Blogging Roller: Stupid irrestable urges.

Stupid irrestable urges.

Why do I do it? Why do I have to re-install Linux every six months? Every time I do it, without fail, I find myself on my knees with my computer case open, swearing out load, and muttering "why the hell did I do this." I have the same problem with room re-arrangement. Every couple of months I find that I must, I simply must, rearrange some room in the house. I empty the bookcases, take everything off of every surface, and burn a day re-arranging and cleaning and putting everything back together again. Sometimes it works out for the best - I learn something cool about Linux or I find a better way to use the space in my house. Usually, it is just a waste of time.

My latest re-installfest was a classic example of this phenomenon. I had told myself and even mentioned to my wife that I wouldn't do it. I would resist the urge to install Gentoo Linux. I had too way to many things to do, but late one night in a moment of weak geekness I burned a Gentoo install CD and it was all downhill from there. It took me a week and a half to get back where I started: a Linux box with Apache hooked up to Tomcat via JK2, MySQL Roller, and Gallery. Along the way I installed Gentoo three times, took out memory modules then put them back in, moved my CD drive from one IDE controller to another, installed Debian unstable, unstalled Debian testing, and fought and won a bloody battle with JK2. I gained nothing! I think need a therapist.

Dave Johnson in General • 🕒 05:51PM Apr 28, 2004

Tags: General

Comments:

Dave, You do not need a therapist. You are just a normal (middle aged) human being. So many of the things we do gain nothing except experience. Love from your old aged, Mom

Posted by Mom on April 29, 2004 at 12:19 AM EDT #

I feel your pain. Don't you hate when your 2-hour upgrade turns into a week-long debacle? The last time I did this, I used Out-of-the-Box to re-install everything. I had everything back to normal in about a couple of hours - w/o any painful configuration stuff.

Posted by Matt Raible on April 29, 2004 at 12:25 AM EDT #

Look at it this way. May be you are better prepared now to install Gentoo again than you were before!. You will also be better prepared to face the outcomes when you get the urge to install Gentoo again!. A successful install of Gentoo will make you several times more excited!

Posted by Florence Nightingale on April 29, 2004 at 01:22 AM EDT #

Wow, that's the story of my life!...except that my upgrades usually come about because of hardware failures, or new hardware, but I still think - Oh, this will just take a couple of hours. Then 4 hours later I'm going "Damn it, I just want to go to sleep!" but I can't because nothing works. So I have a recommendation for you. Buy a second hard drive for my server when I want to upgrade. Take out the working one, and install linux on the new one. Then, when it's 2 hours past your 2 hour estimate, you can put back in the old one and your computer will still work. Plus, if you want to continue working on it the next day, you can continue where you left off. :-)

Posted by Will Gayther on April 30, 2004 at 06:59 PM EDT #

Whoa, I meant "Buy a second hard drive for your server when you want to upgrade.

Posted by Will Gayther on April 30, 2004 at 07:02 PM EDT #