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<TABLE BORDER><TR><TD WIDTH="200">
<A HREF="http://www.linuxgazette.com/">
<IMG ALT="LINUX GAZETTE" SRC="../gx/2002/lglogo_200x41.png"
WIDTH="200" HEIGHT="41" border="0"></A>
<BR CLEAR="all">
<SMALL>...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I></SMALL>
</TD><TD>
<center>
<BIG><BIG><STRONG><FONT COLOR="maroon">The Mailbag</FONT></STRONG></BIG></BIG><BR>
<!-- BEGIN wanted -->
<STRONG>From <A HREF="mailto:gazette@ssc.com">The Readers of <i>Linux Gazette</I></A></STRONG></BIG>
</TD></TR>
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<P>
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<center>
<BIG><STRONG><FONT COLOR="maroon">HELP WANTED : Article Ideas</FONT></STRONG></BIG>
<BR>
<STRONG>Submit comments about articles, or articles themselves (after reading <a href="../faq/author.html">our guidelines</a>) to <A HREF="mailto:gazette@ssc.com">The Editors of <i>Linux Gazette</I></A>, and technical answers and tips about Linux to <A HREF="mailto:linux-questions-only@ssc.com">The Answer Gang</A>.
</STRONG>
</center><HR>
<UL>
<!-- index_text begins -->
<li><A HREF="#wanted.1"
><strong>Linux aol dial-up</strong></a>
<li><A HREF="#wanted.2"
><strong>Linux Infrared</strong></a>
<li><A HREF="#wanted.3"
><strong>On a slower computer...</strong></a>
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</UL>
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<P> <A NAME="wanted.1"><HR WIDTH="75%" ALIGN="center"></A> <P>
<H3><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM ALT="" SRC="../gx/envelope.gif">
<FONT COLOR="navy">Linux aol dial-up</FONT></H3>
Thu, 17 Apr 2003 10:45:48 -0400
<BR>Narendra Shah (<a href="mailto:linux-questions-only@ssc.com?cc=nss99@hotmail.com&subject=%20Re%3A%20%5BLG%2090%5D%20help%20wanted%20%231">nss99 from hotmail.com</a>)
<P>
I have Peng client connect to AOL on RedHat 9.0. It connects to AOL
alright but my system doesn't recognise the active connection. For my
browser or gFTP clients do not connect to any http or ftp sites.
</P>
<P>
What do I have to do so that the system/n/w config understands the
active connection
</P>
<P>
-Narendra
</P>
<blockquote><font color="#000066">Well folks, it's not a late edition of a Fool's Day joke ..
<a href="http://www.peng.apinc.org">Peng</a>
really is intended for letting people use their AOL dialup to get what
we'd consider more ordinary connectivity. Anyone out there
hitting the net this way? Let us know how you do it!
-- Heather</font></blockquote>
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<H3><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM ALT="" SRC="../gx/envelope.gif">
<FONT COLOR="navy">Linux Infrared</FONT></H3>
Sun, 6 Apr 2003 18:25:21 +0530
<BR>Joydeep Bakshi (<a href="mailto:linux-questions-only@ssc.com?cc=joy12@vsnl.net&subject=%20Re%3A%20%5BLG%2090%5D%20help%20wanted%20%232">joy12 from vsnl.net</a>)
<P>
Hi all,
I am interested to make an infrared remote for linux. I have also visited the
LIRC webpage. if there is any body who has already build this remote please
tell me how it is working and a little bit about the circuit &amp; driver
,library etc u have used. please share ur experience with me.
</P>
<P>
If some one is using creative infrasuite remote (credit card size) , please
let me know. does it need the separate IR receiver or the inbuilt IR in the
CD Rom is enough ? I have the Panasonic Tv remote at home. so please let me
know too if there is any body using this remote with LIRC.
</P>
<P>
thanks in advanced.
</P>
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<H3><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM ALT="" SRC="../gx/envelope.gif">
<FONT COLOR="navy">On a slower computer...</FONT></H3>
Tue, 8 Apr 2003 01:17:51 -0500
<BR>Thomas (<a href="mailto:linux-questions-only@ssc.com?cc=tea@cyberscope.net&subject=%20Re%3A%20%5BLG%2090%5D%20help%20wanted%20%233">tea from cyberscope.net</a>)
<P>
Hello,
</P>
<P>
About 8.0 LInux installation either "stand alone"? or install with
windows on a pc. can you offer tips on installing it to a 75 mhz
computer. what of fdisk or other info format?
</P>
<P>
You may refer my request on to someone else in club as you desire.
Thank you,for you time.
