2016 — 10 August: Wednesday
There's a minor discrepancy1 in their morning behaviour between Skylark and the i5 NUC. Shock, horror!
Manifestation?
Alas, any fuller description must await a cup of tea. I'm not pointing the finger directly at my Dell screen just yet, but I have my dark "DisplayPort versus HDMI" suspicions. NoMachine reveals the difference.
"Tell the jury exactly what happened on the morning of the 10th August."
Briefly, with the Dell screen displaying BlackBeast's desktop, I switched on the NUC, and gave it a minute or so to wake up. Then I fired up NoMachine on BlackBeast, selected the NUC, and logged in as 'normal' on a full screen display from the NUC, mirrored on BlackBeast. All was sweetness and light. However, when I did exactly the same with Skylark, still with the Dell screen displaying BlackBeast's desktop, NoMachine reported "no screen display found".
"Your conclusion?"
Unless the Dell is set to Skylark on power on, Linux fails to discover its screen properly. The 'workaround' is to set the Dell briefly to its DP connection from Skylark. This will only matter while there are two PCs connected to the Dell's DisplayPort inputs. Once Skylark takes over from BlackBeast the problem will disappear. And the NUC, on the Dell's HDMI input, seems immune to this "feature".
When Trump plants...
... the not-so-bright idea of shooting his rival in the minds of keen gun-owners, his handlers spin it as "encouraging people to vote". Truly bizarre. (Link.)
I'm going out for some fresh air. I may be a while...
I realise...
... economics is a relatively recent "science", but what I didn't realise is just how recently2 the concept of "asymmetric information" in a market arose. George Akerlof's paper "The Market for Lemons" (PDF file) is pleasantly readable. It was also rejected several times. (Link.)
After a series...
... of misadventures and mis-steps, the i5 NUC has a new Linux Overlord on board: namely, a copy of Mint 18 Cinnamon. It's perhaps better to let me relax for a bit before asking any questions. Suffice to say, I don't yet know enough about UEFI versus Legacy to be trusted with an Installation stick — and said stick is now questionable, having been yanked abruptly out in the cause of getting in a timely fashion from Ghent to Aix (as it were). I need another cuppa. But will simply nuke the one that's gone stone cold wondering where its drinker has been.
Judging by all the frantic yelling and screaming of faux-excited commentary on the main news radio channel, some sort of long-running sports event seems to be taking place somewhere. Who knew?
Now then, where were we?
Let's re-cap. First, the walk: it consisted of around 14,000 steps (apparently). It took us round a loop starting in the IBM Clubhouse carpark that we've done only once before. On a much hotter day than today.
Post-walk lunch lunched? Check
Post-walk shower showered? Check
Post-walk laundry laundered? Check
Post-walk Linux re-installation on the i5 NUC purely for my own education, and to try to make sure I understand and can carry out every step of the process unaided? Don't be silly!
Still, after a helping3 hand, and the subsequent giving-of-a-lift into Hursley, I'm now back at Technology Towers where — in between grabbing an evening snack — I've spent about 90 minutes deciding whether or not to keep Cinnamon — it was the only ISO we had readily to hand earlier when time was running out and my MATE stick seemed to have rendered itself useless. I'm actually not over-impressed — Cinnamon always struck me as a bit heavy weight — but I'm prepared to give it a go, so I've just whacked NoMachine back on to control the NUC from either of the other two PCs, and am now once again enjoying my music collection after just a couple of clicks to select my simple NAS, and a couple more to choose what to hear.
I'm working my way through all the CDs that were stuck to the front cover of the now, sadly, defunct "Word" magazine for only the second time. As some sort of cosmic Karma for countless earlier shenanigans, this time audio from the NUC "just worked". Makes a pleasant change. My history of epic failure with digital audio on Linux has been a fraught one over the years.
I've updated my NUC notes accordingly.
It's odd...
... what bubbles up to the top of my memory stack from time to time. For example, Christa spent a lot more time on the phone than I do. From our earliest time together in that rented flat in 1975...
... to March 2007...
She long ago treated herself to a kitchen bar stool, just for phone use. I now use the stool for my favourite plastic serving tray, but I broke it yesterday by absent-mindedly sitting on the damn' thing (on the stool) while receiving a phone call. Curiously upsetting. But better than having it shatter while carrying a bowl of soup.
This...
... is enlightening.