I’m not entirely sure why, but I just couldn’t get the desire to have a new monitor out of my mind today. I’ve been using the same Samsung 17” Flat Screen CRT since I built my first computer in 2000, and it’s been great, but it’s 17” and it’s my primary entertainment. I was watching some TV today (torrent shifted) and I just couldn’t take it. I’ve been scoping HDTVs for ages now, but today I had a purpose. Before I was always scoping for a large TV for the living room I will someday have, today I was specifically shopping for a unit to replace my monitor in my bedroom, which actually meant a max size of 32”; given the purpose combined with my current budget I decided on a max of $600.
This morning I went out and did some serious comparisons on screens, including going down to 26” and looking at units well above my price range, what I found shocked me: There are a number of 32” units with tag prices from $499 to $599 in both LCD and Plasma varieties that exhibit wide variance in quality. Going into my search today I already had the idea that I wanted a Vizio, and I found both a plasma and LCD example in range, but that’s not what I bought. Of the variety of televisions that I found in range only a few actually had good image quality.
Although it’s generally frowned upon by the employees at the various stores I went to I futzed with the settings of the panels just to make sure they weren’t incorrectly calibrated, and generally found that the color quality in most of the panels suck. The ones that did have decent color generally had issues with white and black quality. I actually found an Emerson that had great color, but serious white issues: After carefully watching for a while I found that the whites didn’t contain well and a striped shirt just looked white, and sky with wispy clouds simply appeared a very light blue.
In the end the decision came down to two Vizios (a plasma and LCD) and a Sanyo. I know that Vizio has an excellent reputation for inexpensive HDTVs and I’d never heard anything about Sanyo HDTVs, so I was preferring the Vizio, but I couldn’t shake the quality of the Sanyo’s image. I couldn’t discount the Vizio Plasma as quickly as I should have, but it was the cheapest of the TVs by about $30 so it was really in the running up to the end. The problem with the Plasma is that the colors weren’t as vibrant as the other panels. I kept going back to that Plasma in part because it was right next to the washout Emerson mentioned above, but the colors really were muted and the whites really weren’t white.
The decision, ultimately, was down to the Vizio LCD and the Sanyo and, honestly, I didn’t really consider the Vizio that hard. The colors on the LCD panel were better than the plasma, but the Sanyo was just beautiful. The colors are rich, the blacks are black, the whites are white, and the off-whites are off-white. The image quality of the Sanyo actually matches the quality of much higher priced panels (such as the Sony). Although the internet is rather devoid of Sanyo HDTV reviews, and I still haven’t found a good one for the DP32648, I went with it anyway. I’ve owned Sanyo products with LCDs before and, although they may well not make the panel themselves, I’ve never had an issue.
It’s only been a few hours now, but this is a beautiful TV. The first thing I did was pull out my old CRT and connect the Sanyo to my Mac Mini via DVI-to-VGA and after scanning for displays I was able to output to the Sanyo at natural 720P. I’ve also run some coax into my room and found that my basic Comcast cable has a tone of digital channels which look absolutely beautiful on the Sanyo. As for the speakers: the computer audio is still going through my surround sound system, but the TV hasn’t been connected to it yet so I have watched a little with the speakers in the system and they aren’t bad. I have not, however, listened to a movie or any music so can’t really give a full judgement at this time. Besides that, I have a small room. It was, however, satisfactory for my channel surfing and a little FoodTV.
While I’ve only been watching for hours I must say that I’m extremely happy with my purchase: The image has been beautiful, color is spot on, and movement is smooth. I’m shocked that the price was so good, but will reserve my final judgement until I’ve got some more time with it.
by Matt at July 04, 2008 12:06 AM
These days it’s all about getting more mobile, also for me …
I have to split myself for my regular work and a project work that I am doing untill beginning of October. That means a lot more meetings and being available for both works (and then of course available for a lot more people), even when I am not in office. And not to forget, there is a lot more small things to do, and with my memory that’s almost impossible to keep track of. So I am quite happy with my work starting to test Notes Traveler, so I can now book meetings direct from my Windows Mobile-based phone (HTC4350). The Notes Traveler software provides mobile support for IBM Lotus Notes and IBM Lotus Domino Web Access users. It provides automatic, real-time replication of Lotus Domino e-mail (including attachments), calendar, address book, journal and to do lists. It supports access from Microsoft Windows Mobile 5 and 6 devices and will work over all wired and wireless connections. Today’s workforce is increasingly on the go. Businesses of all sizes are looking for ways to help their mobile workers be more productive-anytime, anywhere, so also at my work.
Well, at least that’s what I hope after having figured out how to set it up! If it works well for me, I will have problems choosing between the iPhone 2 and HTC Touch Pro. As much as I love my current iPhone, having full Lotus Notes/Domino support means a lot for me. And, I wonder how it will affect the long available CommonTime products that seem to currently be the product line of choice to get Lotus Notes and Windows Mobile devices working together. I am least I am looking forward to not buying the solution any more, and even more to not have to give support on it 
¨
Why not listen to this great podcast interview with enthusiastic Shawne Robinson - IBM Domino Product Manager for Mobile Messaging?
by frankps at June 27, 2008 06:34 AM
I really have creating lists of favorites. For onething I’ll usually look back at a favorites list later and smack my head, wondering why I’d left off X, Y, or Z. Honestly, it’s probably because they just didn’t come to mind. When I’m asked point blank about something that something usually crawls out my ear and heads off for a drink while I’m still trying to find it in my head. I was, however, recently asked to come up with a list of favorite movies, and here’s what I replied with (and it almost certainly differs from any other I’ve written; does my MySpace page list any of this?):
TV shows would be easy, plays and books at least have beginnings, but picking my 5 favorite movies is torturous.TV Shows:
1. Firefly
2. The West Wing
3. Studio 60
4. Invader ZIM
5. And the last spot, well, how can I choose between Quantum Leapand MacGuyver
If this wasn’t an asynchronous communication method you’d’ve seen those just come right out.
