OpenBSD Journal

G5 pledges

Contributed by dhartmei on from the you-can-make-it-happen dept.

Jonathan Walther is collecting money to get the OpenBSD project an Apple G5, which is currently still unsupported due to the lack of hardware:

To date, we have total cash commitments of $770. A private reseller has offered to find the best possible deal on a used dual G5, which could potentially cut $400 off the cost.

Assuming the best, we still need to raise $830.

Read the full story on misc@.

I hereby pledge $50 of my own, and I'd like to ask our readers to consider doing likewise. Trust me, $780 to make Dale feel obliged to get OpenBSD 3.7 running on G5 is an excellent bargain ;) Contact Jonathan directly if you support this cause. Thank you.

(Comments are closed)

Comments
  1. Comments

    1. By Anonymous Coward (69.197.92.181) on

      Somehow, I would feel better if this wasn't organized by an uneducated, hateful bigot, who's biggest contribution to society appears to be deceitful christian propaganda.

      Comments

      1. By Anonymous Coward (68.165.27.173) on

        I second that motion.

      2. By Michael Knudsen (217.157.199.114) on

        This is actually a rather interesting read.

      3. By jkm (213.214.214.2) on

        Yep.

      4. By Anonymous Coward (81.168.23.162) on

        Agreed.

        I suggest anybody who wants to donate money for this project takes a look around his personal website first and decides if they are still comfortable doing so.

        I'll continue to donate to OpenBSD elswhere.

      5. By Michael Knudsen (217.157.199.114) on

        I'm not sure I understand your concerns. What are you worried about? That his reseller might also be an "uneducated, hateful bigot"? Who cares, really? That he keeps the money for himself (and thus probably violates something in that book he seems so fond of)?

        I don't care about other people or their beliefs as long as they don't try to push them down my throat. I think this is where many (most) religious people go wrong as they see it as an insult.

        Now, we're off topic. This is about getting hardware, not people.

        Comments

        1. By jkm (213.214.214.2) on

          Generally you are right, everyone are entitled to his/hers opinions. But at some point a persons opinions gets so wierd that you don't want to deal with that person. Where that point is is hard to say but this guy is way past, according to me.

          If i stated my beliefs about religion he might think the same about me.

          I also agree that it sucks that this gets in the way of developing OpenBSD.


          Comments

          1. By M.Raju (66.23.224.121) on

            I don't see how Open Source/free-thinking gets mixed with someone with radical views on religion and other primitive thoughts [sorry for the OT] I am sticking with donating to OpenBSD in general..

          2. By Michael Knudsen (217.157.199.114) on

            > Generally you are right, everyone are entitled to his/hers
            > opinions. But at some point a persons opinions gets so wierd
            > that you don't want to deal with that person. Where that point
            > is is hard to say but this guy is way past, according to me.

            I fail to see how his opinions are related to OpenBSD. If they are
            unrelated, I fail to see how this can affect your will to cooperate.

            > If i stated my beliefs about religion he might think the
            > same about me.

            I wouldn't be the least surprised.

      6. By Daniel Hartmeier (62.65.145.30) on

        I see what you mean. But imagine a couple of people, among them religious fundamentalists, atheists and manufacturers of baby mulching machines ignore their personal differences and just focus on improving OpenBSD. That wouldn't be so bad, would it?

        One of the goals of the project is:

        Be as politics-free as possible; solutions should be decided on the basis of technical merit.

        In this specific case of fundraising and donations, I'd say the technical merit of the solution consists of promptly delivering a G5 to the project. The money will be coming from individual people and go the project directly. It would be unreasonable to assume any individual sympathized with anything but the specific cause to get OpenBSD a G5. Jonathan gets credit for organizing the pledges no more because of any personal preferences of his own than despite them.

        Comments

        1. By kami petersen (217.215.10.111) on

          there is no way of remaining unpolitical dealing with this kind of scum. that's just naïve and ignorant, although this is quite common rhethoric from spineless engineers and scientists. hitler had lot's of technical merit, that wouldn't make you want to get involved with any of his business. this is worse than being funded by the us military.

          yeah, i know about references to hitler and discussion threads, so i'll end it now...

