Posts by pyite

Boffinry listicle MADNESS: ONE THING you need to know about CHAMELEONS

Check out cuttlefish sometime

They are even more interesting as far as their control of skin color.

Should online pirates get the same sentences as offline ones?

The term "pirate" is a propaganda coup

You make a good point here. The fact that most people refer to unauthorized copying (which neither hurts anyone physically nor takes anything away from them) as 'pirating' (when pirates kill people and steal their sh!t) is ridiculous.

There is a case to be made that artificially-constituted "crimes" such as intellectual property are useful to society in a macro-economic sense. However, it should never be a criminal case and the police should never waste their time with it. Copyright holders should be required to file individual lawsuits and only for provable direct damages.

Grab your pitchforks: Ubuntu to switch to systemd on Monday

After the shitstorm of upstart, this is a welcome change

The last reliable version of Ubuntu server was 9.10. 10.04, and all subsequent Ubuntu releases, have the most unreliable boot process imagineable -- known as "upstart." I was a huge Ubuntu advocate until 10.04, now I hate it with a passion thanks to all the times the boot process pauses forever without any indication why or any way to fix the problem (it is still painful 4 years later -- for example try adding an nfs mount to /etc/fstab where the nfs server is having a problem).

I upgraded my Debian system to a version that uses upstart, and it was quite a bit better thanks to the sysvinit compatibility option. Maybe in the future it will be possible to count on Ubuntu actually booting up all the way again.

YEAR of the PENGUIN: A Linux mobile in 2015?

Re: Will it .. could it..

I'm looking forward to a phone that can run as an X server with an attached monitor & keyboard. Then you can just plug it into whatever hardware you have and get the same desktop. I don't think they're quite powerful enough to do 3840x2160 yet, though.

Careful with the "systemd" comments, Eugene

It is not fair to rip on systemd in Debian without pointing out how Ubuntu added the worst startup system imagineable - known as "upstart." systemd would be a huge improvement.

No NAND's land: Flash will NOT take over the data centre

Re: "what comes after is breathing heavily down the neck of flash"

In my experience, people use "spinning rust" in the same condescending and passive-aggressive way as "legacy."

Why, hello there, Foxy... BYE GOOGLE! Mozilla's browser is a video star

Screen sharing support?

Does this app enable screen sharing? It appears that the only usable screen sharing apps are Skype and WebEx. It would be great to have an alternative.

Tom38: you rightly point out the typical chicken-and-egg problem with new apps - many people won't want to use it until there is a large user base.

However, there is a need for a standards-based protocol with GPL apps to use it. Hopefully Firefox will succeed at this without the rollout problems with protocols such as CalDAV.

Re: Well, I've had it with Firefox

How about IceWeasel? That is the best browser of all time.

systemd row ends with Debian getting forked

This is a legitimate complaint

If Ubuntu's totally disastrous experience with "upstart" is anything to go by, the Devuan complaint about systemd is quite reasonable.

Upstart has ruined Ubuntu Server. Due to inexplicable boot problems it has not been an acceptable server platform starting with the day that 10.04 came out. Some applications (e.g. OpenStack) work better with Ubuntu so sometimes it is acceptable, but without such a compelling reason it is total insanity to use Ubuntu Server.

I have been extremely wary of systemd due to how terrible upstart is. If they designed it so it's easy to make a guess about the boot order and write out sysvinit compatible S/K boot files, then it may be an acceptable alternative. Otherwise, when the time comes I'll upgrade my Squeeze server to Devuan instead of a newer Debian release.

CoreOS's Docker-rival Rocket: We drill into new container contender

lxc or openvz?

Are these systems still stuck with lxc or do they work properly with openvz?

Multi-petabyte open sorcery: Spell-binding storage

pNFS - block & object

IIRC, the pNFS spec is supposed to have an API for block & object storage too. Is this the case, and if so is anyone offering this functionality yet?

Ten Linux freeware apps to feed your penguin

Shutter vs. mate-screenshot or gnome-screenshot

Are there any advantages over using the classic mate-screenshot tool? It lets you choose the whole screen, a window, or an area that you can select with the mouse. The results end up in the clipboard to paste into whatever image app you prefer.