Plays:
1. J.B.
2. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead
3. Endgame
4. Arcadia
5. Inherit the Wind
6. Corporate Handbook Line 11Again, right there no problems.
Books:
1. God Bless You, Dr. Kevorkian
2. Snow Crash
3. Stranger in a Strange Land
4. Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal
5. Their Eyes Were Watching GodSlower, but still not nearly as hard as picking a movie.
Movies? I’m a videophile with eclectic taste. Sure The Cell is stunning visually, but does it really make the top? The Princess Bride is an ever standing classic, but is it really one of the best? Okay, here we go:
1. Baz Luhrmann’s Red Curtain Trilogy (Strictly Ballroom / Romeo + Juliet / Moulin Rouge)
2. Leon – The Professional
3. Hedwig and the Angry Inch
4. Boondock Saints
5. The Sword in the Stone
by Matt at June 26, 2008 02:04 PM
by Matt at June 25, 2008 03:33 PM
I’ve started using the early public beta of Skype 4.0 for Windows, and I am not sure what to say. I am not used to instant messenger client covering the whole screen, and by the way the screen is 27″ Full HD. What is the purpose with making Skype in to a one window app? Will advanced users get the option to run Skype in multiple windows as before? I dislike having to scroll down a long buddylist to see who have written to me. Another thing, is the important space used to show information about the person you are talking to. I guess most of us would be happy with just getting that as a small text info, a huge flag and a clock showing local time are both unneccessary for most of us!
I am working at a university, and have scientists/researchers working with colleagues around the world, so Skype is an obvious choice for communication. But so far, we have also needed to use other tools and some of them are Web 2.0 applications. My professors are helding keynotes and speaches of conferences regularly, and just last week I saved my department for 2-3 plane tickets to Santa Barbra. Saving money and non-productive traveling time are of course important, but more important is the environmental perspective.
The sad thing is, every time they need help with holding a keynote from their office, we are introduced to a new tool. Software might need to be bought and installed, and some times the solution depends on nagware like Real Player. My biggest hope is that Skype could get functionality to import Powerpoint presentations and that it can make them in to HTML slides that can be used next to a video conference. This functionality would be perfect for Skype, imagine how many researchers are travelling around in the world only to hold presentations that are to last an hour or less?
by frankps at June 22, 2008 10:37 AM
It is funny to see that books are going through their biggest change in nearly 400 years. They are starting to migrated to electronic reading devices. So called “ebooks”, such as Amazon’s Kindle, the Sony eBook, Booken Cybook and the iLiad, enable you to read on a device lighter than a paperback with electronic ink. The ebook can be read comfortably in almost any light conditions, including on beaches. It has no need for a backlit screen that fades away at inopportune moments. In other words an almost perfect device better than traditional books: They save paper and can be reproduced at low cost; users can increase the type size and read while eating, using a finger as a page-turner and already today thousands of books can legally be downloaded from the web.
This has made the Norwegian book industry go offensive. The Norwegian Bokhandlerforeningen has learned from the music industry, who for years have been on the defence in relation to consumers with new MP3 players. Bookstores have already equipped their employees with digital eBook readers, so that they can get to know the technology before the regular readers start buying e-books. The committee working on introducing eBooks in Norway has no authority to determine prices, but suggests fixed price also on e-books. This price will probably 30 - 50 % lower than in today’s paper based books, but still a bit higher then the current paperback books. When the bookstores start selling eBooks, readers will get a six pages reading demo of each. The online shop Amazon has had such an offer in place for years.
Internationally we have seen with so many innovations, that manufacturers try to build their devices with their “own” locked format (for example iTMS), in the hope that they will become the standard for the world or to simply milk the market! Sony’s eBook only offers the books Sony wants to sell (without Internet access) and the same goes with Amazon and their Kindle. The unique about this Norwegian variation of book samples is that it has been able, through cooperation between publishers, to create one solution, in stead of each bookstore chain making their own! This will turn out to be a brilliant tactical move. We have a dusin Norwegian online music shop, all of them running their own solution. I guess that is one of the main reasons for iTunes Music Store great success.
I can’t wait getting my hands on some eBooks in Norwegian. I love my Cybook, and have read 6 books on it already. Sadly the time estimate for the “tipping point” for digital book distribution is still 2 - 5 years away. They are probably not far from the truth, as the consumers need more reading devices on the market. The bookstores will then also have installed so-called print on demand. Using a 1-2 square feet “Espresso Book Machine”, the stores will be able to print out a book in the time it takes to drink an espresso (about 3 minutes). The eBooks will of course be equipped with a DRM-solution, and that is understandable. Authors can not as easily as musicians go on tours and play their music.
O’Reilly is probably the first big computer book house going digital. They this month announced that they will offer a select number of books as a bundle of three ebook formats (EPUB, PDF, and Kindle-compatible Mobipocket) for a single price at or below the book’s cover price, and they are starting early next month. These are the first books out: iPhone: The Missing Manual, Windows Vista: The Missing Manual, Facebook: The Missing Manual, Making Things Happen, Open Sources 2.0, The Art of Agile Development and Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, 3ed. This is a nice pilot project and all the books will be released without any DRM, but with some custom watermarking options. The great thing is that with these three formats, customers should be able to read the books with most current ebook software and devices. I am a bit sceptical to reading computer books in ebook formats (.epub and mobipocket), cause of all the screenshots. But I will buy the missing manual for Vista, just to have a try.
by frankps at June 22, 2008 08:08 AM
At last year’s National Homebrewers Conference I met Lucy Saunders
I’ve contemplated this sauce many a time and still don’t understand it fully. I actually lived on Brighton Ave in Allston about three blocks from the Sunset, yet rarely ate while I was drinking and never tried anything with this sauce, so I can’t say exactly how it’s supposed to taste. What I can say is that when I made it the banana disappeared; the abundance of ketchup, molasses, and soy sauce actually made this taste pretty standard (for an asian influenced barbecue sauce). I was, however, intrigued by the idea of actually tasting banana on grilled meats so I contemplated how to rework the sauce, and this is what I did:
I combined the ingredients in a blender, then cooked them in a saucier over medium-low heat for about an hour. After cooking the garlic was still chewy and had a raw bite, but after sitting for a day it’d mellowed into deliciousness; if you want to use it immediately you could definitely cook it longer, and maybe hotter.
I’ve been quick grilling pork chops and putting this on them, and it’s magnificent. The banana caramelizes beautifully, providing an extremely unique, but not over powering, flavor that works well with the pork (and would probably be quite good on chicken as well).
by Matt at June 21, 2008 04:25 PM
Branch code has been frozen and spun off for Firefox 2.0.0.15. I went ahead and pushed to BeBits, even though 2.0.0.15 does not appear to have been pushed to main platforms yet. My calendar is getting full and I didn't want to miss it. No major BeOS updates, just a couple of security and cross-platform fixes.
THIS HACK DECREASES THE SAFETY OF THE KITCHENAID FOOD PROCESSOR AND IS NOT RECOMMENDED BY THE AUTHOR. THIS ARTICLE IS INTENDED FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY AND THESE STEPS ARE NOT MEANT TO BE REPLICATED; ANY ALTERATIONS TO KITCHENAID PRODUCTS SHOULD BE MADE BY LICENSED KITCHENAID TECHNICIANS.
