- main - earth.li

Bash script help please!
by bsamuels＠datamansys.co.uk 23 Jul '01

23 Jul '01

Is it possible to compare the sizes of two files from within a Bash script? I don't need to know the actual sizes just which one is the bigger file. I can't find anything useful in the Bash man page. Barry Samuels

4 5

Re: [Alug] cron job
by Jenny_Hopkins＠toby-churchill.com 23 Jul '01

23 Jul '01

Thanks everyone! I'm eagerly waiting till 3 pm to see if it works. Andrew Glover wrote: >> if [ -f /home/jenny/cwp/ ]; then >if [ -d /home/jenny/cwp/ ]; then Ah! I wondered what the -f was. Ta. Adam Bower wrote: >tar -czf /backups/cwpbak.tar.gz /home/jenny/cwp/ Missed out the gz. Damn.And the wrong way round! Thanks Adam I've left the o-reilly bible at home this week, it's a hassle to transport between home and work on the bike, could do with two copies really. Shall I share my awful moment with you all? Trying to find the right command to copy a directory to another directory, I went to clear the second directory for a second try. So i typed in rm -r ./* Except - you've guessed what i omitted in my haste - the full stop. Ohmygod. Luckily for me I was not superuser and the puzzled linuxbox asked me if I was sure i wanted to delete Games or something, at which point i woke up and lunged for the kill button. As if i haven't read in my O'R book to sit on my hands when i type a command for this very reason? Hee hee. I'm still pale and shaking. Anyone else ever done this? Jenny.

6 5

Weekly IRC reminder
by Neill Newman 23 Jul '01

23 Jul '01

This is the automated ALUG irc meeting reminder sent to remind you that there is an irc meeting tonight (Monday) at 8.00pm. The meeting takes place on the irc server irc.openprojects.net in the #alug channel, you can take a look at www.openprojects.net to get more info on the openprojects network. Popular irc clients include tkirc, bitchx, xchat and ircII on Unix, and Mirc under windows. Here are some links to help you get started with irc. Unix http://www.bitchx.com http://www.xchat.org http://freshmeat.net http://www.epicsol.org/ (for Brett!) Windows http://www.mirc.com (loads of help with irc for newbies!)

1 0

Watch as your apache logs grow!
by Brett Parker 23 Jul '01

23 Jul '01

Hi all, Everyone musta heard by now about the nice new IIS worm that, once its got the IIS server, attacks whitehouse.gov. Have a look in your apache logs and see how many times they've tried to attack you... brett@dustpuppy:/var/log/apache$ grep "default.ida" access.log | wc -l 25 and that's on a 33.6 dialup machine ;) Cheers, Brett

7 10

Winmodems
by Christopher Drane 21 Jul '01

21 Jul '01

Has anyone had any joy getting a winmodem to work with linux, or know how I could set up mine to work Lucent LT Winmodem I have been trying to get it to work on a Packard Bell Easy One Dc Laptop. I was would much rather have the internal modem working, don't want to buy a new one. I am running Mandrake 8.0 Any help would be appreciated Chris Drane

3 3

TV program 8pm Sunday
by Adam Bower 21 Jul '01

21 Jul '01

Hi all, This is slightly off topic but may form the basis for some good discussion over the next few days. Tomorrow night (Sunday) at 8pm on Channel 4 there is a program titled "The Secret history of hacking" now this appears to mean hacking in the sense of l33t h4X00r D00D5 and not in the sense of Linus Torvalds and Alan Cox type hacking. Oh well looking forward to seeing if its crap or not...... Adam -- This message is Copyleft - all rights reversed Adam

2 1

When's the next meeting at the UEA?
by Steve Kuo 21 Jul '01

21 Jul '01

When's the next meeting at the UEA? ===== --------------- Steve Kuo "How can we claim to be an advanced and civilized society when no other creatures on Earth develops technology to blow themselves up three times over?" ____________________________________________________________ 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

