raspberry pi already failed ?

[Tass]

Chris Rowland said:


Do you all realise how rude almost all of you come across as? It's what makes this forum an unpleasant place to be.

If you post rude messages then YOU are being rude and that is your responsibility.

Saying they deserve it is not a valid excuse (I have a much more graphic description that I've removed).

Please, everybody behave like adults - or maybe like children think adults ought to behave. Would it help if you were to imagine saying what you post to everyone face to face.


Really?  I find this forum an exemplary example of how to behave when compared to other forums out there.  Take this for example, where the OP went and posted the same rant:

http://forum.davidicke.com/sho.....1060788767

I'm going to go ahead and politely ignore your advice and say I'm glad he received the same response on a forum completely unassociated with the Foundation

[obarthelemy]

Same, I posted to his blog, though giving him attention is probably just feeding the troll.

[Lob0426]

Chris Rowland said:


Do you all realise how rude almost all of you come across as? It's what makes this forum an unpleasant place to be.

If you post rude messages then YOU are being rude and that is your responsibility.

Saying they deserve it is not a valid excuse (I have a much more graphic description that I've removed).

Please, everybody behave like adults – or maybe like children think adults ought to behave. Would it help if you were to imagine saying what you post to everyone face to face.


And that is why I posted in his blog. I said to him just what I posted here. That is how I expect to be treated and how I will treat them. Don't believe me, then go look for yourself. alleging that someone is acting like a child is not rude? If you have problems with a particular poster then address them rather than all posters in a thread as a whole. Then just try not to be a flamer while you do it.

By the way I have seen many people posting in this forum that have the veiw that this is a polite forum overall. I agree!

http://massapathy.blogspot.co......ailed.html

That is my comment CCCBouly.

[scep]

Tass said:


Really?  I find this forum an exemplary example of how to behave when compared to other forums out there.


Absolutely. I have been admin/mod on several forums, and a member of many more and I have to say that this forum is a pretty good example of helpfulness and general politeness in general.

Disclaimer: I am biased

[scep]

obarthelemy said:


Same, I posted to his blog, though giving him attention is probably just feeding the troll.


Next time, don't use hard words with more than one meaning. Such as "martyrdom".

His reply really cheered me up this morning.

[daveg]

What is his major malfunction?

He clearly has a vendetta against the RPi  Foundation or members of the foundation.

I have to agree that that the behaviour towards this guy here on the forum has been exemplary. Go and look at the rant he posted on the david icke forum and see how they dealt with him.

Just looking at his rant over there tells you all you need to know; "evil doers" and "tyrany". woah…. this guy needs his medication adjusting. Whatever he is on now is no where near strong enough to keep his "issues" in check.

*EDIT: Hah, just seen his comment about death threats. Paranoid delusions anyone? I think they let this one out of the nut house too early. A LOT MORE shock therapy required

[KeithSloan]

SN said:


Phpbb3 supports ip banning I believe



Trouble is turn off router wait a while and turn on again and you have a new IP address

[Chris.Rowland]

I agree that there are more abusive sites than this one. Do we aspire just not to be the worst? That's a useful strategy if running from a hungry lion but I hope we could aspire to better than not being as bad as the worst sites.

Going off and joining other sites just to abuse him seems to me to be bizarre.  Behaving in exactly the same way as you are complaining about him behaving is not a convincing way of demonstrating your objection to his abuse.

As for trolling, I think this guy is a genius.  I don't think I've seen a more successful troll. Over 180 messages and still going, even though he was banned several days ago.

[abishur]

To be fair, I'm not sure if he was initially trolling or if he's just the kind of guy who can't handle his opinion being disagreed with.  After reading his post, it would appear that his main issue was that instead of using Linux we should invent an entirely new OS just for the Pi.

I have to admit that while that sound intriguing it also sounds both incredibly short sighted and a non-solution.  It would, in fact, only duplicate his main issue with Linux that there would be a small subset of people who knew how to be power users and tended to hoard that knowledge.  This would create an os that while having a good possibility to teach programming, provided it came laden with pre-installed teaching material, failed to actually teach them to be deep users of PCs and instead reinforced the notion that PCs were pre-made tools to be interacted with at a shallow level rather than teaching them to be deep, meaningful users.

