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<sagex>
hey guys I am new
* sagex
expects to be hazed
<whitequark>
we prefer to avoid that and get to the work instead.
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<jianju>
Greets, all. Having trouble booting from USB on a Dell 17R SE 7720 running Windows 8 with a secure boot partition. Can anyone shed some light on the subject?
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<whitequark>
you might be interested in trying it out
<wpwrak>
oh, thanks, but i'm very comfortable with gcc so far :)
<wpwrak>
you know, with the years, that certain anxiousness to reject everything that's been around disappears a bit as some things have earned your trust, and you've learned to not pay attention to a lot more, too
<wpwrak>
jianju: i find your problem description to be amazingly self-explaining. windows 8 plus "secure' boot with usb added for fun... and you're having booting problems :)
<wpwrak>
jianju: alas, you're unlikely to find help for your problem in this channel as most people here stay well clear of just those causes
<wpwrak>
sagex: now that you mention it, we actually have some depolarized bits piling up in /dev/null that could use some cleaning ...
<whitequark>
wpwrak: you clearly didn't see much of gcc internals ;)
<whitequark>
on the other hand, you don't exactly need to hack on them, either.
<wpwrak>
sagex: but there's actually no single dominant topic here, so the fact of you being here, new or old, doesn't tell us all that much
<wpwrak>
whitequark: the fact that i've been rather successful in avoiding to do that in the last 20 years or so suggests that you may be right :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: ... or that you were avoiding that precisely because they were so arcane
<wpwrak>
well, 20+ years. damn, how time flies
<whitequark>
s/were/are/
<qi-bot>
whitequark meant: "wpwrak: ... or that you are avoiding that precisely because they are so arcane"
<wpwrak>
oh, gcc has a certain reputation :)
<kristianpaul>
lets hope it keep it
<wpwrak>
but then, i know enough about compilers that i don't presume i'll really understand what one is doing without spending a considerable amount of time on it
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<wpwrak>
so if the compiler actually happens to add obscurity on top of intrinsic complexity, that actually helps :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: (anxiousness to reject everything) sometimes I think that it would be cool to replace every thing GNU for the same reasons as GCC
<whitequark>
but then I very clearly understand that it would bring even more compatibility problems
<wpwrak>
ah, and "one" refers to a specific implementation. i've written "real" compilers before, so i know the drill
<kristianpaul>
real compilers for what language btw?
<whitequark>
wpwrak: (compilers) certain codebases have this intrinsic property that you can look at it and more or less understand what a certain self-contained module does, and how
<jianju>
wprak: thx 4 replying all the same. I took a chance that someone here would know the trick. I'll keep looking.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: LLVM is one of them. this is the main reason I like it, and not the age of either of us ;)
<wpwrak>
naw, don't fight the gnu. most of the gnu-ish things are pretty stable and not overly offending. we even got used to --option, even though everbody hated it back then
* kristianpaul
loves the not very maintained gnu screen
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<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: one i created myself, called "Cora". some weird mixture of my impressions of pascal, C, and forth-ish languages
<kristianpaul>
forth ah :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: (don't fight the gnu) exactly. it took me some time to become accustomed to it. also, --option is awesome--I can't work in BSD's at all :)
<whitequark>
kristianpaul: some people prefer newer alternative, tmux
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: ran on cp/m where it beat turbo pascal in code density :) i also ported it to ms-dos but there, the competition was stiffer
<kristianpaul>
whitequark: yeah sure but as it works as good as my procmail :-)
* whitequark
uses postfix...
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: ah you really like/learnt to fight chip resources constrainsts dont you? :-)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: it seems to me that at least in certain parts of IT, newcomers mainly learn the most recent new cool thing
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: my later forays into compiler/language design didn't involve traditional code generation, so they probably don't count. i'm rather proud of my umlsim language, though, which adds object orientation in an almost clean way to C :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: ten years ago in webdev it was PHP. five years ago Ruby. now it is Node.JS, which is oh god horrible
<wpwrak>
whitequark: and they fight the old stuff, for obvious reasons :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: not only fight, but also copy 80% of it at the very beginning
<wpwrak>
whitequark: much like oldtimers dislike the new stuff, also for obvious reasons :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: it is sometimes hard to understand if you dislike something new because it's new or because it's actually horrible
<wpwrak>
whitequark: yeah, copy 80% until it works, then add 20% fresh problems :)
<whitequark>
I can't stand node.js. it was created by professionally unfit people. on the other hand, rust (which is even newer), is really good IMO.
<whitequark>
for example.
<wpwrak>
i think in many cases things are basically equivalent. so there's no gain in actually learning the new thing. plus you have a lot of existing work that won't cooperate with it.
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<wpwrak>
i don't even know what "node.js" is supposed to be. i've heard of javascript, though :)
<whitequark>
(learning) a whole lot of new things is actually a reiteration of old things. now functional programming is cool again. if your intent is to become a better programmer, you can as well return to '80s and read some papers.
<whitequark>
node.js is basically a standalone javascript engine which is supposed to work as a webserver
<whitequark>
note that javascript is strictly single-threaded, so you are confined to prefork. also you get all other "good" parts of JS, most importantly the fact that everything is done with callbacks.
<whitequark>
so all the processes which are commonly written in a blocking way are suddenly non-blocking, because js requires you to do it
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: well, those chip constraints were in the bad old BASIC days. it still makes me kinda feel guilty to need more than a handful of kB for a program. back then, your imagination was the limit of your universe, but its diameter was always 1 kB (ZX81), later 3.5 kB (VIC-20).
<whitequark>
wpwrak: and you're stuck with mile-long callback chains. and don't forget errbacks!
<wpwrak>
interesting. a language optimized for writing bugs ?
