Contributed by jose on from the multiprocesors dept.
Date: Wed, 17 Mar 2004 02:25:08 -0700
From: Theo de Raadt <deraadt@cvs.openbsd.org>
To: tech@openbsd.org
Subject: SMP development
As some of you already know, we have someone working almost "full time" on making i386 SMP happen by the release after 3.5 (ok, maybe it will be delayed by another release, but I doubt it). That person is funded.
I'd like to bring another person up to doing that, fulltime, and I have someone in mind. If anyone out there is able to fund someone for a few months for this to happen, please get in touch with me for details.
Thanks.
(Comments are closed)
By Anonymous Coward () on
By Mike () on
Is OpenBSD 3.3 or 3.4 affected?
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By Juanjo () on
By kris () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
> don't you setup a donation fund, you are more
> likely to get people, as opposed to asking people
> to just pay for it.
making a wild guess here, but it's possibly because he does not want to ask someone to make a full-time commitment to this work unless he knows for certain they will be able to pay their bills.
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By kris () on
By Brad () brad at comstyle dot com on mailto:brad at comstyle dot com
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By kris () on
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By Nicolas David () on http://www.kodezone.com
By Anonymous Coward () on
Well, it seemed like a reasonable suggestion, even if experience has shown it doesn't work. In any case, it isn't an either/or situation. You can appeal for a single institution to the funding, and set up fund. Maybe sell a special shirt =)
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By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymous Coward () on
Instead, if you make a concerted effort and set up specialized fundS or, say, a special t-shirt section with a t-shirt selection, people would have a greater ability to choose what they want done WITHOUT hunting down the developer(s) to donate specifically to.
A couple of years ago, I wanted firewire development pushed forward faster. But most developers were still focused on wrapping up USB support. In order for firewire development to get focused on, USB support had to become more solid. Those developers would have more time possibly to work on firewire if they so chose.
I tried to donate (contacted Theo several times via email as he was listed at the donation contact at the time), got no response, searched through the mailing list archives, found a person working on usb/firewire, contacted him, and ordered him some requested equipment.
Now, this doesn't sound very hard, but we're talking about something on the order of say, a couple of weeks, for this to occur. Email, wait, no response, email, wait, no response, archive search, web search, contact developer directly via email, wait, correspond over a few days on needs, order equipment.
iow, WHAT A FREAKIN PAIN IN THE ASS. Wastes developers time, wastes people who want to donate time, and a fair amount of effort (not difficult effort, but you've got to be persistant).
I would have much rather had a "fund page" "to support SMP, donate here", "to support Firewire support, donate here", "to support 64-bit processors, donate here". Have a disclaimer that leftover funds may be diverted and even there are no assurances of support except that money will be donated to the OBSD project and related efforts. Click, find address, send money order or PayPal payment, be done with it.
This is really not so different than the OBSD donation web page where equipment gets listed that is wanted.
Personally, I think this also would give greater feedback to developers on what users want. I know developers may not want to work on less exciting or what they consider less important aspects of the OS. And this does stink of "you pay, it gets done, don't pay, we ignore you" sort of environment some people may have a knee-jerk reaction towards.
But it's a lot more directed than general donations, buying CDs and t-shirts, etc.
By deichert () deeiche@digit.not on mailto:deeiche@digit.not
I'm planning on posting the list of donaters to the misc@ list once Ken gets the last of the funds.
By Peter Hessler () spambox@theapt.org on http://www.theapt.org
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By kris () on
By click46 () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
26 * 40 * 40 = $41,600
That is a ballpark.
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By Chad Loder () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymoose () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymous Coward () on
$160'000 high? Maybe today... but certainly not 5 years ago. $40/hour is *very* reasonable, that's $80k/year... getting quality people that know what they are doing at that rate can be hard though...
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By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymous Coward () on
A senior engineer at a good company? The kind that also pays health insurance and retirement crap?
I make 60k a year at my work, but i cost my company $140k once all my benefits are added in.
Paying someone knowledgeable 40/hour to work on SMP while dropping everything else seems like a very, very good deal.
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By Dan () on
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By Chris Humphries () chris@unixfu.net on http://unixfu.net/
By j0rd () mits_rox@OHNOS.hotmail.com on http://j0rd.ath.cx
By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymous Coward () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
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By kris () on
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By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymous Coward () on
Jesus Christ why would I say "Any word on SMP for sparc32?" if I didn't realize that they are talking about i386 SMP.
Posting serious questions about OpenBSD here is such a fucking waste of time.
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By masouds () masouds@oeone.net on mailto:masouds@oeone.net
On a related note, Last time I tried SMP which was couple of weeks ago (yes, call me a cowboy) it failed just after enabling ioapic on doreti() function. Dunno whether it is my motherboard or it is always the same. Gotta try it again soon
By Anonymous Coward () on
By Anonymous Coward () on
Is this being persued in the new multiprocessing work?
MD