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the "pre-blog polls", now reside bellow the blog. please jump to the end of the page to have a little vote in them, just for fun. :)

... now, on with the rambling blog!

Thursday 29 April 2010

weight of a duck?

it's official. witch-alpha2 has been released early! yay! http://puffinux.freeforums.org/post33.html#p33 biiiiiig change from alpha1.

if you want more information beyond what's divulged in the puffinux forums page (the official home of witch), then take a look here, click the button: http://instantsfun.es/legendary

Thursday 22 April 2010

witches! BURN THEM!

...a conversation in #!'s irc, has got me sidetracked in the middle of my big install-fest.

WITCH!
Weight of a Duck, Burn 'em!

http://omploader.org/vNDhsNA/witch-alpha1.txt

http://omploader.org/vNDhscA/witch-alpha1.iso
(thnx for being so cool omploader)
http://data.jonys.info/witch/witch-alpha1.iso
(thnx for da mirror jony123)

for more info, check out the announcement at puffinux, my forum for all my distros, vapourware and the more solid ones.  ;D
http://puffinux.freeforums.org/witch-alpha1-released-t21.html

Wednesday 21 April 2010

LevinRhan gets fed up with masked packages

since i'm quite chatty these days, and this has come up in conversation a few times, rather than respond to the "what are u installing" questions fresh each time, i'm drawing out here, the rough plans as they are at this stage, for my big old drastic revamp of my whole system.  biggest change for years.

on the 300gig velociraptor which until now, has only ever had 3 partitions, i plan on having:

sda1 16gb Swap 
(yeah, i've heard not to go above 4... what do they know about my needs)

sda2 16gb Secondary System  
(where i'll b when it hits the fan)

sda3 ??mb  GRUBBY 
(a small distro, probably slitaz, with a saikee style grub chainloader)
(THE MOST IMPORTANT PARTITION)

sda4 ~~ extended
sda5 3gb #!Statler  vanilla
(or likely in the future, whatever is the most up to date crunchbang)

sda6 16gb #!Statler Squishy
("squishy" from hence forth, for purposes of this document, simply refers to my custom configuration as used in default squishboom)

sda7 16gb #!9.04 Squishy
(old faithful, at least it has been for my laptop for the past whiley)

sda8 3gb Archbang vanilla

(likely the latest archbang.  cos u know, i like to keep track of it's progress too.)

sda9 >5gb Archbang Squishy
(yep, my custom configuration built on archbang... unsure how big i should make it... more likely will be another 16gb, echoing the partitioning for the crunchbangs.)

sda10 5gb Debian - Squishy
(yep, its not statler, it might be squeezebang, but the idea is more to build a squishboom on debian from scratch.)

sda11 5gb Crux - Squishy
(CRUX!   that's right!  i've long wanted to give it a shot... so why not give it some space for the funs.)

sda12 1gb Slitaz - Squishy
(was about to limit it to 512mb only, but 1gb just seems a little more round and convenient)

sda13 5gb Slackware - Squishy
(LONG have i been a Slackware admirer, :)  so i imagine i'll be in full on tantric geekgasm over having a squishslack.)

sda14 3gb Slax - Squishy
(slax!?   SLAX!?   yeah... :)  its loadsa fun.  has great potential to be a dream distro, but as it is, it's more like rummaging around a junkyard trying to put a decent system together.  still... loadsa fun... and easy to make your own distro.)


sda15 ~ sabayon - squishy
(nope... purpose of this is an end to my time with gentoo based... unless i opt for paludis)

sda15 ??gb BSD
sda16 ??gb BSD
sda17 ??gb BSD
sda18 ??gb BSD
(4 BSDs!?  yeah.   most likely PC, FREE, DragonFly & Open)

sda19 ??gb ICAROS
(yeah, i might even stick an aros in there.)

sda20 ??gb AROSBOOM (squishy)
(and if i stick aros in... why not see if i can go mad and install various more familiar apps for the interface)

sda21 room for more distro surfing
sda22 room for more distro surfing
sda23 room for more distro surfing
sda24 room for more distro surfing
sda25 room for more distro surfing
...and more?

and then on sdb 1.5tb internal, besides some backup partitions, storage, there's already partitions prep'd for more.

besides all my various usb pendrives, i'll make sure at least one of them has a full on chainloader grub too, incase something happens to my sda3.   also, in sda3, i'll make sure there's information (updated periodically) with what is in all the partitions... y'know, in a seperate text file, so i dont go messing about too much in the grub config and risking borking it with a pebcak error.

pretty wild huh?



aaaand, if this idea has just come upon me in my fever while ill, i've still got my dd'd backup of my old major grande install of sabayon, and two other sequentially smaller sabayon installs backed up too, so i can always go back.  :)

i'm taking it slow and cautious still tho... i dont want to make any more silly mistakes while my thinking is still a bit groggy from this cold, or flu or whatever i've had.


there.   info overload.   :D  now i just need to link next time someone asks me what i'm up to.  :D

Tuesday 20 April 2010

o noez

"...there will still be idiots."


was the echo of the realization i just had... following the calleman/lungold interpretation of the mayan consciousness calendar... just as there is not the massive ubiquity unto absolute similarity absolutely, as in there are now, that which is not as "consciously evolved" relatively co-existing, so as the progression continues, will the wake accelerate past the boat?

the further back, are the waves bigger? or are they lost in the chaotic noise? or is the "chaotic noise" back there sufficiently self organising? sufficiently inteligent to transcend the entropy?

can the wake accelerate past the boat?

are we the water, or the boat?

