Ethan Blanton @elb@mastodon.sdf.org

I'm reading through the old #Unix news archives from 1976/1976, and all of the things people did with V6 to fix bugs and extend obvious deficiencies ... and wondering if I can find enough evidence on TUHS/Unix Archive/PUPS to reproduce this stuff on my #PDP-11/34s.

Whatever the situation with the #GNU Assembly versus the #FSF, the FAQ does mention the #PDP-11, which I am in favor of!

https://gnu.tools/en/blog/2021/04/answering-frequently-asked-questions/

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@DL!rlunix

login: elb
% ls
hello.c
% cat hello.c
main(argc, argv)
int argc;
char **argv;
{
printf("Hello, Unix user!\n");
}
% cc hello.c
% ./a.out
Hello, Unix user!
%

#unix #pdp

From a retrocomputing chat ... I love this!

"Leap year is only every 4 years, they can just unplug it and move the jumper, it'll be fine."

Logitech is discontinuing the Harmony line; they say they'll continue to support it "as long as people are using it" (which seems unlikely to me, I see no reason I won't be using mine in a decade or more). I wish I could find the hope that they would open the protocols and firmware when they finally abandon it, but we all know how that will go.

This is fun, #Forth for the #PDP-8. Newly authored, no less!

https://github.com/YulBEdwards/forth8

I haven't tried it yet; found at https://retrocomputingforum.com/t/pdp-8-history-and-operation-and-thoughts-of-focal-versus-forth/1436/26?u=elb .

I'm pretty disappointed in #Linux lately (have I complained about this recently?). I remember the 90s when it was a pain to get things running (but it was SO much better than the competition that it was warranted), but I've been spoiled by totally fantastic environments Just Working for a couple of decades now. Yet then comes along something like this: https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/xorg/xserver/-/issues/1084

I mean, I think it's TECHNICALLY #Intel's fault, but nonetheless it's my Linux laptop and environment that's painful.

OK, so ... Loading a file in the #keybase filesystem in my #emacs takes FOR EVER. The culprit is projectile, because emacs -Q is fast and emacs -Q after loading projectile is slow. Adding /keybase to vc-ignore-dir-regexp doesn't seem to fix it.

Any suggestions on how I can find out what part of projectile is so slow, and how to fix it?

#askfediverse #askfedi

I find it amusing that one of the arguments for #rust in the #linux kernel is that a modern language will increase the developer pool.

There have to be like ... three or four orders of magnitude more #C developers than rust developers out there.

I mean, I understand what they're saying, and I don't entirely disagree, but it sure does seem early for that claim.

Another #golang violation of the principle of least surprise:

In a function returning ([]byte, bool), this is legal:

value, ok := data[key]
return value, ok

This, however, fails to compile with "not enough arguments to return":

return data[key]

"Smart" switches are annoying. You can't do a regular dumb light switch off too fast. Well, I mean, you probably can in the sense that at some point it will experience catastrophic failure, but it's not going to just not switch off because it didn't notice you toggled it. Yet I frequently have to double flip my kitchen light because I hit it too fast. So annoying. (I think it's a GE, it's momentary both ways.)