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elsdfr
01-21-2008, 08:34 PM
Help me keep the shell people alive.

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Date: 2007-11-21, 6:46PM EST


There is a sad truth to the world today. I am part of a dying breed of people known as "shell users." We are an old-fashioned bunch, preferring the warm glow of a green screen full of text over the cold blockiness of a graphical interface. We use ssh, scp, and even occassionally ftp. Back in the days before high-speed connections ("broadband"), we would dial up during off-hours to avoid being slammed with huge phone bills. The whole "Microsoft Windows" fad will fade away sooner or later, but in the interim, our kind is facing extinction.

Because there are fewer and fewer of us, I must help keep our lineage alive. I am looking for someone to help me do this. I need a woman (obviously) who is willing to raise a child with me in the method of Unix. Our child will be introduced to computers at a young age, and will be setting emacs mode before any other child can even read. I earn a sufficient income to support a family in modest comfort. Other than the fact our child will be bright, text-based and sarcastic, we will otherwise be a normal family. We will even go to Disney World and see Mickey Mouse.

So, if you are a woman between the ages of 23 and 43 who is ready to raise a child in the way of the shell, let me know so we can begin the process. (If you are ready to raise more than one child, even better.)

PS - yes, this is for real. Given the right person, I would obviously propose before we ... call fork().
PPS - I only set emacs mode for my ksh session. I only edit files using vi. Just wanted to clear that up. And I'm looking to raise the child(ren) as a dedicated couple, so if you aren't interested in being married, you may wish to select() a different posting.

N.B. - on the issue of relocation. I live in a place where my income/expense ratio is proper (i.e., greater than 2:1). I'm willing to live anywhere in the world where this remains true. I've been to much of the country as well as foreign nations. There are no limits to where I will live *so long as the job market for unix admins is robust enough to be sustainable.* And yes, I am interested in a strictly monogamous situation. I've been known to actually turn down offers of "two chicks at the same time."

* Location: Typical Rich Town, CT
* it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests

----

If you meet the above please pm me as well, thanks ;D

xhaan
01-22-2008, 12:11 AM
Sorry to invade your thread here, but I'm glad someone else wants to do this, besides me. :thumbsup:

Even though I do use Windows (and window managers in *nix), it's mainly for the purposes of easy access to streaming video and Flash, specific games, and image editing/creation programs. I use shell all the time though, remote and local, and have a shell only Gentoo install, which happens to be my default boot choice in GRUB.

And no, I'm not an applicant, as I'm also male. :laugh:

elsdfr
01-22-2008, 01:09 AM
Invade? Its not mine and just thought it was funny in a sad geek kind of way.

xhaan
01-22-2008, 01:31 AM
Invade? Its not mine and just thought it was funny in a sad geek kind of way.

Heh, I don't see it as sad, I see it as awesome.
But I guess that's because I might be a geek.

And I love the 'call fork()'... that has.. possible connotations. :laugh: :laugh:

AgentofGaming
01-22-2008, 10:19 AM
I'm pretty sure shell people aren't exactly dying off. In fact as I speak me and fellow classmates are being turned into them.

My university makes us programm C++ on Unix based systems so I have my share of using Linux, Solaris, on old obsolete computers. I was an MS-DOS user when I was young, and a windows user after. When I came into the first programming course here I was thinking "ssh, putty, scp, unix, linux???". Now I use them on a weekly basis.

My main use for a computer is gaming and I only know the basics of Unix systems. So do I really have any reason to like these unix based systems? (aside from Microsoft charging money)

elsdfr
01-22-2008, 04:57 PM
Sure people still use the shell but few LIVE the shell. We're talking about running everything in console, using things like mocp, links2, irssi, rtorrent, centerim/pebrot, mutt and who needs a game machine when you have nethack? :confused:

HackerX
01-22-2008, 05:33 PM
*sigh* I even play a gui version of nethack :(

xhaan
01-22-2008, 07:03 PM
Sure people still use the shell but few LIVE the shell. We're talking about running everything in console, using things like mocp, links2, irssi, rtorrent, centerim/pebrot, mutt and who needs a game machine when you have nethack? :confused:

Who needs a house when you can have a lean-to? :p

Graphics are helpful. Yeah, they can 'dumb things down', and you don't need a graphical frontend to have graphics (frame buffer comes to mind), but still, there are many more ways to configure pixels and colors to identify something than you can do with characters, then when you add 'depth' to it, that opens a whole new dimension of possibilities.

iamnotspock
01-25-2008, 01:21 AM
If you think a GUI is an expensive luxury, elsdfr, what will you do with a woman? Have you considered cloning as a cost-effective alternative?

elsdfr
01-25-2008, 06:25 AM
I don't think the GUI is an expensive luxury, more as a nessesary evil and if I can do something without it, I will.

What would I be cloning?

thod
01-25-2008, 07:15 AM
I still use bash in xterms. Its good for doing most stuff if you are familiar with all the basic commands. You dont want to use it for everything though. You can telnet to port 80 and issue the HTML GET commands etc but what you get back just looks so much better in a web browser. Right tool for the job and all that.

elsdfr
01-25-2008, 08:02 AM
Each to their own and sure you can use Telnet to test connections but to view the a site? Thats what Links if for and yes it doesn't look nearly the same but it would be functional if sites hadn't become so pretty. Not that they shouldn't have either, but the fact is it would be functional if they hadn't.

snoogit
01-27-2008, 12:05 PM
I would say the shell people are experiencing a sort of reincarnation, heck even the newest windows server will have a command-line interface for those who want it.

elsdfr
01-27-2008, 05:58 PM
I would say the shell people are experiencing a sort of reincarnation, heck even the newest windows server will have a command-line interface for those who want it.

Argh, you've tainted my thread! :rolleyes:

TechAlias
02-27-2008, 02:01 AM
Unix is still alive and well. I am personally an XP user, however I am Well aquainted with ssh and shell commands ls -a;. The basis of the majority of todays Operating systems are still founded on Unix. I am in telecommunications. Believe it or not Unix is still the interface used for most telco equipment...

KadenPrescot
03-01-2008, 09:38 PM
You know... as a web developer I hate to hear that people still try to browse the web from shell... ugh. I just don't see a reason to hang on to old ways where there are more elegant ways of doing things now. Text is text and sure for news and communication that's great, but the web is becoming so much more than that. Shell will never die, I ssh onto a server every single day. When "normal" people see you launch terminal and start typing in commands they really get freaked out. Shell is useful for some things, but it's not really functional for "normal" stuff anymore.