http://bsd.slashdot.org/ News for nerds, stuff that matters en-us Copyright 1997-2008, SourceForge, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 2008-05-13T14:50:15+00:00 SourceForge, Inc. help@slashdot.org Technology hourly 1 1970-01-01T00:00+00:00 http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicslashdot.gif http://bsd.slashdot.org/ http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/288101824/article.pl sproketboy writes with news that a developer named Marc Balmer has recently fixed a bug in a bit of BSD code which is roughly 25 years old. In addition to the OSnews summary, you can read Balmer's comments and a technical description of the bug. "This code will not work as expected when seeking to the second entry of a block where the first has been deleted: seekdir() calls readdir() which happily skips the first entry (it has inode set to zero), and advance to the second entry. When the user now calls readdir() to read the directory entry to which he just seekdir()ed, he does not get the second entry but the third. Much to my surprise I not only found this problem in all other BSDs or BSD derived systems like Mac OS X, but also in very old BSD versions. I first checked 4.4BSD Lite 2, and Otto confirmed it is also in 4.2BSD. The bug has been around for roughly 25 years or more."<p><a href="http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/11/1339228&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/05/11/1339228"></a></p><p><a href="http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/11/1339228&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=pdF8jW"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=pdF8jW" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/288101824" height="1" width="1"/> Soulskill 2008-05-11T15:05:00+00:00 bug better-late-than-never it 209 209,198,162,138,71,50,38 http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/11/1339228&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/281531534/article.pl An anonymous reader writes "OpenBSD 4.3 is now available! Released today, May 1, 2008, 4.3 introduces many new improvements and upgrades. The complete changelog is here. Torrents can be found here." As usual, this release is accompanied by a song.<p><a href="http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/01/1440253&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/05/01/1440253"></a></p><p><a href="http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/01/1440253&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=RKOhEc"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=RKOhEc" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/281531534" height="1" width="1"/> timothy 2008-05-01T15:54:00+00:00 announcement deserves-more-praise news 69 69,67,46,32,8,3,1 http://news.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/01/1440253&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/274413279/article.pl An anonymous reader writes "Jeremy White from CodeWeavers has made the announcement that an experimental build of CrossOver Games is now available for PC-BSD users. However, this unsupported edition should also work on FreeBSD or DesktopBSD, allowing users to play Windows games on their desktop. The FreeBSD version of CrossOver Games can be downloaded here (registration required)." From the attached notes: "Remember this is an experimental build! If you are on FreeBSD 6.x, you will need to apply a system patch from http://wiki.freebsd.org/Wine to enable wine to function properly. Users of FreeBSD 7.0 and higher do not need this patch."<p><a href="http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/21/0213251&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/04/21/0213251"></a></p><p><a href="http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/21/0213251&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=GcvaH1"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=GcvaH1" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/274413279" height="1" width="1"/> timothy 2008-04-21T02:57:00+00:00 emulation to-the-other-side games 35 35,35,31,24,10,5,2 http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/21/0213251&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/274199038/article.pl Derkjan de Haan writes "I am glad to see progress is being made on the the ability of OpenSolaris to boot from a ZFS filesystem: 'This putback provides the ability to boot the Solaris Operating System from a ZFS root file system on both x86 and SPARC platforms. Full ZFS boot and install support will be available in a subsequent build. Because of the phased putback, we recommend waiting for the full boot and install support rather than attempting to use the ZFS boot features separately.'"<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/20/1739259&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/04/20/1739259"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/20/1739259&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=FTYBYL"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=FTYBYL" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/274199038" height="1" width="1"/> timothy 2008-04-20T18:17:00+00:00 sun devilish-wings-spread-wider bsd 50 50,49,40,31,13,7,4 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/20/1739259&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/246753533/article.pl cecom writes "After major improvements in SMP support in FreeBSD 7.0, benchmarks show it performing 15% better than the latest Linux kernels (PDF, see slides 17 to 19) on 8 CPUs under PostgreSQL and MySQL. While a couple of benchmarks are not conclusive evidence, it can be assumed that FreeBSD will once again be a serious performance contender. Some posters on LWN have noted that the level of Linux performance could be related to the Completely Fair Scheduler, which was merged into the 2.6.23 Linux kernel." Update: 03/06 21:32 GMT by KD : An anonymous reader sent in word that Linux kernel developer Nick Piggin reran the benchmark today and came to a different conclusion: In his benchmark Linux was faster than FreeBSD.<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/06/1313218&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/03/06/1313218"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/06/1313218&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=7S4VY3"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=7S4VY3" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/246753533" height="1" width="1"/> kdawson 2008-03-06T13:40:00+00:00 os coulda-been-a-contender bsd 288 288,261,249,201,74,38,21 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/06/1313218&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/242422952/article.pl cperciva writes "The first release from the new 7-STABLE branch of FreeBSD development, has been released. FreeBSD 7.0 brings with it many new features including support for ZFS, journaled filesystems, and SCTP, as well as dramatic improvements in performance and SMP scalability. In addition to being available from many FTP sites, ISO images can be downloaded via the BitTorrent tracker, or for users of earlier FreeBSD releases, FreeBSD Update can be used to perform a binary upgrade."