          Comments

          1. By Anonymous Coward (209.142.209.161) on

            I don't see anyone else getting off their ass and organizing something.

            The money isn't going to or through Reactor Core or Jonathan Walker, he is simply counting pledges and then money is donated directly to OpenBSD. I don't see what the big deal is.

            Comments

            1. By jkm (213.214.214.2) on

              good point

            2. By Anonymous Coward (209.142.209.161) on

              I don't see anyone else getting off their ass and organizing something.

              For accuracy's and respect's sake, i should have noted that Diana Eichert organized a similar fundraising earlier this year. Sorry i forgot to mention that, Diana. Can't recall anything similar, though.

              Comments

              1. By MotleyFool (134.253.26.12) on

                Ya know, have you noticed it's those darn extremists who actually do things.

                A lesbian, http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/openbsd/2002-10/1282.html,

                and now a "Christian".

                what can you do, what can you do...

                Comments

                1. By Anonymous Coward (141.157.237.121) on

                  the problem is not that Jonathan Walther is a Christian or the poster of that message is a lesbian; the problem is with the comments found on the reactore-core website. You'll notice that no one says that "gee, he shouldn't have put anything about Christianity on a Website", for this is not the problem that people have with it. Instead, it is with the articles on the site, most notorious is the "Islam promotes homosexual child abuse", along with the comments made by Mr. Walther. No one is attacking Christianity, nor Christians in general, just the bigotry that is prevalent in the writing on the site.

          2. By James (141.154.117.46) on

            Yeah, but if Hitler never killed anyone and just raised money for a G5 for OpenBSD, I'd be ok with it. :)

            Comments

            1. By Anonymous Coward (24.95.36.101) on

              Jesus. Heh heh... That is wrong but funny...

          3. By James (66.218.244.40) on http://www.opentorrent.org

            What a shame that a mere mention of a name can cause so much grief...

        2. By Anonymous Coward (68.148.237.181) on

          There's no doubt OpenBSD should be as free of politics as possible, but it looks like donors are helping this guy to get a good deal on used hardware.

          Can someone please enlighten me if this is necessary? Just 2 weeks ago, Theo was asking for Hackathon donations, so which is more important? Or, what's the priority?

          Comments

          1. By Anonymous Coward (68.148.237.181) on

            My sentiment is what Theo already said:

            http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/openbsd/2004-11/2820.html

            I guess I answered my own question too. ^_^

      7. By Anonymous Coward (68.202.41.228) on

        I find it revealing that those who harp on "tolerance" the most are usually the least tolerant of opposing viewpoints, in particular anything to do with Christianity.

        As far as I can tell, it's rooted in an inferiority complex; they have to ridicule *something* to seem intellectual and socially progressive, but choosing something non-Western as a target opens them up to charges of whatever-ism, so they pick Christianity or western culture.

        Anyway, he's contributing and you're not, so how about shutting the fuck up, eh?

        Comments

        1. By Anonymous Coward (69.197.92.181) on

          Except that you are making up a strawman because you have no valid argument. I never said anything about christians, or that there is anything wrong with being a christian, I have neither said nor done anything intolerant. I didn't say christians like molesting little boys, and that christians should be feared and hated. This is what he says about muslims. I have nothing against christians, I have a problem with bigots who lie to spread fear and hate.

          Comments

          1. By Anonymous Coward (141.157.237.121) on

            I should think that this more of a red herring argument, since she/he did not attack another form of your argument, but instead redirected to another, OT, argument, hence a red herring.

        2. By kami petersen (217.215.10.111) on

          man, how can you even put "tolerance" and "shut the fuck up" in the same post? somebody's gotta struck a nerve. got something against intellectuals and progressives? they have something you lack?

          freedom of speech means that everybody can say whatever they wish. if they take responsibility for it. if, for instance, the main character in this drama was a resident of my country, i would file a police report on racial agitation (or whatever it translates to), wich is criminal here. and i think "Islam Promotes Homosexual Child Abuse!" etc. would have been a strong case. i don't know canadian law however.

          amen.

