Sure enough, as promised two weeks after filling my new composter I was able to use the contents on my garden. Granted, it was not 100% composted yet, but it was far enough along to make for some excellent mulch which I've used in my soybean patch. As I understand it, this should provide them with a good supply of humic acid for quite some time.

We quickly refilled the composter with grass we'd dug up to plant the soybeans, newspapers, paper bags, and a 5 gallon bucket full of the past two weeks kitchen scraps (including pumpkin innards). The latter was slightly smelly, but nice to know in a few weeks it'll come out a dark humus that is actually pleasant to the senses.

I happily set up my new "Urban Compost Tumbler" today... Quite simple, looks like a backyard creation. Just a black 50(ish) gallon pickle bin, a metal rod, and a stand. I filled it up with newspapers and paper bags (it says it can be half full of those!), last week's lawn clippings, sweet potatoe greens, and various remnants of the past couple weeks dinners. I'm eager to see what comes out the other side in a few weeks...

Okay, I've broken down and decided to learn Cascading Style Sheets. I'm planning on a major site over-haul soon, and that does seem like the way to go. I just ordered two books on the subject.

Wish me luck... ;)

As discussed earlier [story], I've enabled banner and text advertisement functionality on KernelTrap. Currently there's just a handful of KernelTrap text ads to get a taste of the new functionality. Now is an excellent time to make suggestions and recommendations if there's anything about how it's done that you don't like. I'm learning as I go, so I welcome all feedback.

If you're interested in advertising on KernelTrap, read more about it here. The pricing is intended to be affordable, especially when you purchase in monthly increments. Prices are of course subject to change.

Our new server is officially online and serving traffic. Kind thanks to Danube Technologies for donating the colocation services. And thanks again to all the KernelTrap readers that have donated more than $700 to help pay for our new server. For more information on the new server, please refer to the recently updated KernelTrap FAQ (consider it a work in progress). First question -- does it feel faster?

Until your DNS updates (for most, within twenty four hours), you'll be seeing http://216.218.244.58/ in your browser instead of http://kerneltrap.org/. If this causes you any problems, you can add '216.218.244.58 kerneltrap.org' to your hosts file as a temporary solution.

The migration to Drupal 4.2 is going well, though there's still more to be done. To begin your tour of the new functionality, please visit our new discussion forums: Linux forum (linux.kerneltrap.org), FreeBSD forum (freebsd.kerneltrap.org), OpenBSD forum (openbsd.kerneltrap.org), and more. Or, if you have a user account, test out our new chatbox. Leave comments here or in the forums, and please cast a vote. As additional functionality is enabled, I'll make note of it here.

I've been busy the past couple of months (photos linked within), but I'm home again for the duration. I hope to get back to updating KernelTrap within a week or so. For now, however, I'm focused on getting the new server up and running with the latest software. That's a thrill in itself -- compiling source code feels blazingly fast compared to this old desktop server I use!

If all goes as planned, I hope to have the new site up and running on the new server by the end of next week. New additions will include organized discussion forums, configurable comment moderation, an automatic term glossary, a chat room, and a (hopefully) more intuitive book-like organization to compliment the current Slashdot-style front page. Once things settle down, I'll head out looking for another round of kernel developer interviews...

My recent trip lasted longer than expected, and I will be returning to the Middle East again this weekend, hence for another month I will be unable to update KernelTrap.

Please feel free to submit original content yourself. Details on this process can found here in the FAQ. With a free KernelTrap user account, you'll also be able to go here to vote on whether or not these submitted stories get posted.

KernelTrap is in the midst of a migration and server upgrade. Unfortunately, at the same time that this is happening, I'm leaving on a business trip for most of June, so in the interim the site will be hosted on a relatively slow DSL connection, and infrequently updated. Upon my return, it will ultimately be moved to a faster, dedicated server, collocated in Seattle by Danube Technologies.

