Is it advisable to refromat the entire hard drive?

Since no OS works any more, may I use GParted?

How do you put a partition inside a partition?

WHat are the recommended partition sizes? For a 500GB HD, I want a 650MB pure
DOS partition, then WIn XP (100GB?) then QUantian
(Knoppix, Debian, somewhat old/legacy)
(Ext4, Swap, data partitons???)

Can the shared DATA partition be inside the extended partiton holding Unix
and SWAP? Win3 used a swap file, can (should?) I get Win XP to share the SWAP
with Linux?

XP wants chkdsk/reformat of Win7 partiton. Is it complaining about NTFS or MBR?
I thought I reformatted the Win7 partiton already.

--
Vasos Panagiotopoulos panix.com/~vjp2/vasos.htm
---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}---

On 2023-01-31, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com <vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com> wrote:
> Is it advisable to refromat the entire hard drive?
>
> Since no OS works any more, may I use GParted?
>
> How do you put a partition inside a partition?
>
> WHat are the recommended partition sizes? For a 500GB HD, I want a 650MB pure
> DOS partition, then WIn XP (100GB?) then QUantian
> (Knoppix, Debian, somewhat old/legacy)
> (Ext4, Swap, data partitons???)
>
> Can the shared DATA partition be inside the extended partiton holding Unix
> and SWAP? Win3 used a swap file, can (should?) I get Win XP to share the SWAP
> with Linux?
>
> XP wants chkdsk/reformat of Win7 partiton. Is it complaining about NTFS or MBR?
> I thought I reformatted the Win7 partiton already.
>

A great resource is the gentoo handbook:
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Handbook:AMD64/Full/Installation Search for the
*Introduction to Block Devices* section, and start reading from there.

--
"Many have sought in vain to tell joyously of the Most Joyous; now at last
it declares Itself to me, now in this misery." -Holderlin

On 1/30/23 16:25, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
> Is it advisable to refromat the entire hard drive?

Depends on previous use and it may be too old to bother with.
>
> Since no OS works any more, may I use GParted?

A good distribution will have GPartEd as a component
of a Live DVD/CD.
>
> How do you put a partition inside a partition?

We don't do that anymore in enlightened circles.
We used to do that when Hard Disks were quite small and
the term for that is creating logical partitions.
These days we use Globally Identifiable Partitions
Which are not the old style at all but are all primary
partitions.
We create depending on the computer, an EFI partition
300 MB and then i use 1 gig for boot 50 GB for my / Root to allow
for updates and I use a large /home plus a data and or backup
partition.

>
> WHat are the recommended partition sizes? For a 500GB HD, I want a 650MB pure
> DOS partition, then WIn XP (100GB?) then QUantian
> (Knoppix, Debian, somewhat old/legacy)
> (Ext4, Swap, data partitons???)

I guess you are a student? Or a masochist but it should work with 50 GB
for the Windows XP. I ran it on 20 or 30 GB hard drive which I split
with my first Linux install. You should not install Knoppix as it is
a tool for solving problems but maybe you can give 4 GB and let it boot
from its Iso file? Why use old Debian, if you do not want systemd
download and use Devuan which uses the same repositories as Debian.
Your EFI is in FAT32. Your small DOS partition should be in FAT.
Windows XP in NTFS, SWAP is its own filesystem whatever Linux partition
other than Swap can be ext4. I dunno nuttin about no Quantian.

>
> Can the shared DATA partition be inside the extended partiton holding Unix
> and SWAP? Win3 used a swap file, can (should?) I get Win XP to share the SWAP
> with Linux?

I doubt it.
Shared data should be either FAT32 or NTFS Linux can copy back and
forth to eigher
>
> XP wants chkdsk/reformat of Win7 partition. Is it complaining about NTFS or MBR?
> I thought I reformatted the Win7 partition already.
Windows is a deceitful tool that will turn in your hand
to your disadvantage. Check your BIOS for the ability to use
EFI without a special partition.

Good Luck, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com

bliss - on the ever-faithful Dell Latitude E7450, PCLinuxOS 2022
KDE Plasma 5.26.5 Kernel: 6.1.8-pclos1 (64-bit)
KDE Frameworks 5.102.0 - Qt Version: 5.15.6
Graphics : X11 - Mesa Intel® HD Graphics 5500
15.5 GiB of RAM - CPU 4 × Intel® Core™ i7-5600U CPU @ 2.60GHz
Actually 2 real cores and 2 virtual cores.