There's are definite learning curve to Linux and this forum has been excessively nice, the best I've seen for a forum of its size.

There are two matters I see when it comes to politeness.  The first is the "RTFM" who give no information or who tell you to do an insanely complicated task with no instructions despite you telling them upfront that you're an absolute beginner.  This is the wrong sort of help, the bad sort that I think you are complaining about.  I've only seen a few very isolated incidents of this that are usually covered up by others quickly helping out.

The second are those who say "read this thread" and then give a link.  It's a lot like telling someone to RTFM except it's actually helpful.  This is a good an appropriate  response.  There's no need to rehash every subject every time it's brought up a simple point to the right page it all most people are really looking for anyway.

As for this thread still going.  It's because once the OP was gone and no longer hindering the discussion with his "you're all idiots because you don't agree with exactly what I'm saying" it's been, for the most part, a fruitful discussion.  If it was a troll, than it is in fact the least successful troll I've ever seen because, again for the most part, the OP's subject has been completely lost under the larger issue he raised and the, general, civility the thread has kept.

[abishur]

Oh side note, please don't chase him down on his site guys.  Let him have his rant in peace and quiet.

[colincoach]

Further to Abishur's recent post - I'll not quote it in an effort to keep things brief(er).

Having started out my working life as a programmer - IBM Mainframes using Cobol and initially hierarchical databases, eventually relational databases (SQL), there always was a definite distinction between System programming, i.e. playing with the OS, and application programming. Sysprogs were the ultimate geeks, who could quote assembler at you, and these are the sorts I'd imagine who nowadays would love Linux. Us mere application programmers yearned for development tools that let us get on with the programming without having to worry that disks were mounted, required libraries of precoded routines were available etc.

In most organisations there would be one sysprog for about every ten application programmers. If we are to encourage kids to get in to programming, or at least have an understanding of it, and develope their logical thinking which is a very transferable skill, then I suspect they would be more attracted to the modern equivalent of application programming than becoming too familiar with Linux. This would be databases, graphics, web pages etc.

I will be in that category as well, I fancy investigating how to help encourage good programming practice and education for children, rather than advising them on how many backslashes and hyphens they need to type!!

I'll be honest - Linux is one of the most unfriendly features of computing I've come across. It exists in my current workplace, and we have a couple of 'egghead' gurus that specialize in it. They are in great demand, but most of us are quite happy to let them get on with it while we produce real customer facing, revenue generating products.

[jamesh]

Blimey - just read the guys blog and the comments on David Icke forum. He really is a few kangaroos short in the top paddock. I do wonder what can be done about people posting obvious lies (specifically about the Foundation being a scam) on the internet. I guess leaving them alone to stew in their own conspiracy theories is the best option.

David Icke, btw, is well known in the UK as being completely off his tree.

[jamesh]

colincoach said:


I'll be honest - Linux is one of the most unfriendly features of computing I've come across. It exists in my current workplace, and we have a couple of 'egghead' gurus that specialize in it. They are in great demand, but most of us are quite happy to let them get on with it while we produce real customer facing, revenue generating products.


I not sure I entirely agree. Yes, Linux can be mind bending difficult. But for general usage, I don't find it any more difficult than Windows, and in many cases, it's easier. I've never got wireless working properly on my other half's Vista machine for example, yet have got it working no problems on a number of Linux boxes.

It's all down to familiarity. If you use something every day, it becomes second nature. I have the same problem with Perl as I do with some command line Linux, I only have to use it once in a blue moon, and it's a struggle to get up to speed.

[Joe Schmoe]

colincoach said:  


I'll be honest – Linux is one of the most unfriendly features of computing I've come across. It exists in my current workplace, and we have a couple of 'egghead' gurus that specialize in it. They are in great demand, but most of us are quite happy to let them get on with it while we produce real customer facing, revenue generating products.



IOW, they have all the fun (and get paid for it), while I'm just a low-level corporate tool.  But I have to justify it to myself somehow, so I make my Windoze level drudgery out to be a virtue.

