Advantage of knowing a tiny bit about Vista and unix
Mark Conrad
Reasons for learning a bit about unix and Vista.
Notice I lumped them together, that is because they
are both difficult, when with a little design effort,
they could have been made _easy_ , like good old
Macs and OSX.
Where was I, oh yeah, posting about "good reasons"
to diddle with these difficult subjects.
Excuse my mental wanderings, senile here.
Now I know diddly squat about unix, I know one
unix utility on a superficial basis, the "dd" util.
One out of about 800 unix "things" available to
us Mac users, shame on all of us for not spending
ten years learning unix.
So recently, still playing with dd, I got a brief
look at things unix geeks here take for granted.
I decided, in my senile mind, to use dd to do two
things I have always wanted to do.
Using my MacBook Pro
*******************
1) Run Boot Camp on an external hard drive
2) Boot Vista from an external hard drive
It is a done deal, achieved both goals.
Imagine what I could do if I knew _two_ unixy
things out of 800 things!
Think I will look over some of Tom Stiller's old
posts that I saved, and try to learn another unix
trick.
Meanwhile, now that I have flushed that
infernal Vista Boot Camp partition off of my
internal hard drive, I can ban Vista to that cheap
external drive, where it belongs.
I can look my fellow Mac users in the eye and
truthfully claim that Vista is not contaminating
my MacBook Pro.
They don't need to know that I hid Vista on a
cheap 300GB external hard drive, to use it on
my Mac whenever I want to go slumming.
Next week, need to verify that Vista/Dragon is
still able to turn my speech into text at the
rate of 336wpm. (using my external hard drive)
That is as fast as I can talk without causing
any errors in the resulting text.
Those "fast talker" guys we sometimes hear on TV
commercials can talk above 600wpm.
Normal speed of talking is in the 100-220wpm range
for ordinary people, probably centered near 160wpm
for most people.
Mark-
fishfry
Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> Reasons for learning a bit about unix and Vista.
>
> Notice I lumped them together, that is because they
> are both difficult, when with a little design effort,
> they could have been made _easy_ , like good old
> Macs and OSX.
>
OS X *is* *nix. What are you talking about?
Mark Conrad
<BLOCKSPAMfishfry-FF...@comcast.dca.giganews.com>,
fishfry <BLOCKSPA...@your-mailbox.com> wrote:
Sun Microsystems would not agree with you at all.
<http://www.sun.com/desktop/workstation/ultra40/index.xml>
Mac users would not even know how to run the $1,995
Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation with the Sun Solaris 10 OS.
Likewise, a Sun workstation user would be disappointed with
the lack of unix features, lack of unix speed and flexibility,
that a $2,000 Mac box has, as compared to the same cost Sun
hardware and Sun Solaris 10 operating system.
Now why don't you try being truthful for a change, and post
that Mac/OS X can do _some_ of the unix that the same-cost
Sun/Solaris-10 can do, albiet at a more sluggish pace and
with nowhere near the reliability of the Sun products.
The day I see NASA switching to Macs/OS X for their life-critical
missions, is the day I will believe that "OS X *is* *nix".
Mark-
Mark-
Mark Conrad
<thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> Using my MacBook Pro
> *******************
> 1) Run Boot Camp on an external hard drive
> 2) Boot Vista from an external hard drive
>
> It is a done deal, achieved both goals.
Whoops! I better look at the $MS EULA.
Microsoft will not allow Vista users to boot Vista from
an external hard drive, and here I went and did it.
Do not want the $MS goon squad to smash in my front door.
Mark-
Mark Conrad
Steiner <mich...@michelle.org> wrote:
> In article <240720082044166174%thi...@absolutely.invalid>,
> Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
>
> > > OS X *is* *nix. What are you talking about?
> >
> >
> > Sun Microsystems would not agree with you at all.
>
> Mac OS X (running on Intel processors) is certified and registered with
> the X/Open Company as being a true Unix.
> <http://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/certificates/1190p.pdf>
>
> Anyone buying a Registered Product is guaranteed that:
...<clipped>...
The two different products (Sun vs Apple) have strengths
in different areas, smarten up.
Mark-
Gregory Weston
Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> In article
> <BLOCKSPAMfishfry-FF...@comcast.dca.giganews.com>,
> fishfry <BLOCKSPA...@your-mailbox.com> wrote:
>
> > In article <240720081346016831%thi...@absolutely.invalid>,
> > Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> >
> > > Reasons for learning a bit about unix and Vista.
> > >
> > > Notice I lumped them together, that is because they
> > > are both difficult, when with a little design effort,
> > > they could have been made _easy_ , like good old
> > > Macs and OSX.
> > >
> >
> > OS X *is* *nix. What are you talking about?
>
>
> Sun Microsystems would not agree with you at all.
a) What makes you say that?
b) What makes you think Sun has veto power in deciding whether something
is UNIX, no matter what they think of the product?
> Mac users would not even know how to run the $1,995
> Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation with the Sun Solaris 10 OS.
So you're saying that using a Mac someone disallows someone from also
being a competent Solaris user? I guess I'll have to get rid of one of
my machines.
> Likewise, a Sun workstation user would be disappointed with
> the lack of unix features, lack of unix speed and flexibility,
> that a $2,000 Mac box has, as compared to the same cost Sun
> hardware and Sun Solaris 10 operating system.
Now I'm confused. I've been using Solaris longer than Mac OS X has
existed. Please: Help me realize that I'm disappointed in the Mac.
> Now why don't you try being truthful for a change, and post
> that Mac/OS X can do _some_ of the unix that the same-cost
> Sun/Solaris-10 can do, albiet at a more sluggish pace and
> with nowhere near the reliability of the Sun products.
>
>
> The day I see NASA switching to Macs/OS X for their life-critical
> missions, is the day I will believe that "OS X *is* *nix".
