Hans Reiser: Once a Linux Visionary, Now Accused of Murder

There was one thing, probably only one of the few, I really like of Linux since the first time I've installed in 1997 (wow already 10 years), especially in SuSE (now NOVELL) and that was the Reiser filesystem.

A file system organizes data on a computer. When you double-click a Microsoft Word document on your desktop, for instance, the file system tells the processor where to find the data. When you upload a picture from your camera, the file system decides how to place the information on your hard drive. Every bit and byte — including the operating system itself — has its place in the layers upon layers of branching directories. "A file system represents the roads and waterways of the OS,"

Differently from Windows, where there are only 2 major filesystem as FAT32 and NTFS, in Linux there are many different types, some of them developed under other OS (OS=Operating Systems) and later bring into the Linux Kernel. The most common at the point of time was the 'ext2' (now replaced by the 'ext3') that was the "installed by default" in 99% of all linux distributions at that point of time. But ReiserFS was much much superior in quality, in performance and in stability. But Hans Raiser (its developer) was a bit "strange" fellow... that never to be liked by Linux's owner, Mr. Linus Torvalds (someone I would like to call "the idiot", imho anyway). People believe the ReiserFS never got the full right attention from Mr. Linus (at that point of time the only person that can decide what can go into his linux kernel), simply because Linux kernel itself was getting much less attention (= $$ paid by big softwarehouses) compared to a small part of it, a filesystem.

Anyway, 10 years of debates, arguments, ets are too long to be zipped inside here...

Hans Reiser, one time one of the most respected programmers in the world, is now a jailed man, waiting for the probe starting next week; at the bottom of this post there is a link to an article posted on one of my favourite magazine, WIRED, that combined 4 interviews made to him since he has been jailed.

The end of the article (along with Reiser's inability to account for his front seat) seems to suggest Reiser knows more than he is telling.
"Sean Sturgeon — Reiser's childhood friend and Nina's ex-lover" had apparently confessed to eight killings, but would not give names. He swears he did not kill Nina, but claims the author would 'weep and piss blood' if he knew all the details of Reiser's friendship with Sturgeon.

Personally, I think the guy isn't all there. Of course I've always been told that the line between genius and insanity is a very thin faint one.
They all sound too whacked out to be raising kids. Regardless of who killed Nina (if she's dead, that is), the real victims are those kids. They're going to grow up without a mother or a father, and what few memories they will have of their childhood will be stranger than some of my nightmares.
A sad case all the way around. Each of those lives is destroyed and the open source community has lost a prolific (if eccentric and pushy) contributor.

http://www.wired.com

Intel Core 2 Duo processors... buggy!

If you are considering to buy a new laptop/desktop computer engined with an Intel CORE 2 DUO processor, I would recommend you to wait for a while until new production, maybe not ruled out from Intel's Malaysia plant will be bugs free.

openbsd developers mailing list
or
undeadly.org (openbsd journal)
or
slashdot.org (/.)

As just some of you knows, I'm a programmer/contributors for some BSD operating systems flavour (as FreeBSD, OpenBSD) especially for high-end servers environment; If anyone of you out there need help to setup a cluster or normal server unix favour, please feel free to contact me for whatever I may useful to solve your problems.

But please don't ask me to help with your Linux...
I did use it since 1997 for my own servers in Italy and well, it's still running, running well, but.... well, it's more about politics, conflicts, mentality, license, debate and probably fashion.
Yes, fashion! Linux nowadays is simply a cool toy for snobbish arrogant people.
Administer a cluster or high-availability node/blades is nothing related to fashion and it's not cool, it's experience, determination, a different mind opened wider than "normal" computer user.

So if you wanna talk serious about OS and servers application, only BSD languages please!

Have a nice crontab day and remember : rm -dfr * /

Can't live without Homer ?

This things happen only in Malaysia.
Malaysia Boleh !

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia: It was a caper that Bart would have loved — except the culprits got caught.

Two Malaysian college students believed to be over-exuberant fans of "The Simpsons" stole a life-sized figurine of Homer Simpson from a cinema, but police tracked them down and forced them to return it Thursday.

"This case has been solved," Mazlan Mansor, police chief of Malaysia's central Petaling Jaya district, told The Associated Press.

The fiberglass replica of Homer holding a TV remote control was part of a promotional display at a local cinema for the upcoming big-screen version of the U.S. TV cartoon series.

The exhibit included the rest of the Simpson family — Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie — sitting on a couch at a multiplex lobby in 1 Utama, a popular suburban shopping mall near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia's largest city.

"Homer will be reunited with his family soon," Moo Hon Mei, 20th Century Fox's senior marketing director in Malaysia, told the AP. She said the studio suspected the thieves were "passionate fans who want to own a piece of 'The Simpsons' before the movie opens."

Cinema employees discovered the 1.2-meter-tall (4-feet-tall), statue had vanished Monday morning. Closed-circuit security cameras showed that two men carried the statue out at about 3 a.m. and took it to the mall's parking lot, where they put Homer in the boot of their car and sped away. The theft took only three minutes.

