Hubert Feyrer notes the addition of a pad(4) device to NetBSD, allowing arbitrary redirection of audio. This would be great to see in DragonFly; a similar feature for audio and video streams in BeOS was very powerful.
After a short hiatus, BSDTalk is back with an interview of Joerg Sonnenberger, a developer for DragonFly and pkgsrc, etc., etc. (Add to that list if you’re reading, Joerg).
The source code to MULTICS, the ‘predecessor’ on which the UNIX named is based, has been released.  (From here via hubertf) If you are unfamiliar with the term, a short history is available.
Results from the bulk builds of pkgsrc are now available at http://pkgbox.dragonflybsd.org/package-reports/. There’s several reports in there already, for anyone who wants to see what isn’t working. (hint: net-snmp.)
Ulrich Habel put together a script to digest emailed pkgsrc bulk build reports. You can see the output at his site.
Peter Avalos has managed to add some changes originally from FreeBSD that makes CAM now loadable as a module. This means, as his commit message mentions, a USB floppy can be hooked up without a kernel recompilation.
Undeadly.org has a writeup on something I’ve needed but never done: accessing your console’s X desktop remotely, using x11vnc. There’s an earlier ‘Stupid SSH Trick’ for using ProxyCommand.
(Warning: another visual timewaster)Â Seen at SrslyCool: Apple computer design parts one and two, Nintendo devices through the years, iPod evolution, various computer case mods, and of course knockoffs.
The SuperComputing 2007 (SC07) Cluster Challenge has undergrads creating computer clusters using commodity equipment, with the limit being amperage used. I link to it because that’s the problem space where DragonFly is headed.
Sepherosa Ziehau has posted initial patches for a rather large project: separating ipfw and dummynet, and making dummynet run cpu-local.
The 24th Chaos Computer Congress is at the end of this year in Berlin, and Simon ‘corecode’ Schubert is going to be there, along with other DragonFly folks like Sascha Wildner and Nuno Antunes. Here’s a chance to mix with other DragonFly users (and a lot of other people…)
I’d love to see a binary update system for DragonFly, similar to this alpha version of ‘haze’ for NetBSD. (Via)
Here’s two articles for your persual: First, this Guardian Unlimited article attacks one of those ‘well-known facts’ that Betamax failed despite being better than VHS. The title says it explicitly: Why VHS was better than Betamax. The author even manages to mention the Windows vs. Unix idea that is an offshoot of this.
Second, a New Yorker article for those who care about patents and copyright: The “Piracy Paradox” describes how a lack of copyright in fashion design had led to better business – perhaps this could apply to software design too?
Both links via things magazine. So, do you all (the readers) like when I go off the beaten path for related material like this?
The 386 processor is no longer officially supported for DragonFly. I say “officially” because it probably didn’t work anyway, as I doubt anyone was crazy enough to try it in the last few years.
Hasso Tepper has added some USB to serial drivers: uticom(4) for TI TUSB3410, moscom(4) for the MosChip Semiconductor MCS7703, and uchcom(4), for WinChipHead CH341/CH340. Dmitry Komissaroff contributed to the uticom(4) driver.
Some entertainment: This article at American Scientist talks about programming language choice and the arguments that have come up over the years. The bibliography at the end of this 5-page essay is worth special attention, because of the links to early documents describing these battles over languages and choices nobody thinks of these days, like PL/I or Cobol.
Some specific links to articles cited:
- How do we tell truths that might hurt? (Edsger W. Dijkstra, 1975)
- On holy wars and a plea for peace (Danny Cohen, 1980)
- Why Pascal is Not My Favorite Programming Language (Brian W. Kernighan, 1981)
- Computer Languages History (Éric Lévénez, 2006)
- Programming languages and their relationship styles (Meredith L. Patterson, 2006)
All the citations are worth investigating – take some time to read them.
Sepherosa Ziehau has made more changes to ipfw, which means a more complete rebuild is required for bleeding edge users when upgrading. This is in addition to the earlier ipfw/dummynet changes.
Hasso Tepper updated the root servers list to accomodate an IP change. The interesting part of this is Hasso linking to something I didn’t know existed: the ICANN blog.
Gregory Neil Shapiro has updated Sendmail to version 8.14.2.
Peter Avalos has upgraded libarchive to version 2.4.0, which apparently eats much less CPU than earlier, inspired by benchmarks comparing it to other tar implementations.