>
> Mark-
>
> Mark-
The sound of a dog with a hare-lip?
--
"Harry?" Ron's voice was a mere whisper. "Do you smell something ... burning?"
- Harry Potter and the Odor of the Phoenix
Mark Conrad
Gregory Weston <u...@splook.com> wrote:
> > Mac users would not even know how to run the $1,995
> > Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation with the Sun Solaris 10 OS.
>
> So you're saying that using a Mac someone disallows someone from also
> being a competent Solaris user?
Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for
the complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
Wish I knew more unix, however being semi-senile due to the
normal aging process, I find it _very_ difficult to learn,
unless of course one throws ten years at it.
Never did understand why the Unix Gods made unix so
difficult to learn, when they did not need to.
Some sort of job security?
> Now I'm confused. I've been using Solaris longer than Mac OS X has
> existed. Please: Help me realize that I'm disappointed in the Mac.
Yes, if the Mac were your only computer.
I do not see you selling your Solaris OS on eBay, so it must
have some advantages for you.
You never did post what type of computer you are running
Solaris on, hope for your sake it is not a junky Windows box.
Arf-
Arf-
--
Back to my normal barking now, I had
some fluffy stuffing tangled in my teeth
during my last post.
Mike Rosenberg
> Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for
> the complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
Most _COMPUTER_ users in general have a low tolerance for the complexity
of anything other than getting their required tasks accomplished.
--
I kill Google Groups posts. See http://improve-usenet.org for details.
<http://designsbymike.net/shop/mac.cgi> Mac and geek T-shirts & gifts
<http://designsbymike.net/shop/prius.cgi> Prius shirts/bumper stickers
<http://designsbymike.net/shop/greet.cgi> Holiday cards with attitude
Gregory Weston
Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> In article <uce-23568A.0...@newsclstr02.news.prodigy.com>,
> Gregory Weston <u...@splook.com> wrote:
>
> > > Mac users would not even know how to run the $1,995
> > > Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation with the Sun Solaris 10 OS.
> >
> > So you're saying that using a Mac someone disallows someone from also
> > being a competent Solaris user?
>
> Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for
> the complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
I'm confused. You made the blanket statement that "Mac users would not
even know ..." I asked if I was correct in thinking that you meant that
Mac use somehow disallowed someone from learning UNIX and you start by
saying "yes" and then contradict it by acknowledging that Mac users can
(and some do) have facility with UNIX.
You've conflated two very different notions. If Mac OS actually did
somehow prevent its users from becoming familiar with any other
techniques that would be bad. But there's no such effect. The only
effect is that in general Mac users are not *required* to learn other
techniques. Surely that expanded accessibility, which allows larger
numbers of people than ever before to be profitable tool *users* without
demanding that they also be technicians is not a bad thing? That would
be comparable to saying that it's bad that people can use window fans
without being able to describe the work of Michael Faraday.
> Wish I knew more unix, however being semi-senile due to the
> normal aging process, I find it _very_ difficult to learn,
> unless of course one throws ten years at it.
>
> Never did understand why the Unix Gods made unix so
> difficult to learn, when they did not need to.
>
> Some sort of job security?
Transmission lines that were barely able to keep up with a competent
touch-typist and paid for per-character effectively means they *did*
need to.
> > Now I'm confused. I've been using Solaris longer than Mac OS X has
> > existed. Please: Help me realize that I'm disappointed in the Mac.
>
> Yes, if the Mac were your only computer.
That sentence is nonsensical. You seem to be saying that if the Mac were
my only computer then I'd be disappointed in it. But if I were
disappointed with my only machine I would, knowing alternatives exist,
investigate switching. So you can't have meant that. But you also can't
mean what you originally implied - that familiarity with alternatives
would render Macs disappointing - because I *am* familiar with many
alternatives and am not disappointed.
> I do not see you selling your Solaris OS on eBay, so it must
> have some advantages for you.
You haven't seen me sell my BeBox yet either, but in 2008 BeOS has
exactly one win over Mac OS X, and that's that BMessages are much
simpler to use than AppleEvents for any given task.
I keep Solaris around because some of the tools and techniques are
*different* and in my line of work it behooves me to be facile with as
many different systems and idioms as is reasonable. I do *not* keep
Solaris around because it's somehow "more UNIXey" than OS X.
G
Ian Gregory
> Never did understand why the Unix Gods made unix so difficult to
> learn, when they did not need to.
Unix is user friendly - it is just picky about it's friends.
Ian
--
Ian Gregory
http://www.zenatode.org.uk/ian/
thepixelfreak
> Never did understand why the Unix Gods made unix so
> difficult to learn, when they did not need to.
>
> Some sort of job security?
Huh? Simply put, operating systems provide services to applications
(cpu, memory, system calls etc) and provide filesystems for users to
store data (files, directories or folders in Mac parlance). What is so
difficult about Unix? The Mac makes things nice and graphical, unix
uses a command line (and MOST unix operating systems provided a
Motif/X-window based GUI front end ala mac/windows). In the end, all
computers are the same. They run your applications, they save your data
in a filesystem.
--
thepixelfreak
VAXman-
>In article <250720080540175484%thi...@absolutely.invalid>,
> Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
>
>> > So you're saying that using a Mac someone disallows someone from
>> > also being a competent Solaris user?
>>
>> Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for the
>> complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
>
>reason they're Mac users. (Actually, to be fair, the same can be said
>of Windows users; they don't need unix either.)
Save that there's never been anything unix or unix-like behind the blinds
of Weendoze.
I'm a Mac user because there *IS* unix "underpinning" Mac OS X.
--
VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM
... pejorative statements of opinion are entitled to constitutional protection
no matter how extreme, vituperous, or vigorously expressed they may be. (NJSC)
Copr. 2008 Brian Schenkenberger. Publication of _this_ usenet article outside
of usenet _must_ include its contents in its entirety including this copyright
notice, disclaimer and quotations.
