I’ve been pretty quiet lately, other than short posts on G+, because I’ve been grinding hard on NTPsec. We’re coming up on a 1.0 release and, although things are going very well technically, it’s been a shit-ton of work. One consequence is the NTPsec Project Blog. My first major post there expands on some of… Continue reading Some of my blogging has moved
Category: General
My first maker recipe
I’ve been learning more about tinkering with electronics lately, soldering and casemodding and that sort of thing. The major reason for this is NTPsec-related and will be discussed in a near-future post, but here is an early consequence unrelated to that project: Converting a PS/2 TrackMan Marble to USB
The Rule of Names
This is an entirely silly post about the way I name the machines in my house, shared for the amusement of my regulars.
Evil viziers represent!
Over on G+, Peter da Silva wrote: ‘I just typoed “goatee” as “gloatee” and now I’m wondering why it wasn’t always spelled that way.’ #evilviziersrepresent #muahaha The estimable Mr. da Silva is sadly in error. I played the evil vizier in the first run of the Arabian Nights LARP back in 1987. No goatee, and… Continue reading Evil viziers represent!
What Amending the Constitution Cannot Do
An underappreciated fact about U.S. Constitutional law is that it recognizes sources of authority prior to the U.S. Constitution itself. It is settled law that the Bill of Rights, in particular, does not confer rights, it only recognizes “natural rights” which pre-exist the Bill of Rights and the Constitution and which – this is the… Continue reading What Amending the Constitution Cannot Do
ifdex: a tool for code archeologists
I’ve written a tool to assist intrepid code archeologists trying to comprehend the structure of ancient codebases. It’s called ifdex, and it comes with a backstory. Grab your fedora and your bullwhip, we’re going in…
Major progress on the NTPsec front
I’ve been pretty quiet on what’s going on with NTPsec since posting Yes, NTPsec is real and I am involved just about a month ago. But it’s what I’m spending most of my time on, and I have some truly astonishing success to report. The fast version: in three and a half months of intensive… Continue reading Major progress on the NTPsec front
Word of the day: shimulate
shimulate, vt.: To insert a shim into code so it simulates a desired standardized ANSI/POSIX facility under a deficient operating system. First used of implementing clock_gettime(2) under Mac OS X, in the commit log of ntpsec. I checked first use by Googling.
The Great Beast has met its match
When I built the Great Beast of Malvern, it was intended for surgery on large repositories. The specific aim in view was to support converting the NetBSD CVS to git, but that project is stalled because the political process around NetBSD’s decision about when to move seems to have seized up. I’ve got the hardware… Continue reading The Great Beast has met its match
Productive yak shaving
So here’s how my day went…. I started off trying to convert a legacy manual page to asciidoc. Found that pandoc (which could be the target of a whole separate rant, because it totally sucks at translating anything with tables in it) won’t do that. @PUSH… But it will convert DocBook to asciidoc. OK, so… Continue reading Productive yak shaving
git-weave, a tool for synthesizing repositories from fossil tarballs
Welcome to my first new-project release of the year, git-weave. It’s a polished and documented version of the script I used to reconstruct the early history of INTERCAL five years ago – see Risk, Verification, and the INTERCAL Reconstruction Massacree for the details on that one. git-weave can be used to explode a git repository… Continue reading git-weave, a tool for synthesizing repositories from fossil tarballs
How to Deny a Question’s Premise in One Easy Invention
Now that the Universe Splitter is out, it might be that a lot more people are going to trip over the word “mu” and wonder about it. Or it might be the word only occurs in the G+ poll about Universe Splitter – I don’t know, I haven’t seen the app (which appears to be… Continue reading How to Deny a Question’s Premise in One Easy Invention
Friends of Armed & Dangerous party
It’s Penguicon 2015 at the Westin in Southfield, Michigan, and time for the 2015 Friends of Armed & Dangerous party. 9PM tonight, room 314. Nuclear ghost-pepper brownies will be featured.
Penguicon 2015!
I’ve been sent my panel schedule for Penguicon 2015. Building the “Great Beast of Malvern” – Saturday 5:00 pm One of us needed a new computer. One of us kicked off the campaign to fund it. One of us assembled the massive system. One of us installed the software. We were never all in the… Continue reading Penguicon 2015!
shipper 1.7 is released
I’ve released shipper 1.7. The main new feature in this release id that it now knows how to play nice with repository collections managed by gitolite and browseable through gitweb, like this one.
I have been nominated for a John W. Campbell Award
Last Sunday I was informed by email that I have been nominated for the 2015 John W. Campbell award for best new science-fiction writer. I was also asked not to reveal this in public until 4 April. This is a shame.. I had a really elaborate April Fool’s joke planned where I was going to… Continue reading I have been nominated for a John W. Campbell Award
Newly published: Introduction to Time Service
I’ve published a background paper on precise clocks, time service, and NTP. It is Introduction to Time Service and is meant to be read as a companion to (or before) the GPSD Time Service HOWTO. Comments, critiques, and suggestions for additions will be welcome.
How not to botch an interview
I just dealt with an attempt to interview me by email that checked off pretty nearly every possible mistake in the form. As a public service, I now reproduce the advice I gave after bailing out halfway through the list of questions.
Designed for the job
Every once in a while I have an experience that causes me to meditate on the question of how much variation in human behavior is genetically driven. I’ve written before about my gradually increasing awareness that I am genetically designed to enjoy combat. I had another experience something like this last night in a completely… Continue reading Designed for the job
First video from the Great Beast build
For my blog regulars, first video from the Great Beast build. Thanks once again to everyone who donated money to make this happen. I think you’ll see it was well spent. And there’s more video coming.