50 ms·

John Carmack is reading and contributing to OpenBSD source code

744 points by hellschreiber 6y ago

TeaDude 6y ago
Oooh. Very interesting. I really hope he does write an article on the source. I'd read the hell out of it.
- cbsks 6y ago
  Does John Carmack have a blog somewhere? I did a quick search and couldn't find anything.
  - jimbob45 6y ago
    https://mobile.twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor https://mobile.twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoo... His Twitter is a pseudo-blog
  - samplatt 6y ago
    To expand on jimbob45 - his tweets aren't your usual "140 characters" style of affair :D
toisanji 6y ago
I thought he was working on AGI? Gave up already?
- bgorman 6y ago
  Maybe he is testing AGI by seeing if it can pass the turing test for writing device drivers.
- yAak 6y ago
  I don't feel like this precludes him from working on AGI -- and for him, it seems to be related: https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722526967&id=100006735798590 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722...
- rozgo 6y ago
  The road to AGI is paved with yak shavings.
  - solotronics 6y ago
    First I have to have a stable OS. Then I have to make kernel updates to support the kind of process management I want. Then I have to fix the other kernel bugs affecting my update. Then I have to modify the network drivers. Then I have to ... 5 years later what was I even working on in the first place?
    - Scarblac 6y ago
      To make AGI from scratch, first you have to create the universe.
      - dota_fanatic 6y ago
        Not the original source, but better? ;) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc
  - usefulcat 6y ago
    That's one of the funniest things I've read on HN.
  - type0 6y ago
    But first we need to breed the yaks
  - 0xdeadbeefbabe 6y ago
    And walls
- ywhjaknskkkw 6y ago
  Maybe he is, and that's not really Carmack ;)
- cameronfraser 6y ago
  Most people who actually work in AI know that AGI being possible is still an IF and IF it is possible, it is centuries or even further away (basically some indeterminate time frame because we don't even know if we're on the right path). The techniques we're using today are likely not going to be applicable to AGI. John Carmack is very smart, but I wouldn't place him on the same pedestal as any of our great historical polymaths and IMO if a single person is going to make any progress in AGI it's going to be someone like Leibniz or Euler.
  - jamesjyu 6y ago
    That's an interesting perspective: why do you believe that it will be an individual who will make a breakthrough, as opposed to a web of Carmack-like folks?
    - cameronfraser 6y ago
      I actually don't believe an individual will make a breakthrough, that was more of a if an individual did do it statement. IMO it's actually going to be the result of a lot of methodical work by an army of researchers over a really long period of time.
  - marvin 6y ago
    > IF it is possible, it is centuries or even further away Just out of curiosity, would you have been willing to bet that something most people will agree on being AGI will not be developed before 2221 at the earliest? Because given the history of science and technology since 1821, that seems like a statement that's just drawn out of thin air. "I don't know" would make sense. "Definitely not in the next 200 years" does not make much sense.
    - cameronfraser 6y ago
      Sorry, the time frame was arbitrary, I clarified in parens what I intended by that statement (an indeterminate amount of time)
  - 6y ago
- echelon 6y ago
  My dream is to do what Palmer Luckey did - build a successful computer graphics-based startup and then lure John Carmack to be CTO. I've got a snowball's chance in hell of being that successful, but I do envy the fact Palmer was able to hire him. What an incredible hire. Then again, he did have Facebook money. It's cool that he's got the autonomy to pursue AGI after guiding Oculus into a good position.
  - deltron3030 6y ago
    Oculus wouldn't have had that buzz without Carmack pushing the original Rift DIY kit before their Kickstarter. He was already commenting on Palmers DIY creations in the community where the ideas for Rift were born. It was more or less a community project, because without community input in those forum threads Palmer woulnd't even had considered glasses, he was deciding between VR glasses and a 3D monitor in his first posts there, and got nudged by a member towards glasses, lol. He just never stopped absorbing information and kept iterating on his franken HMDs and prototypes, and one day when he had already reached a good level Carmack showed up.
  - criddell 6y ago
    At this point in Carmack's career, I doubt money is a top three reason for why he takes on a project.
blakesterz 6y ago
If you're like me and can't remember names very well but thought "I know I've heard of him"... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Carmack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Carmack "He co-founded the video game company id Software and was the lead programmer of its games Commander Keen, Wolfenstein 3D, Doom and Quake and their sequels."
- weavie 6y ago
  I am terrible with names, but John Carmack is one of the few that I never forget.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- elyseum 6y ago
  Omg never knew he did Commander Keen too. CK2 probably was the first video game I played (as far as I can remember). Go go pogo sticks!
  - dEnigma 6y ago
    Commander Keen is also Doom Guy's father, at least according to Tom Hall (co-founder of id software) https://twitter.com/ThatTomHall/status/958352500431572992 https://twitter.com/ThatTomHall/status/958352500431572992
    - komali2 6y ago
      Being now 1/4th of the way through Doom Eternal I wonder how Canon that is. It seems Doomguy is the direct descendent of human-but-not warrior race? So BJ Blascowitz being human (maybe?) doesn't quite fit. They're doing such an awesome job expanding the Doom mythology that it'd be tight to watch them go back and explore Keen more, silly a game though it may have been.
      - raymond_goo 6y ago
        See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lii3m4ct_gI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lii3m4ct_gI And: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU0L4--Yh28 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU0L4--Yh28
Icedcool 6y ago
Cool and exciting. Carmack has a level of brilliance that I find astounding. Some of his youtube video's of him talking about graphic rendering and compression are really cool.
- Icedcool 6y ago
