Very Computer

Utter nonsense!  I just backed up 15 GB of data from one Linux box to
another from a remote Solaris dtterm 13 hops away and firewalls blocking X
on both ends.  What GUI would *you* use for that purpose?

Quote:> With Solaris 10 out (and being
> accessible to more and more people), more people will come here with such
> questions. It would be more constructive to them and Sun to help them rather
> than insult and ridicule. It's really that simple.

I did try to help the OP and not only in this thread.  If you think that
derogatory references to using "file managers" is insult and ridicule
perhaps you have put on the shoe that fit.

Yes, I am a journalist, but don't let that bother you.  I'm just doing this
on my own time.  I might write about it at some point; we'll see.  

I am kinda dismayed to see this thread turn into the sort of slanging match
I usually find on Macintosh sites.  I figured Solaris types were all
middle-aged sysadmins who were used to dumb questions.  Oh well...

Good point about the point-n-click approach.  It's not just Windows either.
Mac does it too, of course, but most apps in Linux are amenable to the PNC
approach, so I figured it'd work here too.  I have nothing against shells,
but I don't go out of my way to use 'em.  In any case, I have little
patience with the philosophy that I prove my manhood by performing a
computing task in the most difficult manner possible.  Even the Linux
bigots are getting out of that way of thinking, which is why Linux is
beginning to approach usability for ordinary folk.  Why, I'm using it right
now.  My hands...they're soaking in it!  :-)

Anyway, I opened a shell and typed man sys-unconfig and there it was.  So
never mind about that troff stuff.  Then I tried running sys-unconfig in
the shell, and it started up as well. How cool.

All this blundering raises a question.  Why'd I have to open a shell to do
this?  There's a Run Application icon on the menu.  I clicked it and up
popped a command window.  Yesterday I typed both these commands into that
window, and of course nothing happened.  It was only after unsuccessfully
doing this that I came crawling back here, confused as heck.  In Solaris,
you have a window for running commands, but the commands don't run.  But
type the exact same commands in a shell window, and the commands do run.
What's the Run Application window for if it won't run applications?  In
Windows, this feature works fine.  If you know the app name and path, you
just type it into the run app window and it fires up.  Solaris doesn't seem
to work that way.  Why not?

Thanks.  Now I'll go see if I can get DHCP fired up...

Er...well, no I can't.  I ran sys-unconfig, and the computer rebooted.  It
marched me through another menu.  It asked me nothing about DHCP.  And
having finished all this, my computer's as disconnected from the network as
ever.

I notice from the absence of lights on my router that the card inside the
computer appears to be switched off.  It seems that Solaris never even
activated the network card, which would go a long way toward explaining a
lack of connectivity.

This is a drag.  Even Linux spotted my network card, a Marvell Gigabit LAN
controller, and configured it without a hitch, but Solaris can't make sense
of it.  Lack of driver--it happens.  Presumably I must ask the manufacturer
if there's a fix for this.  

Thanks anyway, folks.

I hope that you noticed that the individual using coarse language is
atypical of the majority of people using this newsgroup.

Quote:> Good point about the point-n-click approach.  It's not just Windows either.
> Mac does it too, of course, but most apps in Linux are amenable to the PNC
> approach, so I figured it'd work here too.  I have nothing against shells,
> but I don't go out of my way to use 'em.  In any case, I have little
> patience with the philosophy that I prove my manhood by performing a
> computing task in the most difficult manner possible.  Even the Linux
> bigots are getting out of that way of thinking, which is why Linux is
> beginning to approach usability for ordinary folk.  Why, I'm using it right
> now.  My hands...they're soaking in it!  :-)

Nobody questioned your manhood, only your expectation that Solaris would
perform as you expect using Windows.  Windows does not even have man
pages!

Besides, using a shell is hardly the "most difficult manner possible".  It
is the way that UNIX, as well as MS-DOS, was designed to be used.  Hiding
the OS under a GUI is for Aunt Emma who uses a computer for email and
surfing the Internet.

Quote:> Anyway, I opened a shell and typed man sys-unconfig and there it was.  So
> never mind about that troff stuff.  Then I tried running sys-unconfig in
> the shell, and it started up as well. How cool.

Just as advertised.

Quote:> All this blundering raises a question.  Why'd I have to open a shell to do
> this?  There's a Run Application icon on the menu.  I clicked it and up
> popped a command window.  Yesterday I typed both these commands into that
> window, and of course nothing happened.  It was only after unsuccessfully
> doing this that I came crawling back here, confused as heck.  In Solaris,
> you have a window for running commands, but the commands don't run.

That is not Solaris but the desktop environment which Sun, and you, have
chosen to use.

[ ... ]

Quote:> Thanks.  Now I'll go see if I can get DHCP fired up...

Are you sure that your NIC is supported in Solaris?

There are 32 bit drivers available for this card; we're still waiting
on 64 bit ones.
http://www.syskonnect.com/support/driver/htm/skgesol_x86v624b02.htm
looks like it for Solaris 10...

- Bart

Likewise, the individual using ridicule and sarcasm to answer a beginner's
(to Solaris) simple question is also not the norm here. Unfortunately some
people forget that not everyone starts out an expert.

