December 2012

There were 2 posts published in December 2012 (this is page 1 of 1).

The Console is addictive / God’s li’l creatures

The console is addictive

Now the strange thing is that even though I’ve “proved” to myself a couple of times that there’s stuff that just doesn’t work so well in Mutt, and that I’d be a lot better doing them in webmail, I find that I keep on clicking F12 (for Guake) and going back to Mutt. I’m not sure exactly why. I think I’m just tired of the Gmail interface and longing for simplicity. It’s addictive. I seem to be doing more and more in the terminal. Will it last?

My imaginary illness

Since returning from India last time my digestion ain’t what it used to be. Loose stools and itchy bum seems to imply worms. I didn’t actually test for parasites, because I hate taking samples of my shit. But I’ve been reading up on what to do in case they’re there. It seems that there are certain substances that worms despise, so I’m feeding them with these. Between meals drinking wormwood tea (fortunately there are a few plants around the village), sometimes mixed with sage. NB though I haven’t actually read that they hate sage, I figure they should. And at meal times I’ve been adding desiccated coconut or nibbling on raw carrot. And neem capsules, which I still have a supply of from Auroville. Worms also hate garlic. But I do too. One website recommends putting it in your socks, or between 2 layers of socks, in order that the garlic will be absorbed into yer blood. But something tells me that nothing is going to work unless I do something extreme, like eating raw pumpkin seeds followed by a wormwood enema. There’s always vermex.

Real fleas

In dogs, worms follow fleas. I don’t think that’s the case with me, but in one room, The End Room, we have the fleas. In the days when we still let her in the house, MarryDog used to sneak in there to sleep on the rug. Then one day we discovered fleas. Since then, MarryDog has been outdoors, and the door to the End Room has been closed. We’ve vacuumed a couple of times, and gone in with anti-flea spray – which involves rapidfire commando raids while holding the breath then running out for air. And we’ve vacuumed and sprayed other kinds of insecticides. But the sad fact is that every time we go in that room, a flea or two jumps on us. And a bit later in the day we discover a bite somewhere. The latest strategy is a glass oven dish filled with water and detergent under a reading lamp. The fleas jump in and they drown. But not all of them. Adult fleas survive only a couple of weeks, while their pupae are supposed to hatch “only in the presence of a host”, which usually means a dog. Anyway, they’re under siege. We’re waiting them out.

An odd thing about fleas is that, as far as we know, they eat only a single meal in all the four stages of their lives: a meal of blood.

experiments in the terminal (again)

I’ve been mucking around once-again with terminal programs; trying to see if I can make this an environment in which I really feel at home. I remember the first time that I used MS Windows (3.1 or 3.11, I think) and how strange it was to get used to a mouse. Till that time I’d been using WordPerfect for DOS, and sometimes Einstein and similar programs. I never imagined I might want to return to that, and now it’s quite hard to go back.

My motivation is not nostalgia, but the realization that terminal programs offer greater freedom and promise a more distraction-free environment. I could manage with simpler hardware and software. My computing environment would depend much less upon the vagaries and advances in hardware, software and web services. It’s a kind of adventure. In text-based computing there is a greater uniformity in what is presented on the screen. The mouse is superannuated, impressive hardware specs and graphics power become redundant. The screen is clutter free and quiet. I have no doubt that once the adjustments have been made, this would be a much more productive environment.

So I’ve been making experiments again with Mutt as my mail reader, and Emacs as my text editor. There are programs like ttytter (for Twitter) and MC (a wonderful filemanager). I’m currently trying out the Guake terminal, whereby one flips in and out of a full-screen terminal with the F12 key. Different programs can be opened in different tabs.

The main difficulty in working in the terminal is coping with panic attacks when suddenly stumped about how to do stuff at a very basic level. For instance, I’m relatively comfortable already with all the main Mutt keystrokes. But the need to store and retrieve files and messages opens up whole new areas of uncertainty and frustration. This kind of computing requires skills which grow less and less necessary in a world dominated by IOS devices and intuitive software. And indeed, an alternative simplicity can be obtained by purchasing a tablet or a Chromebook, where there is no need to deal with the operating system. But I find that to be somewhat limiting, a surrender of control. Opensource computing is about retaining control over one’s working environment, rather than being subject to limitations that are imposed by large companies.

I feel that a cleaner, simpler, freer computing environment matches the yearnings of my spirit towards minimalism, detachment from consumerism and reduced preoccupation with “things”. But I’m not sure yet. It’s still an experiment.