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Re: HURDNG : Which type of OS design could we have to think nowadays ?
by Ernst Rohlicek jun. 08 Aug '06

08 Aug '06

Hello Guillaume, Hello list, This is a long post and I hope to have made it somewhat interesting as well. Please stay with me :-) > Here is the start point of my reflexion : > > http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/l4-hurd/2006-04/msg00053.html In this post, Mr. Shapiro compares roads of action for a next-generation Hurd and starts out with: "This will sound strange coming from me, but it may turn out that HurdNG should build it's own microkernel. I do not think this is a good idea, but let me try to enumerate the alternatives and articulate the advantages and disadvantages as I see them." His conclusions are true: Using something existing is great, PROVIDED it fits reasonably well - and it must fit almost the way it came. You may be able to retro-fit a few bits here and there, but that's it. It is also my experience that if you try to change a program in fundamental ways, it's easier to redo it rather than trying to re-orient it. Think of changing a KDE application into a GNOME application ... and the closer you get toward the kernel, the more work you have with re-orienting it. You have translated your design into code (created an "instance" so to speak) and we all know that C code is not friends with large re-writes. Another thing is that FAR too many people shy away from starting out anew. We're not a commercial company with time pressure. We have learned from the last "iteration", know a lot of the issues and mistakes - plus, we have time. Instead of patching and re-orienting and hoping, we should enter the next iteration and put to use what we've learned. Another snippet from the above message: "If, after you look at the alternatives, you still think that building or modifying a micro-kernel sounds good, try to assemble a team. If you can't, stop and look for another way. In my opinion, the L4-Hurd and mainstream Hurd communities simply do not have the (human) resources to build both a microkernel and an OS before most of this list has died of old age." Yup, there's action required... if not, well ... read again about that age thing. Just wanted to point that out... > I believe that we can do extremely complex and reliable software with > a few people, thanks to the powerful formal and design tools available > now. > > Time is maybe our worst ennemy : more and more technologies are > created day by day and we need to understand and to be able to use > them And it's maybe our better friend : as the hardware/software > becomes more and more complex, the tools to develop them becomes more > powerful too. > > The tools developed to understand and create complex systems give us > the ability to design and implement an OS design secure & reliable. You mention some interesting methods and utilities. I've used formal design myself (IBM's Rational - great tool) and it really takes away a lot of burden. You can change some relationships in the design view and they get translated / "instantiated" right into code. Usually you have to just fill in the blanks and application logic. I wonder if the things you mentioned can be used not just for modeling specific types of applications and relationships, but for more generic (Hurd servers, maybe even kernel?) programs. Could you find out about that? Rationale: In projects you often just HAVE to re-adapt the design of your program after iteration 1 ... and any way of quickly re-adapting the code to fit the new design is just GOLD. That's in my opinion why there is things like re-factoring, meta-programming, formal and model-based design and lots of scripting (prototyping?) languages. Would you implement a proof-of-concept or prototype rather in Python or in ANSI C ? With manual memory allocation, char arrays, buffers, pointers, Makefiles, autotools stuff...? Guillaume, your idea is quite on the spot, I believe. I personally acknowledge that you can do great prototypes with formal design and high-level languages. Look over to the development of the seL4 / L4.sec kernel: http://ertos.nicta.com.au/research/sel4/tech.pml They themselves use a machine simulator, which catches all kernel requests and hands them to the "kernel", which is developed outside of the simulator in the Haskell programming language. I'm convinced that they're able to go through design and verification iterations so much faster. And besides, their specification = implementation looks almost the same as a model description from model-based engineering. I guess that later, when the algorithms have been optimized and they found that they've developed a useful design for their requirements, they might actually implement it in C (though comparison shows that the Haskell GHC compiler also produces very fast code), search for "performance" or "slow" here: http://www.haskell.org/haskellwiki/Introduction But that Haskell thing just as a side note. It's important to point out that fast prototyping, fast design verification (and -adaption until we know, "This is it, we have it"), fast creation of code instances from a model or directly use a high-level language for initial design creation is almost a key point. > -The first one is the start of any important project : developers can > have the possibility to share complex ideas with minimum requirements > and to integrate them in a coherent environment. ( see > http://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/ => 23 years old and even the goals > are not well defined ) That's an under-estimated point ... and yet a vital one. > -The second feature provide any user the ability to develop on it with > existing materials and to have the support of developers of legacy OS. Yes, transition is important. Going too far out with GNU Hurd means no good. > -The third one needs that a device driver framework needs to be > rapidly envisaged. ( again http://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/ => no > good driver kit at this date, the same for linux : > http://www.kroah.com/log/2006/05/24/, 