bash-timestamping-sqlite VS Windows Terminal

> It’s just collecting data for the sake of collecting data.

No, sleep is one of the most important parameters for health!

If in 2024 you are not collecting data on your sleep to take action (and for ex, stop overtraining, reduce drinking etc) to reduce the risks of future brain problems, you are doing it wrong.

> Even if it was accurate, I can just tell by feel

I can't, and I fear it may be the same "overconfidence" issue that cause car accidents when drunk.

I collect logs with my sqlite based bash history collection that I've been running for 5 years: https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite

Thanks to my garmin, I have identified a pattern where I feel ok, but my garmin reported less REM sleep than usual: in the day, I run a few more commands than usual and I have more mistakes (as can be seen by the non-zero return values)

> Should be doable with bash's PROMPT_COMMAND if you are still on bash

Already done, with a sqlite backend: https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite

It will be inspired by https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite but it will add a theme suited for eink and a proper support for shortcuts or keys like delete/backspace/control delete/control backspace etc. as I'm used to Windows shortcuts and can't do with vim if control-left doesn't jump to the left word but I have to do the traditional esc b that I don't like much :)

For bash users who are tempted by zsh interactive "fuzzy" completion, here's my take on it: it's directory-aware (offering different suggestions based on your history of commands in that given directory), pure bash code using sqlite to store data: https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite

The only other dependency is fzy for fuzzy matching.

It should be a super simple feature to add to your terminal emulator: SCP works with a X,Y position. RCP just "jumps" there.

If you keep an accounting of how many lines you have displayed since then, you could alter the response to RCP by also doing the appropriate amount of scrolling: it should only take one variable, the deltaY to scroll.

If you want to test the idea, I think you could even use tmux and send commands to control the scrollback cf ahttps://superuser.com/questions/209437/how-do-i-scroll-in-tm...

I've used similar tricks with RCP/SCP but for simpler things: the only slight difficulty is the deltaY accounting, like when you are executing commands near the bottom of the screen because you must take into account that scolling will happen - but it's essentially similar to your idea.

So check https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite/blob/main... and make sure you understand both how the __notbottom function works, and why PS0 needs an extra Esc[2a

Actually, now that I think more about your idea, it would be sweet to keep a SCP/RCP stack with multiple values, where you can push values with each SCP then pop them with RCP, say in sequence, or maybe just access the nth value with a different command that wouldn't pop them? That could be done nicely by augmenting RCP.

Also you could augment SCP with an optional flag to specify whether the terminal should scroll back upon RCP of this nth entry, and you'd have a great function that would be quite useful (ex: SCP with a jump bool when the return is non 0: you could make a shortcut to jump to the commands that have returned errors)

There's no reason to stop adding cool features to terminals: we're in a terminal renaissance!

Or if you use bash, try my own bash solution: https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite

> The problem happens when somebody "updates" that web server in-place.

Imagine this is 28-nginx : I would jist create another script 29-nginx-update recording the update, even if it: "echo apt-get update; apt-get upgrade nginx ; echo "make sure to fix variable $foo"

Next time I have to do that, I will integrate that into 28-nginx and remove 29-nginx-update

> eventually when someone tries the whole checklist from the beginning, they'll find it's now broken; the steps aren't working as expected.

Maybe I don't understand the issue, but my scripts or text files are simple and meant to be used in sequence. If I hack the scripts, I make sure it still works as expected - and given my natural laziness, I only ever update scripts when deploying to a new server or VM, so I get an immediate feedback if they stop working

Still, sometimes something may work as expected (ex: above, maybe $foo depends on a context?), but it only means I need to generalize the previous solution - and since the script update only happen in the context of a new deployment, everything is still fresh in my head.

To help me with that, I also use zfs snapshots at important steps, to be able to "observe" what the files looked like on the other server at a specific time. The snapshots conveniently share the same name (ex etc@28-nginx) so comparing the files to create a scripts can be easily done with diff -Nur using .zfs/snapshot/ cf https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19253-01/819-5461/gbiqe/index.ht...

