slackware on a fast machine

slackware on a fast machine

[Jude DaShiell]

I just remembered something and why this is I can't figure.  The 
speakup_ltlk module in speakup.s in slackware and possibly also in the 
Linux kernel unless it was patched requires a ps/2 keyboard to be used to 
boot up the computer.  I remember on an earlier slackware installation 
switching out keyboards to a usb keyboard and I couldn't get speech 
working when trying to boot into slackware until I switched that USB 
keyboard out for a ps/2 again.  In that move, all the ps/2 keyboards I 
have also got donated.  Slackware does respond to a three-fingered salute 
on the usb keyboard I have and does respond to typing on that keyboard 
otherwise but that's as far as I can go here.  This is using an amd k8 
athelon machine too.  If I remember properly, this also happened on an 
intel machine I was using.  Now I'm wondering if this happens to any other 
slackware speakup users using usb keyboards.  It could be my particular 
brand keyboard is the problem or it could be this effects more than one 
brand and model of usb keyboard I don't know.  Aside from that, I can't 
get any audible indication as to when the boot: prompt comes up on the 
screen so I don't know if I ever keyed in the boot parameters at the right 
time during the past few days either.  When I get slackware any more, I 
use bittorrent and let that run overnight and burn DVD's in the afternoon 
of the next day since the distributor of slackware boxed sets will not 
package those shrink wrapped sets well enough to prevent breakage of cases 
and sometimes disks inside those cases and this is happening for people 
who have a slackware subscription.

I'll put archlinux on this 80GB disk and hope Slackware improves a few 
things eventually.  The faq files on slackware.com are outdated in that 
they don't refelect slackware's move from multiple floppy disk 
distribution to cd's and DVD's distributions.  It is unfortunate the 
linux-slackware email list on yahoogroups.com had to be closed down since 
it was being misused by people who didn't even know what Linux is let 
alone the slackware distribution is but list moderators apparently 
couldn't manage those problems.  I could restart that mailing list and may 
be able to moderate it, I don't know if a lynx user on linux can do the 
necessary web work on yahoogroups to moderate lists yet.  I have time 
since retiring from Southern Maryland and the Navy but that could change 
in a while too.



jude <jdashiel@shellworld.net>

Re: slackware on a fast machine

[John G. Heim]

I suspect that when speakup wasn't working with a particular keyboard it 
wasn't the keboard itself. Probably speakup wasn't loaded. There could 
be timing issues between USB and PS2 keyboards but I don't think that 
speakup itself cares about the kind of keyboard you use.

How short on hardware are you? When I had to deal with a slow internet 
connection, I set up my own debian mirror. I have no idea how hard that 
is to do in slackware. But for a mirror that you are going to use 
yourself, all you need is an old P4 or even a 486. I think the debian 
mirror takes about 16Gb of space. I don't know how things are where you 
live but around here, machines like that are free for the taking. People 
give them away to avoid paying the recycling fee.

I'll bet if you ask around at your local maker space or on the local 
lug, you'll get offers for a dozen machines that could serve as a mirror.

On 6/29/2014 6:48 AM, Jude DaShiell wrote:
> I just remembered something and why this is I can't figure.  The
> speakup_ltlk module in speakup.s in slackware and possibly also in the
> Linux kernel unless it was patched requires a ps/2 keyboard to be used to
> boot up the computer.  I remember on an earlier slackware installation
> switching out keyboards to a usb keyboard and I couldn't get speech
> working when trying to boot into slackware until I switched that USB
> keyboard out for a ps/2 again.  In that move, all the ps/2 keyboards I
> have also got donated.  Slackware does respond to a three-fingered salute
> on the usb keyboard I have and does respond to typing on that keyboard
> otherwise but that's as far as I can go here.  This is using an amd k8
> athelon machine too.  If I remember properly, this also happened on an
> intel machine I was using.  Now I'm wondering if this happens to any other
> slackware speakup users using usb keyboards.  It could be my particular
> brand keyboard is the problem or it could be this effects more than one
> brand and model of usb keyboard I don't know.  Aside from that, I can't
> get any audible indication as to when the boot: prompt comes up on the
> screen so I don't know if I ever keyed in the boot parameters at the right
> time during the past few days either.  When I get slackware any more, I
> use bittorrent and let that run overnight and burn DVD's in the afternoon
> of the next day since the distributor of slackware boxed sets will not
> package those shrink wrapped sets well enough to prevent breakage of cases
> and sometimes disks inside those cases and this is happening for people
> who have a slackware subscription.
>
> I'll put archlinux on this 80GB disk and hope Slackware improves a few
> things eventually.  The faq files on slackware.com are outdated in that
> they don't refelect slackware's move from multiple floppy disk
> distribution to cd's and DVD's distributions.  It is unfortunate the
> linux-slackware email list on yahoogroups.com had to be closed down since
> it was being misused by people who didn't even know what Linux is let
> alone the slackware distribution is but list moderators apparently
> couldn't manage those problems.  I could restart that mailing list and may
> be able to moderate it, I don't know if a lynx user on linux can do the
> necessary web work on yahoogroups to moderate lists yet.  I have time
> since retiring from Southern Maryland and the Navy but that could change
> in a while too.
>
>
>
> jude <jdashiel@shellworld.net>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup

Re: slackware on a fast machine

[Rob Hudson]

I have a few machines like that sitting around, and have been considering 
setting up my own local debian mirror for situations when I don't have an 
outside connection. Is it just a matter of using wget on something like 
us.debian.org? Or is there a master archive that can be downloaded?
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John G. Heim" <jheim@math.wisc.edu>
To: "Speakup is a screen review system for Linux." 
<speakup@linux-speakup.org>
Sent: Sunday, June 29, 2014 10:12 AM
Subject: Re: slackware on a fast machine


>I suspect that when speakup wasn't working with a particular keyboard it 
>wasn't the keboard itself. Probably speakup wasn't loaded. There could be 
>timing issues between USB and PS2 keyboards but I don't think that speakup 
>itself cares about the kind of keyboard you use.
>
> How short on hardware are you? When I had to deal with a slow internet 
> connection, I set up my own debian mirror. I have no idea how hard that is 
> to do in slackware. But for a mirror that you are going to use yourself, 
> all you need is an old P4 or even a 486. I think the debian mirror takes 
> about 16Gb of space. I don't know how things are where you live but around 
> here, machines like that are free for the taking. People give them away to 
> avoid paying the recycling fee.
>
> I'll bet if you ask around at your local maker space or on the local lug, 
> you'll get offers for a dozen machines that could serve as a mirror.
>
> On 6/29/2014 6:48 AM, Jude DaShiell wrote:
>> I just remembered something and why this is I can't figure.  The
>> speakup_ltlk module in speakup.s in slackware and possibly also in the
>> Linux kernel unless it was patched requires a ps/2 keyboard to be used to
>> boot up the computer.  I remember on an earlier slackware installation
>> switching out keyboards to a usb keyboard and I couldn't get speech
>> working when trying to boot into slackware until I switched that USB
>> keyboard out for a ps/2 again.  In that move, all the ps/2 keyboards I
>> have also got donated.  Slackware does respond to a three-fingered salute
>> on the usb keyboard I have and does respond to typing on that keyboard
>> otherwise but that's as far as I can go here.  This is using an amd k8
>> athelon machine too.  If I remember properly, this also happened on an
>> intel machine I was using.  Now I'm wondering if this happens to any 
>> other
>> slackware speakup users using usb keyboards.  It could be my particular
>> brand keyboard is the problem or it could be this effects more than one
>> brand and model of usb keyboard I don't know.  Aside from that, I can't
>> get any audible indication as to when the boot: prompt comes up on the
>> screen so I don't know if I ever keyed in the boot parameters at the 
>> right
>> time during the past few days either.  When I get slackware any more, I
>> use bittorrent and let that run overnight and burn DVD's in the afternoon
>> of the next day since the distributor of slackware boxed sets will not
>> package those shrink wrapped sets well enough to prevent breakage of 
>> cases
>> and sometimes disks inside those cases and this is happening for people
>> who have a slackware subscription.
>>
>> I'll put archlinux on this 80GB disk and hope Slackware improves a few
>> things eventually.  The faq files on slackware.com are outdated in that
>> they don't refelect slackware's move from multiple floppy disk
>> distribution to cd's and DVD's distributions.  It is unfortunate the
>> linux-slackware email list on yahoogroups.com had to be closed down since
>> it was being misused by people who didn't even know what Linux is let
>> alone the slackware distribution is but list moderators apparently
>> couldn't manage those problems.  I could restart that mailing list and 
>> may
>> be able to moderate it, I don't know if a lynx user on linux can do the
>> necessary web work on yahoogroups to moderate lists yet.  I have time
>> since retiring from Southern Maryland and the Navy but that could change
>> in a while too.
>>
>>
>>
>> jude <jdashiel@shellworld.net>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Speakup mailing list
>> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
>> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> 

mirroring (was: slackware)