First, regarding the old server, many thanks to Michael Bischoff who kindly donated the 100 Mbit connection and webserver that KernelTrap has been running on for over a year. Unfortunately this is no longer possible, hence the current migration.

Thanks to the many user donations [story] (currently totaling $576.18), a new server is on its way. The old server was a shared 300 Mhz Pentium II. The new server is a dedicated 2.66 Ghz Pentium 4 (the selected configuration weighing in at $1,172.30). Needless to say, the difference in performance when KernelTrap is up and running on the new server will be quite noticeable.

Having friends visiting I've not found much time these days to follow mailing lists and update KernelTrap... Now I'm headed out of town for a week, so I'll not be likely to post any new stories before next Wednesday, April 23'rd.

Submissions are always welcome, though please be sure to include original content. Details on how to submit stories and what we're looking for can be found here in the FAQ.

There have been a number of banners submitted in our recent contest [story], though no themes. You can view all submissions and vote on them here, so please take a look and cast your vote (registered users can vote up to five times, whereas anonymous users are only able to vote once).

If you have a banner that you forgot to submit, go ahead and send it now.

A final selection will be made toward the end of the month. Whether or not we change to a new default banner/logo will depend on the feedback I get, so leave your comments...

We'll be upgrading the server running KernelTrap shortly, thanks to the many donations received so far [story]. To date, 21 people have donated a total of $370.90 (after PayPal's fees). My intention is to order the new server this weekend, having it up and running handling live traffic by the end of March. Bandwidth for the new server is being donated by Danube Technologies.

On the new server, I'll be upgrading to the latest release of Drupal, which will most notably add comment moderation and discussion forums to the site. Additionally, there will be numerous performance optimizations taking place behind the scenes to better handle heavy loads.

With this upgrade, I would also like to introduce a new KernelTrap logo and theme. Unfortunately, my artistic skills are limited to stick figures and vague scribbles, my web layout skills not much better. Instead, I'm opening up the new logo and theme design to KernelTrap readers. If interested, read on for full details.

I've started looking into buying a new server for KernelTrap, hoping to make the purchase within the next month. I'm currently planning on building a simple 1.2GHz PIII, in total running less than $750. Very affordable, though I'm also considering something a little more powerful. The requirements: 2 NICs, redundant disk drives, 1U. Danube Technologies has kindly offered to host the server for free, an offer I have gratefully accepted.

If you wish to help out in this effort, donations are certainly welcome. However, don't worry if you aren't in a position to make a donation, the upgrade is going to happen no matter what. In any case, a handful of people have suggested that they'd make donations if the option was available, and any little bit helps. 100% of the money I receive will go towards purchasing the new KernelTrap server. (On the off chance more money is donated than is needed, the extra money will go towards soliciting original articles for KernelTrap, such as is done by any magazine [story]. But I'm getting ahead of myself...)

It looks like I'll not be updating this site for the rest of the year. I'm taking some holiday time away from work and my computer both, off playing in the Florida winter sun with friends. Fortunately there's a handful of other admins out there that are able to update the site and promote stories to the front page, so hopefully new stories will continue to appear.

In any case, there's a lot planned for KernelTrap next year... If interested, read on.

Murphy's Law came through again... Shortly after I lost internet access (a temporary state) the server hosting KernelTrap suffered a hardware failure. Fortunately with a little creative shuffling the site is back up again, restored from a backup...

And so, once again I'm searching for a new home for the KernelTrap web pages. Anyone who's in a position to make me an offer I can't refuse, drop me an email here: jeremy@kerneltrap.org I've begun exploring the options...

It's going to be difficult for me to post news to KernelTrap for a while. Likely for the next few weeks my postings will be quite infrequent. After that time, I do intend to resume maintaining the site as per normal.

Of course, stories can be submitted by anyone as always, and then users will be able to vote as to whether or not the story should be posted. Submissions are welcome and encouraged...