15 years later ). Who wants to > have an OS that boots only a black screen with a beep sound ? If we > follow the Moore law, an OS design of the future would be thought for > quadruple play ( mobility, audio, video, Internet ) and security of > course. Yes, being able to fulfill use-cases is important. Besides, any developer for a possibly next-gen OS wants to listen to some MP3s :-) > Abstraction will be the solution, Putting more and more layers of abstraction between the hardware and the program logic usually is no good. What exactly do you mean with abstraction? Or: What kind of abstraction do you mean? > I believe that HurdNG had to focus one 2 things ( lol :-), easy to tell, > hard to design ) : security and performance. Security because all > devices are becoming more and more connected and performance because of > the Moore's law. Security indeed is becoming more and more important; as as maintainability and modularity. > *First option : > > Should we support 386 and let the OS die with this obselete hardware or > think to the future and enjoy the power of 64 bits and multicore that > are becoming standards ? > > The ideas have to go more far that the present, if the HURDNG ( forget > now UNIX:-) ) want to be a good option/successor to Linux. > > A Single Adress Space OS ( 64 bits = 256 Tb, we have time before > exploiting all this power => it would be moore easy to get rid of ACL > because of easier implementation of persistence) and a language/main > library thought for massive multithread (CSP or Concurrent/Parallel > Haskell => get rid of C/ maybe GNU/UNIX/POSIX too :-) ) . > > http://www.torsion.org/ > > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~dfk/papers/kotz:addrtrace.pdf > > http://www.wotug.org/ > > http://www.eros-os.org/pipermail/e-lang/1999-November/003069.html > > http://tunes.org/wiki/Orthogonal_Persistence Persistence: Well, I'm not sure whether orthogonal persistence (in my interpretation this is quite similar to hiberation / suspend to disk) is really required - better: what it's benefits in a general-purpose OS for non-embedded CPUs are... After all you can still store your caps on disk, if you would like to. Design for old HW or for the future: I would not design a new OS for a machine you can't buy in stores anymore since 5 years (in 2001 we had Athlons and Pentium 3 / 4). Rationale: If you say that a new OS will have a lifetime of 10 years, then you will think back and say, "Why the hell did they let themselves get restricted by CPUs, which were several generations behind - already back then?!" Looking from today's perspective: If you design a little bit "too big" or "far ahead" for today's measures (64-bits where possible, massively threaded and laid out for SMP, among many other decisions), then today's design might still be ... hm, well at least MAKE SENSE in 10 years. > *Second option : > > Explore new ideas, maybe too innovative (Have to carefully choose/adapt > the language). > > http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/l4-hurd/2006-04/msg00053.html > > I would add a fourth option : Get rid of a kernel : Well, you need need some kind of authority. "Processes can all be equal, but some have to be more equal." And the Exokernel idea is probably great for very specialized purposes, so remember that GNU/Hurd is supposed to be a general-use OS. If I misunderstood, we can further discuss of course. > http://www.tunes.org "Reflective OS" sounds tempting, though I personally think this belongs more into AI - intelligent, integrated assistants and the like. Of course it's okay that you mention it - I guess we all honor your right to bring new things to the table :-) > "Isaac is an operating system purely made by dynamicaly interconnected > prototype object. Each macro-object run on top of the processor. > > IsaacOS is not an interface with a standard kernel. IsaacOS is fully > made with only object. No file, no process, no kernel, just and only > object." > > http://isaacos.loria.fr/index.html I have yet to read up on "prototype-based" languages and this specific language here - hm, "based on Smalltalk", "uses GCC", "fast code like C", "used for writing operating systems", " Generally, I believe that we don't have to use C anymore to write hardware-near programs - back then in the 70s, 80s and even still in the 90s it was fine, but not today. There are fast alternatives with better facilities. BTW, think back to the 70's when C was invented. Back then it must have been like, "Oh my god, this is high-tech - are you sure you want to use that new, crazy 'C' language for your OS?" ... why are we so shy to use something newer and safer than C? (Safer as in eg. type safety) There are alternatives are in place. As motivation, here is a link to a WORKING implementation of Unix in C++, which is even binary compatible with Linux: http://www.unixlite.org/index.html So it is possible. As mentioned in my reply-paragraphs above, I suggest one of the following for a new kernel for GNU/Hurd - should seL4 / L4.sec and Coyotos be too far off the goals and requirements ... wait, WHAT goals and requirements BTW? - But I digress. ;-) Anyway, in that case, I would suggest using one or more or a mix of the following roads: 1. Using an intermediate prototyping language and/or some (needs TBD) model-based approach 2. Using an intermediate high(er)-level language for prototyping and starting implementation in C once we're sure about a (for our purposes) complete and sound design 3. Writing in a high(er)-level language which can be compiled into fast code (as fast like C), but which does not allow you to shoot yourself in the foot (too often) and which allows for relatively easy re-orientation of the code. For any of that to work, we need to know (and then get clearer) about things like: Goals, ideas, what Hurd really could do better than others ... how your computer(s) would work differently if it would be running your ideal version of Hurd, according to your ideas...? What are your ideas BTW? > Best Regards, > > Guillaume FORTAINE > Likewise, thanks for the input. --Ernst Rohlicek jun.