<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/27/2255229&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/02/27/2255229"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/27/2255229&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=dryscy"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=dryscy" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/242422952" height="1" width="1"/> samzenpus 2008-02-28T00:31:00+00:00 software get-it-while-it's-hot bsd 229 229,207,168,121,48,27,20 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/27/2255229&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/241754638/article.pl blackbearnh writes "FreeBSD is about to release the much-anticipated version 7, and as usual there's a comprehensive interview with over two dozen of the major contributors over at O'Reilly's ONLamp site. Federico Biancuzzi interviewed the developers to discuss all the details of FreeBSD 7.0: networking and SMP performance, SCTP support, the new IPSEC stack, virtualization, monitoring frameworks, ports, storage limits and a new journaling facility, what changed in the accounting file format, jemalloc(), ULE, and more."<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/26/2043254&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/02/26/2043254"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/26/2043254&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=wyekKY"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=wyekKY" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/241754638" height="1" width="1"/> kdawson 2008-02-26T22:40:00+00:00 software what-indeed bsd 103 103,99,84,60,25,14,7 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/26/2043254&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/232605944/article.pl snake-oil-security writes "Last fall Amit Klein found a serious weakness in the OpenBSD PRNG (pseudo-random number generator), which allows an attacker to predict the next DNS transaction ID. The same flavor of this PRNG is used in other places like the OpenBSD kernel network stack. Several other BSD operating systems copied the OpenBSD code for their own PRNG, so they're vulnerable too; Apple's Darwin-based Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server, and also NetBSD, FreeBSD, and DragonFlyBSD. All the above-mentioned vendors were contacted in November 2007. FreeBSD, NetBSD, and DragonFlyBSD committed a fix to their respective source code trees, Apple refused to provide any schedule for a fix, but OpenBSD decided not to fix it. OpenBSD's coordinator stated, in an email, that OpenBSD is completely uninterested in the problem and that the problem is completely irrelevant in the real world. This was highlighted recently when Amit Klein posted to the BugTraq list."<p><a href="http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/10/0136236&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/02/10/0136236"></a></p><p><a href="http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/10/0136236&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=jppGx1"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=jppGx1" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/232605944" height="1" width="1"/> kdawson 2008-02-10T12:58:00+00:00 security random-acts-of-kndness it 196 196,190,158,119,42,21,16 http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/02/10/0136236&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/219180893/article.pl cperciva writes "FreeBSD 6.3-RELEASE, the fourth release from the highly successful 6-STABLE branch of FreeBSD development, has been released. In addition to being available from many FTP sites, ISO images can be downloaded via the BitTorrent tracker, or for users of earlier FreeBSD releases, FreeBSD Update can be used to perform a binary upgrade."<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/01/18/1937254&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=08/01/18/1937254"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/01/18/1937254&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=9FXWpc"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=9FXWpc" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/219180893" height="1" width="1"/> ScuttleMonkey 2008-01-19T02:02:00+00:00 os put-the-daemon-back-in-the-box bsd 100 100,95,78,52,16,9,7 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/01/18/1937254&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/202874769/article.pl ci4 writes to tell us that NetBSD 4.0 has been released and has been dedicated to the memory of Jun-Ichiro "itojun" Hagino. "Itojun was a member of the KAME project, which provided IPv6 and IPsec support; he was also a member of the NetBSD core team (the technical management for the project), and one of the Security Officers. Due to Itojun's efforts, NetBSD was the first open source operating system with a production ready IPv6 networking stack, which was included in the base system before many people knew what IPv6 was. We are grateful to have known and worked with Itojun, and we know that he will be missed. This release is therefore dedicated, with thanks, to his memory."<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/19/1630257&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=07/12/19/1630257"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/19/1630257&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=cCSqjY"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=cCSqjY" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/202874769" height="1" width="1"/> ScuttleMonkey 2007-12-19T17:59:00+00:00 os so-long-and-thanks-for-all-the-stacks bsd 121 121,109,90,68,23,11,9 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/19/1630257&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/178351545/article.pl blackbearnh writes "OpenBSD 4.2 was released today, and has a host of new features. O'Reilly's ONLamp site has a pretty thorough overview of the release. 