RHEL 6.0 Beta Catastrophic X-server Crash

I’m giving it a rest. When I tried to open my PySolFC game — compiled on the system — it took down the X server and the system froze. I’ve seen this behavior before in Ubuntu a couple of releases back. I’m sure the Red Hat folks will eventually fix it, but until they do, I need to get my work done. Yes, that “work” includes taking a mental break playing some silly game while my subconscious brain turns things over in the background. It has proven effective and I don’t plan to change.

I can’t even file a bug report because (1) as with the last time I saw this, nothing in the system picked up any crash info, and (2) it doesn’t fit the parameters of something that comes with the system. I built PySol from source.

It was fun, but I need to keep working. BTW, under Ubuntu the proprietary ATI drivers gives me about 5200 FPS on glxgears, not the 3000 or so I remembered.

Update: For the sake or readers seeking information, I have discerned long after this original post the issue was Compiz instability, particularly in relation to later ATI chips. So far as I know, unless the X.org bundled driver offers full 3D for your Radeon chips, you’re best to avoid Compiz — disable visual effects on the desktop. Frankly, I consider that a smart move regardless of the chipset you are running, because Compiz has yet to show me anything anyone really needs.

Getting a Real Whois Client on RHEL 6

It may not be broken, but the default Jwhois package on RHEL and friends is not easy to use, and the results aren’t satisfactory. Why it is they dropped the original stand-alone client is beyond me. I can’t find anything on it.

What I can find is the source to the package and build it myself. Given all the stuff I’ve built and installed for developmental purposes on my RHEL 6.0-Beta box, I wasn’t too worried about dependencies. There is nothing to configure. You simply unzip and untar the tiny bundle. Step into the build directory and type “make” and “make install”. Job done.

And it works from the start without configuration.