Brisbane POTN Coffee Club Rev. 4

balus wrote in post #5763562
I remember being at Grove Creek Observatory in about 1986ish, with a 30 something inch cassegrain watching Mars in opposition.... those were the days.

Now that's a big one

that it was - rather than looking at Mars I spent hours watching the storm on Jupiter, now that is fascinating

I'd love to get more into astronomy from a practical point of view. I have the uranometria atlases (not cheap), supernova charts, burnhams celestial guides (invaluable imho), star atlas 2000, and lots of other books. I just lack a scope (the 3" cheap newtonian that my dad bought me as a 9 year old doesn't cut it anymore lol). I probably wouldn't go a SCT anyways, but more a meade newtonian, probably a 10" with a equatorial mount and goto, and a SBIG CCD camera. However, as things go, photography is far more important to me as a hobby, so all things astronomy can wait (I'm not on a huge income lol, if anyone knows a single, sexy, rich young lady, point her my way :P)

Dave

warning ***strong language***

Uggh...god Ubuntu blows. Seriously. I dislike sudo, it sucks. Got rid of that crap and went back to the Linux standard su. Had a problem with some of the stuff in the administration menu not working, so I joined and posted on the Ubuntu forums asking for a wee bit of advice, since I don't like, want or use sudo. You know what I got for my troubles? A PM from a w*nker mod telling me that discussions of sudo/su are not allowed on the forums and an official warning.

Gee, what a really nice way to welcome a new person to your community. Hell, I've probably been using Linux before this tosser had even heard of Linux. I just love the way some mods love to throw their weight around, like their God's gift to the world of Internet forums. Anyways, my reply wasn't too kind, I don't really give a rats a$$ if I get banned from there, if they want to be tossers like that I'd rather not be there.

This just reinforces me how bad Ubuntu is for the Linux community. Firstly, it shoves Gnome down your throat (and I prefer KDE, like many others). Secondly, it assumes that everyone that uses it is a butt stupid, ex Windows "I'm too dumb to tie my shoelaces" refugee and can't be trusted to actually look after their system. Hell, if Ubuntu is after those types of users, it's ONLY going to give Linux a bad name in the long run. I really wish Linux would go back to the good old days when men were men, and boys well, they stayed out of the ring. God forbid if I ever did a tutorial on manually compiling a kernel on those crappy forums lol!!!

I am so tempted to simply wipe Ubuntu and put Debian back on the box. There goes Ubuntu on the laptop. I'll probably go with Mepis just to spite Ubuntu.

Rant over...

Dave

edit: Ubuntu is the ONLY major distribution that demands that you use sudo, rather than the traditional su. They imply that those using SU are logging in as root, rather than as a normal user, and thus it is bad to use su. How about teaching people that they hae a normal everyday account, and a root account. They should rarely log on as root, but rather log on as their normal user account and ONLY log on as root, via su, when needed for system maintenance/administra​tion. You don't make people smarter by treating them like idiots. You make them smarter by educating them. BTW - I solved the problem myself about a minute after I'd posted the thread.

Don't hold back now, Dave

How yer goin' ?

Sorry to hear your Saturday night / Sunday Morning was, umm, a little less then peaceful Dave.

Internet heroes - dime a dozen. Forum mods, likewise. It's a long time since any of them bothered me. They are like ants, too many to squash em all Just find a way around them and go my merry way.

As for ubuntu and linux in general; just this morning I've been pondering ditching my windows environment here at home (again!) and going linux (again). Seems to be a bit of a cycle I am in. Have flip-flopped maybe 5 or 6 times over the last few years.

