Bits from the Debian GNU/Hurd porters

Hello,

it has been more than three years since the last "Bits from the Debian
GNU/Hurd porters"[1], high time for an update on the port.

 * Snapshot releases

Three new snapshot releases have been done by Philip Charles, K14, K15
(which was only done as an updated mini CD-ISO, not a full snapshot),
and K16.  K16 has been released[2] on December 18th, 2007 featuring four
CDs or two DVDs.  Additionally, it also features a ready-to-go
qemu-image[3] for the first time.  K16 was also the first snapshot which
included TLS (Thread Local Storage), a requirement for modern glibcs.
New ported packages include Qt3, Qt4, SDL and Emacs22.

 * Base and toolchain status

Currently, most base packages are current, with the notable exception of
util-linux, which has been a big problem over the last years.  However,
Samuel Thibault got all outstanding issues of util-linux applied
upstream so the version in experimental is mostly working.  The
toolchain is in pretty good shape as well since TLS support got
implemented; we are using the current glibc, binutils and gcc Debian
packages unmodified.

 * Xen support

Besides qemu, which can be very slow to run, a Xen DomU port for GNU
Mach has been made available by Samuel Thibault.  It requires a non-PAE