Re: I think I want to help

[Alfred M. Szmidt]

   How do I help to make GNU/Hurd reached 1.0 release ASAP? (I know, a
   little bit of over-optimism ;-))

Depends with what you mean "GNU/Hurd 1.0".  Do you mean a release of
the GNU system?  A release of the Debian GNU/Hurd port?

If you wish to help and make a release of the Debian GNU/Hurd port,
then fixing bugs that are related to the Hurd is a good start.  You
could also become a Debian Developr and help out with Debian in
general.  See www.debian.org for all the details.

For the GNU system just subscribing to gnu-system-discuss@gnu.org is a
good start, and reading the mailing list archives (they are spam
free!).

   I can get some scattered info that we are trying to use OSKIT-Mach
   now (are we? howcome no debs for oskit-mach?), heading towards L4
   microkernel.

Well, truth to be told it seems that we are abandong GNU Mach 2.x (aka
OSKIT-Mach) since it is a pitta to add/update drivers to.  Most people
use GNU Mach 1.x to my knowledge.

   Some essential info I can get also about a need of pthread, a real
   filesystem (ext2/ext3?), and porting lots of applications.

The Hurd already supports ext2.  It has some support for pthreads.
And most programs will not need any porting unless they use funky
features.

   Being unable to access anon-CVS from office (or other net access
   beside http and ftp), I don't know where I can get things working
   much further then what I have now (gnumach and hurd from debian).

You can get the CVS version of the Hurd (and some others stuff) from:

http://www.update.uu.se/~ams/gnu/cvs/

And I think Savannah just started making daily CVS tarballs...

   What can this poor guy do to help in GNU/Hurd development?

By starting to fix things that you consider broken, and missing.  That
is usually the place where one starts helping.

   Can anyone post updated TODO/tasks list?

The TODO list is actually not that outdated. :)


Happy hacking.