What is Digg?Sponsored by Dragon Age: Origins
See the new YouTube feature trailer for Dragon Age: Origins view!
youtube.com/DragonAge - EA presents BioWare's new dark fantasy epic Dragon Age: Origins. '9/10' from Game Informer.
63 Comments
- XVampireX, on 10/12/2007, -2/+38People are afraid of the console because they don't know the commands. The terminal is a really useful piece of software :)
- baalzebub, on 10/12/2007, -1/+26console apps = stable-secure & low overhead...
- Schlaefer, on 10/12/2007, -1/+23+ usable and sophisticated keyboard only navigation
- darkchild, on 10/12/2007, -4/+22You are right there. Another reason why some people are afraid of the console is the myth that the command line is hard to use. Once you view the command line as just another user interface and grasp the basics of how to use it, there is no reason to be scared at all.
- kerryhall, on 10/12/2007, -2/+20ssh is pretty much the coolest thing ever.
- schestowitz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+16These apps are probably the most backward-compatible and the most cross-platform as well. Relying on learning to rely on them is a good habit.
- pixelat3d, on 10/12/2007, -4/+17He said "Kewl" in his blog.
-1000 points. - Mejogid, on 10/12/2007, -1/+11For me, overhead is one of their greatest strength, since I can set a workstation compiling and still use it without affecting compile time... and talking of overhead, I'm not sure why 6 VTs is such an issue since they use a handful of kilobytes each and literally no CPU power when unused (see description).
- wynd, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10He keeps talking about how he can run things in a virtual console instead of a termimal emulator so things can keep running if/when X crashes. Someone above said that they routinely use 20+ xterms.
Why not use GNU Screen? It will do the same and more.
http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/3/9/16838/14935 - MrUnderbridge, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9"1) No amount of cajoling will convince me that the commands are intuitive with cryptic flags that I have to look up every time I need to use. And no not all us have a photographic memory or use the commands enough everyday to remember. "
To me, the complexity of GUIs grows worse than CLI. When I know what I want to do, I'd *rather* be able to find what letter the option is (ie, is it -v or -V?), by simply typing man , than by having to play 'guess the submenu.' I can't count how many times I've cursed badly designed GUIs this week alone.
"2) I see most CLI diehard's as arrogant. Looking down on Gui's as some sort of disease. Even tho that is what the masses require. No matter how hard it is for you to understand Better does not equate to Ease,Desire. Just look at the mass of window user's oblivious and happy."
Please tell me "it's what Windows users use, it must be better!" isn't your best argument. I don't see happy when I see windows. I do understand your issue with perceived self-superiority of CLIers, but I think that's a minority. I far prefer CLI for most things, but I've found I've actually started using Konqueror more for moving files between machines on our network - which is saying something since I don't even use KDE. Sometimes the best tool is a GUI, sometimes it's CLI. I think people who get over the learning curve with CLI don't tend to go back, so there is that.
"I hope the cli - Term will always be there for the power user it is just I don't really care to learn it beyond basic commands I can't do in a gui."
That's OK, to each his own. You might eventually find that the one thing that puts it over the top is scripting and automation - in other words, if you have to use that GUI so often that you actually learn where all those hidden options are, you could have created an automated script in the first place. - Loonacy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Quick and dirty tutorial:
To use screen, just type "screen". Difficult to remember, I know, but you'll eventually get the hang of it.
If the unthinkable happens, and X crashes, and you want to get your screen back, just do "screen -r" (-r = resume). If there is more than one screen open, it will give a list with numbers. Just reopen the one you want with "screen -r ".
If you want to manually detach for some reason, just do Ctrl-a Ctrl-d and voila, you're detached.
And now you have all the functionality of the virtual consoles, except it will run anywhere you want. X terminals, SSH terminals, etc.
Also, you must be missing the manual for screen, because "man screen" gives me lots of useful information. - tomarocco, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7I'd do her...just not her distro.
- schestowitz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6How can LaTeX not be allowed at the school? What does the school think is used to prepare books at the publishers?
- ISVDamocles, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Methinks you've just not really seen someone who's really got their console code editing properly configured.
Now, I'll admit that I'm not 100% CLI when it comes to programming, but I'm fairly close. I have one virtual desktop with Gnome Terminal maximized and with 8-10 tabs usually open at once. Each one is using Vim, but first I went into /usr/share/vim/vimrc and uncommented the following lines:
syntax on
if has("autocmd")
filetype indent on
endif
set showmatch
What this does is color code my source code, automatically reformat my code indenting, and highlight matching braces, parenthesis, and brackets when the cursor rests on them. With this configuration I get 140 characters across my screen and 42 lines down, which is probably more than your graphical editor gives you.
Also, compiling code couldn't be easier. Write up a simple Makefile, like so:
CC=gcc
CFLAGS=-lftd2xx -pthread
APP=testcan
all: $(APP)
$(APP): canapi.c canapi.h test1.c
$(CC) -o $(APP) $(CFLAGS) canapi.c test1.c
clean:
rm -f *.o ; rm $(APP)
and then in vi enter the command:
:make
To build it. It will switch to bash to show you the compilation output, then when you hit enter return to vi.
