c186282 <c186282@nnada.net> writes:

I'm gonna argue that, while powerful, IPTABLES is
just WAY too obscure, too weird. This is why there
are a number of GUI helpers ...

iptables is also only a hollow shell over nftables since 2014 so over a
decade now. I learned nftables a few years ago since I didn't want to
bother with different tools for a firewall, like iptables and ip6tables, separately. Also not too keen on the frontend flavor of the week; is it
ufw or firewalld or something else this week in this distro and what
about that other distro?

I have to say I quite like nftables. My router rules are based on their
router example, other computers have a basic thing with usually just
common things like ICMP(6) and ssh allowed in.

Then, if a machine serves something more (like radius or nfs or mosh
here), then I can put a few lines in an include dir and they get read
in.

Anyways, this is all very basic and traditionial. As I understand it,
eBPF is what the big boys play with these days. Also it's apparently
becoming an everything-VM in the Linux kernel with the sched_ext stuff
for process scheduling for example and who knows what. eBPF I would
classify as too hard for me and not generally needed for the home user.

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On 2025-08-20, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:

On Tue, 19 Aug 2025 12:41:46 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:

On 2025-08-07 01:56, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote:

On Wed, 6 Aug 2025 12:46:30 +0200, Carlos E.R. wrote:

I don't trust my router, provided by the ISP.

I bought my own. I could even run my own routing stack on a Linux box.

The configuration needed by the ISP on the router is not documented ...

Here in NZ it’s all standard protocols. I bought the router from a local retailer, not from the ISP. Setup was straightforward -- the router calls
the setup option I am using “Dynamic IP”, but I think it’s just DHCP.

In this case, I think we're talking about a box with router and a bunch
of other stuff, to deal with incoming GPON (can this part still be
called modem, or the workings of fiber disqualify that?) and at least
outgoing coax for TV, RJ11 for telephony and 8p8c for Ethernet.

I've seen these called "ONT", but it seems (from another thread here)
that this may not be entirely appropriate either?

--
Nuno Silva

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Mike Scott <usenet.16@scottsonline.org.uk.invalid> writes:

What's wrong with a couple of clear examples, plus the detail to
expand on them?

Nothing wrong with that. I think the nftables devs agree since they
provide examples in their wiki, such as "Simple ruleset for a
workstation", "Simple ruleset for a server", "Simple ruleset for a home router".

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On 2025-08-21, Carlos E.R. wrote:

On 2025-08-21 12:34, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

On 21/08/2025 10:44, Carlos E.R. wrote:

I do not want reference documentation.

I primarily want documentation that allows me to start using a new
program, fast, and to achieve my goals.

Once I have that, I want the reference documentation.

+1001

[...]

To that I added "bird.avi" as output file, but WhatsApp rejected
it. So I told ChatGpt all that. It replied giving me the missing data:

ffmpeg -i IMAG0009.avi -vf "scale=640:-2" -c:v libx264 -profile:v \
baseline -level 3.0 -preset fast -c:a aac -b:a 128k \
-movflags +faststart bird_whatsapp.mp4

and that worked. Having that command line, I modified it easily for
more resolution (scale=1024:-2). I was already familiar with all the
options, I just needed to find which would produce the wanted result,
and not spend a day on it.

But if I want to find in the manual what "-b" stands for, I fail. Ask chatgpt, instant reply, it is bitrate. Oh, yes, I remember now.

:-)

Oh, searching the man for "movflags" or "faststart" fails. So ask the
AI. They are in the man page for the MP3 muxer, it says. Oh, right, I
forgot that.

So, even a reference manual is hard to use when you want to find a
particular reference, basically using "grep".

(ffmpeg's online manual is spread over more than one page, isn't it?)

--
Nuno Silva

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On 2025-08-21, Carlos E.R. wrote:

On 2025-08-21 15:27, Nuno Silva wrote:

On 2025-08-21, Carlos E.R. wrote:

On 2025-08-21 12:34, The Natural Philosopher wrote:

On 21/08/2025 10:44, Carlos E.R. wrote:

I do not want reference documentation.

I primarily want documentation that allows me to start using a new
program, fast, and to achieve my goals.

Once I have that, I want the reference documentation.

+1001

[...]

To that I added "bird.avi" as output file, but WhatsApp rejected
it. So I told ChatGpt all that. It replied giving me the missing data:

ffmpeg -i IMAG0009.avi -vf "scale=640:-2" -c:v libx264 -profile:v \
baseline -level 3.0 -preset fast -c:a aac -b:a 128k \
-movflags +faststart bird_whatsapp.mp4

and that worked. Having that command line, I modified it easily for
more resolution (scale=1024:-2). I was already familiar with all the
options, I just needed to find which would produce the wanted result,
and not spend a day on it.


But if I want to find in the manual what "-b" stands for, I fail. Ask
chatgpt, instant reply, it is bitrate. Oh, yes, I remember now.

:-)


Oh, searching the man for "movflags" or "faststart" fails. So ask the
AI. They are in the man page for the MP3 muxer, it says. Oh, right, I
forgot that.


So, even a reference manual is hard to use when you want to find a
particular reference, basically using "grep".

(ffmpeg's online manual is spread over more than one page, isn't it?)

Yes.

I don't know right now if there is a command that would search all
manuals and find a word.

cer@Telcontar:~> apropos movflags
movflags: nothing appropriate.
cer@Telcontar:~>

At least here, perhaps "man -w -K movflags". Turns up ffmpeg-all and ffmpeg-formats.

(But no, I wasn't aware of this, had to check "man man", so maybe
there's some better man flag, or separate utility that I'm not aware of (besides plain grep on the man pages where possible, I guess).)

--
Nuno Silva

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On 2025-08-30, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:

On Fri, 29 Aug 2025 08:10:08 -0700, John Ames wrote:

On Fri, 29 Aug 2025 00:56:54 -0000 (UTC)
Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

Weren’t you one of those complaining that bare reference material
wasn’t enough? That you wanted tutorial examples and how-tos and
all that? Then when I mention that it all that is available, you
now find a new reason to complain?

Again, when important information for *core networking tools* is
only found on the Web, it hardly takes a great sage to discern the
problem.

The problem is, you don’t understand the Web?

Because *everything* is on the Web these days. If you can’t figure out basic Web searching, then perhaps you should stay away from computers altogether?

If there's no network connectivity, your web search skills won't do
much?

--
Nuno Silva

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Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> writes:

On 2025-08-30, Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:

On Fri, 29 Aug 2025 08:10:08 -0700, John Ames wrote:

Lawrence D’Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

Weren’t you one of those complaining that bare reference material
wasn’t enough? That you wanted tutorial examples and how-tos and
all that? Then when I mention that it all that is available, you
now find a new reason to complain?

Again, when important information for *core networking tools* is
only found on the Web, it hardly takes a great sage to discern the
problem.

The problem is, you don’t understand the Web?

Because *everything* is on the Web these days. If you can’t figure
out basic Web searching, then perhaps you should stay away from
computers altogether?

If there's no network connectivity, your web search skills won't do
much?

Wasn’t this about nftables? You don’t need that to establish network connectivity.

--
https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

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