Joe(theWordy)Philbrook said the following on 09/30/2011 10:06 AM:

It would appear that on Sep 28, Anton Aylward did say:

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Joe(theWordy)Philbrook said the following on 09/28/2011 01:30 PM:

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Can anybody tell me how to fix this?

Or you could try

su --preserve-environment -c /sbin/yast2 Well I suppose that might work... Though I think Patrick's suggested command form:

su - -c yast2

is easier to type, and while it never occurred to me to mix the "- " option to get something like root's own login environment, with the "-c command" option, if it works like he said (I'll have to test it next time I boot OpenSuSE (at the moment I'm reading my mail with Sabayon Linux) It sounds logical to me that it would work since using the "- " option to get a root shell then typing "yast2" worked...

Word, yes. You missed a point. The issue is about the environment. I use "- " but I was trying to make you understand what was going on. *sigh* Do I have to be "Wordy" to get the message across? I was hoping to teach principle and understanding, not merely tell you what to type to make it work. Its about the environment. If the DISPLAY isn't in the environment then the application, whatever the application, doesn't know it got access to an X screen. So when you su you want to "preserve" (or re-create) the environment. Q.E.D. Like Larry Wall says, "There's more than one way to do it" -- Lead and inspire people. Don't try to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed but people must be led. ~ Ross Perot -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

It would appear that on Sep 28, Patrick Shanahan did say:

* Joe(theWordy)Philbrook <jtwdyp@ttlc.net> [09-28-11 13:33]:

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I've tried starting yast2 from an "xterm" (actually a "konsole" window, {konsole being one of the few KDE apps I still use in spite of kde4}):

emblishment irrelivant

"Embellishment", maybe "irrelevant" I'm not so sure, I've seen things work very differently in other xterm like terminal windows than in a Konsole from the KDE environment. And since I didn't know WHY I got three different results from the three different methods (all of which I "thought" should have worked), How would I know if the difference between an xterm and a konsole window was significant.

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This bothers me because I much prefer to use either: 'su -c "command arglist"' or 'sudo command arglist' to start an admin level gui than to leave an open root shell that I might forget to close hanging around.

It bothers you that the incorrect commandline will not provide the function you wish? su - -c yast2 works for me from a user prompt in xterm and/or konsole

OK my command line could have been improved. Thank you for reminding me that it is possible to include providing "an environment similar to" having logged in as the target user (in this case root) AND the "-c command" option in the same su command. I really should have thought of that. Though I still don't understand why my less evolved command form didn't work. If I had looked at "man su" however I wouldn't have thought your example was quite "correct" however. (At least not going by the man document in Sabayon Linux, (which I'm using at the moment) because it says: => When - is used, it must be specified as the last su option. The => other forms (-l and --login) do not have this restriction. which makes me think the "correct" form would have to be either: su -l -c yast2 or perhaps: su -c yast2 - But of course, I could just as easily be misunderstanding the man document Thanks again for including your example of an improved command.

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And of course because there should be a working yast menu choice in the gui menu on an OpenSuSE system, shouldn't there???

there is!

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Can anybody tell me how to fix this?

use the correct command

ps: really, your personal habits/needs/wants/desires are not necessary to ask why a particular command does not work for you, and detract immensely from your real question; ie: wordy is not necessary.

Maybe not strictly "necessary" Patrick, but when I try to be more succinct, I often fail to convey enough details to make the people who know what I don't, understand the question I'm asking, instead of the question they would have asked... ie: to "NOT" be wordy would be to "NOT" be myself. I'm sorry if my excessive wordiness bothers you. But it is my natural state... Thanks again for providing such a useful hint, even to somebody who's writing style seems to bug you. That is a sign of a kind heart. have a nice day -- | --- ___ | <0> <-> Joe (theWordy) Philbrook | ^ J(tWdy)P | ~\___/~ <<jtwdyp@ttlc.net>> -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

It would appear that on Sep 30, Anton Aylward did say:

Joe(theWordy)Philbrook said the following on 09/30/2011 10:57 AM:

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How would I know if the difference between an xterm and a konsole window was significant.

RTFM perhaps ?

I really couldn't blame anyone for slamming me with that. But I've always had a problem with the manuals... They usually spend to much time with in depth over my head details and little or none on providing enough actual examples for me to get the idea. Even the printed books that should be more helpful than the man/info documentation. I remember reading a book on shell programing once. I was trying to figure out how to manipulate the contents of variables involving making $A equal $B except that it needed to omit the first 10 characters, or something like that. Anyway I couldn't understand it But when I asked somebody for help they pointed me at another book, which in turn led me to a third before I found one two line example that would work. Except by then I no longer remembered why I'd wanted to do that, and I couldn't remember any of the other stuff I'd read in any of the three books. And now I can't even remember the names of the books, never mind the syntax of doing that, or even what the technique is called so that I could maybe google it... No If I need to do that now, I'd hope that instead I could find an example of something I managed to do when I tried to learn sed... Personally, I think I suffer from CRS (see below) Either that or I've simply got too much brain flatulence for my own good. ;-7 * CRS : "Can't Remember Sh^Htuff" : In my case this means that unless I * do something the same way every day for a LONG time, or have examples * of how I did it before (where I can still find them), I usually wind up * scratching my head the next time I need to do a non-daily task. Or for * that matter, to remember what I was doing before the durned phone rang etc... -- | ~^~ ~^~ | <*> <*> Joe (theWordy) Philbrook | ^ J(tWdy)P | \___/ <<jtwdyp@ttlc.net>> -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On 10/01/2011 02:32 PM, Michael S. Dunsavage pecked at the keyboard and wrote:

On 10/01/2011 02:58 AM, Joe(theWordy)Philbrook wrote:

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* CRS : "Can't Remember Sh^Htuff" : In my case this means that unless I * do something the same way every day for a LONG time, or have examples * of how I did it before (where I can still find them), I usually wind up * scratching my head the next time I need to do a non-daily task. Or for * that matter, to remember what I was doing before the durned phone rang etc... There's memory exercises for that....but you could, you know, write stuff down on a notepad and keep cheat sheets....

