Klaus Halfmann: HFS+

# HFS+ for the Linux Community

My name is Klaus Halfmann and you may find me in the #ppclinux irc channels with my nickname Hasi. In this text I tell you how and why I started contributing to the (power PC) Linux community. I currently develop userland tools to acces the second generation Apple &tm; File System HFS+.

## Small Curricumlum vitae

I have studied information science at the University of Kaiserslautern. Stimulated by a friend of mine I bought my first Apple Macintosh® an SE/30. After finishing my studies with a diploma I started working with MacAp, a C++ application framework supplied and founded by Apple. After working about 2 years, mostly doing medical applications I lost my job there and was caught by Stardivision in Hamburg. I was involved in the delivery of the Starwriter 3.0 and main development of StarOffice 4.0 for the Apple Macintosh. I still had the illusion of some quality in software development. Being not satisfied with my position and duties in Hamburg I went back to a loose friend of mine in Hochspeyer near Kaiserslautern, who became my boss. The first thing to do for me was porting a stock-charting and analyzing software from Object Pascal to C++ and PPC (MacApp again). Although I sucessfully managed to develop and deploy Version 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4 of the application the company as a whole went down and was bought by the german department of Programmers Paradise: ISP*D. I learned some lessons about programming, marketing and finances during that time, but perhaps I am still to truethfully for the current world of software engineering.

Dropping the whole Mac-busines we started developing a Web-Application using Microsoft Active Server Pages &tm; and Microsoft SQL Server &tm;. Doing so I learned much more about HTML, SQL and Windows NT &tm;. After bringing the Application to some sort of finish called Version 1.0, I started reengeneering the Application using Java Server Pages (JSP) and a 100% Java aproach, now supporting Oracle and DB2, too. Meanwhile the product including the developers was bought by a newly founded copany: Healy Hudson. I had been reading some good books about Software engeneering and felt myself as technical leader of the project. After doing so about 2 years I found that my ideas where not adopted by the management at all: central ideas and problems where not know at all. Marketing told customers almost lies about the product and no cut was made to release some (more or less) useable Version 2.x. Although working with my boss was a pleasure and the corporate climate was really fine, I can not deny that my boss was unable to communicate with the managers in Munic and was in fact unuseable as a project manager. (As a programmer and problem-solver he was and still is great, and he can talk you into everything he wants to). Frustrated I looked for a company nearby and made my way to Libra Software GmbH, Mannheim.

At that time I made my first experiences with Linux and PowerPC. Due to good Java Support I was able to port our application to Linux in less than three days, mostly concerend with case-sensitive file names. We had some external co-workers who all came with there personal notebooks. So I decided I would buy an iBook with ppc-linux and integrate it into the unavoideable Windows network using Samba. I did so at my old company and without much pain, at the new company. I usually travel about an hour by train to Mannheim. It came, that I dedicated most of this time to the linux community.

## Decision for Linux

At university I programmed my diploma works on Ultrix &tm; using C++ and all the unix tools, so I was not afraid of the linux commandline. I looked around what I could do for the linux community. The first thing I stumbled over was that the `nvsetenv` tool was broken for new world machines like my iBook. I took this as a starting point and reworked the tool to be suiteable for new and (using the existing code) old nvram. With a kernel modification from Benjamin Herrenschmidt my work was almost ok (Hollis Blanchard has fixed a BUG, though :)). You can currently download it at hollis pages. I always had a goal in mind: I would like to boot into MacOS and back to Linux more easily.

I looked around further for tools that where needed and I could do. Due to lack of acces to more hardware than my iBook, many things are out of range for me. The iBook (at that time) lacked support for graphics and sound, and I found that HFS+ was not supported by Linux at all. I tried a bit of kernel programming, but decided that this would need more expirience (and hardware perhaps). So I decided to provide HFS+ acces for the Linux community. My goal here was to ease the use of Linux for users of MacOS 8-9 (and maybe MacOSX, too, future will tell us)

Asking around I found the hfsplus tools, which where a good starting point for my work. (It seems they still work but are not supported anymore. Who knows what happend to rob@mars.org ?). After doing my first steps I was able to provide the first useable tools. Thanks to Suse I now have a CVS repository for my project and someone that helped me creating rpm-packages. You can obtain a current version from penguinppc.org. I hope I will be able to finalize this project in some way which may need about a year with the time I currently can spare.

## Motivation and Philosophy

I found a sort of new home in the ppclinux virtual community and want to thank the many people I met there. At my jobs much of the work I did and will do is not honored in a way I like it. And even more code and time was thrown away. Thinking about this, the approach of the Gnu Public License and the idea of open Software is much better: I can keep my, not my companies, copyright. The code is not lost when some boss of mine decides to do so. I would even like to do my normal work as open software but the German and international "software culture" is not ready for this step yet. (Well, my boss is not ready yet, too :))

In my - now ten years - of programming I found that very often the customers want a solution but a product is sold to them. Current software industry is far away from being a craftsmanship: You can not go to the software worker next door and ask for a solution. And, some days later, you get a well done product, manufactured using some reliable standards and verifiable by anybody who likes too. I hope the idea of open software will move us towards this direction. Meanwhile I try to keep my head up, not telling the customers lies about my products, but involve them into the creative process of software development.

I am still looking for a company that works like the ideals I stated above (and some other principles) I would like to adhere to. But I am realistically enough to see that I cannot stop the globe and turn it around as I like. So I leave that Job to God, the creator. Meanwhile I do what can be done to push things slowly in the direction I like them to be. Without hurting me and others to hard.

## A Joke from IRC

(Hasi was talking about the HFS+ B*-Trees) Maybe I confused the names, anyway:

    <NightDog> Oh no I fear the Bees in the trees
    <Hasi> Bees ?
    <NightDog> Yes in the B-Trees
    *Hasi* listens to the Bees on his HFS+ volume
    <Hasi> cat /dev/hda13 > /dev/snd
    <Hasi> Argh, no sound on iBook yet

                  |          __    khalfmann@libra.de
    +--------+    |   |\  | |  \
    | +----+ |    v   | \ | |__/   Klaus Halfmann
    | |... | |   .^.  |  \| |      Kirchstraße 24a
    | |..  | |  <   >      |       67691 Hochspeyer
    | +----+ |   'v'       |
    |_____==_|+==-------------==+  GERMANY
     |      | |   --__  __--    |
     +------+ +-------==--------+