Tim McNamara
I can never tell if you are a idiot or just an idiot who thinks he's
provocative. Now you've gone from "OS X is not Unix" simply because
"Mac users wouldn't be able to run a Sun workstation" to "the two
products have strengths in different areas." In short, Michelle just
kicked your ass in one post. Jeez.
OS X is POSIX compliant. It is "Unix" as much as GNU/Linux distros
are Unix, as much as BSD distros are Unix and as much as Sun's distros
are Unix. Of course, nothing other than Unix itself is really Unix
but we'll overlook that.
Mark Conrad
Steiner <mich...@michelle.org> wrote:
> That is entirely irrelevant to the point at hand, namely your inane
> remark that Sun Microsystems would not agree that Mac OS is unix. You
> just cannot stand to be proven wrong about anything, can you?
Michelle, Michelle, Michelle, I taught you everything I know
and you still know nothing.
You appear to me to be advocating things like banging in a
nail with the heel of your shoe, which is about the same
as running unix on a Mac.
Sure it _can_ _be_ _done_ in both cases, but who in
their right mind would want to.
As you well know, I was replying to "fishfry" who made the
statement:
"OS X *is* *nix. What are you talking about?"
His statement is roughly akin to a Windows user who has hacked
a crappy Windows box into running OS X as then saying:
"Windows *is* OS X. What are you talking about?"
I could not let that sweeping statement of "fishfry"
stand unchallenged.
For one thing, OS X tries to be all things to all people.
As such, it needs constant patching to plug up various
security holes that result from that policy.
A modern Sun computer running Solaris does not need
anywhere near the patching that Mac/OSX does, therefore
is much more secure than OS X is.
A modern Sun computer running Solaris is _designed_
to run Unix, in the same way as a hammer is designed to
drive in nails.
Why bang in nails with the heel of your shoe?
Mark-
Gregory Weston
VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG wrote:
> In article <michelle-870869...@news.east.cox.net>, Michelle
> Steiner <mich...@michelle.org> writes:
> >In article <250720080540175484%thi...@absolutely.invalid>,
> > Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> >
> >> > So you're saying that using a Mac someone disallows someone from
> >> > also being a competent Solaris user?
> >>
> >> Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for the
> >> complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
> >
> >Most Mac users have no need for the underpinnings of Unix. That's the
> >reason they're Mac users. (Actually, to be fair, the same can be said
> >of Windows users; they don't need unix either.)
>
> Save that there's never been anything unix or unix-like behind the blinds
> of Weendoze.
>
> I'm a Mac user because there *IS* unix "underpinning" Mac OS X.
But... but... but... I distinctly remember a Microsoft executive
asserting several years ago that NT was just another kind of UNIX.
Surely a Microsoft exec wouldn't fib.
...
Actually, I suspect it was just confusion. If I recall correctly, what
he *meant* to say was that NT had been certified as (barely) POSIX
compliant in certain configurations, and probably didn't understand the
distinction.
Gregory Weston
Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> In article <michelle-12C20F...@news.east.cox.net>, Michelle
> Steiner <mich...@michelle.org> wrote:
>
> > That is entirely irrelevant to the point at hand, namely your inane
> > remark that Sun Microsystems would not agree that Mac OS is unix. You
> > just cannot stand to be proven wrong about anything, can you?
>
> Michelle, Michelle, Michelle, I taught you everything I know
> and you still know nothing.
>
> You appear to me to be advocating things like banging in a
> nail with the heel of your shoe, which is about the same
> as running unix on a Mac.
>
> Sure it _can_ _be_ _done_ in both cases, but who in
> their right mind would want to.
>
> As you well know, I was replying to "fishfry" who made the
> statement:
> "OS X *is* *nix. What are you talking about?"
>
> His statement is roughly akin to a Windows user who has hacked
> a crappy Windows box into running OS X as then saying:
>
> "Windows *is* OS X. What are you talking about?"
Actually, it's nothing like that scenario. Mac OS X is a UNIX by any
meaningful definition of the term. The hardware on which it runs is
irrelevant; if a given build of OS X has been certified as UNIX it is
UNIX and it is, of course, OS X. To put OS X on a different piece of
hardware and then claim that a different OS that also runs on that
hardware "is OS X" is irrational.
G
J.J. O'Shea
(in article <250720081354360928%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca>):
> In article <uce-9CF2AF.1...@newsclstr02.news.prodigy.com>,
> Gregory Weston <u...@splook.com> wrote:
>
>> To put OS X on a different piece of
>> hardware and then claim that a different OS that also runs on that
>> hardware "is OS X" is irrational.
>
> Mark is irrational.
>
>
In much the same way, the center of the Sun is warm.
--
email to oshea dot j dot j at gmail dot com.
Tom Stiller
> In article <250720081146261685%thi...@absolutely.invalid>,
> Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
>
> > In article <michelle-12C20F...@news.east.cox.net>, Michelle
> > Steiner <mich...@michelle.org> wrote:
> >
> > > That is entirely irrelevant to the point at hand, namely your inane
> > > remark that Sun Microsystems would not agree that Mac OS is unix. You
> > > just cannot stand to be proven wrong about anything, can you?
> >
> > Michelle, Michelle, Michelle, I taught you everything I know
> > and you still know nothing.
That says more about Mark than it does about Michelle.
--
Tom Stiller
PGP fingerprint = 5108 DDB2 9761 EDE5 E7E3 7BDA 71ED 6496 99C0 C7CF
Mark Conrad
<f...@prdetfanaaeextna.invalid> wrote:
> > Never did understand why the Unix Gods made unix so difficult to
> > learn, when they did not need to.
>
> Unix is user friendly
Hah! That is a joke, right?
