Fun at the Unix Terminal • Hacker News Board

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#31

Post by ja_k » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:10 PM UTC

d33 wrote: post #13

Surprised nobody commented on bb yet. This thing is really impressive - and I thought that mplayer -vo caca is jaw-dropping!

and then realising the last time the BB project page was updated was 1997.. 20 years ago!

(http://aa-project.sourceforge.net/bb/)

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#32

Post by nerdponx » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:12 PM UTC

mfukar wrote: post #27

masklinn wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you even bother with that when `say` can take a string or read from stdin? Just use $ say $(fortune) or $ fortune | say -f- For bonus coolness, add "-i" (it prints the lines and highlights the current word during reading).

Because it's fun spawning a new process and watching the otherwise idle cores of your box reach 0.1% usage for a millisecond.

Don't all three of those commands spawn new processes?

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#33

Post by sanpan » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:18 PM UTC

mushiake wrote: post #3

sl [0] is always my favorite. [0] https://github.com/mtoyoda/sl

Is there a way to lolcat sl?

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#34

Post by _binder » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:20 PM UTC

> This is aimed at grade 6 students

I read through the whole thing with joy, and I am 20

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#35

Post by ziroshima » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:25 PM UTC

_binder wrote: post #34

> This is aimed at grade 6 students I read through the whole thing with joy, and I am 20

Same, but I'm 36!

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#36

Post by mark212 » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:32 PM UTC

You kids today and your fancy command lines. When I was in sixth grade, state of the art joking around with technology meant multiplying two numbers on a calculator with red LEDs and turning it upside down to (sort of) spell SHELL OIL

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#37

Post by stevekemp » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:40 PM UTC

dandermotj wrote: post #18

Does anyone have a place/site for browsing through new/popular utilities? I've been on Ubuntu for the last year and I love it, but reading this I just realised I don't have anywhere to browse or find things like this.

I wonder if it is time for a freshmeat.net alternative?

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#38

Post by rbonvall » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:53 PM UTC

masklinn wrote: post #26

lloeki wrote: post #22

Instead of: $ fortune > my_fortune.txt $ say -f my_fortune.txt One could use the underrated (bashism) process substitution: $ say -f Which works wonders for e.g diff'ing live: $ diff

Why would you even bother with that when `say` can take a string or read from stdin? Just use $ say $(fortune) or $ fortune | say -f- For bonus coolness, add "-i" (it prints the lines and highlights the current word during reading).

Not all commands accept input as arguments, so it's still a good trick to know.

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#39

Post by hownottowrite » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 1:56 PM UTC

ziroshima wrote: post #35

_binder wrote: post #34

> This is aimed at grade 6 students I read through the whole thing with joy, and I am 20

Same, but I'm 36!

I can confirm that enjoyment can be found up to age 46.

Re: Fun at the Unix Terminal

#40

Post by bigkm » Thu, Apr 06, 2017, 2:16 PM UTC

It's a shame the author polarizes having fun and learning. I've always thought of them as the same.