Geocaching Australia

Lt. Sniper wrote:Apart from probobly CraigRat does anyone else use a Linux distro for normal dekstop use?

I use Linux.. oh....wait... you already said that.... nevermind

Several Tassie Cacher use Linux (Orac7000,Team Tiges And Aloysius7 have been known to embrace the penguin... and are also members of TasLUG....).. Nerds of a feather flock together it would seem...

For the record:

1 x Fedora Core 2 (soon to be 3) Box (box for all my web Browsing/Development/Day to day stuff... running KDE)
2 x RH7.2 Boxes doing trivial stuff like SQL/Samba/Apache etc etc.. No GUI....

Sometimes I boot the FC2 machine into Windows for a gaming fix, but its now a once or twice a month thing....

I am a sloppy coder so I choose to use PHP for shell scripts (yes, you read that right)..... you can keep your stinkin' perl...

I am also into S&M so I perefer to write GUI apps in PHP-GTK...its kind of like self flagelation ......

GSAK works OK under Wine,and I'd really love to get Ozi working.................

My $0.02

aussiecoder wrote:

The Garner Family wrote:

would have uptimes of years without patches/updates.

Doesn't matter what distro you were running... if you were running it for years without patches/updates then I'd say your machine was vulnerable. Using Linux doesn't mean you don't have to patch your O/S.

Not all linux (or unix) patches require a reboot. Most windows patches do. So linux boxes can be kept up to date (except for kernel updates) while maintaining high up times.

Also, if the machine is standalone (not on the internet) or well firewalled, then vulnerablity is a non issue - and this is true for windows (and macs and palm pilots, etc, etc).

I had to reboot a unix system the other day that had a 200+ day up time. I've seen unix systems with 600+ days uptime.

That's nothing, I know of DOS systems that have been operational continuously for 15+ years! Limited only by redundent power supply failure.

EcoDave

Mind Socket wrote:

EcoTeam wrote: I wrote my own operating system once too, and both the above comments held true way back then. Guess nothings changed!

EcoDave

Ok, I'll bite. I bet you haven't tried it for yourself lately. Stick knoppix or ubuntu in the drive and you'll be up and running in no time.

No point, I'm already up and running, Windoze does everything I need. Running Linux would add precisely ZERO value to my life.

EcoDave

Not all linux (or unix) patches require a reboot.

Oh, I know, but it was said that it wasn't patched, not that it wasn't rebooted... which is a worry, even if it is protected or well firewalled, it's still prudent to patch regularly.

would have uptimes of years without patches/updates.

One machine that is burried deep in the network, runs a dns server, mars server (netware for linux!), dhcp server and had been routing between 4 networks both tcpip and ipx, has no UPS, and has had 1 network card and one power supply failure, has a kernel version 2.2.13 built in Oct 2001. I don't think anything has been patched/upgraded since. It is about to be decomissioned.

SuSe 9.2 desktop on primary machine, Windoze on the laptop, only coz the development tool that I work with is a windows only prog at the moment, a linux port is in the pipeline. They want to get the main stuff running right before they throw in a whole lot of new issues!!!<br><br>

Smoothwall box under the house to work as firewall and DHCP server.
SuSe box also serves the MP3s for the whole house, using slimserver (that is the most important thing to get right!!)<br><br>

CraigRat, $0.02 is redundant, as it is less than $0.05 it gets rounded down to $0.00!!! <br>
orac7000

dajjct wrote:If it wasn't for that both my work and my wifes, and gsak, gartrip, etc all need MS software I would run Linux at home fulltime.

Reading this, makes me wonder. It seems we have quite a few programmers here. Wouldn't it be possible to setup some project for linux GPS software? I wouldn't mind writing bits, I'd actually find it quite interesting. Unfortunately, I don't have the time to do it all by myself and I don't know enough about the functionality we need (I'm just a newbie).

Any ideas on this?

There already exists quite a bit out there. Apart from any win apps that run under Wine, there is ...

Grass (massive GIS application)

gpsbabel
gpsdrive
gpsd and clients
gpsman
gpstrans
rgpsp

And that's just the list of relevant Debian packages with gps in the name. Have a look at sourceforge and I'm sure you'll find lots of GIS/GPS projects.

Haven't had a chance to try any of them yet, though.

- Rog

has anyone actually got a good mapping package under *nix though? as craig said gsak will work inder wine but ozi wont. It blows hivng to run windows on box purely cause of ozi...I couldnt live without my ozi now though...

I've heard that ozi does run under wine, but haven't tried anything under wine yet myself. Check out Grass as a possible alternative.

- Rog

craigrat tried to get it running as i understand with no joy. I haven had a chance to try yet, hopefully after this weekend i will have some more time on my hands and can have a crack...that grass looks interesting. Is anyone actually using it?

http://grass.baylor.edu/

Ohhh.. Grass looks like a good way to fill in the weekend, I'll give it a try.


Ozi just wont run under Wine at the moment, I've tried all the tricks I know but to no avail.................

lemme know what you think of grass craig...including whether the 25k ozi maps of our state work...It will be a week or so till i get back to my pc and can try grass out...

CraigRat wrote:Ohhh.. Grass looks like a good way to fill in the weekend, I'll give it a try.

Some acquaintances of mine swear by it.

Oh, you mean the GIS application ... gotcha.

- Rog

Mind Socket wrote:Oh, you mean the GIS application ... gotcha.

Do I???