My friends will kill me

February 24, 2009 at 7:15 pm | Posted in Hacking, History, Patterns | 11 Comments
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Its been more than a year (since 2007) that I am using a a Linux distro running on text-based system configuration. The idea was difficult to adopt in the beginning but it look intelligent to me. So friends here is my Linux box running on Arch . There is no way you can edit any network or printer configrations from the Administration menu of GNOME in Arch. If yuo want to configure then go edit the text file. My colleagues who are still using Ubuntu struggle with the unknown and unrasonable problems everyday but they stick to Ubuntu, its Administration menu, the GUI based system to configure the system settings and they are stil there. Even after several years of usage they get mentally handicapped when some problem arises. They ask stupid questions to each other. Here is some conversation:

Ubuntu User 1: My system is not booting properly in Ubuntu. What should I do ?

me : whats the problem ?

Ubuntu User 1: I don’t know, Ubuntu is showing some error.

me : What kind of error. Is root file system geting mounted.

Ubuntu User 1: I don’t know.

me : Let me check

Ubuntu User 1: Don’t worry, I will reinstall Ubuntu.

Later I found out, fsck was showing some error on mounting /home partition and was throwing the user into maintenance shell to do fsck but he kep on pressing the Reset button instead.

Ubuntu User 1: I have Ubuntu but I need to play 3D games. Ubuntu does not play them as good as Windows XP.

Ubuntu User 2: Install Sabayon, you can play good games on it.

me : What playing games has to do with either Ubuntu or Sabayon (or even Debian) ?

Ubuntu User 2: Debian does not have any games.

me : Debian has largest collection of packages among all the distros. You only need to install a game using apt-get. Even if the package is not there, then you can download and install it.

Ubuntu User 2: With Debian I have to configure GNOME manually to run, eve after install it. I don’t want to configure GUIs.

me : Debian comes auto-configured. You just install something, e.g. X, and it configures it automatically.

Ubuntu User 2: No, Debian does not play games.

I really don’t understand this, if there is Open Source game, and the package is not available for Debian then you can compile it form source. But my friend does not say that he can’t compile, he says “Debian does not run games”. See the difference ?

Ubuntu User 1: I will not use Fedora, my sound system does not work in Fedora. It works in Ubuntu. So I will use Ubuntu.

me : your statement does not make any sense. Both Ubuntu and Fedora are Linux distros, you can check the sound module of your card and load it in Fedora.

Ubuntu User 1: you don’t want listen to me. I said, there is no sound coming in Fedora.

me : you need to run the lspci to check for what hardware you have and the see lsmod on Ubuntu to know the name of the kernel module being used for sound. Also check for Linux kernel version.

Ubuntu User 1: I will ask some one else who can solve my problem, you just don’t understand it.

Ubuntu User 2: Why go so deep into Linux. He can just reinstall Ubuntu if he gets problems.

… and they got angry. No.. I am serious, they are angry now.

I can show you thousands and millions of Linux users like this, who don’t want to know how to solve problems . First I thought, they don’t like the black screen of command line (I too don’t like it) or even the white background of X-terminal (which I do like), then I thought no one likes to type some words, you just need a mouse click and even these days companies are creating mouses with which we can type characters using clicks. Then I came to know the problem is more fundamental than Linux issues. The problem is of pain, finding the cause of some problem is a painful process (whether Linux or real life), even when you want to build a new house or put the wash-basin at some place in yoru house , it takes some amount of understanding and familiarity with how the houses are constructed and used by people. Putting time into understanding the house when your retired Father is finally building his sweet home , takes energy and the ability to take pain (mental exhaustation ?). All of colleagues are not running away from Linux, they are running away from pain the Linux gives. No one wants pain, everyone wants joy. Yeah.. me too. I want happiness and peace of mind.. the joy of life. The why do I believe in struggling with problems in Linux for days and nights when a 45 minutes Ubuntu reinstall will solve the problem. Why do I get into pain ?

To answer that question I have to go back to my earlier days, the day before I even installed Linux, the day my friend Dinesh mentioned the word Linux to me. Its all about happiness. So let me answer the question I have aksed: Why did I install Linux, because I trusted my friend, I knew he is intelligent than me, Its matter of friendship, the trust and respect you give to your friend based on his ability to creeate angels and daemons on hardware. Moreover I accepted my incompetence in front of him. Dinesh knew it wil be painful for me (a typical Windows User) to install Linux but he never helped me, he never said that he will want to help me. It was like the Cat’s kid, the Cat does not pick up her kitten when he falls while walking on some fence. She does not help her children because she wants them to learn to face the reality of life (quite in contrast to Human Mothers). I think thats why Cats grow out to be so intellgent. It is natural process of how cats grow their kittens. Kitten feels pain but that is required to successfully walk the fence, he needs training and his Mother gives him proper. Same way Dinesh behaved like. In the World of Linux, he was Cat and I Was his kitten and he handled me well. I am proud of having a friend like him who belives in letting people learn themselves rather than spoonfeeding them, a typical Hacker behavior.