3 2

Re: [Alug] locale
by Andrew.Chandler＠ftid.com 21 Jul '01

21 Jul '01

Indeed... the country is the UK... but the iso-whatever lists the country code as GB.... in fact all the .uk domains used to be aliases from .gb My old Uni email address of chanaa(a)sx.ac.uk could also be chanaa(a)sx.ac.gb!!! Mind you chanaa(a)uk.ac.sx would also work on JANET!! A> MJ Ray <markj(a)cloaked.freeserve.co.uk> on 19/07/2001 22:34:56 To: Andrew.Chandler(a)ftid.com cc: alug(a)stu.uea.ac.uk (bcc: Andrew Chandler/PSD/LONDON/FTI) Subject: Re: [Alug] locale RFC822 message headers Andrew.Chandler(a)ftid.com writes: > Just one of those strange things about our country - we are the UK > but for some purposes we have to be GB? Like at the Olympics etc. I think it's something like ISO says GB, but reality often says UK. Sometimes reality beats a standard. _______________________________________________ alug, the Anglian Linux User Group list Send list replies to alug(a)stu.uea.ac.uk http://www.anglian.lug.org.uk/ http://rabbit.stu.uea.ac.uk/cgi-bin/listinfo/alug See the website for instructions on digest or unsub!

2 1

Re: [Alug] Ow! MS strikes out against cross-platform?
by MJ Ray 20 Jul '01

20 Jul '01

Andrew Savory <a.savory(a)btinternet.com> writes: > > > (That's the new technology bit. It's innovation.) > > Not our innovation. That's the point I was making: why are we trying > > to implement theirs ahead of our own? > Oh, that's just daft. Talk about "Not Invented Here". If it's good, use > it. If it's not, don't. NIH has nothing to do with this. If it's proven to be good, then use it and shout about it from the rooftops. There's not even much harm with quietly exploring implementation for ourselves. Until then, we've got our own innovations to promote and shouldn't be wasting our energy doing their marketing department's work for them. > > Making a big noise before these projects have started is just > > *begging* to be knocked back. > For sure, but look how much noise the Gnome and KDE lot make. And look at the lumps Gnome took for too much PR too early. KDE were actually quite quiet until they had something half-working. Gnustep are like church mice just now. > [...] I think that along with Open Source should be an open mind -- > all too often people tend to discard good ideas just because they > came from dubious sources. No, dubious licensing. That viral shared source licence is a really nasty trick, I think. I also care more about Freedom than Openness. > If Microsoft is making a noise about > something that we've all been doing in similar ways for years, or > making a noise about some fantastic new innovation, why not steal > their thunder by offering an Open Source alternative? Why not, indeed?

1 0

Re: [Alug] Ow! MS strikes out against cross-platform?
by MJ Ray 20 Jul '01

20 Jul '01

Andrew Savory <a.savory(a)btinternet.com> writes: > Um, yeah, let's not get bogged down in paranoia though, eh? Ignore the > fact that it is Microsoft for a minute: some very bright minds have sat > down and designed a new framework for internet-based applications and > services. Who? I've only seen one recognised language guru involved with the project. It mostly seems to be being advocated and evangelised by the management who have so much to lose if Microsoft don't retain their monopoly as the battle moves to service provision. > (That's the new technology bit. It's innovation.) Not our innovation. That's the point I was making: why are we trying to implement theirs ahead of our own? > Remember that Microsoft had a significant input into SMIL and XML > (and many other funky technologies and innovations). "Significant input" does not equate to Microsoft-led and -owned. > Should we discard these lest we wind up staring at the competition? > Does it matter who the competition is? Well, I don't see acres of newsprint devoted to these other worthy technologies and I don't see the huge waste of programmer talent in their pursuit. Where Free software has got on quietly and provided sound implementations of useful techologies, it works well. Making a big noise before these projects have started is just *begging* to be knocked back. > Surely, if the competition have the cash to employ some > extremely talented designers, engineers, geeks etc, shouldn't we let them > pay while we steal their ideas? ;-) Depends if they want to steal our revolution...

2 1

Re: [Alug] [fwd] Re: Very Worried at MS .net
by MJ Ray 20 Jul '01

20 Jul '01

Andrew Savory <a.savory(a)btinternet.com> writes: > http://www.ximian.com/tech/mono-index.php3 or So, Mono is a C-hash compiler (yuck), the CLI and CLR. Where are the other languages? Will the viral nature of the MS Shared Source licence kill them? > http://www.microsoft.com/net/whatis.asp for more details. It doesn't seem to like my web browser. I guess they're looking at the user agent. > I think to say .NET is "the new Windows API" is a little too glib. ...but depending on the contents of the CLI, it could be entirely fair.