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GDB on Fiasco-UX?
by Andreas Niederl 07 Aug '06

07 Aug '06

Hi, is Fiasco-UX suited for debugging with GDB? I noticed the lines generic.inc: [ -n "$RUN_GDB" ] && gdb_wrap="gdb $GDB_ARGS --args" generic.inc: $gdb_wrap $FIASCODIR/$FIASCO in l4/tools/runux/generic.inc and tried to run GDB by setting the RUN_GDB variable to something when calling one of the predefined ux-scripts, but it always results in segmentation faults concerning the calls to the cli and sti instructions. GDB output: Welcome to Fiasco(ux)! DD-L4(v2)/x86 microkernel (C) 1998-2006 TU Dresden Rev: Thu Aug 3 18:16:37 2006 compiled with gcc 4.0.2 for Intel Pentium 4 Detaching after fork from child process 5989. Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault. Dirq::alloc (this=0xce93f, t=0x639f5000, ack_in_kernel=802816) at auto/processor.h:128 128 asm volatile ("cli" : : : "memory"); (gdb) $ gdb --version GNU gdb Red Hat Linux (6.3.0.0-1.84rh) Regards, Andi

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Can we really think at a new OS design nowadays ?
by Guillaume FORTAINE 06 Aug '06

06 Aug '06

Hello, Here is the start point of my reflexion : http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/l4-hurd/2006-04/msg00053.html I believe that we can do extremely complex and reliable software with a few people, thanks to the powerful formal and design tools available now. Moreover, I think that this OS has to support three key things to be able to survive ( an essential key to have a long term development ) : synergy ,transition & usability. -The first one is the start of any important project : developers can have the possibility to share complex ideas with minimum requirements and to integrate them in a coherent environment. ( see http://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/ => 23 years old and even the goals are not well defined ) -The second feature provide any user the ability to develop on it with existing materials and to have the support of developers of legacy OS. ( see www.tunes.org => maybe too innovative and this : http://symbolx.org/ddf_news.html ). -The third one needs that a device driver framework needs to be rapidly envisaged. ( again http://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/ => no good driver kit at this date, the same for linux : http://www.kroah.com/log/2006/05/24/, 15 years later ). Who wants to have an OS that boots only a black screen with a beep sound ? If we follow the Moore law, an OS design of the future would be thought for quadruple play ( mobility, audio, video, Internet ) and security of course. Time is maybe our worst ennemy : more and more technologies are created day by day and we need to understand and to be able to use them And it's maybe our better friend : as the hardware/software becomes mor and more complex, the tools to develop them becomes more powerful too. The tools developed to understand and create complex systems give us the ability to design and implement an OS design secure & reliable. Here are my guidelines to start : _ First : Users collaboration :_ http://www.opencroquet.org _Second - Formal tools :_ http://www.fmeurope.org Z method : http://czt.sourceforge.net/ http://www.zuser.org/ B-method : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-Method http://rodin-b-sharp.sourceforge.net/index.html _Second - Software design :_ http://planetmde.org/ http://distributed-software.blogspot.com _ Third - Language Designer's Toolkit :_ http://lambda-the-ultimate.org/node/1562 http://hlvm.org/ Abstraction will be the solution, Best Regards, Guillaume FORTAINE