<whitequark>
besides that, it doesn't actually introduce any new or even slightly interesting concepts, except for the fact that you now *might* run identical code in your browser and on your server
<whitequark>
like, for example, validations for forms
<whitequark>
because you, of course, can validate everything without a roundtrip to the server. like username uniqueness.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: there's also MongoDB, a NoSQL database promoted by roughly the same kind of people
<wpwrak>
i love those client-side validations. so much fun to read those security issue bulletins ...
<whitequark>
by default, it returns _before_ it actually writes the data to disk, _to achieve better results at benchmarks_ in order to bash relational database
<whitequark>
*databases
<wpwrak>
let's just say that, as the universe gets older, the amount of noise increases :)
<whitequark>
this is just so wrong on so many levels I don't even know where to start :)
<whitequark>
it is also quite fun to watch people praising NoSQL as the new big thing, given that BerkleyDB actually predates relational databases
<whitequark>
(there are very nice and useful nosql solutions, but for 99% you need an rdbms/only rdbms)
<wpwrak>
naw, even unit write() returns before data is written to disk. normally, that's okay. what's a bit troubling is that it's hard to insert barriers.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: relational databases issue such barriers before returning from a transaction. of course.
<wpwrak>
heh, yes, or postgres
<whitequark>
this is the whole point of transaction. and you need to go additional lengths to ensure your journaling FS won't munge that
<whitequark>
postgres is RDBMS :)
<wpwrak>
sure. and it's *ancient*
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<wpwrak>
besides, the oldest database is still the file system. a lot of people seem to forget that.
<whitequark>
well, not exactly ancient, but surely not new
<whitequark>
we use postgres everywhere in our webdev company and <3 it
<wpwrak>
of course, it lacks the benefit of vendor lock-in, since you can just poke around with ls, cat, rm, and friends
<whitequark>
hehe
<wpwrak>
(postgres) kewl. it's nice that it's getting some love even today.
<whitequark>
it's basically what is used everywhere except the simplest sites (for which mysql is ok too)
<whitequark>
and it still improves quite a bit
<whitequark>
wpwrak: (SNR ratio) my solution to keeping with that is stay sane is as follows: look at every single new cool thing. learn it. evaluate it by technical merit, but never, ever, by userbase. try to keep my opinion with myself. don't switch unless it has actual tangible benefit.
<whitequark>
s/is/and/
<qi-bot>
whitequark meant: "wpwrak: (SNR ratio) my solution to keeping with that and stay sane and as follows: look at every single new cool thing. learn it. evaluate it by technical merit, but never, ever, by userbase. try to keep my opinion with myself. don't switch unless it has actual tangible benefit."
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<wpwrak>
nice, but eventually you'll get bored with the new thing of the week
<whitequark>
wpwrak: not sure I understand you here
<wpwrak>
"hey look, they're doing that mistake from 5.18 years ago again" :)
<whitequark>
oh, let me explain it another way
<wpwrak>
so with time you look for additional competence indicators
<whitequark>
"know something? don't like it? don't give a fuck, it will go away by itself."
<whitequark>
most certainly.
<whitequark>
not knowing it might be actually dangerous, because good new things tend to eat your own pie
<whitequark>
but if they're not good... who cares
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<wpwrak>
"good" alone is not enough. unless you're looking for a cause to fight for, it still needs to come with a somewhat broad acceptance.
<wpwrak>
and again, with time, you're less eager to find causes to fight for.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: nice limits, well thats actually even less what implement a cpu on a fpga with built ram so still room for creativity dont you think?
<wpwrak>
not because a lack of energy (well, sometimes too) but simply because eventually you solve or reach a truce with the most pressing need or issues
<wpwrak>
so the number of fights to pick shrinks
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: those fpgas have excessive resources ;-)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: I don't agree with the acceptance part
<whitequark>
when Rails took off, it was a fringe framework in a very, very fringe language
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: exactly :-D
<whitequark>
from japan
<whitequark>
after Rails took off, there is now a Rails clone in every single language, and that's certainly a good thing
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: alas, it also shows in the price. i would hope to see wolfgang's nice work also to have an effect on cplds. they're often a lot more accessible, yet they're rarely seen in the open hardware scene.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: i think was azonenberg who said was going to work on cheap cplds
<wpwrak>
it's indeed impressive that an idea from japan makes it. that doesn't happen very often, for a number of reasons. but lack of originality usually isn't one of them.
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: kewl
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: soon we'll have to solve the fpga board problem
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: the bga thing?
<whitequark>
wpwrak: (japan) there are communication problems even right now, but they're not threatening to the ecosystem or anything like that
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: well, maybe ...
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: seems that wolfgang isn't very concerned with dealing with the potential of his work just yet
<whitequark>
wpwrak: I heard that with other japanese projects, there was some degree of nationalism, and it didn't help at all. Basically original developers expected everyone else to treat them as higher-ups and not peers. Very fortunately, and somewhat unexpectedly, none of the Ruby folks do that. This is probably the main reason Ruby is where it is now.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: well one single man work dont get time to realize all that potential :)
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: in particular, it would be a great seed for a community. but that community will need hardware to play with.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: hardware and facilities
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: xiangfu's bga boards could work for that, but you'd have to produce them since bga is diy-hostile
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: not all people will want to understand chip foorplanning for just making a blinking led...
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: indeedn xiangfu's board are just right, anyway you could use a single bus for the rest of the comunication
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: i'm not talking about all people. i'm talking about those who understand what this means. obviously, we're not millions :)
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: ahmm =)
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: nevertheless, this is significant work. he's forcing open a door where there was previously a wall. with the right spin, this could be great.
<wpwrak>
consider linux - back then, the whole hacker world was ready. and then linus provided the seed. he's great, but he couldn't have done everything himself. but he didn't have to, since lots of people had been waiting already for this opportunity.