I'm with you on the KDE preference though. Last time I went full linux here was on Mandriva 2007. Have fiddled with ubuntu and I have to say that philosophically I do appreciate what Mr Shuttleworth wants to do.

dpastern wrote in post #5763968
I'd love to get more into astronomy from a practical point of view. I have the uranometria atlases (not cheap), supernova charts, burnhams celestial guides (invaluable imho), star atlas 2000, and lots of other books. I just lack a scope (the 3" cheap newtonian that my dad bought me as a 9 year old doesn't cut it anymore lol). I probably wouldn't go a SCT anyways, but more a meade newtonian, probably a 10" with a equatorial mount and goto, and a SBIG CCD camera. However, as things go, photography is far more important to me as a hobby, so all things astronomy can wait (I'm not on a huge income lol, if anyone knows a single, sexy, rich young lady, point her my way :P)

Dave

I've been interested in the night sky since I was a kid. At various times I've owned small refractors and reflectors but they were always a little frustrating. "If only I could afford a bigger scope, it would be SO MUCH better" I thought. "An 8" or 10" would make all the difference" I thought.

Went to an astro fest in Sydney about a year ago. Looked through maybe 2 dozen scopes up to 15" in size. Was disappointed in ALL of them. Sure, some showed better colours than smaller scopes and some slightly sharper but the final straw for me was checking out the permanent scope mounted at the Macquarrie uni observatory. It was a very large scope, maybe 30" and who knows, maybe $100K worth of scope and perm mount and dome over it. And it was STILL disappointing. That night I realized that for me I'd be better off with a nice pair of binoculars to sit back in a deck chair at night and scan the heavens and let the big guys chase the serious stuff.

ymmv.

dpastern wrote in post #5763968
I'd love to get more into astronomy from a practical point of view. I have the uranometria atlases (not cheap), supernova charts, burnhams celestial guides (invaluable imho), star atlas 2000, and lots of other books. I just lack a scope (the 3" cheap newtonian that my dad bought me as a 9 year old doesn't cut it anymore lol). I probably wouldn't go a SCT anyways, but more a meade newtonian, probably a 10" with a equatorial mount and goto, and a SBIG CCD camera. However, as things go, photography is far more important to me as a hobby, so all things astronomy can wait (I'm not on a huge income lol, if anyone knows a single, sexy, rich young lady, point her my way :P)

Dave

Get in line there

Glenn-san wrote in post #5766264
I've been interested in the night sky since I was a kid. At various times I've owned small refractors and reflectors but they were always a little frustrating. "If only I could afford a bigger scope, it would be SO MUCH better" I thought. "An 8" or 10" would make all the difference" I thought.

Went to an astro fest in Sydney about a year ago. Looked through maybe 2 dozen scopes up to 15" in size. Was disappointed in ALL of them. Sure, some showed better colours than smaller scopes and some slightly sharper but the final straw for me was checking out the permanent scope mounted at the Macquarrie uni observatory. It was a very large scope, maybe 30" and who knows, maybe $100K worth of scope and perm mount and dome over it. And it was STILL disappointing. That night I realized that for me I'd be better off with a nice pair of binoculars to sit back in a deck chair at night and scan the heavens and let the big guys chase the serious stuff.

ymmv.

Gees you are hard to please

dpastern wrote in post #5764242
warning ***strong language***

Uggh...god Ubuntu blows. Seriously. I dislike sudo, it sucks. Got rid of that crap and went back to the Linux standard su. Had a problem with some of the stuff in the administration menu not working, so I joined and posted on the Ubuntu forums asking for a wee bit of advice, since I don't like, want or use sudo. You know what I got for my troubles? A PM from a w*nker mod telling me that discussions of sudo/su are not allowed on the forums and an official warning.

Gee, what a really nice way to welcome a new person to your community. Hell, I've probably been using Linux before this tosser had even heard of Linux. I just love the way some mods love to throw their weight around, like their God's gift to the world of Internet forums. Anyways, my reply wasn't too kind, I don't really give a rats a$$ if I get banned from there, if they want to be tossers like that I'd rather not be there.

This just reinforces me how bad Ubuntu is for the Linux community. Firstly, it shoves Gnome down your throat (and I prefer KDE, like many others). Secondly, it assumes that everyone that uses it is a butt stupid, ex Windows "I'm too dumb to tie my shoelaces" refugee and can't be trusted to actually look after their system. Hell, if Ubuntu is after those types of users, it's ONLY going to give Linux a bad name in the long run. I really wish Linux would go back to the good old days when men were men, and boys well, they stayed out of the ring. God forbid if I ever did a tutorial on manually compiling a kernel on those crappy forums lol!!!

