliable vendor? Who is a reliable vendor? Is Debian > also available as a boxed set? Debian is available as a boxed set, but the extra money goes as a donation to their holding company, rather than buying support, I believe. You could try a debian derivative such as Progeny (anyone tried this recently?) Good suppliers include cheeplinux and Linux Emporium. Both offer a speedy service and decent discs. -- MJR Thesis watch: 27% This is my personal web site =-> http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ http://www.alug.org.uk/ <-- This is the LUG I go to I work for this clever internet developer ==> http://www.luminas.co.uk/

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Intro & Linux CD question
by Edenyard 15 Sep '01

15 Sep '01

Dear List, "Introduce yourself", the subscription notice said - so here goes: I'm relatively new to Linux, having started dabbling about three months ago with an old Slack 3.5 set that was lying around. I became interested in Linux because I'm a dyed-in-the-wool DOS man. We don't allow windoze stuff on the premises here. Because my work is in semiconductors, I need to be able to read .PDF files (data sheets, etc.) and such support as there is for DOS in that format is woefully behind the times - hence Linux! I'm located in east Suffolk as a one-and-a-half-man band control systems design company. Here's my (first) question: I got on well with the Slack 3.5 that I mentioned earlier but was frustrated that I seemingly couldn't add newer programmes (e.g., acroread) to it. Someone gave me Redhat 7.1 to try and I got on better with adding 'extras', but it seemed so bloated and slow (I'm using a P166, 64Mb RAM & SVGA). Since I liked the feel of Slack 3.5, I decided to get a set of newer Slack CDs and ended up with a 3-CD Slack 7.1 set. I got those, and also a 3-CD Debian 2.2r3 set from an outfit called Crazy Penguin, by following a link from the UK Linux Groups page (where I also found ALUG, incidentally). My problem is that I can get neither the new Slack or Debian to install. Booting from CD, they both get to a stage early on where the PC locks up solidly with the CD and HDD lights on permanently. I can swithc consoles (Alt-F2 etc.) and one of the consoles sometimes says 'hdc interrupt lost'. I've tried copying the relevant files to a DOS HD partition and installing from there. The process gets a bit further than with booting from CD but it seems that when it needs BIG files from the CD, it hangs up. I tried making some floppies with Slack 7.1 using RAWRITE.EXE under DOS, but RAWRITE caused a QEMM exception. I wondered whether the CDs may be perhaps unreadable, so I tried copying everything from the CD to a DOS HD on my work machine using Xtree and it all copied without any errors. Thinking that my Linux PC was dying, I moved to yet another machine but that gave me the same results. I went back and tried re-installing the old Slack 3.5 and that went through like clockwork. So I tried re-installing Redhat 7.1 and that installed properly, too, so I'm fairly sure that all my hardware is up to scratch. The old Slack 3.5 RAWRITE.EXE works properly, too. The only common clue to the new Slack 7 and Debian failures is that they both came from this Crazy Penguin outfit and look like they're home-made CDs (titles written untidily by hand across disk top surface). So my question really is: has anyone else ever had this problem and, if so, was it fixable? Or should I just stump up for a proper boxed set of Slack 7.1 from a reliable vendor? Who is a reliable vendor? Is Debian also available as a boxed set? Any clues/help would be very greatly appreciated. Sorry that my first message has been so LONG!! All the best, Gerald Pye mail(a)edenyard.co.uk

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bt in surrey
by Chris Brown 15 Sep '01

15 Sep '01

I have just relocated to Surrey and have spent the last 4 days scratching my head over the port not connected error under windows ( no problem under Linux ! ) . I even resorted to Fdisk and a clean install....... twice! Lucky I still recieve the ALUG list or the Modem was heading for the skip ! Have just rung BT and they are looking into it ( as if they have not heard of the problem already ). Maybe I shall be brave and go for a clean Suse install and just skip the W2k Cd...... Chris Brown

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Test Please delete
by oms101＠freeuk.com 14 Sep '01

14 Sep '01

This is a test to see if I am still A subscribed to this list B) now only getting one copy of each email not two Soryy for the incovenience Owen Date: 14-Sep-01 Time: 17:40:37

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Re Students vs Engineers
by tom potts 13 Sep '01

13 Sep '01

One of the problems is you're not timed at university. I was one of the 'Oh God Its Easter!' crowd and found it amusing that some people worked 16hrs a day for three years to obtain 3% higher marks (the difference between a 1st and a 2:ii my year). Unfortunately these people get good jobs and never forget to hate us that have fun! However I do remember I could miss more lectures in a week than an English student had in a term. But remember genius may be 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration but that inspiration invariably comes when your not perspiring. Laziness IS the mother of invention Tom ____________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.co.uk address at http://mail.yahoo.co.uk or your free @yahoo.ie address at http://mail.yahoo.ie

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Re: [Alug] Re: CS students vs Engineers
by MJ Ray 12 Sep '01

12 Sep '01

This is another discussion that would be better off moving to social, I guess. -- MJR Thesis watch: 27% This is my personal web site =-> http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ http://www.alug.org.uk/ <-- This is the LUG I go to I work for this clever internet developer ==> http://www.luminas.co.uk/

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Re: [Alug] Re: CS students vs Engineers
by Ricardo Campos 12 Sep '01

12 Sep '01

>I don't agree with that, a friend got a 3rd, and I consider him way >above me in most things (yeah that's you bing ;) >In my opinion, just because someone has a degree dosen't mean they have >more experience/knowledge than somebody else. Some of the most >knowledgeable people I know didn't go to uni. I agree! I did well at university, but it only means that I am smart enough to pretend to be smart- by thinking in a way predefined as 'correct' by my professors, most of which could tell you almost everything about a certain chemical reaction or whatever, but couldn't remember to do up their flies, and let themselves dangle out. As for grades... they don't really matter too much either, you can do absoloutely bugger all work and still do well, you just have to be cunning. Look at all the f*ckwits on graduate schemes for big companies- surely they are reason enough to take academic results with a ton of salt?! Wouldn't it be better to choose employees very specifically on their personal merits and abilities- these things you can't tell by looking on paper. A lazy but smart person can do well, and a hard-working but 'not as a bright' person can do well also. Which would you rather have? They are not simply the same in the workplace, whereas under our normal examination techniques they are. Besides which, you only begin to ACTUALLY learn about real-life AFTER uni, and this includes vocational skills. Of course, this is all coming from an academically brilliant but exceptionally lazy person who can't even tell his *rse from his elbow... Kinda shooting myself in the foot, methinks. ;P Well, I'm not looking for a job... yet... ;D _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp

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