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<wpwrak>
and of course, not "people on the street" but capable developers
<whitequark>
wpwrak: it's way easier with software
<kristianpaul>
and people with business ideas :-)
<wpwrak>
xiangfu's boars have the problem that you need to industrially produce them. they're non-diy. not sure if wolfgang is prepared to do this.
<wpwrak>
whitequark: yes, software is always easier :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: besides, things with fpgatools (I assume you're talking about them) look way more interesting in this discussion than before, for me
<whitequark>
where can I read more about it?
<wpwrak>
whitequark: software, been there, did it, we won. no on to the next challenge, hardware :)
<wpwrak>
s/no/now/
<qi-bot>
wpwrak meant: "whitequark: software, been there, did it, we won. now on to the next challenge, hardware :)"
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: but he could use other friendly slx9 models but to be honest bga will soon or later there for diy
<kristianpaul>
later be there*
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: i don't think so. bga is inherently unfriendly because you can't inspect it.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: (we won) yeah! and I think that it is the right time to go after it.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: yes sure
<whitequark>
wpwrak: what about manufacturing BGA modules which expose all pads? this isn't that expensive yet is suitable for diy perfectly
<wpwrak>
whitequark: you mean, besides the source ? :) i don't think there is anything else
<whitequark>
wpwrak: discussion maybe? ok, source it is :)
<wpwrak>
we don't need "BGA adapters". the chip in question is available in a QFP package
<whitequark>
ah
<kristianpaul>
as soon as those slx9 QFP still avaliable i dont see problem either
<wpwrak>
it's just that no fully DIY-able design compatible with our needs exists yet
<kristianpaul>
anyway bistreams should be same no?
<wpwrak>
varies between USD 90-120, depending on where you are
<whitequark>
wpwrak: ohhh, C only. I would even agree on using Python, but only C? not friendly, especially for prototyping.
<wpwrak>
C is perfectly suitable for this
<wpwrak>
besides, this is a rock-bottom low-level interface. you don't want to start wasting your cycles already there
<wpwrak>
i mean, what's next ? memcpy written in Common LISP ?
<kristianpaul>
hum?
<whitequark>
wpwrak: 1) you would be correct if the interface and its goals were set in stone. but the project is in very early stage.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: yes nice board still remember is not real price and is subsided some how
<whitequark>
2) memcpy in common lisp doesn't inherently have to be slow. there is plenty of evidence to prove that, including, I suspect, literal memcpy implementations in CL.
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: that's not the issue :)
<wpwrak>
whitequark: if you memcpy in CL is fast, it's not native :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: why?
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: the issue is that, once fpgatools go public, people will want to join the effort. maybe just to play. maybe to contribute.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: yes correct
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: now, what hardware do they use ? build a frigging BGA board ? no way. design their own ? maybe. buy something ? yes, most would like that.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: as per examples: PyPy for Python, Maxine VM for Java. all of the above are meta-circular VMs written completely in their target language and yet achieving native speed on operations like memcpy.
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: so there's a point in the continuum and that's the avnet board. available, has the LX9, not too expensive, but has certain issues.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: besides, that's not what I'm trying to communicate at all.
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: Hi
<kristianpaul>
xiangfu: hey :)
<kristianpaul>
morning there
<whitequark>
wpwrak: if you can hack on something while wasting 10x less time on the quirks of your language, it's worth whatever bad runtime performance if it's not literally hours. history proved that countless times.
<wpwrak>
whitequark: yeah, the thing is that the runtime of certain languages isn't suitable for such low-level operations. so you out them out of the box. kinda like gcc builtins.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: _when_ your project matures and _if_ you actually need that speed, you simply go and rewrite it in C. it's really easy once you have an architecture which is known to work
<xiangfu>
wpwrak: the plan was switch bga with fab-made pcb. since I think I have enough experience on home made pcb.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: and you can trivially replace it part by part with all modern dynamic languages.
<kristianpaul>
xiangfu: oh nice wfp board
<wpwrak>
whitequark: you'd be surprised by the number of people who are extremely comfortable with C ;-)
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: good morning
<hellekin>
wpwrak: you forgot your cups :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: again, not what I'm trying to communicate here
<wpwrak>
xiangfu: mmh, now that's a lovely sight :-)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: I'm comfortable with C. I just don't see the point to do something for a week if I can do it in one evening, with a negligible performance penalty.
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: I will send the package tomorrow. EMS was on holidays.
<kristianpaul>
xiangfu: sure no rush ;)
<kristianpaul>
still need to write the forth part..
<wpwrak>
xiangfu: so you decided to adopt azonenberg's design ?
<xiangfu>
wpwrak: yes. basicly modify from azonenberg's board. remove the ft232 chip. get the serial pins out for blue-tooth serial modular.
<xiangfu>
wpwrak: yes.
<kristianpaul>
ah good !
<wpwrak>
hellekin: you didn't read what i wrote after i got back home :)
<kristianpaul>
so getting back to qfp?
<hellekin>
I might have missed it :)
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: no.
<kristianpaul>
ahmm
* kristianpaul
got lost
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: just another experience. I have plan to switch to fab-made-pcb + bga.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: as a trivial example, my flash decompiler is 8KLOC. eight thousand. it beats every single commercial one out there. yeah it works for five minutes on a single real-world file, but no one cares
<kristianpaul>
that was earlier experience no?
<xiangfu>
earlier experience was the pre-made pin out pcb. only pins out.
<kristianpaul>
so if i got right the diy experience is mostly done and what remain is out source manufacturing the boards?
<wpwrak>
i'd avoid bga. this is not a good moment for it. bga has its place when you do serious quantities or have space constraints. right now, we have none of that.
<wpwrak>
without bga, you have the option of selling fully assembled board or just the pcb. since all the parts are from digi-key anyway, it's not too hard to make virtual kits.