[John G. Heim]

I used apt-cacherng. I'm not saying that's the best tool. I do recall 
that it took me about one afternoon to set up.  So this is not a true 
mirror. But it automatically downloads packages to it's own cache 
whenever you ask for them. Next time, you don't have to download them 
again. But what you do is point the machine itself to it's own cache and 
have it  update all packages each night. Therefore, the cache on the 
mirror machine is always up to date. When you do an install, you install 
from the mirror. On a debian install, you select 1 when the list of 
mirrors come up and this allows you to enter the URL for your cache. It 
decreased the time it takes me to install debian from 2 to 4 hours to 
about 20 minutes.

I have a gig network in my house but I found that didn't make that much 
difference. I had a 100mb ethernet card in my cache machine and I 
replaced it with a 1000mb card. But it didn't seem to make any 
difference. So I am guessing the download time is no longer the 
bottleneck. Unpacking the packages and writing  them to disk is now the 
limiting factor.


On 6/29/2014 11:02 AM, Rob Hudson wrote:
> I have a few machines like that sitting around, and have been 
> considering setting up my own local debian mirror for situations when 
> I don't have an outside connection. Is it just a matter of using wget 
> on something like us.debian.org? Or is there a master archive that can 
> be downloaded?
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "John G. Heim" <jheim@math.wisc.edu>
> To: "Speakup is a screen review system for Linux." 
> <speakup@linux-speakup.org>
> Sent: Sunday, June 29, 2014 10:12 AM
> Subject: Re: slackware on a fast machine
>
>
>> I suspect that when speakup wasn't working with a particular keyboard 
>> it wasn't the keboard itself. Probably speakup wasn't loaded. There 
>> could be timing issues between USB and PS2 keyboards but I don't 
>> think that speakup itself cares about the kind of keyboard you use.
>>
>> How short on hardware are you? When I had to deal with a slow 
>> internet connection, I set up my own debian mirror. I have no idea 
>> how hard that is to do in slackware. But for a mirror that you are 
>> going to use yourself, all you need is an old P4 or even a 486. I 
>> think the debian mirror takes about 16Gb of space. I don't know how 
>> things are where you live but around here, machines like that are 
>> free for the taking. People give them away to avoid paying the 
>> recycling fee.
>>
>> I'll bet if you ask around at your local maker space or on the local 
>> lug, you'll get offers for a dozen machines that could serve as a 
>> mirror.
>>
>> On 6/29/2014 6:48 AM, Jude DaShiell wrote:
>>> I just remembered something and why this is I can't figure.  The
>>> speakup_ltlk module in speakup.s in slackware and possibly also in the
>>> Linux kernel unless it was patched requires a ps/2 keyboard to be 
>>> used to
>>> boot up the computer.  I remember on an earlier slackware installation
>>> switching out keyboards to a usb keyboard and I couldn't get speech
>>> working when trying to boot into slackware until I switched that USB
>>> keyboard out for a ps/2 again.  In that move, all the ps/2 keyboards I
>>> have also got donated.  Slackware does respond to a three-fingered 
>>> salute
>>> on the usb keyboard I have and does respond to typing on that keyboard
>>> otherwise but that's as far as I can go here.  This is using an amd k8
>>> athelon machine too.  If I remember properly, this also happened on an
>>> intel machine I was using.  Now I'm wondering if this happens to any 
>>> other
>>> slackware speakup users using usb keyboards.  It could be my particular
>>> brand keyboard is the problem or it could be this effects more than one
>>> brand and model of usb keyboard I don't know.  Aside from that, I can't
>>> get any audible indication as to when the boot: prompt comes up on the
>>> screen so I don't know if I ever keyed in the boot parameters at the 
>>> right
>>> time during the past few days either.  When I get slackware any more, I
>>> use bittorrent and let that run overnight and burn DVD's in the 
>>> afternoon
>>> of the next day since the distributor of slackware boxed sets will not
>>> package those shrink wrapped sets well enough to prevent breakage of 
>>> cases
>>> and sometimes disks inside those cases and this is happening for people
>>> who have a slackware subscription.
>>>
>>> I'll put archlinux on this 80GB disk and hope Slackware improves a few
>>> things eventually.  The faq files on slackware.com are outdated in that
>>> they don't refelect slackware's move from multiple floppy disk
>>> distribution to cd's and DVD's distributions.  It is unfortunate the
>>> linux-slackware email list on yahoogroups.com had to be closed down 
>>> since
>>> it was being misused by people who didn't even know what Linux is let
>>> alone the slackware distribution is but list moderators apparently
>>> couldn't manage those problems.  I could restart that mailing list 
>>> and may
>>> be able to moderate it, I don't know if a lynx user on linux can do the
>>> necessary web work on yahoogroups to moderate lists yet.  I have time
>>> since retiring from Southern Maryland and the Navy but that could 
>>> change
>>> in a while too.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> jude <jdashiel@shellworld.net>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Speakup mailing list
>>> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
>>> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>> _______________________________________________
>> Speakup mailing list
>> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
>> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup

Re: mirroring (was: slackware)

[Rob Hudson]

Okay, looks simple enough. Thanks for the tips.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John G. Heim" <jheim@math.wisc.edu>
To: "Speakup is a screen review system for Linux." 
<speakup@linux-speakup.org>
Sent: Sunday, June 29, 2014 11:23 AM
Subject: mirroring (was: slackware)


>I used apt-cacherng. I'm not saying that's the best tool. I do recall that 
>it took me about one afternoon to set up.  So this is not a true mirror. 
>But it automatically downloads packages to it's own cache whenever you ask 
>for them. Next time, you don't have to download them again. But what you do 
>is point the machine itself to it's own cache and have it  update all 
>packages each night. Therefore, the cache on the mirror machine is always 
>up to date. When you do an install, you install from the mirror. On a 
>debian install, you select 1 when the list of mirrors come up and this 
>allows you to enter the URL for your cache. It decreased the time it takes 
>me to install debian from 2 to 4 hours to about 20 minutes.
>
> I have a gig network in my house but I found that didn't make that much 
> difference. I had a 100mb ethernet card in my cache machine and I replaced 
> it with a 1000mb card. But it didn't seem to make any difference. So I am 
> guessing the download time is no longer the bottleneck. Unpacking the 
> packages and writing  them to disk is now the limiting factor.
>
>
> On 6/29/2014 11:02 AM, Rob Hudson wrote:
>> I have a few machines like that sitting around, and have been considering 
>> setting up my own local debian mirror for situations when I don't have an 
>> outside connection. Is it just a matter of using wget on something like 
>> us.debian.org? Or is there a master archive that can be downloaded?
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "John G. Heim" <jheim@math.wisc.edu>
>> To: "Speakup is a screen review system for Linux." 
>> <speakup@linux-speakup.org>
>> Sent: Sunday, June 29, 2014 10:12 AM
>> Subject: Re: slackware on a fast machine
>>
>>
>>> I suspect that when speakup wasn't working with a particular keyboard it 
>>> wasn't the keboard itself. Probably speakup wasn't loaded. There could 
>>> be timing issues between USB and PS2 keyboards but I don't think that 
>>> speakup itself cares about the kind of keyboard you use.
>>>
>>> How short on hardware are you? When I had to deal with a slow internet 
>>> connection, I set up my own debian mirror. I have no idea how hard that 
>>> is to do in slackware. But for a mirror that you are going to use 
>>> yourself, all you need is an old P4 or even a 486. I think the debian 
>>> mirror takes about 16Gb of space. I don't know how things are where you 
>>> live but around here, machines like that are free for the taking. People 
>>> give them away to avoid paying the recycling fee.
>>>
>>> I'll bet if you ask around at your local maker space or on the local 
>>> lug, you'll get offers for a dozen machines that could serve as a 
>>> mirror.
>>>
>>> On 6/29/2014 6:48 AM, Jude DaShiell wrote:
>>>> I just remembered something and why this is I can't figure.  The
>>>> speakup_ltlk module in speakup.s in slackware and possibly also in the
>>>> Linux kernel unless it was patched requires a ps/2 keyboard to be used 
>>>> to
>>>> boot up the computer.  I remember on an earlier slackware installation
>>>> switching out keyboards to a usb keyboard and I couldn't get speech
>>>> working when trying to boot into slackware until I switched that USB
>>>> keyboard out for a ps/2 again.  In that move, all the ps/2 keyboards I
>>>> have also got donated.  Slackware does respond to a three-fingered 
>>>> salute
>>>> on the usb keyboard I have and does respond to typing on that keyboard
>>>> otherwise but that's as far as I can go here.  This is using an amd k8
>>>> athelon machine too.  If I remember properly, this also happened on an
>>>> intel machine I was using.  Now I'm wondering if this happens to any 
>>>> other
>>>> slackware speakup users using usb keyboards.  It could be my particular
>>>> brand keyboard is the problem or it could be this effects more than one
>>>> brand and model of usb keyboard I don't know.  Aside from that, I can't
>>>> get any audible indication as to when the boot: prompt comes up on the
>>>> screen so I don't know if I ever keyed in the boot parameters at the 
>>>> right
>>>> time during the past few days either.  When I get slackware any more, I
>>>> use bittorrent and let that run overnight and burn DVD's in the 
>>>> afternoon
>>>> of the next day since the distributor of slackware boxed sets will not
>>>> package those shrink wrapped sets well enough to prevent breakage of 
>>>> cases
>>>> and sometimes disks inside those cases and this is happening for people
>>>> who have a slackware subscription.
>>>>
>>>> I'll put archlinux on this 80GB disk and hope Slackware improves a few
>>>> things eventually.  The faq files on slackware.com are outdated in that
>>>> they don't refelect slackware's move from multiple floppy disk
>>>> distribution to cd's and DVD's distributions.  It is unfortunate the
>>>> linux-slackware email list on yahoogroups.com had to be closed down 
>>>> since
>>>> it was being misused by people who didn't even know what Linux is let
>>>> alone the slackware distribution is but list moderators apparently
>>>> couldn't manage those problems.  I could restart that mailing list and 
>>>> may
>>>> be able to moderate it, I don't know if a lynx user on linux can do the
>>>> necessary web work on yahoogroups to moderate lists yet.  I have time
>>>> since retiring from Southern Maryland and the Navy but that could 
>>>> change
>>>> in a while too.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> jude <jdashiel@shellworld.net>
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Speakup mailing list
>>>> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
>>>> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Speakup mailing list
>>> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
>>> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
>>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Speakup mailing list
>> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
>> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> _______________________________________________
> Speakup mailing list
> Speakup@linux-speakup.org
> http://linux-speakup.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/speakup
> 