Now when I struggle with the problems for days, then I am learning, I am looking for the final happiness, the long-term hapinnes, rather the short-term happiness caused by reinstallation. My friends have based their Linux learning on short-term happiness, thats the whole point. Their definition of hapinnes and my definition of happiness are different. They want quick-fix (cocaine ?) and I Want to drink Milk for 2-4 years continuouly everyday becayse only after years of this daily routine I will be in a good health. Their source of happiness is 2 hours ( Bade Miyan Chote Miyan ?) , my source of happiness is solving problems ( The Money Masters ?). and thats the source of everyone’s way of living this life. If you are still reading, good and if you are still reading and understand it too, well, congratulations, you can be the one you want to become. As a final note, I have edited the subtitle that comes with Ubuntu:

Linux for Idiot Beings

or need I say: Linux for Windows Beings, for Windows and Ubuntu users don’t have any identity of their own, they have let Microsoft shaped their way of thinking about software. They are no longer original but just copies of the way the Windows is designed.

 

 


Copyright © 2006, 2007, 2008 Arnuld Uttre, #331/type-2/sector-1, Naya Nangal, Distt. – Ropar, Punjab (INDIA) – 140126

Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article are permitted worldwide, without royalty, in any medium, provided this notice, and the copyright notice, are preserved.

Way of Life

November 15, 2008 at 12:11 pm | Posted in community, Hacking, History | 1 Comment
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People are wrong when they say GNU (FSF) is just a collection of free softwares, GNU is a way of life. This way of life transcends itself from software profession into one’s personal and social life too. The truth is not that when people come in the GNU community then they become good, that they become the ones who think of society first instead like others who think of their selfish business interests based on the proprietary softwares.

The actual truth is GNU is a place which attracts people who work in the favor of the society, in the interest of humanity. GNU is nothing less than unicef , helping both kids and mature people who have a common interest in making technology better so that that technology can be used to put humanity on the forefront of innovations. When GNU was founded it gave a platform to all the people who were working on different places all across the different nations, to come under one umbrella, the Free Software Movement.

For me, GNU worked liked Red Cross. I have worked for 5 years with Windows, 3 years in college plus 2 more years at home and when today I compare my learning in Windows with just 2 years of working with Linux I see, I am much more of a man with common-sense about software. Windows is an Operating System which kills your senses, and so are all the other proprietary Operating Systems. They kill your senses. It is like you purchased a Motor Cycle and you don’t know where are its spark plug and Petrol Tank. When it stops working, you go to the Manufacturer and he charges you $100 and then tells you that your Petrol Tanks is empty, please fill it and then it will work. It is exactly same in the case of support from Proprietary Softwares. GNU gives you the complete Motor Cycle like as it exists today, you can see where is the engine, where is the spark plug and when trouble happens, you can open them and look for the solution. You can think of the fully-covered machines and then can imagine where our development have been gone if it was like that. The technology must remain open for everyone to study , so that they can spend their time on understanding problems and offering solutions. This is what exactly Free Software community does and I think this is what exactly GNU does. Making money and keeping technology patented are two very-very different things. Corporations are making money on both GSM and CDMA technologies while GSM is open and CDMA is patented. In fact, 82% of the Mobile market is owned by GSM, an open standard. I don’t understand why companies making proprietary software get so baffled when someone talks about Free Software in front of them. For becoming the leader of the market and #1 in business, your competitors need to go out of business. You do that by solving some problems which are unsolved yet, by changing your way of doing business, by offering some service to your customers, services that seem very simple and general but never done, by looking at the domains that are not understood by pointy-haired bosses. Google did that same, it solved the problem of searching, it solved some problems of e-mail. If you will look at the history of corporate you will find many examples conforming my viewpoint.

Business means making money, by either hook or crook. Unfortunately, general public does not want to understand this, an average man avoids an understanding of his surroundings all the time. He spends 30 years in his job, yet never tries to understand why he is there doing his boring job. He never asks himself what will happen to the company if no one does his kind of job. He never tries to understand his place or the place of his seniors in the company. If one tries to do so, he will get fed up by the so less power he gets in his current job, he will get impatient by thinking if his job and comparing it with what he can do, what he could have accomplished in last 5 years. Many people are afraid of doing business in first place, that fear is nothing, the fear of loosing is just plain nonsense because if you don’t get any risks, if you don’t have any insecurity, you won’t get anything worthwhile (e.g. having 10 million dollars in your bank account is one worthwhile thing, while the other worthwhile thing from my view point is I can buy nutritious food and make my body strong) . One can also make money by not harming the society. One can make money by making the society, the surroundings a better place to live. There is no need and there is no point in using political tactics to gain power in business. It is like that we have create a different type of business-model while keeping it more-profitable than current models. Besides that when one works in interest of his people, he will not know, how many people will be helping him. There will be communities working day and night to support such a business. One of those organizations is GNU.

GNU is not only about software. Its about making lives better. The people from the Free Software Community are not the onle ones who can become great Hackers (a.k.a great programmers), they are also the ones who can become great politicians, innovative businessmen and global leaders. I know most readers will not understand that. GNU uses software as a primary way to express itself. How do you express yourself ? GNU is about living for a cause, GNU is about Freedom, GNU is a about living your life the way you want, the way you truly are, not the way some boss thinks you are. GNU is the way of life, GNU is inside you, GNU is a mirror all you see in GNU is just own reflection. GNU is not only about software, its about Freedom of your inner self from all the chains. GNU just hands you a tool that sets you free. GNU is a way of life.

 

 


Copyright © 2008, Arnuld Uttre, #331/type-2/sector-1, Naya Nangal, Distt. – Ropar, Punjab (INDIA) – 140126

Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article are permitted worldwide, without royalty, in any medium, provided this notice, and the copyright notice, are preserved.

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