Police traced Homer's kidnappers through their car license plate and summoned them to the police station, where they returned the figurine unscathed Thursday, Mazlan said.

"They were students, only 21 or 22 years old," Mazlan said. "We've released them for now, and a decision will be made later on whether to charge them for theft."

The figurine costs 3,000 ringgit (US$860; €640) and was flown in from the United States, Moo said. The other Simpsons remain on display, but it was not immediately clear whether the mall has taken any extra security to curb further abductions, she said.

Moo said 20th Century Fox had offered a reward of 1,000 ringgit (US$285; €212) for information leading to the figurine's discovery.

"The Simpsons Movie" starts showing in Malaysia on July 26, one day before its U.S. launch.

When 'civilized' shouldn't be the eact world to call this world today

Last week, the USA army forces in deployed in Iraq, did found an horfanotrofy lturn into a torture camp where many kids, most of them, with mental illness, were left dying without food.
I would like to say something,...but...I think photos are talking enough!
What else to say, maybe that we shouldn't call "civilized" this world!
Have a nice day, because you can have it, as not someone else is wishing too.

Sometimes, maybe....women are right!

What I like more recently is to lay down on my bed, immediately after shower and read one of those book that have nothing inside that could interest Leonardo Da Vinci if he could be still alive, one of those low-culture comics book, especially italians, that have the strange unknown power to make you forget about all those past day problems.

Sometimes is amazing to see how a book can have so much power...

I don't tell you, whose book is this, I mean the writer, but as it's in italian, I believe some of my friends will find no difficulties to guess it right. For all my other foreigner friends, sorry alls, but I can't translate some of the typical italians jokes. I will play it fair soon, don't worry!

For the moment....

Il principe azzurro

È che noi donne siamo fastidiose. Ci abbiamo la fastidiosità inserita proprio nel DNA. Sarà che il cuore ci batte più veloce e diventiamo insofferenti. Abbiamo bisogno che il nostro Re mogio ci dica delle robe. Ma non robe qualsiasi, tipo: «Guarda che ti scade il bollo dell'auto». Parole d'amore, dannazione. Agogniamo l'assoluto. Vogliamo credere che siamo fatti proprio uno per l'altra. Qualche giorno fa mi sentivo molto Perla di Labuan, così ho mandato un SMS al mio Sandokan personale. «Ti amo» ho scritto. Un po' scontato, ma sempre attuale. Bastava che mi rispondesse: «Anch'io». Son poi sei lettere. No. Lui no. La mia tigre di Mompracem mi ha risposto: «Prendo atto». Ho dovuto alzare il gomito con la Soluzione Schoum per liberarmi dalle scorie emotive. E io che una volta credevo nel principe azzurro. Coi capelli di polenta e gli occhi a lago. Due. Bolsena e Bracciano. Che mi citofonava al portone posteggiando il cavallo bianco di lato al cassonetto. Son passati trentotto anni e ancora non l'ho trovato. O son cretina o comincio a dubitare che sia una specie protetta. Magari si è estinto da anni. Ho trovato svariati uomini che mi piacevano, con i quali ho fatto anche un pezzo di strada. Principini, principastri, principuzzi. Non tantissimi per la verità. Con qualcuno ho giusto fatto due passi. Mai a cavallo. Sempre a piedi. Ma nessun principe azzurro. E allora me ne sono fatta una ragione. E son cambiata io. Il tempo mi ha trasformata. Mi si è allargato il punto vita, ho perso altri due decimi di vista e mi è crollato il sottomento come ai pellicani. Solo le tette resistono. In decenni di rispettabile carriera ancora non si sono sottomesse alla forza di gravità. Col tempo ho anche imparato a conoscermi. Mi so a menadito. Riesco persino a mettermi il rossetto a memoria. E ho imparato anche a fare a meno del principe azzurro. Però le parole d'amore le esigo. Ieri ci ho riprovato. Gli ho scritto: «Grazie di esistere». E lui mi ha risposto: «Prego». Zotico. Poi si è accorto di avere un tantino esagerato. La sera è arrivato a casa con una poesia. Scritta apposta per me. Mi ha specificato che era in stile futurista. Poi ha cominciato a declamare: «Non bulloni! / Non pistoni! / Centomila megatoni / tengo dentro ai pantaloni!». Ecco fatto. La mia idea dell'inferno è più o meno questa.

Good night!

I didn't forget about you all!

My dears,

almost 3 weeks since last post, and, yes, I know, I know!

These has been 3 very tough weeks for me, preparing for an important visit (customer), completing one machine for the same (customer), arranging the best for the same (customer).

Did I forget about you ? Not at all, it's just I'm not able to compress 36 working hours into 24! And honestly not even 25 into 24. I'm very curious to know how some of my friends are able to do so many things in 24 hours, including sleep (8 hours) without delegating!

My table is always empty at the end of the day with all my tasks completed but still no dinner, no shower, and sometimes already midnight!

So strange the life....

Outside there are so many people so laaazy! They have no idea how to spend their time.

Inside, my bed side drawer is still full of dreams and although I can start to work around at some of them, I don't have time.

Can someone tell me how can I have more time ?