<wpwrak>
a pcb can be shipped as mail. very cheap and still reasonably quick.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: my ruby implementation is almost ready for generating first useful code, and it's something like 4KLOC together with dependencies. tell me you can do the same in a month of full-time work in C, and I'll switch everything I have to it.
<xiangfu>
wpwrak: the xilinx new chips are all BGA. no qfp.
<xiangfu>
wpwrak: so if woflgang switch slx9 to 7 seriles. I have to use bga. :)
<wpwrak>
whitequark: i wonder why you think C is generally inefficient. especially things that deal with bytes and such, instead of strings, are extremely straightforward there
<whitequark>
wpwrak: experience with large codebases in both kinds of languages?
<wpwrak>
xiangfu: yeah, 7 would break all this. but then, is this coming ?
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: (source manufacturing the boards) no. those experience make me can make demo board fast, under controlled. :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: bytes, mostly, yes. but here is a project with a good amount of quite complex routing logic. it really doesn't go well with C (compared with more dynamic counterparts).
<wpwrak>
whitequark: not really. lots of BASIC, Pascal, C. done some assembler, shell, Perl, Python (and of course Cora :). but for really big things, only C.
<sagex>
wpwrak, you are awesome
<whitequark>
wpwrak: out of that list, only Python and Perl are dynamic HLLs, and it is generally hard to write big things in Perl for unrelated reasons
<wpwrak>
(plus the usual fringe languages, lisp, cobol, and all that. but that's just extremely superficial knowledge)
<wpwrak>
sagex: thanks ;-)
<wpwrak>
whitequark: when a project outgrows perl, i switch it to C :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: doh. sometimes I'll just find a few free weeks and show you how things should be done, with my code :)
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: what i don't know is what wolfgang is planning to do about the board situation, if anything
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: the board i sent to you only have 1 pins out. 1 led, 1 DONE LED. the jtag pins name at back.
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: me either... lets he speak by it self soon :-)
<wpwrak>
whitequark: you know the risk in trying to teach that old dog is that he may just enjoy the meal (-:C
<kristianpaul>
xiangfu: well i do not plan more than a blinking led with the j1 cpu
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: ok. so you are using the Verlog code? right?
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: so i looked around a bit, and for LX9, the situation is relatively bleak. the only thing halfway decent i found is that avnet board. (which is nice but has issues)
<wpwrak>
there's also the question on whether we still consider such boards to be disposable (because experiments may destroy fpga internals)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: well, I don't really care what you personally like, and I shouldn't. I think that if you'll see the actual benefit, you'll jump across yourself.
<wpwrak>
disposable = board has to be very simple or modular
<whitequark>
wpwrak: but have to finish this ruby thing first.
<wpwrak>
non-disposable = more convenient logistics
<wpwrak>
whitequark: (jump) i feel like a fish in water with C :) and i know enough of object-oriented principles and their application to C that i doubt it'll ever outgrow my needs. maybe my discipline may fail me from time to time, but that can happen in any language.
<kristianpaul>
xiangfu: and yes i steal all your ucf and makefiles :-)
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: I can do quict test here too. in case you want more feedback. once you finish the j1soc.
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: great.
<kristianpaul>
xiangfu: ah yes, well no forth code yet..
<kristianpaul>
but i will ping you when have dont that part
<kristianpaul>
also will need load that in bram
<wpwrak>
another option would be to move from LX9 to something else. there are also relatively cheap boards for non-LX9 chips. the question is how hard or easy it would be to adapt wolfgang's work to them. from what i've heard about what he's doing, this should be quite feasible, but may require some serious amount of grunt work.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: sometimes forks take over the original projects, you know ;)
<wpwrak>
whitequark: yet most die within a week ;-)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: a week is optimistic :D
<xiangfu>
(but may require some serious amount of grunt work) yes. and he have to understand the chip details again. (just like wolfgang done with slx9)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: looking at github stats, most don't even see a single commit
<wpwrak>
whitequark: "within" is "<=" ;-)
<whitequark>
yeah yeah :)
<wpwrak>
whitequark: so it also includes the ones that already end after sobering up :) but then, the zero-commit ones are a bit suspicious
<whitequark>
wpwrak: well, it's just that on github you're one click away from a fork. it is much more like a git-clone.
<whitequark>
so you gotta have a lot of forks which aren't forks in traditional OSS sense. for example, the typical workflow is fork-commit-pullrequest
<wpwrak>
whitequark: yeah, some may just fall asleep on their mouse :)
<whitequark>
wpwrak: I think it is a side effect of github being a "social network" whatever that means. Some people mistake "fork" for "like" or something like that.
<wpwrak>
;-))
<whitequark>
I mean that seriously btw
<wpwrak>
the facbook culture :)
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: you are using the tqg144. the board I send to you are bga. the different is the clk pin and led pin are different.
<whitequark>
wpwrak: kind of
<xiangfu>
s/the board I send to you are bga/the board I send to you is bga/
<qi-bot>
xiangfu meant: "kristianpaul: you are using the tqg144. the board I send to you is bga. the different is the clk pin and led pin are different."
<kristianpaul>
ahm ok
<kristianpaul>
well easy change ! :-)
<wpwrak>
xiangfu: so the idea is to produce one of these boards for fpgatools users ?
<wpwrak>
"users" being pioneers, of course :)
<xiangfu>
wpwrak: not sure. if someone want buy. we can sale. but the target is make some product for consumer. make some real money.
<xiangfu>
kristianpaul: yes.
<wpwrak>
heh :)
<wpwrak>
xiangfu: so what would the customer product be like ? fpgatools seem to be very very far from that
* kristianpaul
thing same
<kristianpaul>
think*
<xiangfu>
wolfgang already target on j1 soc.
<wpwrak>
in fact, i've been wondering if wolfgang had given up for good on making money :)
<kristianpaul>
lol
<xiangfu>
wpwrak: I don't know.
