From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: David Kastrup Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Emacs vista build failures Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2008 01:22:50 +0200 Message-ID: <85od51id2t.fsf@lola.goethe.zz> References: <36366a980807101702r5677d096g8e62ef5b3e278868@mail.gmail.com> <4eb0089f0807111217m66d6cf4el777c197c107ce034@mail.gmail.com> <87skug6tq5.fsf@catnip.gol.com> <4eb0089f0807111345h13eccdds9b2cf43370b94074@mail.gmail.com> <4eb0089f0807121340x5e26f6dbve03ef50b238f3a3a@mail.gmail.com> <87k5fph5rh.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <20080713214648.GB1076@muc.de> <487A783B.7060603@gmail.com> <20080713232635.GD1076@muc.de> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1215991394 5651 80.91.229.12 (13 Jul 2008 23:23:14 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 13 Jul 2008 23:23:14 +0000 (UTC) Cc: Chong Yidong , emacs-devel@gnu.org, "Lennart Borgman \(gmail\)" , rms@gnu.org, David Robinow To: Alan Mackenzie Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Mon Jul 14 01:24:01 2008 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1KIAv9-0004i2-9b for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Mon, 14 Jul 2008 01:23:59 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:42977 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1KIAuH-0008Ly-7D for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 13 Jul 2008 19:23:05 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1KIAuC-0008Lj-VE for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 13 Jul 2008 19:23:00 -0400 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1KIAuA-0008Kc-EX for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 13 Jul 2008 19:22:59 -0400 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=38880 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1KIAuA-0008KJ-7u for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 13 Jul 2008 19:22:58 -0400 Original-Received: from mail-in-06.arcor-online.net ([151.189.21.46]:44186) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:DHE_RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1KIAu4-0004y5-SZ; Sun, 13 Jul 2008 19:22:53 -0400 Original-Received: from mail-in-06-z2.arcor-online.net (mail-in-06-z2.arcor-online.net [151.189.8.18]) by mail-in-06.arcor-online.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 695F631E750; Mon, 14 Jul 2008 01:22:51 +0200 (CEST) Original-Received: from mail-in-17.arcor-online.net (mail-in-17.arcor-online.net [151.189.21.57]) by mail-in-06-z2.arcor-online.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4EDFC5BD73; Mon, 14 Jul 2008 01:22:51 +0200 (CEST) Original-Received: from lola.goethe.zz (dslb-084-061-034-089.pools.arcor-ip.net [84.61.34.89]) by mail-in-17.arcor-online.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0F83E2BCDB1; Mon, 14 Jul 2008 01:22:50 +0200 (CEST) Original-Received: by lola.goethe.zz (Postfix, from userid 1002) id 6B8311CFAEF1; Mon, 14 Jul 2008 01:22:50 +0200 (CEST) In-Reply-To: <20080713232635.GD1076@muc.de> (Alan Mackenzie's message of "Sun, 13 Jul 2008 23:26:35 +0000") User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/23.0.60 (gnu/linux) X-Virus-Scanned: ClamAV 0.93.3/7705/Sun Jul 13 22:57:18 2008 on mail-in-17.arcor-online.net X-Virus-Status: Clean X-detected-kernel: by monty-python.gnu.org: Linux 2.4-2.6 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:100658 Archived-At: Alan Mackenzie writes: > Hi, Lennart! > >> I wonder if this still is the case with Ubuntu? > > I tried Ubuntu. It's an arrogant and patronising distribution - they > try to pretend that there's no such thing as the root user, and they > try to stop you finding out. They have their own idiosyncratic init > program with a fragmented, undocumented configuration system. The > response of my request for this documentation was "hey, why don't > _you_ contribute it?". > > Still, if you can cope with that sort of attitude, Ubuntu seems to > work relatively well. However, it was business as usual (2 - 6 hours > per issue) when I got to installing framebuffer on my Ubuntu. It took > me ~2 hours to get my Emacs to find my site-start.el - Debian (and > thus Ubuntu too) puts a content-free site-start.el somewhere in /etc > which blocks out your own real one. I keep meaning to complain about > this. Forget about Debian and Emacs. They use a clever system for sharing package code between different Emacs versions (which you can install at the same time) and XEmacs, so clever that nobody understands it. Not even Emacs or XEmacs itself (just try M-x list-load-path-shadows RET and shudder). Just compile and configure your own Emacs from scratch. I know of _no_ upstream Emacs or XEmacs developer who claims to understand or get along with the Debian setup. > Yes. I think a bigger problem is that each distribution tries to > "encapsulate" the problem in its own way, but they end up just > wrapping the problem in yet one more layer of undocumented complexity. > Sometimes I think it would be better if the instructions just said > "fill in these configuration files as follows, using your favourite > text editor" rather than obfuscating the process with layers of > scripts and GUI "friendliness". There are situations, but they get pretty rare. Nowadays I rarely need to resort to "look away now and don't ask what I did" when configuring the computer of somebody else. -- David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum