The Official Status Thread

Polygeekery

What a freaking week. I hope next week is a little less hectic. If it is, I have a list of WTFs to write up.

HardwareGeek

Status: Turned 30

Watch for incoming cupcakes.

Weng

Raw digital video transmission streams. There are variations for satellite, terrestrial broadcast and cable. If you're capturing DVB for playback purposes, you're prettymuch doing it wrong. The only reason to capture it is because you don't have enough hardware handy to transcode it to a useful format (or for rebroadcast unedited, which is more or less never a thing that is ever done).

In other words, niche shit that got bolted onto ("contributed") to an otherwise unrelated opensores project.

blakeyrat

I, uh, didn't care.

HardwareGeek

@blakeyrat said:

I, uh, didn't care.

You asked. Whose shoulder aliens was @Weng supposed to listen to in order to realize that what you said wasn't what you meant?

blakeyrat

Status: oh man my RSS reader delivered me a Slashdot whopper today:

Removing Libsystemd0 From a Live-running Debian System - Slashdot

lkcl writes The introduction of systemd has unilaterally created a polarization of the GNU/Linux community that is remarkably similar to the monopolistic power position wielded by Microsoft in the late 1990s. Choices were stark: use Windows (with SMB/CIFS Services), or use UNIX (with NFS and NIS)....

The introduction of systemd has unilaterally created a polarization of the GNU/Linux community that is remarkably similar to the monopolistic power position wielded by Microsoft in the late 1990s.

That sentence doesn't even slightly make sense, but it'll ne sure to make the Slashdotter's heads explode.

HardwareGeek

@blakeyrat said:

That sentence doesn't even slightly make sense

Hmm...

polarization .. is ... similar to ... monopolistic power position

[A] sharp division, as of a population or group, into opposing factions

is similar to

[e]xclusive control by one group

Um, no, not really.

EvanED

@blakeyrat said:

The introduction of systemd has unilaterally created a polarization of the GNU/Linux community that is remarkably similar to the monopolistic power position wielded by Microsoft in the late 1990s.

I kinda like /. most of the time and follow it on RSS (and have a metric buttload of comments there, though not many for a while), but... wut? I don't even know what the author of that comment was even trying to say.

Mikael_Svahnberg

Status: gearing up for a week of reading master's theses. Because of this that sentence makes perfect sense to me:

The community is divided into two camps over systemd, which (at least) one of the camps see as being a monopolisation and a Bad Thing.

Onyx

@Mikael_Svahnberg said:

two camps

@Mikael_Svahnberg said:

monopolisation

I... WHAT?

@Mikael_Svahnberg said:

Bad Thing

Oh, yes, save us from the Evil Standards, please!

VinDuv

@EvanED said:

I don't even know what the author of that comment was even trying to say.

Who cares? He was only trying to fulfill Slashdot’s weekly systemd flamewar quota...

RaceProUK

I'm clearly behind on my Linux Holy War updates; what's so bad about systemd?

VinDuv

The systemd is that way.

Luhmann

Status: Cursing at the SharePoint Taxonomy Administrator Thingy. Fuck what a turd. MS I bet you didn't actually tried doing some actual Taxonomy management through your own interface before releasing this turd.

Background: Think of the Taxonomy as a global master list of hierarchic terms that can be used in SharePoint to tag content (documents, items, ...). Every tag can have alternative labels assigned to it. Since you use these for global tagging most likely mere mortals are not allowed to add/change the taxonomy.

Task: update some terms with additional alternative labels.

Workflow: Click in search field. Enter existing alternative label. Search will fold down to show suggested terms as you type. Type the entire existing label. Suggested items list will show 1 item. Enter. Suggested items list will show a few hundred items loosely related to term you entered, but NOT the term you entered. Tree pane will refresh showing the position of your selection in the hierarchy. Main screen will start to load term information. Term name will be displayed as title. Wait ...

Yes, that is right. You'll get a pop-up first asking if you want to close the term it is LOADING without saving. Choosing Cancel (Annuleren) will STOP loading the term screen. Pressing OK to continue.
Search field will refresh changing out your search term with the selected items standard label. Click inside empty 'new label' field. Type the new label. Enter to confirm. Click save (opslaan). Watch the save button drop a few lines while you click. Wait for SharePoint to enter a new blank 'new label' field so the save button stops moving. Scroll down so the save button is visible again. Click save. Wait for the spinner to end.

Repeat until all changes are applied.
Bonus round: sometimes, just sometimes it throws in an additional close without saving pop-up. Irregardless that it just fucking told you it saved your change correctly and that in the background the 'save' button is grayed out because it damn well knows there is nothing to save.

RaceProUK

@VinDuv said:

The systemd is >a href="http://what.thedailywtf.com/t/this-systemd-thing-is-really-out-of-hand/5062"> that way.

Ah, so basically it's a combination of bad design decisions (like putting an HTTP server in pid 1; server crashes and takes down the whole system) and sysvinit fanbois throwing a massive (though in part justified) hissy fit.

loopback0

@blakeyrat said:

EDIT: OMG it can also be used as a DVB player, that's the best fea-- what the fuck is a DVB?

OMG you can also customise the tool bars.
You know an application is "good" when one of the top 3 features is customisable tool bars.

Luhmann

@loopback0 said:

You know an application is "good" for the 90ties when one of the top 3 features is customisable tool bars.

TimeWarped TFY

RaceProUK

@blakeyrat said:

what the fuck is a DVB?

Digital Video Broadcasting apparently. So basically, it's TV, just with a silly name.
@loopback0 said:

OMG you can also customise the tool bars.You know an application is "good" when one of the top 3 features is customisable tool bars.

It's important to some people, I guess.

Typical WTDWTF user:

"Is it stable? Does it support [esoteric codec]? What about licensing? DRM? Spyware?"
*gets answers*
"Oh. In that case, I'll find something else."
*finds something else*

Normal person:

"OMG LOOK AT THE SHINY!"
*downloads*
"Oh, why did I download this crap- OMG MORE SHINY!"

loopback0

@RaceProUK said:

it's TV, just with a silly name.

Seems a perfect name for it?

RaceProUK

@loopback0 said:

Seems a perfect name for it?

Normal people just call it 'digital TV'. Or, since all the analogue towers were turned off, 'TV'.

aliceif

I still use analogue cable TV.

RaceProUK

@aliceif said:

analogue cable

I'd be surprised if it hasn't been upgrated to digital by now.

Y'know what, fuck it; I'm leaving the @accalia in this time

Luhmann

@aliceif said:

analogue cable TV

@RaceProUK said:

I'd be surprised if it hasn't been upgrated to digital by now.

It hasn't, because I'm not paying for digital services. Granted, the analogue cable is only important in the last few miles. Everything upstream is digital already.

RaceProUK

@Luhmann said:

the analogue cable is only important in the last few miles. Everything upstream is digital already.

Close enough for me

Luhmann

@RaceProUK said:

Close enough

When close enough is neither close nor enough.

Luhmann

So now I get this one when hitting save ...

"The term archive is possible not available." Possibly? If you are throwing me an error I kind of expect you to know if it is available or not. So it is actually available but you are just throwing me an error to piss me off?

Better go and blow off some steam and hope that this is an intermediate thing. Maybe Jeff worked on this and I'm limited in the number of changes I'm allowed to perform per day.

loopback0

@aliceif said:

I still use analogue cable TV.

Cable is digital only here.

@RaceProUK said:

Normal people just call it 'digital TV'. Or, since all the analogue towers were turned off, 'TV'.

Still doesn't make DVB and it's variants a silly name.

RaceProUK

@loopback0 said:

Still doesn't make DVB and it's variants a silly name.

Well… I guess. Not for us tech-types, anyway.

Mikael_Svahnberg

@loopback0 said:

Cable is digital only here.

So it's DVB-C then?

boomzilla

@FrostCat said:

My 25th is coming up in May, because I got married young.

Huzzah! My 18th is coming up in June, but you're a little older than me.

ijij

@Mikael_Svahnberg said:

Status: gearing up for a week of reading master's theses. Because of this that sentence makes perfect sense to me:

And it's already starting to infect you, I see.

Your meaning is "discoverable", however

boomzilla

@EvanED said:

I don't even know what the author of that comment was even trying to say.

Eh...seems obvious, if very poorly communicated. Linux people like to yell at each other (and the world) about systemd like they used to about Microsoft. I wonder if your spiritual ancestors came over with, e.g., Cortez...

What did he say?
Not sure. It was mostly gibberish, but I think he said something about your mother.
I guess it's a good thing we brought the smallpox blankets after all.

ijij

Got home Friday, the usual "How was your day?"/"How was your day?" "Wally and the Beav did the cutest thing...." etc...

IJIJ: "... and I was doing some PL/SQL stuff... I even got to test part of it and it worked..."
Son: "Daddy?"
IJIJ: "Yes, Son of IJIJ."
Son: "Did you test it in Production?"

Filed under: Those Kojack[sic] Moments that make you proud to be a parent...

HardwareGeek

Status: 04:36: Some asshole drove down my street on the world's loudest motorcycle. I'm sure all my neighbors appreciated the extra-early wake-up as much as I did. !

Filed under: Tea is not supposed to be that color.

RaceProUK

@ijij said:

Son: "Did you test it in Production?"

He'll grow up to be a fine young developer, who's code will never grace the pages of this fair website ;)
@HardwareGeek said:

Filed under: Tea is not supposed to be that color.

Maybe it's Green Tea
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-4-gLlF0uw

I'm here all week; try the veal.

OK, it's turquoise. Or something.

blakeyrat

@RaceProUK said:

I'm clearly behind on my Linux Holy War updates; what's so bad about systemd?

It adds a bunch of nice features that Windows (and OS X, and Solaris, and etc) has had for ages.

