When combined with other hardware that will remain in use, the total capacity will rise to 40 petaflops. (A petaflop is a measure of computing speed equal to one thousand million million (10¹⁵) floating-point operations per second.) Given upgrades in storage and connectivity, and this increasing computing power, there will be a noticeable increase in resolution and other features of NOAA’s modeling of earth systems.

There is a rumor that the Trump Whitehouse plans to sell off the hardware to some friends who live out near the airport in Queens, and replace it with lower grade equipment that Trump claims works just as well (see illustration).

Though the press release does not give details, a spokesperson for NOAA just informed me that these computers will run the Linux operating system. I had assumed so, but wanted to check. Linux is the standard operating system for super computers, because it is a super operating system. Nobody wants to see the Blue Screen of Death in the middle of their tornado warning.

Specifically, the computers will run the Cray Shasta Linux Environment. This is a high performance suit designed to run large and complex applications on more than a half a million cores, with docker container support, and the robust Cray system management support including staged upgrading capabilities and the low overhead Cray system snapshot analyze.

Two: Start using your computer.

Three: Cancel the order for the new laptop because your old laptop is faster now.

You may have been expecting one of those posts that tell you the “ten things to do after installing [Linux Distribution]” but this ain’t it. In fact, for the most part, those posts have become fairly useless. Consider these “things to do”:

Update your system.

Install the software you like

For the most part, anyone installing some version of Linux knows about updating, the part about “third party drivers” is in the install sequence as a checkbox in every distribution known to humankind, and why does anyone have to be told to install the software they like?

But, now that I’ve got your attention, I want to put in a plug for XFCE, and for your trouble, I’ll give you a really cool tip or two.

You’ve heard of the “Linux and the Unix Philosophy“. Let me tell you my Linux Philosophy. Use any updated Linux system you want, to get an efficient, reliable, and secure operating system. But, at the local, “desktop” level here is what I want: I want workspaces (usually four) with a workspace pager that shows me a thumbnail of the workspace, and ctrl-alt arrow switching between workspaces and alt-tab switching between apps on a desktop.

That is how all the original Linux desktops worked in the old days, or mostly anyway. But Ubuntu with its strange ways and Unity desktop gave permission for other desktops, including Gnome, to destroy these features. Mate (pronounced “Matt eh”) has it, and it can be configured with a little work in KDE. Gnome 3.X not only does not have these features, but trying to simulate them is impossible even with the gazillion enhancements you can get for Gnome, and if you find some way to do it in Gnome, there is an 80% chance that way will break before long because Gnome Extensions generally disappear or become so badly maintained that they become bugs and have to be turned off.

I stopped using Mate when I found out that the maintainers are unmitigated assholes, and have no real interest in making sure their desktop works. KDE is nice, and I used it for a long time, but then I discovered that it is a little too cute for its pants in relation to, possibly, how Java works with some of it, and the moment the KDE experts suggested that I fix a certain problem by re-installing the OS (one of the reasons I left Windows … that need NEVER be an option) I got rid of KDE as well. (I still recommend it, and frankly, I still recommend Mate, I just feel personally bad about it.)

Several years ago, I used Xfce on several computers, and often on older laptops. But it was a distribution that couldn’t always be trusted to be installed without a lot of tweaking. Last time I installed it on a laptop, about three or four years ago, the installation would not recognize my network, and in order to get the network going, I needed to install something from the network. A true Linux expert could have worked around that, but I’m one of those dilettantes who has to look up half the cli commands I use every time. That was about the time I switched to Matt-eh.

But then, Xfce released its latest desktop, the first major revision in, literally, years.

Replacing KDE on my old laptop cut boot time from just over three minutes to just over two minutes. Replacing Gnome 3.5 on my desktop made me stop throwing my shoes at the computer. It sings, and it acts like a good Linux desktop is supposed to act.

So, I recommend you give Xfce a try. Simple, no frills, highly efficient, works.

I recommend the Greybird theme because it handles mouse dragging better than the other themes and is not dark. If you like a dark theme, I’m sure you’ll find what you need out there, bring a flashlight.