Between that + a sqlite database containing the full history of commands types (including in which directory, and their return code), I rarely have such issues

Shameless plug for that bash history in sqlite: https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite

> I believe that using zsh means, for the vast majority of users, using just a small subset of functionality that gives a better UX when compared to Bash.

What about adding only these functionalities you may care about?

When I tried zsh, what I liked was the history search. Like youm Everything else "wasn't as simple as I expected".

So I fixed my bash. Check https://github.com/csdvrx/bash-timestamping-sqlite :

- stores everything into a sqlite database so 2 separate terminals can access each other history on the go

- add extras details to the history like when the command started, stopped, which with return code, in which directory,

- for accessing the history, uses fzy for fuzzy finding,

- provides 2 separate history search context: either global (ctrl-t) or "this directory only" (ctrl-r), with extra goodies like excluding commands with a non-zero return error code thanks to the extra things saved

I included a few examples of the SQL queries you can run.

> convince management of the value

This presupposes that such convincing is even possible. Many, many companies have leadership that are simply terrible at identifying value. If you've never been part of a majority of developers advocating for, if not outright begging for, some huge ROI initiative to get the green light, you are very fortunate.

There are great counterexamples, like Valve, which is known for giving developers an extreme degree of autonomy, and they benefit greatly from that approach. For each Valve, though, there are dozens of companies that manage to succeed despite themselves.

Take Microsoft, for example. One tiny, yet representative, example: the way the Windows Terminal team handled a suggestion from Casey Muratori to take their software from abysmally slow to lightning fast:

https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/issues/10362

A quote from one of the Terminal developers, dismissing the suggestion:

> I believe what you’re doing is describing something that might be considered an entire doctoral research project in performant terminal emulation as “extremely simple” somewhat combatively…

Just how difficult was such an endeavor in actuality? Well, given that Casey implemented his own terminal emulator from scratch and incorporated the functionality he was proposing in a mere weekend... not a whole lot. Relatively minor effort for a huge return on investment. It took Casey explaining the concepts, then providing a working proof of concept, and finally a bunch of backlash online towards the Terminal team to get them to do the right thing for themselves and their users.

At this point ConHost.exe is open source [0] so it is maybe not a stretch to expect Microsoft to open source CMD.EXE at some point.

Though with PowerShell being cross-platform and already open source, I personally don't think there's enough to gain in some sort of better open source CMD.EXE fork. I'd be interested in being proved wrong on that, but I'm also happy enough with PowerShell these days I'm not in a hurry to return to CMD.EXE.

[0] https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/tree/main/src/host

"Users of Linux and macOS may well be familiar with the sudo command, used regularly in the terminal, and it looks like Windows may finally be getting its own version."

More Linux tools are coming to Windows, especially Windows Server because the tools are good and they make it easier to administer a Windows Server.

They are looking at adding a default TUI text editor (https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/discussions/16440) and now they are adding sudo.

I would not be surprised if systemd or something like it gets ported or reinvented for Windows simply because it makes managing services so nice.

GitHub

>We are allowed to view and consume it, to be influenced by it, and under many circumstances even outright copy it.

People keep saying this but it's actually much more complicated, and in many cases you can't view copyrighted content.

An example, MicroSoft employees are not permitted to view or learn from an open source (GPL-2) terminal emulator:

https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/issues/10462#issuecomm...

Another example is proprietary software that may have it's source available, either intentionally or not. If you view this and then work on something related to it, like WINE for example, you are definitely at risk of being successfully sued.

If you worked at MicroSoft and worked on Windows, you would not be able to participate in WINE development at all without violating copyright.

If you viewed leaked Windows source code you also would not be able to participate in WINE development.

An interesting question that I have, is whether training on proprietary, non-trade-secret sources would be allowed. Something like unreal engine, where you can view the source but it's still proprietary.

Windows Terminal is pretty good and a new terminal emulator written in the last few years. No smooth scrolling, here's the GitHub issue requesting it: https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/issues/1400

Assume its related to this:

https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/issues/10362

It's nothing serious just microsoft engineers writing slow as shit code and reacting poorly to someone trying to help.

"There are plenty of offline scenarios where this would be incredibly useful. For disconnected environments, etc. There are some environments that will never connect to winget."

Source: https://github.com/microsoft/terminal/discussions/16440#disc...