<wpwrak>
hmm, what would be the consumer demand for a j1 soc ?
<whitequark>
is J1 SOC the milkymist soc?
<whitequark>
synthesized in asic?
<kristianpaul>
no no
<kristianpaul>
no no no :p
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: is just a small target
<kristianpaul>
i dont see any consumer demand eithe
<whitequark>
kristianpaul: what it is then?
<kristianpaul>
but fpgatools need do more that a counter anyway
<whitequark>
it is used as a simple yet real target for fpgatools, right?
<xiangfu>
(consumer demand) depends on what we want the product do with j1 soc inside.
<wpwrak>
xiangfu: well ... are there plans beyond J! ? as far as i know, J1 was the next step towards making a better "proof of concept"
<wpwrak>
what i don't see in all this is something sellable to end customers
<xiangfu>
no plan.
<wpwrak>
on the other hand, it's something that ought to be very suitable for attracting sponsorship from interested parties
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: j1 or anyother small cpu can do actually something i think
<xiangfu>
( to end customers) I am not very clear on this. have to talk with wolfgang.
<jianju>
Do you guys know of that Bittware board with an FPGA alongside an Epiphany chip?
<wpwrak>
usually, when there's some cartel in charge of things, there are many powerful entities who are silently suffering but will be more than happy to exercise their muscle as soon as they see a way out of their misery
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: oh, sure j1 can do "something". but then, i can get a chip that does quite a few "something"s for 1/10 of the price of that fpga :)
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<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: ;)
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: now the question is what all this is supposed to connect to. maybe it's just wolfgang needing to work off some stress and there's no goal besides breaking the fpga conspiracy.
<kristianpaul>
breaking fpga conspiracy
<kristianpaul>
:-)
<kristianpaul>
jeje
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: or maybe he's got some commercialization plan but isn't telling anyone
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: or something else :) it's rather obscure
<kristianpaul>
haha
<kristianpaul>
maybe indeed
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: it may also be that he doesn't see a way to turn this into income, yet there is.
<kristianpaul>
but is too early?
<kristianpaul>
well you need a plan to build on it
<wpwrak>
not sure about timing. depends on the goals. if there' s specific goal but it's still far out, perhaps keeping a low profile is good.
<kristianpaul>
yeah
<sagex>
oh guys whats happening
<kristianpaul>
and you just announce fpgatools may get public officially ;)
<wpwrak>
but then, if it's just to work off the frustration of fpga closedness, it would be beneficial to "go public" soon
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<wpwrak>
and i think a blinking led is convincing proof of concept
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: hmm, did you use "you" as "someone" or as "Werner" ?
<wpwrak>
(obviously, i hope there will be some sort of announcement in the fpgatools future :)
<wpwrak>
(and i do keep on putting hints into my monthly statistics. they're also reminders for wolfgang that he could be a little less secretive :)
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<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: werner :)
<kristianpaul>
reminders oh yes i noticed most of then
<kristianpaul>
hehe
<sagex>
anyone use their nanonote to do something bizarre
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: good. so they weren't imperceptibly subtle :)
<wpwrak>
sagex: ah, welcome to the nanonote club then :)
<wpwrak>
(at least i tried to find a reasonably bizarrely-looking angle when taking the pictures :)
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<whitequark>
wpwrak: I just stumbled upon a problem and invented a solution for it
<whitequark>
then someone else realized I was going to rewrite `make'
<hozer>
did they stop you?
<whitequark>
hozer: I've to support Windows, and my data format is not serializable
<whitequark>
but at least I'd have a thing to steal code from
<hozer>
so are you installying cygwin and make now?
<whitequark>
hozer: rewriting the part of make I need :3
<whitequark>
actually using make would be a terrible idea, as the amount of interfacing required to use that tiny part of the old tool will probably be far higher than the algorithm itself
<whitequark>
but it was a fun discovery nevertheless
<whitequark>
I'm even solving basically the same problem: compiling translation units while obeying dependencies
<hozer>
heh
<hozer>
seems like we need a new title: code Archeologist
<whitequark>
and he does what?
<hozer>
or engineering archeologist
<hozer>
find a problem, look for old code that solves it
<whitequark>
this should be a prerequisite to be named an engineer even jokingly
<whitequark>
the amount of real (and imaginary) problems not yet solved by anyone publicly is vanishingly small...
<hozer>
it should be, but if that were a requirement most universities would cease to exist as they are
<whitequark>
maybe they should, then?
<hozer>
the solution to renewable energy storage is sitting in 25-30 year old ammonia tanks
<whitequark>
hm.
<whitequark>
could you elaborate?
<hozer>
Yet DOE continues to talk about 'advances in fundamental blah blah blah for hydrogen storage'
<whitequark>
also that sounds quite... smelly. and not exactly safe in case of a rupture.
<hozer>
There's more hydrogen in a truck loaded with pressurized liquid ammonia than a truck full of liquid hydrogen
<whitequark>
how come such obvious thing isn't mentioned anywhere?
<hozer>
well, the big tanks are atmospheric pressure but -33f
<hozer>
so basically, instead of making ammonia the way we've done it since the 1920's when Haber and Bosch figured it out (by using natural gas or coal for the hydrogen), we just use electrolysis to get the hydrogen, and the same haber-bosch reactor
<whitequark>
hozer: this is an awesome idea. are there any other reasons (except for the ammonia being quite dangerous to handle) everyone is pursuing hydrogen stuff?
