On 2024-03-08, vallor <[email protected]> wrote:
We like to give customers a soft landing when turning
down services. I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions
for good shell providers, places like Panix.
That concept mostly went away 30 years ago with free Unix-like operating systems that run on low-spec consumer hardware.
"bare-bones" for the users I'm thinking of. Some of
them might be able to transition to being a system
administrator, but a lot just want to run tin, pine,
mutt, irssi, tf, and so forth.
To access some remote shell account you need a machine
that is internet connected and can run SSH. That machine
can just run a freeware OS with all the above packages.
Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]> writes:
On 2024-03-08, vallor <[email protected]> wrote:
We like to give customers a soft landing when turning
down services. I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions
for good shell providers, places like Panix.
That concept mostly went away 30 years ago with free Unix-like operating
systems that run on low-spec consumer hardware.
"bare-bones" for the users I'm thinking of. Some of
them might be able to transition to being a system
administrator, but a lot just want to run tin, pine,
mutt, irssi, tf, and so forth.
To access some remote shell account you need a machine
that is internet connected and can run SSH. That machine
can just run a freeware OS with all the above packages.
That's all true, but it seems that people like to share a system
together because people love to belong to a community. In the
beginning, I believe such communities were mostly made of local people
and the Internet has sort of destroyed that. I believe people still
long for these local communities again. BBSs connected local people.
The Internet seems to have done the opposite.
(*) On community building
There's also this conjecture that a person can't deal with more than N people. The number I usually hear is 150. In other words, human
communities should be small (and local).
One principle I think about to achieve that is one begins a community
but others can only come through invitation. If someone misbehaves, we
know who invited that person---the tree of invitation being public.
Yes, we lose anonimity. Perhaps anonimity is overrated.
On Fri, 8 Mar 2024, Julieta Shem wrote:
Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]> writes:
On 2024-03-08, vallor <[email protected]> wrote:
We like to give customers a soft landing when turning
down services. I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions
for good shell providers, places like Panix.
That concept mostly went away 30 years ago with free Unix-like operating >>> systems that run on low-spec consumer hardware.
"bare-bones" for the users I'm thinking of. Some of
them might be able to transition to being a system
administrator, but a lot just want to run tin, pine,
mutt, irssi, tf, and so forth.
To access some remote shell account you need a machine
that is internet connected and can run SSH. That machine
can just run a freeware OS with all the above packages.
That's all true, but it seems that people like to share a system
together because people love to belong to a community. In the
beginning, I believe such communities were mostly made of local people
and the Internet has sort of destroyed that. I believe people still
long for these local communities again. BBSs connected local people.
The Internet seems to have done the opposite.
(*) On community building
There's also this conjecture that a person can't deal with more than N
people. The number I usually hear is 150. In other words, human
communities should be small (and local).
One principle I think about to achieve that is one begins a community
but others can only come through invitation. If someone misbehaves, we
know who invited that person---the tree of invitation being public.
Yes, we lose anonimity. Perhaps anonimity is overrated.
I run a community for IT-professionals and have been doing so for
close to 10 years. I think what you say is correct and that there
definitely is a need for it.
If you don't have one, start one! =)
D <[email protected]> writes:
On Fri, 8 Mar 2024, Julieta Shem wrote:
Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]> writes:
On 2024-03-08, vallor <[email protected]> wrote:
We like to give customers a soft landing when turning
down services. I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions
for good shell providers, places like Panix.
That concept mostly went away 30 years ago with free Unix-like operating >>>> systems that run on low-spec consumer hardware.
"bare-bones" for the users I'm thinking of. Some of
them might be able to transition to being a system
administrator, but a lot just want to run tin, pine,
mutt, irssi, tf, and so forth.
To access some remote shell account you need a machine
that is internet connected and can run SSH. That machine
can just run a freeware OS with all the above packages.
That's all true, but it seems that people like to share a system
together because people love to belong to a community. In the
beginning, I believe such communities were mostly made of local people
and the Internet has sort of destroyed that. I believe people still
long for these local communities again. BBSs connected local people.
The Internet seems to have done the opposite.
(*) On community building
There's also this conjecture that a person can't deal with more than N
people. The number I usually hear is 150. In other words, human
communities should be small (and local).
One principle I think about to achieve that is one begins a community
but others can only come through invitation. If someone misbehaves, we
know who invited that person---the tree of invitation being public.
