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(And I suppose I must mention this for the sake of the people who'll reply with "well, of course, IE sucks so it shouldn't be used" - how would you like it if that page redirected you to "This page is ONLY viewable with Internet Explorer" instead?)

Discussions? Flames? :P

(And I suppose I must mention this for the sake of the people who'll reply with "well, of course, IE sucks so it shouldn't be used" - how would you like it if that page redirected you to "This page is ONLY viewable with Internet Explorer" instead?)

Discussions? Flames? :P

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KCD Applet

Oh wait, what's that last one doing there? Cursed klipper. Seriously, another suggestion would be to pour hot grits...

Actually, the 68000-series CPUs on which the Amiga was based are mostly 32-bit. The original 68000 CPU was not fully 32-bit, but the 68020 and up were. Linux requires a 68020 or higher with an MMU.

Yeah, the 68000 and 68010 were 16 bit CPUs with 24 bits of address space. The 68020 and up are 32 bits. I don't remember if the 68060 made it to 64 bit, but I don't think so, I think it was just 32 bit with 48 bit addressing or something wonky like that. You could get a 60MHz '060, though, not too shabby, especially when AmigaDOS runs suitably on a 7.14MHz 68000.

Anyway, the point of this message:

After seeing the uClinux homepage, I decided to try to apply the patches these guys made to the standard m68k subtree. This way, I thought, it'd be possible to boot a Linux kernel on old 68000 machines which have no MMU. And I was right. So if you have an old Atari ST, Amiga or Mac, you might want to look at these patches, or even help a hand...
(From http://www.esat.kuleuven.ac.be/~pcoene/atari.html)

And

What is uClinux?
uClinux is a derivative of Linux 2.0 kernel intended for microcontrollers without Memory Management Units (MMUs). (From http://www.uclinux.org/description/)

So far, uClinux runs on the Palm Pilot and on the uCsimm. Paul Coene's setup will boot on Atari ST (another 68000-based box, much like an amiga without all the cool custom chips) and in the STonX Atari ST emulator.

I still think they should have called it herfstvrucht, angstschreeuw or koeieuier, like they propose here
--

Serpent is actually more secure than Rijndael, even if slightly slower. I personally use serpent in my loopback fs's, and it works really well!

Here it is.

Don't try this with IE, since it won't work:
*** Error 404: Wrong Browser ***
I am sorry to inform you that this page is not accessible with Microsoft's Internet Explorer.

I had a good laugh when I tried it and saw the error message. On purpose I assume, since his page reveals that he is a Linux fanatic and obviously doesn't like MSFT.

In addition to the open-ended key size of Rijndael, after reading the AES Round 1 report, it looks like smart card applications were a key consideration (possible THE key?).

This shouldn't come as a surprise because John Daemen is currently working for ProtonWorld, a Belgian smart card company. Millions of people here in Belgium are using their e-purse smartcards daily to make small payments. I wouldn't be surprised if RijnDael is the main algorithm behind Proton.

• The algorithm has to be free and unencumbered by patents. The ElGamal public key algorithm is an example of an unencumbered algorithm, but it did not become unencumbered until the DH patent expired in 1997. The symmetric key algorithm Blowfish is the first unencumbered post-DES algorithm that people believe is secure, which is why it is so popular.
• The algorithm has to feel secure. This is way people stull use 3DES, even though it is far slower than Blowfish and most of the other new SK algorithms at the block cipher lounge and the AES candidates.
• The algorithm has to, once it meets the above two criteria, be efficient. Blowfish has an inefficient key generation cycle, but is otherwise efficient. Rijndael is the most efficient of the AES candidates.

One thing people can do is use a cryptosystem instead of a single algorithm. This makes implememtation much easier, since people don't need to become familiar with Applied Cryptography and the literature on crypto. This is why people like SSL--it is free outside of the US, and will become free in the US on September 20th, and is a complete system belived to be secure.

One of the nice things about crypto research is that most of the research papers out there are freely available on the internet.

