blog/tags/english/index.html

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  13  <h1>
  14      <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/">Petter Reinholdtsen</a>
  15
  16  </h1>
  17
  18 </div>
  19
  20
  21     <h3>Entries tagged "english".</h3>
  22
  23     <div class="entry">
  24       <div class="title">
  25         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Tor___from_its_creators_mouth_11_years_ago.html">Tor - from its creators mouth 11 years ago</a>
  26       </div>
  27       <div class="date">
  28         28th May 2016
  29       </div>
  30       <div class="body">
  31         <p>A little more than 11 years ago, one of the creators of Tor, and
  32 the current President of the Tor project, Roger Dingledine, gave a
  33 talk for the members of the Norwegian Unix User group (NUUG).  A video
  34 of the talk was recorded, and today I finally was able to publish the
  35 video of the talk on Frikanalen, the Norwegian open channel TV station
  36 where NUUG currently publishes its talks.  You can
  37 <a href="http://frikanalen.no/se">watch the live stream using a web
  38 browser</a> with WebM support, or check out the recording on the video
  39 on demand page for the talk
  40 "<a href="http://beta.frikanalen.no/video/625599">Tor: Anonymous
  41 communication for the US Department of Defense...and you.</a>".</p>
  42
  43 <p>Here is the video included for those of you using browsers with
  44 HTML video and Ogg Theora support:</p>
  45
  46 <p><video width="70%" poster="http://simula.gunkies.org/media/625599/large_thumb/20050421-tor-frikanalen.jpg" controls>
  47   <source src="http://simula.gunkies.org/media/625599/theora/20050421-tor-frikanalen.ogv" type="video/ogg"/>
  48     <h1>Browser does not support HTML5 video</h1>
  49     Please use Chrome, Opera, Firefox or any other browser which
  50     supports Ogg Theora.
  51 </video></p>
  52
  53 <p>I guess the gist of the talk can be summarized quite simply: If you
  54 want to help the military in USA (and everyone else), use Tor. :)</p>
  55
  56       </div>
  57       <div class="tags">
  58
  59
  60         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
  61
  62
  63       </div>
  64     </div>
  65     <div class="padding"></div>
  66
  67     <div class="entry">
  68       <div class="title">
  69         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram_with_PackageKit_support___new_version_0_23_available_in_Debian_unstable.html">Isenkram with PackageKit support - new version 0.23 available in Debian unstable</a>
  70       </div>
  71       <div class="date">
  72         25th May 2016
  73       </div>
  74       <div class="body">
  75         <p><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">The isenkram
  76 system</a> is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware
  77 related packages.  The idea is to have a database of mappings between
  78 hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to
  79 install the packages to use a given hardware dongle.  Some use cases
  80 are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software
  81 needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it
  82 proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader;
  83 and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to
  84 install the driver for it.  The system work well, and even have a few
  85 command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the
  86 hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).</p>
  87
  88 <p>The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found
  89 good documentation and example code on how to use it.  But aptdaemon
  90 is going away and is generally being replaced by
  91 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/">PackageKit</a>,
  92 so Isenkram needed a rewrite.  And today, thanks to the great patch
  93 from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the
  94 rewrite finally took place.  I've just uploaded a new version of
  95 Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default
  96 for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit.  To check it out,
  97 install the <tt>isenkram</tt> package and insert some hardware dongle
  98 and see if it is recognised.</p>
  99
 100 <p>If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for
 101 the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup
 102 program.  This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:</p>
 103
 104 <p><blockquote><pre>
 105 % isenkram-lookup
 106 bluez
 107 cheese
 108 fprintd
 109 fprintd-demo
 110 gkrellm-thinkbat
 111 hdapsd
 112 libpam-fprintd
 113 pidgin-blinklight
 114 thinkfan
 115 tleds
 116 tp-smapi-dkms
 117 tp-smapi-source
 118 tpb
 119 %p
 120 </pre></blockquote></p>
 121
 122 <p>The hardware mappings come from several places.  The preferred way
 123 is for packages to announce their hardware support using
 124 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
 125 cross distribution appstream system</a>.
 126 See
 127 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">previous
 128 blog posts about isenkram</a> to learn how to do that.</p>
 129
 130       </div>
 131       <div class="tags">
 132
 133
 134         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
 135
 136
 137       </div>
 138     </div>
 139     <div class="padding"></div>
 140
 141     <div class="entry">
 142       <div class="title">
 143         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Discharge_rate_estimate_in_new_battery_statistics_collector_for_Debian.html">Discharge rate estimate in new battery statistics collector for Debian</a>
 144       </div>
 145       <div class="date">
 146         23rd May 2016
 147       </div>
 148       <div class="body">
 149         <p>Yesterday I updated the
 150 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats
 151 package in Debian</a> with a few patches sent to me by skilled and
 152 enterprising users.  There were some nice user and visible changes.
 153 First of all, both desktop menu entries now work.  A design flaw in
 154 one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was
 155 dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available.
 156 The script worked when called from the command line, but not when
 157 called from the desktop menu.  I changed this to look for a DISPLAY
 158 variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the
 159 graph window pop up as expected.</p>
 160
 161 <p>The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the
 162 graphs (the one showing the last few hours).  New is also the user of
 163 colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red.  The percentages
 164 of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design
 165 capacity.</p>
 166
 167 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-rate.png"/></p>
 168
 169 <p>The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery
 170 statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to
 171 visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time.  The red
 172 line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent:
 173
 174 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-history.png"/></p>
 175
 176 <p>In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80
 177 percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is
 178 shrinking. :(</p>
 179
 180 <p>The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle
 181 more hardware models.  On some hardware, Linux power supply
 182 information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the
 183 collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/.  Now
 184 both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the
 185 machine.</p>
 186
 187 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
 188 check out the
 189 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
 190 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
 191 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from <a
 192 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
 193 Patches are very welcome.</p>
 194
 195 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 196 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 197 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 198
 199       </div>
 200       <div class="tags">
 201
 202
 203         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 204
 205
 206       </div>
 207     </div>
 208     <div class="padding"></div>
 209
 210     <div class="entry">
 211       <div class="title">
 212         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/French_edition_of_Lawrence_Lessigs_book_Cultura_Libre_on_Amazon_and_Barnes___Noble.html">French edition of Lawrence Lessigs book Cultura Libre on Amazon and Barnes & Noble</a>
 213       </div>
 214       <div class="date">
 215         21st May 2016
 216       </div>
 217       <div class="body">
 218         <p>A few weeks ago the French paperback edition of Lawrence Lessigs
 219 2004 book Cultura Libre was published.  Today I noticed that the book
 220 is now available from book stores.  You can now buy it from
 221 <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Culture-Libre-French-Lawrence-Lessig/dp/8269018260">Amazon</a>
 222 ($19.99),
 223 <a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/culture-libre-lawrence-lessig/1123776705">Barnes
 224 & Noble</a> ($?) and as always from
 225 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/culture-libre/paperback/product-22645082.html">Lulu.com</a>
 226 ($19.99).  The revenue is donated to the Creative Commons project.  If
 227 you buy from Lulu.com, they currently get $10.59, while if you buy
 228 from one of the book stores most of the revenue go to the book store
 229 and the Creative Commons project get much (not sure how much
 230 less).</p>
 231
 232 <p>I was a bit surprised to discover that there is a kindle edition
 233 sold by Amazon Digital Services LLC on Amazon.  Not quite sure how
 234 that edition was created, but if you want to download a electronic
 235 edition (PDF, EPUB, Mobi) generated from the same files used to create
 236 the paperback edition, they are
 237 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">available
 238 from github</a>.</p>
 239
 240       </div>
 241       <div class="tags">
 242
 243
 244         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
 245
 246
 247       </div>
 248     </div>
 249     <div class="padding"></div>
 250
 251     <div class="entry">
 252       <div class="title">
 253         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_want_the_courts_to_be_involved_before_the_police_can_hijack_a_news_site_DNS_domain___domstolkontroll_.html">I want the courts to be involved before the police can hijack a news site DNS domain (#domstolkontroll)</a>
 254       </div>
 255       <div class="date">
 256         19th May 2016
 257       </div>
 258       <div class="body">
 259         <p>I just donated to the
 260 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/dns-beslag-donasjon.shtml">NUUG defence
 261 "fond"</a> to fund the effort in Norway to get the seizure of the news
 262 site popcorn-time.no tested in court.  I hope everyone that agree with
 263 me will do the same.</p>
 264
 265 <p>Would you be worried if you knew the police in your country could
 266 hijack DNS domains of news sites covering free software system without
 267 talking to a judge first?  I am.  What if the free software system
 268 combined search engine lookups, bittorrent downloads and video playout
 269 and was called Popcorn Time?  Would that affect your view?  It still
 270 make me worried.</p>
 271
 272 <p>In March 2016, the Norwegian police seized (as in forced NORID to
 273 change the IP address pointed to by it to one controlled by the
 274 police) the DNS domain popcorn-time.no, without any supervision from
 275 the courts.  I did not know about the web site back then, and assumed
 276 the courts had been involved, and was very surprised when I discovered
 277 that the police had hijacked the DNS domain without asking a judge for
 278 permission first.  I was even more surprised when I had a look at
 279 <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://popcorn-time.no">the web
 280 site content on the Internet Archive</A>, and only found news coverage
 281 about Popcorn Time, not any material published without the right
 282 holders permissions.</p>
 283
 284 <p>The seizure was widely covered in the Norwegian press (see for
 285 example <a href="http://www.hegnar.no/Nyheter/Naeringsliv/2016/03/Popcorn-time.no-beslaglagt-av-OEkokrim">Hegnar Online</a> and
 286 <a href="http://itavisen.no/2016/03/08/okokrim-har-beslaglagt-popcorn-time-no/">ITavisen<a/>
 287 and
 288 <a href="http://www.nrk.no/kultur/okokrim-gar-til-aksjon-mot-popcorn-time-1.12842452">NRK</a>),
 289 at first due to the press release sent out by Økokrim, but then based
 290 on
 291 <a href="http://blogg.torvund.net/2016/03/09/okokrims-beslag-i-domenet-popcorn-time-no/">protests
 292 from the law professor Olav Torvund</a> and
 293 <a href="http://www.klassekampen.no/article/20160311/ARTICLE/160319995">lawyer
 294 Jon Wessel-Aas</a>.  It even got some
 295 <a href="https://torrentfreak.com/norwegian-authorities-sued-over-popcorn-time-domain-seizure-160418/">coverage
 296 on TorrentFreak</a>.</p>
 297
 298 <p>I
 299 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUG_contests_Norwegian_police_DNS_seizure_of_popcorn_time_no.html">
 300 wrote about the case a month ago</a>, when the
 301 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> (NUUG),
 302 where I am an active member, decided to ask the courts to test this seizure.
 303 The request was denied, but NUUG and its co-requestor EFN have not
 304 given up, and now they are rallying for support to get the seizure
 305 legally challenged.  They accept both bank and Bitcoin transfer for
 306 those that want to support the request.</p>
 307
 308 <p>If you as me believe news sites about free software should not be
 309 censored, even if the free software have both legal and illegal
 310 applications, and that DNS hijacking should be tested by the courts, I
 311 suggest you <a href="http://www.nuug.no/dns-beslag-donasjon.shtml">show
 312 your support by donating to NUUG</a>.</a>
 313
 314       </div>
 315       <div class="tags">
 316
 317
 318         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
 319
 320
 321       </div>
 322     </div>
 323     <div class="padding"></div>
 324
 325     <div class="entry">
 326       <div class="title">
 327         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_with_ZFS_on_Linux_included.html">Debian now with ZFS on Linux included</a>
 328       </div>
 329       <div class="date">
 330         12th May 2016
 331       </div>
 332       <div class="body">
 333         <p>Today, after many years of hard work from many people,
 334 <a href="http://zfsonlinux.org/">ZFS for Linux</a> finally entered
 335 Debian.  The package status can be seen on
 336 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/zfs-linux">the package tracker
 337 for zfs-linux</a>.  and
 338 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
 339 team status page</a>. If you want to help out, please join us.
 340 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">The
 341 source code</a> is available via git on Alioth.  It would also be
 342 great if you could help out with
 343 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/dkms">the dkms package</a>, as
 344 it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.</p>
 345
 346       </div>
 347       <div class="tags">
 348
 349
 350         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 351
 352
 353       </div>
 354     </div>
 355     <div class="padding"></div>
 356
 357     <div class="entry">
 358       <div class="title">
 359         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">What is the best multimedia player in Debian?</a>
 360       </div>
 361       <div class="date">
 362          8th May 2016
 363       </div>
 364       <div class="body">
 365         <p><strong>Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in
 366 Debian claim support for most file formats.</strong></p>
 367
 368 <p>A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser
 369 plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian
 370 Edu.  I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types
 371 for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser
 372 plugin supported most file formats / media types.