  For anyone interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUxcVzpeFqc&list=PL-wlZ9j-w5b8dLzm5-8cA2AXqzeCr3wav https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUxcVzpeFqc&list=PL-wlZ9j-w5...
  - unknown2374 6y ago
    Why does that link contain such a screwed up playlist? Clean link to a different playlist with just the lectures: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLfhkR8m8wYsgLEqr__PIWcrddcUvfEod https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLfhkR8m8wYsgLEqr__PI...
cbsks 6y ago
If OpenBSD knows what's good for them they will encourage him to read and contribute as much as possible! What I'd give for John Carmack to clean up my code...
- teknopurge 6y ago
  OpenBSD doesn't need their code cleaned-up. Theo is the Liam Gallagher of development mangers.
  - yfiapo 6y ago
    Ah, but there is so much value in fresh eyes. Miod, who has been involved with OpenBSD development for 20 years and has surely seen those function names a thousand times, provided the historical reason (they thought they might need to allocate memory) but agreed they never ended up using that. The fresh eyes don't have the history and are thus able to point things out that the older eyes inherently accept.
  - pnako 6y ago
    "He's the angriest man you'll ever meet. He's like a man with a fork in a world of soup." (Noel Gallagher, about his brother) I found the quote relevant ("a man with a fork")
    - teknopurge 6y ago
      This is accurate. You may end up getting stabbed with that fork however...
montebicyclelo 6y ago
lm terrlble wlth letters, l always use l lnstead of l
s_dev 6y ago
Is it possible Occulus has a big need for such an OS and this is the cause of the contributions? Or is this Carmack being a hobbyist and simply making contributions for its own sake?
- Lammy 6y ago
  I assumed his use of an armadilloaerospace address was a signal that it isn't work-related.
  - dgritsko 6y ago
    He's basically retired at this point and working on things he finds interesting (which was AGI as of a few months ago; there was a blog post where he went into more detail).
  - yellowapple 6y ago
    Or perhaps he's bringing Armadillo Aerospace back and wants to use OpenBSD for guidance and control?
- chongli 6y ago
  John Carmack stepped down as consulting CTO of Oculus in November 2019.
  - polishTar 6y ago
    Nit: In November, he stepped down as CTO. He still has a part part-time role at Oculus with the title of 'consulting CTO'
wmichelin 6y ago
Here is your daily reminder to read "Masters of Doom", a book about the early days at ID Software. It's an amazing look into a really cool time in gaming and software as a whole. It's a great book, mostly about John Carmack and the guys at ID! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_Doom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_Doom
- Trasmatta 6y ago
  I love that book so much. It makes me sad sometimes that I missed those days of programming in the 90's.
  - MacSystem 6y ago
    sounds quite fun, right? I also have this impression and kinda miss that
  - self_awareness 6y ago
    Well, you still can experience early days of conventional programming in 2020 until quantum programming takes over in 2040 ;)
  - epicide 6y ago
    I also often long for that magical feeling of everything being new and exciting again (to you). Like the computer was waiting for you to just press the right sequence of buttons... I obviously can't guarantee getting that feeling back in full, but I've been able to experience remnants of it by just poking around with completely unfamiliar tools/languages/servers/systems that have little to no use in business. Maybe even obsolete. Basically, look for anything that you wouldn't be tempted to turn into a job or use to make any real money. Just enjoy it for what it is. Write hacky code. Press all the wrong buttons. Make it do things it was never meant to do. Do stupid things with it just for the sake of doing stupid things. Have fun just for the sake of it being fun.
- Insanity 6y ago
  It's a great book, and they're also turning it into a series. :)
mikorym 6y ago
Is there any more context to OP's post? I guess someone just noticed in the mailing list, but it's not clear whether maybe John Carmark does this with all code everywhere in the universe. And then probably still has some interesting coffee break conversations... On a different note. I am something of a Ubuntu fan and try to be more involved there. But then again the xBSDs where x = {Free, Open, Net, ...} are one of those things that always prods the back of your mind. It's a bit like topics in mathematics that always catch my attention, only to be forsaken for more mundane tasks. Then again, mathematics is a bit like the art of making everything mundane.
- yfiapo 6y ago
  I don't see any additional context but this does appear to be a new thing. Two commits credited to Carmack in the OpenBSD source and they are dated 5/16/2020 and 5/17/2020.
  - philosopher1234 6y ago
    where are those commits? I didn't see anything credited to carmack on those dates. Must've missed them. Would be curious to see!
    - bitofhope 6y ago
      I found these two commits to the stc/sys/dev/ic/vga.c crediting Carmack https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.70&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup&sortby=date https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.70&con... https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.71&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup&sortby=date https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.71&con...
- deltron3030 6y ago
  >Is there any more context to OP's post? I guess someone just noticed in the mailing list, but it's not clear whether maybe John Carmark does this with all code everywhere in the universe. I remember a story about Carmack going off the grid with a laptop and OpenBSD for a couple of weeks, and him being delighted about their documentation and the ability to build things without access to the web. Carmack is a hero in the C community, and OpenBSD is also all about C and classic Unix, so he might just feel at home there.
ksec 6y ago
As someone who is not following closely, did he ever mention why he is looking into alternative OS? And why OpenBSD instead of say NetBSD or FreeBSD? I assume he has many experience with linux already.
- cptnapalm 6y ago
  While I can't say for sure, during a hole-up-for-a-week-to-learn a couple of years ago, he decided on neural networks and OpenBSD. He commented favorably on its opinionatedness. I'm suppose he liked the system and decided to contribute.
  - petee 6y ago
