Where are you? Yahoo! Fire Eagle

Hello,
the Twitter question was "What are you doing?". The new question is now "Where are you?"

Yahoo! has launched a sort of social application called Fire Eagle for updating your location and share it across other web services.

Cincom Industry Misinterpretations reached the 100th podcast

Hello,
I'm listening to the Industry Misinterpretations podcasts (though my English is so poor to understand only a few words) and now they reached the century mark. They're managing an account on Podcast Alley.

Stay tuned!

Interviewed by Clubsmalltalk

Hello,
lately I've been interviewed by the new clubsmalltalk. Hey, I know, I'm not so good with English ;)
I'm glad of this, thanks to Hernan Galante.

Vagalume, GTK+ and Last.fm

Vagalume, GTK+ and Last.fm
Originally uploaded by Lethalman

I've found this great gstreamer application to listen to the last.fm stations. It works perfectly, fully functional and up-to-date. Features several IM status updates, including telepathy. It's definitely good-looking with my dark theme.
Homepage: http://vagalume.igalia.com/
Last.fm group: http://www.last.fm/group/Vagalume

Compiz with ATI RS480 on Debian

Hello,
after years that compositing has been introduced in our desktop, it's finally come the time to try it.

Uninstall fglrx
My video card is not supported very well with Mesa 7.0.x, in fact I've been using the fglrx driver for a long time.... until now!
I had to manually dpkg --purge all the related packages.
Now it's better to rmmod fglrx.

Install mesa 7.1 from experimental
On #compiz-fusion some guys hinted me I should have used Mesa 7.1rc because of recent improvements on my video card. The only way to get such version was to include experimental sources.
Ok, no problem, if it doesn't work I can downgrade back to the previous one.

Upgrade xorg to experimental
But there're still problems, I had to upgrade to the latest xorg in experimental because of mesa compatibility. In fact AIGLX couldn't load DRI drivers because of missing symbols.
I had to dpkg -l|grep xorg the install the one by one. I did pray for everything to work, really.
Now backup xorg.conf and go ahead with X -configure.

Install compizconfig-settings-manager and compiz-fusion-plugins-extra
For some reason, the first time I've tried running compiz it's gone Segmentation Fault. On the IRC channel they hinted me to install the crash handler plugin to back track the error. After installing such packages, magically compiz --replace worked!
Now I have a GNOME Desktop with the Blue-Joy theme and the Avant Window Navigator.

Everything both nice and unuseful, but now I understand how eye-candy fancy stuff can change your desktop.

Before the war:


After:

iStream

iStream
Originally uploaded by Lethalman

Very useful applet for listening to the radio. It lacks a perferences dialog, but it's still nice.

Gnome main menu

Gnome main menu
Originally uploaded by Lethalman

Hello,
while I was playing with apt-cache I've discovered a new kind of main menu in GNOME. It's being developed by SuSE. It feels nice, robust and innovative.
The screenshot is showing the documents tab.
To install, aptitude install gnome-main-menu and add the new applet.

kqemu on Debian amd64

Hello,
I've been using qemu a lot lately because I'm creating an usb hdd with debian live.
The image contains a system running postgresql, development packages for gtk and python and gnome-core . All this ends up loading in more than 5 minutes, this is really boring.

Then I begun looking for a faster virtualization system, and found KVM. Unfortunately my processor hasn't the right flag for it.

Finally I found kqemu, which is a module for the kernel that speeds up a lot qemu. I never thought it could speed up things...... so.... much!
Let's install it:

m-a a-i kqemu
modprobe kqemu

That's it, for those who owns an amd64 processor, this is the right way to use kqemu:

qemu-system-x86_64 -kernel-kqemu [your options]

You shouldn't get any error, if you do... boh.

The image now boots in 33 seconds down to the bottom init scripts, and GNOME works only with a slight delay but it's definitely a great speed up. With the real machine, I enter gnome in about 40 seconds.

Keep going the good work Qemu team, and thanks as usual to everyone who helped me on IRC.

Debian and zd1211 wifi

Hello,
I'm using debian lenny and I've got these two problems:

• With versions of the linux kernel prior to 2.6.20 (maybe) I could install zd1211 firmware using the module-assistant which has been now dropped from testing and unstable.
• Boot process slowed down by 30 seconds and couldn't plug-in the usb pen because udev/hal screw up
  

What I've done is to remove the source and its created firmware, with the one shipped with testing and unstable (bug #411912):

aptitude remove --purge zd1211-firmware zd1211-source
aptitude update
m-a clean zd1211
aptitude install zd1211-firmware

Now let's fix the hotplug part, open /etc/udev/rules.d/z25_persistent-net.rules and remove similar lines:

# USB device 0ace:1215 (zd1211rw)
SUBSYSTEM=="net", DRIVERS=="?*", ATTR{address}=="00:1d:0f:b3:66:f7", NAME="eth2"

Now try to detach and reattach your usb pen and everything should magically work.

Thanks to Nss (#debianizzati), dcbw NetworkManager developer and gsimmons (#debian).