--
bliss dash SF 4 ever at dslextreme dot com

Am 31.01.2023 um 00:25:46 Uhr schrieb
vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com:

> Is it advisable to refromat the entire hard drive?

If you like to change the partitioning, yes.

> How do you put a partition inside a partition?

That is only intended for MBR and logical partitions.

> WHat are the recommended partition sizes? For a 500GB HD, I want a
> 650MB pure DOS partition, then WIn XP (100GB?) then QUantian
> (Knoppix, Debian, somewhat old/legacy)
> (Ext4, Swap, data partitons???)
>
> Can the shared DATA partition be inside the extended partiton holding
> Unix and SWAP?

Yes, if the OS can read it.

> Win3 used a swap file, can (should?) I get Win XP to
> share the SWAP with Linux?

I assume this won't work.

> XP wants chkdsk/reformat of Win7 partiton. Is it complaining about
> NTFS or MBR? I thought I reformatted the Win7 partiton already.

Delete the win 7 partition, then create an NTFS for XP if you really
like to use that dinosaur.

On 31/01/2023 06:41, Marco Moock wrote:
> Am 31.01.2023 um 00:25:46 Uhr schrieb
> vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com:
>
>> Is it advisable to refromat the entire hard drive?
>
> If you like to change the partitioning, yes.
>
>> How do you put a partition inside a partition?
>
> That is only intended for MBR and logical partitions.
>
>> WHat are the recommended partition sizes? For a 500GB HD, I want a
>> 650MB pure DOS partition, then WIn XP (100GB?) then QUantian
>> (Knoppix, Debian, somewhat old/legacy)
>> (Ext4, Swap, data partitons???)
>>
>> Can the shared DATA partition be inside the extended partiton holding
>> Unix and SWAP?
>
> Yes, if the OS can read it.
>
>> Win3 used a swap file, can (should?) I get Win XP to
>> share the SWAP with Linux?
>
> I assume this won't work.
>
>> XP wants chkdsk/reformat of Win7 partiton. Is it complaining about
>> NTFS or MBR? I thought I reformatted the Win7 partiton already.
>
> Delete the win 7 partition, then create an NTFS for XP if you really
> like to use that dinosaur.
>
XP runs better and boots faster in a VM. I think my virtualBox XP
install is about 12Gb.

Runs fast enough for everything except real time games. But why would
you use XP for that?

--
"I am inclined to tell the truth and dislike people who lie consistently.
This makes me unfit for the company of people of a Left persuasion, and
all women"

On Mon, 30 Jan 2023 17:59:27 -0800, Bobbie Sellers wrote:
>
> On 1/30/23 16:25, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>> Is it advisable to refromat the entire hard drive?
>
> Depends on previous use and it may be too old to bother with.

If there is no use for any of the old data, yes.

>> Since no OS works any more, may I use GParted?
>
> A good distribution will have GPartEd as a component
> of a Live DVD/CD.

Suppose any distribution today has Gparted. Boot it and let it do the
job.

Btw.: Blast from the past. When I installed my first Linux back in 1997
(was a simple CD glued to a computer magazine, not even dealing only with
Linux) there was a lengthy how to install it next to Windows (95 I had
back then). First, boot Windows, defrag it. Start fips.exe to do the
partitioning.

On first run the PNP sound card wasn't working. Had to use pnpdump and
isapnp to probe for DMA, IRQ and stuff, then try it with the (probably
wrong) values, half of the time crashing Linux. *LOL*

Ah, good old days.
--
Andreas

THanks for replies.

I am 61, trying to reconstruct a former setup I still need.
I had done this before ten years ago.

Will XP read a DATA partition under EXTENDED that houses Linux (Knoppix/Quantian)
and SWAP as well? In my former setup I accessed the XP files from Linux.

Quantian is a form (distro) of Knoppix/Debian chock full of apps I need

If I really was a masochist (it shows up on my psych profile 13/15, Obsessive
14/15) I would also set up a DEC TOPS20 partition to emulate what I had in
college. DOn't tempt me.

Thanks again.

--
Vasos Panagiotopoulos panix.com/~vjp2/vasos.htm
---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}---

On 31.1.2023 20.11, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
> THanks for replies.
>
> I am 61, trying to reconstruct a former setup I still need.
> I had done this before ten years ago.
>
> Will XP read a DATA partition under EXTENDED that houses Linux (Knoppix/Quantian)
> and SWAP as well? In my former setup I accessed the XP files from Linux.
>
> Quantian is a form (distro) of Knoppix/Debian chock full of apps I need
>
> If I really was a masochist (it shows up on my psych profile 13/15, Obsessive
> 14/15) I would also set up a DEC TOPS20 partition to emulate what I had in
> college. DOn't tempt me.
>
> Thanks again.
>
>

XP is not supported anymore by Microsoft. You may have problems
activating it after installation.