Here’s a trick: Put a picture in a folder and name it folder.jpg. That picture will become the picture used as the icon for the folder. (These all work: folder.jpg, cover.jpg, albumart.jpg, or fanart.jpg.)

Find and discover Catfish, the Xfce file finding program. It is pretty good.

Finally, I should mention this. Xfce as a desktop uses less in the way of computer resources than KDE as a desktop. But, Xubutnu (the Ubuntu flavor that has Xfce as its desktop) does not necessarily do so. They use about the same in that comparison. Putting SFCE or KDE on top of an efficient distro uses fewer resources than the same desktops on any Ubuntu base, since Ubuntu is inherently less efficient for reasons that I can’t explain. For the most efficient desktop, maybe install Debian with Xfce. But, you will need to tweak, most likely.

Here is where you get xubuntu.

The main web page for Xfce is here.

The name “Xfce” comes from “Common Desktop Environment:” an ancient Linux concept dating to 1996. CDE was proprietary and for use with early Unix systems. Xfce forked off and was originally for “XForms COmmon Environment” (XForms was an early GUI toolkit for X window systems.) Now, Xfcd does not stand for anything formally, but unofficially means “X Freakin’ Cool Environment” or Cholesterol Free Desktop Environment, which makes, obviously, no sense.

I like PDF Lab‘s PDFtk aka PDF toolkit. This is not OpenSource and there is both a non free pro and free version of it. I’ve tried the free version (example below) and was impressed. Next time I need to do a lot of PDF work I’ll probably fork out the 399 for the pro version. (That’s 399 pennies, quite cheap. It is developed by Sid Steward, the author of PDF Hacks: 100 Industrial-Strength Tips & Tools.

So, for example, I can get pages 11-20 of a larger file called big.pdf extracted into a smaller file called extracted.pdf like this:

pdftk A=bigpdf cat A11-20 output extracted.pdf

That line of code makes almost no sense to me, but it works.

I learned about this tip at a Linux Journal Tech Tip page on extracting pages from a PDF, where you will find several other approaches.

Small, Sharp, Software Tools: Harness the Combinatoric Power of Command-Line Tools and Utilities by Brian P. Hogan is the latest iteration (not quite in press yet but any second now) of one such book.

I really like Hogan’s book. Here’s what you need to know about it.

First, and this will only matter to some but is important, the book does cover using CLI tools across platforms (Linux, Mac, Windows) in the sense that it helps get you set up to use the bash command line system on all three.

Second, this book is does a much better than average job as a tutorial, rather than just as a reference manual, than most other books I’ve seen. You can work from start to finish, with zero knowledge at the start, follow the examples (using the provided files that you are guided to download using command line tools!) and become proficient very comfortably and reasonably quickly. The topic are organized in such a way that you can probably skip chapters that interest you less (but don’t skip the first few).

Third, the book does give interesting esoteric details here and there, but the author seems not compelled to obsessively fill your brain with entirely useless knowledge such as how many arguments the POSIX standard hypothetically allows on a command line (is it 512 or 640? No one seems to remember) as some other books do.

I found Small, Sharp, Software Tools a very comfortable, straight forward, well organized, accurate read from Pragmatic.

He gives key examples of what can go wrong if you don’t pay attention to certain things.

For example, if you have a dot in (especially at the start of) your PATH variable, you risk running a Trojan horse that snuck sneakily into your /tmp directory. If you want the dot, put it last.

Anyway, a simple straight forward article with a few pieces of good advice: Writing Secure Shell Scripts

You are the boss. You want a pile of files to be put away. You could do it yourself, but instead you instruct someone else to do it. There are a lot of them and they are all mixed up. So you write a memo to an employee that says “put the files away” and sis-bam-boom you’re all set.

Or are you?

It turns out that the files fall into four categories, each associated with a different set of file cabinets. All the files have labels with words and numbers on them. One set is filed alphabetically. Two sets are filed by the number that is on the label. The fourth set are stacked in an outbox in any order where they are to be processed by someone else at a later time.

