New Computer

As part of the process of changing employers, I needed to get a new computer for the new job (and return the old desktop to Oracle.)

I wound up picking this one... I didn't seem to be able to build it any cheaper (as of the date of this post) myself. And guess what... someone goofed! Instead of the 3 GHz Core i7 950, it came with a 3.2 GHz Core i7 960. Bonus! (Other goofs relative to the ad: the system has 9 GB -- but that's spelled out in the details, comes with a black aluminum chassis, and ships with a cheap logitech keyboard.)

I'm still using the stock load of Windows 7, and I'm both surprised (and maybe a bit embarrassed) to admit that the Windows environment (especially when replacing IE with Chrome) is actually quite nice -- fast and usable. Maybe running this environment (and running OpenSolaris in a VM) might not be so bad after all! (Ok, I'll go find some soap to wash my mouth out for blaspheming....) If I do this, besides being able to use Skype for work, I'll be able to use my Phoenix RC flight simulator without having to resort to borrowing the wife's computer...

Engines arrived for Squat yesterday

The Squat is a 4" diameter short high power rocket with a 54mm engine mount. My engines, 54mm hardware (including the higher end Aeropack retainer), and 38 mm adapter arrived from What's Up Hobbies yesterday. Timothy's going to fly it at the LDRS mass launch on a G67 redline -- this will be his first reloadable engine. Later that day I'll fly it on an I140 skidmark, which represents both my first 54mm engine, and my first Caeseroni engine.

Timothy and I put the rocket together last night; I must say, the higher end metal hardware and thicker fins on this rocket are definitely a step up even from the LOC IV I flew previously on my Level 1 flight (go to about 1:30 in the video link -- I haven't figured out how to edit the video file yet).

I also received the propellant for the J350W, which I'll be flying in my LOC IV as part of my Level 2 certification attempt. OpenRocket says the LOC IV will be approaching 700 mph with this particular engine! Guess I will be glassing the fins on it to help strengthen them for transonic speeds. (I'm open to alternative suggestions from the experts, as well.)

LDRS is going to be fun, indeed!

Greener pastures

I've recently made a major decision -- I'll be leaving Oracle. My last day as an Oracle employee will be on May 21, 2010. Leaving such a great group of people at Sun will be difficult indeed.

However, I hope to be able to continue as a significant contributor to the OpenSolaris community, as I'll be joining the team at Nexenta. At Nexenta, my responsibility will be to lead a group of engineers working on the OpenSolaris kernel. As such, I'm excited that I'll be able to continue to work on finest operating system kernel on the planet, and I look forward to further collaboration with some of the best software engineers on the planet.

My first day at Nexenta will be on May 24, 2010.

Going up to SF bay area

Its been a while since I've been to the Bay Area. I'm going up for two days, which is a shade longer than I usually go for. Part of the reason is to make sure I meet with folks in the Bay Area that I otherwise don't see. I'll be up Thursday and Friday April 29 and 30 -- and I expect I'll be at MPK most of that time. Anyone who wants to chat, please let me know.

audiocmihd driver (Asus Xonar cards)

Some people have been asking me about this driver. (Asus Xonar cards are fairly high-end high definition cards using the CMI 8788 chip.)

I've finally gotten the code reasonably cleaned up, and converted to my interrupt free audio framework.

I'll probably start a case to get this integrated into late b137, or b138. Mostly its just running a bunch of tests at this point.

One problem I have is that I only have Xonar DX1 cards. (PCI.)

If someone is able to help me qualify the driver with build 137 (or a nightly build) of ON, please let me know. The more I can get this driver tested, the sooner I can get it integrated into OpenSolaris.

Interrupt Free Audio

Today I integrated "interrupt free audio". This set of changes, including some other changes, represents a substantial simplification in the DDI for audio drivers.

The typical audio driver no longer needs to worry about interrupt handlers. On average, about 300 lines of code (or about 10-20% of complexity for typical drivers) was removed from each audio driver.

Furthermore, many audio drivers (for example audio810) are able to run completely lock free, since the audio framework provides synchronization for certain operations. (Operations against each audio engine are synchronized, operations against audio controls are synchronized as a whole, and everything is synchronized against suspend/resume functions.)

Even better, these changes enable some new advanced features that will be used for Sun Ray, virtualization, and hotplug support in the future.

Oh yeah, and since the asynchronous processing now happens as part of the regular timer interrupt, it means that system CPUs can remain in deeper C states for longer, even while playing audio. So, we should have an improvement on system power consumption (admittedly I've not measured this.)

There will be more stuff related to audio in the future, stay tuned.

"Legislative Sleight of Hand"

I normally have avoided using my blog as a soapbox for my political beliefs. However, I simply cannot remain silent on recent events in the House of Representatives (United States for foreign readers.

No matter what your position is on the health care reforms under consideration, everyone should agree that the reforms are sweeping; perhaps some of the most significant legislation that will affect nearly every American we've seen in quite some time.

House Democratic leadership, knowing that the measure is unpopular with many voters (and hence House Democrats may be unlikely to "vote the party line" to avoid a backlash in their constituencies) are planning a move that is even more offensive than "reconciliation".

While I'm a Republican, and generally opposed to nationalization of 1/6th of our economy, I find far more offensive that the House leadership (particularly Ms. Pelosi) would consider a move that so boldly disenfranchises the people of this nation.

This is a crime, if not against the law, then certainly against the spirit of democracy upon which our country is founded. If health care reform is to be passed, then it should be done with a regular vote where the politicians who vote for it are required to be accountable for those votes (and vice versa, by the way).

If it passes without such a vote, then it will go down as one of the greatest failures of "representative democracy" in history.