 373 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">The
 374 result</a> can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have
 375 not been updated for a while.  But browser plugins are less relevant
 376 these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone
 377 players.</p>
 378
 379 <p>A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable
 380 player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National
 381 Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why.  The cause is a
 382 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/822245">missing MIME type in the VLC
 383 desktop file</a>.  In the process I wrote a script to compare the set
 384 of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin,
 385 only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the
 386 two for VLC.  This discovery made me dig up the script I used to
 387 compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files
 388 instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian
 389 support most file formats.</p>
 390
 391 <p>The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as
 392 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">a
 393 table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included
 394 in the table</a>, with the package supporting most MIME types being
 395 listed first in the table.</p>
 396
 397 </p>The best multimedia player in Debian?  It is totem, followed by
 398 parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and
 399 kmplayer.  Time for the other players to update their announced MIME
 400 support?</p>
 401
 402       </div>
 403       <div class="tags">
 404
 405
 406         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
 407
 408
 409       </div>
 410     </div>
 411     <div class="padding"></div>
 412
 413     <div class="entry">
 414       <div class="title">
 415         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Pyra___handheld_computer_with_Debian_preinstalled.html">The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled</a>
 416       </div>
 417       <div class="date">
 418          4th May 2016
 419       </div>
 420       <div class="body">
 421         A friend of mine made me aware of
 422 <a href="https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/">The Pyra</a>, a
 423 handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled.  I
 424 would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)</p>
 425
 426 <p>The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB
 427 plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5"
 428 LCD touch screen.  The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole
 429 day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests
 430 confirming this.  The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the
 431 last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before
 432 production started.</p>
 433
 434 <p>As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with
 435 Debian.  Please let me know if you know of any others.  Is it the
 436 first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?</p>
 437
 438       </div>
 439       <div class="tags">
 440
 441
 442         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 443
 444
 445       </div>
 446     </div>
 447     <div class="padding"></div>
 448
 449     <div class="entry">
 450       <div class="title">
 451         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/NUUG_contests_Norwegian_police_DNS_seizure_of_popcorn_time_no.html">NUUG contests Norwegian police DNS seizure of popcorn-time.no</a>
 452       </div>
 453       <div class="date">
 454         18th April 2016
 455       </div>
 456       <div class="body">
 457         <p>It is days like today I am really happy to be a member of
 458 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the Norwegian Unix User group</a>, a
 459 member association for those of us believing in free software, open
 460 standards and unix-like operating systems.  NUUG announced today it
 461 will
 462 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Pressemelding__NUUG_og_EFN_begj_rer_rettslig_pr_ving_for_DNS_domenebeslag_av_popcorn_time_no.shtml">try
 463 to bring the seizure of the DNS domain popcorn-time.no as
 464 unlawful</a>, to stand up for the principle that writing about a
 465 controversial topic is not infringing copyrights, and censuring web
 466 pages by hijacking DNS domain should be decided by the courts, not the
 467 police.  The DNS domain was seized by the Norwegian National Authority
 468 for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic and Environmental Crime
 469 a month ago.  I hope this bring more paying members to NUUG to give
 470 the association the financial muscle needed to bring this case as far
 471 as it must go to stop this kind of DNS hijacking.</p>
 472
 473       </div>
 474       <div class="tags">
 475
 476
 477         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
 478
 479
 480       </div>
 481     </div>
 482     <div class="padding"></div>
 483
 484     <div class="entry">
 485       <div class="title">
 486         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_F__Stone___an_inspiration_for_us_all.html">I.F. Stone - an inspiration for us all</a>
 487       </div>
 488       <div class="date">
 489         13th April 2016
 490       </div>
 491       <div class="body">
 492         <p>I first got to know I.F. Stone when I came across an article by Jon
 493 Schwarz on The Intercept
 494 <a href="https://theintercept.com/2015/05/07/new-documentary-legacy-f-stone/">about
 495 his extraordinary contribution to investigative journalism in
 496 USA</a>. The article is about a new documentary in two parts
 497 (<a href="https://vimeo.com/123974841">part one is 12 minutes</a> and
 498 <a href="https://vimeo.com/123974842">part two is 30 minutes</a>), and
 499 I found both truly fascinating.  It is amazing what he was able to
 500 find by digging up public sources and government papers.  He
 501 documented lots of government abuse and cover ups, and I find
 502 <a href="http://www.ifstone.org/weekly.php">his weekly news letters</a>
 503 inspiring to read even today.</p>
 504
 505 <p><blockquote>
 506 All governments are run by liars and nothing they say should be believed.
 507 <br>- I. F. Stone
 508 </blockquote></p>
 509
 510 <p>His starting point was that reporters should not assume governments
 511 and corporations are telling the truth, but verify all their claims as
 512 much as possible.  I wonder how many Norwegian reporters can be said
 513 to follow the principles of I. F. Stone.  They are definitely in short
 514 supply.  If you, like me half a year ago, have never heard of him,
 515 check him out.</p>
 516
 517       </div>
 518       <div class="tags">
 519
 520
 521         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn</a>.
 522
 523
 524       </div>
 525     </div>
 526     <div class="padding"></div>
 527
 528     <div class="entry">
 529       <div class="title">
 530         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_French_paperback_edition_of_the_book_Free_Culture_by_Lawrence_Lessig_is_now_available.html">A French paperback edition of the book Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig is now available</a>
 531       </div>
 532       <div class="date">
 533         12th April 2016
 534       </div>
 535       <div class="body">
 536         <p>I'm happy to report that
 537 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/culture-libre/paperback/product-22645082.html">the
 538 French paperback edition</a> of
 539 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">my
 540 project to translate</a> the <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free
 541 Culture</a> book by Lawrence Lessig is now available for sale on
 542 Lulu.com.  Once I have formally verified my proof reading copy, which
 543 should be in the mail, the paperback edition should be available in
 544 book stores like Amazon and Barnes & Noble too.</p>
 545
 546 <p>This French edition, Culture Libre, is the work of the
 547 <a href="http://dblatex.sourceforge.net/">dblatex</a> developer Benoît
 548 Guillon, who created the PO file from the initial translation
 549 available from
 550 <a href="http://www.wikilivres.ca/wiki/Culture_libre">the Wikilivres
 551 wiki pages</a> and completed and corrected the translation to match
 552 the original docbook edition my project is using, as well as
 553 coordinated the proof reading of the final result.  I believe the end
 554 result look great, but I am biased and do not read French.  In
 555 addition to the paperback edition, the book is available in PDF, EPUB
 556 and Mobi format from the github project page linked to above.</p>
 557
 558 <p>When enabling book store distribution on Lulu.com, I had to nearly
 559 triple the price to allow the book stores some profit.  I also had to
 560 accept that I will get some revenue when a book is sold via Lulu.com.
 561 But because of the non-commercial clause in the book license
 562 (CC-BY-NC), this might be a problem.  To bypass the problem I
 563 discussed how to handle the revenue with the author, and we agreed
 564 that the revenue for these editions go to the
 565 <a href="https://creativecommons.org/">Creative Commons non-profit
 566 Corporation</a> who handle donations to the Creative Commons project.
 567 So far they have earned around USD 70 on sales of the
 568 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22440520.html">English</a>
 569 and
 570 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/fri-kultur/paperback/product-22441576.html">Norwegian
 571 Bokmål</a> editions, according to Lulu.com.  They will get the revenue
 572 for the French edition too.  Their revenue is higher if you buy the
 573 book directly from Lulu.com instead of via a book store, so I
 574 recommend you buy directly from Lulu.com.</p>
 575
 576 <p>Perhaps you would like to get the book published in your language?
 577 The translation is done using a web based translator service, so the
 578 technical bar to enter is fairly low.  Get in touch if you would like
 579 to make this happen.</p>
 580
 581       </div>
 582       <div class="tags">
 583
 584
 585         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
 586
 587
 588       </div>
 589     </div>
 590     <div class="padding"></div>
 591
 592     <div class="entry">
 593       <div class="title">
 594         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">Lets make a Norwegian Bokmål edition of The Debian Administrator's Handbook</a>
 595       </div>
 596       <div class="date">
 597         10th April 2016
 598       </div>
 599       <div class="body">
 600         <p>During this weekends
 601 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Oslo__Takk_for_feilfiksingsfesten.shtml">bug
 602 squashing party and developer gathering</a>, we decided to do our part
 603 to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian
 604 Bokmål, and got in touch with the people behind the
 605 <a href="http://debian-handbook.info/">Debian Administrator's Handbook
 606 project</a> to get started.  If you want to help out, please start
 607 contributing using
 608 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
 609 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
 610 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
 611 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
 612 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
 613 contributors</a>.</p>
 614
 615 <p>The book is already available on paper in English, French and
 616 Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian
 617 Bokmål too.  In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and
 618 Mobi versions available.  And there are incomplete translations
 619 available for many more languages.</p>
 620
 621       </div>
 622       <div class="tags">
 623
 624
 625         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 626
 627
 628       </div>
 629     </div>
 630     <div class="padding"></div>
 631
 632     <div class="entry">
 633       <div class="title">
 634         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/One_in_two_hundred_Debian_users_using_ZFS_on_Linux_.html">One in two hundred Debian users using ZFS on Linux?</a>
 635       </div>
 636       <div class="date">
 637          7th April 2016
 638       </div>
 639       <div class="body">
 640         <p>Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related
 641 packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found.  I use
 642 ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so.
 643 But I might be wrong.</p>
 644
 645 <p>According to
 646 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=spl-linux">the popcon
 647 results for spl-linux</a>, there are 1019 Debian installations, or
 648 0.53% of the population, with the package installed.  As far as I know
 649 the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS
 650 on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS
 651 installation on Linux in Debian.  In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian
 652 the ZFS feature is already available, and there
 653 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=zfsutils">the popcon
 654 results for zfsutils</a> show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of
 655 the population.  So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.</p>
 656
 657 <p>But even though the Debian project leader Lucas Nussbaum
 658 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2015/04/msg00006.html">announced
 659 in April 2015</a> that the legal obstacles blocking ZFS on Debian were
 660 cleared, the package is still not in Debian.  The package is again in
 661 the NEW queue.  Several uploads have been rejected so far because the
 662 debian/copyright file was incomplete or wrong, but there is no reason
 663 to give up.  The current status can be seen on
 664 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
 665 team status page</a>, and
 666 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">the
 667 source code</a> is available on Alioth.</p>
 668
 669 <p>As I want ZFS to be included in next version of Debian to make sure
 670 my home server can function in the future using only official Debian
 671 packages, and the current blocker is to get the debian/copyright file
 672 accepted by the FTP masters in Debian, I decided a while back to try
 673 to help out the team.  This was the background for my blog post about
 674 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">creating,
 675 updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>, and I
 676 used the techniques I explored there to try to find any errors in the
 677 copyright file.  It is not very easy to check every one of the around
 678 2000 files in the source package, but I hope we this time got it
 679 right.  If you want to help out, check out the git source and try to
 680 find missing entries in the debian/copyright file.</p>
 681
 682       </div>
 683       <div class="tags">
 684
 685
 686         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 687
 688
 689       </div>
 690     </div>
 691     <div class="padding"></div>
 692
 693     <div class="entry">
 694       <div class="title">
 695         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/syslog_trusted_timestamp___chain_of_trusted_timestamps_for_your_syslog.html">syslog-trusted-timestamp - chain of trusted timestamps for your syslog</a>
 696       </div>
 697       <div class="date">
 698          2nd April 2016
 699       </div>
 700       <div class="body">
 701         <p>Two years ago, I had
 702 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Public_Trusted_Timestamping_services_for_everyone.html">a
 703 look at trusted timestamping options available</a>, and among
 704 other things noted a still open
 705 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/742553">bug in the tsget script</a>
 706 included in openssl that made it harder than necessary to use openssl
 707 as a trusted timestamping client.  A few days ago I was told
 708 <a href="https:/www.difi.no/">the Norwegian government office DIFI</a> is
 709 close to releasing their own trusted timestamp service, and in the
 710 process I was happy to learn about a replacement for the tsget script
 711 using only curl:</p>
 712
 713 <p><pre>
 714 openssl ts -query -data "/etc/shells" -cert -sha256 -no_nonce \
 715   | curl -s -H "Content-Type: application/timestamp-query" \
 716          --data-binary "@-" http://zeitstempel.dfn.de > etc-shells.tsr
 717 openssl ts -reply -text -in etc-shells.tsr
 718 </pre></p>
 719
 720 <p>This produces a binary timestamp file (etc-shells.tsr) which can be
 721 used to verify that the content of the file /etc/shell with the
 722 calculated sha256 hash existed at the point in time when the request
 723 was made.  The last command extract the content of the etc-shells.tsr
 724 in human readable form.  The idea behind such timestamp is to be able
 725 to prove using cryptography that the content of a file have not
 726 changed since the file was stamped.</p>
 727
 728 <p>To verify that the file on disk match the public key signature in
 729 the timestamp file, run the following commands.  It make sure you have
 730 the required certificate for the trusted timestamp service available
 731 and use it to compare the file content with the timestamp.  In
 732 production, one should of course use a better method to verify the
 733 service certificate.</p>
 734
 735 <p><pre>
 736 wget -O ca-cert.txt https://pki.pca.dfn.de/global-services-ca/pub/cacert/chain.txt
 737 openssl ts -verify -data /etc/shells -in etc-shells.tsr -CAfile ca-cert.txt -text
 738 </pre></p>
 739
 740 <p>Wikipedia have a lot more information about
 741 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trusted_timestamping">trusted
 742 Timestamping</a> and
 743 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linked_timestamping">linked
 744 timestamping</a>, and there are several trusted timestamping services
 745 around, both as commercial services and as free and public services.
