From memory, augmented by some saved mail messages.
Today I set off by car to Sydney for the AUUG 1998 conference, where I was
to present my paper on Vinum. I took the Mallee highway via Ouyen and Hay, and made it as
far as Grenfell by
nightfall. On the way got into a skid on a road with a creek crossing it and came off the
road, damaging the right-hand outside mirror and filling the right-hand front wheel with
mud. A passing truck pulled me out, but the mud in the wheel put it out of balance, and I
couldn't drive very fast.
Off in the direction of Orange, finding a petrol station to clean out the wheel, then down
the Blue Mountains into the Sydney area, greatly marvelling at the terrible traffic and the
ridiculous speed limits.
Didn't go into Sydney right away—headed north
to Woy Woy, where Sue Blake lives, and
brought her an old Panasonic laser printer that I had had in Germany. Played a bit of music
with her, then off to Sydney, arriving hungry at about 23:00. Surprisingly, the hotel
couldn't offer me anything to eat, so out to an all-night eatery.
Tutorial day today: Richard
Stallman with two Emacs tutorials. Got
in there and met a bloke called John Terpstra, who had a laptop with him. That sounded like
a good idea—this was one of my first conferences, and I wasn't very on the
ball—so since rms still hadn't shown up, went up to my room to get the laptop. Came
down to find rms wandering aimlessly in the empty hallway, saying “I have no idea
where my tutorial is”. Got in there, and he then discovered he had left the power
supply for his laptop behind, so I ended up lending him my laptop.
It was interesting hearing rms teach, but I didn't learn much: it was mainly aimed at people
who hadn't already been using Emacs for 18 years.
My own tutorial today, installing FreeBSD. I didn't get everything finished; the Ethernet
card gave me a real hard time.
It's difficult to think that you could spend all day installing an operating system in
those days. By this time, the first three editions of my book were already on the market.
Some things do get better; nowadays it takes about 30 minutes.
At this time I was attending my first AUUG conference
in Sydney. I had just completed the first version
of Vinum, and since Peter Wemm of
the FreeBSD core team, and also CVS-Meister, was
there, I asked him to help me commit the code to the FreeBSD repository. Things didn't
exactly go according to plan: for some reason, while typing the commit message into
an Emacs window, the Emacs crashed. It worked again the second time round,
but we ended up committing more than intended: apart from the source files, there was also a
file
emacs.core.
Peter was one of the few people allowed to physically remove anything from the repository,
and he did so. Not quickly enough, though, as the ensuing email discussion shows. Most of the
people in the discussion are still (as of June 2007) in the FreeBSD project, but some things
have changed in the ensuing time, so I'm including some headers which might be of historical
interest. Unfortunately I no longer have the original commit message.
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1998 08:05:36 +0200
From: Ollivier Robert <roberto@keltia.freenix.fr>
To: cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
According to Greg Lehey:
> N src/lkm/vinum/emacs.core
Aieeeeeeee.
--
Ollivier ROBERT -=- FreeBSD: The Power to Serve! -=- roberto@keltia.freenix.fr
FreeBSD keltia.freenix.fr 3.0-CURRENT #64: Fri Sep 11 23:22:44 CEST 1998
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1998 23:12:00 -0700 (PDT)
To: grog@FreeBSD.ORG
CC: cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
From: asami@FreeBSD.ORG (Satoshi Asami)
* N src/lkm/vinum/emacs.core
Huh? :>
Satoshi
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1998 17:04:05 +0930
From: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com>
To: Satoshi Asami <asami@FreeBSD.ORG>
Cc: cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
On Tuesday, 15 September 1998 at 23:12:00 -0700, Satoshi Asami wrote:
> * N src/lkm/vinum/emacs.core
>
> Huh? :>
What are you guys talking about? I see no emacs.core.
Greg
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1998 00:58:10 -0700 (PDT)
To: grog@lemis.com
CC: cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
From: asami@FreeBSD.ORG (Satoshi Asami)
* What are you guys talking about? I see no emacs.core.
I don't know. It was in the commit message.