One of the features of the KitchenAid ultra wide mouth food processors (such as the KFP760
The reason this is the case is because there are three bars on the inside of the plunger:
(this is a post hack picture, before the hack there was a third bar in the bottom middle of the picture between the two other bars—it was where the rough patch is), these bars push levers inside the feed tube,
which cause a tab to stick out of the bottom of the lid.
This tab fits into a slot at the top of the handle of the work bowl
, which causes a cone to pop out at the bottom of the bowl.
This cone fits into the food processor base and is what allows the motor to function. What bothers me about this process is that the “securely” state of the plunger is about two inches into the feed tube and prevents larger items (such as a quarter head of cabbage) from being fed into the processor. The question then became how could the process be alter so that the plunger doesn’t have to be inserted for the motor to function.
Since this is a simple mechanical mechanism all that really needs to be done is the button on the base needs to be pushed and the motor will work, so there are three spots that could be modified:
I decided that to allow larger items to be fed through the tube without sacrificing too much safety the best option was to modify the lid. The modification pretty clearly needed to be one which simulated the levers being pushed by the plunger at all times so that the tab would be exposed and the lid could simply be twisted into place without the plunger at all. This is where an examination of the levers inside the feed tube started. What I found is that, when facing the levers, the one on the left is a lock mechanism, this must be pushed down before the other levers can be activated. The one on the right is actually the engagement lever: the one which causes the tab to be exposed for inserting into the bowl. This right lever is attached to the middle one, which isn’t a lever at all. The middle goove contains a catch.
The plunger’s three tabs are different lengths to fulfill the different tasks based upon which groove the go into. The longest tab, which is the length of the plunger, is on the left and presses the lock lever so that the other trigger can be pressed. The right tab is shorter than the left, coming to only about an inch of the bottom of the plunger. The middle tab is only about an inch long, and is placed at the bottom of the plunger. This arrangement means tha the left tab can release the lock and the middle tab can go below the catch before the right tab presses the activation lever which moves the catch into place and exposes the tab at the base of the lid. This method means that if everything is pinned into place so the tab on the bottom of the lid is exposed then, because of the catch groove, the plunger will either be stuck in the feed tube or will fail to come out of it.
The solution actually centers around that middle groove. To allow the feed tube to go in and out while the catch is down I used a dremel with multisaw attachment
by Matt at June 16, 2008 11:26 PM
comSocket = comListener.AcceptSocket(); is a blocking call. If you try to call Abort() on a thread that hasn’t received a socket connection yet everything hangs.
by Matt at June 10, 2008 04:10 PM
I have long been waiting for a decent Lotus Notes client for MacOS X 10.5, but today I tested the public beta of Lotus Notes v8.5. The installer has a small bug, so you have to check that Notes should be your default e-mail client, other wise the installer crashes. The application itself seems to be stable (I would almost say rock solid), and I have not managed to crash it so far.
This version is a multi-user version. Previous versions I have tried for Mac, has installed the user data in a subfolder of the Applications folder. The needed configurations were done in two minutes, and as I am using roaming profiles, I needed another minute to download my user data. Only negative thing I have to say about Lotus Notes 8.5, is what happened to the great template that was used in the public beta of v8.0? Group calendars don’t necessarily have to be boring!
After having installed Lotus Notes, I went on trying to install Pocketmac GoBetween to be able to synchronize with my iPhone. The installer didn’t follow the standards for how we install software on Macs, and I had to temporary give my normal user account admin privileges. That should have been unnecessary! Secondly I only managed to sync Addressbook with Lotus Notes. I didn’t manage to sync calendar entries and todos. Sync of contacts didn’t support special European letters, as for instance the Norwegian letters Æ, Ø and Å. Problems also appeared with letters like Ö and É.
by frankps at June 09, 2008 05:31 PM
Haiku has some nice locking primitives, I have an older rewritten NSPR. Both should improve speed quite a bit.
Oh, and how about dropping support for BeOS and Zeta?
Update:
NSPR is working fine and fast, only thing left is switch to Haiku locking primitives.
After that it is probably time to figure out how to run the packaging script while crosscompiling, and that damn redraw problem.
Yesterday was an exceptional good day for my blog, normally I have a little bit less then 200 readers. Yesterday I had 315!
I love the plugin Blog Stats for Wordpress, it shows me what readers of my blog are interested in. I have known for a while that the topic HDTV is hot, just the two last days I’ve had 75 readers wanting to learn more about HDTV, next generation DVD (Blu-ray and HD DVD).
It also fun to see my articles about syncronization with Lotus Notes are popular, and that they like the articles about the holidays that I have made.
by frankps at June 03, 2008 05:46 PM
I think that Stippi is reading this blog from time to time, so I'm sending him a message :)
As Axel increased BLooper's message queue to 200 today I was curious if that might not be what is the big problem behind our redrawing issue under Haiku. This because we may take a lot of time when dealing with messages which may allow it to fill up faster than we can manage. (Shame on us).
Luroh who had a freshly built version of Haiku tested and he said he didn't experience any redrawing issues. Update: Apparently it's still there.
After that we went for punch and pie. Not really, but this is my story. Anyway I suspect that this might be the case and I will probably run some tests. Feel free to come with ideas, fix the issue or just not read this post :)
wait(1000) != sleep(1000)
by Matt at May 29, 2008 09:33 PM
As much as I hate to jump on the bandwagon, but 8.04 is still not as usable for me as 7.10 was 
The biggest annoyance is that usb devices aren’t automounted. Stick in a USB memory stick, formatted as fat32 or ext2, and nothing happens. Looking at dmesg shows it’d detcted and devfs does it’s thing, but then nothing. In previous versions of Ubuntu it would be mounted - exactly as you would expect and hope. Sometimes running “gnome-mount -d /dev/xxxx” will mount the device, but not always. Annoying
I do find it quite amazing that the Ubuntu team have released 8.04 with such a serious flaw, but looking around for solutions it seems I’m not the only one to experience this problem. Sadly my searching hasn’t found a solution and I’ve seen reports that people still using Ubuntu 7.10 have had the same problem, so reverting to that version probably isn’t an option
This is the first time I’ve run into serious problems with Ubuntu on the desktop, but I hope it’ll be the last!
