From owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Sat Mar 7 00:44:46 2009 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 49BEF106564A for ; Sat, 7 Mar 2009 00:44:46 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from emailrob@emailrob.com) Received: from mx03.dls.net (mx03.dls.net [216.145.245.199]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 18D338FC08 for ; Sat, 7 Mar 2009 00:44:45 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from emailrob@emailrob.com) Received: from [216.145.235.219] (helo=emailrob.com) by mx03.dls.net with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1Lfk0Y-00087H-Ga; Fri, 06 Mar 2009 18:03:16 -0600 Message-ID: <49B1B9C9.5050501@emailrob.com> Date: Sat, 07 Mar 2009 00:03:21 +0000 From: spellberg_robert User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.0.2) Gecko/20030208 Netscape/7.02 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org References: <200903061346.n26Dk9K5057916@lurza.secnetix.de> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Subject: Re: FreeBSD Bounties X-BeenThere: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Non technical items related to the community List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Sat, 07 Mar 2009 00:44:46 -0000 mr. fromme almost gets to the point that i am about to make. every so often, some one posts a complaint about another entity's browser. it can't do this, it can't do that, "blah, blah, woof, woof" [ the quote is from jimi hendrix; monterey, 1967, iirc ]. question: if the "browser_products" of other entities are --so-- problematic, just --how-- difficult would it be to "roll our own" ? note that this question is --not-- the same as asking how long it would take to code all of the whiz_bangs that the marketing_department_dweebs want to advertise. it doesn't have to do everything, but, what it does do must be done well; reliably, predictably. i would want it to do things "the bsd way", e. g., search by reg_ex. it would be totally divorced from anything "gnu". i don't care about animation [ images hog bandwidth, big_time ]. here is a concept about which i have fantasized for quite some time. i have been writing a book_keeping app that is designed to do certain things that i have not found to exist in any of the pre_fab, out_of_the_box, point_and_click thingies, which are available for purchase [ "ask about our multi_user_license program" ] at the big_box store. for quite some time, off_and_on, admittedly, i have been researching how to write a "browser". it is my understanding that, once i can recursively render tables, the rest is comparitively easy. i have not, just yet, figured_out how to do the secure_http thing [ this is where i am stalled ]. i want a program that, either, is or, to the outside_world, appears to be a "browser"_like thingy and which is --programmable--, so that it may, in co_ordination with my book_keeping app, log in to any account, >----> to which i am already authorized access, <----< such as my bank or my electric_utility, in the middle_of_the_night, while i am asleep, to down_load transaction_events or other postings, to up_load bill_payment schedulings or other instructions, so that i don't have to use my waking moments to do these routine, but, necessary, time_consuming chores. this is an example of the bsd approach, "routine tasks should be scripted". further, i want this "browser" to be a "logging" "browser", making a disk_copy of --every-- page that comes in, text, image, --everything--, so that i do not have to remember to "save" a copy of the page, even from so_called "secure" sites [ i have confidence in my ability to secure sensitive information and to manage log_files ]. to get to the topic of "bounties", it is with deep regret that i inform all readers that, "for the duration" of the global_economic_depression, presently being engineered by the american donkey political_party, with the able assistance of their front_man, the "magic_messiah" [ for whose failure, i pray several times per day ], i will be unable to supply any funds to the "bounty" program [ surely, there is a better word, isn't there ? ]. however, especially after the book_keeping app is working, i anticipate having more time available. as my bsd skills continually improve, my confidence in, one day, being able to make a credible contribution to the freebsd project improves commensurately. [ an aside to mr. stokely. regarding a dialogue in which you took part about a month ago, i am pleased to learn that your need is for author people, not mark_up people. i frequently find myself making copies of files, e. g., "man" pages or "info" docs, then, amending them to add examples or explanations, fix spelling, grammar and punctuation [ the comma is great for setting_off subordinate clauses ] errors, rewrite tortured phrasing and, sometimes, correct content errors. "fixing things" may be where i may be of initial service. as an example [ this one is current ], have any of you ever tried to teach yourself m4(1), with only the "man" page available ? i wanted a general_purpose macro_instruction processor. on faith, i assumed that "m4" wouldn't be included, if it wasn't useful. further, i assumed that it was a "current" tool, because, if "m4" was a "legacy" tool, another tool, "for new designs", would exist. i had never before been able to make "m4" work "right", but, this time, considering the above reasoning, i decided to stick with it for more than a few hours [ now, i know why: i am line_oriented ]. having some initial success, i kept at it, grumbling frequently [ if it hadn't been for the "-dV" option, i would, probably, have given_up --very-- early on; the quoting approach is --not-- intuitively obvious ]. i went three full weeks before i discovered that the "info" doc is in "/usr/local", not "/usr/share", where i had found the "cc" and "as" "info" docs. "make" was with it [ surprise ! ]. shouldn't those all be in one place ? to make things worse, the "man" page and the "info" doc assume --opposite-- defaults. further, the "info" doc describes feat^H^H^H^Hcharacteristics which, in fact, do not exist [ perhaps, stallman recruited that author from a redmond marketing firm ]. after several more weeks of hacking, i have, for the most part, figured_out what does work and what does not work. i have even developed techniques to insert nearly arbitrary white_space into my macroes, rendering them amazingly readable. this past monday, i installed sendmail [ the latest one; 8_14_3, i think ], so that i can see examples of actual use. i haven't needed to translate between looping and tail_recursion since my fortran days. i realize that this is a "gnu" product, so, i put the blame there. however, it illustrates my point. but, i digress. ] sorry to go on at such length. perhaps, if i were to post more frequently, my posts would be shorter. when i started this, i thought i would type only about one paragraph, asking the "roll our own" question. for ready reference, i enclose the relevant portions of mr. fromme's post. rob spellberg Oliver Fromme wrote: > Matt Olander wrote: > > james michael wrote: [ snip ] > > > ... but I don't > > > think the problem is that people aren't willing to do the work, its > > > that places like adobe has closed its software so that we can't > > > really create anything. > > > > Actually, Flash9 on FreeBSD 7.x is working pretty good now with Linux > > emulation. > > Unfortunately only with Firefox, and it's far from perfect. > > I tried to get Flash9 working the past few days with the > latest RELENG_7 and the latest ports. This is on a UP > i386 machine, so nothing special. > > - Native Opera: No go. It segfaults. > > - Linux Opera: Works somewhat, but hangs often, leaves > lots of dead processes behind. Generally unusable. > > - Native Firefox3: Works most of the time. Problems > with youtube (hangs quite often). Most other sites > seem to work better. > > - Linux Firefox: Didn't try because the port is marked > "forbidden" due to security issues. > > I definitely prefer Opera for normal browsing because it's > faster and has more useful features, so I use it most of > the time. I only start up Firefox when I need to visit > a site that requires Flash, which doesn't happen too > often, fortunately. > > Certainly, I wouldn't mind if someone improved the existing > nspluginwrapper to work better with native Opera, or write > a new software from scratch that enables using Flash with > native Opera. [ snip ] > Best regards > Oliver