Bill’s Mind

June 4th, 2007

Disclaimer: I’m a prick. No, really! I complain all the time.

Today, I’m going to complain about Linux, A-GAIN! Actually my gripe isn’t so much with the Linux kernel or community, I’m specifically irritated at Redhat, Fedora, CentOS and any other RPM-based distro that relies on “yum” for installing and updating packages. The yum tool itself comes from Yellow Dog Linux, a distro I’ve never personally used since it’s mainly targeted at PowerPC architectures.

First, some backstory: I’m one of those uber-geeks who likes Gentoo Linux. Gentoo has this very friendly package manager named Portage, which is a simple yet powerful rethinking of BSD-style ports. Like most everything else in Gentoo, it is extremely versatile and configurable in great detail. What I love most about Portage is its no-nonsense approach to version control. With Portage, you can specify which version of any package you want to install, and it will pull in the appropriate dependencies. You can also record custom configurations for any package through the famed USE flags, and the system will happily factor in your preferences when building related software. A seasoned Gentoo admin can finely build their system to perfectly fit his or her needs, all without ever touching any source code. Read the rest of this entry »

May 28th, 2007

Domain tasting, from Wikipedia
This is a throw down. The practice known as “domain tasting” or “domain kiting” must be put to an end. It is unethical and just plain sneaky… Read the rest of this entry »

May 24th, 2007

In a world where a large portion of internet users are on fast broadband connections, we sometimes come across slow-loading web sites. We’re quick to notice when it takes more than a second or two to load, but what do you do when it’s been over a minute since you clicked the link ?… Read the rest of this entry »

May 14th, 2007

Sometimes I wonder if I’m getting “old”. What is “old” anyway ? When does one cease to be young and cross over into this fuzzy concept known as old age ?
Allow me to give an example: Ruby. It’s the big fad on the net, a high-level programming language… Read the rest of this entry »

May 9th, 2007

There’s this wonderful racket on the net, that makes tons of money for nothing. It’s heavily marketed, littered with up-sells of all kinds, and priced arbitrarily. It’s easy to join in as a business partner, and hard to do well.
That racket is called the domain name business. Everyone who wants to be seen on the web has to get at least one domain… Read the rest of this entry »