> ...it is just picky about it's friends
Assigning human characteristics such as "picky"
to a bunch of code? Weird, to say the least.
Mark-
Mark Conrad
<n...@dot.com> wrote:
> What is so difficult about Unix?
You are kidding, right?
Maybe you are not kidding.
What is so difficult -
Primarily, the extreme lack of easy-to-learn
unix training books, that can bring up a new unix
newbie to somewhere near the same level (50% say)
as for example Tom Stiller, assuming the new user
diligently studies those books for say six months.
Now I would hazard a guess that Tom likely has
at least 30 years of unix behind him.
Now why don't you demonstrate how easy Unix is by
stamping out a dd script that will backup an internal
160GB hard drive of a MacBook Pro - - - then use
that backup file to restore an _external_ 300GB
hard drive, such that the external hard drive can
boot both the Mac OS X and the Vista partition with
no noticable differences from booting both those
partitions from the MacBooks internal hard drive.
Oh yeah, a few more requirements.
1) The compressed version of the backup file
should be less than 9GB.
2) The time to "restore" the external drive
should be reasonable, 40 minutes in my case.
Note: The Vista partition on my Mac is 60GB,
the rest of the space is the OS X partition.
...and no, I am not going to post _my_ dd script
here, just in case a fleet of $MS lawyers is getting
ready to pounce on me for somehow violating
Microsofts paranoid EULA.
I will take your word for it, if you get the dd script
to work. One thing for certain, no present Unix book
will show you how to do that sort of task.
Mark-
Mark Conrad
Gregory Weston <u...@splook.com> wrote:
> > Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for
> > the complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
>
> I'm confused. You made the blanket statement that "Mac users would not
> even know ..." I asked if I was correct in thinking that you meant that
> Mac use somehow disallowed someone from learning UNIX and you start by
> saying "yes" and then contradict it by acknowledging that Mac users can
> (and some do) have facility with UNIX.
I see little contradiction. You paid a _very_ high price in both
time expended _and_ effort in order to learn the very difficult
and arcane unix.
That is very unusual, not liable to happen with most Mac users.
> You've conflated two very different notions. If Mac OS actually did
> somehow prevent its users from becoming familiar with any other
> techniques that would be bad.
You have confused the issue; it is not OS X that will somehow prevent
its users from becoming familar with other techniques. (unix)
Rather, it is the extreme lack of easy-to-comprehend unix training
books that prevent would-be unix newbies from learning unix.
That is downright criminal, considering the potential benefits that
unix has to offer potential new users, and considering the length
of time that unix has been around. (30 years?)
For example, you can't point to even one book that will _easily_
demonstrate to a potential new user how to use dd for the noble task
of backing up a Macs internal hard drive that has a Vista partition,
such that the resulting restore using dd will return both the Mac
and the Vista partition to their former pristine bootable condition
in a reasonable length of time. (40 minutes in my case)
I learned that simple task, sure, but it took months, plus the
combined efforts of several unix geeks in these NGs.
That is one crummy dd utility, imagine how long it would take
to learn the ins and outs of 800 unix utilities, ten years?
Long, steep, tough, and very arcane learning curve for unix
to this day. Can we agree on that?
> I do *not* keep Solaris around because it's somehow
> "more UNIXey" than OS X.
I like that, have to add "UNIXey" to my vocabulary.<g>
Well IMO you should re-consider that Solaris is indeed
more UNIXey than OS X is.
After all, Solaris is _designed_ to run unix, OS X is not.
OS X is designed to be an easy-to-use OS with many features
which supposedly appeal to the "average user".
When pigs can fly and I somehow find that elusive unix
book titled "Unix, the Missing Manual" (hypothetical)
that allows me to learn unix in depth in say 3 months,
a two-foot thick book with thousands of examples,
which I paid $200 for...
...well then I would not hesitate to buy both a dedicated
Unix computer from Sun Microelectronics, plus a
dedicated Solaris operating system.
(would still keep my Macs, naturally)
Mark-
Mark Conrad
Rosenberg <mike...@TOGROUPmacconsult.com> wrote:
> Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
>
> > Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for
> > the complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
>
> Most _COMPUTER_ users in general have a low tolerance for the complexity
> of anything other than getting their required tasks accomplished.
I somewhat agree, however Mac users are less tolerant of
complexity than Windows users are, which is one of the
main reasons they chose Macs over PCs in the first place.
Mark-
sbt
<thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
Okay...try to get this straight. Solaris is a GUI running on a cerified
Unix base. OS X is a GUI running on a certified Unix base. Both bases
are certified as "Unix" and are POSIX-compliant. Similarly, there are
multiple GUIs commonly employed atop Linux base distributions. None of
the interfaces supplement or detract from the fact that the OS is Unix.
As to running Unix on a Mac, it is running all the time. That's where
all the logs come from (view in Console) and the commandline is
omnipresent when/if you run Terminal. Mac OS X is *nix, just as Gnome
is *nix and Solaris is *nix. fishfry was correct and, as usual, you are
being obstinate.
--
Spenser
John Varela
(in article <250720081146261685%thi...@absolutely.invalid>):
> I taught you everything I know
> and you still know nothing.
And from this we conclude what?
--
John Varela
Trade NEW lamps for OLD for email.
thepixelfreak
> In article <2008072509322543658-not@dotcom>, thepixelfreak
> <n...@dot.com> wrote:
>
>> What is so difficult about Unix?
>
> You are kidding, right?
No.
> Primarily, the extreme lack of easy-to-learn
> unix training books, that can bring up a new unix
> newbie to somewhere near the same level (50% say)
> as for example Tom Stiller, assuming the new user
> diligently studies those books for say six months.
Now the question is why? I would bet most OS X users never use the
command line. And there are well documented ways of cloning drives with
available sw. Super Duper, Carbon Copy Cloner etc.
