On Mon, 17 Oct 2011 10:06:22 +0100, Invisible wrote:

>>>> A more appropriate comparison is latest against latest.
>>>
>>> I don't know how big the latest version of Windows is. I've never
>>> installed it. More to the point, I don't know of anybody who's using
>>> it yet.
>>
>> Windows 7.  You might have heard of it.
> 
> I've heard of it, yes. What I *said* is that I don't know how big it is.
> And that I haven't seen anybody using it.

"I don't know of anybody who's using it yet."

I'm using it.  In a VM.  So there's one. ;)

>>>> Yeah, ultimately, you gave up without asking for help.  If you'd
>>>> asked for help, someone probably would've been able to help you.
>>>
>>> 1. You're assuming that it's /possible/ to fix this.
>>
>> I'm basing that assumption on years of experience in troubleshooting
>> Linux systems.
>>
>> You're giving up and assuming it's impossible to fix it, so why bother
>> even asking for help?
>>
>> *That's* absurd.
> 
> Ultimately, it's "possible" to fix anything. You could reimplement the
> entire OS, for example. (Isn't that how Linux came to exist in the first
> place?) But that's far beyond my level of skill. For all practical
> purposes, that's "impossible". Not every computer problem is solvable.

The reason one asks for help is when something is beyond one's skill 
level.  There's invariably someone with *more* experience and skill, and 
the purpose of asking for help is to learn from those with more 
experience.

When I'm giving technical interviews, you might recall, I ask questions I 
know the candidate doesn't stand a chance of asking.  The reason I do 
this is to find out how they learn beyond their current skill.

You seem to think there's no point in asking questions to learn more.  
That's troubling.  You *have* the ability to learn, and you seek out 
information when it suits you.  But at the same time, you declare 
something as "impossible" (remember the discussion we had a couple years 
ago about debugging a kernel?  You uncategorically declared it was 
impossible to do so, and I told you that I had actually *done* so myself, 
but you still refused to believe it was possible to use a kernel debugger 
to get anything useful out of a crash).

You need to revise your view on that kind of thing and admit that you 
don't know *everything*, but that there are people who know *more* than 
you do and that you could *learn* from them.

>>> 2. You're assuming that had I asked, somebody would have actually
>>> bothered to reply. And that their reply would have been helpful.
>>
>> Again, based on decades of experience in online forums.  Is there a
>> chance of a useless answer or no answer?  Sure.  But I guarantee you
>> you won't get an answer IF YOU DON'T FUCKING ASK.
> 
> My limited experience is that when you ask for help, you get no reply.
> Or you get a few replies from people who don't really know how to help
> you, but they try to offer you some kind of useful information anyway.

Your experience is limited; you need to gain more experience.

I've been answering technical questions in online forums for over 20 
years now.  I can assure you that your experience is not normal - because 
it it was, why on earth would I waste 20 years of my life doing exactly 
what you've said isn't helpful or useful?

>>> As I say, I can get Linux to /work/ OK. Indeed, my dad still uses it
>>> on a daily basis. It's just that one or two things - like getting the
>>> package manager to install just the packages I actually need - are
>>> annoyingly fiddly.
>>
>> If you asked for help in understanding it, you might just learn
>> something.
>>
>> Heaven forbid *that* should happen. ;)
> 
> What's to understand? Dependencies are tracked at a fairly coarse level.
> It is what it is. Just live with it...

So, there's absolutely nothing more you can learn about dependency 
tracking in Linux?

Some dependencies are very coarse, yes.  Some are not.  Your assumption, 
based on a high level understanding, is incomplete - and you certainly 
*could* ask for more information about it and possibly even contribute to 
making it better.

Or at least understand it better, instead of parroting an explanation 
that the MS-fanbois just love.

Jim

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