Programming Environment
We use entirely open source software for the programming and running of
FreeBMD. Here is a (possibly not comprehensive list).
- FreeBSD
- The operating system for all our servers.
- Apache
- The webserver.
- mod_backhand
- Load balancing for the server cluster.
- Wackamole
- Cluster failover management.
- MySQL
- The database.
- Perl
- Used for all the CGI and supporting scripts. Although we quite like C++, we
chose to use Perl instead as it is much easier for volunteers to get to grips
with and is a very powerful tool for mangling data around (which we obviously
do a good deal of). If volunteers want to use a different language, that's OK
with us, so long as we can run it, of course.
- Various CPAN modules
- CPAN has many useful Perl modules. We use some of them.
- CVS
- The version control system we use for all the source code and web pages.
Anyone wanting to help really must use this. A zipped file containing the correct versions of CVS and SSH to run on Windows for use on the project can be
downloaded here (cvs_ssh.zip), and there is also a page of instructions on how to
install and run them.
- SSH
- Used for all remote access. We don't like telnet. It's dangerous.
If you reckon you can do useful stuff in the environment outlined above,
and want to help, drop Ben a line.
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