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jmcunx Tech blog

This will contain personal ramblings about various tech items.

2024-08-12: Emacs on OpenBSD with RCS does not get along too well. To use RCS with Emacs on OpenBSD you need to install GNU RCS from ports (grcs-5.9.4p4). That alone will not get around the issue. What I had to do is ensure the binaries from GNU RCS is in a Directory that is first in your path. This script will set up the links for you:

Script to fix the issue with GNU Emacs with RCS, requies GNU RCS.

2024-06-24: All my utilities are now also maintained in gitlab along with here in sdf. I found gitlab easier to use then github, once you figure out how to create a new repo in gitlab. Their free account is an odd retention policy, but it should be fine for me. I am keeping an eye on a new announcement about an OpenBSD GOT repository being build, it sounds intriguing.

2024-06-14: For the past month, on my Laptop, I enabled my old "Great Internet Mersenne Prime Search" setup. But after a few weeks I disabled it, no matter what I set the Throttle to, it ran too hot. So I re-enabled BOINC for the "World Community Grid" and "Rosetta". Time will tell if I keep this active on the W541 with Slackware. The Average Temperature is about 20F (12C) higher, I do not know if I can live with that. I miss the desktop days, but laptops are far more convenient these days :)

2024-06-14: Converting from RCS to git was rather easy, but trying to get the git repository loaded into gitlab was way too hard. Seems no matter what, they want you to use https instead of ssh for pushing/cloning, so I could not get that to work after 2 days of trying. https is a deal breaker for me, so for now I will stick with RCS and anonymous ftp. Plus the documentation seem to be tailored to Microsoft Windows or MACs, making things even harder. The only easy option is go go back to github, but due to Microsoft 2FA and the need for a Cell Phone, that is a no go for me.

2024-06-12: I finally found a way to convert my source from RCS to git and keep all the history. It was on stack, pretty much you convert it from RCS to CVS, that is trivial. Then via "git cvsimport", it will load the objects to git with history. The missing piece was utility cvsps(1). I am slowly moving to back to git again. That is a tough decision, but friends kept pushing me to do go to git. Plus, RCS on OpenBSD has issues with Emacs. So I guess I relented. Years ago I converted to git/github, but because I lost my history and github 2FA, I decided to abandon git and stick with RCS. This conversion activity may depend upon github, Microsoft 2FA requirement upset me and I left github. I calmed down a bit since and will read about this 2FA more, or see if I can find a good alternative. If so, I may finally be 100% on git for source.

2024-06-07: On OpenBSD I found a work-around for the Emacs Issue. Instead of installing "emacs-29.3-gtk3", install "emacs-29.3-gtk2" instead. That allows Emacs to work fine on OpenBSD. The gk3 version freezes when you use Menus on the menu-bar via your mouse in X. Depending on what you have installed, there is a good chance gtk2 has been installed as a dependency for some other package.

2024-05-24: My lisp tags setup NetBSD pkgsrc emacs29-29.3 and emacs 29 from ports on OpenBSD breaks the menus. Emacs will freeze Xorg when I try and use any of the drop down menus. On NetBSD I reverted back to Emacs 28, all works good. That is not an option on OpenBSD. I will check to see why that is the case in an emacs forum, but I suspect it is something in "~/.emacs".

2024-04-03: This has been a "fun" week. It was discovered that a backdoor was put in library liblzma starting version 5.6.x. This backdoor added a hole to sshd with many distros using systemd. I know the BSDs and Slackware was not affected. Do a WEB search and you will find more information then you will need. As of now, I believe all affected distros have been patched.

2024-03-28: Updated the T420 to NetBSD 10.0 from RC6. All went well and no major issues. But if I run a heavy Hash Analysis Program I created, after ~1 hour, X will get corrupted. I may create a PR for that, but for now I am running that on my Slackware System since it executes 10x faster then on BSD.

2024-02-24: I had more time, seems ksh(1) and csh(1) is pledged on OpenBSD, so since I really like pledge(1)/unveil(1), I stopped using tcsh(1) on OpenBSD :( For a fun activity on OpenBSD, you can issue this command to see what ports have been pledged: "find /usr/ports/ -name pledge\*". Of course you need to install ports, see the FAQ for that.

2024-02-22: I finally examined OpenBSD's ksh using objdump(1). Seems ksh(1) and csh(1) is not pledged or unveiled, which makes sense based upon how it is used. Because of that, I am decided to use tcsh(1) on OpenBSD. I was using csh(1) only because I prefer its interactive use compared to "sh type" shells. I have always used tcsh(1) on Slackware and still do. I was exposed to it when I used Coherent 386 on a 386sx.

2024-02-06: For the last few years, I have been playing with using the original csh(1). I am a tcsh(1) user so all that is really missing is cursor movement to edit commands. Right now, I decided to use the original csh(1) for an undetermined period of time to exercise my memory. Over the years I have become very dependent on using tab completion for some commands. I was exposed to csh(1) decades ago on SunOS, at the time I did not like it too much. But now I see an elegance I missed back then.

2024-02-05: I played with git again with a couple of new utilities. But when you sign commits with gpg, OpenBSD and NetBSD has issues. This is due to pinentry, gpg2 needs that for a GUI prompt. Why the the gpg people "broke" gpg2 forcing a GUI on us is beyond me. So, that reinforces my use of RCS and ftp distribution of my things. gpg (not 2) is no longer available on Open/Net and I kind of expect support to stop for it. But, Slackware still ships it :)

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$Id: tech_2024.gmi,v 1.21 2024/08/22 15:09:06 jmccue Exp $