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Invalid l4x_hybrid_return ?
by Oskar Senft 04 Aug '06

04 Aug '06

Hi L4Linux experts! We are currently doing some experiments with L4Linux L4BD and encounter a problem during a connect call by IPC (see logs). l4x_hybrid_return: Invalid hybrid return for 21.03 (0x00000000, d, 402, -1, b7a2a25e)! l4x_hybrid_return: Currently running: 00.00 I don't know what this error means and how we produced that. We use the L4Linux L4BD as shipped with L4Linux without any patches. What can we do? Regards Oskar. -- Sirrix AG security technologies - http://www.sirrix.com Oskar Senft eMail: o.senft(a)sirrix.com Tel +49 (681) 936 251 - 119 Fax +49 (681) 936 251 - 500 get public key from keyserver Fingerprint 6FC6 3E44 233F 7F4B 33C7 A8D0 2EDA F3BA B5A3 0BA4 This message may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not the addressee, you must not use, copy, disclose or take any action based on this message or any information herein. If you have received this message in error, please advise the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete this message. l4lx | ======> L4Linux 2.6 starting... <======== l4lx | Linux version 2.6.16-l4 (osk@olaptop) (gcc version 3.3.6 (Debian 1:3. l4lx : 3.6-13)) #4 Thu Aug 3 15:19:50 CEST 2006 l4lx | Binary name: vmlinuz26-minimal l4lx | Kernel command line (6 args): mem=64M noreplacement l4bd.l4blk_name=b l4lx : lockenc root=/dev/hda1 panicblink=0 lang=de l4lx | Image: 00400000 - 00727000 [3228 KiB]. l4lx | Areas: Text: 00400000 - 0063d000 [2292kB] (a bit longer) l4lx | Data: 0063d000 - 00681520 [273kB] l4lx | Initdata: 00684000 - 006a8000 [144kB] l4lx | BSS: 006a8000 - 00725060 [500kB] l4lx | l4lx_thread_create: Created thread 21.03 (server) l4lx | main thread will be 21.03 l4lx | l4env_register_pointer_section: addr = 0063d000 size = 958464 l4lx | l4env_linux_startup thread 3. l4lx | sec-w-init: virt: 0x0063d000 to 0x00726fff [936 KiB] l4lx | sec-w-init: Number of physical regions: 1, 958464 Bytes l4lx | sec-w-init: 1: Phys: 0x006ea000 to 0x007d4000, Size: 958464 l4lx | main thread: received startup message. l4lx | Main thread running, waiting... l4lx | setup_l4env_memory: Forcing superpages for main memory l4lx | Main memory size: 64MB l4lx | Main memory: virt: 0x00800000 to 0x047fffff [65536 KiB] l4lx | Main memory: Number of physical regions: 1, 67108864 Bytes l4lx | Main memory: 1: Phys: 0x11400000 to 0x15400000, Size: 67108864 l4lx | Filling lower ptabs... l4lx | Done (1075 entries). l4lx | l4lx_thread_create: Created thread 21.04 (timer.i0) l4lx | Starting L4FB via CON con | vc_loop(): vc[2] running as D.08 l4lx | l4lx_thread_create: Created thread 21.05 (L4ConInput) con | vc_open_out(): vc[2] 1024x768@16, gmode:0x35 l4lx | l4fbcon: 1024x750 2bypp, size: 1540096 l4lx | l4lx_thread_create: Created thread 21.06 (CON refresher) l4lx | atexit(function = 0x00526130) called l4lx | l4x_hybrid_return: Invalid hybrid return for 21.03 (0x00000000, d, 40 l4lx : 2, -1, b7a2a25e)! l4lx | l4x_hybrid_return: Currently running: 00.00 backtrace (thread 21.03, fp=0080defc, pc=005e4273): #1 005e4273 : l4blk_driver_open_call + 0x53 ... v/drops-060505/l4/pkg/generic_blk/idl/OBJ-x86-l4v2/blk-client.c:82 #2 005e341e : l4blk_open_driver + 0xbe ... /devenv/drops-060505/l4/pkg/generic_blk/lib/client/src/driver.c:133 #3 00698e9a : l4bd_init + 0x3a /home/osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/drivers/block/l4bd.c:317 #4 0068479b : do_initcalls + 0x2b /home/osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/init/main.c:576 #5 0068483c : do_basic_setup + 0x1c /home/osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/init/main.c:615 #6 00400090 : init + 0x30 /home/osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/init/main.c:687 #7 00406389 : kernel_thread_start + 0x29 ... s-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/arch/l4/kernel/arch-i386/process.c:199 #8 0040635e : ret_kernel_thread_start + 0x6 ... s-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/arch/l4/kernel/arch-i386/process.c:174 #9 0040001c : rest_init + 0x1c /home/osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/init/main.c:399 #10 0068471b : start_kernel + 0x16b /home/osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/init/main.c:546 #11 0068ad3f : l4env_linux_startup + 0xbf ... /osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/arch/l4/kernel/main.c:695 #12 000186d3 : l4th_thread_start + 0x73 ... pdate-060505-134059/drops-060505/l4/pkg/thread/lib/src/create.c:72 #13 0001b9a6 : l4th_thread_entry + 0x16 ... opsupdate-060505-134059/drops-060505/l4/pkg/thread/lib/src/l4.c:93 #14 00420804 : .text.lock.rcupdate + 0xa /home/osk/tmp/drops-060505/l4linux-2.6-minimal/kernel/rcupdate.c:603