<big snip>

Quote:

>All this blundering raises a question.  Why'd I have to open a shell to do
>this?  There's a Run Application icon on the menu.  I clicked it and up
>popped a command window.  Yesterday I typed both these commands into that
>window, and of course nothing happened.  It was only after unsuccessfully
>doing this that I came crawling back here, confused as heck.  In Solaris,
>you have a window for running commands, but the commands don't run.  But
>type the exact same commands in a shell window, and the commands do run.
>What's the Run Application window for if it won't run applications?  In
>Windows, this feature works fine.  If you know the app name and path, you
>just type it into the run app window and it fires up.  Solaris doesn't seem
>to work that way.  Why not?

>Thanks.  Now I'll go see if I can get DHCP fired up...

There are many things that a GUI makes easier.  There are also many
things that a GUI does not make easier!  A "Run Application" window,
even if you can find it (I've never seen it) provides no advantage over
a terminal and shell.

Lack of a driver will do it.   There is a "Hardware Compatibility List"
(HCL) somewhere on the Sun site, that will tell you what is supported.  
Even if there's a driver that would work, if the system doesn't
recognize the hardware there's not much it can do.

Sun Java Desktop 3 has one.  I just tried it, and it does work
provided that I select `Run in terminal'.  I typed `man man' in
the command field, and got a terminal window that displayed the
man page.

--
-Gary Mills-    -Unix Support-    -U of M Academic Computing and Networking-

Solaris is why you used to be able to make a good living being a unix system
administrator.  It basically expects you to know all the low level commands
and details.  On Sun hardware you were expected to have the hardware docs
and be able to figure out from the info from the hardware prompt or from
prtconf what you had, though you could guess from the /dev driver names.
This didn't work out so good in practice when you administered 100's of
remote systems you never saw before.

Anyway, Sun never did do a decent UI for admin like Aix's SMIT.  I haven't
used Aix since 3.0 but SMIT was better then than anything on Linux today.
SMIT also had an option to show you the low level commands it used so
you knew what to use for expert mode stuff.  Get somebody to show you
SMIT on Aix.

Solaris uses the basic standard network and tcp commands, i.e.
ifconfig  (similar but not the same as win32 ipconfig)
netstat   (win32 took theirs from unix, BSD probably)
route  - set and display routing table (netstat displays routing table info too)
ping, traceroute, etc...
/etc/resolv.conf -- your name server.  dhcp sets this.  you don't need
        to mess with it unless you're doing static configuration or debugging.

dhcp stuff I don't know off hand since I don't have my Solaris box fired up.
I think you have answers from others on this already.

Config stuff is in /etc/init.d/ and/or /etc/rc.d/.  grep is your friend here.
The naming convention for the start/stop scripts is quite arcane.  Linux
uses the chkconfig command to try to deal with this.

You should get a decent book on unix and tcp/ip network administration.
Most of the stuff will help you in debugging network problems on Linux
and on windows as well (ipconfig, netstat, tracert, ...).

Quote:

> Anyway, I opened a shell and typed man sys-unconfig and there it was.  So
> never mind about that troff stuff.  Then I tried running sys-unconfig in
> the shell, and it started up as well. How cool.

> All this blundering raises a question.  Why'd I have to open a shell to do
> this?  There's a Run Application icon on the menu.  I clicked it and up
> popped a command window.  Yesterday I typed both these commands into that
> window, and of course nothing happened.  It was only after unsuccessfully
> doing this that I came crawling back here, confused as heck.  In Solaris,
> you have a window for running commands, but the commands don't run.  But
> type the exact same commands in a shell window, and the commands do run.
> What's the Run Application window for if it won't run applications?  In
> Windows, this feature works fine.  If you know the app name and path, you
> just type it into the run app window and it fires up.  Solaris doesn't seem
> to work that way.  Why not?

The command or app window is somebody's idea of something useful for the desktop/windows
manager you're running.  It's useless.  I usually just delete it from my desktop
and use xterm which is your basic X shell window.  There are other terms as well.

If an X app doesn't fire up, it should give an error message.  Typically something
like display not found.  If that's the case, check your display environment variable.
   echo $DISPLAY
The typical problem is it not being set.  Your shell profile (depends on shell,
echo $SHELL) isn't setting it up or sets it incorrectly.  Should be something
like myhost:0 or myhost:0.0.  :0 might work.  It's been a while since I screwed
around with X problems other than get Linix to configure my display.
(I have yet to get a Linux distro do this correctly, even when the install was
done in graphics mode it will still configure my display incorrectly.)
A good unix admin book will have a section on administering X windows.

A note on why MS windows seems to be easier to install and configure.  It's because
Microsoft makes the hw vendors do all the work of making sure their hardware installs
and configures well.  Since MS windows is the biggest market for these vendors, their
survival depends on this.  Linux works because lots of people put in a lot of time
writing drivers.  Linux is also gaining enough market share that vendors are doing
a better job of supporting their stuff for Linux.  Solaris used to be all propietary
Sun hardware with some independent hw vendors but it was high end server oriented
(meaning expensive).  So you're going to see limited hw support for Solaris.

--
Joe Seigh

http://atomic-ptr-plus.sourceforge.net/