> Now why don't you demonstrate how easy Unix is by
> stamping out a dd script that will backup an internal
> 160GB hard drive of a MacBook Pro - - - then use
> that backup file to restore an _external_ 300GB
> hard drive, such that the external hard drive can
> boot both the Mac OS X and the Vista partition with
> no noticable differences from booting both those
> partitions from the MacBooks internal hard drive.
>
> Oh yeah, a few more requirements.
>
> 1) The compressed version of the backup file
> should be less than 9GB.
dd doesn't do compression. gzip bzip and others do. And the compression
isn't something that can be targeted. It depends on the
'compressibility' of the source data.
>
> 2) The time to "restore" the external drive
> should be reasonable, 40 minutes in my case.
Depends on the relative i/o performance of the from/to disks and the
i/o subsystem e.g. Firewire, IDE, USB, SCSI etc.
Without getting overly detailed, you could create the backup of the
partition using dd and gzip. e.g.
dd if=/dev/somediskpartition bs=512 | gzip > foo.gz
and restore via
gzcat foo.gz | dd bs=512 of=/dev/sometargetpartition
But why waste the step, just
dd if=/dev/sourcepartition of=/dev/destinationpartition bs=512
Now if you want to copy the entire disk, you can do that too. But the
caveat here is that the source and the target drives need to have the
same size, geometry etc. dd does a 'raw' copy of the blocks, including
the filesystem structures that are created when the filesystem is made,
it will copy MBR's etc and any other filesystems structures. If you
copy a 100GB partition to a 300GB drive, you will be loosing 200GB of
space on that drive. Some filesystems (XFS for example) can be
dynamically grown on the fly. Not sure about HFS+
--
thepixelfreak
Mike Rosenberg
> > Most _COMPUTER_ users in general have a low tolerance for the complexity
> > of anything other than getting their required tasks accomplished.
>
> I somewhat agree, however Mac users are less tolerant of
> complexity than Windows users are, which is one of the
> main reasons they chose Macs over PCs in the first place.
You don't talk about computers with a lot of Windows users, do you?
Tim McNamara
> I taught you everything I know and you still know nothing.
Elegantly phrased! Congratulations on your blinding clarity.
Gregory Weston
Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> In article <uce-0BF052.0...@newsclstr03.news.prodigy.net>,
> Gregory Weston <u...@splook.com> wrote:
>
> > > Yes, _most_ Mac users in general have a low tolerance for
> > > the complexity of Unix, yourself and other Unix geeks excluded.
> >
> > I'm confused. You made the blanket statement that "Mac users would not
> > even know ..." I asked if I was correct in thinking that you meant that
> > Mac use somehow disallowed someone from learning UNIX and you start by
> > saying "yes" and then contradict it by acknowledging that Mac users can
> > (and some do) have facility with UNIX.
>
> I see little contradiction. You paid a _very_ high price in both
> time expended _and_ effort in order to learn the very difficult
> and arcane unix.
>
> That is very unusual, not liable to happen with most Mac users.
Not liable to happen with most current desktop computer users, period.
But the contradiction lies in the fact that you implied, and then
confirmed that you meant, that Mac use would actually *prevent* someone
from understanding UNIX, and then you acknowledged it wouldn't.
> > You've conflated two very different notions. If Mac OS actually did
> > somehow prevent its users from becoming familiar with any other
> > techniques that would be bad.
>
> You have confused the issue; it is not OS X that will somehow prevent
> its users from becoming familar with other techniques. (unix)
Oh. Then you made a mistake in your original statements and your
confirmation when I questioned it.
> Rather, it is the extreme lack of easy-to-comprehend unix training
> books that prevent would-be unix newbies from learning unix.
So, nothing to do with the Mac at all, then? Kind of like how there are
a great many Windows users today who have no clue how to use DOS or the
DOS-like console that's available on modern Windows installations.
> That is downright criminal, considering the potential benefits that
> unix has to offer potential new users, and considering the length
> of time that unix has been around. (30 years?)
>
> For example, you can't point to even one book that will _easily_
> [any random but somewhat special-interest task you'd care to name]
"Easily" is in the eye of the beholder.
> I learned that simple task, sure, but it took months, plus the
> combined efforts of several unix geeks in these NGs.
>
> That is one crummy dd utility, imagine how long it would take
> to learn the ins and outs of 800 unix utilities, ten years?
>
> Long, steep, tough, and very arcane learning curve for unix
> to this day. Can we agree on that?
I'll agree to arcane.
> > I do *not* keep Solaris around because it's somehow
> > "more UNIXey" than OS X.
>
> I like that, have to add "UNIXey" to my vocabulary.<g>
>
> Well IMO you should re-consider that Solaris is indeed
> more UNIXey than OS X is.
Based on your statements, I feel comfortable believing that I'm a better
judge of what's UNIX than you do, and I don't think Solaris is a more
"real" UNIX than OS X. I feel equally comfortable in the belief that The
Open Group knows even better than I do - what with them actually
controlling the definition and all - and they agree with me.
> After all, Solaris is _designed_ to run unix, OS X is not.
That statement makes no sense. Neither Solaris nor OS X is "designed to
run UNIX." Both of them *are* UNIX.
> OS X is designed to be an easy-to-use OS with many features
> which supposedly appeal to the "average user".
Irrelevant.
George Kerby
On 7/25/08 6:13 PM, in article m24p6dk...@bitstream.net, "Tim McNamara"
<tim...@bitstream.net> wrote:
I was wondering if any one else had their antennae raise on that.
Ian Gregory
><f...@prdetfanaaeextna.invalid> wrote:
>
>> > Never did understand why the Unix Gods made unix so difficult to
>> > learn, when they did not need to.
>>
>> Unix is user friendly
>
> Hah! That is a joke, right?
It is the first half of a joke, the second half being:
>> ...it is just picky about it's friends
>
> Assigning human characteristics such as "picky" to a bunch of code?