Yes, we lose anonimity. Perhaps anonimity is overrated.
I run a community for IT-professionals and have been doing so for
close to 10 years. I think what you say is correct and that there
definitely is a need for it.
If you don't have one, start one! =)
That's great to know because I really am building one. Mine is also a community of IT-professionals, so I started it out by writing the very software that runs the communication. It works as a playground: people
enjoy hacking the very software that they and their peers use.
Can I joing your community? I promise to behave. :)
D <[email protected]> writes:
On Fri, 8 Mar 2024, Julieta Shem wrote:
Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]> writes:
On 2024-03-08, vallor <[email protected]> wrote:
We like to give customers a soft landing when turning
down services. I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions
for good shell providers, places like Panix.
That concept mostly went away 30 years ago with free Unix-like operating >>>> systems that run on low-spec consumer hardware.
"bare-bones" for the users I'm thinking of. Some of
them might be able to transition to being a system
administrator, but a lot just want to run tin, pine,
mutt, irssi, tf, and so forth.
To access some remote shell account you need a machine
that is internet connected and can run SSH. That machine
can just run a freeware OS with all the above packages.
That's all true, but it seems that people like to share a system
together because people love to belong to a community. In the
beginning, I believe such communities were mostly made of local people
and the Internet has sort of destroyed that. I believe people still
long for these local communities again. BBSs connected local people.
The Internet seems to have done the opposite.
(*) On community building
There's also this conjecture that a person can't deal with more than N
people. The number I usually hear is 150. In other words, human
communities should be small (and local).
One principle I think about to achieve that is one begins a community
but others can only come through invitation. If someone misbehaves, we
know who invited that person---the tree of invitation being public.
Yes, we lose anonimity. Perhaps anonimity is overrated.
I run a community for IT-professionals and have been doing so for
close to 10 years. I think what you say is correct and that there
definitely is a need for it.
If you don't have one, start one! =)
That's great to know because I really am building one. Mine is also a community of IT-professionals, so I started it out by writing the very software that runs the communication. It works as a playground: people
enjoy hacking the very software that they and their peers use.
Can I joing your community? I promise to behave. :)
Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]> writes:
On 2024-03-08, vallor <[email protected]> wrote:
We like to give customers a soft landing when turning
down services. I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions
for good shell providers, places like Panix.
That concept mostly went away 30 years ago with free Unix-like operating
systems that run on low-spec consumer hardware.
"bare-bones" for the users I'm thinking of. Some of
them might be able to transition to being a system
administrator, but a lot just want to run tin, pine,
mutt, irssi, tf, and so forth.
To access some remote shell account you need a machine
that is internet connected and can run SSH. That machine
can just run a freeware OS with all the above packages.
That's all true, but it seems that people like to share a system
together because people love to belong to a community.
From: Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]>
Reply to: Kaz Kylheku
Date: Sat, 9 Mar 2024 01:48:41 -0000 (UTC)
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
Newsgroups:
comp.unix.shell
Followup to: newsgroup
References:
<usef6b$1iemc$[email protected]>
<[email protected]>
Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]> writes:
..
The era of secure multi-user computing is behind us..
The era of secure multi-user computing is behind us;
we now know that processors cannot actually be trusted to enforce
their documented protection mechanisms like user/supervisor separation,
due to side channel attacks.
On 3/8/24 19:48, Kaz Kylheku wrote:
The era of secure multi-user computing is behind us;
Nonsense.
The era of the shell account's heyday is definitely behind us.
But -- ostensibly -- secure multi-user computing is alive and quite well.
RDP / VDI is very much a thing and those are multi-user computing.
My day job is supporting a farm of Solaris servers that clients log into interactively to run applications.
we now know that processors cannot actually be trusted to enforce their
documented protection mechanisms like user/supervisor separation, due to
side channel attacks.
Not quite true.
The optimizations that have been introduced cause problems.
But disabling those optimizations significantly restores trust.
Also, that trust is largely an x86 specific issue. There are other processor architectures that don't have the same issues.
I run a community for IT-professionals and have been doing so for
close to 10 years. I think what you say is correct and that there
definitely is a need for it.
If you don't have one, start one! =)
That's great to know because I really am building one. Mine is also a
community of IT-professionals, so I started it out by writing the very
software that runs the communication. It works as a playground: people
enjoy hacking the very software that they and their peers use.