<hozer>
hydrogen is a pain to store
<hozer>
it either needs 5000psi (dangerous), or near absolute zero
<hozer>
and then, even as liquid, it's very low density
<hozer>
so about the only place the mass-energy-density of H2 makes sense is a rocket
<whitequark>
thanks for telling this, I never heard about ammonia storage before
<whitequark>
(as a hydrogen repository, that is)
<hozer>
you can burn ammonia in engines or tubines directly too
<whitequark>
I'd worry about releasing ammonia into atmosphere accidentally
<whitequark>
through I'm not sure what would be the consequences of doing that with hydrogen
<hozer>
but for places like Iowa that grow a lot of corn (which needs a lot of nitrogen), 20GW of wind turbines would make enough electricity to make the ammonia
<hozer>
do you have cats?
<whitequark>
not at the moment
<hozer>
well, if you clean the catbox you have an ammonia release ;)
<whitequark>
yeah, trace amounts of it. urea hydrolizes very slowly.
<hozer>
the nice thing about NH3 is it's self-alarming. You know very quickly if there's a leak
<whitequark>
whereas here you could trivially get a large-scale chemical accident if your turbine malfunctions
<whitequark>
hm
<whitequark>
what if there isn't a small leak? on the page you've linked me to ( syntax do |s|
<hozer>
now here's the thing... what happens if you have a natural gas leak in your home
<hozer>
I used to haul ammonia tanks when I was in high school ... my dad had (well still has) an applicator
<hozer>
and then I decided I never wanted to deal with that stuff again
<hozer>
and 15 years later I'm doing a feasibility study on wind energy to ammonia
<whitequark>
hozer: I have an electric stove here. I don't like natural gas either.
<whitequark>
Also: here, almost all length of the pipes is routed outside so that all leaks just spill to atmosphere, as opposed to accumulating and exploding in the basement
<whitequark>
natural gas isn't dangerous unless it explodes, ammonia is
<hozer>
I wouldn't advocate putting NH3 in a home
<whitequark>
I'd rather not see it in a city either
<whitequark>
but it is probably fine for long-distance transport
<hozer>
or long-term storage
<whitequark>
yes
<hozer>
in the areas where it's windy
<hozer>
we have all kinds of diesel fuel and gasoline in cities that just gets carcinogens in the groundwater :P
<whitequark>
we also have phenolic resins which release them right into our lungs
<whitequark>
carcinogens is one thing, caustic NH3 is another
<whitequark>
*are
<hozer>
well, you can smell NH3 and easily avoid it :P, and then it evaporates and blows away
<hozer>
but yeah ;)
<hozer>
and now, I need to get to bed
<whitequark>
see you later
<hozer>
later!
<whitequark>
ha, only two more years till mp3 patents expire
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<wpwrak>
do we need an xclock --patent=mp3 that shows a count-down until expiration ? :)
<lindi->
xclock doesn't support clipboard :(
<wpwrak>
why would we need that ?
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<wpwrak>
and of course, that sounds like a nice thing for a twisted mind to add :)
<lindi->
wpwrak: to paste the current time to some application?
<whitequark>
lindi-: alias whatever='date|xsel -b
<lindi->
wpwrak: but that's the primary selection
<whitequark>
wpwrak: I'm tired of installing libsox-fmt-mp3 and friends on every new linux system
<whitequark>
lindi-: no, keyboard
<whitequark>
err
<whitequark>
clipboard
<whitequark>
gotta get some sleep.
<lindi->
ah true, but it leaves an extra process running :)
<kyak>
seems like a trivial change, but now for some reason --without-cxx-binding leaks into configure args, even though we have CONFIG_INSTALL_LIBSTDCPP=y in config
<kyak>
xiangfu: do you have an idea why it is happening?
<kyak>
this leads to breakage of all ncurses apps written in C++ :)
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<kyak>
i have a feeling that it must read ifneq ($(CONFIG_INSTALL_LIBSTDCPP),y)
<kyak>
yeah. .that's exactly how it should read
<kyak>
i'm don't want to start bashing OpenWrt again, but it's just not getting enough testing (and quality control) on some aspects
<kyak>
this commit is almost three months, and noone even noticed.. it's a pity Ben is the only (more or less used) desktop target of OpenWrt
<kyak>
i'll post a bug report, just to clear my conscience and also see how this report is ignored
<wpwrak>
kyak: yes, gettimeofday is what i was thinking of
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<wpwrak>
wolfspraul: heya ! happy new year ! hangover successfully evicted ? ;-)
<wolfspraul>
he, thanks! no alcohol no hangover :-)
<wpwrak>
ooh, boring :)
<wpwrak>
wolfspraul: yesterday, we had a discussion here, trying to figure out where you might be planning to take fpgatools
<wolfspraul>
I'm not into these types of talks much
<wpwrak>
especially regarding boards for experimentation (which will be needed in one form or another once people want to get involved)
<wolfspraul>
there is a todo section in the readme, that roughly describes my current thinking
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<wpwrak>
that explains some of the core bits, but not much of the environment
<wpwrak>
well, assuming you actually want to have one :)
<wpwrak>
for example, if people want to "play" with your work ("play" as in low-key exploratory projects), what hardwere would they use ? e.g., do you plan to produce and sell xiangfu's bga board ?
<wpwrak>
or make the design and hope someone picks it up ? or evaluate and recommend a 3rd party product ?
<wpwrak>
or not care at all and expect others to take care of such worldly issues ?
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<portconsole>
hello
<portconsole>
what is this irc for?
<wolfspraul>
nothing much works right now, so there is no need for a board
<wolfspraul>
I could make 20 and send out as freebies maybe, don't know
<wpwrak>
i thought you had the LED blinking ?
<wolfspraul>
yes, at a fixed frequency
<wolfspraul>
next step will be to make this more variable
<wpwrak>
btw, i think the to do list lacks characterization: propagation delays, fan-out limits, maybe current restrictions.
<kristianpaul>
propagation delays with larget designs indeed
<wpwrak>
fixed frequency is already a major achievement
<wpwrak>
it's like receiving the first greetings from extraterrestrials. even if it's just a "hello earth", i don't think anyone would dismiss it for lacking eloquence
<kyak>
"read the topic or gtfo" would have worked, too!