--

-TV

On 31/01/2023 18:25, Tauno Voipio wrote:
> On 31.1.2023 20.11, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
>> THanks for replies.
>>
>> I am 61, trying to reconstruct a former setup I still need.
>> I had done this before ten years ago.
>>
>> Will XP read a DATA partition under EXTENDED that houses Linux
>> (Knoppix/Quantian)
>> and SWAP as well? In my former setup I accessed the XP files from Linux.
>>
>> Quantian is a form (distro) of Knoppix/Debian chock full of apps I need
>>
>> If I really was a masochist (it shows up on my psych profile 13/15,
>> Obsessive
>> 14/15) I would also set up a DEC TOPS20 partition to emulate what I
>> had in
>> college. DOn't tempt me.
>>
>> Thanks again.
>>
>>
>
> XP is not supported anymore by Microsoft. You may have problems
> activating it after installation.
>
More pirate activation codes than Ive had hot dinners, out there,

--
Climate is what you expect but weather is what you get.
Mark Twain

Am 31.01.2023 um 18:11:04 Uhr schrieb
vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com:

> THanks for replies.
>
> I am 61, trying to reconstruct a former setup I still need.
> I had done this before ten years ago.
>
> Will XP read a DATA partition under EXTENDED that houses Linux
> (Knoppix/Quantian) and SWAP as well? In my former setup I accessed
> the XP files from Linux.

IIRC XP can use extended partitions that contain logical partitions
with a file system XP can read. Using a swap partition for Linux
together with XP doesn't work.

On 1/31/23 10:11, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
> THanks for replies.
>
> I am 61, trying to reconstruct a former setup I still need.
> I had done this before ten years ago.

I hope it is not nostalgia as too much nostalgia can
be fatal.

>
> Will XP read a DATA partition under EXTENDED that houses Linux (Knoppix/Quantian)
> and SWAP as well? In my former setup I accessed the XP files from Linux.

Not as far as I know. Linux has a flexibility that Windows© eschews.
There were supposed to be additions to Windows© that allowed
it to read in ext3 or ext4. Haven't heard about it lately.
But modern Linux distributions can access the Windows© partitions.

But if you are a glutton for Windows© punishment they Microsoft©
has produced a version of Linux that runs under Windows©. Not under XP
but the later versions. You will have to go to Windows© to read about
that addition to Windows©

>
> Quantian is a form (distro) of Knoppix/Debian chock full of apps I need

Well I haven't seen it lately. Maybe it is time to look around.
By the way Knoppix is up to 9.1 freely distributable but maybe 9.2 has
been released by now. It was released only at a German show with a
magazine promotion. AFAIK it will still install as version of
Debian...

>
> If I really was a masochist (it shows up on my psych profile 13/15, Obsessive
> 14/15) I would also set up a DEC TOPS20 partition to emulate what I had in
> college. DOn't tempt me.
>
> Thanks again.

Oh please don't regress to DEC TOP20 partition.
If you do finding help will be harder.

bliss - on the ever-faithful Dell Latitude E7450, PCLinuxOS 2022
KDE Plasma 5.26.5 Kernel: 6.1.8-pclos1 (64-bit)
KDE Frameworks 5.102.0 - Qt Version: 5.15.6
Graphics : X11 - Mesa Intel® HD Graphics 5500
15.5 GiB of RAM - CPU 4 × Intel® Core™ i7-5600U CPU @ 2.60GHz
Actually 2 real cores and 2 virtual cores.

--
bliss dash SF 4 ever at dslextreme dot com

On 1/30/23 7:25 PM, vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com wrote:
> Is it advisable to refromat the entire hard drive?
>
> Since no OS works any more, may I use GParted?

If nothing works then nothing works - so you may as
well do a total reformat.

> How do you put a partition inside a partition?

You don't REALLY do that.

Go to the "Device" tab, pick "Create a Partition Table".

I would recommend a "GPT" partition.

If you go with the "MSDOS"/MBR style partitioning scheme
then you will have to create an "extended partition" if
you need more than four partitions. With GPT (today's
de-facto standard) you can create lots and lots of
partitions no problem.

If you need UEFI, then your very first partition should
be a FAT-32, 128mb to 512mb in size. Smaller usually
does it.