Until recently an encrypted volume I was using was automounting, but now it’s the same as my other USB devices When i try and use gnome-mount to mount the drive, I get…
x40:~$ gnome-mount -vtd /dev/mapper/luks_crypto_xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx
gnome-mount 0.8
** (gnome-mount:17095): DEBUG: Mounting /org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/volume_part_1_size_0
GConf Error: Bad key or directory name: "/system/storage/default_options/(null)/fstype_override": `(' is an invalid character in key/directory names
** (gnome-mount:17095): DEBUG: Mounting /org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/volume_part_1_size_0 with mount_point='', fstype='', num_options=0
** Message: Mount failed for /org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/volume_part_1_size_0
org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.UnknownMethod : Method "Mount" with signature "ssas" on interface "org.freedesktop.Hal.Device.Volume" doesn't exist
Any Ubuntu folks have solutions or suggestions?
by david at May 28, 2008 06:47 PM
I have a confession to make, I have gotten myself an iPhone two days ago, and funnily enough yesterday TeliaSonera announced that they through Netcom will sell iPhones in Norway.
This is not to be a long review, to many have already written one. It is the best mobilephone I have had so far. I bought it despite it’s lack of support of MMS (you can send pictures as e-mail) and the lack of video recording. That the iPhone doesn’t support wireless headsets (bluetooth) doesn’t bother me either. I prefer proper headsets for the best possible music experience. A bigger problem is that I cannot surf with a higher speed then 200 kbps (EDGE). There is no support for UMTS or HSDPA. But again, I don’t browse to much with the inbuilt Safari browser, but I already see that I will be using the e-mail client a lot more then I have used on my previous phones. The same goes with instant messaging (Fring). They don’t need better mobile Internet connection then EDGE.
Here in Oslo, most coffee bars have free wireless, so the lack of UMTS and HSDPA is some what compensated with the many free wireless accesspoints we have available. And I am really looking forward to iPhone 2.0, as I then will be able to use our wireless solution (WPA Enterprise) at work.
I have an iPod Touch, so for me the user interface was not new, and it was therefor more fun to see my boss playing with the phone. If we find a working Lotus Notes syncronization solution for Windows, I guess his Windows Mobile telephone (Tytn 2) will be history. I will be using the Go Between syncronization application for MacOS X, and hope to be able to write a small little review about my experiences.
by frankps at May 28, 2008 12:53 PM
I've created BONE builds from the latest branch for use with Haiku.
Thunderbird
Firefox
Enjoy!
Hello all!
I'm now settled into the new job and will hopefully be able to focus a bit more time on Firefox. As I updated my 2.x branch code this morning, I noted a rather large number of commits coming down the line. It seems bug 419030 now has the 2.x branch picking up changes in the security components that were being missed.
Update: As usual, changes to the code have broken BeOS building. Here's the latest problem.
Update 2: ...or not broken. I restarted a clean build and everything was fine. Very odd; may point to bfs weirdness on my HD, as fyysik diagnosed once before. At any rate, updated code builds cleanly. Looks like this was a system error.
Last year was all about bio fuel, and that that environment friendly alternative was to save the world. It was all about it being a promising source of environmentally friendly energy that would also be a boon to the world’s farmers. What happened? The bio fuel alternative hit massive criticsm, and goverments accross the world were forced to stop and start thinking. Skeptics argue that biofuel production will threaten food supplies for the poor while failing to achieve many of its alleged environmental benefits.
The numbers have started coming on the table, and they show that the transition to bio fuel is one of many reasons for the international foodprice crises. According to International Food Policy Research the increased biofuel demand during the period 2000 - 2007 has estimated to have accounted for 30 percent of the increase in weighted average grain prices. Unsurprisingly, the biggest impact was on maize prices, for which increased biofuel demand is estimated to account for 39 percent of the increase in real prices. Increased biofuel demand is estimated to account for 21 percent of the increase in rice prices.
I find it sad to see that the critics come so late. It comes after several factories have been built or are in the process of being built, and more and more fuel stations have started selling this “green” alternative. For instance the Australian company Agri Energy Limited is planning to build a cogeneration power plant in Hódmezővásárhely, Hungary, one of the best food chambers in Eastern Europe, a 500,000 tonne per year oil seed (sunflower) crushing facility and a cogeneration 55 MW input capacity biomass power plant. The project targets to take advantage of low cost agricultural feedstock from Hungary, Romania and Serbia to provide crude and degummed/refined vegetable oil into the rapidly expanding Western European biodiesel market. I have just one word for he project: Disgusting.
In Norway the market is luckily collapsing. Norway’s biggest biofuel company, BV Energi, recently went bankrupt. It’s remainings sadly got bought up by Statoil.
EU recently announced that they were sticking to a previously agreed goal that biofuels should provide 10 percent of the energy needed to power cars and other modes of transport by 2020, even when the European commissioner for development aid has stated that there is a genuine risk that traditional agriculture in poor countries will be damaged if arable land is used for growing crops destined to meet energy needs in wealthier parts of the world. And a recent study by scientists working for the Commission concluded that “the uncertainty is too great to say whether the EU 10 percent biofuel target will save greenhouse gases or not.”
Why do we do this then? No greenhouse gases saved and less food produced. Where is the logic? And why don’t we focus more on producing bio energy from waste? Waste-to-energy facilities as a fuel with minimal processing, can undergo moderate to extensive processing before being directly combusted as refuse-derived fuel; or it can be gasified using pyrolysis or thermal gasification techniques. Each of these technologies presents the opportunity for both electricity production as well as an alternative to landfilling or composting. In contrast with many other energy technologies that require fuel to be purchased, people/companies pay to get rid of their waste.
by frankps at May 24, 2008 07:42 AM
6. Buffalo Bill’s Alimony Ale Billed as “the bitterest beer in America,” this India Pale Ale is clearly the brainchild of someone disenchanted with the notion of till death do us part.3. McQuire’s I’ll Have What The Gentleman On The Floor Is Having Barley Wine The name is a subtle hint that at 12 percent alcohol by volume, this beer is meant to be sipped. If you can drink it faster than you can say it, slow down!
by Matt at May 23, 2008 05:10 PM
Michael Lotz gave this hint in #haiku today:
the fonts in firefox are not broken, it just uses the wrong ones
it uses the "extra light" versions of dejavu
if you delete those firefox will look normal.
So how Firefox chooses fonts or the order returned by Haiku needs looking into.
Fyysik?
The world seems to be changing. It’s not many years ago tornadoes were unheard of in Europe. May 20th a tornado/hurricane appeared in the small village Gatér in Bács-Kiskun county (in between Kiskunfélegyhaza and Csongrád). Gatér is not to far from my “hometown” Mindszent.
More info about this hurricane, can be found on the Hungarian Tornado site.
by frankps at May 22, 2008 10:04 AM
I filed bug of directory listing that does not URL Encode ";" in file name on file scheme.
It is bug 412428 (https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=412428).
And I already wrote patch for the bug.
But, I don't know how should we handle ";" in filename on BeOS.
Current patch does not URL encode ";" in file name on BeOS.
