[CLUE-Tech] Re:"getting insanely frustrated"

[Jed S. Baer]

On Thu, 23 May 2002 17:28:14 -0600
Mike Staver <staver at fimble.com> wrote:

> 3) Run the following commands:
> setterm -powersave off
> setterm -blank 0
> 
> I also added those commands to my .bashrc file, which may have been a
> mistake.  I should probably move them to my rc.local file.  Either way,
> the commands are being run, but my screen still goes blank.  This
> happens in both X and at the console level, so it probably is in the
> kernel, but since I didn't compile my own kernel, I don't know how to
> remove it without recompiling.  It is worth noting though that since I
> have added the commands to my .bashrc file, everytime I open up a
> terminal window in gnome, it spits out the following error:
> 
> cannot (un)set powersave mode
> 
> Why would it be saying that?  My guess is that maybe it's being set
> somewhere else in a config file I'm unaware of, and it's ignoring my
> .bashrc file and anywhere else that I run the commands.

I think it would be saying that because at the point where you've got X
running, it's like X "owns" the psuedo-tty device you're using, and so you
can't modify it. Or, a gnome-term, or xterm, etc., cannot be set
independently of the root window in which it's running.

I used to know the gory details behind the "profile" vs. "rc" stuff, as in
when each ran and why. Well, actually, that was a long time ago, and it
was for Korn shell, not bash, but I sorta think they operate the same.
Looking at the bash manpage, it says .bash_profile is invoked whenever
bash is started as a login shell. But .bashrc is started whenever a new
shell is started. So, I think you'd want to put those in your
.bash_profile instead.

I encourage you to learn to compile the kernel. If you want to be really
paranoid, make a backup of /usr/src/linux (actually should be a symbolic
link to /usr/src/linux-{kernel version} ) and try things out. You won't
effect your running system unless you do a "make install" or "make modules
install". Once you do decide to install a kernel you've compiled, there
are some things you can do to protect yourself. I always keep a "known
good" kernel around. Since both lilo and grub will let you select multiple
kernels to boot, there's always a way back if you build a kernel that
doesn't work.

I don't know what the APM/PM (yes, there a couple different things in
there) defaults are. But just become root, cd to /usr/src/linux, and do a
"make xconfig" (obviously, running X). Nothing there to force you to
change anything, and you can run through the various settings and look
around. make xconfig will let you quit without saving changes.

Have fun! (And make Alan Cox proud ;-)

jed

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