Slashdot Mirror

"What's to stop someone from developing an essentially Open Source educational system"

The lady who teaches Software Engineering at the University of Texas is doing exactly that, step by step. Her background is in Computer Science Education, so she's more attuned to educational issues than most of us are. Each semester she has her SE class break up into teams, and each team does a project for a real client. The clients are almost always elementary school teachers. So she's building an archive of educational projects, which she hopes to burn onto a CD and start distributing to schools sometime this year.

Oh, yeah. She requires the teams to copyleft their projects.

Most of the projects are HTML or Java apps for Windows machines, and some of the projects are incomplete and/or kinda cheesy due to being one semester projects for undergraduates, but I saw demos of a couple that were kinda nice too. And some of the projects go back for retreads in later semesters, so with time I expect to see some fairly nice stuff coming out of it.

Her archive is here.

Get a few other people doing this kind of thing and let their projects merge, and it might be enough of a "show me the code" situation that it could bootstrap itself into exactly what you visualize.

Check out NetMath which I believe does exactly what you want.

--

There is a gpl'd version of macsyma available here. They call it "Maxima" but it really is a fork of macsyma. I've used both this version (on linux) and the commercial version (on windows). It is an *outstanding* tool. Go get it.

First, I find it easier to use ls than a graphical file manager, but if your not in the mood to type a lot of repetitive "ls -l" 's...go with SystemG. It's a good graphical file manager with an Explorer like interface. Second, the newsletter I'm webmastering has an article on Linux Desktop customization, and Mac and Win also. Check it out, it's called coredump .

Keep in mind that their are a lot of systems for handling installed software via symlinks, and most of them have unique strengths in particular circumstances. I have a list of many of them at my opt_depot page, including CMU Depot, Stow, Epkg, and several others.

With the exception of Epkg and LUDE, these systems tend to come into play only when it comes time to install and manage installed software on your system and/or network, so it isn't so crucial that everyone use the same software.

Epkg does seem to be one of the best out there now, at least going by the feature list on the Epkg web site. I know that opt_depot is uniquely easy to manage on an NFS network with central package archives, and we and others have been running on it for over 5 years now. I doubt that you're going to get everyone to use Epkg, but it's good to see the work that the UIUC folks are doing on it.

It might not kill them to acknowledge the many alternatives to their software for this very commonly implemented idea, however.

If people are looking for something like STOW, they should take a look at opt_depot. opt_depot is rather more developed than Stow, and includes support for managing package archives in an NFS server environment.

The only downside to opt_depot is that I haven't filed the paperwork to release it under the GPL.. I've been too busy with Ganymede over the last few years to mess with it.

Note that opt_depot itself hasn't been very actively maintained for the last few years, but some folks at the National Library of Medicine are supposedly preparing a new release based on it.

It just came in today and I've just finished installing linux (rh6.1). Not a single problem thanks to others who have done it on similar models.

This is my first portable system and I'm quite happy with it. I've never really been interested in portables since to me, the compromises were just too great. Sure, there are the so called desktop replacements but these things are just too damned heavy. For me, anything over 4lbs travel weight is *not* portable.

Good:
- lightweight (3.5lbs)
- thin (1"")
- decent screen size

Bad:
- integrated modem is of the winmodem variety (ugh!) Are winmodems cheaper? Is that why oems don't put in a real modem? Bottom line is I had to fork over more cash for a 3com pc card modem.
- integrated ethernet requires a dongle (one more thing to lose)
- battery life is kind of crappy (a little over an hour with power management). There's a 4 hour battery available but it's $399!!

Finally, I got a Zoom backpack from Spire instead of the traditional briefcase type bags. Very cool and practical.

Now, I need to save up for an Aibo...

curse the U of Texas @ Austin...they don't provide any support for Linux in the dorms even though they claim to in their flyers...check out our new newsletter coming out this month at locutus.csres.utexas.edu/coredump I think there will be an article about Macroshaft as well as university non-support of linux.