I am so tempted to simply wipe Ubuntu and put Debian back on the box. There goes Ubuntu on the laptop. I'll probably go with Mepis just to spite Ubuntu.

Rant over...

Dave

edit: Ubuntu is the ONLY major distribution that demands that you use sudo, rather than the traditional su. They imply that those using SU are logging in as root, rather than as a normal user, and thus it is bad to use su. How about teaching people that they hae a normal everyday account, and a root account. They should rarely log on as root, but rather log on as their normal user account and ONLY log on as root, via su, when needed for system maintenance/administra​tion. You don't make people smarter by treating them like idiots. You make them smarter by educating them. BTW - I solved the problem myself about a minute after I'd posted the thread.

Ah, I see elitism is still alive and well within the IT community

::John:: wrote in post #5765686
Don't hold back now, Dave

How yer goin' ?

Feeling a wee bit grumpy this morning, but alive :P I have never liked Ubuntu from its very first release, I think it is a vastly overrated, overhyped ordinary operating system. Gnome's UI is disgraceful imho, the look is blah, and by all accounts, each release of Ubuntu is getting buggier. I'll probably blow it away just to get rid of the sour taste in my mouth and return to good ole Debian.

Dave

Thanks Glenn!

I can't understand Ubuntu, they go to the trouble of an automated PM welcoming you, but they can't do such a thing for *no no* topics. That said, I completely disagree with Ubuntu on this - people should be taught how to *use* their Linux box, and use it effectively. Dumbing it down (and this is one of my largest complaints with Gnome) does not fix the problem. Educating people does. In ten years time we're going to end up with a large number of Linux users who are just plain dumb, ex Windows refugees who keep screwing up their systems. And kind people like me will probably waste a lot of time trying to help them fix it. If you don't know how to use a PC, and don't want to be bothered learning how to do so, then you shouldn't be using one. I am VERY firm on this ideal.

As a point in example, how do you think so many viruses spread? How do you think spammers get so many boxes to exploit? Because dumb users, who don't care, don't secure their boxes properly. They don't use them properly. All through a lack of education, or a lack of wanting to be educated. Such things means I have to put with a lot of spam, it means lots more viruses go around the world, it means bandwidth of networks are consumed by wasteless cycles that could be well and truly avoided, leading to less network congestion.

You don't fix a problem by masking it, you fix a problem by removing its source. This is the modern world, if it's too hard, then sweep it under the carpet and how others forget about it. It's partly the reason why modern society has gone down so low imho. Yes, I have a very poor opinion of humans as a society in general. And yes, I have little faith that it'll get rectified in time before things implode.

As to astronomy, it'll depend on what you are doing. Large "light buckets" are far better for faint objects such as smaller galaxies or those with a larger size, but low light density. They are good for observing finer details in faint nebulae. Reflectors with longer f stops will generally be better for planetary observations than reflectors. Remember, these objects (or most of them) are very faint, and our human eyes don't exactly excel at dealing with faint objects. I still remember the first time I saw kappa crucis as a 14 year old courtesy of our science teacher, or the rings of Saturn, wow! He had an 8" newtonian, was awesome compared to my 3" p.o.s lol.

Dave

Glenn-san wrote in post #5766218
Sorry to hear your Saturday night / Sunday Morning was, umm, a little less then peaceful Dave.

Internet heroes - dime a dozen. Forum mods, likewise. It's a long time since any of them bothered me. They are like ants, too many to squash em all Just find a way around them and go my merry way.

As for ubuntu and linux in general; just this morning I've been pondering ditching my windows environment here at home (again!) and going linux (again). Seems to be a bit of a cycle I am in. Have flip-flopped maybe 5 or 6 times over the last few years.