    I feel this quote of his sums up the initial draw: "Despite not having actually used it, I have always been fond of the idea of OpenBSD — a relatively minimal and opinionated system with a cohesive vision and an emphasis on quality and craftsmanship. Linux is a lot of things, but cohesive isn’t one of them."
- AndrewBissell 6y ago
  He wrote awhile back about why he chose OpenBSD to get more familiar with Unix during a coding retreat. tl;dr: the offline documentation and quality of the source code were major draws for him working with slow/no internet. https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722526967&id=100006735798590 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722...
  - ksec 6y ago
    I guess that is why I missed it. I deleted my Facebook. I dont understand why anyone make long post on Facebook and Linkedin instead of the good old blog post. But thanks for the link.
    - selykg 6y ago
      I didn't check the link, but keep in mind he worked for Oculus, which was acquired by Facebook. Not sure it was a requirement from Facebook, but was probably some choice around that.
yuribro 6y ago
This is such a positive and wholesome example - both the mail itself (getting to know the preferences of the project), the proposed fixes (naming functions in a better way, adding explanatory comments), and on the higher level - the humility in which it was done, and the time being invested by him for a project he isn't part of.
- jlengrand 6y ago
  My thoughts as well. Gentle suggestion, looking into other's suggestions first. Everything is there.
  - tachyonbeam 6y ago
    An interesting contrast from the Torvalds approach. I seriously think this is a huge part of why John Carmack is so popular. He's always kind to people, and very keen on sharing useful information.
    - droopyEyelids 6y ago
      What has Tovald’s approach been while familiarizing himself with contributing to someone else’s huge and respected codebase? Or are you just referring to his communication when defending his own codebase?
      - paloaltokid 6y ago
        Hey friend, please don't purposely misread the comment. It's clear that folks are contrasting two different styles of communication. Linus Torvalds can be plenty kind when he wants to be. And John Carmack has also done his time being a jerk. What people are saying is that the kind approach is their preferred default.
        john4532452 6y ago
        > And John Carmack has also done his time being a jerk. Citation Please.
yfiapo 6y ago
That's neat to see. This may not be a big story but as a fan of OpenBSD who doesn't currently have time to read the CVS log I appreciate it. OpenBSD source is one of the cleanest I've had the pleasure to work with. You (generally) won't be scoffed at for submitting a semantic change like this, fixing typos, or the like. It certainly isn't perfect but the bar feels higher than elsewhere. Clean code and as importantly the documentation kept in sync.
sgt101 6y ago
Also he's had a look at the Imperial COVID19 model that has attracted so much bile in the last week: https://twitter.com/id_aa_carmack/status/1254872368763277313?lang=en https://twitter.com/id_aa_carmack/status/1254872368763277313... I share his opinion on the code (though not his expertise!)
- renewiltord 6y ago
  I’ve always liked Carmack’s walking the walk. It’s common on Internet forums (like this one) to talk about how some code is shit or whatever. Carmack submits patches and sees them through. An ideal to aspire to. His Twitter is a great replacement for his planfiles. One of the few I follow.
- hedora 6y ago
  > I can’t vouch for the actual algorithms, but the software engineering seems fine. I also looked at the code a bit, and it seemed like typical bad natural sciences / electrical engineering grad student code that could have as easily been done the same way in matlab or python (or, as Carmak suggested, fortran). I guess I’m in good company in thinking it was ok-ish, so now I’ll ask. Why are people so upset with this code base / the choice of C++?
  - toyg 6y ago
    > why are people so upset Politics. “Anything that supports a position I don’t like, should be attacked with full force. Anything less than perfect must disqualify the entire position.”
  - sgt101 6y ago
    I think that there are two pathologies. The first is that alot of programmers have very specific and utterly unshakable views on what constitutes good or acceptable code. These are rooted in their experiences, but often have no foundation in terms of evidence or science (because there is very little good research on this). The second issue is politics; there are a lot of people who hate the idea that data science or science can provide inputs to policy decisions (in business and government). I see modern political groups as : - traditionalists : protecting what they have, policy aimed at preserving status quo - capitalists : untrammeled use of capital power to maximize capital return - idealists : interested in a higher causes/morality (as they see it) and unconcerned about other impacts or concerns - technocrats : concerned about taking the highest utility actions (measuring utility in various often unconnected ways). Capitalists have held the whip hand for 50 years, idealists (trade unionists, safety campaigners, ect) have been in full on retreat, traditionalists have managed to align with capitalists (by co-opting them with nice things like country estates). Technocrats have swayed in and out of influence; the crisis of 2009 really smashed up peoples faith in economists for example, the first gulf war really brought logistics and management science to the fore... but the war on terror has smashed this up now. Data scientists are mostly technocrats but often are compromised/partially capitalists (because... money). In every case that I have seen where capitalists are thwarted by data science they react with fury - because at the moment they are very unused to being thwarted. Recently though idealists have been grabbing more of the mic, and have a large contingent of data scientists of their own - ie. university scientists. This is why climate change modellers are so hated!
jasoneckert 6y ago
I have read many posts and articles by John Carmack, as well as viewed or attended many of his talks. In short, I have nothing but respect for him as a developer, thinker and human being in general. Consequently, if he's contributing to OpenBSD, that can only be a good thing in my opinion.
jeffreyrogers 6y ago
I thought it was funny that the first reply comes from someone whose email address was @id.au. (Pretty sure this is unrelated to Id Software but quite a coincidence!)
- pnako 6y ago