===
>> ls -lg /home/ncvs/src/lkm/vinum/
total 299
1 drwxrwxr-x 2 grog ncvs 1024 Sep 16 00:54 ./
1 drwxrwxr-x 36 wollman ncvs 1024 Sep 15 22:56 ../
3 -r--r--r-- 1 grog ncvs 2303 Sep 15 22:56 COPYRIGHT,v
:
22 -r--r--r-- 1 grog ncvs 21828 Sep 15 22:56 vinumvar.h,v
===
Judging from the timestamps, someone deleted it directly from the
repository? :<
Satoshi
To: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com>
cc: Satoshi Asami <asami@FreeBSD.ORG>, cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG,
cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1998 01:59:19 -0700
From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@time.cdrom.com>
> On Tuesday, 15 September 1998 at 23:12:00 -0700, Satoshi Asami wrote:
> > * N src/lkm/vinum/emacs.core
> >
> > Huh? :>
>
> What are you guys talking about? I see no emacs.core.
It was in the commit, clearly. I also hope you weren't the one to
delete it from the repository since that would also mean you'd have to
kiss your commit privs goodbye from this moment forward. The "do not
touch the respository directly, ever" rule is not just for show, and
the penalties for doing so are pretty final.
- Jordan
From grog@papillon.lemis.com Thu Sep 17 12:43:15 1998
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 12:43:15 +1000
From: Greg Lehey <grog@papillon.lemis.com>
To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@time.cdrom.com>
Cc: Satoshi Asami <asami@FreeBSD.ORG>, cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG,
cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
On Wednesday, 16 September 1998 at 1:59:19 -0700, Jordan K. Hubbard wrote:
>> On Tuesday, 15 September 1998 at 23:12:00 -0700, Satoshi Asami wrote:
>>> * N src/lkm/vinum/emacs.core
>>>
>>> Huh? :>
>>
>> What are you guys talking about? I see no emacs.core.
>
> It was in the commit, clearly. I also hope you weren't the one to
> delete it from the repository since that would also mean you'd have to
> kiss your commit privs goodbye from this moment forward. The "do not
> touch the respository directly, ever" rule is not just for show, and
> the penalties for doing so are pretty final.
Well, *you* should know what really happened. I didn't delete it, the
guy looking over my shoulder did.
For the benefit of the others, I am currently at the AUUG conference
in Sydney, and in a break between two presentations I ran into the
terminal room and committed the modules. On the first attempt, Emacs
refused to work, and for a change decided to leave a .core behind. I
repeated with vi as the editor, and the commit succeeded, but the guy
looking over my shoulder said "Oh dear, you've committed a .core
file". I said "Why the hell did you let me do that", and *he* went
out and deleted it. I don't suppose you're going to revoke Peter
Wemm's commit privileges :-)
Greg
To: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com>
cc: Satoshi Asami <asami@FreeBSD.ORG>, cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG,
cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
Date: Wed, 16 Sep 1998 19:54:22 -0700
From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@time.cdrom.com>
> > It was in the commit, clearly. I also hope you weren't the one to
> > delete it from the repository since that would also mean you'd have to
> > kiss your commit privs goodbye from this moment forward. The "do not
> > touch the respository directly, ever" rule is not just for show, and
> > the penalties for doing so are pretty final.
>
> Well, *you* should know what really happened. I didn't delete it, the
> guy looking over my shoulder did.
DOH! DOH! DOH! I forgot you happened to be there with Peter, and
Peter is indeed allowed to do pretty much anything he likes to the
repository.
Erm.. I'll just slink away quietly now, back into my little hole.. ;)
My sincere apologies to Greg for the accusation of not going to church
when he happened to actually be talking to god directly at the
time. :-)
- Jordan
From peter@netplex.com.au Thu Sep 17 15:27:01 1998
To: asami@FreeBSD.ORG (Satoshi Asami)
cc: grog@lemis.com, cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 13:56:35 +0800
From: Peter Wemm <peter@netplex.com.au>
Satoshi Asami wrote:
> * What are you guys talking about? I see no emacs.core.
>
> I don't know. It was in the commit message.