Is it needed to URL encode ";" on BeOS?
My main server lives, like many others do, in a dark, cold room protected by locked doors. It’s a lonely existance, but one that it seems to enjoy - rewarding me with a relatively trouble free few years. On sunday morning that run of good uptime came to a crashing end.
The problems started after a reboot. The box came up, but none of the networking was configured. The people from the hosting company managed to get the interfaces configured (after initially omitting adding a route) and I was able to access it via ssh. Something wasn’t right though and there was a raft of odd behaviour.
The OS was in need of an update, so as the machine was being monitored and the network KVM was still attached, it seemed like an ideal opportunity to upgrade. After backing up all the required files I installed the kernel and rebooted - to be met by silence. A phone call confirmed my fears, but the guy from the hosting company simply asked how he could help - very cool and collected 
After a session of trying a few simple things we managed to get the networking working sufficiently to let me login via ssh. After a 30 minute session of head scratching and puzzling the machine was rebooted and came back perfectly - much to my relief.
It’s been a frustrating couple of days, but the server is now working and the various ports have been upgraded.
This gets me from an old, old version of FreeBSD (4.9) to a slightly newer one (5.2). I’m aiming to get it to at least 6.3 so I can use the newer binary updater to try and avoid all these issues in future.
Full credit to my hosting company, Positive Internet for their help and support.
by david at May 19, 2008 09:19 PM
I have been on and off about Firefox. It is in many ways an amazing browser, but at the same time a huge dissapointment. Not much has changed about that regarding version 3 of Firefox. The user interface is perhaps more cluttered then ever, especially the Windows version.
Today, one of my favorite writers, Paul Thurrot, said what he thought about:
“visually integrate” with the underlying platform while maintaining “a unqiue (Firefox) identity.”
…
Put simply, Firefox 3 is a user interface disaster on Windows Vista and doesn’t satisfy the promises Mozilla made last year, sorry.
Well put!
by frankps at May 19, 2008 05:10 PM
It was a beautiful idea, almost to good to be true, or was that just what it was? A 100 dollar laptop with only free, open source software. It was to run Linux, a special scaled down version of Redhat. The foundation and Nicholas Negroponte for that reason turned down Steve Jobs’ offer of getting Apple OSX free of charge!
Finally also children in the third world would get the chance to use a computer and the Internet, was my thought, just as so many others must have believed. But soon the computer was costing far more, and then no one seemed want the computers. Well, not entirely true, but they had to be bought in such a large number that only a few countries did.
This week Microsoft announced an agreement with One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) that will make Windows XP available on the non-profit’s low-cost laptops for third-world children. The foundation have agreed to pay 3 dollars per license. Funny, cause they could have used MacOS X for free. The blue screen of death in many ways symbols the death of the OLPC project. I guess the Sugar interface project will live on, but why would developers continue with the OLPC project? Sugar can already run onFedora, Debian and Ubuntu, and was developed to be a platform for educational software and that could very well even run on Windows.
And many have jokefully said: “Thank goodness third world children will no longer have to struggle to learn Linux…“. Well, this time it was all about bad management. As Ivan Krstic said it on his blog:
Nicholas’ new OLPC is dropping those pesky education goals from the mission and turning itself into a 50-person nonprofit laptop manufacturer, competing with Lenovo, Dell, Apple, Asus, HP and Intel on their home turf, and by using the one strategy we know doesn’t work. But hey, I guess they’ll sell more laptops that way.
As so often, a dream is not enough.
by frankps at May 18, 2008 08:23 PM
Hi guys,
I'd like to change the usual error message, replacing it with a random haiku, like in NetPositive. What do you think?
I tried some things, but I don't have knowledge enough to make it work properly. The page opens, but nothing is seen.
Me: I’ve written a DLL which the C# calls to watch for CBT_CREATEWND messages, and I’m successfully clearing the the pop-up, but I think there’s something funky with #32770 windows because I can’t get a bitblt of the actual window. I think the the problem is something odd with the DC of the window because I keep getting an image of what’s behind the window (although it’s exactly the size and placement of the window I’m trying to catch).
CTO: Are you waiting long enough?
Me: Yeah, I through in an excessive 5 second sleep. I can see the window on the screen when the image of what’s behind it is written.
CTO: But, are you waiting long enough for the window to be created?
Me: Because CBT_CREATEWND fires when the calling application tells windows to create the window, not after it’s actually created. I’m an idiot.
Fortunately I haven’t been fired yet.
by Matt at May 16, 2008 01:36 PM
...you try to unlock your actual machine with CTRL-ALT-INS.
by Matt at May 15, 2008 02:30 PM
I've completed builds of the next Firefox 2 point release, version 2.0.0.14. I am not able to post to BeBits. It seems the password for the Bezilla account is different than before. Anyway, for those who read this blog and want the latest in security updates, here are links to the usual three versions:
BeOS R5
BONE, Dano and derivatives
Zeta (requires i686 or later CPU)
Update: now posted to BeBits
I’ve played with various approaches to shared calendars for the last few years - largely without much success. The lack of progress in this area has been strange and annoying as it’s really a service that many people need but most businesses need. The dominance of Exchange Server in this area may explain some of it, but I don’t think it can explain everything. I’ve watched the emergence of CalDAV with some interest but until recently hadn’t bitten the bullet and done anything about it - until this week.
The Mozilla Sunbird client works well and runs on Linux and Windows. It supports CalDAV and so running a CalDAv server shouldn’t be a problem so I figured this should move me away from the hacks I’ve tried before and get me to a point where things simply worked without constant intervention.
Having gotten this far, it was time to find a CalDAV server. Given how long the specification has been around I figured there would be a few to choose from. As usual, I wanted an open source solution and one that wasn’t Java (sorry Java weenies) and would run on Ubuntu. Naively, I didn’t think this would be too hard!
After a few web searches with a variety of keywords I was going round in circles. Every search gave me the Apple CalendarServer as the first or second result with a mixture of others - most of which I’d not heard of before. When I came across a post about running the apple server on Ubuntu and seeing someone I know from Apache was involved in the project, I decided to give it a go. There didnt seem to be a package available, so it was time to grab the source and build.
Getting the source proved easy enough, but building it revealed a lot of missing packages form the machine, each quickly solved. [ I had to edit some of the files as they included the Python.h header by using ‘Python/Python.h’ which didn’t work. using just ‘Python.h’ worked fine. ] Finally I had a built server. Running the quick test showed it to be working OK. Now I needed to install it.