1 0

bash script...
by Andrew J Glover 20 Jul '01

20 Jul '01

Could somebody explain to me why the following doesnt work, or offer a better solution please? -- DIRECTORY=".thumbnails" remThumbs() { rm -rf $DIRECTORY } for i in `ls -a` ; do if [ -d $i ] ; then echo "Yup, $i is a directory" if [ $i == $DIRECTORY && $i != "." || $i != ".." ] ; then echo "Removing $i ..." # remThumbs else echo "Entering $i ..." cd $i $HOME/bin/remThumbnails fi else echo "Nope, $i is a file" fi done -- Thanks, Andrew.

2 2

LaTeX help
by David Freeman 20 Jul '01

20 Jul '01

Hi, Can any one tell me how to change the way the date is displayed in LaTeX? ATM it shows up as July 19, 2001 which I don't want. I want it to show tomorrows date (20th July) as: 20 July 2001 This is being used in a letter which needs to be done tonight for tomorrow! Thanks D ===== -------------------- "We all know Linux is great... it does infinite loops in 5 seconds." Linus Torvalds __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/

2 1

Re: [Alug] bash script...
by MJ Ray 20 Jul '01

20 Jul '01

Andrew J Glover <flexifoil(a)btinternet.com> writes: > if [ $i == $DIRECTORY && $i != "." || $i != ".." ] ; Almost certainly that line wants [ ]s around each test (man test and man bash to see why). Use Brett's way though. Much nicer.

1 0

test message
by Brett Parker 20 Jul '01

20 Jul '01

OK, this is just to see if I have now stopped my self from being blocked and having to wait for admins to approve the mails, please ignore, delete, set fire to, whatever ;) Brett

1 0

Re: [Alug] cron job
by MJ Ray 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

Neill Newman <neill(a)entora.co.uk> writes: > when I first started using linux, I was logged in as root and typed Don't you think that root and the -f flag really don't mix? I also su lots for very short spaces of time these days too ;-)

2 1

The Java Debate
by tom potts 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

Just a few comments: C# looks interesting but is designed by Microsoft to Lock you in - they've already stated that in the future they will be charging for the XML standards. Froma design point of view its a bit of a mish mash of old technologies glued together. If theres a design flaw in Microsoft they provide a work around. Java is meant to be multi-platform and if there is a design flaw Sun have the temerity to go back and rip up all the previous work and start again. If you get a chance check out Forte - the Java IDE its free for now and runs on Windows/Solaris/Linux and if it doesnt scare the hell out of Microsoft i'll be surprised. Now some added bitching: As a Microsoft Technet user I was offered extra free information at the technet site. I went in and was told to fill in a Passport (all the usual lies for any market research). And on returning to the site I discovered it couldnt use the passport data and I would have to enter it all again to get my free info. Anyone know what it was? Beware trends: XML provides little more (over EDI peer to peer) than a nice way to view Data. But ask yourself why you would want to view data that is meant to be pumped straight into your business system? 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

5 5

Re: [Alug] locale
by MJ Ray 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

Andrew.Chandler(a)ftid.com writes: > Just one of those strange things about our country - we are the UK > but for some purposes we have to be GB? Like at the Olympics etc. I think it's something like ISO says GB, but reality often says UK. Sometimes reality beats a standard.

1 0

Re: [Alug] Mail Clients Which one do you use?
by MJ Ray 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

oms101(a)freeuk.com writes: > Is that part of emacs? I must start to play with emacs one day. It runs in Emacs or XEmacs, yes. Whether it is "part of" Emacs would be a very contentious issue.

1 0

Who .NEEDS it ...?
by Earl Brannigan 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

Hi All, Following these .NET threads I couldn't help smiling. C#...?? Sorry, who needs another 'C/C++' like language. (I trust everyone realises the # is a ++ on ++, ie C# is C++++ (NOT!!!). C++ is a well defined mature standardised programming language. I can already write cross platform code with it. OK I need to compile on whatever platform but compilers are very compliant, and if I use posix api for threads and standard winsock api etc etc .... you get the picture. So why would I want to move to an immature, unproven, non-standard(yet) mechanism driven by the one company on this planet that I actually HATE. If C++ isn't up to what I need then Java can fill that gap usually, but there are all the other Perl/Python/yadayayada etc that I can also get into. Open, standardised, mature, robust. There is nothing Sharp about C#, it is a blatant plagiarism of Java. As such it is very blunt. Runtime engine, garbage collector, libraries. Sorry that's Java. And if I want something that looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks, I'll get a duck thank you very much. My 2 penneth. Hailstorm??? Sorry, M$ do not have a very good record with authentication services.... PPTP anyone ? .NET, my .ARSE Earl

