More Zonkyness

Author: Mike Meredith

  • When Is a Command-Line Application Not?

    It sometimes seems that every time I dive into a Youtube video promising “${N} Awesome CLI Applications” (or equivalent), that most of the suggested applications are not command-line applications. They’re TUI-applications – text user interface as opposed to graphical user interface – or to align with my bad habit of referring to GUI applications as gooey applications, perhaps tooey applications.

    Now there’s nothing wrong with tooey applications; I use them every day. Especially nmon (just because I got used to it before I discovered htop). Or btop

    Screenshot of btop running

    But none of these are really command-line applications; by which I mean they aren’t used at the command-line even if they are (optionally) invoked there. A command-line application allows you to use the shell including pipes to produce an aggregate result. For example :-

    » grep mike /etc/passwd | awk -F: '{print $5}'
Mike Meredith

    That uses two command-line “applications” to turn a username (“mike”) into a full name (“Mike Meredith”). Yes it can be optimised into a single command :-

    » awk -F: '/^mike:/ {print $5}' /etc/passwd
Mike Meredith

    … which even improves the search, but makes the point less well. And we can do slightly fancier things too :-

    Screenshot of a random URL being picked and turned into a QR code.

    (don’t assume that QR code takes you somewhere nice)

    I’m not suggest Youtubers should stop making videos about terminal-based applications; I’m not even suggesting they should concentrate on “proper” command-line applications. Just don’t call terminal-based applications “command-line” because they really are not.

  • Why Republican Politicians Should Be Jailed

    Not all of them, perhaps. But the NRA has a very convenient list of politicians that are friendly to gun rights; which serves as a double-purpose – it’s also a list of politicians who don’t care how big a pile of dead kids it is, as long as they get their backhanders from the NRA.

    In the latest tragedy (but hurry up they’ll be another along shortly), the rancid heap of necrotic pus that is the governor (Greg Abbott) tried the usual tactic of blaming mental health despite no evidence the shooter had any mental health issues. The same dude who not only cut mental health funding, but loosened gun controls to make it easier for those with mental health issues to get guns.

    There’s a crime that fits the bill – “malfeasance in a public office” – which not completely unreasonably could be argued that certain Republican politicians are guilty of. The ones who take backhanders from the NRA whilst refusing to contemplate any concrete action that might have an effect on mass shootings.

    Plus if you threaten them with a scary sounding crime like “malfeasance” they might start contemplating actually doing their fucking jobs.

    Who Are You Looking At?

  • A Couple More of Portsmouth

    The Column
    Lighting The Sea

  • Portsmouth: Local Hero

    Local Hero

  • Brighton

    Who Are You Looking At?
    West Pier Ruins
    The Seagulls Disapprove
    Peering At Each Other