Friday 16 April 2010

yacb

yacb, Yet Another Config Backup.

this time, in my fresh archbang install, i've installed firefox and all the addons i use in my crunchayon* opperating system's firefox.

the purpose of this is so that should i need to again, i can just (in theory) download and decompress this .mozilla folder to my home folder, and assuming the correct version of firefox is installed, it will run just as i like it, with all my addons.

for clarity of reference, here are the addons, as generated by  MR Tech Toolkit:

Generated: Fri Apr 16 2010 15:56:05 GMT+0000 (UTC)
User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux x86_64; en-US; rv:1.9.2.3) Gecko/20100402 Namoroka/3.6.3
Build ID: 20100402183726

Enabled Extensions: [14]

Installed Themes: [4]

Installed Plugins: (1)
  • Shockwave Flash

 and without further ado, here's the link to the uploaded config:
http://omploader.org/vNDY2Zw/digitsfresharch.mozilla.tar.lzma
or the short link:
http://omploader.org/vNDY2Zw
or if for some reason you wish to see omploader's info page about it:
http://omploader.org/iNDY2Zw


but i'm not stopping there.

as nice as the config files for conky, tint2 and openbox's menu.xml and rc.xml in vanilla archbang 2 rc2 are, i've grown too accustomed to my own configuration, especially the keyboard shortcuts... not really all that fussed about my menu.xml to be honest tho.  its not as useful once u get a nice logical and intuitive keyboard shortcut setup.  

just to illustrate some of the general guidelines in my keyboard shortcuts:

Ctrl, like the name suggests, is generally for "control", root control that is.  so for example, if u press Tux*** - f to launch file manager, Ctrl - Tux - f to do the same, but with root priveledges.

Alt, like the name suggests, is either used to "alternate" something, like perhaps a toggle, or it is used as an alternative where that particular key combination (without the alt) is already taken by something else, but no other suitable alternative key had been found.  one example of this in squishboom is the package manager and partition editor, both mapped to p.  as package management is likely the more commonly used, it gets Tux-p, while the likely less often used partition editor is assigned the Tux-Alt-p.

Tux, as the more sherlock holmes / quincey / ironside / dunnaway among you may have already guessed, is for things relating to the opperating system... or more accurately/commonly, the window manager.  like for starting applications, adjusting transparencies, switching desktops....

...well, sort of.  it's an imperfect system, as the underlying crunchbang original controls were pretty much all kept intact so to preserve useability and workflow for those switching from crunchbang to squishboom.   squishboom's interface can be described with reasonable accuracy as crunchbang plus.

ooookay, enough waffle, to the point, here are the links to my squishboom** configs:

http://omploader.org/vNDY3Yg/digitssquishboomopenboxconfigs.tar.lzma
be advised, it may not all work, for example, there will be shortcuts in the rc.xml which will refer to applications not installed, and the autostart script will attempt to launch files which arent available.  the menu.xml has been neglected quite a bit thnx to both my shortcuts, and the debian automenu included within it, which of course will not function in non debian/ubuntu based distros.

http://omploader.org/vNDY3aA/digitssquishboomtint2configs.tar.lzma
my tint2 config.  maximising screen space usage, taking a leaf out of the book of tiling window management.  :)

http://omploader.org/vNDY3aw/digitssquishboomconkys.tar.lzma
and the conkys.   as nice an idea as the keybinding conkyswitcher is, its not essential for me at the moment with my system of shortcuts i can fathom easily enough without the cheatsheet.

http://omploader.org/vNDY3ZQ/digitssquishboomtildaconfig.tar.lzma
i've also included my tilda config, because i always install it, and its becoming an all too familiar experience reconfiguring it in every distro i install.

okies, that'll do the job.

*crunchayon is the nickname i gave to a minimal sabayon 5.1 install, configured to be like as is in squishboom (or crunchbang if you like).

** squishboom originally being my crunchbang adaption inspired by crunchbang, and attempting to take that which i liked about crunchbang most, further.