--

MUQ is indeed very well done. There are other such projects out there. Mine is called Momoko. While I like MUQ, it's not perfect so I figure I'll do it myself and get it just right. Momoko is designed not just for MUDs, but for any sort of multi-user networked application, like community based dynamic web sites or IRC servers or the like. Of course, the lovers of speed will laugh at me because it's written in Java. However, Java is just a language. They're working on compilers to compile Java into native machine code. Of course, OO code is generally not as fast as C. I think flexibility and ease of use is more important in the case of graphical MMORPGs. All the really speed critical code is in the client, the graphics routines. The server is all modelling of behaviour and an OO system is inherently better at that. In fact, I received an e-mail from someone working on Ultima Online 2 praising my use of Python as a MUD scripting language. I think perhaps they're using Python in UO2, but that's just a rumour. Another project is Coldstore, which isn't an entire MUD framework, but a huge, fast persistent store like EROS uses, except on the application level. It will be very useful to future MUD framework developers.

I don't think there are many 100% PalmPilot-Packet-Orientated programs out there (PocketAPRS being the exception) I have come across a few programs that can be used in Packet Radio Fashion. You can find them here. They are quite simple, nothing more then vt100 emulators for the Palm. But you should be able to talk to your Packet Modem in Terminal mode.

Another (Texas) mirror for your illegal code-spreading pleasure.

> I can tell you from personal experience that a good third of the students drank...

Abilene, Texas. Home of three (3) colleges associated with fundamentalist religious sects, all "enforcing" rules very much like those you describe.

Impact, Texas. Apparently a neighborhood that seceded from Abilene and ditched its anti-liquor laws in the process.

On Friday nights the traffic used to back up for miles on all sides of Impact, with students on their way over from Abilene to visit the liquor stores.

(A web search tells me that all this is just a footnote to history, now.)

And yes, dorm rooms were choked with cigarette smoke and strewn with "fuck books". And students I didn't even know used to ask me if I knew where they could "cop a bag", presumably because my mildly long hair among the greater crowd of gyrines marked me for a dope-dealing hippie.

And there's that memorable day in the cafeteria, when I heard a skanky girl a few seats down the table summarizing her latest visit to the doctor for her friends without even lowering her voice, including his request that "couldn't she at least limit the number of her partners" to help get her problem under control.

Oh, the foolishness of those who long for Legislated Paradise (TM).
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?

If you're talking about a LinuxConf-style tool, then yes, scaling breaks down quickly, and you're far better off with a cfengine-based utility, the way that Christopher Browne was suggesting.

For a network of systems, though, you can have very good tools for managing a directory database that all the systems can consult for their networking operations, and this can be a big win.

Exhibit A: Ganymede, a GPL'ed metadirectory system I've been working on for the last four years.

XML integration coming soon. ;-)

Here's my mirror:
http://www.ece.utexas.edu/~hintz/decss/

The only real setbacks I encountered were the fact that I got stuck with the sucky Mwave DSP modem, and that the drivers for my ethernet card are kinda flaky, so I could never get decent networking to happen.

Try the Linux on Laptops site for more useful info.

Only through hard work and perseverence can one truly suffer.

One more thing to dislike about this kind of ad-pushing is that it works on the premise that the only way to get people to do something is to trick, cajole, or manipulate them (everyone seen Office Space ?). What if we cut out the advertisers and sold our allegience to companies directly?
What if, instead of having to sit through ads for Ritz(TM) crackers, you received a plaintext e-mail at the beginning of the month from your ISP:

Send us 3 UPC symbols from Ritz(TM) cracker boxes by the end of the month, or a surcharge of $3.00 will be added to your bill.

Sure, you'd then have to actually spend money on the products. Yes, they'd get even more data on your shopping habits. But I say it would be worth it not to have to hear about rich buttery goodness. . .

- Michael Cohn
Author of the GHB FAQs

And yes, I do practice what I preach. I have no television for this very reason. I will not pay for those programs by sacrificing my mind to trivialized sound-bytes and deceptive adverts.

