I have a first edition right here. The publisher, O'Reilly & Associates, is still in business, but I couldn't find a reference to anything beyond a 4th edition.

I have a 5th edition on my desk from O'Reilly. Great book and handy as is Rute Users Tutorial and Exposition

1 members found this post helpful.

I look at the positive side: I no longer need to write kernels or most userland tools.
Ed

I see nothing wrong with the post other than it should probably be moved to General.

When I started with RH 6.0, I had dial-up. I couldn't get RH connected to the Internet. So I had to boot back into Win to connect to the net to hopefully find answers. Being new to Linux, I wasn't aware of the books/magazines out at the time.

Sounds like the Unix editor "ed". I believe that is still around, and still capable of making people crazy! ;-) When all else failed and vi was not installed, ed worked. IT was a pain, but it worked.

Everything now is so EASY! We are SO SPOILED! (And loving it!)

Yes I did. Plus used ed(?) on the VAX when we used teletypes (programmed on fan fold paper rather than screen) back in high school. Been there . And yes we are spoiled today. Now people complain when there 'icon' moves or disappears on the screen, or screen widgets aren't pretty enough, or screen isn't big enough, or... .

Mention of 'edlin' brought back memories, or was it nightmares, lol. Microsoft put in a different editor after one of the dos versions, 5? I think. For some reason the WindowsNT versions will allow you to run it still today. Just for something to do I pulled a 32bit XP out of my 'junk' room and fired up edlin this morning after seeing your post. It reminded me of the first few times I ran vi, I couldn't even remember how to save an edit and exit. Gradually I got it to work- with a little help from the web.
I tried to upload a pic but got this message:
Cloudfare tried to make sure I was 'human', lol.

"Your submission could not be processed because a security token was missing.

If this occurred unexpectedly, please inform the administrator and describe the action you performed before you received this error."

Not sure what's going on, never had any trouble before.
Edit: Tried to attach a pic again today, no luck.

Linux/unix ed is similar to edlin, but maybe more usable...

https://www.gnu.org/software/ed/manual/ed_manual.html

Can't understand why new users suffer from terminalphobia. Never bothered me. I even had a couple of goes with ed. Which might account for the hair-loss.

1 members found this post helpful.

I don't know why people seem to fear using a terminal since after all, it requires only the ability to read/write and the willingness to do so. I guess then, lazy and semi-literates would have a problem. The other problem would be unlearning windows before having to learn Linux.

The OP in this thread admits toward the end that s/he is only venting and feels better for it so something has been accomplished for him/her. The only question in the whole complaint is in reference to being willing to spend a lot of time having to learn new coding to use Linux which is of course, ridiculous as simply reading and taking notes will suffice in most cases and many Linux users never do any coding..

It would be nice if there was a sub-forum for these type of posts, maybe in General something like Linux Complaints/Rants so that members wouldn't end up wasting time starting to read them before finding they are a waste of time.

That's rather harsh. I can understand it very well. Our generations (boomers and Gen X) have probably used typewriters, have often come across command line in offices, or have messed about with DOS and BASIC on early PCs. The people growing up now have never seen a typewriter or used a keyboard in earnest. A lot of them don't even use laptops, just tablets and phones. They do everything with their thumbs.

And then they come here with a problem and are told to open a terminal and type in some weird command and post the result. With any luck, they'll do it and post it and they'll get a diagnosis and instructions on how to solve their problem. And they'll be grateful. But the whole thing is very likely to seem like black magic to them.

1 members found this post helpful.

The way to avoid hair loss is to choose your parents very carefully .

Or even desktops.... Kind of makes my point that this 'dumbing down' of society is putting us on the road to Idiocracy. When everything is done for you... or it is 'so easy' to use, or you don't have to remember anything, don't have write cursive, don't have read, just listen to talking heads for your news... Just ask Alexa ... And you don't have to 'go' to work, just work in your pajamas at home ... Not a good thing. But, as implied above, it really isn't their fault... Technology has put us on this road for better and side affects for the worst IMHO.

A lot of modern undergraduates can't even read cursive. Last year I read an article by a history professor whose students told her they couldn't read nineteenth century historical sources such as handwritten letters.