And snow it did

[altivo]

But not until the wee hours of morning. I happen to have gotten up around 1:30 and there was still nothing, so I thought the prediction was a bust. By 3:00, though, we had a good inch on the ground. In the morning there was almost two inches on my car that had to be brushed off, though much of what hit the ground had melted. Now it's cold, and supposed to be colder, down to 15F or so tomorrow night.

The library was noisy and hyperactive. I think kids and adults both are getting worked up over the approaching holidays. Our actual circulation activity is declining, though. By the week between Christmas and New Year, it will be nearly dead.

Packages in the mail, included the first gift, three and a half pounds of pistachio nuts from mys sister. Eeep. They're good, but we son't be eating all those at once.

Tomorrow Gary and Rob have a Christmas music performance at a historical society event one county over. Time for me to do some shopping, I guess. Can't put it off any longer.

Anyone know what happened to the linuxpackages.net website? I haven't been there for a couple of months and it's gone. Well, still in DNS but not reachable. I wonder if it's behind the same breakdown that has cut off Furaffinity.

Comments

[feathertail]

What is linuxpackages.net? I've heard of the massive Debian repository, but I don't think I've heard of them ...

And do the packages you install from there update automatically, the way a Launchpad PPA does?

[altivo]

The linuxpackages.net site is (or was) a large unofficial archive of installable packages compiled for Slackware Linux. Unlike the Debian repository, packages in the Linuxpackages site do not have any automatic update features linked to the archive.

Slackware does, however, have an update facility that is similar to that of Debian. Where Debian has apt-get, aptitude and synaptic, Slackware has slapt-get and gslapt to perform very much the same functions, using official repositories and mirrors.

I use Wolvix, actually, which is a minor distribution based off Slackware. It comes with slapt-get and gslapt preconfigured and automatically installed.

[feathertail]

Ah yes, I've heard of Wolvix! I thought furries might appreciate it. ^.^ I use Linux Mint, myself.

Is Slackware's software selection anywhere near as good as Debian / Ubuntu / Mint's? Or does it depend?

[altivo]

Slackware's selection of pre-compiled packages is nowhere near as large as Debian's. That's why the linuxpackages.net site was so useful. You could often get a prepared package there that was not included in the official archive.

Slackware is the oldest surviving Linux distribution, and often seems the most conservative. New packages are not added easily to the official distribution, but anyone can submit them the the linuxpackages.net archive.

That latter site is now active again. I'm not sure why they were down, but it's conceivable that they were taken out by the same line cut that disabled FA last week.

[feathertail]

It's possible! Which, that was very inconvenient when that happened.

Oh, um, while I'm here, I read a lot of the discussion on FurRag about what's happening over there, and I don't remember all of it except I think you seemed level-headed. I'm sorry about what happened and I hope you and your friends find a decent archive soon maybes.

[altivo]

Well, FurRag isn't going away for the forseeable future. It just doesn't get any maintenance except for big problems. I think Alex was really taken aback by our resistance to his plans to have us move to YiffStar, but he has seen that he can't sell us on it. I've been putting more stories on FA, but of course they are lost there amid the millions of pornographic art pieces. We'll find somewhere to go eventually. I keep hoping that Claw & Quill will materialize, but it isn't even in beta yet.

[feathertail]

his plans to have us move to YiffStar

I know that's emphatically not how he put it, but it seems like a good summary of his plans, heh >.>

I get more views on FA than DA ... and more comments on either than on my and my mate's website. FA's interface for publishing stories is even less convenient than DA's, though, in some ways. And some of the art really bothers me.

What's Claw & Quill?

[altivo]

Claw & Quill is Watts Martin's (Why Coyotes Howl) planned furry writing website. He's mostly working on it single-handed (pawed?) in his spare time between paying work, so it progresses kinda slowly. Nothing online for us to see yet, though I guess he has about reached a point where he can solicit help from other web site design folks.

Yes, well, Alex's plan was to have us all move to "SoFurry" which is just supposed to be YiffStar's next regeneration. I won't be going there, period, no matter what.

[feathertail]

Oh, um, belated happy birthday it looks like. >.>b

[altivo]

Thanks. It was a good one, all things considered.

[kingodin.livejournal.com]

We were supposed to get some snow flurries today, but I didn't see any, although it will be below freezing tonight where I live.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Got down to 21F here last night. Time to switch to winter mode water management. Pounding ice out of rubber buckets is no fun.

[kingodin.livejournal.com]

Indeed. My parents and older sister used to live in Vermont, and the way they describe it, it was like living in the depths of Cocytus.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Well, it's not that bad. You do have to learn how to deal with it, though. In summer, we can just top up buckets and water tubs as needed. In winter, the ones that are not heated have to be emptied when they aren't in use and refilled.

For instance, my horse has a bucket in her daytime play area and one in her stall. The stall bucket is emptied in the morning and refilled at night when she goes in. The outside bucket is emptied at night and refilled in the morning.

Unless the temperature gets below 0F for 24 hours or more, the buckets will not freeze solid. We use rubber buckets, so usually just dropping one on the ground will deform it enough to break the ice and allow it to be emptied. The older of our two barns has provisions so we can use heated buckets in the stalls and a heater in the outdoor water trough, which makes it simpler. The water is held at a temperature between 40 and 50F, so it's liquid and drinkable, but not wasting excessive energy to actually heat it.

[mondhasen.livejournal.com]

We're finally due for snow tonight, most likely a dusting. Maybe this will slow down the tweets from the RI EMA as they finally get to do something other than warn us to be ready for trouble.

The library was noisy and hyperactive. I think kids and adults both are getting worked up over the approaching holidays. Our actual circulation activity is declining, though. By the week between Christmas and New Year, it will be nearly dead.

I'm always off from here that week (actually from the 19th through New Years this year), taking the time to be home with the kids. Mom works in retail and can't take time off from Thanksgiving through New Years.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Colder tonight, but no snow. Next chance is Sunday night into Monday I think, and then again midweek. Some of the news people are threatening up to a foot of snow midweek, but I think they are just sensationalizing for the attention. Myself I'd love a foot or more now. But the NWS is not offering more than "a chance of light snow" for Wednesday.

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Pistachios??!! Give me a gallon (4.6L) of root beer and let me at em :D

You left your shopping till now O.O either you are insane or very brave....or lazy ;)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Neither. I just hate the commercial rah-rah.