So, if you just say, “file these” a lot of things can go wrong, unless he person who gets the memo knows what to do.

Your memo could read “Find the person who knows how to file stuff. Then have that person file these files properly.” In a computer language, that is a little like loading a library then using instructions from that library to carryout a task in a specific way.

# file.py
import alpha-numeric-filing as fileit

def main():
files.fileit(file)

… or code to that effect.

The point is, telling your underlings to do something only works if the underlings do it correctly. This is also true with computers, where a line of code seems to be instructing the processor, way down deep in the hardware, to do a certain thing, but it may or may not be actually doing that thing.

Computers are famous for making strange and unexpected (to the non-expert) calculations. For example, a computer will calculate the base 10 log of 2 as 0.000029995663981195 off of the actual number because of the way numbers are represented and manipulated inside the machine. So when you ask for that value in a computer program, you are making an incorrect assumption if you think it is being done correctly.

That is a known mathematical phenomenon and not of consequence to most people or most programs, but there may be other issues that are more important and even less predicted. Like the filing problem mentioned above, there may be assumptions built into the deeper level operation of a computer program or script once it is complied or interpreted, linked up with other software it works with, and deployed on this or that machine. This is the difference between working in the area of written code including uncompiled programs or scripts and the deeper binary code that is created by the software that interprets or complies your program.

Practical Binary Analysis: Build Your Own Linux Tools for Binary Instrumentation, Analysis, and Disassembly by Dennis Andriesse (with a foreword by Herbert Bos) is a guide to looking into the binaries created by application-making software. This is a set of approaches to delve into the space in which malware may lurk, bugs may flourish almost invisibly, and inefficiencies may wreak their slow and ponderous havoc.

The book teaches how to:

The most important way in which this book will change your life is that it will allow you to analyze binaries more automatically and with less manual work.

I can not truly evaluate this book because this is way beyond, or maybe, way below (as in down deep in the abyss of computer science where I assume small gnomes still write all the assembler language) my understanding of thing. But the book gains great praise from others, and is a brand new edition.

Dennis Andriesse has a Ph.D. in system and network security and uses binary analysis daily in his research. He is one of the main contributors to PathArmor, a Control-Flow Integrity system that defends against control-flow hijacking attacks such as ROP. Andriesse was also one of the attack developers involved in the takedown of the GameOver Zeus P2P botnet.

Here are a few ways to find out that information.

In KDE, go to the command line and run the command

kinfocenter

That will pop up a box with all sorts of information about what you are running, and about hardware, and all sorts of other things. The current version of kinfocenter has the most annoying tool tips on the planet, but otherwise, is useful.

There is a similar thing in Gnome. Go to the standard toolbar on the top and open up the thingie by that looks like an off on switch or audio level adjuster. That will open a spooky looking box that includes the actual audio volume control, an actual on switch, some other stuff, and a toolbox icon. Open the toolbox icon, and in there, click on about. You won’t get as much info as KDE gives you, but you’ll have the desktop name, version, your computer name, and some basic hardware information.

A lot of information is stored inside variables and system files on your computer. There are therefore a large number of different command line ways to access this information. Here are some examples:

I’m running a current version of KDE, so I get this answer:

greg@cj:~$ echo $DESKTOP_SESSION
plasma

The type of window manager is stored in the name of a file in a system directory, and you can get that like this:

greg@cj:~$ ls /usr/bin/*session
/usr/bin/dbus-run-session

There is a command called “env” which invokes a long readout of way more information than you will ever want. But you can grep it. For example:

greg@cj:~$ env | grep DESKTOP
DESKTOP_SESSION=plasma
XDG_SESSION_DESKTOP=KDE
XDG_CURRENT_DESKTOP=KDE

This is a command that prints out various system information data about the kernel, the machine, the processor, etc. With no options, or just the -s option, it prints out the kernel name, like this:

greg@cj:~$ uname -s
Linux

But you can get much much more

greg@cj:~$ uname -srm
Linux 4.15.0-42-generic x86_64

To see all the options, run “man uname” to see the man page.