HOWEVER, if you ARE starting from scratch then just install
a standard linux distro like Debian from a USB stick or DVD.
It will create the UEFI partition and set all the little
status flags correctly. However MANUAL control of new partitions,
like for Debian, will be needed so it won't use up the entire
damned disk. The alt is to do a Deb install and then use a USB
stick with a 'live' linux so you can run gparted on the disk
and SHRINK the Deb partition. You can't gparted on the partition
you're running from.

If you use WINDERS ... well then ... things get uglier. You
can indeed make a "dual boot" drive. Alas Winders thinks it
owns the universe so it has to be installed FIRST and then
you have to SHRINK the Winders partition to make space for
anything else (ControlPanel->Administrative Tools->DiskManagement).
You can also use gparted from a USB stick, gparted-live.
Then you install a Linux in the empty space. GRUB2 will be
installed automatically and you will get a boot menu when
the box starts - Linux or Winders. But WHY would you want
Winders ??????

Note, heavy-duty Winders fix-it utilities will REMOVE Grub2
and re-assert the WinderVerse model on the disk. Bill Gates
does NOT like competition. A more difficult alt is to set
up Linux/Unix/Grub on a completely different drive and
then use the PC's BIOS options to boot THAT disk when you want.

>
> WHat are the recommended partition sizes? For a 500GB HD, I want a 650MB pure
> DOS partition, then WIn XP (100GB?) then QUantian
> (Knoppix, Debian, somewhat old/legacy)
> (Ext4, Swap, data partitons???)
>
> Can the shared DATA partition be inside the extended partiton holding Unix
> and SWAP? Win3 used a swap file, can (should?) I get Win XP to share the SWAP
> with Linux?
>
> XP wants chkdsk/reformat of Win7 partiton. Is it complaining about NTFS or MBR?
> I thought I reformatted the Win7 partiton already.

??? The newer version of Winders rules. If you have Win-11 or Win-10
then IGNORE anything Vista/XP/W2k/etc wants to do. I'd suggest running
them as virtual machines anyhow ... VirtualBox works fine - you can
even run CP/M-86 ... the "other disk" that came with the IBM-PCs.

Though insider rumors are that MicroSquish is going down the same,
sane, path as Apple ... ie converting more and more to a Linux/Unix
underlying system ... they are disguising this and you won't really
see anything Linux-ish for quite awhile. Winders is a HORRIBLE OS,
packed full of 30 years of fix-ups, compromises and vulnerabilities.
Nobody there understands how it works anymore - they just practice
patch-n-hope. It's a lost cause. Winders WILL become a Linux/Unix
pretty soon for sheer SURVIVAL reasons.

On 31/01/2023 19:18, Marco Moock wrote:
> Am 31.01.2023 um 18:11:04 Uhr schrieb
> vjp2.at@at.BioStrategist.dot.dot.com:
>
>> THanks for replies.
>>
>> I am 61, trying to reconstruct a former setup I still need.
>> I had done this before ten years ago.
>>
>> Will XP read a DATA partition under EXTENDED that houses Linux
>> (Knoppix/Quantian) and SWAP as well? In my former setup I accessed
>> the XP files from Linux.
>
> IIRC XP can use extended partitions that contain logical partitions
> with a file system XP can read. Using a swap partition for Linux
> together with XP doesn't work.
>

I am not quite clear on what the OP is asking here, and believe you may
have answered the wrong question

>>Will XP read a DATA partition under EXTENDED that houses Linux
>> (Knoppix/Quantian) and SWAP as well?

And the answer to this is, not directly, but it can easily be made to.
Virtualbox will allow you to map a linux disk as a *networked* windows
drive.

I keep no data of any consequence in my Windows VM. Its all under linux.
And indeed on a different machine to the one running Windows in a VM.

At one time I ran SMB on my server and mounted that on windows, but I
susbequently ditched that because I had no native windows or macintosh
machines - I went all linux, and now I mount the server via a mount of a
local drive that is in fact an NFS mount of the server!

Sounds clunky, but works really well. NFS integrates machines seamlessly
in a trusted environment, saturates the link satisfactorily, and as far
as the windows VM knows it might as well be part of the local disk.

IIRC (and its ages since I played with it), Virtual Box takes the user
it is initiated by and runs with those permissions. So there is no
problem in giving access to system folders since you wont have
permission to tamper with anything therein.

I just peeked into my config, and what i had set up - so long ago I had
forgotten - is /home/me as a shared drive in virtual box, so I cant
actually see the host machine root directory at all.

This appears in Virtual box as \\vboxsvr\...

And in fact I think will work even if you disable networking in the Vbox
XP client.

So its all very well thought out and logical. You set up the Vm and
control what access it has to the host machine, and use windows
networking to access the data.

HTH

--
"In our post-modern world, climate science is not powerful because it is
true: it is true because it is powerful."

Lucas Bergkamp

On 2023-02-01, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:

> If you use WINDERS ... well then ... things get uglier. You
> can indeed make a "dual boot" drive. Alas Winders thinks it
> owns the universe so it has to be installed FIRST and then
> you have to SHRINK the Winders partition to make space for
> anything else (ControlPanel->Administrative Tools->DiskManagement).

Beware - Windoze creates a Master File Table (MFT) and places it
smack in the middle of its partition. This table is immovable,
so you can shrink the partition by a maximum of 50%. Download a
trial version of PerfectDisk (https://www.raxco.com). It's capable
of moving the MFT after a reboot. The MFT still goes into the
middle of the shrunken partition, so you might have to repeat the
process a few times to shrink the partition down to the size you
want. (The Win7 partition on this laptop was taking up the entire
250GB disk - after a few cycles I got it down to 45GB.)

> Though insider rumors are that MicroSquish is going down the same,
> sane, path as Apple ... ie converting more and more to a Linux/Unix
> underlying system ... they are disguising this and you won't really
> see anything Linux-ish for quite awhile. Winders is a HORRIBLE OS,
> packed full of 30 years of fix-ups, compromises and vulnerabilities.

More than 40 years if you include the cruft it inherited from MS-DOS.
Their quality standard is "Sort of works, most of the time."

> Nobody there understands how it works anymore - they just practice
> patch-n-hope. It's a lost cause. Winders WILL become a Linux/Unix
> pretty soon for sheer SURVIVAL reasons.

M$ has had to back away a bit from their constant reboots -
I think it was interfering with their surveillance efforts.

A delightful irony is that originally M$ ran their web sites on Apache,
because it took a while before IIS was ready for prime time.

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Microsoft is a dictatorship.
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | Apple is a cult.
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | Linux is anarchy.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | Pick your poison.

On 2/1/23 1:03 PM, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
> On 2023-02-01, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>
>> If you use WINDERS ... well then ... things get uglier. You
>> can indeed make a "dual boot" drive. Alas Winders thinks it
>> owns the universe so it has to be installed FIRST and then
>> you have to SHRINK the Winders partition to make space for
>> anything else (ControlPanel->Administrative Tools->DiskManagement).
>
> Beware - Windoze creates a Master File Table (MFT) and places it
> smack in the middle of its partition. This table is immovable,
> so you can shrink the partition by a maximum of 50%. Download a
> trial version of PerfectDisk (https://www.raxco.com). It's capable
> of moving the MFT after a reboot. The MFT still goes into the
> middle of the shrunken partition, so you might have to repeat the
> process a few times to shrink the partition down to the size you
> want. (The Win7 partition on this laptop was taking up the entire
> 250GB disk - after a few cycles I got it down to 45GB.)

"PerfectDisk" hmm ??? Interesting.

At least with earlier versions of Winders - XP/Vista/7 and
I *think* 10 - I've had good luck using gparted to shrink
down the Winders main partition. Can't swear about 10 or
11 however.

On the plus, 'disks' are now usually HUGE - so even shrinking
Winders by 50% leaves way way more than you need for any Linux
environment(s). You can also upgrade to a larger 'disk' after
shrinking Winders, making it proportionally smaller just-because.
2-3tb SSDs are now (kinda) affordable too.

I've got a box with a Win-10 part on it - but it's only about
20% of the entire drive. I think I fire up Winders about once
every three months, mostly just for the updates but it's also
good to ensure my Python apps are Win+Lin compatible. Other
langs need to be re-compiled on Win alas. I like CodeBlocks
for 'C' dev and Lazarus for Pascal GUIs. Easy to move across
OS's with those tools.

>> Though insider rumors are that MicroSquish is going down the same,
>> sane, path as Apple ... ie converting more and more to a Linux/Unix
>> underlying system ... they are disguising this and you won't really
>> see anything Linux-ish for quite awhile. Winders is a HORRIBLE OS,
>> packed full of 30 years of fix-ups, compromises and vulnerabilities.
>
> More than 40 years if you include the cruft it inherited from MS-DOS.
> Their quality standard is "Sort of works, most of the time."

Hmm .. I wonder how much DOS is *still* in Win-11 ? How much CP/M
was in DOS for that matter ?