> Weird, to say the least.
A sandwich walks into a bar and orders a beer. Hey, wait a minute,
sandwiches can't talk!
Unix was designed by geeks for geeks and is good at what it does, which
in the case of Mac OS X is basically to act as a platform on which to
run Aqua (which in turn allows users to run apps).
But it is not particularly difficult to learn. I sat down at a terminal
back in the day and typed "man man" - things just fell in place and
before I knew it I was a professional Solaris admin. From the little I
have seen of Microsoft Windows its underlying OS (NT) appears to be
significantly more obtuse. You need to compare like with like:
Typing "ls" in a shell = typing "DIR" at a DOS prompt
Interacting with Aqua on Mac OS X = interacting with the Windows GUI
Editing config files in Unix = hacking the Registry in NT
Writing Unix device drivers = Writing NT device drivers
In none of these cases is it more difficult on a Unix system (such as
Mac OS X) than it is on an NT system (such as Vista), and I would argue
that it is probably easier - they are both pretty complex but then that
is the nature of operating systems. Those are the two basic platforms
out there and although there are some more elusive creatures like VMS
and Plan 9, there is nothing significantly easier. With operating
systems, if you create something that even a fool can understand then
only a fool would want to use it. The point being that computer users
(people who want to edit films or build websites or play games for
example) should not need to know anything about operating systems -
leave that to people who develop operating systems and the user
interfaces behind which they are conveniently hidden. To use the almost
obligatory car metaphor, I don't need to understand Thermodynamics or
Tribology or Metallurgy to drive a car. Or to use an example dear to
your heart, you don't need to understand Fast Fourier transforms or
Wavelet theory, or context free grammars to use speech recognition
software.
The fact that I can easily peek behind the curtain on my Mac is a nice
bonus because I happen to like playing with Unix, but there is no need
to peek behind the curtain to run a Mac and be productive with it. If
you *want* to "learn Unix" there are no short cuts but there are plenty
of excellent text books to get you started if you need a hand. There
*is* no easier OS to learn.
By the way, the barman answers "Sorry, we don't serve food".
Mike Rosenberg
> What does not exist are books that can teach *YOU* anything. But nobody
> is going to write for an insane audience of one.
I will, provided he's also insane enough to pay me enough to make it
worth my while.
Steve Hix
> Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
>
> > In article
> > fishfry <BLOCKSPA...@your-mailbox.com> wrote:
> >
> > > In article <240720081346016831%thi...@absolutely.invalid>,
> > > Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
> > >
> > > > Reasons for learning a bit about unix and Vista.
> > > >
> > > > Notice I lumped them together, that is because they
> > > > are both difficult, when with a little design effort,
> > > > they could have been made _easy_ , like good old
> > > > Macs and OSX.
> > >
> > > OS X *is* *nix. What are you talking about?
> >
Complete and utter nonsense, for several reasons including:
1 - Sun is not the organization responsible for declaring whether or
not something is Unix.
2 - A lot of Sun engineering personnel believe that MacOS X 10.5 *is* a
valid Unix distribution. I certainly work with enough of them daily.
> > Mac users would not even know how to run the $1,995
> > Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation with the Sun Solaris 10 OS.
It wouldn't take more than a couple of hours for them to get up and
running with it.
I've watched enough usability tests where we've brought in people with
no Unix experience to find out that it's doable.
> > Likewise, a Sun workstation user would be disappointed with
> > the lack of unix features,
With the exception of some custom applications on Solaris that haven't
been ported to MacOS X, you're wrong. The low-end Solaris workstations
are slower that low-end Macs, although not as badly as was the case a
couple years ago.
> > lack of unix speed and flexibility,
Since MacOS X 10.5 is genuine true Unix, you're making no sense at all.
> > that a $2,000 Mac box has, as compared to the same cost Sun
> > hardware and Sun Solaris 10 operating system.
> > Now why don't you try being truthful for a change, and post
> > that Mac/OS X can do _some_ of the unix that the same-cost
> > Sun/Solaris-10 can do, albiet at a more sluggish pace and
> > with nowhere near the reliability of the Sun products.
Why not put up some verifiable benchmarks?
> > The day I see NASA switching to Macs/OS X for their life-critical
> > missions,
Like the Shuttle's operating system? (It's not Unix; FCOS was a custom
OS written by IBM to control the Shuttle.)
NASA (subcontractors in most cases) will use the tools they figure best
suited for the job. It isn't always Unix.
> > is the day I will believe that "OS X *is* *nix".
Ah. I see that your criteria for "Unixness" has nothing to do with the
rest of the world. As usual.
Steve Hix
sbt <dogb...@chaseabone.com.invalid> wrote:
> Okay...try to get this straight. Solaris is a GUI running on a cerified
> Unix base.
This will disappoint a lot of people at work who install and run Solaris
without any GUI operating at all. Kind of pointless for a lot of server
uses, actually.
That would be, by the way, people in various groups at Sun.
sbt
<se...@NOSPAMspeakeasy.netINVALID> wrote:
Yes, Steve, but I also know people who boot a Mac directly into the
commandline. Not that many, but a few -- I have an old G4/400 that
boots directly into Darwin, for example (the G4 is too underpowered to
run a version of Aqua that I'm still willing to use).
The basic state of affairs is that Solaris, as a package, includes a
GUI (either Common Desktop Environment or Java Workstation) and
out-of-the-box the GUI is what the enduser sees (at least on the Sun
workstations I used a few years ago). I will gladly concede that it is
a lot easier to eschew the GUI on a Sun, but what people think of as
"Solaris" includes that default graphical front end.
--
Spenser
Mark Conrad
<n...@dot.com> wrote:
> > Primarily, the extreme lack of easy-to-learn
> > unix training books, that can bring up a new unix
> > newbie to somewhere near the same level (50% say)
> > as for example Tom Stiller, assuming the new user
> > diligently studies those books for say six months.
