Jim's Ramblings

Apache HTTP Server 2.3.8-alpha

Today, I (as Release Manager for the project) released the latest, and what is expected to be the last, alpha version of the NextGen release of Apache httpd.

This is pretty exciting news because for now on we'll be focusing on pushing out beta releases in anticipation of a quick trip to 2.4.0-GA.

Certainly, Apache httpd 2.4.0 has been a long time coming, but it will be well worth the wait. The new features, especially related to MPMS, Authn/Authz and the Proxy module, will continue to be the reference standards for web servers. I'm really excited by all the mod_proxy improvements because that's an area which I, and others, have been giving special attention to. You combine that with the various async changes, the Event and (for the time-being still experimental) Simple MPMs and you have a killer server.

So download and try it out and give us your feedback.

Cheers!

So what's next...

Yes, the rumors are true. As anyone who follows me on twitter knows following my tweet, I will be leaving VMware.

The experience has been incredible, and being with VMware was the end of a journey started about 10 years ago when I first joined Covalent. Following some "interesting" events within that company, Covalent emerged as a premier FOSS-related business and as CTO I was able to continue working with Mark and Ryan to grow the company. We were so successful that SpringSource took notice of our products, or business plan and our customer base and decided they wanted in, and so they bought the company. At SpringSource I was, in addition to other tasks, the tech lead and developer for a project that became one of the most significant (if not the most significant) products for the company. And after around 2 years, SpringSource was so successful that VMware took notice and bought us.

Now after a year, it is time to move on.

I'm ready for new challenges and new opportunities. I'm looking for a place that can benefit from my talents, experience and expertise as much as Covalent/SpringSource/VMware has.

I'm ready to make a difference and an impact... Know of any places that might be interested? Let me know.

Thanks.

ASF Voting System Rocks

The ASF uses an ssh-based voting tool, mostly developed by Roy, to handle the new member and new director voting process. New members are elected in using a simple yes/no/abstain whereas directors are voted in using the STV system. The tool is great, but it had the requirement of actually having to ssh into a specific machine to cast your votes.

Well, after some discussions on the members mailing list, our illustrious SysAdmin Joe (with some patches from others) created this exceptional GUI front-end for the tool, which makes casting votes even easier. Hopefully, with this front-end, the voter tool will be used for a bunch of other things...

As far as setting up the voter tool, well, I just use a bunch of scripts I hacked together years ago... Not fully automated, but good enough.

Side project Telaen

In addition to the stuff I do for $WORK and the ASF, there are also some coding side-projects that I like spending some time (and my limited talents) on. One of these is a PHP-based webmail system called Telaen. It started off when I wanted a nice webmail system to use with jaguNET and found Uebimiau. But the code in Uebimiau was a mess and seemed to be abandon-ware, so I hacked away at it and provided the so-called jimjag patches which many users found useful. After awhile though, it just seemed better to fork it and so a few of us created Telaen.

Anyway, as it always is when you do stuff on the side, Real Life has this nasty habit of intervening, causing development on Telaen to slow down. Well, I've since rebooted the project (who needs sleep??) and have a beta of the latest version (Telaen 1.3.0) available... Check it out.