Slashback: Plexion, Kernelism, Salaryness

The list grows of how many OSes Plex86 can boot. Soon you may have an easier time of installing a new kernel (besides turning to page 207 of Running Linux). SAGE wants to know the intimate, personal, steamy details of how much you earn as a SysAdmin. Also, not everyone trusts the proposed data-escrow deal involving Celera and Science. All below, in this episode of Slashback.

Plex those muscles, yeah, and one and two and three ... dhunley expressed himself thusly: "A handful of days after getting Dos, Win95, and Linux to boot, Plex86 does it again! Initial support for booting QNX now works! Screenshot is here!" And shortly thereafter, the very same dhunley wrote: "Plex86 boots NT 4.0! Well, at least to the login dialog box. This is an old bochs disk image file. The mods will be uploaded to CVS soon."

Thanks, d. Watch out soon for an interview with bochs and plex86 lead Kevin Lawton, who promises to take time out from his busy schedule to tell you what's up in the worlds of emulation and virtualization.

While you're here, why not take a tour of the whinery? Apropros the wacky things that people have decided to put in the kernel lately (like GNOME ORBit), Booker writes: "Every time there's a major new kernel release, there's whining on Slashdot about killing uptime, and how much it sucks to have to reboot to get a new kernel. Well, whine no more.

Erik Hendriks at scyld.com brings us Two Kernel Monte, a 'kernel module which allows Linux to load another kernel image into RAM and restart the machine from that kernel.' The only major limitation appears to be that it will not work with SMP machines. Apparently Erik got the idea from the Linux Bios Project."

Now if some smart distribution maker (anyone, anyone) were to integrate that into their updates system, would that be so wrong?

We join this survey already in progress: Marketing Manager writes: "Anyone who's been in the job market knows how tough it is to find information about salaries and compensation. For system administrators, the search is compounded by the varieties of tasks, talents and responsibilities required to get the job done. Now there's something you can do to fix this.

SAGE invites you to participate in the 2000 System Administrator Salary Survey starting December 1, 2000. This annual survey is part of SAGE's ongoing effort to advance Systems Administration as a profession through information and advocacy. By participating in this survey, you join thousands of system administrators in examining the market and defining compensation according to your talents, your location, and your technical prowess."

So now you can find out where you stand in comparison to others with similar positions, perhaps a valuable bargaining chip come contract renewal (or incentive to check out a new city). The results will be available early next year -- automatically sent to SAGE members, available by request to everyone else.

Number One, can't you do anything about that rabble? bluets writes: "Some leading scientists and open-source advocates are attempting to raise awareness that the Celera/Science Magazine deal is a 'Big Mistake.' More details [here]."

And if you didn't know about this, it's only because you're not opening the barrel-of-monkeys Slashdot Science Section often enough. We're considering an experiment where everyone who opens it gets a food pellet, and everyone who doesn't ... well, do we have to bring out the Punishment Stick?

Comments

Speaking of Celera and the Ilk

[Seumas]

I'm really surprised at the lack of media attention (that is, NONE) given to the purchase of the rights to index full genetic information for an entire population -- liberties granted by their own government for a fee.

Outside of specific groups like Slashdot and a few scientific journals, I have heard ZERO conversation on this in meat-space or meat-media.

Come on people -- real life makes The 6th Day look like a fucking walk through Disneyland.
---
seumas.com

Two Kernel Monte != Maintaining Uptime

[modus]

Two Kernel Monte stops you from a having to do a warm reboot of your system, but it is 100% equivalent to it, from the user perspective. The entire system, including the previously running kernel, is killed off and the new kernel is booted up. All you save is the 10 (or more) seconds waiting for your system to do a reboot. So, the whining will continue :-).

Kewlio

[cluge]

The ultimate advantage over NT. New kernel no reboot. That way you can compile a the kernel a couple of different ways and then test for performance advantages right then and there. Or is it, lets consider.....

Linux : built to your spec, optimize to your hearts content. Preserve uptime(ugh)

Windows : Change IP address reboot. Add protocol : reboot. Install program : reboot. Upgrade : reboot

MS has has won an important aspect in the ever lucrative server market. That is the "reboot" aspect. Reboots are becoming more and more popular. Reboots are now considered fun, they give sysadmins a good excuse for a traditional "coffee break". Reboots are familliar. What will sysadmins do without them? How will a sysadmin be able to wield his usual power. The phrase "We will be down for an upgrade!" no longer holds water! ACK what is Linux doing?? What are they thinking?? Are they putting us SYSADMINS out of business? Reducing our free time? I no longer strike fear into the hearts of lusers by saying "we have to upgrade the software on the server"

Do you realize just how difficult it is to write with my tongue so firmly stuck in my cheek?