Then it sounds to me like you have a dangerously low opinion of said mind. Seeing an ad does not cause you to change any opinions or buy any products; these are things you must give your consent to. They may prevaricate; they may use subtle and manipulative tricks; but these are things that we encounter every day from every information source, including other humans. In this era of information overload, it's a vital skill to be able to choose what to pay attention to. If being exposed to advertising will really compromise you so badly, you're already in deep trouble -- you must click on every link you see, stop to read every book that has a favorable review on the cover, and offer a dinner invitation to every stranger who calls you "buddy."
My point is that we can't filter out every potentially dishonest stimulus the environment is going to provide, so we'd better learn to defend ourselves (of course, learning when not to be minutely suspicious is a vital skill as well). Acting as if any exposure to persuasion will produce not only transitory impulses (which it may do) but lasting alterations thought and behavior seriously shortchanges our intelligence. Or, to adapt a famous maxim from neurology:

If the mind were simple enough that an advertisement could change us, we wouldn't be able to create advertisements.

That being said, I am in complete agreement that people tend to undervalue their time and attention. Filtering out ads does cost us something, and these "free" services probably will work to change a few brand alignments, simply because it becomes too draining to keep all the babble out. And if that disturbs you enough to keep you from subscribing, your choice is perfectly valid -- but quite different from the idea that we're tabulae rasa, defenseless against the programming of content-pushers.

- Michael Cohn
Author of the GHB FAQ

Here's a neat site that has Pilot software for Hams >>> http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/khark er/palm-ham/
and of course here for really neat Palm-APRS software >>> http://www.pocketaprs.com/
I've always thought that if someone could port AX25 from Linux to PalmOS, that would be very neat AND useful. PPP to a gateway box is neat but somewhat limiting. The Palm Pilot is a cpu (albeit simple)... why not just connect directly to the TNC and do the link management right on the Pilot? Makes sense to me.

I figured, get the fastest, strong, best now, and it'll take a little longer for it to be obsolete. But what about OS issues?

That's what I did 6 years ago. Six years was stretching it a bit, but you get the idea. My new laptop will hopefully last a while as well.

Personally, I would recommend focussing on (in order of importance):

• Keyboard -- If you are going to use your laptop with the built-in keyboard, make sure this works for you.
• Pointing device -- depending on your use, this may be as important as (or even more so) the keyboard. I loathe the erasers; mine has a trackpad.
• maximum possible RAM, preferably in a standard format -- you can never have too much, and it often makes a much bigger impact than processor speed.
• Screen -- very hard to upgrade, so get the biggest and best you can. Of course, you have to trade off the size of your screen versus the size of the screen. That is, a bigger screen is better, but it translates into a bigger overall laptop.
• Hard Drive -- it doesn't have to be huge, but make sure you can swap it out with another, standard drive. My last laptop started with 340MB, and has since had nearly a dozen different drives as big as 3+GB. My new laptop came with 6GB; I bought extra drive sleds for $20 each and have a 2GB loaded with DOS and a 10GB destined to get Linux.
• Battery -- If at all possible, have it be one of the more standard batteries. You'll need to replace it (or buy additional ones) so standard batteries are easier to find and cheaper.
• Processor -- I think processor speed is nowhere as important as available RAM. If it's upgradeable, that's great. If you've got the money, go for as fast a processor as you can, of course.

But what about OS issues?

Well, I went for a ChemBook 7400 which is one of the laptops that Linux Laptops used to sell. (Unfortunately, they stopped taking orders before I got mine.) There is also a page on running Linux on an ASUS 7400 (which is the OEM version of the ChemBook). For more general info, check out the Linux Laptop page.

Once the knowledge protected by a trade secret becomes public (by legal or even illegal means) it is no longer a trade secret. This fact has been verified by a respected patent lawyer with a JD. Therefore, the only way that a trade secret remains intact is by it truly remaining secret. If by any means (including reverse engineering) it becomes public knowledge, then the trade secret ceases to exist.