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Re: The future of L4
by Guillaume FORTAINE 03 Aug '06

03 Aug '06

Hello all, Here are two interesting links : http://www.nondot.org/sabre/os/articles http://www.ps.uni-sb.de/alice/ Best regards, Guillaume FORTAINE

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multithreaded tcp echo server problem & flips
by David Silcott 03 Aug '06

03 Aug '06

hello all, I've ported my multithreaded tcp server to L4 using flips but I am having some problems getting it to run properly. It is a quite a bit to explain so I've written a simple tcp echoserver to demonstrate my problem. The following happens when the server starts and the client connects and send data. 1. Echoserver starts and listens on port 2222 2. client connects, server creates a child_server thread to service client and starts listening again 3. client sends string to child_server thread which is received. child_server however is unable to complete send(echo), it seems to be blocked at this point. 4. The send is only completed when another client attempts a connect(..and the server moves on from the accept(..) statement). I have appended my code at the bottom of this mail maybe someone can spot my mistake and highlight it. To check if I've used the threads properly I also wrote a program in which each thread prints the numbers from 0 to 9 and that runs fine. So I am pointing my finger and the recv(), accept() and send() functions in my echo server :-| Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. cheers david ============================================================================= /*** GENERAL INCLUDES ***/ #include <stdlib.h> #include <stdio.h> #include <unistd.h> #include <sys/socket.h> #include <sys/types.h> #include <netinet/in.h> #include <arpa/inet.h> #include <string.h> /*** L4 INCLUDES ***/ #include <l4/names/libnames.h> #include <l4/thread/thread.h> #include <l4/log/l4log.h> #include <l4/dm_mem/dm_mem.h> #define BUF_SIZE 100 l4_threadid_t srv; char LOG_tag[9] = "tcpecho"; int data_key; struct th_data{ int c; //socket char foo[10]; //.... }; /* exit handler */ void child_exit(l4thread_t thread, void * data); void child_exit(l4thread_t thread, void * data){ struct th_data *ptr = (struct th_data *)data; /* close the connection and free up memory used by data structure*/ close(ptr->c); free(ptr); } /* declare exit function descriptor */ L4THREAD_EXIT_FN(exit_fn,child_exit); void child_server(void *data); void child_server(void *data){ char databuf[BUF_SIZE]; struct th_data *dptr = (struct th_data *)data; int ret, sock, n; void *ret_val; l4thread_t id; sock = dptr->c; LOG("got socket\n"); /* register exit function */ ret = l4thread_on_exit(&exit_fn, // exit function descriptor data // data pointer ); if (ret < 0){ /* register error function failed */ LOG_Error("Register error function failed\n"); } id = l4thread_myself(); LOG("Server thread starting with id %u\n",id); /* we are up */ if (l4thread_started(ret_val) < 0){ /* startup notification failed */ LOG_Error("Startup notification failed\n"); } LOG("Entering loop to wait for requests on socket %d.... \n",sock); while (1){ LOG("At top of while loop\n"); if((n = recv(sock, databuf, BUF_SIZE-1, 0)<=0)){ LOG_Error("recv failed %d returned \n",n); break; } databuf[4] = '\0'; databuf[5] = '\n'; LOG("GOT MESSAGE\n"); LOG(">%s; sending ....