  Address for an individual, in Australia (e.g. john.smith@id.au)
Ericson2314 6y ago
Next time I got flak for gratuitous refactors, I'll point to this. From John to John, thanks.
- BrandonM 6y ago
  Take care to observe how John Carmack went about it, though. He described the issue from his perspective, gave a clear example, didn't blame anyone, and asked before making any changes at all. Someone replied suggesting that the refactoring be performed separately from other changes. It's hard to give flak to someone taking a measured approach like this.
  - Ericson2314 6y ago
    Indeed, it's not license to go for forgiveness rather than permission.
jquast 6y ago
My favorite developer contributing to my favorite operating system! This is like Christmas. I’ve been contributing $ to OpenBSD since 3.x release days, and reading John carmack’s “.plan” file since Doom 2, when they ran digital Unix! Did you know: you have John Carmack to thank for first porting X11 to OSX? Thank you John!!
- rvz 6y ago
  > My favorite developer contributing to my favorite operating system! This is like Christmas. What? Calm yourself man. No need to get too excited over the past.
- dylanz 6y ago
  I share your excitement! I've never contributed to OpenBSD but have been running and following the distro for ages. I have a few mugs and t-shirts and support when I can. I'm hoping this may bring some fans of his over to the distro who wouldn't have run into (or contributed to) it before.
  - jquast 6y ago
    I tried many source contributions to OPENBSD when I was in school, but only one was accepted—-to fix a “house purchase overflow bug” in the command-line monopoly game from the BSD games collection, lol :) I stopped hacking on it some years ago, but always contribute $$ when I’m well employed (currently not, sigh) I’ve yet to work at a $JOB with anyone else who wishes to use OpenBSD, even in the places it is most appropriate, my most recent employer had someone under qualified as the devops lead so we had to use pfSense, an endless source of frustration of issues that couldn’t be addressed, but that I knew exactly how to address with OpenBSD, but, such is life. The most experienced people seem to have the least control, a common complaint in all industries, I’m sure. I always encourage everyone to use many different Unix’s, it provides a much deeper understanding of everything you use, even if you end up only using Linux, anyway, it provides a much better perspective of what a distribution is and how to select the correct one even if you end up being forced into Linux anyway. But just like how I always end up using python and JavaScript and Ubuntu Linux everywhere —- unless you’re in charge, it’s much like school, the whole team has to succumb to the lowest common denominator, the lowest also often being the boss or lead, who does very little hands-on work but feels making decisions of which Linux and which Language to use is their best contributing factor, lol
williamscales 6y ago
http://archive.is/hNXNE http://archive.is/hNXNE
2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago
Is it him or is it a general AI that he created?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
MR4D 6y ago
Wow, the idea of Carmack as BDFL for BSD [0] is pretty cool. Or would that be BSDBDFL ? (BSD Benevolent Dictator For Life ) :)
- MR4D 6y ago
  That comment got downvoted??? I guess that either the BSD folks really like things the way they are or people really don't like Carmack. Weird to see it downvoted. Would love to know why.
HugoDaniel 6y ago
OpenBSD 6.7 is going to be released tomorrow https://www.openbsd.org/67.html https://www.openbsd.org/67.html Their release engineering is awesome!
- philsnow 6y ago
  Looks like there haven't been any new openbsd release songs since 6.2 :\ https://www.openbsd.org/lyrics.html https://www.openbsd.org/lyrics.html Some of these are pretty great.
  - ta17711771 6y ago
    Fuck, that's cool.
- LeoPanthera 6y ago
  This is the first release to install to UFS2 (which they confusingly call FFS2) by default.
gigatexal 6y ago
But what is he using OpenBSD for? That’s what is really interesting.
mrfusion 6y ago
What happened to his AGI work?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- bor100003 6y ago
  Yes, any results?
annoyingnoob 6y ago
Be cool and you will be cool.
WalterBright 6y ago
John Carmack is the person I'd most like to read a programming book authored by.
fit2rule 6y ago
If there is anyone that could successfully submit a patch containing only comment breadcrumbs, it'd be Mr. Carmack. I'd love to read it, personally.
boolcow 6y ago
John Carmack streaming his programming sessions would make me happier than almost anything else programming related.
- fwef64 6y ago
  Totally agree. He also seems like the type of person that would do this.
- mycall 6y ago
  Who knows, maybe he is @ https://www.twitch.tv/programming https://www.twitch.tv/programming
  - boolcow 6y ago
    That can't be him. Carmack doesn't have a ponytail (anymore). I do enjoy Jonathan Blow's live streams http://twitch.tv/naysayer88 http://twitch.tv/naysayer88 It would be amazing if lots of great programmers started streaming at least some of their work.
e12e 6y ago
It wasn't immediately obvious to me what this change actually was about (perhaps I scimmed the comments parts too quickly), but I found this reply somewhat illuminating: https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-tech&m=158978831318077&w=2 https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-tech&m=158978831318077&w=2
sn41 6y ago
This is really a great coincidence. I was talking to a friend of mine two days ago about code that we have read for pleasure. I said that the Doom source code was so surprising because the logic was so clean and elegant. One felt that the code did the most obvious thing to do, rather than using unnecessary cleverness. Even in this mail, John Carmack favors elegance.
zengid 6y ago
So I didn't understand what that syntax meant for the code John was talking about, so I figured I would share my findings for other C newbies like myself. (If I am incorrect, please tell me!) This: int (*alloc_attr)(void *c, int fg, int bg, int flags, long *attrp); means it's defining a function pointer that can point to a function that returns the type int and has a matching parameter list. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/840501/how-do-function-pointers-in-c-work https://stackoverflow.com/questions/840501/how-do-function-p...
nottorp 6y ago
So will Bethesda sue?
HeavyStorm 6y ago
I've never seen the use of idols, but I have to admit, John Carmack is mine. I'd give a leg to know the guy, and both to work with him.