For a good primer on current US intellectual property laws, head over to my old EE professor's web site at:
http://www.ece.utexas.edu/~kort um/ee302/lecture/IP/

The PDF version of the lecture is available at:
http://www.ece.utexas.edu/~k ortum/ee302/lecture/IP.pdf

This lecture was recently written by a patent lawyer, so I would definitely assume that it is timely and accurate.

Once the knowledge protected by a trade secret becomes public (by legal or even illegal means) it is no longer a trade secret. This fact has been verified by a respected patent lawyer with a JD. Therefore, the only way that a trade secret remains intact is by it truly remaining secret. If by any means (including reverse engineering) it becomes public knowledge, then the trade secret ceases to exist.

For a good primer on current US intellectual property laws, head over to my old EE professor's web site at:
http://www.ece.utexas.edu/~kort um/ee302/lecture/IP/

The PDF version of the lecture is available at:
http://www.ece.utexas.edu/~k ortum/ee302/lecture/IP.pdf

This lecture was recently written by a patent lawyer, so I would definitely assume that it is timely and accurate.

Who's Dmitri Medeleeff? :) From some searching I did, I believe the name is Mendeleeff and he published Periodic Law of the Elements. I found this link on yahoo and google. Pretty weak...but it mentions his name!:)

• Java

  There seems to have been something of a "trainwreck" with respect to Java. There are lots of "nearly done" Java environments out there, including Kaffe, GCJ, Jikes, "Blackdown," and likely others.

  Unfortunately, none are truly useful without some combination of classes (ala GNU Classpath) and some combination of AWT/Swing. And that has been rather less rapidly forthcoming in the "reasonably free form" that is necessary in order for it to be ubiquitous enough for people to really use it to deploy applications, or to use it as a layer on which to build further infrastructure like EJB.

  Is anybody near to deploying a complete "libre" Java for Linux?

• System Config Tools

  There's Linuxconf. There's COAS. There's cfengine. And Ganymede (tho it needs Java; see above...) and bunches of other system config tools one one degree of incompleteness or another.

  Big, expensive things like UniCentre are also getting ported, although they're not likely of great interest on the home front.

  Is there any intent to try to have some useful protocols to allow intercommunications of some of these systems, or to perhaps pick an existing one rather than recreating the wheel?

• Testing/Standards

  There has been some lipservice about Linux Standard Base (LSB), but it is not evident that anyone has either deployed substantially changed systems as a result of attempting to conform to some common guidelines, nor to actually provide ways of conforming systems to standards.

  There are lots of tools out there to run systems through automated test suites; that is apparently one of the major tasks of one ACLs for Linux project. In other contexts, we find ANSI Common LISP Conformance Tests. The folks at Cygnus run EGCS through testing, and provide EGCS Test Suite Results. Greg is being used to validate that GnuStep conforms to its documentation.

  ... And every "dot zero" release of Red Hat Linux fills many with fear as it tends to at least appear undertested.

  And then there's the Extreme Programming approach (particularly associated with Smalltalk) where one of the core requirements is of Continuous Integration Tests that are integrated in with the development process.

  But it is, often enough, not clear that people are depending in much more than merely the notion that Because it's Open Source, naturally bags of people will want to spend their weekends testing my code.

  We badly need to have some regression tests so that some testing takes place as distributions are constructed. Debian does some of this with dpkg-related tools; it is highly unfortunate that similar tools have not cropped up around RPM.

  Question: What are you doing to help contribute to the public body of test suite code?

I've enjoyed your articles on how to tell "snake oil" crypto from the real stuff. So what do you think of current copy protection efforts like CSS (recently cracked), DTCP, SDMI, InterTrust, etc? Are they selling a false sense of security?

too lazy to get an account,
Wesley Felter

One interesting idea this leads to is the adoption of Doom as the basis for a 3-D visulaization interface for network and system management.