 746 Among the latter is
 747 <a href="https://www.pki.dfn.de/zeitstempeldienst/">the
 748 zeitstempel.dfn.de service</a> mentioned above and
 749 <a href="https://freetsa.org/">freetsa.org service</a> linked to from the
 750 wikipedia web site.  I believe the DIFI service should show up on
 751 https://tsa.difi.no, but it is not available to the public at the
 752 moment.  I hope this will change when it is into production.  The
 753 <a href="https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3161">RFC 3161</a> trusted
 754 timestamping protocol standard is even implemented in LibreOffice,
 755 Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat, making it possible to verify when
 756 a document was created.</p>
 757
 758 <p>I would find it useful to be able to use such trusted timestamp
 759 service to make it possible to verify that my stored syslog files have
 760 not been tampered with.  This is not a new idea.  I found one example
 761 implemented on the Endian network appliances where
 762 <a href="http://help.endian.com/entries/21518508-Enabling-Timestamping-on-log-files-">the
 763 configuration of such feature was described in 2012</a>.</p>
 764
 765 <p>But I could not find any free implementation of such feature when I
 766 searched, so I decided to try to
 767 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/syslog-trusted-timestamp">build
 768 a prototype named syslog-trusted-timestamp</a>.  My idea is to
 769 generate a timestamp of the old log files after they are rotated, and
 770 store the timestamp in the new log file just after rotation.  This
 771 will form a chain that would make it possible to see if any old log
 772 files are tampered with.  But syslog is bad at handling kilobytes of
 773 binary data, so I decided to base64 encode the timestamp and add an ID
 774 and line sequence numbers to the base64 data to make it possible to
 775 reassemble the timestamp file again.  To use it, simply run it like
 776 this:
 777
 778 <p><pre>
 779 syslog-trusted-timestamp /path/to/list-of-log-files
 780 </pre></p>
 781
 782 <p>This will send a timestamp from one or more timestamp services (not
 783 yet decided nor implemented) for each listed file to the syslog using
 784 logger(1).  To verify the timestamp, the same program is used with the
 785 --verify option:</p>
 786
 787 <p><pre>
 788 syslog-trusted-timestamp --verify /path/to/log-file /path/to/log-with-timestamp
 789 </pre></p>
 790
 791 <p>The verification step is not yet well designed.  The current
 792 implementation depend on the file path being unique and unchanging,
 793 and this is not a solid assumption.  It also uses process number as
 794 timestamp ID, and this is bound to create ID collisions.  I hope to
 795 have time to come up with a better way to handle timestamp IDs and
 796 verification later.</p>
 797
 798 <p>Please check out
 799 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/syslog-trusted-timestamp">the
 800 prototype for syslog-trusted-timestamp on github</a> and send
 801 suggestions and improvement, or let me know if there already exist a
 802 similar system for timestamping logs already to allow me to join
 803 forces with others with the same interest.</p>
 804
 805 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 806 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 807 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 808
 809       </div>
 810       <div class="tags">
 811
 812
 813         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
 814
 815
 816       </div>
 817     </div>
 818     <div class="padding"></div>
 819
 820     <div class="entry">
 821       <div class="title">
 822         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Full_battery_stats_collector_is_now_available_in_Debian.html">Full battery stats collector is now available in Debian</a>
 823       </div>
 824       <div class="date">
 825         23rd March 2016
 826       </div>
 827       <div class="body">
 828         <p>Since this morning, the battery-stats package in Debian include an
 829 extended collector that will collect the complete battery history for
 830 later processing and graphing.  The original collector store the
 831 battery level as percentage of last full level, while the new
 832 collector also record battery vendor, model, serial number, design
 833 full level, last full level and current battery level.  This make it
 834 possible to predict the lifetime of the battery as well as visualise
 835 the energy flow when the battery is charging or discharging.</p>
 836
 837 <p>The new tools are available in <tt>/usr/share/battery-stats/</tt>
 838 in the version 0.5.1 package in unstable.  Get the new battery level graph
 839 and lifetime prediction by running:
 840
 841 <p><pre>
 842 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph /var/log/battery-stats.csv
 843 </pre></p>
 844
 845 <p>Or select the 'Battery Level Graph' from your application menu.</p>
 846
 847 <p>The flow in/out of the battery can be seen by running (no menu
 848 entry yet):</p>
 849
 850 <p><pre>
 851 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph-flow
 852 </pre></p>
 853
 854 <p>I'm not quite happy with the way the data is visualised, at least
 855 when there are few data points.  The graphs look a bit better with a
 856 few years of data.</p>
 857
 858 <p>A while back one important feature I use in the battery stats
 859 collector broke in Debian.  The scripts in
 860 <tt>/usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/</tt> were no longer executed.  I
 861 suspect it happened when Jessie started using systemd, but I do not
 862 know.  The issue is reported as
 863 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/818649">bug #818649</a> against
 864 pm-utils.  I managed to work around it by adding an udev rule to call
 865 the collector script every time the power connector is connected and
 866 disconnected.  With this fix in place it was finally time to make a
 867 new release of the package, and get it into Debian.</p>
 868
 869 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
 870 check out the
 871 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
 872 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
 873 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from
 874 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
 875 As always, patches are very welcome.</p>
 876
 877       </div>
 878       <div class="tags">
 879
 880
 881         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
 882
 883
 884       </div>
 885     </div>
 886     <div class="padding"></div>
 887
 888     <div class="entry">
 889       <div class="title">
 890         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/UsingQR____Electronic__paper_invoices_using_JSON_and_QR_codes.html">UsingQR - "Electronic" paper invoices using JSON and QR codes</a>
 891       </div>
 892       <div class="date">
 893         19th March 2016
 894       </div>
 895       <div class="body">
 896         <p>Back in 2013 I proposed
 897 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_Electronic__paper_invoices___using_vCard_in_a_QR_code.html">a
 898 way to make paper and PDF invoices easier to process electronically by
 899 adding a QR code with the key information about the invoice</a>.  I
 900 suggested using vCard field definition, to get some standard format
 901 for name and address, but any format would work.  I did not do
 902 anything about the proposal, but hoped someone one day would make
 903 something like it.  It would make it possible to efficiently send
 904 machine readable invoices directly between seller and buyer.</p>
 905
 906 <p>This was the background when I came across a proposal and
 907 specification from the web based accounting and invoicing supplier
 908 <a href="http://www.visma.com/">Visma</a> in Sweden called
 909 <a href="http://usingqr.com/">UsingQR</a>.  Their PDF invoices contain
 910 a QR code with the key information of the invoice in JSON format.
 911 This is the typical content of a QR code following the UsingQR
 912 specification (based on a real world example, some numbers replaced to
 913 get a more bogus entry).  I've reformatted the JSON to make it easier
 914 to read.  Normally this is all on one long line:</p>
 915
 916 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-03-19-qr-invoice.png" align="right"><pre>
 917 {
 918  "vh":500.00,
 919  "vm":0,
 920  "vl":0,
 921  "uqr":1,
 922  "tp":1,
 923  "nme":"Din Leverandør",
 924  "cc":"NO",
 925  "cid":"997912345 MVA",
 926  "iref":"12300001",
 927  "idt":"20151022",
 928  "ddt":"20151105",
 929  "due":2500.0000,
 930  "cur":"NOK",
 931  "pt":"BBAN",
 932  "acc":"17202612345",
 933  "bc":"BIENNOK1",
 934  "adr":"0313 OSLO"
 935 }
 936 </pre></p>
 937
 938 </p>The interpretation of the fields can be found in the
 939 <a href="http://usingqr.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/UsingQR_specification1.pdf">format
 940 specification</a> (revision 2 from june 2014).  The format seem to
 941 have most of the information needed to handle accounting and payment
 942 of invoices, at least the fields I have needed so far here in
 943 Norway.</p>
 944
 945 <p>Unfortunately, the site and document do not mention anything about
 946 the patent, trademark and copyright status of the format and the
 947 specification.  Because of this, I asked the people behind it back in
 948 November to clarify.  Ann-Christine Savlid (ann-christine.savlid (at)
 949 visma.com) replied that Visma had not applied for patent or trademark
 950 protection for this format, and that there were no copyright based
 951 usage limitations for the format.  I urged her to make sure this was
 952 explicitly written on the web pages and in the specification, but
 953 unfortunately this has not happened yet.  So I guess if there is
 954 submarine patents, hidden trademarks or a will to sue for copyright
 955 infringements, those starting to use the UsingQR format might be at
 956 risk, but if this happen there is some legal defense in the fact that
 957 the people behind the format claimed it was safe to do so.  At least
 958 with patents, there is always
 959 <a href="http://www.paperspecs.com/paper-news/beware-the-qr-code-patent-trap/">a
 960 chance of getting sued...</a></p>
 961
 962 <p>I also asked if they planned to maintain the format in an
 963 independent standard organization to give others more confidence that
 964 they would participate in the standardization process on equal terms
 965 with Visma, but they had no immediate plans for this.  Their plan was
 966 to work with banks to try to get more users of the format, and
 967 evaluate the way forward if the format proved to be popular.  I hope
 968 they conclude that using an open standard organisation like
 969 <a href="http://www.ietf.org/">IETF</a> is the correct place to
 970 maintain such specification.</p>
 971
 972 <p><strong>Update 2016-03-20</strong>: Via Twitter I became aware of
 973 <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11319492">some comments
 974 about this blog post</a> that had several useful links and references to
 975 similar systems.  In the Czech republic, the Czech Banking Association
 976 standard #26, with short name SPAYD, uses QR codes with payment
 977 information.  More information is available from the Wikipedia page on
 978 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_Payment_Descriptor">Short
 979 Payment Descriptor</a>.  And in Germany, there is a system named
 980 <a href="http://www.bezahlcode.de/">BezahlCode</a>,
 981 (<a href="http://www.bezahlcode.de/wp-content/uploads/BezahlCode_TechDok.pdf">specification
 982 v1.8 2013-12-05 available as PDF</a>), which uses QR codes with
 983 URL-like formatting using "bank:" as the URI schema/protocol to
 984 provide the payment information.  There is also the
 985 <a href="http://www.ferd-net.de/front_content.php?idcat=231">ZUGFeRD</a>
 986 file format that perhaps could be transfered using QR codes, but I am
 987 not sure if it is done already.  Last, in Bolivia there are reports
 988 that tax information since november 2014 need to be printed in QR
 989 format on invoices.  I have not been able to track down a
 990 specification for this format, because of my limited language skill
 991 sets.</p>
 992
 993       </div>
 994       <div class="tags">
 995
 996
 997         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
 998
 999
1000       </div>
1001     </div>
1002     <div class="padding"></div>
1003
1004     <div class="entry">
1005       <div class="title">
1006         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Making_battery_measurements_a_little_easier_in_Debian.html">Making battery measurements a little easier in Debian</a>
1007       </div>
1008       <div class="date">
1009         15th March 2016
1010       </div>
1011       <div class="body">
1012         <p>Back in September, I blogged about
1013 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">the
1014 system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery</a>, and
1015 how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced).  I
1016 created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing,
1017 but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already
1018 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">a battery-stats
1019 package in Debian</a> that should do the same thing, and I did not see
1020 a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be
1021 fixed instead.  I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and
1022 hoped someone would step in and fix it.  But no-one did.</p>
1023
1024 <p>I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own
1025 hands.  The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of
1026 battery stats (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">available from github</a>) and part of the team maintaining
1027 battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally
1028 able to collect battery status using the <tt>/sys/class/power_supply/</tt>
1029 information provided by the Linux kernel.  If you install the
1030 battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a
1031 graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the
1032 status of the battery.  The source package build and work just fine in
1033 Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not
1034 tested).  The default graph you get for that system look like this:</p>
1035
1036 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-03-15-battery-stats-graph-example.png" width="70%" align="center"></p>
1037
1038 <p>My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the
1039 battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details
1040 about the battery.  The scripts are merged into the upstream
1041 battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work
1042 yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way.  Will have to test a
1043 bit more before I make a new release.</p>
1044
1045 <p>I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I
1046 suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it
1047 impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing
1048 and graphing.</p>
1049
1050 <p>If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop
1051 battery, check out the battery-stats package in
1052 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">Debian</a> and
1053 on
1054 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
1055 I would love some help to improve the system further.</p>
1056
1057       </div>
1058       <div class="tags">
1059
1060
1061         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1062
1063
1064       </div>
1065     </div>
1066     <div class="padding"></div>
1067
1068     <div class="entry">
1069       <div class="title">
1070         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">Creating, updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>
1071       </div>
1072       <div class="date">
1073         19th February 2016
1074       </div>
1075       <div class="body">
1076         <p>Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to
1077 details.  And one of the details is the content of the
1078 debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by
1079 the code in the package in question, preferably in
1080 <a href="https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/">machine
1081 readable DEP5 format</a>.</p>
1082
1083 <p>For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write
1084 and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the
1085 package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters.  So getting it right
1086 the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save
1087 both you and the ftpmasters some work..  Today, while trying to figure
1088 out what was wrong with
1089 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=686447">the
1090 zfsonlinux copyright file</a>, I decided to spend some time on
1091 figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least
1092 semi-automatically.</p>
1093
1094 <p>Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the
1095 file based on the code in the source package,
1096 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/debmake">debmake</a></tt>
1097 and <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cme">cme</a></tt>.  I'm
1098 not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to
1099 create a sensible draft file.  As far as I can tell, none of them can
1100 be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be
1101 polished a bit before the file is OK to upload.  I found the debmake
1102 option in
1103 <a href="http://goofying-with-debian.blogspot.com/2014/07/debmake-checking-source-against-dep-5.html">a
1104 blog posts from 2014</a>.
