Red Hat Diaries/002e

Good As Gold

Joseph Heller's third doublespeak book was about a guy who almost but not quite ever makes it to the White House. All through the book he's engaged in employment discussions with the press secretary. These discussions never get anywhere. But when he's asked a question and answers frankly 'I don't know', he blows the press secretary's mind. A brilliant manoeuvre, says the press secretary, but our hero doesn't understand.

Will the President reach a policy decision soon on the issue of blah blah blah?
I don't know.

Does that mean you really don't know, or that you are not allowed to say?
I don't know.

And so forth. And it's exactly how I feel about a number of issues with OS X right now.

Does the OS X file system fragment?
I don't know.

How do you get to root?
I don't know.

People have point to Norton for the Mac, but they also say they won't recommend it. I've been in a console and can't find root anywhere. (Maybe one has to boot into single user mode, but something tells me that won't work either.)

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