</P>
<blockquote><font color="#000066">Now, small distros and distros-on-floppy we have by the dozens. But RH
8 compatible? Or kickstart floppies that chop out a bunch of that
memory hogging, CPU slogging stuff? An article on keeping your Linux
installers on a diet would be keen. Just in time for Summer, too.
-- Heather</font></blockquote>
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<HR>
<center>
<BIG><STRONG><FONT COLOR="maroon">GENERAL MAIL</FONT></STRONG></BIG>
<BR>
</center><HR>
<UL>
<!-- index_text begins -->
<li><A HREF="#mailbag.1"
></a>Re: LG #89, Perl One-Liner --or--
<br><A HREF="#mailbag.1"
><strong>A Walk through Frink's Confusion</strong></a>
<li><A HREF="#mailbag.2"
><strong>Cloning workstations article</strong></a>
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</UL>
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<H3><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM ALT="" SRC="../gx/envelope.gif">
<FONT COLOR="navy">A Walk through Frink's Confusion</FONT></H3>
Wed, 2 Apr 2003 17:38:01 -0800 (PST)
<BR>Ben Okopnik (<a href="mailto:gazette@ssc.com?subject=%20Re%3A%20%5BLG%2090%5D%20mailbag%20%231">the <em>LG</em> Answer Gang</a>)
<BR>Question by Brad Chapman (jabiru_croc from yahoo.com)
<!-- ::
A Walk through Frink's Confusion
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
:: -->
<P><STRONG>
I don't understand why this:
</STRONG></P>
<pre><strong>x=`echo -e "\240"`;mkdir $x;echo "hostname -f"&gt;$x/perl;chmod +x $x/perl;export PATH=$x:$PATH;clear
</strong></pre>
<P><STRONG>
combined with this:
</STRONG></P>
<pre><strong>perl -we'fqdn'
</strong></pre>
<P><STRONG>
is considered an Easter Egg. How do you enter it into a bash prompt to
make it an Easter Egg?
</STRONG></P>
<P><STRONG>
Brad
</STRONG></P>
<P><STRONG>
*looks for riffles, JIC*
</STRONG></P>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
I don't understand your question. What Easter Egg? What the heck does
"enter it into a bash prompt" mean ("enter at the command line", maybe?)
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<P><STRONG>
That's what I meant. Woomert's command line looked as if it was meant to
be entered directly into a shell prompt. Is it meant to be entered some
other way?
</STRONG></P>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
Ah, OK. Yes, it's meant to be entered at the shell prompt.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
What did you try? What results did you get? What did you expect to see
instead? Give me some info to go on, and I might be able to help you -
if I can get an idea of what you're asking for.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<P><STRONG>
I tried entering the x=&quot; line, then calling perl -we'fqdn' to see the output.
That worked.
</STRONG></P>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
&lt;grin&gt; Except... it didn't. There's no such function as "fqdn" in Perl;
it's just a random string that I munged up, an abbrvtn for "fully
qualified domain name."
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<P><STRONG>
What I was expecting was something which made perl stop working
or something which would munge my command line.
</STRONG></P>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
That's exactly what you've got: Perl is now "broken". No matter how you
invoke it, it will now type the FQDN.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<P><STRONG>
I have an idea on what this is meant to do, though:
</STRONG></P>
<pre><strong>x=`echo -e "\240"`;mkdir $x;echo "hostname -f"&gt;$x/perl;chmod +x $x/perl;export PATH=$x:$PATH;clear
</strong></pre>
<pre><strong>echo -e "\240" : ASCII code 240
mkdir $x : create a directory with name $x
</strong></pre>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
Well, with the content of $x - which is an "invisible" ASCII character
(at least with the default LOCALE), easy to miss when you do an "ls".
<IMG SRC="../gx/dennis/smily.gif" ALT=":)"
height="24" width="20" align="middle">
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Jason]
Hmmm....my 'ls' shows the escape character. ("\240") That's becasue the '-b'
(show escape characters) is in $LS_OPTIONS, which is used in my 'ls' alias.
That's pretty neat, but I find a backspace character has more intersting
effects:
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<blockquote><pre>~/tmp$ x=$(echo -e '\b')
~/tmp$ mkdir $x
~/tmp$ touch $x/lala
~/tmp$ ls
\b/
~/tmp$ cd ^H/
~/tmp$ ls
lala
~/tmp$ cd ..
~/tmp$
</pre></blockquote>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
It makes it look like you don't even change directory! And the output of the
'ls' command is, of course, given the -b options via my alias. Normally, (my
version of) ls outputs a '?' when there's an unprintable character.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<pre><strong>echo "hostname -f"&gt;$x/perl : echo the hostname into a file named perl in $x
</strong></pre>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
Nope. Echo <EM>the string</EM> "hostname -f" into that file.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<pre><strong>chmod +x $x/perl : make the perl file executable
</strong></pre>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
Thus making it an executable shell script which runs "hostname -f".