Re: GIMP

That's fine as long as it doesn't require !#$^!#$ upstart.

Re: GIMP

I bring out the GIMP regularly, it has sure come a long way since I first tried it (when Bill Clinton was in office)

Yes, you heard me – the storage infrastructure WARS are over

Half hour boot times

You said "we wouldn't tolerate a system that took a half an hour to boot in today's world."

I wish this were the case, but server POST times are now the biggest headache in all of IT, with practically every server taking 5 minutes and many are over 10 when loaded with memory. I have to deal with new hardware from all major vendors, sometimes requiring many reboots to get things just right. On my last big project, a majority of my "working" time was spent staring at POST screens. SuperMicro is about the only vendor who seems to be resisting this disturbing trend, but only because they suck a little less than the others.

It is time for IT customers of the world to unite against this nightmare. The problem actually comes down to the fact that people working on the servers are typically not the same people making the purchasing decisions.

Somewhat of a tangent, I'll admit, but this particular premise is clearly wrong.

'Tech giants who encrypt comms are unwittingly aiding terrorists', claims ex-Home Sec Blunkett

Fixing global warming will aid the terrorists too

And goddamn it, terrorists drink tap water too so we had better put a stop to clean drinking water.

Words to put dread in a sysadmin's heart: 'We are moving our cloud from Windows to Linux'

Re: More AC pro-MS propaganda.

amanfromarse: many companies make these kinds of decisions without asking any hands-on techies for their opinions.

Just a couple of examples I have had to deal with: an acquisition and at another job we had a board member who pushed out a private OpenStack system in favor of a different cloud system that he had invested in.

Re: Stupid question

ratfox: Finding Linux admins is just as easy.

Finding Linux admins willing to take a pay cut to match Windows admin salaries is the hard part.

Yes, yes, Steve Jobs. Look what I'VE done for you lately – Tim Cook

That should probably be "führer"

Though I really prefer the u with the angry eyes: ǚ

Microsoft, Docker bid to bring Linux-y containers to Windows: What YOU need to know

zzzzz, Virtuozzo did this many years ago

It is always fun to see a rehash of 10 year old technology introduced as the hot new thing.

Swsoft marketing really dropped the ball somewhere.

Zippy one-liners, broken promises: Doctor Who on the Orient Express

Spot on review

I was thinking the same thing as the headline. It was the most fun since the Godfather scene in the first episode.

Nvidia's screaming new Maxwell GPUs bring 4K gaming to notebooks

Where do you find a laptop with NVidia?

Is it possible to get an NVidia laptop these days? I have only seen Intel for the last couple of years.

Oracle will 'kill MySQL' and steal its users? Ha ha, haha, ha. Seriously, we won't – Oracle exec

Thank you GPL

It is impossible to kill a GPL project that has sufficient momentum. Worst case there will be too many forks to manage.

Microsoft splurges 2½ INSTAGRAMS buying Minecraft maker Mojang

Scale relative to the size of players

In Minecraft, every block is basically one cubic meter and players are 2 blocks tall.

Re: well...

> Be fair - Skype was always crap.

Crap compared to what exactly?

As a long time Microsoft loather, I have to give them credit for keeping Skype alive. It is still the only screen sharing software that is usable at all... even WebEx is a total fail these days. GoToMeeting never worked, Lync's sipe plugin for Pidgin is also useless, etc, etc, etc.

Kind of ironic that Microsoft is the company making Linux screen sharing possible.

Re: WTF?

My son and I play a good bit of Minecraft, so here is my $.02.

The reason Minecraft Is attractive is because it is a whole platform, not just a game. I see a couple of possibilities:

1) They wanted the social network. The built-in chat system is just as primitive as the blocky graphics, but to teens and tweeners it is like IRC for the next generation. The chat users alone are certainly worth more than, say, ICQ. From what I understand, it is the most popular Xbox game. And of course, look at how popular Minecraft-related videos are on YouTube! One of these youtubers even got a cameo in the Lego movie (the SPACESHIP!!!!! guy)

2) Minecraft has a one time charge for a username, and the game & most server content are free for the rest of eternity. This means that people who play a different game for awhile still come back to Minecraft. As long as MS doesn't screw it up, they will be able to control the content of the default "portal" for millions of users.