>
>
> Now the question is why?
Do not know. Forget about OS X for awhile, and ask
yourself how a new unix user is supposed to learn.
By osmosis, perhaps, given the sorry state of unix
tutorials for the past 30 years.
> I would bet most OS X users never use the
> command line.
That is correct, mainly because of lousy tutorials.
Mac users loss, as I am sure most unix people would
agree. Even the most diehard Mac GUI user could
benefit from occassional use of some unix utils in his
own area of interests.
> And there are well documented ways of cloning drives
> with available sw. Super Duper, Carbon Copy Cloner etc.
None of which will work with a drive with a Vista partition.
Now someone who knows unix well would have no trouble
quickly stamping out a dd script that would do the job.
For me, who does not know diddly about unix, it was a
major undertaking.
> > Oh yeah, a few more requirements.
> >
> > 1) The compressed version of the backup file
> > should be less than 9GB.
>
> dd doesn't do compression.
I never posted that it did.
> gzip bzip and others do. And the compression
> isn't something that can be targeted. It depends on the
> 'compressibility' of the source data.
I used the ordinary GUI supplied "Compress" in the
File menu, which would more likely appeal to a Mac user.
> And the compression isn't something that can be targeted.
> It depends on the 'compressibility' of the source data.
And we all know the compressibility of system files can be
compressed to slightly better than half their original size,
say 40% of their original size, don't we, from our previous
experience compressing operating systems.
That means that if both the Vista and OSX operating systems
were 11-GB apiece, that the combination of the two could be
compressed to 8.8 GB. ( 40% times 22 GB )
> Without getting overly detailed, you could create the backup of the
> partition using dd and gzip. e.g.
>
> dd if=/dev/somediskpartition bs=512 | gzip > foo.gz
>
> and restore via
>
> gzcat foo.gz | dd bs=512 of=/dev/sometargetpartition
>
> But why waste the step, just
>
> dd if=/dev/sourcepartition of=/dev/destinationpartition bs=512
No need to post code examples, to give people bad ideas about
them trying the same thing.
As we both know, there are major inefficiencies in that code
version, takes way too much time for both backup and restore.
All I am trying to say is that a unix geek would have no problem
stamping out an efficient version quickly, but by contrast a
beginner would have a terrible time learning how to do it.
> Now if you want to copy the entire disk, you can do that too. But the
> caveat here is that the source and the target drives need to have the
> same size, geometry etc. dd does a 'raw' copy of the blocks, including
> the filesystem structures that are created when the filesystem is made,
> it will copy MBR's etc and any other filesystems structures. If you
> copy a 100GB partition to a 300GB drive, you will be loosing 200GB of
> space on that drive. Some filesystems (XFS for example) can be
> dynamically grown on the fly. Not sure about HFS+
In my case I copied a 160GB drive to a 300GB drive, granted
that I was wasting 140GB.
I will say it certainly was nice to free up my internal drive
and place everything onto an external drive instead.
I could completely erase my internal drive, and still
be in business by booting either OSX or Vista from
my external drive.
Not even PC guys can boot Vista from an external
hard drive.<g>
Conceivably, I could run _one_ MacBook, with several
200GB external drives with various OSs, including
the most recent Solaris-10 operating system.
Do not know if Solaris will tolerate a Boot Camp created
Windows partition however, with GUID partitioning and
EFI. (aka modern BIOS, or "firmware" as Apple calls it)
I would not imagine that Solaris uses the HFS+ file system,
they probably have their own proprietary file system
included with the Solaris OS code, dunno.
Perhaps if I get my hands on Solaris, I might be able to
determine what Gregory Weston is yapping about when he
posts that a Mac can run unix just as well as a dedicated unix
computer can. Until then, I will keep my own bull-headed
opinion that dedicated unix hardware and dedicated unix OSs
like Solaris will do a measurably better job.
Mark-
Wes Groleau
>> absolutely.invalid wrote:
>>> Mac users would not even know how to run the $1,995
>>> Sun Ultra 40 M2 Workstation with the Sun Solaris 10 OS.
I had no trouble going from System 7.5 to Solaris.
>>> The day I see NASA switching to Macs/OS X for their life-critical
>>> missions, is the day I will believe that "OS X *is* *nix".
The day I see Joseph Conrad sign with an X is the day
I will believe that "Mark" Conrad exists and is not a
clever implementation of AI (artificial inanity).
--
Wes Groleau
People would have more leisure time if it weren't
for all the leisure-time activities that use it up.
-- Peg Bracken
Ian Gregory
> Perhaps if I get my hands on Solaris
It won't cost you anything and I believe it will even run on an Intel
Mac so (at the risk of the comp.unix.solaris guys taking out a contract
on my life) go right ahead.
Steve Hix
sbt <dogb...@chaseabone.com.invalid> wrote:
> In article <sehix-D97C0C....@news.speakeasy.net>, Steve Hix
> <se...@NOSPAMspeakeasy.netINVALID> wrote:
>
> > In article <250720081406000953%dogb...@chaseabone.com.invalid>,
> > sbt <dogb...@chaseabone.com.invalid> wrote:
> >
> > > Okay...try to get this straight. Solaris is a GUI running on a cerified
> > > Unix base.
> >
> > This will disappoint a lot of people at work who install and run Solaris
> > without any GUI operating at all. Kind of pointless for a lot of server
> > uses, actually.
> >
> > That would be, by the way, people in various groups at Sun.
>
> Yes, Steve, but I also know people who boot a Mac directly into the
> commandline. Not that many, but a few -- I have an old G4/400 that
> boots directly into Darwin, for example (the G4 is too underpowered to
> run a version of Aqua that I'm still willing to use).