The Linux command “cat” prints out a file. There are a few cat tricks you can use.

greg@cj:~$ cat /etc/os-release
NAME="Ubuntu"
VERSION="18.04.1 LTS (Bionic Beaver)"
ID=ubuntu
ID_LIKE=debian
PRETTY_NAME="Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS"
VERSION_ID="18.04"
HOME_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/"
SUPPORT_URL="https://help.ubuntu.com/"
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/"
PRIVACY_POLICY_URL="https://www.ubuntu.com/legal/terms-and-policies/privacy-policy"
VERSION_CODENAME=bionic
UBUNTU_CODENAME=bionic

There is a command to print out distribution specific information, with the handy -a switch to dump it all to the screen.


greg@cj:~$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS
Release: 18.04
Codename: bionic

And finally, the command hostnamectl, which allows you to change the hostname (don’t do this if you don’t know what it is) or get information about the hose.

greg@cj:~$ hostnamectl
Static hostname: cj
Icon name: computer-desktop
Chassis: desktop
Machine ID: c9c8b3b223c34d14ae7fcabfbf1f2c1c1ba
Boot ID: 6dba797cc332bbababb58c7373dba9797c
Operating System: Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS
Kernel: Linux 4.15.0-42-generic
Architecture: x86-64

So, now you know how to find out a whole bunch of information you almost never really need, but when you do …

What can you do short of buying a new computer? Well, install Linux. Linux is so much more efficient as an operating system, your computer will simply run better. Guaranteed.

How do you install Linux? Go to the Ubuntu site or somewhere like it, and download an “image” (as it is called), and use some software that may well already be on your computer to put the image onto a USB stick. Then, turn off your computer, put the disk in, and as the computer boots up, hit the correct function key. Maybe F12. Maybe F9. Maybe F12. Don’t worry your computer will tell you “Hit FX for boot options.” Hit that key.

Now you get to chose the USB stick as the boot device. Do so. Your computer is now running Linux, literally. You now have a new operating system running your computer. The old OS is not running any more, but you will still have access to the disk drive and stuff.

Now, the correct thing to so, ASSUMING YOU HAVE BACKED UP ALL YOUR DATA ON A DIFFERENT DRIVE SOMEWHERE ELSE, is to use that operating system to literally install Linux on your old computer. There is probably a icon you select. Whatever. This is not hard, just follow the instructions.

But you don’t have to. You can just run your computer off the stick. No problem.

This, by the way, is a great way to leverage the immense power of that nice new work laptop they gave you that runs Windows. But I digress.

So, that’s the best idea ever, but how does that relate to a huge rip-off holidayh gift?

Because some brilliant entrepreneur figured out that people are stupid, in a particular, extra stupid way. Linux is free, and good. And you can install it using your own old and extra USB stick, so you need not spend a dime. But say you are stupid person, and you just don’t believe that something free can be good. Actually, that isn’t so stupid. Free stuff is usually crap. But there are very good reasons this does not apply to OpenSource software. If you are a stupid person, you think, “oh, I don’t want freeware on my computer” but that is like saying that you don’t want needed surgery at the Mayo because Jeeter and Justin down at the shop forgot to bolt your wheels back on after rotating your tires last week, which caused all kinds of havoc when you drove away from “Just Fine Tuned Auto Works Inc” and over that bridge with no guard rails on it … Linux is not Freeware. Freeware is a whole ‘nuther thing.

Point is: The world of computers runs on Linux. 500 of the biggest supercomputers run on Linux. Most servers serving the Internet run on Linux. Your cell phone probably runs on Linux. Linux is good. It is also free. And you can put it on a USB and play with it on your computer.

Or, you can pay PrarieIT anywhere between $30 and $67 bucks for this product: Xtra-PC Turbo 16 — Turn your old, outdated, slow PC into a like-new PC, 16GB. Its a USB stick on which they’ve installed a Linux system, that you can do the above with.

Very enterprising. So enterprising, this product has actually gotten itself on to several “coolest gift” lists.

