Recent Posts

91

TCB Talk / Re: Request: VPN or proxy GUI configuration

« Last post by neonix on February 04, 2025, 12:22:00 AM »

openvpn doesn't have gui.

92

TCE Talk / Re: /etc vs. /usr/local/etc pain

« Last post by GNUser on February 03, 2025, 11:11:13 PM »

Hi Rich. I meant a bug in  tce-load  rather than a bug in  cp  . But perhaps it's best to leave this well enough alone: Tinkering with the relevant step in  tce-load  seems unwise given that it's a key step and the  cp  command with current flags is very extensively tested.

I guess my idea was a fool's errand after all

Thanks for your help, as always

93

TCE Talk / Re: /etc vs. /usr/local/etc pain

« Last post by Rich on February 03, 2025, 10:39:06 PM »

Hi GNUser
No, I don't think it qualifies as a bug. Based on the help
message from GNU cp, following links only applies to
source links:

Code: [Select]

----- Snip -----
  -H                           follow command-line symbolic links in SOURCE
 ----- Snip -----
  -L, --dereference            always follow symbolic links in SOURCE
 ----- Snip -----

94

TCE Talk / Re: /etc vs. /usr/local/etc pain

« Last post by GNUser on February 03, 2025, 09:33:25 PM »

Hi Rich. Yes, I realize that the problem is that the  cp  step in  tce-load  wants a real directory and fails if it encounters a symlink to a directory instead. My question at this point is whether this behavior is fussy/unexpected enough to qualify as a bug.

Hi CNK. I considered some kind of wrapper script to  tce-load  but decided I don't want to complicate things. I'd like to either fix the problem at the root (i.e., in tce-load) or just leave this alone.

95

TCE Talk / Re: /etc vs. /usr/local/etc pain

« Last post by Rich on February 03, 2025, 09:03:47 PM »

Hi GNUser
Here's what it doesn't like:

Code: [Select]

tc@E310:~/YN$ /bin/cp -aisH /tmp/tcloop/test/usr /
cp: target '/usr/local/test' is not a directory
cp: can't preserve times of '/usr/local': Operation not permitted
cp: can't preserve ownership of '/usr/local': Operation not permitted
cp: can't preserve permissions of '/usr/local': Operation not permitted
cp: can't preserve times of '/usr': Operation not permitted
cp: can't preserve ownership of '/usr': Operation not permitted
cp: can't preserve permissions of '/usr': Operation not permittedIt's not a directory.

It wants a directory:

Code: [Select]

tc@E310:~/YN$ /bin/cp -rsfH /tmp/tcloop/test/usr /
cp: target '/usr/local/test' is not a directory

96

TCE Talk / Re: /etc vs. /usr/local/etc pain

« Last post by CNK on February 03, 2025, 08:56:03 PM »

I understand and agree with reasoning behind having /usr/local/etc but the reality is that many extensions do not use it--either because the extension contributor was unaware of our convention or because the build process for some applications makes it difficult/impossible to specify the configuration directory. The problem is not that the /usr/local/etc convention exists--the problem is that not all extensions follow the convention.

My take has been that if an extension comes with default configuration files then it should go in /usr/local/etc because extension files shouldn't be outside of /usr/local. But I figured it was desirable to avoid this cludge if a default configuration isn't needed, and use /etc. Personally I'd like to only have symlinks in /usr/local and needing to put configuration files in there has caused me pain before, so the less of it the batter.

For your purposes, maybe just rsync /etc and /usr/local/etc after each edit or after running tce-load? Or a script that makes links to everything at /usr/local/etc in /etc after running tce-load? I started a script to do this but ran out of time (these things never just work), I might post back with it in a few hours/days/years...

97

TCE Talk / Re: /etc vs. /usr/local/etc pain

« Last post by GNUser on February 03, 2025, 06:33:49 PM »

Hi Rich. The problem is nothing as fancy as /etc/etc being created and causing interference.

Please download the attached test.tcz. It contains a single, empty file: /usr/local/test/helloworld.

Then try this:

Code: [Select]

$ sudo mkdir /usr/local/test # this step is optional--if /usr/local/test doesn't exist, it gets created at the tce-load step
$ tce-load -i ./test.tcz
test.tcz: OK
$ ls /usr/local/test/helloworld
/usr/local/test/helloworld # helloworld gets created in the "test" directory as expected
Then try this:

Code: [Select]

$ sudo rm -rf /usr/local/test
$ sudo mkdir /test
$ sudo ln -s /test /usr/local/test
$ sudo rm /usr/local/tce.installed/test
$ tce-load -i ./test.tcz
test.tcz: OK
$ ls /usr/local/test/helloworld
ls: /usr/local/test/helloworld: No such file or directory # unexpected! tce-load doesn't like that "test" is a symlink, refuses to create any files in "test"

98

TCB Talk / Re: how is tinycore able to run a desktop environment on older hardware?

« Last post by hiro on February 03, 2025, 05:56:13 PM »

many little things adding up. generally rejecting bloat & newness over older simpler "good'enuf" things, using Xvesa instead of modern Xorg, not using bloated frameworks like gtk/kde etc.

99

TCE Talk / Re: /etc vs. /usr/local/etc pain

« Last post by Rich on February 03, 2025, 04:48:13 PM »

Hi GNUser
Looking through the logs didn't reveal anything to me.
I was a bit surprised not to see any error messages from
the cp command.

Is it possible it is following the link and creating  /etc/etc/ ?
Does adding this to the script reveal anything interesting:

Code: [Select]

ls -l /etc > "$TCE/lsetc.txt"

100

TCB Talk / how is tinycore able to run a desktop environment on older hardware?

« Last post by monn380 on February 03, 2025, 04:11:19 PM »

Hello, I'm a relatively new user of Linux.
 I've been under the impression for a couple of months that even though the kernel has very broad support for any type of hardware if you wanted to use a Desktop environment on an older machine you would need to stop updating the kernel and the x server components, that was until i yesterday when I watched a video about installing tiny core on a Pentium 2 laptop and making it work remarkably well with a fully featured window manager and browsing the web without any problems, instead when I've tried to install Linux mint 20 on a 2008 laptop the GUI wouldn't even start.
How does tiny core to have such compatibility to manage to display a DE in a Pentium 2 when a "modern distro" can't even display the login screen properly in a 10 year younger laptop?
any insight on how linux builds the gui and how it works would be appreciated i want to make my laptop work properly again in a normal distro and understand more how linux works