1105
1106 <p>To generate using debmake, use the -cc option:
1107
1108 <p><pre>
1109 debmake -cc > debian/copyright
1110 </pre></p>
1111
1112 <p>Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so
1113 this might not be the best option.</p>
1114
1115 <p>The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found
1116 this approach in
1117 <a href="https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2015/04/05/improving-creation-of-debian-copyright-file/">a
1118 blog post from 2015</a>.  To generate using cme, use the 'update
1119 dpkg-copyright' option:
1120
1121 <p><pre>
1122 cme update dpkg-copyright
1123 </pre></p>
1124
1125 <p>This will create or update debian/copyright.  The cme tool seem to
1126 handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.</p>
1127
1128 <p>When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to
1129 check if the file is correct.  For this I found two good options,
1130 <tt>debmake -k</tt> and <tt>license-reconcile</tt>.  The former seem
1131 to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect
1132 ineffective blocks in the copyright file.  The latter reports missing
1133 copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license
1134 names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0).  I suspect it is good to use both and
1135 fix all issues reported by them before uploading.  But I do not know
1136 if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a
1137 copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.</p>
1138
1139 <p>The devscripts tool <tt>licensecheck</tt> deserve mentioning.  It
1140 will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements.
1141 It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but
1142 can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.</p>
1143
1144 <p>Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update
1145 debian/copyright file.  Please let me know, or blog about it on
1146 planet.debian.org.</p>
1147
1148 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1149 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1150 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1151
1152 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-20</strong>: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel
1153 on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file
1154
1155 <p><pre>
1156 licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
1157   /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
1158 </pre></p>
1159
1160 <p>He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the
1161 version control system to make it easier to discover license and
1162 copyright changes in the upstream source.  I will try to do the same
1163 with my packages in the future.</p>
1164
1165 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-21</strong>: The cme author recommended
1166 against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed
1167 command line.</p>
1168
1169       </div>
1170       <div class="tags">
1171
1172
1173         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1174
1175
1176       </div>
1177     </div>
1178     <div class="padding"></div>
1179
1180     <div class="entry">
1181       <div class="title">
1182         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_in_Debian_to_locate_packages_with_firmware_and_mime_type_support.html">Using appstream in Debian to locate packages with firmware and mime type support</a>
1183       </div>
1184       <div class="date">
1185          4th February 2016
1186       </div>
1187       <div class="body">
1188         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">appstream system</a>
1189 is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very
1190 convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given
1191 firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it.  This can
1192 be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog
1193 about. :)</p>
1194
1195 <p>Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware
1196 file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly
1197 picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian
1198 unstable.  In general you would be looking for the firmware requested
1199 by the kernel during kernel module loading.  To find the package
1200 providing the example file, do like this:</p>
1201
1202 <blockquote><pre>
1203 % apt install appstream
1204 [...]
1205 % apt update
1206 [...]
1207 % appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
1208   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
1209 firmware-qlogic
1210 %
1211 </pre></blockquote>
1212
1213 <p>See <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">the
1214 appstream wiki</a> page to learn how to embed the package metadata in
1215 a way appstream can use.</p>
1216
1217 <p>This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a
1218 given MIME type.  This is very useful when you get a file you do not
1219 know how to handle.  First find the mime type using <tt>file
1220 --mime-type</tt>, and next look up the package providing support for
1221 it.  Lets say you got an SVG file.  Its MIME type is image/svg+xml,
1222 and you can find all packages handling this type like this:</p>
1223
1224 <blockquote><pre>
1225 % apt install appstream
1226 [...]
1227 % apt update
1228 [...]
1229 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
1230   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
1231 bkchem
1232 phototonic
1233 inkscape
1234 shutter
1235 tetzle
1236 geeqie
1237 xia
1238 pinta
1239 gthumb
1240 karbon
1241 comix
1242 mirage
1243 viewnior
1244 postr
1245 ristretto
1246 kolourpaint4
1247 eog
1248 eom
1249 gimagereader
1250 midori
1251 %
1252 </pre></blockquote>
1253
1254 <p>I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for
1255 packages providing appstream metadata.</p>
1256
1257       </div>
1258       <div class="tags">
1259
1260
1261         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1262
1263
1264       </div>
1265     </div>
1266     <div class="padding"></div>
1267
1268     <div class="entry">
1269       <div class="title">
1270         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creepy__visualise_geotagged_social_media_information___nice_free_software.html">Creepy, visualise geotagged social media information - nice free software</a>
1271       </div>
1272       <div class="date">
1273         24th January 2016
1274       </div>
1275       <div class="body">
1276         <p>Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around
1277 with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their
1278 position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long
1279 time (like every time a SMS is received or sent).  And if their
1280 computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called
1281 mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often
1282 also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access
1283 during installation).  And when these programs send out information to
1284 central collection points, the location is often included, unless
1285 extra care is taken to not send the location.  The provided
1286 information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is
1287 good and bad, depend on your point of view).  What is certain, is that
1288 the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and
1289 perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way,
1290 when they share their whereabouts with private and public
1291 entities.</p>
1292
1293 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-01-24-nice-creepy-desktop-window.png"></p>
1294
1295 <p>The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out
1296 when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing.  It is
1297 unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government
1298 officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from
1299 unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information.  But the
1300 public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software
1301 tool to do so is called
1302 <a href="http://www.geocreepy.com/">Creepy or Cree.py</a>.  I
1303 discovered it when I read
1304 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Slik-kan-du-bli-overvaket-pa-Twitter-og-Instagram-uten-a-ane-det-7787884.html">an
1305 article about Creepy</a> in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i
1306 November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian.
1307 The python program was in Debian, but
1308 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/creepy">the version in
1309 Debian</a> was completely broken and practically unmaintained.  I
1310 uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not
1311 have time to fix it then.  This Christmas I decided to finally try to
1312 get Creepy operational in Debian.  Now a fixed version is available in
1313 Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches
1314 are now included
1315 <a href="https://github.com/jkakavas/creepy">upstream</a>.</p>
1316
1317 <p>The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from
1318 Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a
1319 complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a
1320 given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all
1321 these services.  Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at
1322 least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these
1323 days it is impossible.  This mean that to use Creepy, you need to
1324 configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide
1325 information to them about your search interests.  This should be taken
1326 into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information
1327 about yourself with the services.</p>
1328
1329 <p>The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least
1330 geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital
1331 of Norway.  One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at
1332 information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the
1333 information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area.
1334 I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in
1335 twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a
1336 Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time,
1337 making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other
1338 things.  A similar technique have been
1339 <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl">used
1340 to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine</a>, and it is both a powerful
1341 tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people
1342 understand the value of the private information they provide to the
1343 public.</p>
1344
1345 <p>The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as
1346 it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at
1347 least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and
1348 python-requests-toolbelt).</p>
1349
1350 <p>(I have uploaded
1351 <a href="https://screenshots.debian.net/package/creepy">the image to
1352 screenshots.debian.net</a> and licensed it under the same terms as the
1353 Creepy program in Debian.)</p>
1354
1355       </div>
1356       <div class="tags">
1357
1358
1359         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
1360
1361
1362       </div>
1363     </div>
1364     <div class="padding"></div>
1365
1366     <div class="entry">
1367       <div class="title">
1368         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Always_download_Debian_packages_using_Tor___the_simple_recipe.html">Always download Debian packages using Tor - the simple recipe</a>
1369       </div>
1370       <div class="date">
1371         15th January 2016
1372       </div>
1373       <div class="body">
1374         <p>During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum
1375 <a href="https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/meeting/331/what-is-to-be-done/">observed
1376 that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to
1377 believe a computer have a given security hole</a> if it download a
1378 security fix from a Debian mirror.  This is a good reason to always
1379 use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those
1380 listening do not know which IP address to attack.  In August, Richard
1381 Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible
1382 to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that
1383 download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and
1384 <a href="http://richardhartmann.de/blog/posts/2015/08/24-Tor-enabled_Debian_mirror/">proposed
1385 to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror</a>.  He
1386 was not the first to propose this, as the
1387 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/apt-transport-tor">apt-transport-tor</a></tt>
1388 package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt
1389 to use <a href="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</a>, but I was not
1390 aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.</p>
1391
1392 <p>Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian
1393 sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central
1394 Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making
1395 it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes,
1396 making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.</p>
1397
1398 <p>Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by
1399 installing <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> and replacing http and https
1400 urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead
1401 of the official Debian mirror site.  I recommend installing
1402 <tt>etckeeper</tt> before you start to have a history of the changes
1403 done in /etc/.</p>
1404
1405 <blockquote><pre>
1406 apt install apt-transport-tor
1407 sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
1408 sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
1409 </pre></blockquote>
1410
1411 <p>If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run
1412 the sed commands for these too.  The sed command is assuming your are
1413 using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror.  Adjust the command (or just
1414 edit the file manually) to match your mirror.</p>
1415
1416 <p>This work in Debian Jessie and later.  Note that tools like
1417 <tt>apt-file</tt> only recently started using the apt transport
1418 system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs.  For
1419 <tt>apt-file</tt> you need the version currently in experimental,
1420 which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable.  So if you
1421 need a working <tt>apt-file</tt>, this is not for you.</p>
1422
1423 <p>Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start
1424 using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you
1425 update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus
1426 masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine.  Using Tor will
1427 become normal for the machine in question.</p>
1428
1429 <p>On <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox</a>, APT
1430 is set up by default to use <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> when Tor is
1431 enabled.  It would be great if it was the default on any Debian
1432 system.</p>
1433
1434       </div>
1435       <div class="tags">
1436
1437
1438         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
1439
1440
1441       </div>
1442     </div>
1443     <div class="padding"></div>
1444
1445     <div class="entry">
1446       <div class="title">
1447         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenALPR__find_car_license_plates_in_video_streams___nice_free_software.html">OpenALPR, find car license plates in video streams - nice free software</a>
1448       </div>
1449       <div class="date">
1450         23rd December 2015
1451       </div>
1452       <div class="body">
1453         <p>When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to
1454 call the car license plate numbers in those days.  I would write the
1455 numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids
1456 to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some
1457 exotic or special region codes and numbers.  It was a fun game to pass
1458 time, as we kids have plenty of it.</p>
1459
1460 <p>A few days I came across
1461 <a href="https://github.com/openalpr/openalpr">the OpenALPR
1462 project</a>, a free software project to automatically discover and
1463 report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the
1464 "car numbers" in a machine readable format.  I've been looking for
1465 such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the
1466 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition">automatic
1467 number plate recognition</a> tool only is available in the hands of
1468 the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to
1469 even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance.  I
1470 discovered the developer
1471 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/747509">wanted to get the tool into
1472 Debian</a>, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to
1473 help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian
1474 archive.</p>
1475
1476 <p>Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded
1477 it into Debian, where it currently
1478 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org//new/openalpr_2.2.1-1.html">waits
1479 in the NEW queue</a> for review by the Debian ftpmasters.</p>
1480
1481 <p>I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful
1482 for the common folks, ie those not running a large government
1483 surveillance system?  Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike
1484 and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified
1485 when number plates on my watch list are discovered.  Another use case
1486 was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home
1487 to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his
1488 car.  When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone
1489 capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to
1490 open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway.  I
1491 guess for such use case it make sense.  I am sure there are other use
1492 cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.</p>
1493
1494 <p>If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check
1495 out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/
1496 before running "debuild" to build the source.  Or wait a bit until the
1497 package show up in unstable.</p>
1498
1499       </div>
1500       <div class="tags">
1501
1502
1503         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
1504
1505
1506       </div>
1507     </div>
1508     <div class="padding"></div>
1509
1510     <div class="entry">
1511       <div class="title">
1512         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">Using appstream with isenkram to install hardware related packages in Debian</a>
1513       </div>
1514       <div class="date">
1515         20th December 2015
1516       </div>
1517       <div class="body">
1518         <p>Around three years ago, I created
1519 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the isenkram
1520 system</a> to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing
1521 hardware related packages.  A GUI system in the isenkram package will
1522 present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by
1523 relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine.  The same
1524 lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line
1525 tools in the isenkram-cli package.  In addition to mapping hardware,
1526 it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to
1527 install needed firmware packages automatically.  The key for this
1528 system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other
1529 words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work
1530 with.</p>
1531
1532 <p>I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and
1533 adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run
1534 time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available.
