Date: Sun, 17 Jun 2001 19:31:02 -0500 From: Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> To: Technical Information <tech_info@threespace.com> Cc: FreeBSD Chat <chat@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: System Tuning/Sysadmins Message-ID: <15149.19398.975415.242825@guru.mired.org> In-Reply-To: <4.3.2.7.2.20010617184404.01776308@mail.threespace.com> References: <20010617093905.A20349@h24-67-61-12.lb.shawcable.net> <20010617063505.A29241@shell.monmouth.com> <20010617073505.B20171@h24-67-61-12.lb.shawcable.net> <20010617103922.A79022@acidpit.org> <4.3.2.7.2.20010617184404.01776308@mail.threespace.com>
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Technical Information <tech_info@threespace.com> types: > At 12:22 PM 6/17/2001, you wrote: > >Which is the real problem with the GUIify the world approach to system > >administration: the GUI hides the details about what's going on, so if > >that tool isn't available, the admin has no idea how to go about > >fixing things with the tools that may be available. > > This is a fair enough statement, but I'm in agreement with Chris too. If I > configured my snazzy UNIX server and it works, what difference does it make > how I got it there (text editing or GUI)? I love the stability of UNIX but > often find myself in a position of wanting to turn on the XYZ service on a > particular system, but not having the time to (nor wanting to) research and > find the one little line of some text file in /etc that I need to uncomment > to make that happen. I'm no sysadmin, but with a reasonable GUI tool at > least I can still get some work done. You missed one critical thing about that statement: it's not about tuning things, it's about *fixing* things (first word, last line). Having a GUI to configure and/or tune things means you can do so without knowing anything about the underlying system. This is fine until the system breaks - at which point you're in the position of having to reinstall and reconfigure the thing from scratch. Or wait for someone who knows what they're doing to come fix it for you. Being able to fix things quickly and inexpensively is an important feature for a server - one that you lose more often than you need to unless you know how to use the more primitive tools for doing so. <mike -- Mike Meyer <mwm@mired.org> http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/ Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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