Running the install command proved to be a disaster the first time round. For some reason the installer ignored all the usual conventions (well it is Apple I shouldn’t have been surprised) and stuck the required files into an odd folder. I removed the folder and debated what had gone wrong. Eventually I ran the installer again using ’sudo ./run -i /’ and things seemed to end up in more sensible places. The location for the installed config file was /usr/caldavd. Hardly where I would have expected it, but possibly not a bad choice given that this is still highly experimental. in keeping with the experimental nature of this I decided to use that directory for the configuration, data and documents.
The next step was to configure the server. This is done by the caldavd.plist file, which is just a slightly odd xml file. Apparently the file is considered straightforward enough not to need any documentation - but I didn’t find it that way and struggled a bit to get things setup the way I wanted.
I added a user, caldavd, to run the service and below are the steps I took to get the various directories and the config file ready. This probably isn’t the ideal way of doing things and I’m sure once there is a debian package available things will move, but this layout does keep things together to allow easy removal for when that happens. Comments or suggestions for improvements welcome
At this point you should see warnings about a missing accounts.xml file. This file needs to be created in /usr/caldavd/conf/accounts.xml. The format is reasonably easy to follow.
<accounts realm="xxxxx">
<user>
<uid>david</uid>
<guid>david</guid>
<password>xxxxxx</password>
<name>David Reid</name>
<cuaddr>mailto:xxxxxxxxx</cuaddr>
</user>
...
<group>
<uid>family</uid>
<guid>family</guid>
<password>xxxx</password>
<name>Family Calendar</name>
<members>
<member type="users">david</member>
...
</members>
</group>
</accounts>
You’ll also need to add the sudoers.plist file (though I’m not sure what exactly this does to be honest and the documentation I read didn’t throw any light on it). The format of this file seems to be as follows.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>users</key>
<array>
<dict>
<key>username</key>
<string>superuser</string>
<key>password</key>
<string>superuser</string>
</dict>
</array>
</dict>
</plist>
The mailing lists for the server could do with a fully searchable archive, and if one exists then a link somewhere on the site to it would be helpful. They do represent a useful place to look, but the lack of documentation has really been frustrating. Thankfully there are several other useful blog posts around that have allowed me to get this far, so maybe this will help someone else.
by david at April 23, 2008 09:33 AM
I’ve been toying with the idea of moving my domain from the old server t the new one for a while now, and finally yesterday pressed the button. As usual, DNS took a while to resolve and then as this blog was the first user of PHP on the new machine a few settings needed to be tweaked - hence the downtime
I’m also taking the opportunity to reorganise my site, so if you’re looking for something that’s not there , let me know and I’ll sort it out. The basic plan is to have a spring clean and remove a lot of the old content and move the site into source control so I can better keep track of it’s current state
While making the move I’ve upgraded to Wordpress 2.5 and initial impressions are mixed. The new admin styling is nice, but some of the functionality isn’t as easy to find as the previous incarnation. I think I’ll hold fire for a while before upgrading the other blogs I look after.
by david at April 23, 2008 07:48 AM
Like a lot of others I’ve been bitten by the strobist bug. Thankfully there is a small support group in Edinburgh - which met last night to have a session.
The venue was the old ruined chapel on Salibury Crags, Edinburgh. Organising an outdoors event in April in Scotland is always a slightly risky proposition due to the unpredictable weather and last night proved to be no exception. The forecast at the start of the week was for rain and wind - hardly ideal conditions - but by Wednesday it had changed to a few showers and windy. Warning people to wrap up warm, we pressed ahead and had a really enjoyable night.
A slideshow of all the pictures can be seen here.
As Rosie and I were both setting up and taking shots it did highlight that despite the (some would say) excessive amount of strobist kit we have, we don’t quite have enough as we kept having to wait for the other to finish. Perhaps a few small purchases will be upcoming to correct this in the coming weeks.
It was amazing to see how much kit the group do now possess though as for much of the evening we had at least 3 simultaneous setups running (1 using PW’s and 2 using skyports for those interested in such things). What was also good to see was an impromptu tutorial session run for a someone who wanted to learn more. 2 of the people attending simply took enough kit and wandered off to one side for around 30 minutes - true peer to peer learning in action.
We’re hoping to make these events a more regular occurrence, but given how cold it was we may have to be more conservative in our locations For anyone in the east of scotland who’s interested the organisation is done via the East Scotland Strobist flickr group.
by david at April 19, 2008 12:01 AM
I’m faced with a dilemma. Suggestions about what to do next are welcomed!
This involves a flickr group, which is in effect a mini community. The group is known as Photography Guide to Edinburgh and can be found here. I’ve been a member for a long time and know a lot of the members of the group - in fact I’ve even attended one of their meeting and have kept trying to attend subsequent ones.
With no prior notice, though, I have found myself removed from the community and any mention or note of my participation removed! It’s as if I never existed! What did I do to warrant such radical rewriting of history?
I’ve had no official notification of my crimes against the community, so can only assume I touched a nerve with a short post about the slowly reducing number of members of the group. Surely any community should care about a rapid reduction in its membership, especially when it follows an especially nasty and very personal thread about whether to allow video content to be added to the group (which has now been deleted).
Let’s face it, all communities go through such growing pains, but ignoring them and removing those who bring them up can’t be the right approach - can it?
So, what do I do next? I’ve rejoined the group, but haven’t dared post any comments on any threads for fear of being removed again? Should the admin who removed me (who remains anonymous) have sent me an email before simply kicking me out? Is removing all evidence of my contribution justifiable? I find myself in the odd position of not knowing what to do next!
Suggestions via the comments to this blog or direct email please!
by david at April 14, 2008 08:33 PM
sorry I've been absent for a few weeks. I've been monitoring the blog and am very happy to see the great progress mmadia is making with reordering. I'm about to begin a new job, so I may be scarce again for a while. Everything is great, just very busy at the moment. I'll start building again as quickly as time allows and will definitely try to keep up with the .point releases if nothing else.
Some hosting has been provided by Master199 at http://bezilla.beuser.de
Right now, It's just a file repository.
A new BeZilla BeBits entry page has been created: Experimentally Built BeZilla Builds
As there are builds for FF, SM, TB, SB, and XULRunner,
I didn't want to litter all of the individual application pages.
Also, any problems that occur in one build, should occur in the others.
eg, reaching the 32mb add-on limit in R5 or incorrect *.so, *.so.stub placement
Once we feel reasonably confident that these builds do not introduce new issues,
that bebits app page can be deleted and links moved to their individual pages.
All comments are enabled for now.
425962 - re-order *.so
Testing and feedback on R5Bone is needed!
It seems XULRunner is the current method of embedding gecko.
quote:
Roll your own browser - An embedding HowTo
From MDC
Note: this document is out of date. According to Benjamin Smedberg: "build XULRunner and use that for all new embedding. You do not need/should not use embedding/config".
