On Tue, Jan 10, 2023 at 04:06:53PM -0500, Larry Linder wrote:
> We used SL from 4.1 ...

We started much earlier, 1998 or so, Red Hat Linux installed from
floppy disks (soon from CDs). Choice of Debian vs Red Hat was settled
by the very nice Red Hat graphical installer (featuring the sadly-now-defunct
"install everything" button).

> On of our dislikes is systemd and package manager.

To give "them" credit, Ubuntu LTS 20 and 22 systemd is mostly problem free,
it does try to take over most system functions (cron, NTP, DNS, etc) but does a 50% job
at that (it works, but config files are bad and diagnostics are non-existant).

> >From an industrial vantage point we really miss SL 5.11 and 6.5.

I would say those were the best vintage of Linux. Since then, only one
big improvement (ZFS) and many degradations. unfriendly UIs, systemd,
grub, network manager, disfunctional boot system - "please shutdown! no! I must wait
for all users to logout and all NFSes to unmount! (no matter that we are in the middle
of a power outage and network is already dead).

> We have basiacally abandoned RH and its following.  They seam to pick up
> the worst ideas and go with it.

I feel opposite. RH abandoned us. They defaced linux with all kinds of laptop-centric
crud (wayland, network manager, containers that do not work on NFS, etc) and then went
"enterprise" where all this laptop-centric stuff only gets in the way.

> Our security is pretty simple.  - don't laugh too hard.  We cron to turn
> off network after 5:30 and turn it back on at 7 AM.

good one! too bad we are a 24/7 shop...

> Odd Notes.  We hade two Toshiba high end laptops we were ready to junk.
> After looking at them in detail.  We replace the slow 125G HD with a 1 T SSD.

So true, lots of old machines get a new life just be replacing SATA HDD with SATA SSD,
unfortunately RAM limits (2G max, 4 GB max, 8 GB max) and limited CPU GHz takes
their toll...

> One of the real sad thing that has happened to our Engineering Comunity
> is the during the China Virus shut down the students didn't learn much.

So true. My favourite, I point physics student at a wall power outlet
and ask "which plug is plus, which plug is minus?". You try it!

> They are pretty good a running windows but they don't know how anything
> works or how to connect a scope etc.  The isolation is a disaster for
> the new science / engineers who worked remotely.  My contribution is
> that we hire one or two bright students and teach them the real world
> applications.

TRIUMF has a big COOP and Summer student program. Lots of kids come through
and learn how to use scope, screw driver, soldering iron, etc
xttps://www.triumf.ca/academic-programs/undergraduate-program/coop-education

> I encourage each when they are ready to explore other
> oportunities.  So far we have had 14 young men and ladies find their
> lifes endever.  The comments I get from companies is how does a student
> get 4 years of engineering experience when they get their Deploma.
> When I worked at GE one of my jobs was to train new engineers in the art
> of digital control.  The digital engine control (gray box) on side of
> the CFM56 engines worked well and was certified in 1987.

CFM56, legendary. Best the new generation could do is build and certify the 737-MAX airplane
with a "fly down, down, down" feature in the control system (MCAS). Redundant
sensors? Input sanity checks? Never heard of him! Discovered and fixed the hard way.

K.O.