          Comments

          1. By Chris (24.76.170.207) on

            Islam isn't race-based.

      8. By Anonymous Coward (68.224.187.79) on

        I AGREE!

    2. By AdJ (212.238.188.197) on

      One thing is to have these flawed notions and ideas, an
      other thing is to put these absurd quotation as a header
      and footer on the donations page.

      Fucking moron.

  2. By Anonymous Coward (66.92.213.226) on

    Ok, I just kicked in some $$$'s... I Enjoy running 3.5 on my G4 (going to upgrade when I get around to it..) I hope that something can be done about the finiky PowerPC Install

  3. By Anonymous Coward (141.157.237.121) on

    I would normally stress at this point that one should not make an argmentum ad hominen, since it does not matter who makes the argument if it is valid. However, donations are supporting the person, and this most definitly clouds the waters. If you are really bothered by the Reactor Core site (as I am), simply donate to OpenBSD in general.

    Comments

    1. By krh (207.75.179.22) on

      The message to misc@ clearly indicates that none of the money will go through Reactor Core. He states,

      Once enough pledges are in, I will send out an email to that effect so
people can send in their $$.

For those who asked, Paypal is fine; when the time comes you will be
able to pay using the paypal id "paypal@openbsd.org". 

You will be able to send cheques or money orders with the following
information:
      (rest snipped)

      He's doing two things: 1) Organizing, and 2) Getting a discount. The first is good because the project doesn't get stuck with a bill it can't pay. The second is obviously good.

      Some people on undeadly have expressed a hatred of this man so intense that I think they need help. I doubt any of his critics actually know him! If they did then it might be fair to call him an "uneducated, hateful bigot", "scum", or "Hitler", but unless they do they're merely demonstrating their own prejudice against conservative Christians. That kind of hatred might be tolerated in their usual society, (in some societies it is even encouraged) but that does not make it acceptable. I'm very disappointed; I thought undeadly was better than that.

      Comments

      1. By M.Raju (66.23.224.121) on

        Bah....it is amazing how people like to toy with the word "conservative" to find a safe haven. The rest is history...[OT again]

      2. By Anonymous Coward (69.197.92.181) on

        His website clearly shows he is an "uneducated, hateful bigot". Its not like I am saying that based on the fact that he has bible quotes scattered around, its based on the "articles" he has on his site.

      3. By Anonymous Coward (157.246.2.6) on

        but unless they do they're merely demonstrating their own prejudice against conservative Christians Uh, it's not "prejudice" if they have a wealth of facts (eg. his website) to base them on. The dude's a bigoted crackpot, go read his website. I wouldn't trust this man as he doesn't seem stable and may try to rip people off. Additionally, he might not take money from persons of certain cultures because they advocate homosexual child abuse (WTF?). You'll also notice he engages in a subtle forcing of beliefs and puts up religious quotes at the top and bottom of this donation page. His wacko beliefs have nothing to do with OpenBSD or G5's. What a crackpot. prejudice: (1) : preconceived judgment or opinion (2) : an adverse opinion or leaning formed without just grounds or before sufficient knowledge

      4. By Anthony (68.145.111.152) on

        Curious about this, I checked his website.

        The sentence "Islam Promotes Homosexual Child Abuse!" appears on the root page.

        Comments

        1. By Anonymous Coward (81.168.23.162) on

          At least now we understand the "reactor" part of the domain name comes from.

      5. By Anonymous Coward (67.121.51.10) on

        I glanced at his front page just to see what all the crap was about. After being greeted with "Islam promotes homosexual child abuse", and then reading further to confirm it wasn't a humor site, I realized why everyone's so passionate about this guy. I find some of the views digusting, but to each his own. I support OpenBSD, not individual people. So...whatever.

  4. By Anonymous Coward (157.246.2.6) on

    Woo, I get to chip in $20 to support OpenBSD AND I get a free preaching, too! I think I'm going to go out and urinate on a priest's car, just to balance the universe back out.