Can I joing your community? I promise to behave. :)
Well, if you're ever in Stockholm, sure you can! =)
Everyone is welcome. But the community only exists in the real world,
and no streaming from the events is allowed. The format is 3 lectures,
one sponsored and two community ones, and afterwards there is always
burgers and beer. This concept has worked well for almost 10 years,
with between 20 and 130 visitors per event.
From: Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]>
Reply to: Kaz Kylheku
Date: Sat, 9 Mar 2024 01:48:41 -0000 (UTC)
Organization: A noiseless patient Spider
Newsgroups:
comp.unix.shell
Followup to: newsgroup
References:
<usef6b$1iemc$[email protected]>
<[email protected]>
Kaz Kylheku <[email protected]> writes:
..
The era of secure multi-user computing is behind us..
Only for you. I've got several shell account on various sites and people I've been conversing with for decades now. Most of the newer sites
are much smaller, informally run, and not open to the general public.
I view this as a positive; IMHO authentic community doesn't scale.
(*) On community building
There's also this conjecture that a person can't deal with more than N >>>> people. The number I usually hear is 150. In other words, human
communities should be small (and local).
One principle I think about to achieve that is one begins a community
but others can only come through invitation. If someone misbehaves, we >>>> know who invited that person---the tree of invitation being public.
Yes, we lose anonimity. Perhaps anonimity is overrated.
I run a community for IT-professionals and have been doing so for
close to 10 years. I think what you say is correct and that there
definitely is a need for it.
If you don't have one, start one! =)
That's great to know because I really am building one. Mine is also a
community of IT-professionals, so I started it out by writing the very
software that runs the communication. It works as a playground: people
enjoy hacking the very software that they and their peers use.
Can I joing your community? I promise to behave. :)
Oh, and tell me more about your community! What have you learned? Is
it flourishing? Do you intend to keep it small or grow?
On 3/8/24 19:48, Kaz Kylheku wrote:
The era of secure multi-user computing is behind us;
we now know that processors cannot actually be trusted to enforce
their documented protection mechanisms like user/supervisor
separation, due to side channel attacks.
Not quite true.
The optimizations that have been introduced cause problems.
But disabling those optimizations significantly restores trust.
Also, that trust is largely an x86 specific issue. There are other
processor architectures that don't have the same issues.
D <[email protected]> writes:
[...]
I run a community for IT-professionals and have been doing so for
close to 10 years. I think what you say is correct and that there
definitely is a need for it.
If you don't have one, start one! =)
That's great to know because I really am building one. Mine is also a
community of IT-professionals, so I started it out by writing the very
software that runs the communication. It works as a playground: people
enjoy hacking the very software that they and their peers use.
Can I joing your community? I promise to behave. :)
Well, if you're ever in Stockholm, sure you can! =)
So far away. :)
Everyone is welcome. But the community only exists in the real world,
and no streaming from the events is allowed. The format is 3 lectures,
one sponsored and two community ones, and afterwards there is always
burgers and beer. This concept has worked well for almost 10 years,
with between 20 and 130 visitors per event.
A sponsored lecture. That's an amazing idea.
D <[email protected]> writes:
[...]
(*) On community building
There's also this conjecture that a person can't deal with more than N >>>>> people. The number I usually hear is 150. In other words, human
communities should be small (and local).
One principle I think about to achieve that is one begins a community >>>>> but others can only come through invitation. If someone misbehaves, we >>>>> know who invited that person---the tree of invitation being public.
Yes, we lose anonimity. Perhaps anonimity is overrated.
I run a community for IT-professionals and have been doing so for
close to 10 years. I think what you say is correct and that there
definitely is a need for it.
If you don't have one, start one! =)
That's great to know because I really am building one. Mine is also a
community of IT-professionals, so I started it out by writing the very
software that runs the communication. It works as a playground: people
enjoy hacking the very software that they and their peers use.
Can I joing your community? I promise to behave. :)
Oh, and tell me more about your community! What have you learned? Is
it flourishing? Do you intend to keep it small or grow?
Not quite flourishing, but it's been overall encouraging with some
elements of pessimism. I don't think I've learned anything yet. I'd
like to see it growing to the point I can't keep up with hanging out
with everyone at the same time, but it shouldn't grow too big so the
group loses its cohesion.