>
> ===
> >> ls -lg /home/ncvs/src/lkm/vinum/
> total 299
> 1 drwxrwxr-x 2 grog ncvs 1024 Sep 16 00:54 ./
> 1 drwxrwxr-x 36 wollman ncvs 1024 Sep 15 22:56 ../
> 3 -r--r--r-- 1 grog ncvs 2303 Sep 15 22:56 COPYRIGHT,v
> :
> 22 -r--r--r-- 1 grog ncvs 21828 Sep 15 22:56 vinumvar.h,v
>
> ===
>
> Judging from the timestamps, someone deleted it directly from the
> repository? :<
I did, but I was stuck on a macintosh with horrible keyboard bindings and
was having a great deal of trouble. I had a good chuckle when greg imported
it.. :-)
Mind you, Greg has got the wierdest keycaps I've ever seen.. It's a
euro-something keyboard with a US keymap and I'm having great fun in "hunt
the key" mode..
>
> Satoshi
>
Cheers,
-Peter
From rb@gid.co.uk Thu Sep 17 17:51:43 1998
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 09:19:13 +0000
To: Peter Wemm <peter@netplex.com.au>
From: Bob Bishop <rb@gid.co.uk>
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
Cc: asami@FreeBSD.ORG (Satoshi Asami), grog@lemis.com,
cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
At 1:56 pm +0800 17/9/98, Peter Wemm wrote:
>[...]
>Mind you, Greg has got the wierdest keycaps I've ever seen.. It's a
>euro-something keyboard with a US keymap and I'm having great fun in "hunt
>the key" mode..
This kind of thing is a serious problem in Europe. The trick appears to be:
select US keymap, and don't look down!
--
Bob Bishop (0118) 977 4017 international code +44 118
rb@gid.co.uk fax (0118) 989 4254 between 0800 and 1800 UK
From phk@critter.freebsd.dk Thu Sep 17 18:04:29 1998
To: Bob Bishop <rb@gid.co.uk>
cc: Peter Wemm <peter@netplex.com.au>, asami@FreeBSD.ORG (Satoshi Asami),
grog@lemis.com, cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 10:27:43 +0200
From: Poul-Henning Kamp <phk@critter.freebsd.dk>
In message <l03020902b226842b54d7@[194.32.164.2]>, Bob Bishop writes:
>At 1:56 pm +0800 17/9/98, Peter Wemm wrote:
>>[...]
>>Mind you, Greg has got the wierdest keycaps I've ever seen.. It's a
>>euro-something keyboard with a US keymap and I'm having great fun in "hunt
>>the key" mode..
>
>This kind of thing is a serious problem in Europe. The trick appears to be:
>select US keymap, and don't look down!
... with the worst case obviously being the "super-euro" keyboard olivetti
developed and delivered to the European Parliament: it had legends in at
least 8 or 10 colours, depending on your preferred keyboard layout.
"Don't look down" was very sound advice.
--
Poul-Henning Kamp FreeBSD coreteam member
phk@FreeBSD.ORG "Real hackers run -current on their laptop."
"ttyv0" -- What UNIX calls a $20K state-of-the-art, 3D, hi-res color terminal
From dag-erli@ifi.uio.no Thu Sep 17 19:19:58 1998
To: Bob Bishop <rb@gid.co.uk>
Cc: Peter Wemm <peter@netplex.com.au>, asami@FreeBSD.ORG (Satoshi Asami),
grog@lemis.com, cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
Organization: University of Oslo, Department of Informatics
Date: 17 Sep 1998 11:49:01 +0200
Bob Bishop <rb@gid.co.uk> writes:
> At 1:56 pm +0800 17/9/98, Peter Wemm wrote:
> > [...]
> > Mind you, Greg has got the wierdest keycaps I've ever seen.. It's a
> > euro-something keyboard with a US keymap and I'm having great fun in "hunt
> > the key" mode..
> This kind of thing is a serious problem in Europe. The trick appears to be:
> select US keymap, and don't look down!