1535 I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in
1536 the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I
1537 was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings,
1538 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
1539 appstream system</a> was announced.  I got in touch and suggested to
1540 add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use
1541 appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the
1542 Debian version of appstream.</p>
1543
1544 <p>A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible,
1545 and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for
1546 appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages.  The only
1547 package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my
1548 pymissile package.  I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out
1549 how do add the required
1550 <a href="https://appstream.debian.org/html/sid/main/metainfo/pymissile.html">metadata
1551 in pymissile</a>.  I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with
1552 this content:</p>
1553
1554 <blockquote><pre>
1555 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
1556 &lt;component&gt;
1557   &lt;id&gt;pymissile&lt;/id&gt;
1558   &lt;metadata_license&gt;MIT&lt;/metadata_license&gt;
1559   &lt;name&gt;pymissile&lt;/name&gt;
1560   &lt;summary&gt;Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher&lt;/summary&gt;
1561   &lt;description&gt;
1562     &lt;p&gt;
1563       Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
1564       Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
1565       motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
1566       launcher.
1567     &lt;/p&gt;
1568   &lt;/description&gt;
1569   &lt;provides&gt;
1570     &lt;modalias&gt;usb:v1130p0202d*&lt;/modalias&gt;
1571   &lt;/provides&gt;
1572 &lt;/component&gt;
1573 </pre></blockquote>
1574
1575 <p>The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value,
1576 which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings
1577 (modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel.  In this case, it
1578 will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code
1579 0202.</p>
1580
1581 <p>Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files
1582 are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide
1583 appstream files.  Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for
1584 these files.  A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as
1585 it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions
1586 (in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use).  But
1587 it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as
1588 upstream for this project is dormant.</p>
1589
1590 <p>To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the
1591 mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the
1592 appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary
1593 package under /usr/share/appdata/.  I did this by adding the following
1594 line to debian/pymissile.install:</p>
1595
1596 <blockquote><pre>
1597 debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
1598 </pre></blockquote>
1599
1600 <p>With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list
1601 all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI
1602 pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already
1603 installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in
1604 question.</p>
1605
1606 <p>Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the
1607 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a> proposal.</p>
1608
1609 <p>To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine,
1610 try running this command on the command line:</p>
1611
1612 <blockquote><pre>
1613 cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
1614 </pre></blockquote>
1615
1616 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
1617 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
1618 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
1619
1620       </div>
1621       <div class="tags">
1622
1623
1624         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
1625
1626
1627       </div>
1628     </div>
1629     <div class="padding"></div>
1630
1631     <div class="entry">
1632       <div class="title">
1633         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_GNU_General_Public_License_is_not_magic_pixie_dust.html">The GNU General Public License is not magic pixie dust</a>
1634       </div>
1635       <div class="date">
1636         30th November 2015
1637       </div>
1638       <div class="body">
1639         <p>A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled
1640 "<a href="http://bonedaddy.net/pabs3/log/2015/11/27/sfc-supporter/">The
1641 GPL is not magic pixie dust</a>" explain the importance of making sure
1642 the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GPL</a> is enforced.
1643 I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:<p>
1644
1645 <blockquote>
1646
1647 <p><a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/"><img src="https://sfconservancy.org/img/supporter-badge.png" width="194" height="90" alt="Become a Software Freedom Conservancy Supporter!" align="right" border="0" /></a></p>
1648
1649 <blockquote>
1650 The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.<br/>
1651
1652 The first step is to choose a
1653 <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft</a> license for your
1654 code.<br/>
1655
1656 The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license,
1657 <b>it must be enforced</b><br/>
1658
1659 and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of
1660 work<br/>
1661
1662 is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do.
1663 </blockquote>
1664
1665 <p><small>-- <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/">Bradley Kuhn</a>, in
1666 <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in Freedom">FaiF</a>
1667 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode
1668 0x57</a></small></p>
1669
1670 <p>As the Debian Website
1671 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/794116">used</a>
1672 <a href="https://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/webwml/webwml/english/intro/free.wml?r1=1.24&amp;r2=1.25">to</a>
1673 imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to
1674 the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful
1675 software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or
1676 software products.  Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created
1677 to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but
1678 such licenses are not enough.  With the ongoing adoption of Free
1679 Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's
1680 expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of
1681 ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always.  As Karen
1682 and Bradley explained in <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in
1683 Freedom">FaiF</a>
1684 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode 0x57</a>,
1685 copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court
1686 to protect it.  The reality of today's world is that legal
1687 representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming.  With
1688 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/">gpl-violations.org</a> in hiatus
1689 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/news/20151027-homepage-recovers/">until</a>
1690 some time in 2016, the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software
1691 Freedom Conservancy</a> (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender
1692 of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations.
1693 In March the SFC supported a
1694 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">lawsuit
1695 by Christoph Hellwig</a> against VMware for refusing to
1696 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/vmware-lawsuit-faq.html">comply
1697 with the GPL</a> in relation to their use of parts of the Linux
1698 kernel.  Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and
1699 conferences
1700 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">blocked
1701 or cancelled their talks</a>.  As a result they have decided to rely
1702 less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of
1703 individuals who support Free Software and copyleft.  So the SFC has
1704 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/23/2015fundraiser/">launched</a>
1705 a <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">campaign</a> to create
1706 a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by
1707 supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free
1708 Software.</p>
1709
1710 <p>If you support Free Software,
1711 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/26/like-what-I-do/">like</a>
1712 what the SFC do, agree with their
1713 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">compliance
1714 principles</a>, are happy about their
1715 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">successes</a> in 2015,
1716 work on a project that is an SFC
1717 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/members/current/">member</a> and or
1718 just want to stand up for copyleft, please join
1719 <a href="https://identi.ca/cwebber/image/JQGPA4qbTyyp3-MY8QpvuA">Christopher
1720 Allan Webber</a>,
1721 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">Carol
1722 Smith</a>,
1723 <a href="http://www.jonobacon.org/2015/11/25/supporting-software-freedom-conservancy/">Jono
1724 Bacon</a>, myself and
1725 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/sponsors/#supporters">others</a> in
1726 becoming a
1727 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">supporter</a>.  For the
1728 next week your donation will be
1729 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/27/black-friday/">matched</a>
1730 by an anonymous donor.  Please also consider asking your employer to
1731 match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC.  Don't forget to
1732 spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or
1733 social media accounts.</p>
1734
1735 </blockquote>
1736
1737 <p>I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter
1738 of Software Freedom Conservancy myself.  Perhaps you should be a
1739 supporter too?</p>
1740
1741       </div>
1742       <div class="tags">
1743
1744
1745         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
1746
1747
1748       </div>
1749     </div>
1750     <div class="padding"></div>
1751
1752     <div class="entry">
1753       <div class="title">
1754         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/PGP_key_transition_statement_for_key_EE4E02F9.html">PGP key transition statement for key EE4E02F9</a>
1755       </div>
1756       <div class="date">
1757         17th November 2015
1758       </div>
1759       <div class="body">
1760         <p>I've needed a new OpenPGP key for a while, but have not had time to
1761 set it up properly.  I wanted to generate it offline and have it
1762 available on <a href="http://shop.kernelconcepts.de/#openpgp">a OpenPGP
1763 smart card</a> for daily use, and learning how to do it and finding
1764 time to sit down with an offline machine almost took forever.  But
1765 finally I've been able to complete the process, and have now moved
1766 from my old GPG key to a new GPG key.  See
1767 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-11-17-new-gpg-key-transition.txt">the
1768 full transition statement, signed with both my old and new key</a> for
1769 the details.  This is my new key:</p>
1770
1771 <pre>
1772 pub   3936R/<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/111D6B29EE4E02F9.html">111D6B29EE4E02F9</a> 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-14]
1773       Key fingerprint = 3AC7 B2E3 ACA5 DF87 78F1  D827 111D 6B29 EE4E 02F9
1774 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
1775 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@debian.org&gt;
1776 sub   4096R/87BAFB0E 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
1777 sub   4096R/F91E6DE9 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
1778 sub   4096R/A0439BAB 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
1779 </pre>
1780
1781 <p>The key can be downloaded from the OpenPGP key servers, signed by
1782 my old key.</p>
1783
1784 <p>If you signed my old key
1785 (<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/DB4CCC4B2A30D729.html">DB4CCC4B2A30D729</a>),
1786 I'd very much appreciate a signature on my new key, details and
1787 instructions in the transition statement. I m happy to reciprocate if
1788 you have a similarly signed transition statement to present.</p>
1789
1790       </div>
1791       <div class="tags">
1792
1793
1794         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
1795
1796
1797       </div>
1798     </div>
1799     <div class="padding"></div>
1800
1801     <div class="entry">
1802       <div class="title">
1803         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Pentagon_deciding_the_Norwegian_negotiating_position_on_Internet_governance_.html">Is Pentagon deciding the Norwegian negotiating position on Internet governance?</a>
1804       </div>
1805       <div class="date">
1806          3rd November 2015
1807       </div>
1808       <div class="body">
1809         <p>In Norway, all government offices are required by law to keep a
1810 list of every document or letter arriving and leaving their offices.
