Frequently Asked Questions
#linux is secured with a channel mode. You need to have a nickserv account AND be identified/logged in to it to communicate in the #linux channel. This is to help reduce the amount of troublemakers/trolls in the channel and have a higher sense of quality.
See the How To Connect for guidance on how to register your nick.
First of all, are you really banned? If you haven’t been specifically banned, and you would normally be aware of it if you were actively participating, you might just have an issue with nickserv identification.
Another reason you might be banned is because your connection was flapping (connecting/disconnecting a lot) in a short period of time. In that case you would usually be ban-forwarded to ##fix_your_connection. If you return when this problem is resolved, you can ask for assistance in #linux-ops to have the ban-forward removed.
If you are a trouble-maker and do not follow the rules, bans will be issued. Our default time span for bans is 24 hours but that can be reduced or extended depending on the severity of the situation. Repeat offenses usually will increase the length of bans as well. We hope and expect everyone to maintain a reasonable respect for each other and keep it clean and mature.
Also (because of repeated abuse) we’ve had to ban the anonymizing services such as irccloud and tor. So, if you’re connecting by either of those, it’s not personal towards you, and is the reason why you are seeing a banned message.
The channel’s visitors are from almost every country in the world, and many of them struggle with “regular” English, the kind taught in schools outside the English-speaking world.
Much SMS-style English relies on a degree of intimacy with English language phonetics which many non-native English speakers lack. The same applies to people with hearing disabilities. Additionally, we occasionally have visitors using screenreader software (for the visually impaired); SMS-style English is troublesome for such people as well.
A pastebin is usually a web site that allows people to post larger amounts of text to share with others. After having committed the text to such a site, they can copy the URL to their specific post(s) and paste the URLs to the channel. Doing this cuts down on “spam” in the channel and is recommended when the text to share exceeds four lines.
Not all pastebin sites are equal; some are starkly functional and others festooned with advertising, pop-ups and other annoyances. Many people object to being asked to view sites that require Javascript be enabled. While using such sites as pastebin.com is not specifically prohibited, it’s a courtesy to other channel members to try to use the “starkly functional” sites such as our own https://paste.linux.chat/ or https://termbin.com.
There really is no best… Anything. Best is a personal opinion that you create on your own.
General responses to various questions:
What’s the best Linux® distro?
Please see http://www.distrowatch.com/ Which has a search feature, user comments, and pretty much everything you need to be able to start answering that question for yourself. Nobody in ##Linux can tell you what’s best, you need to find that for yourself and try various approaches/distros to see what suits your needs.
What’s the best text editor?
You have a choice. That’s the value of Linux®. vim, emacs, nano, pico, joe, jed, gedit, kedit, kwrite, code/vscode…. The list goes on. They each have their strengths and weaknesses, and the better question is to actually ask what types of features you are looking for in such an editor to better serve your purpose.
What’s the best media player?
Like the previous one, there’s plenty of choices, and no one answer will ever satisfy you besides what you’re looking for. Are you looking for Gnome, KDE, non-specific DE, console? Do you want streaming support? Do you want it to be able to stream? Be more specific and ask what you’re really looking for.