'Even though security is still there, this release comes with some amazing performance improvements: basic benchmarks showed PF being twice as fast, a rewrite of the TLB shootdown code for i386 and amd64 cut the time to do a full package build by 20 percent (mostly because all the forks in configure scripts have become much cheaper), and the improved frequency scaling on MP systems can help save nearly 20 percent of battery power. And then the new features: FFS2, support for the Advanced Host Controller Interface, IP balancing in CARP, layer 7 manipulation with hoststated, Xenocara, and more!'"<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/01/1815248&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=07/11/01/1815248"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/01/1815248&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=htQFjJ"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=htQFjJ" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/178351545" height="1" width="1"/> Zonk 2007-11-01T18:32:00+00:00 unix new-footloose-and-fancy-free bsd 203 203,199,138,104,26,13,6 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/01/1815248&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/174920196/article.pl ParaFan writes "In a fascinating story on KernelTrap, Theo de Raadt asserts that while virtualization can increase hardware utilization, it does not in any way improve security. In fact, he contends the exact opposite is true: 'You are absolutely deluded, if not stupid, if you think that a worldwide collection of software engineers who can't write operating systems or applications without security holes, can then turn around and suddenly write virtualization layers without security holes.' de Raadt argues that the lack of support for process isolation on x86 hardware combined with numerous bugs in the architecture are a formula for virtualization decreasing overall security, not increasing it."<p><a href="http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/25/1521258&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=07/10/25/1521258"></a></p><p><a href="http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/25/1521258&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=q9Cp3g"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=q9Cp3g" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/174920196" height="1" width="1"/> kdawson 2007-10-25T15:54:00+00:00 security more-chances-to-blow-it it 340 340,337,269,194,52,28,20 http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/25/1521258&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/164395656/article.pl An anonymous reader writes "The highly publicized debate between Theo de Raadt and the Software Freedom Law Center seems to have come to an amicable end. SFLC has published its research on the lineage of the ath5k driver and determined who owns which changes. In the end, everyone agreed to license their modifications to the Linux driver under the BSD license, and OpenBSD developers can now reincorporate those improvements into the original code (with the exception of one historically GPL-licensed branch)." The article notes that Theo de Raadt has not responded publicly to this development but that comments on the issue in an OpenBSD Journal forum have been generally positive.<p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/02/203212&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=07/10/02/203212"></a></p><p><a href="http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/02/203212&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=eswCS9"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=eswCS9" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/164395656" height="1" width="1"/> kdawson 2007-10-02T20:08:00+00:00 gnu can't-we-all-just-get-along bsd 215 215,210,160,116,30,13,5 http://bsd.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/10/02/203212&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/157660841/article.pl Sunnz writes "The leaner, lighter, faster, and most importantly, BSD Licensed, Compiler PCC has been imported into OpenBSD's CVS and NetBSD's pkgsrc. The compiler is based on the original Portable C Compiler by S. C. Johnson, written in the late 70's. Even though much of the compiler has been rewritten, some of the basics still remain. It is currently not bug-free, but it compiles on x86 platform, and work is being done on it to take on GCC's job."<p><a href="http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/17/1451239&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=07/09/17/1451239"></a></p><p><a href="http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/17/1451239&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=qrG3t0"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=qrG3t0" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/157660841" height="1" width="1"/> ScuttleMonkey 2007-09-17T16:03:00+00:00 programming all-good-things-must-end developers 546 546,542,453,374,87,44,28 http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/17/1451239&from=rss http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~3/157314119/article.pl An anonymous reader writes "In a recent public posting to the Linux Kernel mailing list the founder of the Software Freedom Law Center, Eben Moglen, lashed back at OpenBSD creator Theo de Raadt without actually mentioning his name. 'What has happened is that people who do not have full possession of the facts and have no legal expertise &mdash; people whom from the very beginning we have been trying to help &mdash; have made irresponsible charges and threatened lawsuits, thus slowing down our efforts to help them.' Moglen pointed out that they have and continue to help all open source projects, including OpenBSD, but the process takes time. 'The required work has been made more arduous because some people have chosen not to cooperate in good faith. But we will complete the work as soon as we can, and we will follow the community's practice of complete publication, so everyone can see all the evidence.'"<p><a href="http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/16/1958252&amp;from=rss"><img src="http://bsd.slashdot.org/slashdot-it.pl?from=rss&amp;op=image&amp;style=h0&amp;sid=07/09/16/1958252"></a></p><p><a href="http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/16/1958252&amp;from=rss">Read more of this story</a> at Slashdot.</p> <p><a href="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?a=DuXl60"><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~a/Slashdot/slashdotBsd?i=DuXl60" border="0"></img></a></p><img src="http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdotBsd/~4/157314119" height="1" width="1"/> Zonk 2007-09-16T20:31:00+00:00 programming steady-now-steady politics 464 464,455,367,267,41,26,21 http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/16/1958252&from=rss Search Slashdot stories query http://bsd.slashdot.org/search.pl