And yes, go ahead and do that. If you feel better paying out some fifty bucks for a free operating system, if that make you feel like it will work better, do that.

Or, just get one of these if you don’t have one of them already, then go here or here or wherever, download the image, and use your system’s disk management software to make a bootable USB disk with that image on it. Like this if you use Windows.

This started a while back when I built a computer. In particular, this computer. There are several advantages to building a computer. You can save money or get more bang for your buck even if you don’t pay less. On the saving money side, maybe you have components on hand that you don’t have to buy. I did, mainly mass storage. The case I had, thinking I’d save money there, ended up not working out. You get more bang for the buck because the parts you buy will be better than the ones in the equivilant off the line but cheaper computer, and you’ll have more control over what happens in future upgrades.

For example, say you build a compute from parts for $1,000 and buy an equivalent Dell computer for $800. You save $200 with the Dell.

Then your motherboard burns out. For the computer you built, you replace the motherboard. For the Dell, you may or may not be able to replace the motherboard. You won’t be able to buy the exact one that burned out. The other componants have been designed to work with the Dell OEM motherboard, maybe not with the one you replace it with. There is a good chance that you will even have trouble at the level of getting into and out of the highly optimized Dell case. You can fix it, but it won’t be easy or cheap.

Meanwhile, Dell has designed the motherboard to be as efficacious as possible, meeting the specs at minimal cost. Chances are, the motherboard you bought, that cost you $45 more than Dell paid to put its motherboard in their machine, is sturdier and better performing, unless you are comparing your build to the Dell professional level computer. And the Dell professional level computer comparable to your build does not cost $800. It cost $1750.

So, if you build your own computer, you will not save piles of money, but you might save some, and you probably built a better computer for that price than you’d get commercially, or equivalent. And, there is a very comforting level of comfortable comfort knowing that if something burns out, you just put the new one in, because you totally know how to do that and what part to get. I know in advance more about how to fix a major problem with my hardware than any professional tech anywhere.

The other big advantage is that I get the computer I want. Also, I got to chose the upgrade path. For example, I did not get the most powerful processor available (though mine is quite nice). But, the motherboard I got can easily handle a major upgrade in processor. So, it will be trivial for me to buy a much more powerful processor, if I happen to have a few hundred bucks with nothing else to do with in, and install it in less than 20 minutes. I know I can do this I know exactly what processors I can put in, and I know the exact procedure.

I also can build a second computer really fast. After building mine, I built one for my son. Different case, but otherwise almost exactly the same. His monitors are not as good as mine and he has way less RAM. But, it took me a couple of hours to build his. I can do a third one in an hour, easily. I don’t need a third one, but just in case, I’m ready!

After building this computer, I messed around a bit further with the hardware and ended up with my ideal mass storage system.

I had thought earlier that the ideal system was a very fast SSD with a second drive with data. However, since I use cloud synchronization, it actually becomes slightly risky to have the storage media on a separate drive than the OS, because a rapidly deployed desktop will sometimes get ahead of the hardware, and the cloud becomes confused. THis is easily fixed, but only in a reboot performance hit and with some tricks that then have to be maintained. So, I opted for a single giant SSD, using my smaller older SSD as a giant swap file (which is not needed because I have so much freakin’ RAM), and a third drive, a traditional hard drive, on which I store some files I don’t want taking up cloud space (like downloads of an entire already backed up web site or three, that sort of thing) and to hold an on site backup.

I’m running and decided I totally like and will stick with KDE Plasma. I’m not using it so much for he bells and whistles, but rather, because I can perfectly and nicely emulate a Gnome 2.0 environment on a desktop system that is currently very well maintained and not buggy. If you were thinking KDE takes up a lot of resources compared to other systems, be informed: Not these days. They made it very efficient.

Plus, resources? I have lots of resources.

Finally, I just deployed emacs with my somewhat messy but very well personalized .emacs file.

I open emacs with a launcher that opens “blank.txt” which lives in my home folder. From there I rename, or it simply holds whatever I’m working on. Someday I will improve that end of the process, but it is actually so simple, it is hard to imagine much going wrong.