- Sam

For those interested in code: you can find the GPL'ed C++ code for performing integer wavelet transforms I (and a few colleagues) wrote for my Ph.D. at http://www.cs.kuleuven.ac.be/~wavelets/

There is a good Pascal compiler for Linux. Compatible with Turbo Pascal 7.0 and some Delphi extensions. There are also GTK bindings available. It's called
Free Pascal Compiler.

Many of you wonder why Delphi came on top instead of C/C++. It was not a surpise for me. If Microsoft would run a similar poll, Visual Basic would be on top. To understand why, you have to look at things from the other side of the fence.

If you're a Windows-user, you have several tools to choose from. You can use Visual Basic, Delphi or C/C++, for example. If you use C and want to write for Linux too, there is GCC, a lot of toolkits and everything you need. You can even use winelib if you want. You'll be productive pretty fast.

But imagine what would happen if you don't do C. What if you have done pascal for 10 years and never touched C? Then there's not any good tools to use. There is Free Pascal, but you can't use it to do X11-programming yet. There is Lazarus but it's not even alpha.

So you're stuck in the Windows-world with all those tens of thousands of lines of VB- or Delphi-code. And you're hating it and praying every day that Linux will get a decent development environment for Pascal or Basic.

That aside, it does not mean that purchasers of Dell workstations have any meaningful choice.

If Apple hadn't killed the Mac clones, the IBM CHRP LongTrail including a 604e at 225 MHz would have costed 450 USD (quantities of 1000) in September 1997. I paid 800 USD for my prototype board, which was damned cheap compared to a comparable Pentium II, and of course I run Linux only: http://www.cs.kuleuven.ac.be/~geert/Po werPC/. The LongTrail used off-the-shelf components, and I guess the new reference design is a further evolution, using a G3.

Now things are different, and it looks like IBM has updated the design.

FYI, the original LongTrail specs are at IBM's FTP site. I paid 800 USD for my board (incl. 200 MHz 604e) in May 1997. Although this was an (expensive) prototype board, it was much cheaper than a comparable Pentium II board. Production boards including a 225 MHz 604e would have costed only _450_ USD in quantities of 1000, in September 1997.

And in Europe, you cannot buy them with Linux at all. That's what DELL told us (among other things). Full story at http://www.cs.kuleuven.ac.be/~ geert/DELL_and_MS.html

Of course they don't cost less! Dell admitted to us that they are bound by Microsoft to sell one copy of Windows with each PC sold. That's why you can no longer buy a DELL without OS. Full story at http://www.cs.kuleuven.ac.be/~ geert/DELL_and_MS.html

lazarus is aiming to produce a delphi like environment (not there yet but they're moving fast).
It's available here.

It's using Free Pascal as its base.

If you want a small-memory cipher that uses a Feistel network, Twofish is an excellent choice. If you want something even thinner than Twofish, and do not need to use a Feistel network, Rijndael (pronounce it "Rain Doll") or Crypton are excellent choices.

- Sam

There is development under way to provide Delphi-like IDE's to be used with Free Pascal, a great Pascal compiler for Linux x86, Win32, DOS, Amiga and OS/2 that supports Delphi 2.0 features, is TP 7.0 compatible and has very responsive developers. Everything under GPL...

See the IDE homepages of Megido and Lazarus.

Here's a listing of places that you can download an ISO of the RedHat 6.0 CD, courtesy of Ars Technica.

ftp://o su-linux.capital.ous.edu/pub/linux/redhat/iso/hedw ig.i386.iso9660.gz

ftp://pricie.ccl.kuleuven.ac.be/pub/rh 60.iso

ftp://ftp.s ervers.cx/pub/mirrors/linux/hedwig-27apr1999.i386. iso9660.gz

If anyone is interested in working on a free 3d modeling / rendering project, I would reccomend working on one of the many existing projects. Each project seems to have a slightly different slant on what it intends to be good at so I don't think diversity is a problem.

I have been writing a modeller named Extreme Wave which is based on some of my grad school work, but there are a number of other fine projects that have made some significant progress including MOPS, Moonlight Creator, 3DOM, and MindsEye. No Maya killers in the bunch yet.