> Another condecending Unix / Linux user.
> By the way my great,great,great grandfather was a Hessian solder and
> decided he like the country, jumped ship, married a lady and had 12
> Children.
> 
> Larry Linder
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, 2023-01-10 at 11:49 -0800, Keith Lofstrom wrote:
> > > From: Konstantin Olchanski <[log in to unmask]>
> > > Subject: Re: SL6 ssh fail
> > ...
> > > It looks like my remaining option is to build openssh from OpenBSD "portable" sources.
> > ...
> > > - "so old" - like a grand-father's axe, most our SL6 machines hardware was upgraded 2-3 times by now, they run from SSDs on DDR3/DDR4 RAM machines.
> > > - exception is VME processors
> > 
> > I'm on Konstantin's side here - although it is a side many
> > light-years wide, with MANY of us spread thinly across it.
> > 
> > While I do not have my grandfather's axe, I still use my
> > great-grandfather's carpentry toolbox, which my grandfather
> > brought from Sweden in 1911 (I also have my grandfather's
> > steamship ticket, and his Swedish-to-English dictionary). 
> > 
> > https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__wiki.keithl.com_JohanSigfridLofstrom&d=DwIBAg&c=gRgGjJ3BkIsb5y6s49QqsA&r=gd8BzeSQcySVxr0gDWSEbN-P-pgDXkdyCtaMqdCgPPdW1cyL5RIpaIYrCn8C5x2A&m=iqT8zmlP56N56Jq9YP_a6cjE90PVa3LlHNdlKR14LBh4UY7CFKqQzSC6tQwZud2d&s=_bHbAaGb3b436-GEoRYnWCwPRLp6V7b_tiSALqhmBzY&e=  
> > 
> > I use those tools to build the gizmos that help me imagine
> > space technology evolution into the 22nd century (and read
> > emails from my Swedish fourth-cousins).
> > 
> > Science has plucked almost all of the low-hanging fruit; 
> > future discovery lies in subtle manipulations of vast
> > amounts of both new and archived measurements made by
> > vast amounts of hardware accumulated over many decades. 
> > 
> > The huge problem with archived measurements is their origin
> > in imperfect and evolving hardware, software, procedures,
> > theories, and people.  Those inputs color the data;  new
> > data collected with new hardware, software, etc. can be
> > incommensurate with old data.  This is a good reason for
> > keeping the old hardware/software sets alive, so you can
> > measure twice, with your great-grandfather's ruler and
> > with your laser interferometer, and cross-calibrate the
> > data taken both ways.
> > 
> > Konstantin contributes to TRIUMF, Canada's premiere 
> > particle accelerator.  I am amused that the photo associated
> > with the TRIUMF Wikipedia page shows a Tektronix oscilloscope
> > designed in the 1960s:
> > 
> > https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__en.wikipedia.org_wiki_TRIUMF-23_media_File-3ACanadian-5FScience-5F-2D-5FTRIUMF-5Fcyclotron-5F-2D-5FFlickr-5F-2D-5FCargo-5FCult-5F-2821-29.jpg&d=DwIBAg&c=gRgGjJ3BkIsb5y6s49QqsA&r=gd8BzeSQcySVxr0gDWSEbN-P-pgDXkdyCtaMqdCgPPdW1cyL5RIpaIYrCn8C5x2A&m=iqT8zmlP56N56Jq9YP_a6cjE90PVa3LlHNdlKR14LBh4UY7CFKqQzSC6tQwZud2d&s=VoPCz_dAeUSdH6dEptF53yurEpghrR-JZvyRjGJ0Sj0&e= 
> > 
> > Also a large pipe and a huge dewar labeled "HELIUM", which
> > will probably be all used up and dissipated to outer space
> > by 2160.  Data measured with instruments consuming large
> > amounts of helium may be non-repeatable in 2160. 
> > Yet somehow, data wranglers like Konstantin must "pay data
> > forward" so that 2160 scientists can evaluate 2023 data 
> > (and 1968 data, TRIUMF's founding) in an accurate context.
> > 
> > ----
> > 
> > I began using Scientific Linux because I assumed that
> > Fermilabs would maintain its data-handling infrastructure
> > for decades.  I believed the RedHat booth-boys at Oscon
> > who told me that long term support would not be affected
> > by the sale to IBM. 
> > 
> > Oops.  
> > 
> > With decades of investment in my Gnome2-based creations,
> > I spent the last year flirting with Ubuntu-Mate - and
> > last week fault-isolating a borked desktop environment 
> > (log error: Could not acquire name on session bus)
> > to a flaw in /etc/X11/Xsession.d/80mate-environment,
> > cured(?) by adding "unset DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS"
> > before the closing "fi" in that file. 
> > 
> > So, after climbing out of the Scientific Linux rubble,
> > then beating my head against the crumbling Ubuntu wall,
> > my next desperate move is to debian-mate, hoping that
> > some flavor of mate (or other "gestureless" desktop)
> > will last until I (and my jittery hands) die. 
> > The only gesture I'm good at involves my middle finger.
> >  
> > I hope that the data and algorithms that I create in the
> > debian-mate environment will endure, even if the desktop
> > environment creators transition from mouse gestures to
> > hand gestures to rectal thermometer squeezes.
> > 
> > I'm a circuit designer, more adept with solder than shell
> > scripts.  My guess is that Konstantin is closer to me on
> > the hardware-software spectrum than he is to most of you;
> > he must make the instruments attached to Canada's premiere
> > particle accelerator produce reliable and secure data, not
> > animated web pages.  TRIUMF's data must be accessible and
> > verifiable a century from now, so future researchers can
> > answer the perpetual question about the past:
> > 
> > "What the HELL were they THINKING?"
> > 
> > Blovation off:  Now I must go outside with my great-
> > grandfather's tools, to repair a 1960s greenhouse damaged
> > by last week's windstorm.  Then back to a warm keyboard.
> > 
> > Keith
> > 

-- 
Konstantin Olchanski
Data Acquisition Systems: The Bytes Must Flow!
Email: olchansk-at-triumf-dot-ca
Snail mail: 4004 Wesbrook Mall, TRIUMF, Vancouver, B.C., V6T 2A3, Canada