I've tried that but every time I went to write stuff down I forgot what I wanted to write. :-)) And I never remember to do the memory exercises also. :-( -- Ken Schneider SuSe since Version 5.2, June 1998 -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

It would appear that on Oct 1, Anton Aylward did say:

Michael S. Dunsavage said the following on 10/01/2011 02:32 PM:

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On 10/01/2011 02:58 AM, Joe(theWordy)Philbrook wrote:

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* CRS : "Can't Remember Sh^Htuff" ----<SNIP>---- There's memory exercises for that....but you could, you know, write stuff down on a notepad and keep cheat sheets....

Ore even *shock*horror* make the notes on a computer with a text editor[1]

[1] If you can remember the keystrokes and key bindings ...

For a keyboard oriented person it's not so much remembering the keystrokes and/or ones own chosen key bindings that are hard to remember. {(Though I will admit that I have a key binding that opens my ~/.e16/bindings.cfg with less (in a konsole) to remind me of some of the less frequently used ones that I would have replicated as much as possible in e17, and/or any versions of kde or xfce that may be installed.)} Oh and BTW my ~/.vimrc has a binding that opens my .vimrc with less for the same reason... What "_IS_" hard to remember is the durned pathname of the appropriate notes file... IE if I didn't have the above mentioned shortcut, it might have taken a while to remember the precise path name of the e16 bindings file. I can't tell you how many times I just needed a glance at some note I'd made {plus 5 more minutes} to finish a 20 minute task (that I'd probably spent an hour on) But had to give up, after 3 hrs of searching for the durned note that I'm sure I wouldn't have deleted, when my non-computer literate lady threatened to name my computer as corespondent in a divorces case {this in spite of the fact that neither of us recycled divorcees believe in the institution enough anymore to get legally hitched...} But looking at the clock, I knew that trying to tell her I hadn't even found the time to check my e-mail yet, just wasn't going to fly... True story, But I think this is getting way too off topic and I don't want to annoy those people who seem to think that the OpenSuSE list should be for discussion about using OpenSuSE, or at least the computer... After all some of them might be the ones I need help from someday, so if anyone would like to continue this discussion you are more than welcome to take it off list. Of course since I'm using gmane... It's: jtwdyp (at) ttlc.net -- | --- ___ | <0> <-> Joe (theWordy) Philbrook | ^ J(tWdy)P | ~\___/~ <<jtwdyp@ttlc.net>> -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On 10/3/2011 12:09 PM, Anton Aylward wrote:

Joe(theWordy)Philbrook said the following on 10/02/2011 03:56 PM:

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What "_IS_" hard to remember is the durned pathname of the appropriate notes file...

So? Use a wiki with full text search (perhaps tiddlywiki which does that for me) or use the KDE 'basket' tool.

B8t its getting clear, Joe, that you're not interested so much in solutions as you are in talking about why they don't work for you.

He has a work flow he's developed that not only works well for him, but is perfectly reasonable as far as I can see. I see no reason to demand he do things some other way. The tools are supposed to be exactly this flexible to allow exactly this sort of customization. Tools that fail to allow this are wrong, not him for finding the default system inefficient, worse, needlessly inefficient. I happen to have a well thought out, well proven, incontestible system myself where I have used a thin quick launch bar of 16px icons with no text labels on the right-edge of the screen since about redhat 3 or 4 and fvwm (the original redhat 3 or 4 not rhel or fc). Looking at the fact that the ability to even do this at all was made completely arcane and difficult in Vista and completely removed by Windows7 (I have to use RocketDock and the most minimalist skin available for it to sort of emulate the old quicklaunch toolbar), and that it's either not possible or at least not the default in any linux desktop, it's obvious not only most people but most layout/process experts all agree this is not a good system. And they're all wrong. It's inarguable. The number of clicks and the amount of attention required to do the same job (access all my most-used apps and folders repeatedly) any of the "normal" ways vs the way I do it is a hard number that can't be argued. The combination of one click being less than any other number, and the consumption of screen real-estate in the larger dimension instead of the shorter one, are just plain objective numbers. It's not being closed minded to say I'm pretty sure no matter what new framework you try to show me, it won't be _more_ convenient than what I do now. It's something I've actually put thought into vs accepting by default without wondering about it or trying to do something different just for the sake of doing something different. Inarguable for me still doesn't mean it's the best way for everyone else though either because just for one example I don't happen to use multiple desktops or workspaces. Multiple monitors yes but rarely multiple desktops. Maybe for a multiple workspace user a dockbar intruding, even by 20px, may be intolerable, covering up scrollbars and buttons of full-screen apps etc... And auto-hide is just a case of trying to deal with one brokenness by introducing another brokenness. If someone elses workflow doesn't make sense to you, that does not necessarily mean it doesn't make sense. -- bkw -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org