[Tass]

JamesH said:

It's all down to familiarity. If you use something every day, it becomes second nature. I have the same problem with Perl as I do with some command line Linux, I only have to use it once in a blue moon, and it's a struggle to get up to speed. 

colincoach said:

It exists in my current workplace, and we have a couple of 'egghead' gurus that specialize in it. They are in great demand, but most of us are quite happy to let them get on with it while we produce real customer facing, revenue generating products.

And that's the whole point, isn't it?  If kids get involved from an early age it won't be complicated and unfamiliar - they'll become those sought-after eggheads.  Or they'll just saturate the egghead market and make it a level playing field

[colincoach]

Tass said:


JamesH said:


It's all down to familiarity. If you use something every day, it becomes second nature. I have the same problem with Perl as I do with some command line Linux, I only have to use it once in a blue moon, and it's a struggle to get up to speed.


colincoach said:


It exists in my current workplace, and we have a couple of 'egghead' gurus that specialize in it. They are in great demand, but most of us are quite happy to let them get on with it while we produce real customer facing, revenue generating products.


And that's the whole point, isn't it?  If kids get involved from an early age it won't be complicated and unfamiliar - they'll become those sought-after eggheads.  Or they'll just saturate the egghead market and make it a level playing field


Not quite the whole point. If the egghead gurus didnt do their bit, and provide the rest of us with the dev tools etc then we would not be able to do our part of the development process. However, if we ALL HAD to know Linux, and be able to use it at 'industrial strength' level then the whole development process would take longer, be less efficient and cost more.

In summary, it is pretty obvious there will be a minimum of two levels of pi users (for want of a better word). Those that are happy, confident and knowledgeable enough to use as much Linux as they need to to achieve their aims, and those that want to use it far less (note I am not saying not use it at all) and get on with their aims.

Horses for courses - the Pi will equally help us all - eggheads and non-eggheads, but not everyone wants to be an egghead!!

P.S. my first post was not a dig at sysprogs, some of my best friends in the early days were sysprogs - after all they knew where the 'hidden' Classic Adventure existed on the mainframe!!

[jamesh]

colincoach said:


Not quite the whole point. If the egghead gurus didnt do their bit, and provide the rest of us with the dev tools etc then we would not be able to do our part of the development process. However, if we ALL HAD to know Linux, and be able to use it at 'industrial strength' level then the whole development process would take longer, be less efficient and cost more.


I think there is a happy medium - it's really worth knowing a few commands in Linux that really speed things up (awk comes to mind), even for apps developers,


In summary, it is pretty obvious there will be a minimum of two levels of pi users (for want of a better word). Those that are happy, confident and knowledgeable enough to use as much Linux as they need to to achieve their aims, and those that want to use it far less (note I am not saying not use it at all) and get on with their aims.


I think its more analogue than digital. Many many levels.


Horses for courses - the Pi will equally help us all - eggheads and non-eggheads, but not everyone wants to be an egghead!!


True, but you can become proficient at Linux without being an egg head, and just by using it regularly.

[lewmur]

colincoach said:


Tass said:


JamesH said:


It"s all down to familiarity. If you use something every day, it becomes second nature. I have the same problem with Perl as I do with some command line Linux, I only have to use it once in a blue moon, and it"s a struggle to get up to speed.


colincoach said:


It exists in my current workplace, and we have a couple of "egghead" gurus that specialize in it. They are in great demand, but most of us are quite happy to let them get on with it while we produce real customer facing, revenue generating products.


And that"s the whole point, isn"t it?  If kids get involved from an early age it won"t be complicated and unfamiliar – they"ll become those sought-after eggheads.  Or they"ll just saturate the egghead market and make it a level playing field


Not quite the whole point. If the egghead gurus didnt do their bit, and provide the rest of us with the dev tools etc then we would not be able to do our part of the development process. However, if we ALL HAD to know Linux, and be able to use it at 'industrial strength' level then the whole development process would take longer, be less efficient and cost more.

In summary, it is pretty obvious there will be a minimum of two levels of pi users (for want of a better word). Those that are happy, confident and knowledgeable enough to use as much Linux as they need to to achieve their aims, and those that want to use it far less (note I am not saying not use it at all) and get on with their aims.