*** Tux is name i give to what you may know of as the "Super" or "Windows" button/key.   mine has a little "Tux" the penguin picture on it.  :)

Thursday 15 April 2010

Don't be wrapped in plastic!

lemme set the scene for ya...

i installed archbang, but made a fail on my grub bootloader issues.

that's the scene.

and why did that scene take place in our stage production?

too long with what i, unashamedly insultingly call, noob distros.

it may seem more convenient that everything "just works", but one of the beauties of them not working, is that it forces your hand to learn something.

and that i intend as the central theme here.  learning something!



there are two pieces to the jigsaw of my experience-led mental make-up, that i'd love to hammer home to the world... 

these experiences came from:
1: an episode of star trek where a society is in danger of collapse because a computer that has taken care of their every whim for ages without malfunction starts to break down, and no one knows a thing about it.
2: the gnu.org/philosophy pages.

i summed it up in a near bumper sticker sized quote on a forum...

if your life depends on a computer, then know how it works!
(~edit~ and even if it doesnt too)

or at the very least, start learning!

dont be wrapped in plastic.  basically.

y'know... dont shut yourself off from the world around you.

your operating system is part of that world, and chances are, (especially if you are sad enthusiastic enough to be reading this blog), a really important one!

with proprietary, you're just not really given the chance.  trade secret, keep out, not allowed.

maybe back in the DOS days you felt a little closer to truth, but then along came macs, and that just completely denied the "end user" any chance of knowing what was really going on in their machine, and the DOS lineage pretty much followed in this way.

well it ain my way, no more.

back in the days of reading up on the gnu philosophy, i thought i understood it then... and i did, i was intelectually sold on the idea, and now i hope i KNOW it.

and dont think that just once you also "get it" and make the decision to leave your long familiar proprietary operating system, that your days in a bubble are over... there's still plastic sheeting over many open source distros.

yeah, sure, u can take it off.  you are actually free to look under the hood, and perhaps on occasion you may be asked to, or even required to peek under the plastic wrap which separates you from being one step closer to truth and reality, once in a while.

but if you dont want to fall the way of those who's existence was at risk, you'll have a motivation to your curiosity, you'll look under that plastic hood, you'll want the truth, not the plastic convenience facade.

wont you...?

yeah... convenience has real allure.

Richard stallman warned me.   he warned us all.

and if he had the "Public Relations" budget of the corporations, we all might have heard him over the corporate roar.

well i consider myself getting closer to living the ideals i've long held, now that i have arch installed.

my grub problem?

oh, i fixed that pretty quick... see, i was just a bit rusty after too many years of not needing to think, letting the magic under the plastic wrap do it all for me.

no more.

now the arch way,
is my way.

Monday 12 April 2010

digits personal notes on archbang (2, rc2, 64bit, live cd)

searchmonkey
very glad it's included, but i wonder if it could have it's default text editor, folder explorer and web browser already configured, out of the box.


conky & conkyswitcher
so very chuffed with the inclusion of the super+x to toggle the keyboard shortcut hints.
~this little tidbit, to my perception, is a great exemplar of what happens when you take a little of what makes crunchbang great, and a little of what makes arch great, and mate the two. :)


last time i booted into the live system:
after copying to ram, and installing a few little apps i like, (tilda & gimp), and taking a little look at the installer, amidst making some archbang graphics, with little prior warning, i could no longer make changes to the graphics i was working on, error messages popping up familiar to me when in my other system while running off.

this time, running install, i got a message from sed, how it couldnt read from xorg, just after the install packages segment.

everything else seemed to go well.  very impressed with the nuances of the installation method.   ... though it did all chew up a little more ram than i was expecting it would, still well within acceptible levels for this machine.

i dont miss the arch cursor from archbang2 rc1.  ;)  but it was a nice treat to be shown it.  seeing it first time around inspired me to make my own little cursor... a small mushroom, with a purple glow. ;)


i've got a similar sense of keen excitement about perhaps making archbang my metadistro, my base distro, from which i start to configure my system, as i got when first installing my first distro, or the first time i installed slackware, or when i first realised what a gift crunchbang was for me.  i expect archbang to probably double performance over an ubuntu based system, and further deepen my education in linux ways... specifically, the arch way.  :)

much thanks to the archbangers for providing this very welcome leg up to more conveniently enter the flow of the arch way.  

this is similar to my gratitude a few years back when i discovered sabayon, the convenient leg-up into gentoo, though perhaps the biggest difference here is, little and large.  sabayon, at least when i hooked up with it in version 3.4 FULL, had the closest of any distro i had encountered, to including everything including the kitchen sink.  archbang...  quite the opposite.  after my richly rewarding experiences with a distro like sabayon, where i like to sum it up as "the o'brien way" (born from one comment he made to a cardassian: "I wouldnt like to be caught without a third backup"), i got to know better my options, develop my preferences... so now i feel comfortable trying it on in a more cardassian way, where everything "should just work".  i know it wont, ;)  i know i'll encounter both pebcak errors, and issues i have to resolve myself from using a system that prides itself on being bleeding edge.   thats all part of the excitement, the exhileration of the voyage i am choosing.


ho ho ho...  and this started out so neat and concise.  oh well, glad i got lost in ramble there, just to make sure this post lives up to my intro blurb to this blog.   ;)

suffice to say... i expect mentions of archbang will make more appearances in digit's linux blog from now on.   not to mention, ...  use as base in my squishboom plans, of which i intend to convert my installation scripts to be archbang compatable as well as the crunchbang compatable version.  woohoo...   excuse me while i let this out uncensorred...  FUCK I LOVE LINUX!   lol.  freedomware ftw.

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