744 points by hellschreiber 6y ago

TeaDude 6y ago

Oooh. Very interesting. I really hope he does write an article on the source. I'd read the hell out of it.

cbsks 6y ago
Does John Carmack have a blog somewhere? I did a quick search and couldn't find anything.
- jimbob45 6y ago
  https://mobile.twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor https://mobile.twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoo... His Twitter is a pseudo-blog
- samplatt 6y ago
  To expand on jimbob45 - his tweets aren't your usual "140 characters" style of affair :D

toisanji 6y ago

I thought he was working on AGI? Gave up already?

bgorman 6y ago
Maybe he is testing AGI by seeing if it can pass the turing test for writing device drivers.
yAak 6y ago
I don't feel like this precludes him from working on AGI -- and for him, it seems to be related: https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722526967&id=100006735798590 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722...
rozgo 6y ago
The road to AGI is paved with yak shavings.
- solotronics 6y ago
  First I have to have a stable OS. Then I have to make kernel updates to support the kind of process management I want. Then I have to fix the other kernel bugs affecting my update. Then I have to modify the network drivers. Then I have to ... 5 years later what was I even working on in the first place?
  - Scarblac 6y ago
    To make AGI from scratch, first you have to create the universe.
    - dota_fanatic 6y ago
      Not the original source, but better? ;) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc
- usefulcat 6y ago
  That's one of the funniest things I've read on HN.
- type0 6y ago
  But first we need to breed the yaks
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 6y ago
  And walls
ywhjaknskkkw 6y ago
Maybe he is, and that's not really Carmack ;)
cameronfraser 6y ago
Most people who actually work in AI know that AGI being possible is still an IF and IF it is possible, it is centuries or even further away (basically some indeterminate time frame because we don't even know if we're on the right path). The techniques we're using today are likely not going to be applicable to AGI. John Carmack is very smart, but I wouldn't place him on the same pedestal as any of our great historical polymaths and IMO if a single person is going to make any progress in AGI it's going to be someone like Leibniz or Euler.
- jamesjyu 6y ago
  That's an interesting perspective: why do you believe that it will be an individual who will make a breakthrough, as opposed to a web of Carmack-like folks?
  - cameronfraser 6y ago
    I actually don't believe an individual will make a breakthrough, that was more of a if an individual did do it statement. IMO it's actually going to be the result of a lot of methodical work by an army of researchers over a really long period of time.
- marvin 6y ago
  > IF it is possible, it is centuries or even further away Just out of curiosity, would you have been willing to bet that something most people will agree on being AGI will not be developed before 2221 at the earliest? Because given the history of science and technology since 1821, that seems like a statement that's just drawn out of thin air. "I don't know" would make sense. "Definitely not in the next 200 years" does not make much sense.
  - cameronfraser 6y ago
    Sorry, the time frame was arbitrary, I clarified in parens what I intended by that statement (an indeterminate amount of time)
- 6y ago
echelon 6y ago
My dream is to do what Palmer Luckey did - build a successful computer graphics-based startup and then lure John Carmack to be CTO. I've got a snowball's chance in hell of being that successful, but I do envy the fact Palmer was able to hire him. What an incredible hire. Then again, he did have Facebook money. It's cool that he's got the autonomy to pursue AGI after guiding Oculus into a good position.
- deltron3030 6y ago
  Oculus wouldn't have had that buzz without Carmack pushing the original Rift DIY kit before their Kickstarter. He was already commenting on Palmers DIY creations in the community where the ideas for Rift were born. It was more or less a community project, because without community input in those forum threads Palmer woulnd't even had considered glasses, he was deciding between VR glasses and a 3D monitor in his first posts there, and got nudged by a member towards glasses, lol. He just never stopped absorbing information and kept iterating on his franken HMDs and prototypes, and one day when he had already reached a good level Carmack showed up.
- criddell 6y ago
  At this point in Carmack's career, I doubt money is a top three reason for why he takes on a project.

blakesterz 6y ago

If you're like me and can't remember names very well but thought "I know I've heard of him"... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Carmack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Carmack "He co-founded the video game company id Software and was the lead programmer of its games Commander Keen, Wolfenstein 3D, Doom and Quake and their sequels."

weavie 6y ago
I am terrible with names, but John Carmack is one of the few that I never forget.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
elyseum 6y ago
Omg never knew he did Commander Keen too. CK2 probably was the first video game I played (as far as I can remember). Go go pogo sticks!
- dEnigma 6y ago
  Commander Keen is also Doom Guy's father, at least according to Tom Hall (co-founder of id software) https://twitter.com/ThatTomHall/status/958352500431572992 https://twitter.com/ThatTomHall/status/958352500431572992
  - komali2 6y ago
    Being now 1/4th of the way through Doom Eternal I wonder how Canon that is. It seems Doomguy is the direct descendent of human-but-not warrior race? So BJ Blascowitz being human (maybe?) doesn't quite fit. They're doing such an awesome job expanding the Doom mythology that it'd be tight to watch them go back and explore Keen more, silly a game though it may have been.
    - raymond_goo 6y ago
      See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lii3m4ct_gI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lii3m4ct_gI And: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU0L4--Yh28 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CU0L4--Yh28

Icedcool 6y ago

Cool and exciting. Carmack has a level of brilliance that I find astounding. Some of his youtube video's of him talking about graphic rendering and compression are really cool.