Syx gaining more stability and speed

Hello,
in the new branches of Syx (an open source Smalltalk-80 implementation) we're working to try a new kind of memory management and add many features that have been missed until now to focus on other stuff.

The new faster and more modern v0.1.8 release will contain the following refactoring:

• Objects will be variable-length (minumum 12 bytes on 32-bit processors and 16 bytes on 64-bit processors)
• By changing the objects also the GC changed to a mark and compact GC
  
• Threaded-switch statement to run processes
• More efficient method cache (maybe a simple global cache lookup for this release)
  

API for primitives will only change slightly.

Suggestions for any new particular technologies are welcome.

identi.ca is worse

Hello,
I'm using Twitter in this week and the API works "almost" perfectly while the website is down most of the time.
I've recently heard about identi.ca, so I decided to try it.
My first impression was bad, because I've seen many redirects of the page, and DNS changes sometimes.
But ok, I tried to register and again... I had problems. When I submitted the registration twice it just did nothing.
I then waited for a couple of hours then I've been registered to identi.ca.

Once I tuned all my account settings, the service has gone down. What happened? Too many twitterers have switched and now identi.ca is out of service? In the while Twitter has magically reopened its gate.

New debian tool proposal

Hello,
this is my second post about Debian. I'm lately discovering all the tools for both managing my Debian system and creating packages.
dh_make is the first tool I've used for the "first debianization" (called so by the New maintainers' guide) which creates a basic template for your package.
Anyway after a few packagings I've seen that something redundant could be automatized further.
What I suggest is a tool that does the following stuff after dh_make has been called:

1. First dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot
2. Check for libraries and binaries and create new packages in debian/control
3. Find docs in usr/shared and modify the doc-base
4. Check for .desktop files and .xpm then create menu
5. Find info and manpages files
6. Obtain copyright from COPYING/LICENSE and such, authors from AUTHORS and so on
7. Find ITP on BTS and fill in the bug number in the changelog
   
8. Rebuild the project
9. Check for lintian errors and warnings and try to fix them (such as empty directories, wrong library name, etc.)

I'm sorry if I'm missing any files such as init.d or cron.d but I'm still newbie with packaging and I haven't tried all the stuff yet.
How this tool sounds to you? Would it be useful and easy to make at least for simple autotooled projects?

Syx 0.1.7 has been released

Hello,
after several months a new version of Syx has been released. This release contains mostly VM changes and some changes to the Smalltalk Collections. As usual, release notes follow:

This versions enhances a new version of the interpreter, major updates to the scheduler, and as usual a lot of bug fixes. Syx left the Google Code SVN repositories because of many connection problems.

You can find informations about the new GIT repository here: http://code.google.com/p/syx/wiki/GitSource?tm=4

Installation instructions: http://code.google.com/p/syx/wiki/InstallationInstructions

API and environment:

• SYX_ROOT_PATH and SYX_PLUGIN_PATH environment variables have been introduced.
• Process and context creation changed.
• New functions have been added for the scheduler, for manually do events iteration and adding idle functions to wake up semaphores.
• Startup responsibility has been dropped from libsyx.
• Added syx errors for system signals to be used with syx_signal.
• Image recovering has been fixed.

Smalltalk:

• Covered several standard methods for Collections, Numbers and Object printing/storing.
• Error reporting from the VM now drops the exception to the Smalltalk environment when the interpreter is running.
• Random class has been added.
• Signal handling improvements for the GTK+ plugin.
• #display family methods have been introduced for Smalltalk objects.

Interpreter:

• System signal handling has been improved.
• Cache hash code of Symbols.
• The interpreter has been refactored to use one stack per Process.
• Contexts are now created only on demand.
• Optimized Symbols creation.
• Signal class has been abstracted.

Parser:

• The parser have been changed for handling new interpreter specifications.
• Several fixes to the parser for special cases.
• Fixed blocks scope.
• Support <- assignment.

Image:

• Image snapshot will nullify C pointers
• Image format has been changed for handling new interpreter specifications.
• Handle internal interpreter C pointers to be restored the right way.

Scheduler:

• Different behavior of the scheduler for POSIX and Windows systems has been introduced.
• Scheduler external idle sources have been added.
• Asyncronous command line and GTK+ loop using semaphores. This leads to dropping readline.
• A simple round robin scheduler has been added.
• Dropped image saving of POSIX fd poll

Documentation:

• Added lots of new comments.
• Started documentation project including a manual still under development and a manpage.

Thanks to everyone contributing to the project.

See the ChangeLog for a complete list of things that changed.

Syx, GTK+ and threading

Hello,
you all know that Gtk+ has locks for the GUI when dealing with the X server and prevent async events to be sent. This is done by manually acquiring/releasing the lock on Gdk. Many Gtk+ ports don't do this automatically.

Syx used gtk_main() into a thread and automatically put gdk enter/leave for each function in its wrapper. It would be somewhat ugly in Smalltalk code having to enter/leave each time.
Of course, on Windows everything leads to troubles with threads.