Imagine extending things like Ganymede, Scotty and relational asset databases to auto-generate .WAD files represtenting network maps, zonefiles, LDAP directories, SNMP agents and so forth, and using a modified Doom interface to select and perform actions on objects.

I never got into .WAD design back in the day, but surely there are tools out there for turning architectural floorplans into .WADs, too.

The big issues would be (1) the one-map-at-a-time design of Doom, which would make it hard to toggle between physical and logical views of networks, and (2) the fixed-target UI of Doom, which is good for the game, less good for this. Marathon, with its mouse-positioned gunsight, may not have been as good a game, but it would have made a bettern WAN visualization tool out of the box.

See http://www.ece.utexas.edu/~litt/work.html. So I was bored.

Energy is not conserved.

I *just learned that one the other day from the Particle Adventure Homepage. I'm not suppose to know that one yet, and I piss off the teachers whenever I point out the TRUTH.

My "bible" now is Encyclopedic Dictionary of Mathematics. One needs almost a PhD in mathmatical rigour to read it, but at least I know it has best answers to my questions. I don't always understand it, but I'm only 23, so I have many years yet to understand it fully.

I fully believe a new methodology needs to be found for teaching. Our brains are only so big, and you can only do so much memorization. Then this whole creation/evolution thing would be a non-issue, because we would all realize that base is just that, a base - not an idealogy or a facttoid.

A quick story:In my junior year in high school I did a really far out science project based on quantum mechanics and probability, but got no awards, (or even questions!). I need one in my senior year on Solar power, and got 2nd place statewide.

Just goes to show how messed up our schools really are.

Swift argues that babies could be a delicacy for the upper classes, and a source of revenue, instead of a resource drain, on the working classes. Sounds morbid, but it's quite amusingly done too.

And it is relevant to this debate. Swift too was trying to argue against contemporary attitudes which counted certain people as worthless, although in his case it was the poor rather than the disabled.

You can read a short introduction to the proposal here.

Insightful and well-read for an AC! Yes, in fact, I was referring to Austin and Searle and a few others in my treatment of the post on Word Power. And I've written a small paper on how action words work on-line, and my thesis has a chapter or two on it.

Insightful and well-read for an AC! Yes, in fact, I was referring to Austin and Searle and a few others in my treatment of the post on Word Power. And I've written a small paper on how action words work on-line, and my thesis has a chapter or two on it.

I am not sure if I understand what you think GPS is like, or what you mean with "working".
But I can tell you about the GPS data format, the transmission frequencies, the satellite orbits and much more. I learned this stuff for a class at university and it didn't seem to be secret at all.
Learn more at:
www.utexas.edu/depts/grg/gc raft/notes/gps/gps.html
Have Fun!

reply to: alien@studbox.uni-stuttgart.de

when your choice for Favorite Linux Game is BattleBall

Robotics. The NavLab at the Carnegie Mellon University Robotics Institute has used neural-net-based computer vision for hands-free driving. The system is capable of driving on interstate highways at traffic speeds, and has even driven cross country! Many other robotics tasks are also done with nnets.

For a good general jumping-off point (and a plug!), check out the neural-networks lab at the University of Texas at Austin CS dept. The page has lots of interesting links, and the lab itself is doing work applying NNets to natural language processing, modelling of the visual cortex, game playing, and many kinds of reinforcement learning problems. Some especially cool stuff is their work in combining nnets with genetic algorithms to evolve networks for game-playing, robot applications, and other tasks.

J.

I think this sort of certification falls into the same category as the 'lite' linux that was being discussed the other day. If people are inclined to tinker, you can get linux up and running on laptops (for example, there this linux on laptops reference ). However, there are many people who just want an operating system which works. They don't want to spend hours trying to figure out why it isn't working. If IBM can provide a system which runs linux off the shelf that's a good thing.

And as long as they are upfront and clear about what is and isn't supported by the "certified" machines, I think this will be good for linux in the long run. If people have sucessful and happy linux experiences, they will be more likely to use linux and to become more sophisticated users.

I would't be surprised to see Apple offer more options on their own site when more AGP cards get Mac driver support.