Hmm... my favorite keyboard for programming is the Sun type 5c with US
layout. Pity they don't work on PCs (AFAIK), and that they're not so
common here in Norway... I had one at Geco-Prakla, but at Uni we only
have Norwegian layout keyboards.
DES
--
Dag-Erling Smørgrav - dag-erli@ifi.uio.no
To: Bob Bishop <rb@gid.co.uk>
cc: asami@FreeBSD.ORG (Satoshi Asami), grog@lemis.com,
cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
Date: Fri, 18 Sep 1998 09:27:13 +0800
From: Peter Wemm <peter@netplex.com.au>
Bob Bishop wrote:
> At 1:56 pm +0800 17/9/98, Peter Wemm wrote:
> >[...]
> >Mind you, Greg has got the wierdest keycaps I've ever seen.. It's a
> >euro-something keyboard with a US keymap and I'm having great fun in "hunt
> >the key" mode..
>
> This kind of thing is a serious problem in Europe. The trick appears to be:
> select US keymap, and don't look down!
Yes, I can do that, but being Gregs laptop, the keys have moved around a little too
so it really is a case of "hunt the key" :-) Some of what should be on the top row
is elsewhere..
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 11:17:16 +0930
From: Greg Lehey <grog@lemis.com>
To: Poul-Henning Kamp <phk@critter.freebsd.dk>, Bob Bishop <rb@gid.co.uk>
Cc: Peter Wemm <peter@netplex.com.au>, Satoshi Asami <asami@FreeBSD.ORG>,
cvs-committers@FreeBSD.ORG, cvs-all@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/lkm/vinum - Imported sources
On Thursday, 17 September 1998 at 10:27:43 +0200, Poul-Henning Kamp wrote:
> In message <l03020902b226842b54d7@[194.32.164.2]>, Bob Bishop writes:
>> At 1:56 pm +0800 17/9/98, Peter Wemm wrote:
>>> [...]
>>> Mind you, Greg has got the wierdest keycaps I've ever seen.. It's a
>>> euro-something keyboard with a US keymap and I'm having great fun in "hunt
>>> the key" mode..
>>
>> This kind of thing is a serious problem in Europe. The trick appears to be:
>> select US keymap, and don't look down!
>
> ... with the worst case obviously being the "super-euro" keyboard olivetti
> developed and delivered to the European Parliament: it had legends in at
> least 8 or 10 colours, depending on your preferred keyboard layout.
>
> "Don't look down" was very sound advice.
Yup, that's what I told him too. But it's unnerving the first time
you see it.
Greg
Last day of the conference, and I left early to head off to Victoria to visit the Yeardleys;
we were planning to do a deal with Chris Yeardley, and one of the components involved me
getting a new horse. I apparently blew the mind of one of the attendees by carrying a
saddle through the hallway: I had parked the car in the basement garage, and so I had
brought it to my room for safe keeping.
Once again I marvelled at the terrible Sydney traffic, but finally got out of town and as
far as Yass, where I stayed
the night—rather silly, since Warren Toomey, who lives
in Canberra, had invited me to visit
him, and it was only a few kilometres off my course.
On to Maryborough today,
where the Yeardleys have just moved in. Passed
by Gundagai, and where the dog sits on
the tucker box, 9 km from Gundagai (doesn't sound quite right), and also
through Bendigo.
At the Yeardleys, had another opportunity to install FreeBSD, but this one failed completely. I suspected something wrong with the disk
controller, but David was convinced it was the software.
Chris had two horses to choose from: Harry, a 2 year
old Saddlebred, and Darah, a 6 year
old Arab. I needed a horse to ride
now, so Harry was a non-starter, and Darah didn't look bad, so out with Chris to ride her.
She has a very nice, smooth canter, so I suppose I'll take her.
Back home after that—the Adelaide football team had won the AFL Grand Final
in Melbourne, and the traffic back to
Adelaide was terrible. Got stopped by a police car for doing 110 km/h in a 100 km/h
area—he went to the trouble to turn around, come back and stop me. I hadn't realised
how aggressive the Victoria police are. He made it fairly clear that he had picked on me
because I had a SA rego.
