Michael McCabe

Clarkson Open Source Institute

Spring 2004 Summary

In the beginning of this semester I used an RPM Build system to roll security fixes for the RHEL Taroon Beta Installations that are currently in use on the Z Server. While doing this I also investigated the uses of cross compilers and using them to build rpms.

There is now a small system located on the Z Server that runs a webserver.  It hosts a small static page that describes what the Z Server is currently being used for.  The page is available here.

I've accomplished several things with my work in COSI during this past semester.  I've become an official Gentoo Developer (A copy of my official Introduction is available here) and I am currently working on completing the port to the s390 architecture.  The port is nearing completion and we currently have three things holding us back from a release

• A kernel that compiles without extra patches for s390
• An updated profile that includes libtool
• A lack of a complete installation guide

These things will be fixed shortly after I'm done with my final exams.  My duties as a developer also involve testing applications to make sure that they compile and run correctly on the s390 architecture and then marking them as stable on the s390 in the portage tree. In addition to that I'm also responsible for making sure all of the s390 related bugs get fixed as quickly as possible.

Some of the documentation that I've created for COSI this semester included the following things. I've also started work on the Gentoo Installation guide for the s390.

• 2.6 Kernel for the s390
• c3270 Usage
• Using RPM with a Cross Compiler
• Installing a Cross Compiler
• RHEL Beta s390 Installation Documentation
• Creating and Editing Parm Files
• SSH Setup
• Using the Yum repository at mirror.clarkson.edu
• Using a USB Palm Pilot and Fedora Core 1