Service for the Community

In the universe, great acts are made up of small deeds.  -Lao Tzu

My favorite Internet web sites (in arbitrary order)

Java and Scripts
The Java Specification (at SUN) The Java Tutorial (at SUN)
A lovely lady named "Perl" (script) A quite complete reference site on HTML
Scripts, more scripts of many kind Official Javascript site
Online documentation of SUN OS/Solaris TeX resources at AMS
News for Nerds News from the trenches
Some other sites of interests

News (old:-() excerpts from the Internet.

  1. Advice on buying a PC.
  2. Super computer at a PC price range.

Computer System Manager

I have been in charge of our IBM RS/6000 computer systems, model 550 and 320, for the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science since 1992. These two workstations are equipped with 9 IBM XStations, model 130 connected on an Ethernet LAN, which in turn is connected into the Internet. The workstations also have 4mm, 8mm, 1/4 inch tape drives, CD-ROM drive, for data backup and software distribution. Software installed on the computers include SmallTalk, Cadre/Teamwork, Prolog, InterLeaf, Mathematica, to name just a few. They have been providing the processing power required by many programs carried out over the years in the department. As the System Manager, I am responsible for carrying our the tasks listed below:

Recently, the deparment has purchased about 24 new Pentium II PCs with internal Zip and CD drives that came with Windows 95 pre-installed. I have created a Windows NT Server on one of the PC, and installed Windows NT Workstation on most of the rest of the new PCs. Resource sharing on this NT network, such as printer-sharing, disk drive sharing, file sharing, etc., has provided a great service to the department.

WHAT IS A UNIX GURU?

The following information was obtained during a UNIX User Group Meeting in New Orleans a few years ago. The credit goes to the speaker who distributed this information.

People who come into contact with the UNIX system are often told: "If you have trouble, see so-and-so, he's a guru", or, "Bob there is a real UNIX hacker". Often, they are baffled by these appelations, and do not pursue the matter further. What is a "Unix Hacker?" How does he differ from a "guru"? To answer these and other questions, I present a draft of the "UNIX HIERARCHY":
beginner
  • insecure with the concept of a terminal
  • has yet to learn the basic of vi
  • has not figured out how to get a directory
  • still has trouble typing <RETURN> after each line of input
novice
  • knows that ls will produce a directory
  • uses the editor, but calls it 'vye'
  • has heard of 'C', but never used it
  • has had his first bad experience with rm
  • is wondering how to read his mail
  • is wondering why the person next to him seems to like Unix so very much
user
  • uses vi and nroff, but inexpertly
  • had heard of regular expr's but never seen one
  • has figured out that '-' precedes options
  • is wondering how to move a directory
  • has attempted to write a 'C' program and has decided to stick with pascal
  • thinks that sdb is a brand of stereo component
  • knows how to read his mail and is wondering how to read the news
knowlegdable user
  • uses nroff with no trouble, and is beginning to learn tbl and eqn
  • thinks that fgrep is "fast grep"
  • has figured out that mv(1) will move directories
  • has learned that learn doesn't help
  • somebody has shown him how to write 'C' programs
  • once used sed to do some text substitution
  • has seen sdb used but does not use it himself
  • thinks that make is only for wimps
expert
  • uses sed when necessary
  • uses macro's in vi, uses ex when necessary
  • posts news at every possible opportunity
  • writes csh scripts occasionally
  • writes 'C' programs using vi and compiles with cc
  • has figured out what '&&' and '||' are for
  • thinks that human history starts with '!h'
hacker
  • uses sed and awk with comfort
  • uses undocumented features of vi
  • writes 'C' code with 'cat >' and compiles with '!cc'
  • uses adb because he doesn't trust source debuggers
  • can answer questions about the user environment
  • writes his own nroff macros to supplement standard ones
  • writes scripts for Bourne shell(/bin/sh)
guru
  • uses m4 and lex with comfort
  • writes assembly code with 'cat >'
  • uses adb on the kernel while system is loaded
  • customizes utilities by patching the source
  • reads device driver source with his breakfast
  • can answer any Unix question after a little thought
  • uses make for anything that requires two or more distinct commands to achieve
  • has learned how to breach security, but no longer needs to try
wizard
  • writes device drivers with 'cat >'
  • fixes bugs by patching the binaries
  • can answer any question before you ask
  • writes his own troff macro packages
  • is on first-name basis with Dennis, Bill, and Ken

FAQ center.

vsn.