  5. By Jonathan Walther (142.179.93.180) krooger AT debian.org on http://reactor-core.org/

    The Christian content of my site has caused some people concern.

    In fact, the header and footer is inserted at load time using mod_layout. This is my means to deal with all the non-Christian content I post. In trying to present balanced information, I like to go to the original voices, people describing their own thoughts and words rather than second-hand summaries. I try to post the best quality articles, no matter which side presents them. This includes articles by Sir Arthur Keith on Evolution, Rockwell on Nazism, Marx on Communism, Proudhon on Anarchism, and many others.

    I needed a way to indicate that although I was presenting the information for the thoughtful inquirer, that didn't mean I agreed with it. mod_layout lets me succeed at doing this.

    Comments

    1. By Satan (138.26.81.173) on

      Great article about Muslim pederasty -- I'm on the plane next week! Can't wait to do some boy-fucking for Allah.

      You're a loon, man.

    2. By Michael (163.252.218.94) on

      I couldn't find any Christian content on your site that concerned me.

      I found some hate-filled stuff that is cause for concern, but nothing about this site should remotely be associated with actual christianity.

      --Michael

    3. By Anonymous Coward (69.197.92.181) on

      No, I have a problem with your lies designed to spread fear and hate. Nothing to do with christianity at all.

    4. By Anonymous Coward (69.158.151.20) on

      The Christian content of my site has caused some people concern.

      Just like how Muslim fundamentalists like to pass off their lunacy as the teachings of Islam you're doing the same by claiming that content on your site is Christian. It's not. It's you being a bigot. Own up to it.

      I needed a way to indicate that although I was presenting the information for the thoughtful inquirer, that didn't mean I agreed with it.

      Here is a quote from your own summary:

      "It is all documented by Denise Castor. Christians, awake. The Muslims are not your friends, and their religion is neither clean, nor peaceful."

      Sounds like you not only agree with that author's statement but added your own little diatribe. How do you plan on defending this with mod_layout? Some other Apache module perhaps?

      Comments

      1. By Anonymous Coward (141.157.237.121) on

        actually mod_layout wasn't to blame, it was faulty mod_diatribe rules. This is why you should always check your httpd.conf before setting up your website.

    5. By Gabriel (200.221.124.40) on

      Man, you're out of your time. Max sucks when it cames to socialism in todays world. as religion sucks when it come to a era of knowledge we (i hope) have today.

    6. By djm@ (218.214.226.34) on

      I don't think spreading hate about other religions is a Christian activity and I am very sure that Jesus didn't wander around saying "Islam Promotes Homosexual Child Abuse!"

      OTOH He's welcome to his views, and they don't have much to do with OpenBSD.

      Comments

      1. By Anonymous Coward (149.72.27.130) on

        especially since Islam starts about 600 years after Jesus the Christ

        Comments

        1. By djm@ (218.214.226.34) on

          ok, so s/islam/Zoroastrianism/ and my point still stands.

          Comments

          1. By Noryungi (82.230.182.114) on

            Except, of course, that Zoroastrianism started centuries before Christianity.

    7. By Anonymous Coward (202.81.18.30) marklar_@hotmail.com on

      Sorry dude, I don't have an issue with you having these views, but I do have an issue with you forcing them upon everyone else.

      I recently ran for office in Australia, part of which was to go out and talk to a variety of community groups, one that stood out in my mind was the Christian Lobby. I've never met such an intolerant bunch of ignorant people, no wonder one of the candidates referred to them as the "Christian Taliban"!

      Keep your views to yourself, they don't relate to OpenBSD whatsoever and will only turn people off donating to a very worthwhile cause.

      Comments

      1. By Anonymous Coward (149.72.4.118) on

        to keep this clear, he never came out and said that we must all believe what he did. His site simply has what he believes, although the first _could_ be implied from comments made. Don't be over zealous in attacking this; Yes, the views can be offensive, but don't go so far as to say that you were being forced to view his site (unless you were somehow compelled against your will to do so).

