All The Moneys Worth

Am a wanderer. I have no home and nothing to call my own, I wonder what’s the use for such things for the one who’s seeks the essence.

My early years were spent in the land of my teachers, studying the mystical world of magic, now I wander where the essence leads me.

Through the golden sands of the desert I pass, to the the city of kaliya.

It is written by the wise of the old ages, that those who seek will find it here in this noble land. Through the ages men came here, in search of fortune and fame.

Upon this blessed soil I walk, mingling in the crowd of this thriving city. Walking through the street I savored upon the sights of the great city.

‘Make way for the royal magician’. The palanquin bearer called.

Lost in thoughts, I found myself standing before a majestic palanquin.

‘Has the royal magician’s forgotten to walk ’ I asked ’ or he can’t bear his weight any more’.

The palanquin bears stood silently, Wondering whether my time on this earth has come to end, thus I dare to speak so.

‘No my brother’ I magician said getting out of the palanquin with a smile. ’ the royal magician walks only with his equals’.

‘Bless this day, we meet again’ he said.

He dismissed the palanquin bearers who rushed to the magician house to make arrangements for the guest.

‘Walk with me, my brother for we have lot to talk’. The magician said

Leaving the bustling streets we came upon a path that took us to pond filled with lotus flowers.

‘The royal magical has a great heart’ I said.

‘A great heart and wealth to match’ he said.

‘The patron of this land are benevolent, my magic brings me fame and wealth’ he said.

‘Your wanderings have brought you to this great city.Your magic is great, here it will be measured in silver and gold’.

‘The essence is for all who seek, its not for the pleasure of few’ I said.

‘Does the great essence diminish if you seek its worth in gold’ The magician asked.

‘The essence can not be measured , none but these who seek it know its worth’ I said.

The magician was silent, I looked over the pond filled with lotus flowers. Few children came running down the path carrying small water pitchers,gleefully laughing. A little girl chased a boy who was teasing her.

She came running and ran into the walking royal magician. The pitcher slipped as the girl stumbled and broke into pieces. Seeing the royal magician and a stranger the children scattered.

The royal magician raised the crying girl and said ‘Cry not for what’s broken. Here, take this silver and buy yourself a new one.’

The little girl threw the coins and broke into renewed sobs.

With the ends of my flowing rob I wiped the tears of the girl and said ‘No Cry, My Princess. Tell me what you wish.’

The little girl turned her gaze to the shards of her lovely pitcher.

Smiling, I moved my palms over her eyes and said.

‘My Princess, take your lovely pitcher and go home happy’.

The girl’s face glowed with pleasure looking at her pitcher now mended. She cradled the pitcher in her arms and went home smiling.

I looked at the silver lying in dust and thought.

‘Of all the money’s worth, couldn’t bring the smile on a child’s face’.

About the story

This story was written to portray what I feel separates Open Source movement from FSF philosophy. It try’s not to support either of schools, but I leaves it you as the reader to decide.

Like most of the stories,a idea is shrouded in it. A good friend pointed out that it was rather difficult to grasp the relevance of the story to OSI and FSF tousle.

I believe that people in OSI and FSF movements are not different there are members of the same creed. Just as the wanderer and the royal magician in the story are, they do belong to the same fraternity.They are bond by the same essence.

What really makes them apart is the way they choose to live,the royal magician is wise in his own way.He will be certainly more than happy to share his magic with all,but he doesn’t even hesitate to ask for some offering in value for his magic.

The wanderer is an acetic, he believes the magic is as free as the air we breath.It can not be contained.

Both are right in their way,you may choose to differ from view,but that’s what the you should be doing,coz the same essence flow through you as it does in me.

And this the essence of the story.

Copying

Copyright© 2004 Rakesh ‘arky’ Ambati.
p. Permission is granted to copy and/or distribute this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation. No Front- or Back-Cover Texts are provided. The GNU Free Documentation License is available at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl.htm

House of Dancing Lights

Ah, my dear friends,

Listen,I have a story of tell, the story of house of
dancing lights.

I never heard anyone mention of the house, the little
house on the hill. Not until that overcast day I sat
beside the fire at this roadside inn.

‘I have seen many learned men go the over hill’ said
Anna. Anna, the inn keeper knew me from my annual stopover
at his inn.

‘Go where, Anna?’ I asked.

