No Mod Required

FOR a certain subset of Internet users, “Sudo make me a sandwich” may as well be “Take my wife … please.”

Perhaps some explanation is in order. Before giving up the goods, however, we should heed the warning of Randall Munroe, the 23-year-old creator of xkcd, a hugely popular online comic strip (at least among computer programmers) where the sandwich line appeared. Mr. Munroe believes that analyzing a joke is like dissecting a frog — it can be done, but the frog dies.

Still, he plays along, explaining that “sudo” is a command in the Unix operating system that temporarily grants godlike powers: “The humor comes from people who have encountered typing a command and having the computer say ‘No,’ and they say, ‘Oh, yeah, sudo says,’ and the computer does it. Kind of like ‘Simon says.’ ”

Hence the set-up: one stick figure says to another, “Make me a sandwich,” only to be told, “No.” Thinking quickly, stick figure No. 1 says, “Sudo make me a sandwich,” and the once-recalcitrant stick figure No. 2 must comply.

Read more:

Link by Link - This Is Funny Only if You Know Unix

While I’m here, why not click through for my favorite XKCD ever.

I just started looking into this hosting upgrade option, so I’m looking for advice/anecdotes wherever I can find them.

To that end, anyone out there have any experience with either of these two services?

Dedicated-Virtual Server from Media Temple

Low Cost Virtual Private Servers from JohnCompanies.com

Failing that, anyone have any really good alternatives to the above two?

I know I’m being terribly lazy with the last question. Sure. Sue me I’m just hoping I can go to bed and wake up with a half dozen or more fantastic hosting alternatives that I can kick the tires on over the next few months.

Looking at the pricing and features, these VPS’s look like the perfect upgrade track for me as I start to push the limits of what I should really be doing in a shared environment. I’m cool for now, but I’d rather be prepared for a potential move than have to scramble at some layer date. VPS’s also open up a lot of options in terms of what I can do for some of my clients in terms of hosting, which would be (a) a cool thing to offer and would (b) help offset the cost. The problem is, I just don’t know anyone that’s actually got any experience working with them, so I’m not sure which way to go in terms of companies/options. All the guys I know that know about this stuff are all knee deep in multiple (often load load balanced) machines hosted at the RackSpaces of the world. They don’t have a lot of experience with the kinds of options available at my (comparatively) puny computing budget.

I used to have an Ubuntu partition running on my old Dell. I used it for development from from time to time and I just enjoy using Linux/Unix systems, so it was always nice to have that partition to switch into when the need arose (How often was it to use wget? Pretty often.) When my Dell died and I got my new HP, I really didn’t have any time set aside to set up a dual boot machine. I had client work hanging over my head and had been without a computer for something like three weeks so it was a desperate situation. There was no time for niceties. I had to toss the Adobe Creative Suite disc in there, watch that thing grind through its install; toss the MS Office 2007 disc in and watch it do the same; and then I had to go.

Fast forward to this week. With the release of Internet Explorer 8, I set up a new Virtual PC using the IE App Compat VHD (in English- the Internet Explorer Application Compatibility Testing Virtual Hard Drive.) While testing that promising browser (and it really is promising), I was struck by the thought of setting up a Linux instance on a Virtual PC. One quick Google search later I was presented with this:

Installing Ubuntu on Virtual PC for Windows Lovers

Which seemed promising

Following the advice presented, I was able to set up Ubuntu pretty much without issue and I’ve been happily messing around, setting up the environment for my needs (installing Apache, Mysql and PHP5, Subversion, Wordpress, etc.,) ever since. Even running inside another OS, it’s actually a reasonable experience and everything else is pretty seamless. There’s also the added bonus of being able to switch back and forth between Linux and my Windows desktop, which allows me to keep up with the day-to-day while still hacking mad gibsons on the Linux side.

As an aside, while I’m comfortable on the command line and on Linux/Unix systems, I’m not all that great at anything web-centric beyond what you have access to in a shared environment, so it’s kind of fun for me to actually build and configure a server. I normally don’t get a chance to actually edit apache configuration files (instead I have to on .htaccess files,) so a lot of what goes on there is a learning experience for me. Being the unrepentant geek that I am: Learning Experience + Computers + Open Source Software = Good times.

Anyway, even if you’re not looking to set up a server and are just curious about the Linux “experience” this is an easy way to go about getting a taste without putting your current system into danger. Try it, risk free!

What are you waiting for?

I want a small, light notebook with crazy long battery life for travel. I don’t much care about power, the only thing I really want it for is email, research on the road (AKA - “where should I eat tonight?”), the occasional blog post, emergency bug fixes and watching DVDs. The only concern other than that relatively low barrier to entry is I want to be able to dual boot it with both Windows* and Ubuntu** with very little hassle.

So, dear internet, what should I buy and how much is this going to cost me? Cheaper= better obviously.

I just have no experience at this end of the laptop spectrum.

*just in case I run into some barbaric hotel network or something- “Signing up for mega-yo-yo.net requires Internet Explorer 4.0 or higher”

**so that I can be productive without having to pirate or outfit a second machine with $$ software.

Plus I just like having a Linux machine around the house. They’re fun to play with and useful for testing sites that need broad support.

I guess I could research it, but it’s almost perfectly clueless so it seems like it might be too good to be true.

Read it anyway…

You are kidding arent you ? — jerryleecooper’s comment on “Why Linux will not displace Windows” | TalkBack on ZDNet

I actually use both Linux and Solaris* machines on a daily basis so the twain meet in my head all the time, but Sun is talking about its Linux plans and that’s an interesting development.

News: Amazon: Linux saved us millions