LOL, gtfo with that nonsense!

Brian Kernighan’s book UNIX: A History and a Memoir is a great read for anyone interested in the history of computing.

Sort of like US Democracy.

Any big dump of money (Manhattan Project, Space Race, Arms Race) brings about great strides in progress. It would have been great to see a big dump of money, on the aforementioned scale, dumped into raw research.

I barely have two nickels to rub together, but I would donate them if it would get these fuckheads to Mars.

I’d imagine it will come around, but not the way people think, and not for many more generations. I mean, unless we just kill this planet before we get there, which is where I’d put my money.

The app may be windows only, but it can often help to ask for alternative. And not things like “What can I use in Linux that is the same as <app> under Windows”. More along the lines of “I need to create or do <x>. In Windoze I used <app>, how do I get the same work done under Linux”. Sometimes you don’t have much of a choice, go emulation layer or VM, but often you can find a different path to the same result and once you get used to it, it’s a better solution.

I started using Linux as a liberal arts major in the late '90s. Both my grandparents (RIP) and my parents (partial RIP) kept having issues with Windows on their computers. I was constantly being called to help them with crap. 20+ years ago I asked if I could try something and they didn’t care, as long as it worked. Debian and XFCE. Configured their email, hooked up the printer. Suddenly the service issues went from several times a month to once every 5+ years. And 90% of those issues just was clearing out the printer queue. I have never once understood the LiNuX iS OnlY FoR suPer TeCH NeRDS bullshit.

The were talking about why not to use Linux, not why you do. I agree with your reasons for using Linux though. Productivity.

Not Vim? WTF?

I’d buy that for a dollar.

I absolutely hate all this container shit, for my uses. That said, they make sense when you need to sandbox applications for whatever reason, but most of those uses seem like they would be better served with VMs.

I get the vim frustration. The first Linux distro I used shipped with a broken x-server and vi(m) (late 90s) as the editor, so it was definitely jumping in with both feet. It was Vim or Emacs, and Emacs seemed like more than I was willing to take on at the time. It’s kind of annoying how much other editors frustrate me now. I know a lot of people are OK with nano, or whatever editor, but every time I find myself not using vim to edit these days it freaking kills me.

It always makes me kind of sad when people disparage CLI use. It’s like people thinking they don’t need to actually learn anything because they can always look up what they need to know on their phone. It seems a shame to miss so much of the richness of the experience. I found myself arguing, promoting, whatever, terminal use a few times and then realized how pointless it is. It’s like arguing with someone about what food they like. You can just hope they develop a more sophisticated palate at some point, or at least become more open-minded, but you can’t force it on them.

This was a long way to get around to saying I like that you had that change of frame and are embracing the fun of personalizing your interactions with your computer.

For anyone who loves Vim, Vimwiki is freaking great. I’ve been using it for many years. I’m not sure if it’s still being updated anymore, and I’ve never been able to find a mailing list or anything along those lines though.

Unless you have a real reason not to use X11, why not just use X11?

I stopped sitting in on interviews at my old job. Everyone that I thought was a great interview ended up being a shitty employee.

• update:

Hotkey open terminal -> sudo apt update/upgrade -> done. Never had to touch the stupid mouse. Same with all sorts of tasks.

• email:

Hotkey open terminal -> neomutt -> quickly sort/delete/reply -> done. Never had to touch the stupid mouse.

• file transfer:

Hotkey open terminal -> scp -> done. Never touched the mouse.

and so on.

If you like using a GUI, use a GUI. I’m not saying you can’t, but you sure are missing out on a lot of command-line awesomeness. I’ve never heard anyone argue that a GUI is quicker than command line, just more comfortable for a lot of neophytes. I mean, sure, gaming, browsing the web, graphics stuff, GUIs are great, if not essential.

Not using the terminal is like buying a race car and not using the higher gears. I mean, you can, but what’s the fucking point?

I don’t know if I’m alone on this, but I just bought the biggest 5400rpm HDD that was in my price range when I set up. Might notice the slower speed when doing a big data dump, but for streaming purposes you can run many 4k streams concurrently and the bottleneck would probably be your network speed before you hit a drive read bottleneck.