Then enter a command like:
:!./testcan
To execute the bash command following the exclamation mark (!) and see its output, as well. Once finished it will wait for you to hit enter to return.
Of course, with Gnome Terminal I only have to hit CTRL+PgUp or CTRL+PgDn to switch between tabs, and CTRL+Shift+T to make a new terminal tab, so having the Makefile you're using to compile open is incredibly simple and lets you change compiling options easily.
I know I could use ALT+F1-F6 to switch between true CLI terminals, but I like being able to hit CTRL+ALT+LeftArrow or CTRL+ALT+RightArrow to go to the virtual desktop with Firefox open so I can search API documentation easily.
Now I await all the emacs fans to tell me I'm an idiot and mod me down. :) - hackmiester, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6I don't understand. Why does everyone mention Ubuntu? It doesn't matter what distro, they ALL have packages for this... (or most of them do)! Just for the diggs?
- Protoss, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5heh isn't startx just a script? I may just be talking out of my ass though :P
- tomarocco, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5You got a Smart Ass.
- ISVDamocles, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Well bugger, the commenting system ate my spacing. How exactly do you do nbsp's in Digg? Just copying and pasting that example Makefile as shown above will fail because of make's strict syntax.
- pestilence4hr, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Scrolling is accomplished by Ctrl+a ESC, then page up or down (or use up or down, or j or k if you like).
And the man page for my version of screen (4.00.02) gives just about every command in screen you could possibly want. But I agree that a official tutorial would be very nice. - michaelw, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5I use ncmpc as my mpd front end for playing music. I can ssh into my music server and control my music anywhere.
- TheSeeker11, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3My favourite console app would be abcde (a better cd encoder). It is highly customisable, all via the abcde.conf file, usually found in /etc. Its best feature in my opinion is its ability to encode into several formats at once.
Once installed and configured, it's simply a matter of inserting a CD, opening a console and typing abcde, then accepting the CDDB info. - elroy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Here's a command the author should try in his console:
man screen - cptcomic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@DoubtfulSalmon: You are using Windows to avoid the Gnome vs. KDE flame wars? Wow, that argument was new to me.
- ISVDamocles, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@cptcomic:
Then enlighten me. I know about the tabbing in Vim itself, I just don't use it. I know about find 'n' replacing text in Vi. They just weren't pertinent to his statement that CLI programmers have limited screen real estate and programming with it supposedly can't compare to the GUI IDEs.
What tools do you use in Vim that you think would make me a better programmer? (No joking) - stalefries, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2or the new gaim-text! With pseudo-windows!
- jake3988, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2cmus For the win!
I love cmus, rtorrent, elinks...
and I have (though still not successfully in ubuntu) gotten movies to play in the console using aalib! The quality is obviously not nearly as good, but it does work.
I'm still trying to find a good console aim thingy (or really any other good console apps) - ringo33, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2try naim or centericq to access AIM and any other instant messenger systems
- stockjones, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3consoles still have their uses, but their are many advantages to a GUI style editor over a console. It depends on what you need to do. Simple telnet to configure router or something is just fine with a console. Programming code in a console ugh. Not that there arent people who do it, but its humerous when you have to limit line lengths and such for console programmers. get a gui editor for gods sake so you can see more code on the screen. Its like dealing with someone who has a 22 inch monitor and they are running 640 x 480 resolution.
- lowerlogic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Cool. Learning how to use rtorrent now. Will learn how to use ncmpc next.
- DoubtfulSalmon, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3That's pretty much how I work. I use win32 (xp) as a windowing environment to support a dozen or so instances of putty (win32 ssh client) that are logged into various *nix boxes all over the place. With the exception of the laptop (a C2D Blacbook) that I use for my teaching (kubuntu + openoffice) I've never installed X (or any windowing environment) on a unix/freebsd/linux box, I just don't see the point. The command prompt is where it's at. Even in the past when I've had to support win32, I never really bothered figuring out how to do stuff with the gui, I just -, un, and type "cmd" and go to town.
While you'd obviously never do anything serious with win32, it's a perfectly servicable windowing environment, with the added bonus that you get to completely avoid the whole silly Gnome -vs- KDE DSW, and all the serious stuff happens on boxes that are locked away in cabinets anyway. ssh and screen are your friends! - devindotcom, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4Dude, you totally beat me to it. I saw that word and immediately cringed. That said, although someone who says "Kewl" may not know what is actually cool, they probably know more than me about Linux.
- Fairly, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2Console always rulez. Has to.
- kerryhall, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I really like svgalib, since it works on older hardware.
- benplaut, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The best way I found was to write a little script making a popup terminal (with screen for persistance between closings) and then just tell myself--"every time I need to do task A, i'll do it from the command line"
Nowadays, I use it for pretty much everything other than writing (LaTeX is not allowed at my school, just .rtf and .doc) and web browsing. - cptcomic, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1> Now, I'll admit that I'm not 100% CLI when it comes to programming, but I'm fairly close
I can tell from your examples that you haven't even mastered 10% of the power of vim. - joshman5k, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I find console apps are great if your doing a quick and simple task, like parsing a document. But if you intend on distributing it a fair bit, it can be worth creating a gui for it.