What's exceptionally rare for MacOS X users, isn't all that uncommon for
Solaris users. Until at least recently, you could choose whether or not
to use a GUI of CLI for initial configuration.
Although that's changing, too. The more recent blade servers have built
in graphics hardware, which didn't used to be the case.
> The basic state of affairs is that Solaris, as a package, includes a
> GUI (either Common Desktop Environment or Java Workstation) and
> out-of-the-box the GUI is what the enduser sees (at least on the Sun
> workstations I used a few years ago). I will gladly concede that it is
> a lot easier to eschew the GUI on a Sun, but what people think of as
> "Solaris" includes that default graphical front end.
Which one? Sorry. CDE's gone these days, replaced by GNOME, (even if
they're calling it Java Desktop System (JDS)).
Java Workstation was a marketing name for some of the hardware. They've
been EOL'd and replaced by the Sun Ultra 40 and 20 workstations.
Steve Hix
Ian Gregory <f...@prdetfanaaeextna.invalid> wrote:
> On 2008-07-26, Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> wrote:
>
> > Perhaps if I get my hands on Solaris
It's free, all it would take is a little time.
Get VirtualBox (also free from Sun), and you can run it on your intel
Mac while you're running MacOS X, too.
Mark Conrad
Wow! - Tonights Googling revealed what I am in for when
trying to get Sun's Solaris-10 operating system to work.
...on a Mac, on a PC, on anything. (except a Sun computer)
No matter what hardware I Googled for, there were "issues"
and complex workarounds necessary to get Solaris to work.
I used many different search terms, such as:
1) "Solaris 10 on a MacBook Pro"
2) "Solaris 10 on an Asus PC"
3) "Solaris 10 with Vista"
4) "Solaris 10 with Boot Camp"
...and a bunch of others I forgot.
...and I refuse to buy a Sun computer for $2,000 just to
get 100% compatability with Solaris-10.
Unfortunately, Sun does not make a laptop computer.
I might change my mind about buying a Sun computer,
if I could find an _easy_ to setup remote control app
like Timbuktu, that would allow me to control
the Sun box from my Mac.
Will get off an email to Motorola to ask them whether
Timbuktu will work with Sun hardware and Solaris.
Below website says it all, the hard times that Sun has
suffered recently because of competition from Linux,
the cost of developing Solaris 10, which was
500 million dollars over a four year period.
There is the definite possibility that Sun might
"go under". They are right now doing a big layoff
to try to reduce costs. What a shame if that happens,
because all the web sources I checked agree that
Solaris 10 is a wonderful operating system for
running the Unix command line.
This article in Business Week was titled:
"Will the Sun Shine Again"
<http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_48/b3910053_mz011.htm>
Mark-
Dan Stephenson
> Now I know diddly squat about unix, I know one
> unix utility on a superficial basis, the "dd" util.
>
> One out of about 800 unix "things" available to us Mac users, shame on
> all of us for not spending ten years learning unix.
>
> So recently, still playing with dd, I got a brief look at things unix
> geeks here take for granted.
>
> I decided, in my senile mind, to use dd to do two things I have always
> wanted to do.
>
> Using my MacBook Pro
> *******************
> 1) Run Boot Camp on an external hard drive
> 2) Boot Vista from an external hard drive
>
> It is a done deal, achieved both goals.
>
> Imagine what I could do if I knew _two_ unixy things out of 800 things!
I man'd dd and the documentation didn't say was it did. What's it do?
Hey that's external option sounds good. What kind of performance hit
do you suffer as compared to when it was on the internal drive?
--
Dan Stephenson
Photos, movies, panos from the Europe, USA, plus N.Z.:
http://homepage.mac.com/stepheda
(remove nospam from email address to reply via email)
Dan Stephenson
> Microsoft will not allow Vista users to boot Vista from an external
> hard drive, and here I went and did it.
So how big IS Vista? It is USB thumb drive-able?
sbt
<stephed...@mac.com> wrote:
> On 2008-07-24 23:02:45 -0500, Mark Conrad <thi...@absolutely.invalid> said:
>
> > Microsoft will not allow Vista users to boot Vista from an external
> > hard drive, and here I went and did it.
>
> So how big IS Vista? It is USB thumb drive-able?
Probably...I just used a 32GB USB thumb drive -- the capacities just
keep going up and the prices keep coming down (gotta love the world of
technology -- it's just about the only realm where you can pretty much
count on getting more for less as time progresses).
--
Spenser
Király
> Probably...I just used a 32GB USB thumb drive -- the capacities just
> keep going up and the prices keep coming down (gotta love the world of
> technology -- it's just about the only realm where you can pretty much
> count on getting more for less as time progresses).
I remember when the top of the line Mac model (IIfx) was priced
higher than a base model new Honda Civic.
--
K.
Lang may your lum reek.
Pascal J. Bourguignon
It's always the case, if you go to Apple Store, and build a top-notch
configuration with all the options, you will be billed thrice the
price of a car. But since you can go farther and faster with a computer...
--
__Pascal Bourguignon__ http://www.informatimago.com/
"You cannot really appreciate Dilbert unless you read it in the
original Klingon"
Richard Maine
> m...@home.spamsucks.ca (Király) writes:
>
> > I remember when the top of the line Mac model (IIfx) was priced
> > higher than a base model new Honda Civic.
>
> It's always the case, if you go to Apple Store, and build a top-notch
> configuration with all the options, you will be billed thrice the
> price of a car. But since you can go farther and faster with a computer...
Yep, some people would probably be truly impressed at quite how much you
can end up spending on a really maxed-out top-of-the-line system. The
thrice-the-price-of-a-car probably isn't far off. There are actually
people who buy systems like that.... but mostly not home users.
--
Richard Maine | Good judgement comes from experience;
email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgement.
domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
Dan Stephenson
IIRC it was more expensive than the Quadra, when that model was introduced.