3) Less certain, but possible: Minecraft is a platform to add on paid content (such as the new Realms feature). I'm sure they see some kind of licensing revenue from the Minecraft server community too though they need to be careful not to screw this up. Nothing kills a project's momentum more than having to deal with stupid licensing issues. Admittedly, licensing is the basis of Microsoft's success and the only area where Microsoft is truly the most innovative company in the world.

4) There is a whole generation of new programmers who are learning how to program using Java and dev tools other than Visual Studio. Longer term, they may be able to get a lot of developers to start using the M$ tools by default.

Mark

p.s. if Microsoft can end the worst part of Minecraft culture -- how people put mods and resource packs on site like adf.ly -- I will be ecstatic. These micropayment sites with their gazllion fake "Download" links are unbelievably annoying.

Banking apps: Handy, can grab all your money... and RIDDLED with coding flaws

One egregious example

My bank's web app has a nice two step authentication process.

However, if you bring up their mobile site you just get a single login/password screen.

L4ME!

Six of the best gaming keyboard and mouse combos

IBM Model M + Razer Naga

My first keyboard was the original IBM PC, so nothing feels as natural as the good old Model M. This keyboard gives me the fastest typing speed, and it has adjustable keycaps. For example I replaced the WASD keys with arrows to help my kids figure out how to move around.

The prices on Model M's are getting a lot higher too, so it may even be a good fit for this list. They are quite annoyingly loud, though, which can cause trouble on Mumble -- not to mention whoever is sitting next to you.

The Razer Naga is the classic multi-button gaming mouse, 12 thumb buttons so you never have to reach for the top row of your keyboard or scroll through 10 items to switch weapons. Just make sure you never own one out of warranty, they are fragile!

GitHub.io killed the distro star: Why are people so bored with the top Linux makers?

Overblown

The top distros have become so ingrained to the open source world that they are invisible.

A bigger test would be if Ubuntu skipped a release -- if nobody cared then it would be a big problem.

AMD unveils 'single purpose' graphics card for PC gamers and NO ONE else

"Best in class" means good VDPAU support

So I don't think ATI has a chance.

Docker kicks KVM's butt in IBM tests

Re: Not surprising

Try OpenVZ, it has a ton of tweaking features like this. I still can't figure out why Docker and LXC re-invented the wheel (poorly)

How does this compare to Virtuozzo?

Containers have been the fastest VM technology for a decade thanks to Virtuozzo and OpenVZ. How do these two newer technologies compare?

Bombs away: BiTMICRO dives into enterprise PCIe flash pool

Fusion SX power

FYI the Fusion-io SX cards are limited to using 21 watts of power, and available up to 6 terabytes. How can BitMICRO claim that they have the highest capacity per watt?

Retiring Reg hack explains how bass playing = tech reporting

Cactus

I hope you get to spend plenty of retirement time rolling in your Fuego. Thanks, and enjoy!

OpenStack Icehouse: IT'S ALIVE! – live migration, that is

Please correct your use of "live migration"

I was just about to call you an idiot because OpenStack and libvirt have supported live migration of VM's between nodes for years.

Instead, you are an idiot for using this term to refer to an upgrade path :)

Mark

Red Hat bets on 'Project Atomic' for its container-loaded server future

ZZZZ -- Virtuozzo did this 10+ years ago

OpenVZ is fantastic at this, I've been using it for quite awhile. LXC isn't quite ready for prime time compared to what OpenVZ can -- if only their kernel patches weren't so difficult to integrate.

The area where Docker can help is making generic distros boot under containers. Due to the different boot environment, this can be painful. Upstart-based distros like Ubuntu are practically unusable in containers.

WIMPs wipe each other out in giant radiating spot at galaxy's centre

How do these particles interact with black holes anyway

I am not a physicist, but I would expect dark matter to fall into black holes the same way as ordinary matter -- but the interactions near the event horizon would probably be different than what happens with normal matter. This is the opposite of what some of the observations show, however. From what I understand, dark matter seems to collect in rings that form on the edge of galaxies.

I really wish a science book from 1000 years in the future would show up some time soon since we will probably all be dead before we figure this out.

Hyper-V telling fibs about Linux guest VMs

It's not done 'til Lotus won't run

They have a long history of this kind of passive-aggressive treatment.