- jcaino, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3at the current time, i have 20 xterm windows open.
and i use pretty much all of them - some less frequently than others, but they all have their purpose.
console apps rock b/c they dont require GUI overhead, much easier when dealing with remote admin stuff via the console that through vnc
my job would pretty much be impossible without console apps. - orb9220, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2
"To me, the complexity of GUIs grows worse than CLI. When I know what I want to do, I'd *rather* be able to find what letter the option is (ie, is it -v or -V?), by simply typing man"
And we all know for newbie's how easy it is to understand man pages. I guess I must be dense since it takes me awhile to figure out what the damn flag does alone how to use it. They don't even give a few examples in context to make it clear. Unless you want to spend all your time googling.
"To me, the complexity of GUIs grows worse than CLI."
I find bad Gui's and bad gui apps that doesn't mean all are bad or couldn't use improvement. And that is the very reason I dislike KDE way to much causing confusion.
"Please tell me "it's what Windows users use, it must be better!" isn't your best argument."
I didn't say better just widespread. The Gui is coming and will remain for the average user.
"You might eventually find that the one thing that puts it over the top is scripting and automation"
Yes I accept that the cli is powerful. But what many seem not to grasp is I and many other's do not want to write scripts. And we don't want to keep a list of script's,commands to adjust and maintain.
We just want the equivalent power in a gui approach. Is there something wrong with that. I mean linux is having it your way isn't it? - user98887, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1@DoubtfulSalmon
very funny and very true - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1screen totally rlz! I can't live without it.
It's copy/pate ability is very handy too.
All my shells with rtorrent, mldonkey, xmms2, lftp, vim and others, they keep running even if I need to restart X. Later I open an xterm and can re-attach all those running screens.
I don't understand why people use the physical (non-X) console, tough.
I can have multiple desktops, in each of them multiple terminal windows, then multiple window-tabs (I use a tab-enabled window manager, fluxbox), then multiple terminal tabs (in fact I don't use it, as I prefer plain xterm), then multiple screens inside. Sometimes I even have screen inside screen, it's great to organize taks. - Apreche, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I do most of my work in xterms and such. I couldn't live without them. I only really only resort to the actual TTY when X is having a problem of some sort. Having at least two real TTYs is basically a necessity. Six is a bit of overkill, but it's not like it hurts to have them there. The system resources taken up by the extra four instances of getty or mingetty is trivial, effectively nothing. Most people who even understand how TTYs work and how to switch between them also know how to work from the command line. No reason to fix what isn't broken.
- apecat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Nice to see something else than the usual "OMG !!!1!! WAYS TO MAEK UR UBUNTU INSTALL WORK BETTAR! EASY MUST TRIE!!" posts here on digg. My first real move towards *nix was setting up a home server; screen, irssi, centericq and rtorrent in combination with openssh and samba are the programs that really made me fall for having a Linux box at home. My desktop switch happened much later.
And besides, trying linux out on the server side really makes sense for any person on the geekier side, (irc junkies might fall for screen+irssi). Anything to help the new user get rid of the initial command line phobia is good; and let's face it, working with *nix without using command line tools is a pan in the ass. Certain GNU/Linux distros are trying to make us forget that, but really, i think that one of the reasons Ubuntu is successful and hyped is that geeks don't have to hate it for bad gui config tools. Less easy, quick ways to change system settings that are suitable for clickin'n'droolin' beginners, but at least there are no bloated y(e)ast infections to worry about. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2digg me down
- johnstar, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I use cplay, wget and flac command line all the time.
- apecat, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0To continue my earlier post: ...So dig up your old pc from wherever you buried it, pick a distro with good community support, hide the box in the corner and learn to use the shell to install the stuff needed for serving a basic web pages, buy a vanity domain or register a dyndns, and you've probably already tried something new. A shell server that will irssify your friends, uptime-junkiefy you and make whoever paying the electricity bill utterly insane will soon follow ;)
- shinynew, on 10/12/2007, -2/+2"Music is another great idea. MPD is the industry standard for low-profile music access, and ncmpc is a great console app for managing it. Imagine X giving you a fit and restarting, but the music keeps playing."
a very quick way to do this is go to your music directory and mplayer * Also if you have a gamepad connected you can control it with that, even while in X sever. - jake3988, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1Why not use GNU Screen? It will do the same and more.
========
Its really cool in concept. Unfortunately, its an absolute HELL to run. Could also be the fact that not a single command is documented in the man nor is there an official tutorial.
Once that happens, I'll be glad to use it. - KageSenshi, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0@loonacy
how about scrolling? - stockjones, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0Their...there geez I need a grammar checker
- gr3yn3t, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0@orb9220
http://www.linspire.com/
an abomination, really. -
Show 51 - 63 of 63 discussions
The Digg Toolbar for Firefox lets you Digg, submit content, and keep track of Digg even when you're not on the Digg site. Download the official 
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is