uRandom
Fri 20th Nov 2009 @ 19:28 2009: Memory Lane
Debian Project Lead Steve Kemp has a fascinating trip down memory lane entitled I am not stupid, you know. They cannot make things like that yet. Some of it, the Z80 hacking, I do not remember, nor was I using DOS in its 2.0 days, but other stuff - real/protected mode and unreal mode, 0x100 in COM files, MZ (although more as the marker at the start of a DOS executable than the man it is named after), and other such nostalgia which has drifted away into complete irrelevance.
Thu 19th Nov 2009 @ 10:32 2009: Three Way Mirror with Linux MD RAID
To create a Three Way Mirror with Linux MD RAID:
If we add a third device to a 2-way mirror, we get a 2-way mirror with a "Spare" device (S):
md3 : active raid1 sdc3[2](S) sdb3[1] sda3[0]
10482304 blocks [2/2] [UU]
To make it a 3-way mirror, instead we need to "grow" the RAID device:
[root@mybox ~]# cat /proc/mdstat
Personalities : [raid1]
md2 : active raid1 sdb2[1] sda2[0]
20972736 blocks [2/2] [UU]
md3 : active raid1 sdb3[1] sda3[0]
10482304 blocks [2/2] [UU]
md1 : active raid1 sdb1[1] sda1[0]
111780160 blocks [2/2] [UU]
unused devices: <none>
[root@mybox ~]# mdadm -G /dev/md2 -n 3
We can now look at the device, and see that the status of md2 is "UU_" (where "U" is "Up", "_" is "Missing")
[root@mybox ~]# cat /proc/mdstat
Personalities : [raid1]
md2 : active raid1 sdb2[1] sda2[0]
20972736 blocks [3/2] [UU_]
md3 : active raid1 sdb3[1] sda3[0]
10482304 blocks [2/2] [UU]
md1 : active raid1 sdb1[1] sda1[0]
111780160 blocks [2/2] [UU]
unused devices: <none>
We can then add a new device into the array:
[root@mybox ~]# mdadm /dev/md2 -a /dev/sdc2
mdadm: re-added /dev/sdc2
[root@mybox ~]# cat /proc/mdstat
Personalities : [raid1]
md2 : active raid1 sdc2[2] sdb2[1] sda2[0]
20972736 blocks [3/2] [UU_]
[=====>...............] recovery = 29.6% (6217536/20972736) finish=3.7min speed=64803K/sec
md3 : active raid1 sdb3[1] sda3[0]
10482304 blocks [2/2] [UU]
md1 : active raid1 sdb1[1] sda1[0]
111780160 blocks [2/2] [UU]
unused devices: <none>
[root@mybox ~]#
Thu 12th Nov 2009 @ 23:37 2009: Sun/Oracle
It can't have escaped the attention of many in the IT industry, that Oracle are in the process of taking over Sun Microsystems.
(full disclosure: I have never worked for either company, but have spent most of the past 10 years working for Sun as an employee of one or another Sun Partner. I have no shares in either company, no access to their internal communications, no insider knowledge of any of this). This is all my personal view of the situation.
The US Department of Justice have investigated the takeover, because the largest Database software firm taking over the owner of the Java software programming language was a concern. The DoJ decided that everything was acceptable, and gave the thumbs up. For the new company to trade in Europe, the EU must also approve the takeover. It is rare for the EU to question the takeover of two US firms which have been approved by the US government, but entirely within their rights - to trade in the EU, a company has to play by the EU's rules. The EU have been stricter with Microsoft (who have many friends in their own government) than the US DoJ ever were, and they are also taking a closer look at this situation too.
The EU's concern is not about Java, but about the fact that Sun own MySQL - the most widely-used database to use a Free / Open Source Software (F/OSS) license, as opposed to a proprietary license. This very blog (if you're reading this on http://steve-parker.org/urandom/) is powered by MySQL; without a vaguely credible F/OSS database, many websites would be unable to exist. The "LAMP" stack of Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP was a major contributor to the dot-com boom, and although the financial market went a bit insane over that, the technology remains, and is powering many many businesses, particularly websites. MySQL may not be the best database in the world, but it's the best one that's free (or even cheap), and it's the best one that's F/OSS. That is important, because proprietary software can not be inspected, tested, changed by those who rely upon it. So if you care about that, MySQL is your first (and depending on feature requirements, perhaps your only) choice.
So if Oracle is the biggest proprietary database company, and MySQL is the biggest F/OSS database software, what does that mean? We have a David and Goliath situation - MySQL is tiny in terms of revenue (some support contracts, but that's basically it) whilst Oracle is a multi-billion dollar giant. As a user of MySQL, for my humble blog (and the freely-available wishlist, and for tracking sales of my ever-popular shell scripting tutorial (shameless plug!)), I would indeed care if something were to happen to MySQL. And so the EU are investigating.
The takeover was announced in April, the DoJ investigated for a few months, and now the EU are investigating. In the meantime, Sun's customers do not know what is going to happen to Sun. They also don't know what's happening to Solaris, Java, MySQL, or other Sun-owned technologies. And Sun is losing value every day.
The common cry in the industry is that the EU are taking all the value out of Sun, to the detriment of Oracle.
This is the misconception which I would like to correct.
If somebody can show that I am wrong here, I would be more than happy.
The suggestion is that "MySQL is a mere tiny part of Sun, which Oracle would happen to have control over, buy hey - it's F/OSS, so even if Oracle abandoned it, it would still exist. Websites wouldn't stop working overnight, there's no problem. Oracle don't even plan to abandon it, so there is nothing at all to worry about. Come on, approve the deal, you silly Eurocrats, before Sun lose all their customers, and all their value."
If Oracle have bought Sun for the hardware range, for the Solaris Operating Environment, for Java, for the customer base, for any other reason, with MySQL not being a factor at all, then Oracle would drop MySQL at the first suggestion that the EU have a problem with Oracle owning MySQL.
As Oracle (and Sun) have remained tight-lipped throughout the EU investigation, it seems that Oracle do care about owning MySQL, even at the possible cost of destroying Sun while the EU investigation continues. And if Oracle are prepared to do that, then that means that the EU are indeed right to investigate.
If the Sun/Oracle takeover was blocked, that would not be good for Sun - what I am seeing is that even some of Sun's loyal customers are (if unhappily) moving to other providers due to the doubt caused by Oracle's silence on the entire deal - questions such as what technologies they bought Sun for, what parts they do and do not intend to keep, and - in this small part, what interest they have in MySQL. So Oracle could destroy Sun if the takeover was not approved, but they are not taking the 30 minutes necessary to confirm to the EU that they are happy to do the deal without including MySQL. That arrogance is what is killing Sun day by day, not the EU.
The EU issue says to me that Oracle are adamant on keeping MySQL as part of the deal, and that does not sound good for MySQL's future.
Sun 8th Nov 2009 @ 01:51 2009: Aww, cute little lamb
In a supermarket recently, I noticed that the wall was lined with displays of farmyard sights - including this charming photo of a lamb, peering out from ... erm, would that be the tailgate of the butcher's van, perhaps?
I do not have any marketing qualifications or experience at all, so I am probably wrong in thinking that putting up photos of cute lambs about to die, may not be the best way to promote the sale of lamb cutlets. It must be a really effective marketing technique, I am sure.
(full disclosure: I happen to be currently working on contract for a different supermarket; this observation is entirely coincidental!)
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