Therefore, it's obviously an EVIL CONSPIRACY to turn Linux into Windows!!!!! And even worse, it's from the same guy who wrote Pulse Audio (a.k.a. the only person on Earth seemingly willing to even attempt to improve Linux), and that added a bunch of features that were in Windows first, like a per-application volume mixer! OH NOES! Microsoft conspiracy!!!!!

At least that's all I can figure out. The only technical complaint about systemd I can determine is that it keeps log files in binary instead of plain text, hardly worth 400+ Slashdot comments. Everything else is conspiracy theories.

RaceProUK

@blakeyrat said:

The only technical complaint about systemd I can determine is that it keeps log files in binary instead of plain text, hardly worth 4~~00+~~ Slashdot comments

FTFY ;)

There does seem to be one other issue, and that is the amount it runs given it's PID is 1; if it goes down, it takes the entire system with it, and with how much it does, the chances are uncomfortably high. But maybe that's a Linux WTF rather than a systemd WTF.

HardwareGeek

@Luhmann said:

It hasn't, because I'm not paying for digital services. Granted, the analogue cable is only important in the last few miles. Everything upstream is digital already.

Status: A bit surprised that there aren't (or maybe there are, but I remain blissfully unaware of them) videophile equivalents of the audiophiles who insist that digital is crap, and insist on vinyl records played through vacuum-tube amplifiers.

blakeyrat

@RaceProUK said:

There does seem to be one other issue, and that is the amount it runs given it's PID is 1; if it goes down, it takes the entire system with it, and with how much it does, the chances are uncomfortably high. But maybe that's a Linux WTF rather than a systemd WTF.

Considering EVERY OTHER OS HAS BEEN DOING THAT FOR DECADES, including basically every other Unix, since they're all (unlike Linux) managed by non-idiots-- I'm guessing it's not an issue. There's also a lot of misinformation about it, like a lot of people go, "oh systemd is like 12 different services, THEY ALL RUN AS PID1!" but there's only one that runs as PID1 and I understand it's reasonably-small. The rest are just normal services.

RaceProUK

@blakeyrat said:

Considering EVERY OTHER OS HAS BEEN DOING THAT FOR DECADES, including basically every other Unix, since they're all (unlike Linux) managed by non-idiots-- I'm guessing it's not an issue.

I guess. Plus, if your shell session dies and you can't restart it, PID 1 may as well have died; you'll have to reboot anyway.

HardwareGeek

@RaceProUK said:

Maybe it's Green Tea

Presumably. However, even green tea is not cyan. #04a69c is not a valid color for tea. Just no.

blakeyrat

@RaceProUK said:

I guess. Plus, if your shell session dies and you can't restart it, PID 1 may as well have died; you'll have to reboot anyway.

And currently the situation is everybody who makes Linux services has to write like 57 lines of shellscript to get them to run at all. And since the people at the distro are lazy fucks, half the services don't have the shellscript right, so shit boots in the wrong order or with stupid wrong dependency trees and Linux takes like a half hour to start up.

Some guy comes in and says, "Jesus, dudes, have you ever used Windows or OS X? This sucks-ass compared to the status quo," and he's basically Satan and Hitler rolled into one, as far as Slashdot is concerned.

I find it all hilarious as shit. Also this Twitter account:

https://twitter.com/ShitDevuanSays

(Devuan was a distro founded to make Devian without systemd, it's been 4 months and they haven't accomplished shit.)

loopback0

@Mikael_Svahnberg said:

So it's DVB-C then?

Correct.

Satellite TV is DVB-S/S2.

antiquarian

@blakeyrat said:

That sentence doesn't even slightly make sense, but it'll ne sure to make the Slashdotter's heads explode.

It's what happens when people use big words to try to make themselves seem more intelligent without bothering to find out what the words actually mean. Nothing to see here, please move along.

RaceProUK

@blakeyrat said:

I find it all hilarious as shit. Also this Twitter account:

https://twitter.com/ShitDevuanSays

Since when did Twitter have $-tags?
https://twitter.com/ShitDevuanSays/status/567296940845842432
On the Twitter webside, $RANDOM is a hyperlink; it seems to behave like a hashtag.

Damn you @accalia! Your tendency towards typos is ifecting me!

Seriously, it's getting pretty bad

Onyx

@ijij said:

IJIJ: "Yes, Son of IJIJ."

This made the story even more epic because I started to immediately imagine you as Klingons.

@blakeyrat said:

And even worse, it's from the same guy who wrote Pulse Audio (a.k.a. the only person on Earth seemingly willing to even attempt to improve Linux)

FUCK PULSEAUDIO UP IT'S STDERR PIPE!

Sorry, semi-founded rage (as in, there's something wrong with it, but not on fundamental level), stupid Bluetooth audio bug... Pulse is fine, I like it actually, but this bug is pissing me off. Apparently it got fixed but still not in Mint repos.

I don't get the rage about systemd either. The only thing where I can understand the rage is that they seemed to push it out too early on distros like Arch, same as with Pulse on *buntu. It's buggy and still needs polish. I'm cautiously optimistic now that it's part of Debian - those guys usually take care about usability and I expect at least some automated setup that will at least mitigate some of the problems.