Horses for courses – the Pi will equally help us all – eggheads and non-eggheads, but not everyone wants to be an egghead!!

P.S. my first post was not a dig at sysprogs, some of my best friends in the early days were sysprogs – after all they knew where the 'hidden' Classic Adventure existed on the mainframe!!


Only people who are unfamiliar with Linux make the mistake that it is still a "geek only" OS.  Making that assumption only proves what little you know.  I live in a 400 unit complex for the elderly and am known as the resident geek.  I have installed Linux on so many of my neighbors computers that I have lost count.  Grandma and Grandpa are quite happy doing all of the things they'd do on a Windoze box but with one added extra.  They aren't calling me every other day to remove malware.

There are as many higher level development tools in Linux as there are for Windoze.  And you don't have to know diddly about programming at the system level to use them.  But, again, there is one major difference.  They are typically aimed at "cross platform" development.  (Apps developed with Win tools will typically ONLY run on Win boxes.  Those with Linux tools will typically run on just about any box.)  And "cross platform" development is what the kids of today are going to need to learn for the future.

You can write an app using Python, put the source code on a Linux machine and compile it and you have a Linux app.  Put that same source code on a Windoze machine, compile it and you have a Windoze app.  Put it on an OSX machine... etc.  Try doing the same thing with one written using .Net.

[colincoach]

lewmur said:

Only people who are unfamiliar with Linux make the mistake that it is still a "geek only" OS.  Making that assumption only proves what little you know.



A bit rude that!! Big assumption on your part that I know little.

A bit like the OP"s points, some of which were quite valid but got lost by his approach and the subsequent "discussion", yet again if someone is trying to make a sensible (ok IMHO) point, there is a tendency to get very negative towards them.

Point is, and I"m pretty sure that 90% of the kids that get to use Pi"s will also be in the same situation, I do not want to have to become an expert in Linux. I will learn as much as I need, but there are features and capabilities of Linux that are required but I do not want to have to know every little parameter, backslash, hypen switch etc to be able to achieve what i want with a Pi.

The education system in the UK will not be able to support getting those responsible for coordinating and teaching IT up to speed with Linux, so it will be down to those prepared to do it "extra curricular" IF being proficient in Linux is the only way to get Pi"s working for the masses.

Fortunately the Foundation and open-minded community members know this and are working on providing the tools, GUIs etc so that those who do not want to use Linux too much don"t have to, but at the same time not inhibit those that do.

[scep]

Chris Rowland said:


As for trolling, I think this guy is a genius.  I don't think I've seen a more successful troll. Over 180 messages and still going, even though he was banned several days ago.


Most of the thread is actually an interesting and useful discussion of Linux and other operating systems. This is due to the helpfulness and friendliness of the members here

If I posted a picture of a cow pat on an entomology forum with the caption "That's your mum, that is!", there may well follow hundreds of messages discussing the taxonomy and life cycle of yellow dung flies. These discussions would not confer genius status on me

[nick.mccloud]

Like many things in life, which OS you are good at depends on what you are used to. I'm a Mac man but I'm not too shabby at Windows or Linux because I consider the concepts entirely transferrable and for Mac/Linux, much of the actual commands are the same.

What we need are people with generic skills that they can then apply. Not a generation of people that do things by the numbers without any thought. I think the RPi is an excellent platform to take people away from the familiar so that they have to engage brain and start to explore.

[lewmur]

colincoach said:



lewmur said:

Only people who are unfamiliar with Linux make the mistake that it is still a "geek only" OS.  Making that assumption only proves what little you know.



A bit rude that!! Big assumption on your part that I know little.

A bit like the OP"s points, some of which were quite valid but got lost by his approach and the subsequent "discussion", yet again if someone is trying to make a sensible (ok IMHO) point, there is a tendency to get very negative towards them.

Point is, and I"m pretty sure that 90% of the kids that get to use Pi"s will also be in the same situation, I do not want to have to become an expert in Linux. I will learn as much as I need, but there are features and capabilities of Linux that are required but I do not want to have to know every little parameter, backslash, hypen switch etc to be able to achieve what i want with a Pi.