Some ancient stuff will NEVER go away. When Bill Gates was getting
started there were competitions between programmers to code basic
functions (say times/dates etc) in as few bytes as possible and/or
in as few CPU nanoseconds as possible. This made lots and lots of
little utility routines as optimized as ever possible - and they
still live in *everything*. Working with a very limited CPU/mem
environment does encourage 'tight'/efficient coding.

IMHO, "Programming 101" should use naught but Arduino Uno's for
the first half. That'll teach efficient programming - an oft-
forgotten virtue (and it'll bring you $$$ if you get into
embedded/IOT later). And yes, it IS possible to code a TCP
stack on an Uno - there's a library for it and you can add-on
a 10/100 networking shield and do a minimal web page (I've
done it, but it IS really slow). I won't curse todays newbies
with PIC-12x chips with 128 BYTES of RAM, 1kb of flash and
SIX usable i/o pins - I'm not THAT mean :-)

>> Nobody there understands how it works anymore - they just practice
>> patch-n-hope. It's a lost cause. Winders WILL become a Linux/Unix
>> pretty soon for sheer SURVIVAL reasons.
>
> M$ has had to back away a bit from their constant reboots -
> I think it was interfering with their surveillance efforts.

Win-11 is the worlds largest and most expensive piece
of SPYWARE ever.

> A delightful irony is that originally M$ ran their web sites on Apache,
> because it took a while before IIS was ready for prime time.

Shoulda stuck with Apache ....

Dunno WHAT runs all their big new O365 cloud stuff - but I'm
pretty sure those warehouses full of boxes AIN'T running
Win-Server .....

Anyway, Win has become inscrutable, a Gordian knot, something
too complex and self-interactive for anybody, even AI, to really
get a handle on. Reportedly the last MS guy who could hold it
all in his head and knew how tweaking 'X' would affect 'Y'
retired right after they finished Win2k. They HAVE to migrate
in the same direction as Apple - buy their own little BSD and
pretty it up so it still looks/feels mostly like Winders,
but ain't.

On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:

> On 2/1/23 1:03 PM, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>
>> On 2023-02-01, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>
>>> Though insider rumors are that MicroSquish is going down the same,
>>> sane, path as Apple ... ie converting more and more to a Linux/Unix
>>> underlying system ... they are disguising this and you won't really
>>> see anything Linux-ish for quite awhile. Winders is a HORRIBLE OS,
>>> packed full of 30 years of fix-ups, compromises and vulnerabilities.
>>
>> More than 40 years if you include the cruft it inherited from MS-DOS.
>> Their quality standard is "Sort of works, most of the time."
>
> Hmm .. I wonder how much DOS is *still* in Win-11 ? How much CP/M
> was in DOS for that matter ?

One of my pet peeves goes all the way back to CP/M. The CP/M file
system only stored the size of a file in 128-byte sectors. To make
sure a text file ended in the right place, a hex 1A marker was placed
at the end of the actual text. Since the MS-DOS file system (and its
Windows successors) stores file sizes to the byte, there is not - and
never was - a need for that hex 1A marker. But it lives on to this
day, still causing data lossage. My programs never write it, and
remove it whenever they see it.

> Some ancient stuff will NEVER go away. When Bill Gates was getting
> started there were competitions between programmers to code basic
> functions (say times/dates etc) in as few bytes as possible and/or
> in as few CPU nanoseconds as possible. This made lots and lots of
> little utility routines as optimized as ever possible - and they
> still live in *everything*. Working with a very limited CPU/mem
> environment does encourage 'tight'/efficient coding.

Often at the expense of correctness and reliability.

> Anyway, Win has become inscrutable, a Gordian knot, something
> too complex and self-interactive for anybody, even AI, to really
> get a handle on.

Complexity is a weapon. (The KISS principle is a countermeasure -
which explains why it's so widely hated.)

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Microsoft is a dictatorship.
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | Apple is a cult.
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | Linux is anarchy.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | Pick your poison.