\n",databuf); databuf[0] = 'X'; send(sock,databuf,6,0); memset(databuf,0,BUF_SIZE); LOG("Looping\n"); } /* Call on exit function to terminate */ l4thread_exit(); } /* Start the server */ int main(int argc, char *argv[]){ int c, s,err, ret_val, errcount=0; struct sockaddr_in addr; if ((argc < 2) || strcmp("--nowait", argv[1])) while (names_waitfor_name("ifconfig", &srv, 30000) == 0) { LOG("Client(main): \"mini_ifconfig\" not available, keep trying..."); } memset(&addr, 0, sizeof(addr)); addr.sin_addr.s_addr = htonl(INADDR_ANY); addr.sin_family = AF_INET; addr.sin_port = htons(2222); LOG("try to open socket"); if ((s=socket(AF_INET, SOCK_STREAM, IPPROTO_TCP)) < 0) { LOG("Couldn't create socket"); return -1; } if (bind(s, (struct sockaddr *)&addr, sizeof(struct sockaddr)) < 0) { LOG("Couldn't bind"); return -1; } LOG("bound to socket %d, call listen",s); if ((err=listen(s, 1)) < 0) { LOG("listen(%d): %d", s, err); return -1; } LOG("echo server is up and accepting..."); names_register("echoserver"); while(1){ struct sockaddr dummyaddr; int addrlen; l4thread_t th; struct th_data *th_dptr; LOG("waiting for another connection\n"); if ((c=accept(s, &dummyaddr, &addrlen)) < 0) { LOG("accept(%d): %d", s, c); if (++errcount > 10) { LOG("maximum error count reached---giving up..."); exit(1); } continue; } LOG("Allocating thread data struct\n"); th_dptr = (struct th_data*)l4dm_mem_allocate( sizeof(struct th_data), L4DM_CONTIGUOUS); memset(th_dptr,0,sizeof(struct th_data)); th_dptr->c = c; LOG("Got a connection request, creating thread to handle client on socket %d\n", c); th = l4thread_create( child_server ,(void *)th_dptr ,L4THREAD_CREATE_SYNC); ret_val = l4thread_startup_return(th); /* Thread started ... listening for other requests */ LOG("thread created ... listening again\n"); } return 0; } __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com

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Re: The future of L4
by Guillaume FORTAINE 03 Aug '06

03 Aug '06

Hello all, I believe that the Mozart-Oz language could be a marvellous start point : object-oriented, concurrency, logic verification, security (planned)... What do we need now ? A good kernel design : security, asynchronous IPC, threading, real time scheduler A compiler : parser and optimization ( i think a sort of Elsa & Mozart-oz front-end for llvm ) A driver development environment : I believe the most time consuming part Forget Glibc .... or a poor fork of this => a new library design will be a good challenge too ;-) ! Powerful tools to reengineer legacy programs : http://www.program-transformation.org/Transform/WebHome 1 year of work and 100 very good programmers at least, and I think we will be able to enjoy it ... ;-) ! I am contacting some of the hall of fame, preparing my weapons, no problem. Makus & Neal were too weak because too few, but thanks to their effort, they show us the good way : we can revolutionize the world : linux was only a start point, it's time to port open source philosophy and community to a "military grade" quality ;-) ! Nowadays, is GNU really GNU is not Unix ( I would say GNU is only Linux ... ). Open source life behind a legacy OS ( 30 years ) design : Unix ( & C language too...) Hey guys, 15 years of development and I send you a mail with a LiveCd : very impressive, all my hardware is detected ( sound & video ok) => better than M$ ... But the security and the " raw" performance are indeed disappointing ( debian.org hacked 2 times in 2 years => 2000 developers behind ... ) kernel.org shut down one week ( ext3 ... ) Why an asynchronous IPC and a massively multithread model ? Asynchronous, like in real life : each one takes it times ;-) ! Massively multithread : performance, of course :-) ! I believe that security could be "easily" implemented with a good logic framework, we have marvellous tools to do that. Best regards, Guillaume FORTAINE