Icedcool 6y ago
For anyone interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUxcVzpeFqc&list=PL-wlZ9j-w5b8dLzm5-8cA2AXqzeCr3wav https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUxcVzpeFqc&list=PL-wlZ9j-w5...
- unknown2374 6y ago
  Why does that link contain such a screwed up playlist? Clean link to a different playlist with just the lectures: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLfhkR8m8wYsgLEqr__PIWcrddcUvfEod https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLfhkR8m8wYsgLEqr__PI...

cbsks 6y ago

If OpenBSD knows what's good for them they will encourage him to read and contribute as much as possible! What I'd give for John Carmack to clean up my code...

teknopurge 6y ago
OpenBSD doesn't need their code cleaned-up. Theo is the Liam Gallagher of development mangers.
- yfiapo 6y ago
  Ah, but there is so much value in fresh eyes. Miod, who has been involved with OpenBSD development for 20 years and has surely seen those function names a thousand times, provided the historical reason (they thought they might need to allocate memory) but agreed they never ended up using that. The fresh eyes don't have the history and are thus able to point things out that the older eyes inherently accept.
- pnako 6y ago
  "He's the angriest man you'll ever meet. He's like a man with a fork in a world of soup." (Noel Gallagher, about his brother) I found the quote relevant ("a man with a fork")
  - teknopurge 6y ago
    This is accurate. You may end up getting stabbed with that fork however...

montebicyclelo 6y ago

lm terrlble wlth letters, l always use l lnstead of l

s_dev 6y ago

Is it possible Occulus has a big need for such an OS and this is the cause of the contributions? Or is this Carmack being a hobbyist and simply making contributions for its own sake?

Lammy 6y ago
I assumed his use of an armadilloaerospace address was a signal that it isn't work-related.
- dgritsko 6y ago
  He's basically retired at this point and working on things he finds interesting (which was AGI as of a few months ago; there was a blog post where he went into more detail).
- yellowapple 6y ago
  Or perhaps he's bringing Armadillo Aerospace back and wants to use OpenBSD for guidance and control?
chongli 6y ago
John Carmack stepped down as consulting CTO of Oculus in November 2019.
- polishTar 6y ago
  Nit: In November, he stepped down as CTO. He still has a part part-time role at Oculus with the title of 'consulting CTO'

wmichelin 6y ago

Here is your daily reminder to read "Masters of Doom", a book about the early days at ID Software. It's an amazing look into a really cool time in gaming and software as a whole. It's a great book, mostly about John Carmack and the guys at ID! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_Doom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_Doom

Trasmatta 6y ago
I love that book so much. It makes me sad sometimes that I missed those days of programming in the 90's.
- MacSystem 6y ago
  sounds quite fun, right? I also have this impression and kinda miss that
- self_awareness 6y ago
  Well, you still can experience early days of conventional programming in 2020 until quantum programming takes over in 2040 ;)
- epicide 6y ago
  I also often long for that magical feeling of everything being new and exciting again (to you). Like the computer was waiting for you to just press the right sequence of buttons... I obviously can't guarantee getting that feeling back in full, but I've been able to experience remnants of it by just poking around with completely unfamiliar tools/languages/servers/systems that have little to no use in business. Maybe even obsolete. Basically, look for anything that you wouldn't be tempted to turn into a job or use to make any real money. Just enjoy it for what it is. Write hacky code. Press all the wrong buttons. Make it do things it was never meant to do. Do stupid things with it just for the sake of doing stupid things. Have fun just for the sake of it being fun.
Insanity 6y ago
It's a great book, and they're also turning it into a series. :)

mikorym 6y ago

Is there any more context to OP's post? I guess someone just noticed in the mailing list, but it's not clear whether maybe John Carmark does this with all code everywhere in the universe. And then probably still has some interesting coffee break conversations... On a different note. I am something of a Ubuntu fan and try to be more involved there. But then again the xBSDs where x = {Free, Open, Net, ...} are one of those things that always prods the back of your mind. It's a bit like topics in mathematics that always catch my attention, only to be forsaken for more mundane tasks. Then again, mathematics is a bit like the art of making everything mundane.

yfiapo 6y ago
I don't see any additional context but this does appear to be a new thing. Two commits credited to Carmack in the OpenBSD source and they are dated 5/16/2020 and 5/17/2020.
- philosopher1234 6y ago
  where are those commits? I didn't see anything credited to carmack on those dates. Must've missed them. Would be curious to see!
  - bitofhope 6y ago
    I found these two commits to the stc/sys/dev/ic/vga.c crediting Carmack https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.70&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup&sortby=date https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.70&con... https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.71&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup&sortby=date https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/src/sys/dev/ic/vga.c?rev=1.71&con...
deltron3030 6y ago
>Is there any more context to OP's post? I guess someone just noticed in the mailing list, but it's not clear whether maybe John Carmark does this with all code everywhere in the universe. I remember a story about Carmack going off the grid with a laptop and OpenBSD for a couple of weeks, and him being delighted about their documentation and the ability to build things without access to the web. Carmack is a hero in the C community, and OpenBSD is also all about C and classic Unix, so he might just feel at home there.

ksec 6y ago

As someone who is not following closely, did he ever mention why he is looking into alternative OS? And why OpenBSD instead of say NetBSD or FreeBSD? I assume he has many experience with linux already.