For the longest running example, if you have a Linux partition in your system Windows still shows it as "Unknown" -- even though the 82 partition type code has been in use for 20 years.

Dying for an Ubuntu Linux phone? Here's how much it'll cost you

I am still waiting for a convergence type of device. If it runs Ubuntu, I should be able to plug in a USB keyboard and HDMI monitor and run X with enough power to do a browser, ssh sessions, LibreOffice. Obviously it must be able to do Bluetooth phone calls at the same time.

I would pay big money for something like this -- especially if it could do VDPAU or at least VA-API.

Mark

Home lab operators: Ditch your servers ... now!

Partially a great article

The good part: you are spot on about laptops being the way to go. They are designed to have the best per-watt performance possible and have a built-in UPS. I use these plus a couple of rack-mount Atom machines to handle most of my VM needs, with just one Xeon server remaining to run my NAS/SAN software and VM's that require more CPU power.

However, how much do M$ and VMware pay you for this kind of coverage? Considering how painfully expensive their software is, nobody who uses it should ever be concerned about their power bill because you are already doing the equivalent of wiping your ass with 100 euro bills.

The best way to achive high levels of VM density is to use container VM's with Virtuozzo (OpenVZ, same thing) or other container based software. If you need a hypervisor there are several different ways to use qemu-kvm for this -- either use it straight from the command line, or manage one machine with libvirt, or manage a set of physical servers with OpenStack. I'm having a hard time figuring out why VMware hasn't yet followed PowerQuest into complete redundancy and obsolescence.

New Doctor Who's new costume newly REVEALED by Beeb

Re: Right wingish

Eccleston wasn't exactly a hippie.

Only one thing missing

He needs a piece of celery on his lapel.

Haswell micro: Intel’s Next Unit of Computing desktop PC

The problem is that you can't play the video well without NVidia. There needs to be a way to get decent video hardware on this thing, even a 9400m would be a big improvement.

NVidia video required

NVidia has by far the best support for hardware decoding -- how do you get NVidia video onto this device?

NVidia seems to be doing a terrible job of hardware support these days, I don't see an upgrade path for my Atom 1 unless I give up VDPAU.

I want to play with VMs

Linux + KVM + libvirt is easy

First a comment about hardware - just about any hardware is going to do fine with hypervisors these days, just make sure you can load up on memory for your expected set of VM's.

I have worked with many systems and the easiest way to get started using free software is to load your favorite Linux distro (I recommend Ubuntu 12.04) and load libvirtd. This is a very basic VM database that will manage your VMs. Once you have this installed you can just point it an an ISO to install from disc, or download a pre-installed OS such as the Ubuntu UEC images.

The most annoying part will probably be setting up bridged networking, but these components are all quite mature so 5 minutes on Google should be all you need.

libvirt is designed to manage VM's on one system. Once you have the hang of libvirt, try OpenStack -- it builds on libvirt and has a more advanced OS image system. This will let you have multiple servers and more advanced networking and automation -- if you need it. Best of all, this software will all cost you $0.

Good luck,

Mark

'It's a joke!' ... Bill Gates slams Mark Zuckerberg's web-for-the-poor dream

Obviously Zuckerberg's idea is self-serving, but there would be some benefit to everyone in the world having access to, say, WebMD. It isn't as good as proper medical care but it would certainly help.

Mark

Listen, Google and Amazon: Soon we may not even use tape for COLD STORAGE

Heads vs. platters

I wonder if it would be feasible to separate the disk heads and platters. This would make the economics more similar to tape since the likelihood of platters failing is quite small. But my guess is that it would be way too difficult to keep out the dust.

Dell spits up storage revenues after gobbling promising upstarts

EqualLogic and Compellant anecdote

The lack of native NAS protocols is exactly the problem. Dell's acquisition strategy was terrible since they bought two SAN companies and zero NAS companies.

At my last job we tried a couple of EqualLogic units and considered Compellant, but NetApp won in the end because it could do both iSCSI and NFS.

Vulcan? Not on our tiny balls. Pluto moons named Kerberos, Styx

Vulcan was a bad name

Pluto is close to absolute zero -- you can't name a planed Vulcan if there are no volcanoes.