1811 Internal notes should also be documented.  The document list (called a mail
1812 journal - "postjournal" in Norwegian) is public information and thanks
1813 to the Norwegian Freedom of Information Act (Offentleglova) the mail
1814 journal is available for everyone.  Most offices even publish the mail
1815 journal on their web pages, as PDFs or tables in web pages.  The state-level offices even have a shared web based search service (called
1816 <a href="https://www.oep.no/">Offentlig Elektronisk Postjournal -
1817 OEP</a>) to make it possible to search the entries in the list.  Not
1818 all journal entries show up on OEP, and the search service is hard to
1819 use, but OEP does make it easier to find at least some interesting
1820 journal entries .</p>
1821
1822 <p>In 2012 I came across a document in the mail journal for the
1823 Norwegian Ministry of Transport and Communications on OEP that
1824 piqued my interest.  The title of the document was
1825 "<a href="https://www.oep.no/search/resultSingle.html?journalPostId=4192362">Internet
1826 Governance and how it affects national security</a>" (Norwegian:
1827 "Internet Governance og påvirkning på nasjonal sikkerhet").  The
1828 document date was 2012-05-22, and it was said to be sent from the
1829 "Permanent Mission of Norway to the United Nations".  I asked for a
1830 copy, but my request was rejected with a reference to a legal clause said to authorize them to reject it
1831 (<a href="http://lovdata.no/lov/2006-05-19-16/§20">offentleglova § 20,
1832 letter c</a>) and an explanation that the document was exempt because
1833 of foreign policy interests as it contained information related to the
1834 Norwegian negotiating position, negotiating strategies or similar.  I
1835 was told the information in the document related to the ongoing
1836 negotiation in the International Telecommunications Union (ITU).  The
1837 explanation made sense to me in early January 2013, as a ITU
1838 conference in Dubay discussing Internet Governance
1839 (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Telecommunication_Union#World_Conference_on_International_Telecommunications_2012_.28WCIT-12.29">World
1840 Conference on International Telecommunications - WCIT-12</a>) had just
1841 ended,
1842 <a href="http://www.digi.no/kommentarer/2012/12/18/tvil-om-usas-rolle-pa-teletoppmote">reportedly
1843 in chaos</a> when USA walked out of the negotiations and 25 countries
1844 including Norway refused to sign the new treaty.  It seemed
1845 reasonable to believe talks were still going on a few weeks later.
1846 Norway was represented at the ITU meeting by two authorities, the
1847 <a href="http://www.nkom.no/">Norwegian Communications Authority</a>
1848 and the <a href="https://www.regjeringen.no/no/dep/sd/">Ministry of
1849 Transport and Communications</a>.  This might be the reason the letter
1850 was sent to the ministry.  As I was unable to find the document in the
1851 mail journal of any Norwegian UN mission, I asked the ministry who had
1852 sent the document to the ministry, and was told that it was the Deputy
1853 Permanent Representative with the Permanent Mission of Norway in
1854 Geneva.</p>
1855
1856 <p>Three years later, I was still curious about the content of that
1857 document, and again asked for a copy, believing the negotiation was
1858 over now.  This time
1859 <a href="https://mimesbronn.no/request/kopi_av_dokumenter_i_sak_2012914">I
1860 asked both the Ministry of Transport and Communications as the
1861 receiver</a> and
1862 <a href="https://mimesbronn.no/request/brev_om_internet_governance_og_p">asked
1863 the Permanent Mission of Norway in Geneva as the sender</a> for a
1864 copy, to see if they both agreed that it should be withheld from the
1865 public.  The ministry upheld its rejection quoting the same law
1866 reference as before, while the permanent mission rejected it quoting a
1867 different clause
1868 (<a href="http://lovdata.no/lov/2006-05-19-16/§20">offentleglova § 20
1869 letter b</a>), claiming that they were required to keep the
1870 content of the document from the public because it contained
1871 information given to Norway with the expressed or implied expectation
1872 that the information should not be made public.  I asked the permanent
1873 mission for an explanation, and was told that the document contained
1874 an account from a meeting held in the Pentagon for a limited group of NATO
1875 nations where the organiser of the meeting did not intend the content
1876 of the meeting to be publicly known.  They explained that giving me a
1877 copy might cause Norway to not get access to similar information in
1878 the future and thus hurt the future foreign interests of Norway.  They
1879 also explained that the Permanent Mission of Norway in Geneva was not
1880 the author of the document, they only got a copy of it, and because of
1881 this had not listed it in their mail journal.</p>
1882
1883 <p>Armed with this
1884 knowledge I asked the Ministry to reconsider and asked who was the
1885 author of the document, now realising that it was not same as the
1886 "sender" according to Ministry of Transport and Communications.  The
1887 ministry upheld its rejection but told me the name of the author of
1888 the document.  According to
1889 <a href="https://www.regjeringen.no/no/aktuelt/unga69_rapport1/id2001204/">a
1890 government report</a> the author was with the Permanent Mission of
1891 Norway in New York a bit more than a year later (2014-09-22), so I
1892 guessed that might be the office responsible for writing and sending
1893 the report initially and
1894 <a href="https://www.mimesbronn.no/request/mote_2012_i_pentagon_om_itu">asked
1895 them for a copy</a> but I was obviously wrong as I was told that the
1896 document was unknown to them and that the author did not work there
1897 when the document was written.  Next, I asked the Permanent Mission of
1898 Norway in Geneva and the Foreign Ministry to reconsider and at least
1899 tell me who sent the document to Deputy Permanent Representative with
1900 the Permanent Mission of Norway in Geneva.  The Foreign Ministry also
1901 upheld its rejection, but told me that the person sending the document
1902 to Permanent Mission of Norway in Geneva was the defence attaché with
1903 the Norwegian Embassy in Washington.  I do not know if this is the
1904 same person as the author of the document.</p>
1905
1906 <p>If I understand the situation correctly, someone capable of
1907 inviting selected NATO nations to a meeting in Pentagon organised a
1908 meeting where someone representing the Norwegian defence attaché in
1909 Washington attended, and the account from this meeting is interpreted
1910 by the Ministry of Transport and Communications to expose Norways
1911 negotiating position, negotiating strategies and similar regarding the
1912 ITU negotiations on Internet Governance.  It is truly amazing what can
1913 be derived from mere meta-data.</p>
1914
1915 <p>I wonder which NATO countries besides Norway attended this meeting?
1916 And what exactly was said and done at the meeting?  Anyone know?</p>
1917
1918       </div>
1919       <div class="tags">
1920
1921
1922         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>.
1923
1924
1925       </div>
1926     </div>
1927     <div class="padding"></div>
1928
1929     <div class="entry">
1930       <div class="title">
1931         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_book___Fri_kultur__by__lessig__a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_translation_of__Free_Culture__from_2004.html">New book, "Fri kultur" by @lessig, a Norwegian Bokmål translation of "Free Culture" from 2004</a>
1932       </div>
1933       <div class="date">
1934         31st October 2015
1935       </div>
1936       <div class="body">
1937         <p>People keep asking me where to get the various forms of the book I
1938 published last week, the Norwegian Bokmål edition of Lawrence Lessigs
1939 book <a href="http://www.free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a>.  It was
1940 published on paper via lulu.com, and is also available in PDF, ePub
1941 and MOBI format.  I currently sell the paper edition for self cost
1942 from lulu.com, but might extend the distribution to book stores like
1943 Amazon and Barnes & Noble later.  This will double the price and force
1944 me to make a profit from selling the book.  Anyway, here are links to
1945 get the book in different formats:</p>
1946
1947 <ul>
1948
1949   <li><a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/fri-kultur/paperback/product-22406445.html">Buy
1950     paper edition from lulu.com</a></li>
1951
1952   <li><a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf">Download
1953     PDF, size 7.9 MiB</a> (gratis/free)</li>
1954
1955   <li><a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub">Download
1956     ePub, size 11 MiB</a> (gratis/free)</li>
1957
1958   <li><a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/archive/freeculture.nb.mobi">Download
1959     MOBI, size 3.8 MiB</a> (gratis/free)</li>
1960
1961 </ul>
1962
1963 <p>Note that the MOBI version have problems with the table of content,
1964 at least with the viewers I have been able to test.  And the ePub file
1965 have several problems according to
1966 <a href="https://github.com/IDPF/epubcheck">epubcheck</a>, but seem
1967 to display fine in the viewers I have tested.  All the files needed to
1968 create the book in various forms are available from
1969 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">the
1970 github project page</a>.</p>
1971
1972 <p>The project got press coverage from the Norwegian IT news site
1973 digi.no.  Check out the article
1974 "<a href="http://www.digi.no/juss_og_samfunn/2015/10/29/vil-apne-politikernes-oyne-for-creative-commons">Vil
1975 åpne politikernes øyne for Creative Commons</a>".</li>
1976
1977 <p>I've <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">blogged
1978 about the project</a> as it moved along.  The blogs document the translation
1979 progress and insights I had along the way.</p>
1980
1981       </div>
1982       <div class="tags">
1983
1984
1985         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
1986
1987
1988       </div>
1989     </div>
1990     <div class="padding"></div>
1991
1992     <div class="entry">
1993       <div class="title">
1994         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_Free_Culture__by__lessig___The_background_story_for_Creative_Commons___new_edition_available.html">"Free Culture" by @lessig - The background story for Creative Commons - new edition available</a>
1995       </div>
1996       <div class="date">
1997         23rd October 2015
1998       </div>
1999       <div class="body">
2000         <p><a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22402863.html">Click
2001 here to buy the book</a>.</p>
2002
2003 <p>In 2004, as the <a href="https://creativecommons.org/">Creative Commons
2004 movement</a> gained momentum, its creator Lawrence Lessig wrote the
2005 book <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Culture_(book)">Free
2006 Culture</a> to explain the problems with increasing copyright
2007 regulation and suggest some solutions.  I read the book back then and
2008 was very moved by it.  Reading the book inspired me and changed the
2009 way I looked on copyright law, and I would love it if more people
2010 would read it too.</p>
2011
2012 <p>Because of this, I decided in the summer of 2012 to translate it to
2013 Norwegian Bokmål and publish it for those of my friends and family
2014 that prefer to read books in Norwegian.  I translated the book using
2015 docbook and a gettext PO file, and a byproduct of this process is a
2016 new edition of the English original.  I've been in touch with the
2017 author during by work, and he said it was fine with him if I also
2018 published an English version.  So I decided to do so.  Today, I made
2019 this edition
2020 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22402863.html">available
2021 for sale on Lulu.com</a>, for those interested in a paper book.  This
2022 is the cover:
2023
2024 <p align="center"><a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22402863.html"><img align="center" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-10-23-free-culture-english-published-cover.png"/></a></p>
2025
2026 <p>The Norwegian Bokmål version will be available for purchase in a
2027 few days.  I also plan to publish a French version in a few weeks or
2028 months, depending on the amount of people with knowledge of French to
2029 join the translation project.  So far there is only one active
2030 person, but the French book is almost completely translated but
2031 need some proof reading.</p>
2032
2033 <p>The book is also available in PDF, ePub and MOBI formats from
2034 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">my
2035 github project page</a>.  Note the ePub and MOBI versions have some
2036 formatting problems I believe is due to bugs in the docbook tool
2037 dbtoepub (Debian BTS issues
2038 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=795842">#795842</a>
2039 and
2040 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=796871">#796871</a>),
2041 but I have not taken the time to investigate.  I recommend the PDF and
2042 ePub version for now, as they seem to show up fine in the viewers I
2043 have available.</p>
2044
2045 <p>After the translation to Norwegian Bokmål was complete, I was able
2046 to secure some sponsoring from
2047 <a href="http://www.nuugfoundation.no/">the NUUG Foundation</a> to
2048 print the book.  This is the reason their logo is located on the back
2049 cover. I am very grateful for their contribution, and will use it to
2050 give a copy of the Norwegian edition to members of the Norwegian
2051 Parliament and other decision makers here in Norway.</p>
2052
2053       </div>
2054       <div class="tags">
2055
2056
2057         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
2058
2059
2060       </div>
2061     </div>
2062     <div class="padding"></div>
2063
2064     <div class="entry">
2065       <div class="title">
2066         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lawrence_Lessig_interviewed_Edward_Snowden_a_year_ago.html">Lawrence Lessig interviewed Edward Snowden a year ago</a>
2067       </div>
2068       <div class="date">
2069         19th October 2015
2070       </div>
2071       <div class="body">
2072         <p>Last year, <a href="https://lessig2016.us/">US president candidate
2073 in the Democratic Party</a> Lawrence interviewed Edward Snowden.  The
2074 one hour interview was
2075 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_Sr96TFQQE">published by
2076 Harvard Law School 2014-10-23 on Youtube</a>, and the meeting took
2077 place 2014-10-20.</p>
2078
2079 <p>The questions are very good, and there is lots of useful
2080 information to be learned and very interesting issues to think about