On 2/1/23 11:01 PM, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
> On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>
>> On 2/1/23 1:03 PM, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>>
>>> On 2023-02-01, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Though insider rumors are that MicroSquish is going down the same,
>>>> sane, path as Apple ... ie converting more and more to a Linux/Unix
>>>> underlying system ... they are disguising this and you won't really
>>>> see anything Linux-ish for quite awhile. Winders is a HORRIBLE OS,
>>>> packed full of 30 years of fix-ups, compromises and vulnerabilities.
>>>
>>> More than 40 years if you include the cruft it inherited from MS-DOS.
>>> Their quality standard is "Sort of works, most of the time."
>>
>> Hmm .. I wonder how much DOS is *still* in Win-11 ? How much CP/M
>> was in DOS for that matter ?
>
> One of my pet peeves goes all the way back to CP/M. The CP/M file
> system only stored the size of a file in 128-byte sectors. To make
> sure a text file ended in the right place, a hex 1A marker was placed
> at the end of the actual text. Since the MS-DOS file system (and its
> Windows successors) stores file sizes to the byte, there is not - and
> never was - a need for that hex 1A marker. But it lives on to this
> day, still causing data lossage. My programs never write it, and
> remove it whenever they see it.

I suspect such weirdnesses were carry-overs from older
systems that might have looked at data - esp on tapes -
differently than later data on disks. Having a 'definite'
EOF marker ain't the worst idea even IF the OS stores
length to the byte. There were lots of kinds of storage
media in the old days - tapes, cards, drums, even
mercury-delay lines - and every system or quasi-system
handled it differently.

STILL have to use Ctrl-Z to quit Python3 in Linux ....

>> Some ancient stuff will NEVER go away. When Bill Gates was getting
>> started there were competitions between programmers to code basic
>> functions (say times/dates etc) in as few bytes as possible and/or
>> in as few CPU nanoseconds as possible. This made lots and lots of
>> little utility routines as optimized as ever possible - and they
>> still live in *everything*. Working with a very limited CPU/mem
>> environment does encourage 'tight'/efficient coding.
>
> Often at the expense of correctness and reliability.

Um ... no, not necessarily. Might (probably are) SECURITY
ISSUES these days, but the old code was/is pretty damned
good. Bill Gates often won those 'contests' - he is a very
sharp programmer. Unfortunately he was also a very sharp
business guy without ethical concerns ........

>> Anyway, Win has become inscrutable, a Gordian knot, something
>> too complex and self-interactive for anybody, even AI, to really
>> get a handle on.
>
> Complexity is a weapon. (The KISS principle is a countermeasure -
> which explains why it's so widely hated.)

Yes, complexity CAN be a weapon - and in Win it often seems
to be used that way. However complexity can also be something
of an *accident* - patching, re-patching, re-re-patching for
decades until yer OS is a bowl of spaghetti.

This is why Win MUST migrate to -IX if it is to survive for
much longer, even the 'pros' can't deal anymore. The best
they can do is make the glitches/vulnerabilities look like
YOUR Fault.

Well, there ARE other good systems other than -IX based.
I always liked VMS. Maybe they can buy it and .....

On 2023-02-01 06:30, 26C.Z968 wrote:
>   If you use WINDERS ... well then ... things get uglier. You
>   can indeed make a "dual boot" drive. Alas Winders thinks it
>   owns the universe so it has to be installed FIRST and then
>   you have to SHRINK the Winders partition to make space for
>   anything else (ControlPanel->Administrative Tools->DiskManagement).
>   You can also use gparted from a USB stick, gparted-live.
>   Then you install a Linux in the empty space. GRUB2 will be
>   installed automatically and you will get a boot menu when
>   the box starts - Linux or Winders. But WHY would you want
>   Winders ??????

Years ago I played with Windows 2008 server, and the DVD had both the
server and normal editions. And with that DVD it was very easy to tell
Windows to install to a percent of the disk, because we installed both
versions and Linux later. No resizing needed.

--
Cheers,
Carlos E.R.

On 2023-02-02 05:01, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
> On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>
>> On 2/1/23 1:03 PM, Charlie Gibbs wrote:
>>
>>> On 2023-02-01, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Though insider rumors are that MicroSquish is going down the same,
>>>> sane, path as Apple ... ie converting more and more to a Linux/Unix
>>>> underlying system ... they are disguising this and you won't really
>>>> see anything Linux-ish for quite awhile. Winders is a HORRIBLE OS,
>>>> packed full of 30 years of fix-ups, compromises and vulnerabilities.
>>>
>>> More than 40 years if you include the cruft it inherited from MS-DOS.
>>> Their quality standard is "Sort of works, most of the time."
>>
>> Hmm .. I wonder how much DOS is *still* in Win-11 ? How much CP/M
>> was in DOS for that matter ?
>
> One of my pet peeves goes all the way back to CP/M. The CP/M file
> system only stored the size of a file in 128-byte sectors. To make
> sure a text file ended in the right place, a hex 1A marker was placed
> at the end of the actual text. Since the MS-DOS file system (and its
> Windows successors) stores file sizes to the byte, there is not - and
> never was - a need for that hex 1A marker. But it lives on to this
> day, still causing data lossage. My programs never write it, and
> remove it whenever they see it.