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Re: The future of L4
by Guillaume FORTAINE 01 Aug '06

01 Aug '06

Hello, I believe we need only one language and not multiple languages : why ? There are few developers for L4, no need to divide them .... C++ is for me the best language ever : In the order ;-) !: Hardware design : http://www.systemc.org/ Low level optimization : http://llvm.org llvm is for fpga programming (used by los alamos ;-) !) : High level programming : c++ with concurrency : u++ http://plg.uwaterloo.ca/~usystem/uC++.html Metaprogramming : http://opencxx.sourceforge.net/ No language was so powerful ! If you hate unix, you can try plan9 : http://cm.bell-labs.com/plan9/ Future plans : An alpha kernel for work ( mix of L4.x2 v6 and L4.sec) A robust file system ( I think data log like nilfs with encryption support => trustedFS) A device driver development framework (like linux driver develoment kit) Support for sound/video I sincerely believe that we need to focus on the best things that Linux produces and put our efforts to simplify them (one file system, sound system, video system, desktop environment system) to reasonably produce an alpha os usable and not to wait 2020 or so to have only an IDE driver ... Best Regards, Guillaume FORTAINE

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The future of L4
by Guillaume FORTAINE 31 Jul '06

31 Jul '06

Hello all, I believe it's time to use ne tools to develop a robust l4 based os. here are my suggestions : c++ multithreaded language : http://plg.uwaterloo.ca/~usystem/uC++.html c++ library : http://cxx.uclibc.org/ Could we replace glibc with uclibc++ and ntpl with the uc++ language ? build system : http://www.exactcode.de/oss/exact-build/index.html parrallel and asychronous api: https://gforge.inria.fr/projects/kaapi/ (scheduler and api for l4) => focused on performance : could not we consider a pc as an asynchronous platform ? video server : http://xcb.freedesktop.org/wiki/ X.org was not thought for multithread. It's time to change ;-) ! parser: http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~smcpeak/elkhound/ compiler : http://llvm.org/ (used by los alamos laboratory ;-) !) Sound : http://www.alsa-project.org/ system development environment : http://www.t2-project.org/ A new concept : a meta-distribution (port for hurd planned :-) !) debuggers : http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~dsw/oink.html http://valgrind.org/ I believe with this new tools we can construct the best system ever ... Best Regards, Guillaume FORTAINE

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DICE_NO_REPLY error
by Michael Scheibel 27 Jul '06

27 Jul '06

Hello list, we have compiled the following interface with DICE 2.2.9: UInt32 genBuf( [out, size_is(*bufLen), max_is(MAX_BUFFER_SIZE)] UInt8** buf, [out] UInt32* bufLen, [out, size_is(*buf2Len), max_is(MAX_BUFFER_SIZE)] UInt8** buf2, [out] UInt32* buf2Len); UInt32 is defined as unsigned long, UInt8 as unsigned char, and MAX_BUFFER_SIZE is 4096. DICE options are -ftrace-server=printf -ftrace-client=printf -fforce-corba-alloc -P-DRAM_BASE=0x0 -P-DUSE_DIETLIBC=y -P-DSYSTEM_x86_l4v2 -P-DARCH_x86 -P-DCPUTYPE_ -P-DL4API_l4v2 -template -Bpia32 -Biv2 -BmC Running the generated stubs we noticed that ~0.89% of the IPC transactions fail. In such a case the parameters passed to the server still contain their initialization values on return. The client trace says "ipc error c0" and the server trace says "DICE_NO_REPLY". We would be happy about some hints what's going wrong here... Michael -- Sirrix AG security technologies - http://www.sirrix.com Michael Scheibel eMail: m.scheibel(a)sirrix.com Tel +49(234) 610 071-124 Public key on demand. Fingerprint 009B 9963 7B28 4356 CA43 5BFD 17A4 AE0F 6943 4B54 This message may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not the addressee, you must not use, copy, disclose or take any action based on this message or any information herein. If you have received this message in error, please advise the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete this message.

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