2081 being raised.  Please check it out.</p>
2082
2083 <iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/o_Sr96TFQQE" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
2084
2085 <p>I find it especially interesting to hear again that Snowden did try
2086 to bring up his reservations through the official channels without any
2087 luck.  It is in sharp contrast to the answers made 2013-11-06 by the
2088 Norwegian prime minister Erna Solberg to the Norwegian Parliament,
2089 <a href="https://tale.holderdeord.no/speeches/s131106/68">claiming
2090 Snowden is no Whistle-Blower</a> because he should have taken up his
2091 concerns internally and using official channels.  It make me sad
2092 that this is the political leadership we have here in Norway.</p>
2093
2094       </div>
2095       <div class="tags">
2096
2097
2098         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
2099
2100
2101       </div>
2102     </div>
2103     <div class="padding"></div>
2104
2105     <div class="entry">
2106       <div class="title">
2107         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Story_of_Aaron_Swartz___Let_us_all_weep_.html">The Story of Aaron Swartz - Let us all weep!</a>
2108       </div>
2109       <div class="date">
2110          8th October 2015
2111       </div>
2112       <div class="body">
2113         <p>The movie "<a href="http://www.takepart.com/internets-own-boy">The
2114 Internet's Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Swartz</a>" is both inspiring
2115 and depressing at the same time.  The work of Aaron Swartz has
2116 inspired me in my work, and I am grateful of all the improvements he
2117 was able to initiate or complete.  I wish I am able to do as much good
2118 in my life as he did in his.  Every minute of this 1:45 long movie is
2119 inspiring in documenting how much impact a single person can have on
2120 improving the society and this world.  And it is depressing in
2121 documenting how the law enforcement of USA (and other countries) is
2122 corrupted to a point where they can push a bright kid to his death for
2123 downloading too many scientific articles.  Aaron is dead.  Let us all
2124 weep.</p>
2125
2126 <p>The movie is also available on
2127 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXr-2hwTk58">Youtube</a>.  I
2128 wish there were Norwegian subtitles available, so I could show it to
2129 my parents.</p>
2130
2131       </div>
2132       <div class="tags">
2133
2134
2135         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
2136
2137
2138       </div>
2139     </div>
2140     <div class="padding"></div>
2141
2142     <div class="entry">
2143       <div class="title">
2144         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/French_Docbook_PDF_EPUB_MOBI_edition_of_the_Free_Culture_book.html">French Docbook/PDF/EPUB/MOBI edition of the Free Culture book</a>
2145       </div>
2146       <div class="date">
2147          1st October 2015
2148       </div>
2149       <div class="body">
2150         <p>As I wrap up the Norwegian version of
2151 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">Free
2152 Culture</a> book by Lawrence Lessig (still waiting for my final proof
2153 reading copy to arrive in the mail), my great
2154 <a href="http://dblatex.sourceforge.net/">dblatex</a> helper and
2155 developer of the dblatex docbook processor, Benoît Guillon, decided a
2156 to try to create a French version of the book.  He started with the
2157 French translation available from the
2158 <a href="http://www.wikilivres.ca/wiki/Culture_libre">Wikilivres wiki
2159 pages</a>, and wrote a program to convert it into a PO file, allowing
2160 the translation to be integrated into the po4a based framework I use
2161 to create the Norwegian translation from the English edition.  We meet
2162 on the <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/%23dblatex">#dblatex IRC
2163 channel</a> to discuss the work.  If you want to help create a French
2164 edition, check out
2165 <a href="https://github.com/marsgui/free-culture-lessig">his git
2166 repository</a> and join us on IRC.  If the French edition look good,
2167 we might publish it as a paper book on lulu.com.  A French version of
2168 the drawings and the cover need to be provided for this to happen.</p>
2169
2170       </div>
2171       <div class="tags">
2172
2173
2174         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
2175
2176
2177       </div>
2178     </div>
2179     <div class="padding"></div>
2180
2181     <div class="entry">
2182       <div class="title">
2183         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">The life and death of a laptop battery</a>
2184       </div>
2185       <div class="date">
2186         24th September 2015
2187       </div>
2188       <div class="body">
2189         <p>When I get a new laptop, the battery life time at the start is OK.
2190 But this do not last.  The last few laptops gave me a feeling that
2191 within a year, the life time is just a fraction of what it used to be,
2192 and it slowly become painful to use the laptop without power connected
2193 all the time.  Because of this, when I got a new Thinkpad X230 laptop
2194 about two years ago, I decided to monitor its battery state to have
2195 more hard facts when the battery started to fail.</p>
2196
2197 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-24-laptop-battery-graph.png"/>
2198
2199 <p>First I tried to find a sensible Debian package to record the
2200 battery status, assuming that this must be a problem already handled
2201 by someone else.  I found
2202 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>,
2203 which collects statistics from the battery, but it was completely
2204 broken.  I sent a few suggestions to the maintainer, but decided to
2205 write my own collector as a shell script while I waited for feedback
2206 from him.  Via
2207 <a href="http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html">a
2208 blog post about the battery development on a MacBook Air</a> I also
2209 discovered
2210 <a href="https://github.com/jradavenport/batlog.git">batlog</a>, not
2211 available in Debian.</p>
2212
2213 <p>I started my collector 2013-07-15, and it has been collecting
2214 battery stats ever since. Now my
2215 /var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log file contain around 115,000
2216 measurements, from the time the battery was working great until now,
2217 when it is unable to charge above 7% of original capacity.  My
2218 collector shell script is quite simple and look like this:</p>
2219
2220 <pre>
2221 #!/bin/sh
2222 # Inspired by
2223 # http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html
2224 # See also
2225 # http://blog.sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/01/02/debian-how-to-monitor-battery-capacity/
2226 logfile=/var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log
2227
2228 files="manufacturer model_name technology serial_number \
2229     energy_full energy_full_design energy_now cycle_count status"
2230
2231 if [ ! -e "$logfile" ] ; then
2232     (
2233         printf "timestamp,"
2234         for f in $files; do
2235             printf "%s," $f
2236         done
2237         echo
2238     ) > "$logfile"
2239 fi
2240
2241 log_battery() {
2242     # Print complete message in one echo call, to avoid race condition
2243     # when several log processes run in parallel.
2244     msg=$(printf "%s," $(date +%s); \
2245         for f in $files; do \
2246             printf "%s," $(cat $f); \
2247         done)
2248     echo "$msg"
2249 }
2250
2251 cd /sys/class/power_supply
2252
2253 for bat in BAT*; do
2254     (cd $bat && log_battery >> "$logfile")
2255 done
2256 </pre>
2257
2258 <p>The script is called when the power management system detect a
2259 change in the power status (power plug in or out), and when going into
2260 and out of hibernation and suspend.  In addition, it collect a value
2261 every 10 minutes.  This make it possible for me know when the battery
2262 is discharging, charging and how the maximum charge change over time.
2263 The code for the Debian package
2264 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-status">is now
2265 available on github</a>.</p>
2266
2267 <p>The collected log file look like this:</p>
2268
2269 <pre>
2270 timestamp,manufacturer,model_name,technology,serial_number,energy_full,energy_full_design,energy_now,cycle_count,status,
2271 1376591133,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,62800000,62160000,39050000,0,Discharging,
2272 [...]
2273 1443090528,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
2274 1443090601,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
2275 </pre>
2276
2277 <p>I wrote a small script to create a graph of the charge development
2278 over time.  This graph depicted above show the slow death of my laptop
2279 battery.</p>
2280
2281 <p>But why is this happening?  Why are my laptop batteries always
2282 dying in a year or two, while the batteries of space probes and
2283 satellites keep working year after year.  If we are to believe
2284 <a href="http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries">Battery
2285 University</a>, the cause is me charging the battery whenever I have a
2286 chance, and the fix is to not charge the Lithium-ion batteries to 100%
2287 all the time, but to stay below 90% of full charge most of the time.
2288 I've been told that the Tesla electric cars
2289 <a href="http://my.teslamotors.com/de_CH/forum/forums/battery-charge-limit">limit
2290 the charge of their batteries to 80%</a>, with the option to charge to
2291 100% when preparing for a longer trip (not that I would want a car
2292 like Tesla where rights to privacy is abandoned, but that is another
2293 story), which I guess is the option we should have for laptops on
2294 Linux too.</p>
2295
2296 <p>Is there a good and generic way with Linux to tell the battery to
2297 stop charging at 80%, unless requested to charge to 100% once in
2298 preparation for a longer trip?  I found
2299 <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/34452/how-can-i-limit-battery-charging-to-80-capacity">one
2300 recipe on askubuntu for Ubuntu to limit charging on Thinkpad to
2301 80%</a>, but could not get it to work (kernel module refused to
2302 load).</p>
2303
2304 <p>I wonder why the battery capacity was reported to be more than 100%
2305 at the start.  I also wonder why the "full capacity" increases some
2306 times, and if it is possible to repeat the process to get the battery
2307 back to design capacity.  And I wonder if the discharge and charge
2308 speed change over time, or if this stay the same.  I did not yet try
2309 to write a tool to calculate the derivative values of the battery
2310 level, but suspect some interesting insights might be learned from
2311 those.</p>
2312
2313 <p>Update 2015-09-24: I got a tip to install the packages
2314 acpi-call-dkms and tlp (unfortunately missing in Debian stable)
2315 packages instead of the tp-smapi-dkms package I had tried to use
2316 initially, and use 'tlp setcharge 40 80' to change when charging start
2317 and stop.  I've done so now, but expect my existing battery is toast
2318 and need to be replaced.  The proposal is unfortunately Thinkpad
2319 specific.</p>
2320
2321       </div>
2322       <div class="tags">
2323
2324
2325         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2326
2327
2328       </div>
2329     </div>
2330     <div class="padding"></div>
2331
2332     <div class="entry">
2333       <div class="title">
2334         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Book_cover_for_the_Free_Culture_book_finally_done.html">Book cover for the Free Culture book finally done</a>
2335       </div>
2336       <div class="date">
2337          3rd September 2015
2338       </div>
2339       <div class="body">
2340         <p>Creating a good looking book cover proved harder than I expected.
2341 I wanted to create a cover looking similar to the original cover of
2342 the
2343 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">Free
2344 Culture</a> book we are translating to Norwegian, and I wanted it in
2345 vector format for high resolution printing.  But my inkscape knowledge
2346 were not nearly good enough to pull that off.
2347
2348 <p>But thanks to the great inkscape community, I was able to wrap up
2349 the cover yesterday evening.  I asked on the
2350 <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/%23inkscape">#inkscape IRC channel</a>
2351 on Freenode for help and clues, and Marc Jeanmougin (Mc-) volunteered
2352 to try to recreate it based on the PDF of the cover from the HTML
2353 version.  Not only did he create a
2354 <a href="https://marc.jeanmougin.fr/share/copy1.svg ">SVG document with
2355 the original and his vector version side by side</a>, he even provided
2356 an <a href="https://marc.jeanmougin.fr/share/out-1.ogv">instruction
2357 video</a> explaining how he did it</a>.  But the instruction video is
2358 not easy to follow for an untrained inkscape user. The video is a
2359 recording on how he did it, and he is obviously very experienced as
2360 the menu selections are very quick and he mentioned on IRC that he did
2361 use some keyboard shortcuts that can't be seen on the video, but it
2362 give a good idea about the inkscape operations to use to create the
2363 stripes with the embossed copyright sign in the center.</p>
2364
2365 <p>I took his SVG file, copied the vector image and re-sized it to fit
2366 on the cover I was drawing.  I am happy with the end result, and the
2367 current english version look like this:</p>
2368
2369 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-03-free-culture-cover.png" width="70%" align="center"/>
2370
2371 <p>I am not quite sure about the text on the back, but guess it will
2372 do.  I picked three quotes from the official site for the book, and
2373 hope it will work to trigger the interest of potential readers.  The
2374 Norwegian cover will look the same, but with the texts and bar code
2375 replaced with the Norwegian version.</p>
2376
2377 <p>The book is very close to being ready for publication, and I expect
2378 to upload the final draft to Lulu in the next few days and order a
2379 final proof reading copy to verify that everything look like it should
2380 before allowing everyone to order their own copy of Free Culture, in
2381 English or Norwegian Bokmål.  I'm waiting to give the the productive
2382 proof readers a chance to complete their work.</p>
2383
2384       </div>
2385       <div class="tags">
2386
2387
2388         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
2389
2390
2391       </div>
2392     </div>
2393     <div class="padding"></div>
2394
2395     <div class="entry">
2396       <div class="title">
2397         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/In_my_hand__a_pocket_book_edition_of_the_Norwegian_Free_Culture_book_.html">In my hand, a pocket book edition of the Norwegian Free Culture book!</a>