:etouq
linky
Main XULRunner dev page
here's a random email about embedding with xulrunner 1.8
link
425962 - re-order *.so -- review request not set.
Should these builds be posted publicly before requesting review?
Not many people have been using these builds on net_server, bone, or zeta.
423182 - default MOZ_ZIP_FORMAT : patch landed on trunk and branch.
423183 - replace TARGET_OS/TARGET_CPU : patch landed on trunk and branch.
426083 - fix XULRunner build : approved for 1.9 and 1.8 branch. waiting for checkin on both.
In http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/configure.in#1344
the default optimization level is set to '-O3'
isn't '-O3' highly unreliable for R5?
Should this get changed to -02 or even -Os?
Even though Haiku is for the most part source and binary compatible with R5,
there are some issues.
Most notably, configure scripts break due to different values for `uname`
In particular, `uname -s` reports "Haiku" and "BeOS" respectively.
Currently mozilla's build system performs conditional testing on $(OS_ARCH), which is equal to `uname -s`
It's possible to pass --host=i586-beos or a similar line to configure to use the BeOS definitions, but this isn't an ideal solution.
Numerous beos-workarounds will no longer be needed.
For example, Haiku has better posix support.
For reference, the other beos-specific build system variables are:
BEOS_PROGRAM_RESOURCE :: for applying the .rsrc file,
defined in (application)/app/Makefile.in
used in http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/config/rules.mk#831
BEOS_ADDON_WORKAROUND :: for creating *.so.stub,
defined in http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/config/config.mk#114
used in http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/config/rules.mk#671 and #681
So how are we going to implement Haiku support?
Just a small note, Composer on 1.8 is horribly busted on all OS's.
Compiling KompoZer, http://www.kompozer.net/ went easy enough...
It loads but it crashes as soon as something is typed.
It also crashes on exit.
Note: it appears the project is dead or very idle
In mozilla/composer/app/Makefile.in, this was added:
( i didn't bother checking if it actually needed -lgame though )
ifeq ($(OS_ARCH),BeOS)
BEOS_PROGRAM_RESOURCE = $(srcdir)/apprunner-beos.rsrc
ifdef BUILD_STATIC_LIBS
OS_LIBS += -ltracker -lgame
endif
endif
For the mozconfig, i edited mozconfig.linux , ripped out some parts and dropped in a block of common options for BeOS:
# sh
# Build configuration script for LINUX
#
# See http://www.mozilla.org/build/unix.html for build instructions.
#
export MOZILLA_OFFICIAL=1
export BUILD_OFFICIAL=1
export MOZ_STANDALONE_COMPOSER=1
mk_add_options MOZ_STANDALONE_COMPOSER=1
# Uncomment the two following lines if you want the Site Manager
# to use KDE mimetypes icons. Warning, experimental feature...
# You may have to edit the following files
# mozilla/composer/app/Makefile.in
# mozilla/editor/libeditor/html/Makefile.in
# mozilla/composer/src/ *
#export SITE_MANAGER_KDE_ICON_STYLE=1
#mk_add_options SITE_MANAGER_KDE_ICON_STYLE=1
# Uncomment and edit this line if you want to build
# outside of the source tree
mk_add_options MOZ_OBJDIR=/preR1/KompoZer-bone
# Comment out the following lines for a debug build
#ac_add_options --enable-optimize
ac_add_options --disable-debug
# You may need to uncomment and edit that line. On Linspire,
# just uncomment it
#ac_add_options --with-default-mozilla-five-home=/usr/lib/mozilla
# You probably have nothing to change below that line
ac_add_options --disable-svg
ac_add_options --without-system-mng
ac_add_options --without-system-png
ac_add_options --disable-ldap
ac_add_options --disable-mailnews
ac_add_options --disable-installer
ac_add_options --disable-activex
ac_add_options --disable-activex-scripting
ac_add_options --disable-tests
ac_add_options --disable-oji
ac_add_options --disable-necko-disk-cache
ac_add_options --enable-single-profile
ac_add_options --disable-profilesharing
ac_add_options --enable-extensions=wallet,xml-rpc,xmlextras,pref,universalchardet,spellcheck
ac_add_options --enable-necko-protocols=http,ftp,file,jar,viewsource,res,data
ac_add_options --disable-pedantic
ac_add_options --disable-short-wchar
# // I don't want to do strip yet
#ac_add_options --enable-strip-libs
ac_add_options --enable-crypto
ac_add_options --disable-mathml
ac_add_options --with-system-zlib
ac_add_options --enable-toolkit=beos
ac_add_options --enable-default-toolkit=beos
ac_add_options --disable-freetype2
# Note: Only include icon for mac, windows and os2
ac_add_options --enable-image-decoders=default,-xbm
### // COMMON BeOS mozconfig stuff not found above.
### //EDIT THESE VALUES TO REFLECT YOUR LOCAL BUILD ###
export GLIB_CONFIG=/boot/home/glib-libIDL-beos/glib/bin/glib-config
mk_add_options GLIB_CONFIG=/boot/home/glib-libIDL-beos/glib/bin/glib-config
export LIBIDL_CONFIG=/boot/home/glib-libIDL-beos/libIDL/bin/libIDL-config
mk_add_options LIBIDL_CONFIG=/boot/home/glib-libIDL-beos/libIDL/bin/libIDL-config
### //Automatic updates not currently supported on BeOS. Delete this when we add this feature.
ac_add_options --disable-updater
### //Explicitly enable native BeOS threading
ac_add_options --with-bthreads
### //Build without Cairo
ac_add_options --disable-svg
ac_add_options --disable-canvas
### //Reduce build size and time by omitting test suite and IPv6 support (not needed on BeOS)
ac_add_options --disable-tests
ac_add_options --disable-ipv6
### //Required configure options
ac_add_options --enable-cpp-rtti
ac_add_options --enable-static ## STATIC BUILD
ac_add_options --disable-shared
### //Eliminate lots of relatively useless warnings during build
ac_add_options --disable-cpp-exceptions
### Optional optimizations
ac_add_options --enable-optimize='-Os'
In case you missed it, we are being nominated for Haikuware's "Thank You Award". I think the nomination speaks for itself:
"For their stunning perseverance, hanging on to give us a very solid browser that's become more polished and smooth than I could ever imagine."
Now if I just could decide if I should vote for mmu_man or Jorge A. Mare.