You know, If you check out 3Dfx' website, they've included beta drivers for MacOS 8x and their VooDoo3 series of cards... now... with an AGP Voodoo3 2000, a G4 500MHz System (with agp) and the beta drivers, perhaps the alternative is possible.

Regardless of prevailing /. opinions, I say good job to Apple. They're trying and that's what counts.

Daniel

I've been running linux on a Fujitsu Lifebook E330 ever since I got it. I installed RH5.2 and then 6.0 on it without a problem. There was some problems when I needed to use the RH rescue disk to redo lilo when I upgraded my mini win98 partition (need this partition for the winmodem). The laptop did not want to boot the RH rescue disk. I had to use a slackware boot disk to get back into my linux partition. Other than that everything worked great. Got X and the soundcard working on the first shot. The only problem is that I can't use the winmodem and the IR.

I can see why some people would be turned off to using linux on a latop if they can't use all of the hardware (winmodem/IR/etc.). If somebody spends the money for a laptop, they are going to want to be able to use all of it's features. Also no company seems to make sure their linux disto works on a laptop. I've heard stories from people who couldn't even get their laptops to boot the install disks.

There is a Linux Laptop Volunteer Support Database and a Linux on Laptops that contain large amounts of info on getting linux up and going on a laptop.

I've been running linux on a Fujitsu Lifebook E330 ever since I got it. I installed RH5.2 and then 6.0 on it without a problem. There was some problems when I needed to use the RH rescue disk to redo lilo when I upgraded my mini win98 partition (need this partition for the winmodem). The laptop did not want to boot the RH rescue disk. I had to use a slackware boot disk to get back into my linux partition. Other than that everything worked great. Got X and the soundcard working on the first shot. The only problem is that I can't use the winmodem and the IR.

I can see why some people would be turned off to using linux on a latop if they can't use all of the hardware (winmodem/IR/etc.). If somebody spends the money for a laptop, they are going to want to be able to use all of it's features. Also no company seems to make sure their linux disto works on a laptop. I've heard stories from people who couldn't even get their laptops to boot the install disks.

There is a Linux Laptop Volunteer Support Database and a Linux on Laptops that contain large amounts of info on getting linux up and going on a laptop.

Actually, it seems closer to Babble (markov-chain based learning algorithm; really fun. There's a web port somewhere at CMU, and I have the DOS executable if you want it--contact me via e-mail).

Also, people should read "The PAckerhaus Method" by Gene Wolfe (in _Storeys from the old Hotel_, IIRC), which trapses over similar ground.

Hell, for that matter, I wrote a hyperfiction with this as its central theme, it's The OmegaWare Project.

1600's Calvinist totalitarians (Pilgrims on a journey my ass) escape the wrath of Catholic totalitarians

Salem. Nuff said.

1770's Unpopular Declaration of Independence discussed behind closed doors. All who wanted to be in had to sign. This meant if they were found or the war lost they would be shot.

Big debate on women voting too.

'Course it wasn't too long before we pulled a Columbus on Indians, Mexico.

So don't be surprised. We need a more direct response to this.

When Germany ordered Jews to wear yellow markers, all of Denmark wore them without even thinking twice. It was obvious what they had to do.

So start encrypting long repetitititions of "Mom, I'm at the store. I'll bring my commie friends home tonight."

Check out

Freenet

Ompages

Link Farm

They're trying to reinvent the Earth and conquer it before people get their rightful share. If you really don't want to see pedophiles on the net, your best bet is to claim some part of the net and get over your fears. Otherwise we're guaranteed to see the net auctioned off to superpowers and rampant with crime. There's too much power in it for the assholes to pass up.


Go see Senate on the net and House on th net

I took Ed Nather's Astronomy in Science Fiction class at UT in the spring of 1997.

God, was that man cool.

I had previously read The Story of Mel, but it wasn't until just now that I put the two together.