  6. By Yes, a coward with IP address (66.110.114.5) on

    Now, 17:23 WAT, there is only $30 left to get the $2000 dollars for the G5.
    But I wonder how much money is necessary to put some scalability on OpenBSD;
    $ 2000 ? $ 5000 ? $ 10000 ?. I'm just sick and tired of having to use Linux
    or FreeBSD for mysql for example. OpenBSD's thread implementation really sucks.

    As everyone sees and Theo not, this type of thing works.
    Let's post our needs here, maybe someday they'll be heard.

    Comments

    1. By Anonymous Coward (69.197.92.181) on

      Odd, mysql is working fine on openbsd here. Maybe if you have some specific problem, you should submit a bug report?

      Comments

      1. By Sean Brown (204.209.209.129) on

        There is a known problem with MySQL and OpenBSD, however it does not hit everyone. Here is a short description of the problem, note that its probably not threading, but a file descriptor problem and there seems to be a simple fix included in the user comments.
        Don't be put off by the fact that its listed as a OpenBSD 2.8 problem. That was threading, the file descriptor problem does remain, at least up to 3.5 in my experience, I haven't tried it on 3.6.

        Comments

        1. By Anonymous Coward (69.197.92.181) on

          There is no file descriptor problem. Any program will not work if it doesn't have enough file descriptors. You just have to make sure your limits are set high enough to allow for the load on your server. Some people will need higher limits than others. This is not a bug, and its not even a problem, its a simple fact that applies to all programs. Its also not openbsd specific, openbsd just has lower limits by default, so its more common to come across the issue on openbsd. And of course, like you said, this has nothing to do with threads at all.

    2. By djm@ (218.214.226.34) on

      I have used MySQL on OpenBSD for many years without problems. It has been very stable, especially after the threading improved (~3.1/3.2 IIRC)

      Comments

      1. By Anonymous Coward (66.110.114.5) on

        Under heavy load? Please show us your my.cnf, sysctl or kernel compilation settins and hardware you are using. Until now, I have not gathered any positive results.

      2. By Anonymous Coward (64.235.239.2) on

        it still doesn't hold a candle to Linux. well, neither does FreeBSD.

    3. By tedu (67.124.88.142) on

      collect the money, put up a bounty, see what happens. what's so hard about that?

  7. By uncitizen (aka Matt R) (67.37.28.9) on

    No matter what you think of this guy, he has successfully organized $2005 for the purchase of a G5. Bravo.

    For those who question if he'll actually give the money to OpenBSD, he's telling people to donate directly to OpenBSD! Just state that this donation is for the G5 Pledge.

  8. By Brendgard (69.10.194.180) brendgard@yahoo.com on http://websitegurus.us

    I posted a note on my forums page listig this thread, sounds like its a bit too late though. I just read it though, been a bit tied up lol. I'm assuming donations can be done directly through thr OpenBSD page through Paypal with a note to the effect of it being "for the G5"?

    Comments

    1. By Jonathan Walther (142.179.93.180) krooger AT debian.org on http://reactor-core.org/

      Well, it would be rather nice if you sent in your pledge first, so I'll know when to tell everyone else that we have enough pledges to purchase the box. The plan is to pay after enough pledges are collected, so that we can be sure that our donations will be enough to buy the required hardware for OpenBSD.

      Comments

      1. By Brian (68.224.187.79) brian@notarightwingnutjob.com on

        I will help ... but Jonathan Walther... YOU ARE INSANE. Why would anyone want to associate any "normal" project with your INSANE views? Think about other people next time. Don't put something like this on a Website that is associated with stupid, ignorant, moronic, intolerant, George Bush like, garbage... WTF? Are you on crack?

  9. By nemo (68.104.14.15) on

    so the guy's a hardcore fundamentalist christian (with all that that implies), you're not GIVING HIM the money, you're pledging to give it to openbsd for development on a dual G5.

    Frankly, I wouldn't care if he was Dick Cheney or Mouhammed Al Zarqawi, its not IN THE LEAST BIT relevant. If you choose to make your donation dependent on the personal beliefs/actions/history of a specific person, then really, your donation probably wasn't wanted in the first place.