But Smalltalk has Processes, handled by an internal scheduler. I decided then to not create a thread but cycle through Gtk+ events in the scheduler itself. Now everything works correctly.

Difference with other wrappers? The way Smalltalk is thought let you perform multi-tasking without the need to use OS threads, which means no problems on Windows and no need to take care of the Gdk lock everytime.

In addition, I rewrote part of the Console (Smalltalk-side) to be asyncronous using Semaphores. Now you can work on widgets after you run Gtk main! A small example:

Smalltalk YX 0.1.7 is ready.
Type "help!" to get help.
> Smalltalk loadPlugin: 'gtk'!
true
> | w |
> w := GtkWindow new.
> Gtk main.
> w add: (GtkLabel new: 'hello').
> w showAll!
a GtkWindow

You can imagine the result ;)
If you want to try it out you can download the scheduler branch snapshot.

Stay tuned for next 0.1.7 release.

Syx Manual

Hello,
I report the post on the mailing list below:

Hello,
with the next release 0.1.7, once I get a working interpreter and updated all the parts of Syx,
I will move output of doxygen to doc/reference and start a texinfo manual in doc/manual.

My idea is to have this kind of manual:
1) What is Smalltalk
2) Why Smalltalk YX
3) Introduction to the language
4) Introduction the Syx environment
5) COMPLETE Class and methods documentation, EACH non private method will be documented with examples
and EACH class will have usage examples
6) Embedding
7) Advanced topics, internal documentation

I know it's not the time yet for Smalltalk YX to get such documentation but I think it will be
a nice boost for the project and also for the entire Smalltalk community.
Since I don't have such fantasy now I will start directly with all except the 5th topic.

Any hint will be appreciated.
Bye.

EDIT:
The Smalltalk reference will be created automatically from Smalltalk itself.

Time for Debian

Hello,
I switched to Debian lately and i think it will become my preferred distribution.
I started with Slackware, then an LFS and then Gentoo. I never found them definitive for me.

I used Slackware by compiling sources most of all, then i didn't see any reason to continue using it.

The LFS came since my new PC as a test, and as long I could maintain it I had no problems and had fun with it.

I then installed Gentoo when i got my first DSL. But the updates are slow for lack of testing, I'm on an amd64. I tried to contribute someway but for the time I've been using it I never seen a open and innovative development (not in the sense that it wasn't friendly). And also, I've seen many developers leaving the project.

In other words, I "almost" used always source-based distribution. All the time I tried other binary-based distribution also to change my way of linux-life, like OpenSUSE, Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Foresight, and so on but no one satisfied me.

Then i wanted to try Debian, hoping it was different than Ubuntu. And in fact it is!
What I like of Debian is it's very high QA, how new users deal with bugs, how stable it is, how the BTS work, how the packaging works (eventough there are lots of useful tools I still don't know), the rapid updates, the security.

The thing I dislike from other distribution is that they release new stable versions but that are not so stable at first. For example i had troubles with the package manager with both Ubuntu and Foresight. Boot problems with Ubuntu, several crashes with Foresight, and so on.

But, I don't want to say Debian is now my preferred distro (I'm still afraid of binaries), but this is the good way and hopefully the last choice. Go Debian!

Smalltalk YX toward a new interpreter

Hello,
Smalltalk YX is currently working on refactoring a part of the interpreter, relative to contexts and stack management.
The current version uses one stack per process but always create contexts for each method or block entered.
The new branch, called newinterp, won't create those contexts anymore but they will be created only on-demand (e.g. thisContext). This means both less resources and garbage collector usage, and a possible speedup.

More informations on the mailing list here.

Smalltalk YX 0.1.6 has been released

Hello,
as usual these release notes follows.

This is a major bug fixes release, but introduce as usual many features. First of all this release put the GNU build (autotools) as first build system, and SCons as secondary which is still useful for MingW and the WinCE port.

• Full GNU build support
• X11 plugin
• A basic CommandLine class for parsing the command line
• Basic support for handling foreign C pointers and structs/unions from Smalltalk has been added
• Several fixes for building on Sparc 64 using SCons
• The -e option from command line has been added
• Some help and Syx status will be printed in console mode
• FileStream fileIn has been fixed
• Class declaration from Smalltalk has been fixed
• Lexer fixes for symbols, identifier and strings
• FileStream now handles FILE* instead of file descriptors and this fixed several bugs
• System startup has been fixed when fileing in files
• Dictionary rehashing has been fixed
• Basic support for handling foreign C structs and unions from Smalltalk has been added

Thanks to everyone contributing to the project.

See the ChangeLog for a complete list of things that changed.

Google search? No thanks, Yahoo!

Hello,

lately I've been searching for "maemo emulator" and "mod_python psp" and the results weren't good to me.

If you don't trust, try the above searches (without double quotes) with both Google and Yahoo. This happens with many more searches.

In my opinion, Google lately is lacking a good page weight system and therefore it breaks results showing for example mailing lists instead of more important web pages.

Conclusion? I'm using Yahoo! as my default search engine until Google fixes these troubles.

Merry Christmas

Hi everyone, merry Christmas.

Happy holidays!