He got his Bacherlors in 1947, and his Doctorate in 1972 (I had a bad habit of checking out my prof's credentials). I always meant to ask him what he did for those 25 years; now I guess I know.

Check out Ed's work with the Whole Earth Telescope sometime. It's pretty cool.

Don Negro

I just fell in love with Turbo Pascal 3 the first time I used it. That was the first dev tool I used under DOS. Before that I'd used BASIC on a computer called BBC Micro -- a 6502-based system that ran at 1 MHz and had 32 KB RAM. If I remember right, TP was a 40 KB COM file that had an integrated editor *and* a compiler. Amazing what it could do! I think Borland scaled great heights with TP 5.5. Units rocked. Their online help system was too good. The compiler used to be so fast on my NEC V20-based XT clone, that I used to used to repeatedly compile and and let the IDE move to the error position for errors like misspelled variables which I could have found and fixed myself.

Ahhhh, the good old days!

I tracked down a copy of the *original* advertisement that Borland used to launch Turbo Pascal. Legend has it that BYTE magazine agreed to run the ad on credit because Kahn sweet-talked then into it. I scanned in copy from the Nov 1983 issue of BYTE. See http://www.ece.utexas.edu/~ranga/ads/borland.html

Internet Overview

• Internet Timeline

Technical History

• Charles Spurgeon's Ethernet Web Site (several Ethernet historical documents here).
• I have a printed copy of an ALOHANET analysis, but can't seem to find one online.

Concept History

• As We May Think
• Project Xanadu ("Computer Lib/Dream Machines")
• The Cathedral and the Bazaar

Well, let's hope he finds the real information, such as Spurgeon's Ethernet Web Site [and a historical Ethernet drawing] rather than amateur histories and wrong information such as "collision level of 10% is bad".

Maybe they should add the encheferizer to babelfish. Unfortunately, it only goes english -> swedish, though.

Another multi-lingual translation service along the same lines:

Chef/Jive/ValSpeak/Pig Translator

bork bork bork

Don't forget about the Ganymede GASH 2 project. This looks like it's going to be a full blown directory managment platform. It's released under GPL too.

Sigh. That old myth. Look at the first paper on this page. One of the designers of Ethernet tested it. Drove it at almost 100% of 10Mbps. A bunch of workstations on the net.

The "Texas Persistent Store", developed at the University of Texas, is an object persistence database similar to ODI's ObjectStore. I've never used Texas myself, and it may not have been kept up to date, but I've done considerable programming with ObjectStore, and it's a great way to store and retrieve C++ objects.

Objectstore has a couple of very appealing features: first, it requires no modifications at all to the class definitions of stored objects, and requires no special inheritance. Second, it's fast -- objects are paged into memory, there's no overhead to access them.

ObjectStore probably isn't available for linux, but if Texas has been kept up to date with g++, then it's worth at least a look.

See texas* at ftp://ftp.cs.utexas.edu/pub/garbage/"

--JT

We have developed a server designed for maintaining and managing NIS and DNS information. It's not designed as a full-fledged object database, but the server does include logic for transactions, namespaces, and journalling, as well as a customizable schema.

The URL is http://www.arlut.utexas.edu/gash2

As the member of the UT research group that actually assembled the cluster and ran the tests, they were comparable in terms of execution time and speedup. Our cluster of 300 MHz PIIs with 440LX motherboards, the cluster was about 1.8 times slower than the MHPCC SP, which uses 160 MHz P2SC thin nodes. Using 400 MHz PIIs with 440BX motherboards (and also 400 MHz Xeons), the cluster is as fast as the MHPCC SP.

As for case color, the SP definately outperforms the cluster. Rows of beige cases on metal shelves hardly compare to black refridgerator-sized boxes with more blinking lights. Maybe if we build a cluster of the new SGI boxes...

I would have liked to see more details of our work in the article, but the reporter just wanted to verify that the Hess results weren't out of line. You can find more details of our results at http://topeka.cpge.utexas.edu. Feel free to email me if you'd like specific details that aren't on the webpage.


-jason