cptnapalm 6y ago
While I can't say for sure, during a hole-up-for-a-week-to-learn a couple of years ago, he decided on neural networks and OpenBSD. He commented favorably on its opinionatedness. I'm suppose he liked the system and decided to contribute.
- petee 6y ago
  I feel this quote of his sums up the initial draw: "Despite not having actually used it, I have always been fond of the idea of OpenBSD — a relatively minimal and opinionated system with a cohesive vision and an emphasis on quality and craftsmanship. Linux is a lot of things, but cohesive isn’t one of them."
AndrewBissell 6y ago
He wrote awhile back about why he chose OpenBSD to get more familiar with Unix during a coding retreat. tl;dr: the offline documentation and quality of the source code were major draws for him working with slow/no internet. https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722526967&id=100006735798590 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2110408722...
- ksec 6y ago
  I guess that is why I missed it. I deleted my Facebook. I dont understand why anyone make long post on Facebook and Linkedin instead of the good old blog post. But thanks for the link.
  - selykg 6y ago
    I didn't check the link, but keep in mind he worked for Oculus, which was acquired by Facebook. Not sure it was a requirement from Facebook, but was probably some choice around that.

yuribro 6y ago

This is such a positive and wholesome example - both the mail itself (getting to know the preferences of the project), the proposed fixes (naming functions in a better way, adding explanatory comments), and on the higher level - the humility in which it was done, and the time being invested by him for a project he isn't part of.

jlengrand 6y ago
My thoughts as well. Gentle suggestion, looking into other's suggestions first. Everything is there.
- tachyonbeam 6y ago
  An interesting contrast from the Torvalds approach. I seriously think this is a huge part of why John Carmack is so popular. He's always kind to people, and very keen on sharing useful information.
  - droopyEyelids 6y ago
    What has Tovald’s approach been while familiarizing himself with contributing to someone else’s huge and respected codebase? Or are you just referring to his communication when defending his own codebase?
    - paloaltokid 6y ago
      Hey friend, please don't purposely misread the comment. It's clear that folks are contrasting two different styles of communication. Linus Torvalds can be plenty kind when he wants to be. And John Carmack has also done his time being a jerk. What people are saying is that the kind approach is their preferred default.
      - john4532452 6y ago
        > And John Carmack has also done his time being a jerk. Citation Please.

yfiapo 6y ago

That's neat to see. This may not be a big story but as a fan of OpenBSD who doesn't currently have time to read the CVS log I appreciate it. OpenBSD source is one of the cleanest I've had the pleasure to work with. You (generally) won't be scoffed at for submitting a semantic change like this, fixing typos, or the like. It certainly isn't perfect but the bar feels higher than elsewhere. Clean code and as importantly the documentation kept in sync.

sgt101 6y ago

Also he's had a look at the Imperial COVID19 model that has attracted so much bile in the last week: https://twitter.com/id_aa_carmack/status/1254872368763277313?lang=en https://twitter.com/id_aa_carmack/status/1254872368763277313... I share his opinion on the code (though not his expertise!)

renewiltord 6y ago
I’ve always liked Carmack’s walking the walk. It’s common on Internet forums (like this one) to talk about how some code is shit or whatever. Carmack submits patches and sees them through. An ideal to aspire to. His Twitter is a great replacement for his planfiles. One of the few I follow.
hedora 6y ago
> I can’t vouch for the actual algorithms, but the software engineering seems fine. I also looked at the code a bit, and it seemed like typical bad natural sciences / electrical engineering grad student code that could have as easily been done the same way in matlab or python (or, as Carmak suggested, fortran). I guess I’m in good company in thinking it was ok-ish, so now I’ll ask. Why are people so upset with this code base / the choice of C++?
- toyg 6y ago
  > why are people so upset Politics. “Anything that supports a position I don’t like, should be attacked with full force. Anything less than perfect must disqualify the entire position.”
- sgt101 6y ago
  I think that there are two pathologies. The first is that alot of programmers have very specific and utterly unshakable views on what constitutes good or acceptable code. These are rooted in their experiences, but often have no foundation in terms of evidence or science (because there is very little good research on this). The second issue is politics; there are a lot of people who hate the idea that data science or science can provide inputs to policy decisions (in business and government). I see modern political groups as : - traditionalists : protecting what they have, policy aimed at preserving status quo - capitalists : untrammeled use of capital power to maximize capital return - idealists : interested in a higher causes/morality (as they see it) and unconcerned about other impacts or concerns - technocrats : concerned about taking the highest utility actions (measuring utility in various often unconnected ways). Capitalists have held the whip hand for 50 years, idealists (trade unionists, safety campaigners, ect) have been in full on retreat, traditionalists have managed to align with capitalists (by co-opting them with nice things like country estates). Technocrats have swayed in and out of influence; the crisis of 2009 really smashed up peoples faith in economists for example, the first gulf war really brought logistics and management science to the fore... but the war on terror has smashed this up now. Data scientists are mostly technocrats but often are compromised/partially capitalists (because... money). In every case that I have seen where capitalists are thwarted by data science they react with fury - because at the moment they are very unused to being thwarted. Recently though idealists have been grabbing more of the mic, and have a large contingent of data scientists of their own - ie. university scientists. This is why climate change modellers are so hated!

jasoneckert 6y ago

I have read many posts and articles by John Carmack, as well as viewed or attended many of his talks. In short, I have nothing but respect for him as a developer, thinker and human being in general. Consequently, if he's contributing to OpenBSD, that can only be a good thing in my opinion.

jeffreyrogers 6y ago

I thought it was funny that the first reply comes from someone whose email address was @id.au. (Pretty sure this is unrelated to Id Software but quite a coincidence!)

pnako 6y ago
Address for an individual, in Australia (e.g. john.smith@id.au)

Ericson2314 6y ago

Next time I got flak for gratuitous refactors, I'll point to this. From John to John, thanks.

