Re: Linux at scale

On Sun, 4 Aug 2024 08:42:50 -0700, Bobbie Sellers
<blissInSanFrancisco@mouse-potato.com> wrote in
<v8o7hq$45kh$1@dont-email.me>:

On 8/4/24 05:35, vallor wrote:

On Tue, 30 Jul 2024 22:58:28 -0700, Bobbie Sellers
<blissInSanFrancisco@mouse-potato.com> wrote in
<v8cjq4$1f67q$1@dont-email.me>:
 

On 7/30/24 22:30, candycanearter07 wrote:

John McCue <jmccue@hairball.jmcunx.com> wrote at 13:49 this Saturday
(GMT):

followups trimmed to comp.os.linux.misc
>
In comp.os.linux.misc yeti <yeti@tilde.institute> wrote:

"26yh.0712" <26yh.0713@e6t5y.net> writes:
>

    Ah ... wunnerful Winders  :-)
>
    It should be banned as a socioeconomic WMD ...

>
Imagine systemd swallowing package management, doing automagic
security updates and such a "MSLinux" monoculture.

>
I can see this happening, I think they just swallowed sudo.

>
You mean polkit?

>
No he means "sudo" is going to be replaced with "run0."
<https://www.howtogeek.com/will-linux-run0-command-run-sudo-out-of-

town/>

Not right away but sooner or later unless it causes even
more problems.  "Sudo" is a bad implementation which replaced "su".
which invoked superuser privileges.  You had to use  your root account
password but Ubuntu decided that was dangerous so to invoke the same
privileges you can use your user accont passwork.
Canonical thought apparently that it was asking too
much of their projected userbase to remember User account password and
root password.

 
Actually, sudo(8) isn't a bad implementation of su(8), it's just
"different".
 
You can set sudo to use the root password, which is what I do for my
personal systems.  Requiring the user password is default, and works
better for systems with shared administration where you have to control
what the person runs.
 
For cases where you have multiple (remote) administrators that need
"root" access, that's better handled with ssh keys and clever key
management on the target host.  Another way to handle it is separate
usernames (e.g. "suvallor") that have their own home directory, but
uid/gid 0.
 
Quite a few of our systems are multi-user.  Even used to have a
customer shell server until demand for that dried up.  Right now, one
system is used by employees who need to run tools that interface with
our back end systems.  Login credentials are handled with Active
Directory, the domain of which is joined with sssd(8).
 

The system on my computer uses SysV.init and "su".
>
bliss- Dell Precision 7730- PCLOS 2024.07- Linux 6.6.42- 5.27.11

 
Nice!  I've said for a few years now that Linux _is_ ready for most
home users, as well as enterprise desktops.
 
For example, we use MS Teams at work -- I'm not happy about it, but I
can use it from Linux through the web site.  Same goes for MS Office.
 
The problem is you can't take your Linux laptop to (say) Best Buy and
expect them to help with a problem.  The legendary "year of the Linux
desktop" won't happen until there's some kind of _local_ support
network in place.  And a lot of folks will get help with their Windows
systems from a relative, who is more likely to have Windows experience
than Linux chops.
 

Well that Local Support group is available all over
the place. It is called the Internet and Linux Users Groups. I used to
be the placeholder whe went into a local cafe and held down space for
the other users attending. Nearly all Metropolitan areas have local
Computer Users Groups and I living in San Francisco am a member more or
less of SF-LUG ,but I write a Linux News Column for the Champaign-
Urbana Users Group, CUCUG. Aslo in online support we have a very good
PCLinuxOS Users Forum where we users converge with coders and with
packagers for help and to help where we are competent with our problems
on our Laptops and other machines.  One of the now-passed members even
had his own brand of desktop to sell to anyone who could not run for
whatever reason PCLinuxOS on the machines available to them. At SF-LUG
we had a capable hardware person before Covid-19 Restrictions went into
play.  We have had one real life meeting since then just before the
Delta Wave.
Maybe SF-LUG will go back to in person meetings
at some point in the future but I started in my 60s and now I am 87 and
plagued with many long-term problems. So if it happens soon enough maybe
one more in person event for me before I abandon Usenet and PCLinuxOS
along with the rest of the joys of life.
 
bliss-as old as sin.

At least you're young at heart. :)

When I think of the average computer user, I think of my folks.
(Dad just turned 84.)  I'd love to get them on Linux, but they
have a good chunk of their personal organizing locked up
in MS Access databases.  (I guess I could try to get Access running
in WINE or proton...and you know what?  I should investigate that.)

Regarding support:  you're right about online help, and I could
set up bookmarks for the requisite support forums on their system,
as well as teach them some of the basics of administration.
A lot can be done these days on Linux Mint, even without
the command line.

Just set up my wife's new Linux workstation, and I don't
think I touched a command line getting her configured.
(Wifi drivers were another matter, which I should post about
separately.)

Much different nowadays than way back when, trying to
get the printer working, or setting up modelines for X.

--
-v System76 Thelio Mega v1.1 x86_64 NVIDIA RTX 3090 Ti
   OS: Linux 6.11.0-rc1 Release: Mint 21.3 Mem: 258G