I made use of it, in MsDOS.

My programs stored data starting first with a descriptive text, then
CR,LF,EOF, and then the actual binary data structures. That way, a file
could be identified using "type somefile.dat".

--
Cheers,
Carlos E.R.

On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>
> STILL have to use Ctrl-Z to quit Python3 in Linux ....

errrr..... On my linux system Ctrl-D quits, CTtrl-Z puts python in the
background but stopped.

On Thu, 2 Feb 2023 14:28:10 -0000 (UTC), Jim Jackson wrote:
>
> On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>
>> STILL have to use Ctrl-Z to quit Python3 in Linux ....
>
> errrr..... On my linux system Ctrl-D quits, CTtrl-Z puts python in the
> background but stopped.

"bg" lets it run again in the background.
--
Andreas

On 2023-02-02, Andreas Kohlbach <ank@spamfence.net> wrote:
> On Thu, 2 Feb 2023 14:28:10 -0000 (UTC), Jim Jackson wrote:
>>
>> On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>>
>>> STILL have to use Ctrl-Z to quit Python3 in Linux ....
>>
>> errrr..... On my linux system Ctrl-D quits, CTtrl-Z puts python in the
>> background but stopped.
>
> "bg" lets it run again in the background.

My point was that Ctrl-Z does NOT necessarily QUIT python as was
claimed.

(You can of course alter your tty settings to switch things around as
you wish.)

On Thu, 02 Feb 2023 14:28:10 +0000, Jim Jackson wrote:

> On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>
>> STILL have to use Ctrl-Z to quit Python3 in Linux ....
>
> errrr..... On my linux system Ctrl-D quits, CTtrl-Z puts python in the
> background but stopped.

Correct...ish

While Linux terminal handling often defaults this way, you can change
both the eof (Ctrl-D) and suspend (Ctrl-Z) terminal handling behaviours
(along with a number of others) using the stty(1) command. Concievably,
you /could/ assign ^Z to the eof handling, and some other control character
to the suspend handling.

FWIW, the OP may be confusing Linux Ctrl-D EOF with MSDOS Ctrl-Z EOF.

HTH
--
Lew Pitcher
"In Skills We Trust"

On 2023-02-02, Lew Pitcher <lew.pitcher@digitalfreehold.ca> wrote:

> On Thu, 02 Feb 2023 14:28:10 +0000, Jim Jackson wrote:
>
>> On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>
>>> STILL have to use Ctrl-Z to quit Python3 in Linux ....
>>
>> errrr..... On my linux system Ctrl-D quits, CTtrl-Z puts python in the
>> background but stopped.
>
> Correct...ish
>
> While Linux terminal handling often defaults this way, you can change
> both the eof (Ctrl-D) and suspend (Ctrl-Z) terminal handling behaviours
> (along with a number of others) using the stty(1) command. Concievably,
> you /could/ assign ^Z to the eof handling, and some other control character
> to the suspend handling.
>
> FWIW, the OP may be confusing Linux Ctrl-D EOF with MSDOS Ctrl-Z EOF.

That looks like what happened. However, he wasn't the original poster.
I was the first one to mention control-Z (as hex 1a) in the context
of a brain-damaged feature which MS-DOS blindly inherited from CP/M.
Under CP/M it was needed; under MS-DOS it's just cargo-cult programming.

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Microsoft is a dictatorship.
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | Apple is a cult.
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | Linux is anarchy.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | Pick your poison.

Jim Jackson <jj@franjam.org.uk> wrote:
> On 2023-02-02, Andreas Kohlbach <ank@spamfence.net> wrote:
>> On Thu, 2 Feb 2023 14:28:10 -0000 (UTC), Jim Jackson wrote:
>>>
>>> On 2023-02-02, 26C.Z968 <26C.Z968@noaada.net> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> STILL have to use Ctrl-Z to quit Python3 in Linux ....
>>>
>>> errrr..... On my linux system Ctrl-D quits, CTtrl-Z puts python in the
>>> background but stopped.
>>
>> "bg" lets it run again in the background.
>
> My point was that Ctrl-Z does NOT necessarily QUIT python as was
> claimed.
>
> (You can of course alter your tty settings to switch things around as
> you wish.)

Consider the credibility of the source of the "Ctrl-Z to quit python"
comment (i.e. 26C.Z968).