Re: mirroring (was: slackware)

[Gregory Nowak]

I'd love to be corrected, but the problem with apt-cache is that it
only gets the packages you use, not the whole mirror. So, if you find
yourself without an internet connection, and want to install a new
package, you're screwed. I have seen discussions in the past on
debian-user describing how to create an apt-cache mirror using
loopback-mounted isos of the debian DVD set. Now that use of apt-cache
would give you a full mirror which would still be useable without an
internet connection.

Greg


On Sun, Jun 29, 2014 at 12:03:36PM -0500, Rob Hudson wrote:
> Okay, looks simple enough. Thanks for the tips.


-- 
web site: http://www.gregn.net
gpg public key: http://www.gregn.net/pubkey.asc
skype: gregn1
(authorization required, add me to your contacts list first)
If we haven't been in touch before, e-mail me before adding me to your contacts.

--
Free domains: http://www.eu.org/ or mail dns-manager@EU.org

Re: mirroring

[John G. Heim]

Yeah, but for me at least, the problem (not being able to install 
something new when my network connections is down)  comes up so rarely 
that it isn't worth considering.  I would think that most people who 
want to cache or mirror are doing so because they have a slow dsl line. 
If you are using dialup, caching is probably still better than mirroring 
because it would take forever to download a complete mirror over dialup.

So if you have dsl but it's slow, you have a network connection all the 
time. That's not the problem. The problem is the download takes too long.
When I set up my cache, I had a 768kbps connection. That's kbps as in 
kilobytes per second. Like with your old 56k dialup modem. I now have a 
3mbps connection but I still use the cache. 3mbps isn't really all that 
fast by today's standards. Typically, cable gives you 30mbps and the 
cable company in my area is advertizing  60mbps. But I can't see so I 
don't want to pay $150 a month just to hear Game of Thrones.


On 06/29/14 15:24, Gregory Nowak wrote:
> I'd love to be corrected, but the problem with apt-cache is that it
> only gets the packages you use, not the whole mirror. So, if you find
> yourself without an internet connection, and want to install a new
> package, you're screwed. I have seen discussions in the past on
> debian-user describing how to create an apt-cache mirror using
> loopback-mounted isos of the debian DVD set. Now that use of apt-cache
> would give you a full mirror which would still be useable without an
> internet connection.
>
> Greg
>
>
> On Sun, Jun 29, 2014 at 12:03:36PM -0500, Rob Hudson wrote:
>> Okay, looks simple enough. Thanks for the tips.
>
>

-- 
---
John G. Heim, 608-263-4189, jheim@math.wisc.edu