The UK government are pushing ahead with switching off the analogue transmitters, forcing people to move to digital services. This will bring them a huge windfall (much needed to fund their plans to control every aspect of our lives) and free up some spectrum for other uses - all of which would be fine if the digital services at least provided the same as those they will replace. We’re promised this will be the case, but when I looked at the services available for here it turned out that only 1/2 the channels we currently receive are provided. The rest are promised by the time of the eventual switchover - but that’s not until 2010!
Given that the government is spending a lot of money to encourage people to make the switch sooner rather than later, the current situation hardly seems to provide much incentive. Once more the whole digital switchover seems to be more of a digital “switch off”.
by david at March 26, 2008 05:30 PM
After some small Makefile.in changes, XULRunner still fails in the same way as it did previously
/src/mozilla/xulrunner/stub/nsXULStub.cpp: In function `int main(int, char **)':
/src/mozilla/xulrunner/stub/nsXULStub.cpp:88: `realpath' undeclared (first use this function)
/src/mozilla/xulrunner/stub/nsXULStub.cpp:88: (Each undeclared identifier is reported only once
/src/mozilla/xulrunner/stub/nsXULStub.cpp:88: for each function it appears in.)
make[1]: *** [nsXULStub.o] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/obj/MozillaXULRunner-bone/xulrunner/stub'
tqh said this: -- links updated to "mozilla1.8/"
We don't use realpath to traverse sym-links:
http://lxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/xulrunner/stub/nsXULStub.cpp#63
We should have a #ifdef XP_BEOS with something like:
http://lxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/xpcom/obsolete/nsFileSpecBeOS.cpp#187 and on.
setenv, missing header?
Also note that BeOS execv is broken, and I hope this code at least doesn't relaunch itself, as Firefox does. If it does, it's a nasty hack that is just plain ugly. "
Anyway i can interest someone into
:END QUOTE
can i interest anyone in helping with that bit?
Update: with code from bekeeper's nsXULStub.cpp, xulrunner built successfully.
However, i still need to learn how to test the actual application. Afterwards, i'll make and submit a patch.
After that, i'll recheck my re-ordering patches with a shared+debug builds. If that goes well, i'll submit those patches.
There was discussion at Haiku mail list about FF reordering, installation etc.
People dislike idea of "installation", preffering "unpack-and-run" version, but there is at least one more obstacle here, besides that described in previous posting - GRE.
Currently we're running all Mozilla apps as totally separate entities, wasting OS resources, but actually Mozilla apps (especially from FF 3 and relatives) are meant to use common Gecko Runtime Engine - actually set of shared libs installed somewhere at common lib path. Such version of Mozilla usage cannot be achieved without smart installation procedure.
Our start script for Mozilla apps (FF, TB etc) contains code:
if [ "$OSTYPE" = "beos" ]; then
mimeset -F "$MOZILLA_BIN"
fi
In case we don't use it at least once (e.g. using reordered build which "should" start without script), we can fall in all kinds of strange behaviour, something alike described by tigerdog in previous posting.
Same will happen if OSTYPE isn't reported as BeOS.
And there are some problems with that if we do it at compile time - only new packaging proposed by mmadia (zip) will preserve attributes, and if you do compilation under Linux - this operation cannot be done at all.
For linux there is another problem - all commands like "copyattr" wouldn't work there at build/packaging time.
I've build a BONE version of Thunderbird for testing. It seems to work well under Haiku, however I've noted one odd thing:
When Thunderbird is running and I launch Firefox, Thunderbird closes! If Firefox is running when Thunderbird starts - Firefox closes. Seems to happen at the point during launch when the app restarts. Fyysik, is this a bug worth reporting to the Haiku folks?
Earlier this month, there was a discussion on the [haiku-development] mailing list about repackaging Firefox to allow a more native feel.
I've been working on getting mozilla's build system to produce this at compile time.
... And significant progress has been made!
I found the sections of code in the various Makefile.in's, and rules.mk that are responsible for either :
directly copying the *.so into $(DIST)/bin
symlinknig *.so into $(DIST)/bin
and creating and copying *.so.stub for those *.so's
a quick and dirty test confirms that those *.so's can be placed into $(DIST)/bin/lib to allow direct launching of firefox-bin
There's still some more work to do:
find and remove support for the launching shell script, 'firefox'
find and renove '-bin' from the binary name
cleaning up code for patch submittal.
a few questions:
should the corresponding *.so.stub's be removed?
how important is it to have 'libxpistub.so' in ./add-ons instead of ./lib ?
('libfreebl3.so','libnssckbi.so' can easily be relocated to ./add-ons )
Just for notice and memory.
I suspect now that each BeOS app trying to use Gecko should use same approach as we did in native FilePicker:
1)Create AppShell instance explicitly
2)Spinup it explicitly
http://lxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/widget/src/beos/nsFilePicker.cpp#142
3)Run somwhere loop of GetEvents/DispatchEvents
http://lxr.mozilla.org/mozilla1.8/source/widget/src/beos/nsFilePicker.cpp#201
I've come to a stage where I suspect my gcc4 Firefox builds for Haiku is better than the gcc2 BeOS ones.
Therefore it's time to start to get the changes into CVS. There is still one or two spots where I need to replace shortcuts, but it's pretty much done. I'll try to work on that this weekend.
In the meantime you can always look at this one.
One last thing, does anyone have a clue where Firefox chooses it's GUI-configuration at runtime (colors and such). It isn't using the BeOS defaults even when using gcc2 BeOS-built ones under Haiku.
The missing bindings reported by mmadia (below) have been patched, tested and fixed on the 1.8 branch. Thanks go to fyysik for the commit!
A small group of us spent last Monday evening taking some pictures of the guys from the Edinburgh University Snow & Ski Club. It was a really cold evening and the snow that started half way through didn’t really help. In the best tradition of such strobist meetups, Neil made a small movie that’s now available on You Tube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7h_SiOM9p_I
by david at March 08, 2008 10:25 PM
How long should an external HDD last? The one I’m currently using for backing up my pictures has just died after a ridiculously short period of 4 months! I’m hopeful that not all the pics on it are lost, but it has sent me a large wakeup call.
I really need to sort out a better backup strategy as I’m starting to generate a large amount of data and my laptop’s 60Gb HDD just doesn’t cut it any more. So, anyone got any suggestions?
My current thoughts are to have an external USB HDD that I use for short term storage and then a large RAID based storage device at home. The home based device would either just be a USB/FW standalone device or NAS, but I’d ideally like it to have hot swap drive bays and probably potential for up to 2Tb total storage. Anyone have experience of such a device and care to offer reccomendations?
by david at February 16, 2008 11:15 PM
Came across this and had to read it twice to make sure I wasn’t seeing things…
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/ukcorrespondents/holysmoke/dec07/islam-resolution.htm
by david at January 01, 2008 09:36 PM
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