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<kyak>
but you did it in a more elegant way, yes :)
<wpwrak>
conveys that air of superiority much better :)
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<kyak>
wpwrak: so.. i'm calling my function at periodic intervals using nanosleep(). I also measure my function execution time using gettimeofday() and subtract that time from the nanosleep() intervals. I gave up the idea of real-time for now, but at least i know when my function has overrun
<wpwrak>
for periodic calls, you may want to use interval timers. that way, you don't need to worry about adjusting the sleep
<kyak>
interval timers?
<wpwrak>
setitimer
<wpwrak>
at least that's how i think they work. only used them once a long time ago, and that was for something else
<wpwrak>
lemme check ...
<kyak>
"After the specified timer expires it generates SIGALRM which can be captured using signal() function to call a signal handler function."
<kyak>
perhaps it is what i need
<kyak>
heh, it's good. Even the code mimics the behavior of interrupts (empty while(1) loop)
<wpwrak>
yeah :)
<kyak>
thanks!
<wpwrak>
np :)
<kyak>
damn, there are gazillion ways to do basically the same thing
<wpwrak>
the joy of RT ;-)
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* wpwrak
just realized something :)
<wolfspraul>
which is? :-)
<wpwrak>
the ben may make a rather nice "environment" for an lx9 board
<wpwrak>
it can supply 3V3, a clock, and JTAG
<wpwrak>
so you just need a regulator (or maybe two ... dunno if you can get rid of the 2.5 V rail), caps, and some headers, maybe some leds
<wpwrak>
yeah, seems that Vccaux is fine with 3.3 V
<wpwrak>
oh, and there's even a lx4. is that new ?
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<kristianpaul>
lx4 dont think so
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<kristianpaul>
damn 34 C :-\
<wpwrak>
25 C here. very nice :)
<kristianpaul>
:-(
<kristianpaul>
temperature would nice if were some wind, but dont even that..
<kristianpaul>
would be*
<wpwrak>
but with a lot of humidity ?
<kristianpaul>
no humidy i'm at 1km high
<wpwrak>
no clouds up there ? :)
<kristianpaul>
but its getting cloudy lets if it gets better
<kristianpaul>
yeap
<kristianpaul>
but when is sunny there is wind
<wpwrak>
got a nice view from the heights ?
<kristianpaul>
i love my view from kitchen to the sunset
<kristianpaul>
and from both batroom and kiving room to the sunrise
<wolfspraul>
the large and ongoing price reductions of the lx9 have taken over the small economic niche of the lx4
<wolfspraul>
today the situation is that nobody stocks the lx4, lx4 must be ordered in large quantities from xilinx, and price is equal or even above that of lx9
<kristianpaul>
i a shame there is no diy friendle packing in xilinx 7...
<wolfspraul>
if anybody still insists on lx4, I guess nothing can help them :-)
<kristianpaul>
is*
<wolfspraul>
I don't think much extra money is to be made if xilinx were to offer the xc7 in additional packages
<wpwrak>
wolfspraul: ah, digi-key have the lx4 and it's USD 10.9 (MOQ 1) vs. USD 15.7 for the lx9. but maybe they''re just dumping their stock.
<wpwrak>
kristianpaul: ah, nice view
<wolfspraul>
the lx9 costs ca. 7 usd on the street in china now
<wolfspraul>
lx4 needs to be preordered in large quantities at higher prices... in other words - noone buys it
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: and it gets better on sunsets
<wpwrak>
wolfspraul: USD 7 is nice. it's a bit irritating that digi-key have no volume discount at all on those chips
<wolfspraul>
maybe it's too easy to buy this from china? I don't know...
<wolfspraul>
china accounts for >50% of global semiconductor sales nowadays, maybe for xilinx even more?
<kristianpaul>
but buy from china online seems to lamost imposible if you dont read chinesse
<wolfspraul>
you just need to find one random china-based xilinx reseller and you will not care whether digikey has a volume discount for these chips or not
<kristianpaul>
and write in english, i had have my bad experiences..
<wolfspraul>
oh sure, you have to find that one you trust and can work with
<wolfspraul>
but in general I find digikey not the best source for 'key' chips
<wolfspraul>
maybe because they are 'key', so customers tend to secure supply for these manually/individually anyway
<wolfspraul>
digikey is good if you need high-quality and reliable source for all the other small & important stuff in your designs
<wolfspraul>
but for the 3-5 key chips, maybe not
<wolfspraul>
they won't be there at all, or no volume discount, etc.
<wolfspraul>
that's my experience at least
<wpwrak>
yeah, the fancier the thing, the worse the conditions
<hozer>
wolfspraul: do you have schematics/pcb for the lx9 board you are using for fpgatools?
<wolfspraul>
sure
<wolfspraul>
I have no local storage, quite simply
<wolfspraul>
some are hand-assembled with standard testing pcbs though, and some are variants of azonenberg's board I think
<wolfspraul>
there is nothing unique or valuable in those "designs"
<hozer>
I have a XESS Xula2 board with an LX25-256bga
<hozer>
and I've been thinking about how to get a generic small form factor board that could take lxN-csg324 chips
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<kristianpaul>
hozer: hi, how did end your lm32 soc port btw?
<kyak>
wpwrak, kristianpaul you poor guys, i was just skating :)
<hozer>
kristianpaul: I got lm32 + milkymist to synthesis, but the board I have has a 16 bit dram instead of 32 bits so there are hanging data lines ;)
<kyak>
openwrt devs updated glib2 version. Now, atk won't build against this version (so again, that wasn't tested). If we start updating atk, it would lead to gtk2 update and that would automatically break gtk2 interface on Ben, since currently used version of gtk2 is the last one where directfb is working
<kristianpaul>
hum..