I'm with you on the KDE preference though. Last time I went full linux here was on Mandriva 2007. Have fiddled with ubuntu and I have to say that philosophically I do appreciate what Mr Shuttleworth wants to do.

wmzaphod wrote in post #5766460
Ah, I see elitism is still alive and well within the IT community

I'm sure you'll see the same about car drivers from the safety specialists in that industry. We wonder why so many people die on the roads, I can tell you why - idiocy and a failure to understand and live by road rules. How many drivers do I see sitting far too close to the car in front of them - the golden rule is 3 seconds between you and the car in front of you. How many people do I see speeding? How many people do I see combining both of those things together. Then we have the people using mobile phones whilst driving, or worse still, smoking. Or fiddling with their car stereos whilst driving. Then there's the lot that don't think a seat belt is a good idea, or maintaining the road safety of their car is worthwhile (i.e. driving with bald tyres, poor brakes). Failing to drive according to the conditions - dropping speed and distance to the car in front of you in fog/rain, or indeed pulling over to the side of the road in torrential rain.

All common sense stuff, but few abide by it. It's not elitism, it's a matter of doing the right thing, and most of the ordinary people don't want to do so. If people did the right thing, there would be little need for specialists [In that area] to get involved. People are lazy. People are apathetic.

Dave

PS I'm not saying I'm perfect, I'm far from it, but at *least* I recognise the problems, instead of putting my head in the sand and ignoring them and hoping that they'll go away. The sad thing is that our politicians still haven't figured it out.

G'day Dave,

At the risk of inflaming you more, can I ask a dumb question?

You mention Ubuntu is Gnome based and they're ramming it (Gnome) down your throat. Doesn't Kubuntu provide the KDE GUI for Ubuntu? Wasn't sure why you installed Ubuntu knowing about the Gnome thing when Kubuntu is there. I've never used it, mind you. In fact don't use Ubuntu's Gnome GUI either. Only commandline on my Ubuntu servers.

As for the sudo thing, I use that extensively from the commandline. Not sure how the GUI's handle it. Never had a problem with it in bash. Once the server is set up, don't tend to need either command other than maintenance or upgrades.

dpastern wrote in post #5766873
I'm sure you'll see the same about car drivers from the safety specialists in that industry. We wonder why so many people die on the roads, I can tell you why - idiocy and a failure to understand and live by road rules. How many drivers do I see sitting far too close to the car in front of them - the golden rule is 3 seconds between you and the car in front of you. How many people do I see speeding? How many people do I see combining both of those things together. Then we have the people using mobile phones whilst driving, or worse still, smoking. Or fiddling with their car stereos whilst driving. Then there's the lot that don't think a seat belt is a good idea, or maintaining the road safety of their car is worthwhile (i.e. driving with bald tyres, poor brakes). Failing to drive according to the conditions - dropping speed and distance to the car in front of you in fog/rain, or indeed pulling over to the side of the road in torrential rain.

All common sense stuff, but few abide by it. It's not elitism, it's a matter of doing the right thing, and most of the ordinary people don't want to do so. If people did the right thing, there would be little need for specialists [In that area] to get involved. People are lazy. People are apathetic.

Dave

PS I'm not saying I'm perfect, I'm far from it, but at *least* I recognise the problems, instead of putting my head in the sand and ignoring them and hoping that they'll go away. The sad thing is that our politicians still haven't figured it out.

Huh? what's this all about - I was referring to the moderator of the forum you were bitchin about

ahhh Ubuntu, I absolutely hate BROWN!

I wouldn't put Ubuntu on my worst enemy's computer!

Depending on what you are looking for in a distro, I have run Centos with a fair amount of success, usually as a server though.

As for scopes, you can get by with a good set of binoculars on a clear night while you save for this http://www.telescope.c​om.au …ld=UnitCost%2cP​roductName

wmzaphod wrote in post #5766928
Huh? what's this all about - I was referring to the moderator of the forum you were bitchin about

My apologies, thought you were referring me to being an elitist. I've had many others say that about my PC users thoughts and I'm well and truly sick of it and get a bit heated about it all. It's time knowledgeable users like myself stopped helping the newbies, let them fend for themselves and get off their bums and learn. By not getting them to do that, you're doing them a disservice in the long run I think, by teaching them to stay dumb and not learn and take some responsibility for running their PC systems properly.

Dave