A small notebook for a system administrator • Hacker News Board

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#251

Post by lostmyoldone » Sat, Feb 02, 2019, 7:04 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #64

huhtenberg wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the only comment you have on a detailed technical post that spans several pages? This is not a snide remark. The site is habr.com, which is a Russian resource. So what you perceive is an offensive faux pas, is just a dry and cynical joke of a kind very common to the IT people of the former Soviet Union space. It's not a terribly funny joke, nor do I personally like this brand of humor, but it's clearly not mad…

> That's the only comment you have on a detailed technical post that spans several pages? Yes it's a shame that it lets down the rest of the article, isn't it? > This is not a snide remark. Maybe you have a different idea of what snide is. I don't think it's 'offensive' I just think it's a bit nasty. Why can't they talk about their work without saying that what someone else does isn't work? What's the need for it? Wh…

When reading an article written by someone that clearly doesn't have English as a first language, I don't believe its altogether fair to criticize the tone of language as if it was written by a native speaker. More so when a literal reading of the sentences I assume you refer to, doesn't seem to support the interpretation you are criticising.

It might be useful for the author to know how the text might be read, but otherwise one is probably better off reading the text with some lenience towards weaknesses, or mistakes in style and tone.

The author clearly did quite a bit of work, writes an article in decent English, and I believe they deserve a little slack for what is most likely a minor cultural gaffe, or a joke that doesn't translate that well.

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#252

Post by dbuder » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 12:40 AM UTC

awiesenhofer wrote: post #2

Articles like this are what i love about HN. You may call it some techies wet dream, but the dedication to detail for this dream embodies this community for me.

Except I get the impression that the author/designer would need to hire 5 different roles just to get this to stage where the CM says ok but it will cost you 4x what you thought it would. Has he ever implemented any of these connectors? That along with the promises of galvanic isolation mean there will be so many magnetics, all needing their fields accounted for. Look at the struggles Bunnie and a whole team had putting a laptop together, sure they had other goals, but a laptop is a serious design challenge and you can't do low volume because you're basically tied to the screen and all your compliance requires you can't change the chips as they go end of life.

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#253

Post by panda88888 » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 4:56 AM UTC

Arnt wrote: post #78

anilakar wrote: post #10

Mostly reminds me of https://simpsons.fandom.com/wiki/The_Homer On a serious note, I mostly disagree about the small size. The author mentioned his preferred size being A5, which is about half a letter. Having to type commands on machine that just fits under your palms is painful. I'd rather have a large keyboard, large screen and a large battery. My current EDC setup is an X250 with a huge bag of adapter dongles, ca…

Some of us (I assume OP is one of them) think that since your screen won't be large anyway, there is little point to having a screen bigger than your preferred keyboard size. And since your battery won't be large enough to support compiling LLVM in reasonable time anyway, it's better to just get used to do CPU-heavy stuff by ssh-ing to a rackmount somewhere use the laptop for terminal-ish tasks.

I think the Sony VAIO P series would be a great admin notebook.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Vaio_P_series

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#254

Post by SamReidHughes » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 7:05 AM UTC

panda88888 wrote: post #253

Arnt wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some of us (I assume OP is one of them) think that since your screen won't be large anyway, there is little point to having a screen bigger than your preferred keyboard size. And since your battery won't be large enough to support compiling LLVM in reasonable time anyway, it's better to just get used to do CPU-heavy stuff by ssh-ing to a rackmount somewhere use the laptop for terminal-ish tasks.

I think the Sony VAIO P series would be a great admin notebook. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Vaio_P_series

They really do fit in a jeans pocket. It was really nice to take on vacation as an emergency computer. I wound up printing a proof of car insurance document from it. It had a problem with the mouse pointer cable getting loose though.

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#255

Post by wiseleo » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 8:29 AM UTC

I use an 8" Windows 10 tablet with a USB hub and random keyboards and mice. There's always a keyboard and a mouse somewhere in the data center. If not, I have my bluetooth keyboard with a touchpad. I have it configured with all necessary tools. It works great as a Cisco console.

Oh yeah, it cost me $48 at Fry's. I have two of them. Battery life is more than 5 hours.

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#256

Post by bigbugbag » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 2:05 PM UTC

anilakar wrote: post #10

Mostly reminds me of https://simpsons.fandom.com/wiki/The_Homer On a serious note, I mostly disagree about the small size. The author mentioned his preferred size being A5, which is about half a letter. Having to type commands on machine that just fits under your palms is painful. I'd rather have a large keyboard, large screen and a large battery. My current EDC setup is an X250 with a huge bag of adapter dongles, ca…

the x250 is a really bad design, thinkpad after the x230 are getting worse to bad.

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#257

Post by bigbugbag » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 2:07 PM UTC

PascLeRasc wrote: post #169

stephenr wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your goal is a portable SSH client, even an original iPad mini with a bluetooth keyboard would be a better option than this thing.

I've been using iSH on the iPhone for my portable SSH client, it works pretty great for server maintenance even with the on-screen keyboard. https://github.com/tbodt/ish

iphone lacks vital hardware, it has no keyboard.

lacking a keyboard is abysmal productivity vs being able to type and do key combinations.

try using stuff like vim/emacs or byobu/screen on an iphone, try to select and middle click to copy/paste, or any of the key combination we use all the time in the shell.

no keyboard = no go.

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#258

Post by bigbugbag » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 2:22 PM UTC

criddell wrote: post #38

> Such notebook is suitable for posting photos on Instagram, but not for work. There's something about that statement that put me off the entire article. Maybe the author truly is 3l337, but it just comes off as condescending. Plus, who uses a notebook for Instagram? The author managed to be simultaneously derisive and clueless.

Maybe it's my hate of the macbook air for lacking ports combined with my hate of people used by instagram on top of my hate of everything faceboook, but I had no problem with this particular sentence about the trend hardware has been following for a few years. I actually agree with it, the macbook air is not for work, at least not technical. it's akin to a toy for rich kids that like to brag and live pretend lifes on instagram.

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#259

Post by bigbugbag » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 2:27 PM UTC

morganvachon wrote: post #43

Unfortunately something like this would never come to market, but I use a laptop that comes close enough for my needs. My current portable is a HP Elite X2 1011 G1 (yep that's a mouthful), it's a previous generation version of their current 1012 G2 product. It's a Surface-style convertible that is as fast as a typical business desktop machine, with 8GB of RAM and a 256GB M.2 SSD onboard. The keyboard base has 2x USB3…

Of course something similar to this can come to market, there is a market for this as nothing actually answer to these needs even if it is a niche market.

the success of the openpandora[1] demonstrated without a doubt that as long there is demand for a specialized hardware based upon having a real keyboard then it is possible to successfully sell, and now the pyra[2] is following.

I would not be happy with your HP Elite, a convertible is definetely not suitable for any serious work, lacking an ethernet port is a no go.

[1]: https://www.openpandora.org/ [2]: https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/

Re: A small notebook for a system administrator

#260

Post by bigbugbag » Sun, Feb 03, 2019, 2:30 PM UTC

tluyben2 wrote: post #109

jeffreymartin99 wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is every possibility of something close to this coming to market. Not every device needs to sell in the millions.

Yep, look at the Gemini or the Pocket (2). Niche systems which are apparently worth making.

look at the pyra: https://pyra-handheld.com/