BrandonM 6y ago
Take care to observe how John Carmack went about it, though. He described the issue from his perspective, gave a clear example, didn't blame anyone, and asked before making any changes at all. Someone replied suggesting that the refactoring be performed separately from other changes. It's hard to give flak to someone taking a measured approach like this.
- Ericson2314 6y ago
  Indeed, it's not license to go for forgiveness rather than permission.

jquast 6y ago

My favorite developer contributing to my favorite operating system! This is like Christmas. I’ve been contributing $ to OpenBSD since 3.x release days, and reading John carmack’s “.plan” file since Doom 2, when they ran digital Unix! Did you know: you have John Carmack to thank for first porting X11 to OSX? Thank you John!!

rvz 6y ago
> My favorite developer contributing to my favorite operating system! This is like Christmas. What? Calm yourself man. No need to get too excited over the past.
dylanz 6y ago
I share your excitement! I've never contributed to OpenBSD but have been running and following the distro for ages. I have a few mugs and t-shirts and support when I can. I'm hoping this may bring some fans of his over to the distro who wouldn't have run into (or contributed to) it before.
- jquast 6y ago
  I tried many source contributions to OPENBSD when I was in school, but only one was accepted—-to fix a “house purchase overflow bug” in the command-line monopoly game from the BSD games collection, lol :) I stopped hacking on it some years ago, but always contribute $$ when I’m well employed (currently not, sigh) I’ve yet to work at a $JOB with anyone else who wishes to use OpenBSD, even in the places it is most appropriate, my most recent employer had someone under qualified as the devops lead so we had to use pfSense, an endless source of frustration of issues that couldn’t be addressed, but that I knew exactly how to address with OpenBSD, but, such is life. The most experienced people seem to have the least control, a common complaint in all industries, I’m sure. I always encourage everyone to use many different Unix’s, it provides a much deeper understanding of everything you use, even if you end up only using Linux, anyway, it provides a much better perspective of what a distribution is and how to select the correct one even if you end up being forced into Linux anyway. But just like how I always end up using python and JavaScript and Ubuntu Linux everywhere —- unless you’re in charge, it’s much like school, the whole team has to succumb to the lowest common denominator, the lowest also often being the boss or lead, who does very little hands-on work but feels making decisions of which Linux and which Language to use is their best contributing factor, lol

williamscales 6y ago

http://archive.is/hNXNE http://archive.is/hNXNE

2OEH8eoCRo0 6y ago

Is it him or is it a general AI that he created?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

MR4D 6y ago

Wow, the idea of Carmack as BDFL for BSD [0] is pretty cool. Or would that be BSDBDFL ? (BSD Benevolent Dictator For Life ) :)

MR4D 6y ago
That comment got downvoted??? I guess that either the BSD folks really like things the way they are or people really don't like Carmack. Weird to see it downvoted. Would love to know why.

HugoDaniel 6y ago

OpenBSD 6.7 is going to be released tomorrow https://www.openbsd.org/67.html https://www.openbsd.org/67.html Their release engineering is awesome!

philsnow 6y ago
Looks like there haven't been any new openbsd release songs since 6.2 :\ https://www.openbsd.org/lyrics.html https://www.openbsd.org/lyrics.html Some of these are pretty great.
- ta17711771 6y ago
  Fuck, that's cool.
LeoPanthera 6y ago
This is the first release to install to UFS2 (which they confusingly call FFS2) by default.

gigatexal 6y ago

But what is he using OpenBSD for? That’s what is really interesting.

mrfusion 6y ago

What happened to his AGI work?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
bor100003 6y ago
Yes, any results?

annoyingnoob 6y ago

Be cool and you will be cool.

WalterBright 6y ago

John Carmack is the person I'd most like to read a programming book authored by.

fit2rule 6y ago

If there is anyone that could successfully submit a patch containing only comment breadcrumbs, it'd be Mr. Carmack. I'd love to read it, personally.

boolcow 6y ago

John Carmack streaming his programming sessions would make me happier than almost anything else programming related.

fwef64 6y ago
Totally agree. He also seems like the type of person that would do this.
mycall 6y ago
Who knows, maybe he is @ https://www.twitch.tv/programming https://www.twitch.tv/programming
- boolcow 6y ago
  That can't be him. Carmack doesn't have a ponytail (anymore). I do enjoy Jonathan Blow's live streams http://twitch.tv/naysayer88 http://twitch.tv/naysayer88 It would be amazing if lots of great programmers started streaming at least some of their work.

e12e 6y ago

It wasn't immediately obvious to me what this change actually was about (perhaps I scimmed the comments parts too quickly), but I found this reply somewhat illuminating: https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-tech&m=158978831318077&w=2 https://marc.info/?l=openbsd-tech&m=158978831318077&w=2

sn41 6y ago

This is really a great coincidence. I was talking to a friend of mine two days ago about code that we have read for pleasure. I said that the Doom source code was so surprising because the logic was so clean and elegant. One felt that the code did the most obvious thing to do, rather than using unnecessary cleverness. Even in this mail, John Carmack favors elegance.

zengid 6y ago

So I didn't understand what that syntax meant for the code John was talking about, so I figured I would share my findings for other C newbies like myself. (If I am incorrect, please tell me!) This: int (*alloc_attr)(void *c, int fg, int bg, int flags, long *attrp); means it's defining a function pointer that can point to a function that returns the type int and has a matching parameter list. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/840501/how-do-function-pointers-in-c-work https://stackoverflow.com/questions/840501/how-do-function-p...

nottorp 6y ago

So will Bethesda sue?

HeavyStorm 6y ago

I've never seen the use of idols, but I have to admit, John Carmack is mine. I'd give a leg to know the guy, and both to work with him.