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fortune-mod
If you started using Linux or even Unix some considerable time ago, especially if it was before you started using a mouse with X windows, you could always rely on a few things. The first was that you could typically send the output from the banner command directly to the default line printer connected to the network; the second was that the finger command was actually useful for seeing who else was using a machine; and the third was that you could rely on a snippet of wisdom being displayed whenever you logged in to your console. That snippet of wisdom was courtesy of a simple command called fortune, which was typically set to run automatically either when you connected or logged out.
Remarkably, fortune-mod is a continuation of that original project and is polishing up for the milestone release of version 2.0. Sadly, this doesn't include spinning cube effects or surround sound, but it does update the codebase to use the much more modern cmake, fixes lots of typos in the data files that still exist, and builds support for Travis testing. This update basically makes fortune fighting fit for the 21st century, and if you've not used it for a couple of decades, it's definitely worth a revisit. It may seem jokey – and some of the quips are – but it can also offer a moment of genuine thought now that we typically spend so much time in front of screens. And what's great about building the new version for yourself is that you can see the hard work that's gone into the code, as well as the 41 data files that contain the wisdom. This project is far more than a Perl script with a few embedded quotes.
Project Website
https://github.com/shlomif/fortune-mod
Happiness is having a scratch for every itch. – Ogden Nash
Terminal IRC client
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