‘To the house of dancing lights, where the old white
beard lives. Many learned men from lands far far away
came here. On clear summer nights you can see the
dancing lights,over there’ Anna said.

‘Over that hill, I don’t see any dancing lights, Anna’

‘No, those were good old days, the men never come now’
said sad faced Anna and left the salon.

I decided to stay back the next day and visit the
house on the hill. Perhaps I meet the old white
beard,strange names those country folk have. I rose
early next morning, the portly inn keeper the showed
me the path that led up the hill.

The path up the hill was steep. Disused for the long
time,grass grew all along the path.Sweating with
excursion,I reached the house.

As I passed the gate,looking at house built with
strong oak and stone. It stood there bravely deifying
the menacing winds of the hills.

‘Come in and sit in the shade’, A voice called from the
courtyard.

A white bearded face beckoned me.

‘Its a hot day, drink this water from the spring for I
have none more to offer.’

I drank the cool water the from jug, his calm smiling
face asked for no introduction and none was given.

‘Is this the house of dancing lights’ I asked coyly.

‘That what’s the folks used to call it ’ he said.

‘It was known by that name, when the learned men came
here’ I asked.

‘Learned men, with strong hands build this house.
They built it with ideas, not of stone and oak’

‘Alas, they come no more’

‘In the dark nights they built log fires and talked
the things of learning, the night sky lite with sparks
of joy and learning.’

Thus ended my meeting with old white beard. I left him
there in the house of dancing light, now I knew why its
called so.

Day flew by, again the time had come to visit my old
parents in the country, I once again stopped by at the
inn. Anna,received me with joy and told me ‘the learned
come again from the lands far far away, they all go to
the house over the hill’.

‘Aha, the house of dancing lights, Anna’ I asked.

‘No, I don’t see dancing lights anymore’ Anna said and
went back wiping the mugs.

I decided to visit the old white beard, walking up the
steep path, I saw the path was now well used. Seeing
litter lying around the path, I realized sadly how much
things changed.

The grand old white beard welcomed me with open arm’s
and asked me to sit with him.

‘So the learned men come again’ I said ‘yet, the night
sky isn’t lit with dancing sparks’.

White beard was strangely silent, his gaze so distant
and disenchanted.

As if coming out of reverie, the old white beard
spoke.

‘My son, the learned men of the yore came here to give
light of learning in the darkness of night, sharing the
warmth of their idea’s. They left this place a little
better every time they left.’

‘Men, who cometh now desire to take what can not be
given, they cast only shadows’

=The house of dancing lights is still there,on the hill. I could never understand the words of old white beard. Pray, enlighten me -arky

About the story

This story was first written in private correspondence with my friend Ramanraj, without his encouragement this beautiful story would have been lost forever. I wrote this story to vent out my frustration at the steady disintegration of the fraternity of free thought. First posted on on fsf-mailing .

Guide to Unix/Linux Commands

In October 2005 I contributed to the Guide to Unix/Linux commands wikibook. It is targeted at users who want to learn the shell commands by typing them on a Unix or gnu/Linux console. The wikibook is nowhere near complete but I guess it would be a good start if want to master the shell. For experienced users I request you to spare some time and contribute to this wikibook. If possible please try to adopt this documentation project.

The Guide to Unix/Linux Commands

The Guide to Unix/Linux command line is often considered difficult to learn. This book aims to help beginners by introducing various commands in lucid and simple language. Unlike most command references, this book is designed to be a self-study guide.

Contents

• Getting Help man info apropos whatis makewhatis
• File System Utilities ls mkdir cd pwd chroot cp mv rm touch df link ln unlink chown chmod mount
• Finding Files find whereis which locate
• File Viewing cat more less od head tail
• File Editing pico nano zile vi joe emacs
• File Compression gzip gunzip zcat gzcat tar pax bzip2 zip compress
• File Analysingfile wc cksum stat
• Multiuser Commandswho finger su
• Self Information whoami groups id tty
• System Information uptime uname dmesg free vmstat 50% top df hostname
• Networking ifconf ifdown ifup
• Process Managementnohup ps kill pgrep pidof killall
• Devices fuser lsof fstat
• Kernel Commands lsmod modprobe sysctl
• Compress Commandstar cvf | tar xvf bunzip2
• Miscellaneous sync echo cal date time mail clear PS1