Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1999 10:32:26 -0800 (PST) From: David Wolfskill <dhw@whistle.com> To: freebsd-newbies@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Linux vs. FreeBSD: The Storage Wars Message-ID: <199903291832.KAA01972@pau-amma.whistle.com> In-Reply-To: <3.0.6.32.19990326093033.00919230@mail.bfm.org>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
>Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 09:30:33 -0600 >From: "G. Adam Stanislav" <zen@buddhist.com> >But when I actually want to accomplish something, I have no choice but to >boot Windows. Not because I like it but because I know how to use it. And >when I don't, I can always figure it out. Curious. Different strokes & all that, I suppose. (I'll merely state here that my experiences, limited though they have been, using Microsoft environments have been consistent only in their value as aversion therapy, and that I attribute much of this to the ill-advised attempt to use single-user envirronments as if they were suited to general-purpose computing; my background is mostly in multi-user computing environments, such as IBM mainframes... though I've been dealing with various flavors of UNIX since '86. I'm subscribed to -newbies because dealing with PC hradware is a very weird and unusual experience for me.) >Under FreeBSD (and, I suppose Unix in general), the solution is no doubt >available and probably more powerful, but it always requires me to use some >cryptically named command. Well, a given command will need to have a name in order to be (directly) usable. You generally have the capability for making up your own names for (collections of) commands, either by defining an "alias" to the "shell" (more on this in a moment) or by putting together "shell scripts". (In UNIX, the program that reads what you type at the command line is called a "shell". One of the reasons that this role has a special name (as opposed to merely being considered part of the OS, which it is not) is that you are free to pick and choose what shell will be used to interpret your commands. Indeed, if you want to experiment with a new shell, you can simply invoke it as a program, whereupon it (the new shell) will be reading commands an responding; when you're done, merely exit that shell, and you're back to having the previous shell read and respond to your commands.) >Man pages are of little help to me: First of >all, I would need to know the name of the command to even get to the man >page. That's what "apropos" and the "SEE ALSO" sections of (other) man pages are for. >And even when I do, it seems the man page is always written in some >foreign language that only outwardly resembles English. Something a little more nearly concrete might help pin-point what the nature of the problem is. For example, citing one particular example of such a man page may narrow the field down to the point that trying to fix the problem could become feasible. >Apropos usually does not help me much either. For any particular reason? Many folks are willing to help; that's one of the nice things about the UNIX community in general, and the FreeBSD community in particular. But no one *can* help unless you at least make the effort to identify the nature of the mis-match between your expectations and your perceptions. Few folks here (especially me) can read your mind. >Just days ago I have installed XFree86 3.3.3.1. Its interface is >reminiscent of Windows 1.0, I have no idea what "Windows 1.0" refers to, but referring to a singular interface for X11 is rather like referring to "the shell" in UNIX: you can pick and choose. At this point in your narrative, few folks are likely to have much of a cluse as to what "window manager" (if any) you chose to use with X11. >and it locks up my system either immediately or >in a few minutes (mouse cursor disappears, ctl-alt-backspace does not >work), and the only way out is by turning the system off, ouch). That sounds like a fairly serious misconfiguration, all right. And yes, UNIX (in general) and FreeBSD (in particular) tend to fail to flat-out not work in such cases; rather, they'll generally try to carry on as best they can. >No doubt there is a simple fix, if I only knew what it was. :-) (I kinda >suspect that I need more RAM, I only have 8 Meg, although that is supposed >to be enough.) I haven't checked recently -- I haven't had the time -- but I would be inclined to agree that 8 MB is a bit skimpy. I'm running with 32 MB, and mostly doing OK (been up solid on FreeBSD 3.1-R since 02 March), and memory is comparatively inexpensive any more. Much will depend on what programs you use, such as what window manager. I use a simple one (that I was using on my old Sun 3/60 several years ago), but newer ones tend to be much more resource-intensive. And they also tend to be ones that are advertised as being able to be customized to resemble Microsoft environments, which may appeal to some folks. >Despite all of that, I am sticking with FreeBSD. Some day, I'll learn how >to use it. :-) It is a very steep learning curve, though! Indeed it can be, though I would (fairly strongly) encourage you to broaden the focus a little. You see, FreeBSD is descended from the "BSD UNIX" that the Computer Science Research Group at UC Berkeley distributed for a number of years; as such, there is a wealth of information available on its antecedents, much of which is quite applicable to FreeBSD. Thus, for example, the O'Reilly & Associates books on UNIX-related topics have a great deal that is applicable to FreeBSD, as do both Prentice-Hall and Addison-Wesley. And I would be remiss if I failed to point out Greg Lehey's _The Complete FreeBSD_. (One of the "classics" for folks new to UNIX that I heartily recommend -- especially for folks with any programming background at all -- is Kernighan & Pike's _The UNIX Programming Environment_.) >Not that this has anything to do with the subject line. I suspect the other >OS mentioned there would be even harder for me to learn. Maybe I'm just >getting old (will turn 49 next month). Computers were so much simpler when >I was 15! <big grin> Well, I was born in November, 1951, so I'm not all that much younger than you... and I didn't do anything with computers 'til '69.... Cheers, david -- David Wolfskill UNIX System Administrator dhw@whistle.com voice: (650) 577-7158 pager: (650) 371-4621 To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-newbies" in the body of the message
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?199903291832.KAA01972>