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Hans Reiser Arrested On Suspicion of Murder
Posted by
kdawson
on Tue Oct 10, 2006 09:53 PM
from the sad-day dept.
from the sad-day dept.
Many readers wrote about the arrest today of Hans Reiser, author of ReiserFS, by Oakland, CA police on suspicion of murdering his estranged wife. From the San Francisco Chronicle: "Hans Reiser, 42, was taken into custody at 11 a.m., hours after Oakland police and FBI technicians searched his home in the Oakland hills. His estranged wife, Nina Reiser, 31, has been missing since Sept. 3, when she dropped off the couple's son and daughter at his home on the 6900 block of Exeter Drive... Police made the arrest based on circumstantial evidence and have not found Nina Reiser's body, [Hans Reiser's attorney] Du Bois said. 'I have no idea what the circumstantial evidence is,' he said. 'When I hear what the evidence is against him, I'll make a decision as to whether he'll talk to them.'" kimvette writes, "While the disappearance (and possible murder) of his wife is tragic, Linux users will wonder where this will leave Reiser 4. If Reiser is found guilty, will Novell or IBM pick up the pieces and finish up Reiser 4 for inclusion in the kernel or is this the end of the Reiser filesystem project? Will there be any future for the Reiser filesystem, and if Hans is found guilty and the project is continued, will the project be renamed to avoid notoriety?"
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Hardware: The Future of ReiserFS 459 comments
lisah writes "With the announcement of Hans Reiser's arrest this week, many people have been wondering what this will mean for his company, Namesys, and the future of his filesystem work. According to a report at Linux.com, employees at Namesys are circling their wagons and plan to continue working on the project 'in the short term.' One employee admits, 'we are rather shaken and stressed at the moment, although I cannot say we didn't see it coming.'"
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Linux: Novell Moves Away From ReiserFS 404 comments
VSquared56 writes, "Novell announced a shift in the default filesystem from ReiserFS to ext3 for users of its SuSE Enterprise Linux. This news comes shortly after Hans Reiser's arrest, though Novell says the decision was being considered long before. Though Novell will continue supporting ReiserFS 3, it claims ext3 is more stable and will 'soon' match performance with the newer ReiserFS 4. What implications will this have for SuSE users, and ReiserFS's future as a whole?"
[+]
Hans Reiser in Court Today 496 comments
An anonymous reader writes "Hans Reiser has pled not guilty to murdering his wife and invoked his right to a speedy trial. He will attend a hearing today where the judge will decide if the state has a case " We had covered this story back when it had first broke; and for those of you playing catch-up, Hans is the author of ReiserFS.
[+]
News: Hans Reiser to Sell Company 583 comments
DVega writes "Due to increasing legal costs, murder suspect Hans Reiser is seeking to sell his company. His lawyer William DuBois said he is running out of money to pay for his defense. DuBois added, 'This is a unique opportunity for someone to buy the company for pennies on the dollar. We welcome all vultures.' This is a good opportunity to own a filesystem and rename it after your own."
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That really sucks (Score:5, Funny)
Unbelievable (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Unbelievable (Score:5, Insightful)
But honestly, how many people would think that even if it wasn't posted on the front page?
Parent
Re:Unbelievable (Score:5, Insightful)
Probably a lot of people. But, what's wrong with that? It's natural for people to think of how an event will affect them.
Parent
Re:Unbelievable (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Unbelievable (Score:5, Interesting)
I mean, besides being crass, it's also obvious -- so why point it out? Sure, we all naturally wonder what might happen to the software, but is it worth actually discussing?
Parent
especially since that's the only reason it's here (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
it's like ... the opposite of trust (Score:5, Funny)
I know, Microsoft have paid the police to do this, to discredit a Linux FS?
Totally, dude. Like, this one time, Micro$uxx paid this chick to be this like hardcore open-source dude's girlfriend, and like, she made him chili with peanuts in it, which he like would like totally have died if he ate it? Way of the world, man *massssssivvvee toooooke* way of the fuckin' world.
Parent
You ain't seen tacky yet... (Score:5, Funny)
There. How's that for tasteless?
Parent
This brings up an interesting line of questioning (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This brings up an interesting line of questioni (Score:5, Informative)
In the case of ReiserFS, the code doesn't get into the mainline kernel without it being reviewed by enough people that there is some hope of maintainability in the absence of one key person.
The problem comes in when no one else wants to maintain a piece of code, but then that's why people pay Red Hat or SuSE cash for their otherwise freely distributable distributions.
Parent
Re:This brings up an interesting line of questioni (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re:This brings up an interesting line of questioni (Score:5, Insightful)
Compared to a closed source project that relies so heavily on a single person, the open source project is a much safer bet.
Are concerns like this valid or is the community able to pick up where someone left off with minimal interruption to clients?
You should very much take those considerations into account. With open source, you have two advantages compared to the same project when it's closed: (1) you know who the project relies on, and (2) it is clear under what conditions the project can be continued.
Parent
Re:This brings up an interesting line of questioni (Score:5, Interesting)
A coworker of mine uses an indicator he calls the "bus factor" to determine the likelihood of discontinued support for a particular tool or library.
The "bus factor" is simply defined as "the number of people who have to be hit by a bus before the fundamental understanding of the underlying codebase is lost."
Parent
Jason Haas and linux powerpc-slashdot temperment (Score:5, Interesting)
http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/03/24
Interesting to note the different temperment of slashdot articles 6 years ago. No jokes..
Parent
Can we get some more speculation? (Score:5, Funny)
-b
i hope she is alright (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:i hope she is alright (Score:5, Insightful)
I know that sounds cold, but unless you personally know the Reisiers, I don't think anyone really does. There are hundreds of people murdered each day. There are hundreds killed in tragic car accidents each day. Do you feel pity for each and every one of them? No.
The only reason why this is on Slashdot is because of the ReiserFS. And because of that, it would be silly to not speculate on the ReiserFS future. Unless you just want 250 posts of people saying "Oh, that's terrible!"
Posted as anon for obvious reasons..
Parent
Reiser4 already renamed (Score:5, Funny)
Okay, so I'm not a good person.
Re:Reiser4 already renamed (Score:5, Funny)
Hans kept a journal.
(Sorry everybody...)
Parent
Just remember! (Score:5, Insightful)
Really!
Well, that's what they tell us, anyway.
Special website (Score:5, Informative)
This isn't meant to be funny or insensitive (Score:5, Interesting)
Godwin's Law (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:So if he's guilty (Score:5, Funny)
Parent