[xubuntu-users] shell tools

[pereira]

Hi Uri,

Real Unix Men were once little children too, and passed through various 
stages as they
developed their magical powers in dealing with xubuntu or more in 
general unix.
Others, though, became Real Expert Men in other areas, never having had 
the time
or the motivation to learn other OSs than a 1960s IBM system or the cos 
that came
with the Cray7600 in the 1970s. Then, when it came time to learn new 
magic with
linux and xubuntu, they must use a walker in unix land and count on the 
Real Unix Men
to help them cross the street or whatever else might cause difficulty if 
they mess up.

So, my reaction was intended to gently remind the experts that this list 
is lurked
on by all kinds, from experts who contribute to those who want to more 
than to find
glimmers of insight or stimulus to explore a little and learn from it. 
For the latter it is
best not to assume too much knowledge, e.g., an active knowledge of what 
$PATH
is for. Instead, it is more helpful to be explicit in the commands that 
are needed to make
things work even if these are very basic. That's how many people learn, 
by repetition
ad nauseam.

Really helpful is Ulli's correction to where I put the path to the 
fstools-0.0 directory.
When I first did it, I vaguely remembered something about PATH in 
.bashrc. So I looked
where to add to the $PATH variable, and I noticed a reminder to myself 
that it should
be put in .bash_aliases. When I looked there I did find another addition 
to $PATH,
so I added it there. Thanks to Ulli, I realized that I should have put 
it in .profile, so I
did that and added a note to myself reminding me what .bashrc, 
.bash_aliases and .profile
are for. Then I might do it properly when the next time to do this rolls 
along. Maybe 2018...,
or never. but then again who knows.

Trying to learn some more, I tried sudo apt get install sw,
and sudo apt-get install swtools, but nothing useful happend. So I gave 
up, since I
don't really need any of this right now and I have other things to do, 
like listening
to  songs on youtube with my grandchild.

Be this what it may, thanks to Ulli and others who make it worthwhile to 
lurk on xubuntu-users.

Nino


On 01/08/2017 10:24 AM, Ulli Horlacher wrote:
> On Sun 2017-01-08 (10:00), pereira wrote:
>
>> the web site downloads
>> and installs all the 193 (IIRC) files in the fstool directory. That's easy.
>>
>> But, to make use of them you have to know some linux magic that is not
>> described anywhere
> Of course, one should know what $PATH is (for)!
> This is so basic, I have not described it.
>
>
>> (that I could find). The executable files end up in a directory called
>> fstools-0.0/bin, with minimal
>> documentation in fstools-0.0/doc
> This is a copy of what you see on http://fex.belwue.de/fstools/
>
>
>> and a useless fstools-0.0/README.
> This README is for /sw, a software distribution system developed at the
> University of Stuttgart 1990.
> You can use it with Ubuntu, too, see http://fex.belwue.de/swinstall
>
> My fstools are part of /sw, but you can use it independently.
>
> Some of the /sw applications you can also find in the ubuntu repository,
> but the newest, best, more shiny versions are in /sw. This is what I
> maintain.
>
>
>> But, if you know your
>> own linux magic you would know one of many options: put in your
>> .bash_aliases the abacadabra
>>
>> # look in fstools directory, with useful perl scripts from Stuttgart U:
>> http://fex.belwue.de/fstools/del.html
>> export PATH=$PATH:/home/your-name-here/fstools-0.0/bin
> NO!
>
> Environment variables like PATH must be placed in /etc/profile or
> $HOME/.profile
>
> $HOME/.bash_aliases is for - oh-wonder! - bash aliases!
>
> Do not mix them!
>
>
>> Then you can use such useful commands as del, df3, and other useful
>> esoterica.
> But only for you and not for other users!
> If you want to make them accessible for all, then create an own directory,
> e.g. /opt/fstools/ and add to /etc/profile :
> PATH=$PATH:/opt/fstools/bin
>
> .. or simply install /sw (local copy) :-)
>
>