With some experience in programming and knowing everyone claims interest
in programming, I decided to do it my way. I wrote a prototype of an
NNTP server. An NNTP server is a world of opportunities for programming
and creativity and community experiments. Instead of showing them that
I wrote the system, I merely invited some of my friends to discuss programming.
(*) The idea
A community should make the members feel they belong. For a group of programmers, understanding and writing a piece of the system helps them
to feel like they belong. An NNTP server is something very simple, so
people can quickly learn how it works and can implement something of
their own ideas. Whatever programming is done affects the whole community---bugs, say.
Users can only join through invitation.
--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
200 Welcome! Say ``help'' for a menu.
help
[...]
create-account my-friend
200 Okay, account MY-FRIEND created with password ``mbnxgf''. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
Now you can give your friend an account. If your friend misbehaves, we
can all know who invited her. We'll have no spam problem, say. Every
user has a real-world connection to the community, even if a random
person on the Internet was invited. (The invitations make up a tree.)
--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
users
200 List of current users:
ROOT, last seen on Fri Mar 8 22:03:00 2024, invited (X)
X, last seen on Sat Mar 9 11:23:21 2024, invited (MY-FRIEND J)
J, never seen, invited nobody
MY-FRIEND, never seen, invited nobody
.
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
To feel like they belong, users can create their own groups. (Crazy,
huh?)
--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- create-group comp.my.favorite.topic
280 group comp.my.favorite.topic created
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---
People can now subscribe to this group. The fact that a new group was created is posted to a control group. So everyone can keep an eye on
what's going on in the community. This control group can receive the
usual posts from people, so that people can discuss the server event
right where it was announced.
Accounts can be disabled, except for ROOT. You can only disable an
account if you are a root of the tree of invitation. For example, X
invited J and MY-FRIEND, so X can disable both of these accounts. If J invites Z, then J would be able to disable the Z account not X nor
MY-FRIEND or any other. (X would be able to disable Z as well.) So
users can invite their own subcommunities and be their sysadmin, say.
(If someone loses their password, anyone up in the tree of invitation
can recover it for them.)
After three months, if an account has not posted anything to the server,
that account is automatically disabled. The idea in this is to keep the community tight: you can feel comfortable speaking out your ideas
because the community is fairly closed and you have an intuition of who
is reading you. You know that someone who is there only to watch would actually not have an account (after a while). That's why everyone has
to post, so that you can have a sense of who the person is. (Those who
do not get interested in the groups and eventually forget about the
whole thing will just get disabled. If they regret losing the account,
they will need to ask someone to reenable them.)
That's an experiment. It's hard to come in (as you need to be close to someone who is in) and, once you're in, you must commit: if you were
only curious to see what goes on, that's fine, but you'll get
automatically expelled eventually. I don't know how long should the inactivity period be.
If not anything else, it's a programming playground. There are so many
ideas one can decide to implement. For instance, we could implement anonymous groups where every message posted to it gets the FROM-header replaced with a random name (and only the necessary headers go with the message). We could have a group that's the opposite, where the FROM
header is replaced with the nntp-username of the poster. There are /so/
many other ideas one could try out.
On 3/13/24 02:11, Kaz Kylheku wrote:
How about: Panix, plus living in your parents' basement?
I am up to Five grandchildren and ALL of them are more mature than you
Just checked sdf.org, and found “©1987-2065”.
Coincidentally, the latter is the year in which the old Gerry/Sylvia- Anderson series “Thunderbirds” was set ...
On 25.03.24 06:25, Janis Papanagnou wrote:
On 25.03.2024 03:36, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
Just checked sdf.org, and found “©1987-2065”.
Coincidentally, the latter is the year in which the old Gerry/Sylvia-
Anderson series “Thunderbirds” was set ...
I didn't know about that date. But what a coincidence that just these
days I was looking that series! (Wasn't expecting that anyone knows
about that old series in the first place.)
I do! I even have the complete series here on DVD ;-)
I just LOVED them!
On 25.03.2024 03:36, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:
Just checked sdf.org, and found “©1987-2065”.
Coincidentally, the latter is the year in which the old Gerry/Sylvia-
Anderson series “Thunderbirds” was set ...
I didn't know about that date. But what a coincidence that just these
days I was looking that series! (Wasn't expecting that anyone knows
about that old series in the first place.)
The model scenery and effects I (still) think are really amazing!
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