The education system in the UK will not be able to support getting those responsible for coordinating and teaching IT up to speed with Linux, so it will be down to those prepared to do it "extra curricular" IF being proficient in Linux is the only way to get Pi"s working for the masses.

Fortunately the Foundation and open-minded community members know this and are working on providing the tools, GUIs etc so that those who do not want to use Linux too much don"t have to, but at the same time not inhibit those that do.



You may find it "rude", but you have just proven my point.  You DON'T know what you are talking about.  Do you really think Grandma and Grandpa know anything at all about hypens and backslashes?  You can boot to a desktop in just about all Linux distros and launch programs by clicking icons just as you would in Windoze.  The average Linux user doesn't use the CLI anymore than the average Windoze user uses the command prompt.

Of course there IS going to be a "learning curve" for the educators involved if the Pi is to succeed in the UK school system.  But this would be true no matter what OS the Pi itself used.  After all, the whole purpose is to "teach computer knowledge rather than how to use existing applications such as Excel".  But that in no way implies that the whole "chain of command" in the school system acquire a knowledge of Linux.  And even the people teaching the courses wouldn't need more than a basic knowledge.  How many of the teachers today know how to use the command prompt in Windoze?

[jamesh]

Chill out guys, no need for any rudeness whatsoever. Despite the OP's brash postings, the rest of this thread has been very well behaved. Please keep it that way.

[colincoach]

JamesH said:


Chill out guys, no need for any rudeness whatsoever. Despite the OP's brash postings, the rest of this thread has been very well behaved. Please keep it that way.


Hear hear...but I think you'll find only one person is being rude here, twice accusing me of not knowing what I'm talking about - how arrogant is that!!

I'll not be contributing to this debate any further, as following the exciting news earlier about my Pi arriving w/c 7th May, this has put a bit of a dampener on my enthusiasm for now.

[Joe Schmoe]

I think the Windoze people (and, in a somewhat different way, also the Mac people) have done a "better" job of stigmatizing the command prompt than the Linux people.  In many circles (and I'm guessing that of the OP and also his sock puppet who is posting now, now that the OP has been banned), it is consider immoral (and bordering on illegal) to use the command prompt in Windoze.  When you do it, they look at you funny.

This doesn't happen in Linux.  Even if you are (were) "grandma and grandpa", if you do drop down to a command prompt (e.g., a "Terminal" window on the "desktop"), people won't start whispering about you.  That's a good thing, but it bugs the p*ss out folks like the OP (and his sock puppet(s)).

And, then, of course, there's the old "You had to do *what* with the seat..."

UNIX Airways

Everyone brings one piece of the plane along when they come
to the airport. They all go out on the runway and put the
plane together piece by piece, arguing non-stop about what
kind of plane they are supposed to be building.

Air DOS

Everybody pushes the airplane until it glides, then they jump
on and let the plane coast until it hits the ground again.
Then they push again, jump on again, and so on ...

Mac Airlines

All the stewards, captains, baggage handlers, and ticket agents
look and act exactly the same. Every time you ask questions
about details, you are gently but firmly told that you don't
need to know, don't want to know, and everything will be done
for you without your ever having to know, so just shut up.

Windows Air

The terminal is pretty and colorful, with friendly stewards,
easy baggage check and boarding, and a smooth take-off. After
about 10 minutes in the air, the plane e
0K .xplodes with no warning
whatsoever.

Windows NT Air

Just like Windows Air, but costs more, uses much bigger planes,
and takes out all the other aircraft within a 40-mile radius
when it explodes.

Linux Air

Disgruntled employees of all the other OS airlines decide to
start their own airline. They build the planes, ticket counters,
and pave the runways themselves. They charge a small fee to
cover the cost of printing the ticket, but you can also download
and print the ticket yourself. When you board the plane, you
are given a seat, four bolts, a wrench and a copy of the
seat-HOWTO.html. Once settled, the fully adjustable seat is
very comfortable, the plan leaves and arrives on time without
a single problem, the in-flight meal is wonderful. You try to
tell customers of the other airlines about the great trip, but
all they can say is, "You had to do what with the seat?"