<wpwrak>
openwrt, the eternal uphill battle ... well, you know my opinion. you (mainly kyak and xiangfu) are actually doing an admirable job, but oh the humanity ...
<kyak>
back in those days, you would mention OE and Jlime. Are you still convinced it would've been a better choice?
<wpwrak>
i think with enough effort, OE/Jlime could have survived, yes. rafa's involvement was time-limited because he eventually had to get a job, but i don't think OE is any harder to maintain than openwrt. (i mean, neither is easy but each has its own quirks)
<hozer>
is OE debian-based?
<wpwrak>
hozer: unfortunately not
<hozer>
why not emdebian
<wpwrak>
which brings me to the next step: rafa also suggested that debian may be a choice. debian had many issues back then (with regard to embedded systems), but given general tendencies, i would have favoured something going towards debian
<kyak>
we would see same problems with OE.. their repos have gtk+_2.24.14, where directfb is long broken
<kyak>
dunno.. of course we can override glib2 from openwrt and just run the older version
<kyak>
but then we can take it further and run older everything :)
<wpwrak>
kyak: i think OE should be more open towards "desktop" environments. for openwrt, they're (understandably) quite alien
<kyak>
yes, this is true
<wpwrak>
i also understand worfgang's aversion towards OE. openmoko was the nonstop pervert party of OE. people there used it as a fancy "make". and he was in charge of overseeing that madness.
<kyak>
so openmoko was OE-based?
<kristianpaul>
wpwrak: debian good old dog :-)
<kyak>
i didn't quite understand what do you mean, could you explain more?
<wpwrak>
so obviously, if you wake up from nightmares about OE, go over to meet you folks who have cooked up even scarier things, struggle the whole day to control the fallout of OE perversion, then maybe spend some time watching your kernel hackers fight, before you fall into bed, exhausted, and then the nightmares return, then i guess it's understandable that you don't choose OE for your next project :)
<wpwrak>
kyak: yes, openmoko was OE-based
<kyak>
i'm just trying to understand where is OE's fault exactly
<wpwrak>
kyak: and the OE was a big resource drain. even worse, there was no clear separation between distribution and regular development. so everybody in the sw group lived too close to OE
<wpwrak>
kyak: well, except for a few, myself included, who managed to "outsource" the OE nightmares :)
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<wpwrak>
kyak: ah, it's the overall complexity
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<wpwrak>
kyak: and, in the case of openmoko, that there are no clear separation between distribution and general development
<wpwrak>
kyak: so most people developed their pieces of code inside the OE environment (using bitbake instead of make, and so on)
<kyak>
in openwrt, base system is separated from packages by using "feeds", which contain those packages. Is it the separation you are talking about?
<wpwrak>
no. i actually don't quite get that "feeds" division.
<wpwrak>
in OM, the (well, one) problem was that people developing applications developed them _in_ OE
<wpwrak>
as opposed to the traditional approach where you do your thing and it you need something from the distribution or you and the distribution to pick up something, you'd talk to the distribution guys
<wpwrak>
this division didn't exist. therefore, any OE hickup immediately became everyone's problem.
<wpwrak>
and also everybody had to understand OE.
<wpwrak>
(and install it, etc.)
<kyak>
yep.. i understand now
<hozer>
ah, this explains a few things now
<hozer>
when I was a MontaVista we checked everything into Bitkeeper repos and used RPM packages
<hozer>
and then we had to migrate to CVS/SVN 'very quickly'
<hozer>
there were a few things I liked about OE, but it was brittle
<hozer>
So what if we cloned debian unstable, and had a 'Dem' (Debian EMbedded) (or emD, or something) that was like testing, and finally a stable branch
<hozer>
so in the case of Debian, stuff doesn't get promoted to stable until it's been in testing awhile.
<hozer>
I want to do an embedded system distro that puts things into 'stable' after they pass a regression test suite
<hozer>
which would hopefully block the kinds of nightmares that OE had
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<kyak>
well, there are releases in openwrt
<kyak>
but i'd say that they happen very often, so we stick to a particular svn revision when releasing an image for Ben
<kyak>
*don't happen often
<hozer>
right, but it's hard to get GUI stuff pulled into openwrt, right?
<kyak>
GUI, i18n, UTF-8...
<kyak>
it's very sparsely tested, if tested at all
<wpwrak>
at OM, our main reference was the local OE anyway. i don't know how rapidly things were sync'ed to main OE (probably quickly, since we had some mainline OE developers in our team)
<kyak>
indeed, who cares about ncursesw, if there are lost packets on some router
<wpwrak>
what i did was that i maintained a border between the things i did and OE. when i wanted to put something into OE, i told the OE folks and they took care of the rest. and when i needed a package from them, i asked for it and it usually showed up soon thereafter. of course, my work wasn;t very intertwined with OE, so this made my model of operation more feasible.
<wpwrak>
border, or boundary
<wpwrak>
kyak: i'm a bit surprised they wouldn't care about console things (like ncurses)
<kyak>
wpwrak: it's wide ncurses :)
<kyak>
the variant which supports UTF-8
<wpwrak>
well, whatever-ncurses as long as it's not xncurses ;-)
<kyak>
i think even xiangfu gave up on submitting patches
<kyak>
three months ago we made a release and had to use additional patches for qt4
<kyak>
they are not in openwrt
<wpwrak>
mmh, that doesn't sound good
<wpwrak>
i thought owrt folks were quite close to qi-hw ?
<kyak>
yeah, i'm so happy when something is broken and i can fix it without interferring to upstream openwrt
<wpwrak>
;-)
<kyak>
they are right in this channel, yes :)
<wpwrak>
kinda absent, though
<sagex>
hmm anyone have a successful and stable usb-ethernet solution for the nanonote
<kyak>
sagex: i do, following the instructions in "ethernet over usb" article in wiki