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<pre><strong>export PATH=$x:PATH;clear : adds $x to the $PATH
</strong></pre>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
Much more importantly, putting $x <EM>at the front</EM> of the PATH - meaning
that the executables in there will get run instead of the others. When
you type "perl", the actual Perl binary never gets executed: the shell
script is now the first "perl" in the path!
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<P><STRONG>
Is this Easter Egg supposed to make perl act strange?
</STRONG></P>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
It's not an "Easter Egg"; that term has a specific meaning (hidden
feature that does something cute when you run it, like the maze in MS
Excel, a mini-version of a Doom-like game in Word some years ago, etc.)
That's what had me confused. It's a hack (not a software hack, either;
Woomert just hacked Frink's naivete, too easy of a target by half.
<IMG SRC="../gx/dennis/smily.gif" ALT=":)"
height="24" width="20" align="middle">
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
As to what it does - it makes Perl go away.
<IMG SRC="../gx/dennis/smily.gif" ALT=":)"
height="24" width="20" align="middle"> Until Frink finds the
problem and fixes it (possibly by logging out, closing that xterm, or
rebooting), invoking "perl" will do nothing more than print the FQDN.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Jason]
Only in UNIX can you do so much interesting stuff with a few commands. A while
back I was playing with a script that would, when run, print
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<blockquote><pre>rm -rf /home/username.....12345K deleted
</pre></blockquote>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
where username is your username and 12345K is however much stuff you have in
your home directory. The disk churning sounds would be 'du' running to figure
out how much stuff in your home directory there was. Then the tricky bit was
that the script would add some commands to your .bashrc, which changes $HOME
to <TT>/tmp/$RANDOM</TT> and cds to that directory, so when the user logs in again he
thinks all his files are gone. I thought about uuencoding it and posting it to
the TAG on April 1st, but decided not to.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
Oh, <EM>massively</EM> cute! You should, of course, set the command prompt to
show that the user is still in his home directory...
<IMG SRC="../gx/dennis/smily.gif" ALT=":)"
height="24" width="20" align="middle">))
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Jason]
That's what setting $HOME does.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
[Ben]
Oh, I meant an explicit "<TT>/home/joe</TT>" rather than "~", but you're right -
that's even better.
</BLOCKQUOTE>
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<H3><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM ALT="" SRC="../gx/envelope.gif">
<FONT COLOR="navy">Cloning workstations article</FONT></H3>
Wed, 30 Apr 2003 17:06:28 +0200
<BR>Dirk Schouten (<a href="mailto:gazette@ssc.com?subject=%20Re%3A%20%5BLG%2090%5D%20mailbag%20%232">schoutdi from knoware.nl</a>)
<P><STRONG>
Esteemed editor,
</STRONG></P>
<P><STRONG>
In your April issue of Linxu Gazette there is an an article on
<A HREF="../issue89/ward.html">Cloning Workstations with Linux</A> by Mr. Alan Ward.
An article that starts with:
</STRONG></P>
<P><STRONG><BLOCKQuote>
"Anybody who has had to install a park of 10 - 100 workstations with
exactly the same operating system and programs will have wondered if ...etc"
is able to raise my curiousity.
</BLOCKQuote></STRONG></P>
<P><STRONG><DL><DT>
To my surprise 'Ghost for Unix' was not mentioned by the author.
<DD><A HREF="http://www.feyrer.de/g4u"
>http://www.feyrer.de/g4u</A>
</DL></STRONG></P>
<P><STRONG>
IMHO the best solution for a hundred or so workstations.
</STRONG></P>
<P><STRONG>
Kind regards,
<BR>Dirk
</STRONG></P>
<P>
Please note that g4u is based on BSD, not Linux.
The techniques used are, however, very similar.
</P>
<P>
Best regards,
<BR>Alan Ward
</P>
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<h5>This page edited and maintained by the Editors of <I>Linux Gazette</I><br>HTML script maintained by <A HREF="mailto:star@starshine.org">Heather Stern</a> of Starshine Technical Services, <A HREF="http://www.starshine.org/">http://www.starshine.org/</A>
<br>Copyright &copy; 2003
<br>Copying license <A HREF="http://www.linuxgazette.com/copying.html">http://www.linuxgazette.com/copying.html</A>
<BR>Published in Issue 90 of <i>Linux Gazette</i>, May 2003</H5>
</STRONG></SMALL></CENTER>
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