3 2

Re: [Alug] locale
by Andrew.Chandler＠ftid.com 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

I'm not a Debian user, so it might do it differently, but you might find the locale is 'en_gb'. Just one of those strange things about our country - we are the UK but for some purposes we have to be GB? Like at the Olympics etc. Weird? We don't even have a national Football or Cricket team?!?! Rant over.. Bing Andrew J Glover <flexifoil(a)btinternet.com> on 19/07/2001 12:45:16 To: alug(a)stu.uea.ac.uk cc: (bcc: Andrew Chandler/PSD/LONDON/FTI) Subject: [Alug] locale RFC822 message headers Hello, Ive had this problem since installing Debian (potato), having no success in fixing it.. Its an annoyance more than anything: perl: warning: Setting locale failed. perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings: LANGUAGE = (unset), LC_ALL = (unset), LANG = "en_UK" are supported and installed on your system. perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C"). Looking around for help, a few people mention running 'locale-gen'. I dont have this on my system, should I? Any other ideas would be appreciated, thanks Andrew. _______________________________________________ alug, the Anglian Linux User Group list Send list replies to alug(a)stu.uea.ac.uk http://www.anglian.lug.org.uk/ http://rabbit.stu.uea.ac.uk/cgi-bin/listinfo/alug See the website for instructions on digest or unsub!

1 0

Visit from Tim.
by David Freeman 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

All, I got this email from Josette at O'Reilly. I hope some of you can come. Tim O'Reilly has been one of thr driving forces behing Free software. MOre info on Tim can be found at http://www.oreilly.com/oreilly/tim_bio.html Hope to see some of you there. Thanks D --- Josette Garcia <josette(a)oreilly.co.uk> wrote: Hi David Hope you are interested in the following. Tim O'Reilly will be at BT Labs on Wed. 9th August. You are all cordially invited to attend the talk. To register, please contact library(a)bt.com with name, affiliation and need of car park facility. Description of the talk - Title: The Pause before the Next Wave Speaker: Tim O'Reilly, President and CEO, O'Reilly & Associates Content: With this year's high-tech slowdown in full swing, programmers, web developers, system administrators, and other IT professionals are suddenly facing an uncertain future, as their stock options go underwater and layoffs replace seemingly bottomless demand for people with tech skills. The dotcom party has turned into an industry-wide hangover. But can this really be the end of an era? Date: Wednesday 8th August Venue: BT, Martlesham Heath Time: 15.00 That's all for now. All the best Josette ===== -------------------- "We all know Linux is great... it does infinite loops in 5 seconds." Linus Torvalds __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/

1 0

.NET has hope
by David Freeman 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

Found this on a O'Rielly website " In 1998, we helped found ActiveState in order to make Perl more accessible to Windows users. ActiveState's ASPN product line now provides tools, support, and services for Perl, Python, and XSLT, and Visual Studio plug-ins for these languages so that they can be used with Microsoft's new .Net framework. " Thanks D PS Earl, I like the .ARSE idea. Especially as in diving ARSE stands far Always the Right Stuff for the Evironment! ===== -------------------- "We all know Linux is great... it does infinite loops in 5 seconds." Linus Torvalds __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/

1 0

locale
by Andrew J Glover 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

Hello, Ive had this problem since installing Debian (potato), having no success in fixing it.. Its an annoyance more than anything: perl: warning: Setting locale failed. perl: warning: Please check that your locale settings: LANGUAGE = (unset), LC_ALL = (unset), LANG = "en_UK" are supported and installed on your system. perl: warning: Falling back to the standard locale ("C"). Looking around for help, a few people mention running 'locale-gen'. I dont have this on my system, should I? Any other ideas would be appreciated, thanks Andrew.

1 1

cron job
by Jenny_Hopkins＠toby-churchill.com 19 Jul '01

19 Jul '01

Hi all, Just writing my first backup procedure and wondered on a few points: Does this check the directory /home/jenny/cwp exists? if [ -f /home/jenny/cwp/ ]; then Also, is there a standard place backups are filed? I've created a directory called backups for now in my home directory, and will copy the cwp/ directory into the backups directory, but it would be far neater to somehow roll the directory up into one neat zipped tarball on a daily basis and stuff it in a special backup place. At the mo I have cp -r /home/jenny/cwp/* /home/jenny/cwpbackup/ but could I have something like tar zcf /home/jenny/cwp > /backups/cwpbak.tar ? Thanks all, jenny.

3 3