    The money you spend everyday already lands in the hands of people worse than Jonathan Walther, just by virtue of you being part of the capitalist economy.

    Get over your righteous indignation already.



    Comments

    1. By Anonymous Coward (68.148.237.181) on

      > you're pledging to give it to openbsd for development on a dual G5.

      Here's a clue for you:

      http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/openbsd/2004-11/2929.html

      Could it be this guy wanting a good deal for his or his friend's secondhand hardware before it is worthless? What's the rush for this hardware anyway? Even after Theo made it clear he has no priority supporting "locked in" hardware, why is this guy still pushing his agenda?

      Here's a second clue for you in case you missed my previous post:

      http://archives.neohapsis.com/archives/openbsd/2004-11/2820.html

      > Frankly, I wouldn't care if he was Dick Cheney or Mouhammed Al Zarqawi, its not IN THE LEAST BIT relevant.

      Oh, but you should care. If you don't care, then it's like buying Intel, TI, and Apple with their closed documentation and/or locked in hardware. After all, the money goes to him for all we know about his "private reseller".

      > Get over your righteous indignation already.

      It figures. You're just going to sit there and applaud prejudice and bigotry.

      Comments

      1. By Anonymous Coward (68.40.204.249) on

        After all, the money goes to him for all we know about his "private reseller".

        Where does this bullshit come from?

        Theo gets the money.
        Theo decides where the money is spent.
        Theo decides what the money is spent on.

        In this venture there isn't even any guarantee that Theo will spend the money on a G5; the money has been directly donated to Theo, no clauses, no strings attached, only a comment added to the paypal receipt saying, essentially, "i was hoping this would go towards a G5".

        All of your bullshit, and the majority of posts above, just Don't Get It. There are much more appropriate boards on which to discuss religion, radical beliefs, and stupidity (anyone care to explain what polygamy and husbandry have to do with each other?).

        Comments

        1. By Anonymous Coward (142.179.93.180) on

          Successful polygamy requires good husbandry.

        2. By Anonymous Coward (68.148.237.181) on

          >> After all, the money goes to him for all we know about his "private reseller".

          > Where does this bullshit come from?

          The bullshit comes from the unknown "private reseller". Get it?

          > the money has been directly donated to Theo, no clauses, no strings attached, only a comment added to the paypal receipt saying, essentially, "i was hoping this would go towards a G5".

          I never said don't donate to OpenBSD. However, why is this guy keeping tabs on how much donors contribute for this hardware? And I quote: "To date, we have total cash commitments of $770." There are strings attached because you're adding them, like "i was hoping this would go towards a G5."

          > In this venture there isn't even any guarantee that Theo will spend the money on a G5

          Nevertheless, there is a guarantee he doesn't want to support Apple under current circumstances, if you didn't attach strings to your donations. If you bothered to read what I linked to, Theo says this himself:

          "I know that I have bought apple machines for OpenBSD development before, in particular, because noone ever donated one for here. But I will never buy them again... If they [Apple and their ilk] want to be uncooperative, why go on selling how much you want their machines and openness?"

          It's you who "Don't Get It!" Take your own advice and go to other boards.

      2. By nemo (68.104.14.15) on

        > It figures. You're just going to sit there and applaud prejudice and bigotry.

        does it figure? does it even occur to you that it isn't relevant? have you audited everyone you support either financially or morally for anything which goes against your specific beliefs and morals? asked each of them about their support for the war in iraq? abortion? gay marriage? {moral issue here}?

        For the record, I am not a christian nor do I "applaud prejudice and bigotry" in any way, but since you're so morally pure you know better.

        Comments

        1. By Anonymous Coward (68.148.237.181) on

          > does it even occur to you that it isn't relevant?

          How is it irrelevant writing to Intel and TI to ask for the firmware binary distribution rights? Why is supporting them after they told you a loud No relevant? Your definition of morals is pedantically absolute. In this world of imperfection, it's impossible to have absolute morality on everything; thus, I can only do what I can. If that makes me morally superior according to you, then so be it.

          Your religion or atheist belief is irrelevant, when denouncing prejudice and bigotry.

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