2398       </div>
2399       <div class="date">
2400         19th August 2015
2401       </div>
2402       <div class="body">
2403         <p>Today, finally, my first printed draft edition of the Norwegian
2404 translation of Free Culture I have been working on for the last few
2405 years arrived in the mail.  I had to fake a cover to get the interior
2406 printed, and the exterior of the book look awful, but that is
2407 irrelevant at this point.  I asked for a printed pocket book version
2408 to get an idea about the font sizes and paper format as well as how
2409 good the figures and images look in print, but also to test what the
2410 pocket book version would look like.  After receiving the 500 page
2411 pocket book, it became obvious to me that that pocket book size is too
2412 small for this book.  I believe the book is too thick, and several
2413 tables and figures do not look good in the size they get with that
2414 small page sizes.  I believe I will go with the 5.5x8.5 inch size
2415 instead.  A surprise discovery from the paper version was how bad the
2416 URLs look in print.  They are very hard to read in the colophon page.
2417 The URLs are red in the PDF, but light gray on paper.  I need to
2418 change the color of links somehow to look better.  But there is a
2419 printed book in my hand, and it feels great. :)</p>
2420
2421 <p>Now I only need to fix the cover, wrap up the postscript with the
2422 store behind the book, and collect the last corrections from the proof
2423 readers before the book is ready for proper printing.  Cover artists
2424 willing to work for free and create a Creative Commons licensed vector
2425 file looking similar to the original is most welcome, as my skills as
2426 a graphics designer are mostly missing.</p>
2427
2428       </div>
2429       <div class="tags">
2430
2431
2432         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
2433
2434
2435       </div>
2436     </div>
2437     <div class="padding"></div>
2438
2439     <div class="entry">
2440       <div class="title">
2441         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_paper_version_of_the_Norwegian_Free_Culture_book_heading_my_way.html">First paper version of the Norwegian Free Culture book heading my way</a>
2442       </div>
2443       <div class="date">
2444          9th August 2015
2445       </div>
2446       <div class="body">
2447         <p>Typesetting a book is harder than I hoped.  As the translation is
2448 mostly done, and a volunteer proof reader was going to check the text
2449 on paper, it was time this summer to focus on formatting my translated
2450 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">docbook</a> based version of the
2451 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> book by Lawrence
2452 Lessig.  I've been trying to get both docboox-xsl+fop and dblatex to
2453 give me a good looking PDF, but in the end I went with dblatex, because
2454 its Debian maintainer and upstream developer were responsive and very
2455 helpful in solving my formatting challenges.</p>
2456
2457 <p>Last night, I finally managed to create a PDF that no longer made
2458 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/">Lulu.com</a> complain after uploading,
2459 and I ordered a text version of the book on paper.  It is lacking a
2460 proper book cover and is not tagged with the correct ISBN number, but
2461 should give me an idea what the finished book will look like.</p>
2462
2463 <p>Instead of using Lulu, I did consider printing the book using
2464 <a href="http://www.createspace.com/">CreateSpace</a>, but ended up
2465 using Lulu because it had smaller book size options (CreateSpace seem
2466 to lack pocket book with extended distribution).  I looked for a
2467 similar service in Norway, but have not seen anything so far.  Please
2468 let me know if I am missing out on something here.</p>
2469
2470 <p>But I still struggle to decide the book size.  Should I go for
2471 pocket book (4.25x6.875 inches / 10.8x17.5 cm) with 556 pages, Digest
2472 (5.5x8.5 inches / 14x21.6 cm) with 323 pages or US Trade (6x8 inches /
2473 15.3x22.9 cm) with 280 pages?  Fewer pager give a cheaper book, and a
2474 smaller book is easier to carry around.  The test book I ordered was
2475 pocket book sized, to give me an idea how well that fit in my hand,
2476 but I suspect I will end up using a digest sized book in the end to
2477 bring the prize down further.</p>
2478
2479 <p>My biggest challenge at the moment is making nice cover art.  My
2480 inkscape skills are not yet up to the task of replicating the original
2481 cover in SVG format.  I also need to figure out what to write about
2482 the book on the back (will most likely use the same text as the
2483 description on web based book stores).  I would love help with this,
2484 if you are willing to license the art source and final version using
2485 the same CC license as the book.  My artistic skills are not really up
2486 to the task.</p>
2487
2488 <p>I plan to publish the book in both English and Norwegian and on
2489 paper, in PDF form as well as EPUB and MOBI format.  The current
2490 status can as usual be found on
2491 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>
2492 in the archive/ directory.  So far I have spent all time on making the
2493 PDF version look good.  Someone should probably do the same with the
2494 dbtoepub generated e-book.  Help is definitely needed here, as I
2495 expect to run out of steem before I find time to improve the epub
2496 formatting.</p>
2497
2498 <p>Please let me know via github if you find typos in the book or
2499 discover translations that should be improved.  The final proof
2500 reading is being done right now, and I expect to publish the finished
2501 result in a few months.</p>
2502
2503       </div>
2504       <div class="tags">
2505
2506
2507         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
2508
2509
2510       </div>
2511     </div>
2512     <div class="padding"></div>
2513
2514     <div class="entry">
2515       <div class="title">
2516         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Typesetting_DocBook_footnotes_as_endnotes_with_dblatex.html">Typesetting DocBook footnotes as endnotes with dblatex</a>
2517       </div>
2518       <div class="date">
2519         16th July 2015
2520       </div>
2521       <div class="body">
2522         <p>I'm still working on the Norwegian version of the
2523 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture book by Lawrence
2524 Lessig</a>, and is now working on the final typesetting and layout.
2525 One of the features I want to get the structure similar to the
2526 original book is to typeset the footnotes as endnotes in the notes
2527 chapter.  Based on the
2528 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/685063">feedback from the Debian
2529 maintainer and the dblatex developer</a>, I came up with this recipe I
2530 would like to share with you.  The proposal was to create a new LaTeX
2531 class file and add the LaTeX code there, but this is not always
2532 practical, when I want to be able to replace the class using a make
2533 file variable.  So my proposal misuses the latex.begindocument XSL
2534 parameter value, to get a small fragment into the correct location in
2535 the generated LaTeX File.</p>
2536
2537 <p>First, decide where in the DocBook document to place the endnotes,
2538 and add this text there:</p>
2539
2540 <pre>
2541 &lt;?latex \theendnotes ?&gt;
2542 </pre>
2543
2544 <p>Next, create a xsl stylesheet file dblatex-endnotes.xsl to add the
2545 code needed to add the endnote instructions in the preamble of the
2546 generated LaTeX document, with content like this:</p>
2547
2548 <pre>
2549 &lt;?xml version='1.0'?&gt;
2550 &lt;xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version='1.0'&gt;
2551   &lt;xsl:param name="latex.begindocument"&gt;
2552     &lt;xsl:text&gt;
2553 \usepackage{endnotes}
2554 \let\footnote=\endnote
2555 \def\enoteheading{\mbox{}\par\vskip-\baselineskip }
2556 \begin{document}
2557     &lt;/xsl:text&gt;
2558   &lt;/xsl:param&gt;
2559 &lt;/xsl:stylesheet&gt;
2560 </pre>
2561
2562 <p>Finally, load this xsl file when running dblatex, for example like
2563 this:</p>
2564
2565 <pre>
2566 dblatex --xsl-user=dblatex-endnotes.xsl freeculture.nb.xml
2567 </pre>
2568
2569 <p>The end result can be seen on github, where
2570 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">my
2571 book project</a> is located.</p>
2572
2573       </div>
2574       <div class="tags">
2575
2576
2577         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
2578
2579
2580       </div>
2581     </div>
2582     <div class="padding"></div>
2583
2584     <div class="entry">
2585       <div class="title">
2586         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MPEG_LA_on__Internet_Broadcast_AVC_Video__licensing_and_non_private_use.html">MPEG LA on "Internet Broadcast AVC Video" licensing and non-private use</a>
2587       </div>
2588       <div class="date">
2589          7th July 2015
2590       </div>
2591       <div class="body">
2592         <p>After asking the Norwegian Broadcasting Company (NRK)
2593 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hva_gj_r_at_NRK_kan_distribuere_H_264_video_uten_patentavtale_med_MPEG_LA_.html">why
2594 they can broadcast and stream H.264 video without an agreement with
2595 the MPEG LA</a>, I was wiser, but still confused.  So I asked MPEG LA
2596 if their understanding matched that of NRK.  As far as I can tell, it
2597 does not.</p>
2598
2599 <p>I started by asking for more information about the various
2600 licensing classes and what exactly is covered by the "Internet
2601 Broadcast AVC Video" class that NRK pointed me at to explain why NRK
2602 did not need a license for streaming H.264 video:
2603
2604 <p><blockquote>
2605
2606 <p>According to
2607 <a href="http://www.mpegla.com/Lists/MPEG%20LA%20News%20List/Attachments/226/n-10-02-02.pdf">a
2608 MPEG LA press release dated 2010-02-02</a>, there is no charge when
2609 using MPEG AVC/H.264 according to the terms of "Internet Broadcast AVC
2610 Video".  I am trying to understand exactly what the terms of "Internet
2611 Broadcast AVC Video" is, and wondered if you could help me.  What
2612 exactly is covered by these terms, and what is not?</p>
2613
2614 <p>The only source of more information I have been able to find is a
2615 PDF named
2616 <a href="http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/avc/Documents/avcweb.pdf">AVC
2617 Patent Portfolio License Briefing</a>, which states this about the
2618 fees:</p>
2619
2620 <ul>
2621  <li>Where End User pays for AVC Video
2622   <ul>
2623    <li>Subscription (not limited by title) – 100,000 or fewer
2624      subscribers/yr = no royalty; &gt; 100,000 to 250,000 subscribers/yr =
2625      $25,000; &gt;250,000 to 500,000 subscribers/yr = $50,000; &gt;500,000 to
2626      1M subscribers/yr = $75,000; &gt;1M subscribers/yr = $100,000</li>
2627
2628    <li>Title-by-Title - 12 minutes or less = no royalty; &gt;12 minutes in
2629      length = lower of (a) 2% or (b) $0.02 per title</li>
2630   </ul></li>
2631
2632  <li>Where remuneration is from other sources
2633   <ul>
2634    <li>Free Television - (a) one-time $2,500 per transmission encoder or
2635      (b) annual fee starting at $2,500 for &gt; 100,000 HH rising to
2636      maximum $10,000 for &gt;1,000,000 HH</li>
2637
2638    <li>Internet Broadcast AVC Video (not title-by-title, not subscription)
2639      – no royalty for life of the AVC Patent Portfolio License</li>
2640   </ul></li>
2641 </ul>
2642
2643 <p>Am I correct in assuming that the four categories listed is the
2644 categories used when selecting licensing terms, and that "Internet
2645 Broadcast AVC Video" is the category for things that do not fall into
2646 one of the other three categories?  Can you point me to a good source
2647 explaining what is ment by "title-by-title" and "Free Television" in
2648 the license terms for AVC/H.264?</p>
2649
2650 <p>Will a web service providing H.264 encoded video content in a
2651 "video on demand" fashing similar to Youtube and Vimeo, where no
2652 subscription is required and no payment is required from end users to
2653 get access to the videos, fall under the terms of the "Internet
2654 Broadcast AVC Video", ie no royalty for life of the AVC Patent
2655 Portfolio license?  Does it matter if some users are subscribed to get
2656 access to personalized services?</p>
2657
2658 <p>Note, this request and all answers will be published on the
2659 Internet.</p>
2660 </blockquote></p>
2661
2662 <p>The answer came quickly from Benjamin J. Myers, Licensing Associate
2663 with the MPEG LA:</p>
2664
2665 <p><blockquote>
2666 <p>Thank you for your message and for your interest in MPEG LA.  We
2667 appreciate hearing from you and I will be happy to assist you.</p>
2668
2669 <p>As you are aware, MPEG LA offers our AVC Patent Portfolio License
2670 which provides coverage under patents that are essential for use of
2671 the AVC/H.264 Standard (MPEG-4 Part 10).  Specifically, coverage is
2672 provided for end products and video content that make use of AVC/H.264
2673 technology.  Accordingly, the party offering such end products and
2674 video to End Users concludes the AVC License and is responsible for
2675 paying the applicable royalties.</p>
2676
2677 <p>Regarding Internet Broadcast AVC Video, the AVC License generally
2678 defines such content to be video that is distributed to End Users over
2679 the Internet free-of-charge.  Therefore, if a party offers a service
2680 which allows users to upload AVC/H.264 video to its website, and such
2681 AVC Video is delivered to End Users for free, then such video would
2682 receive coverage under the sublicense for Internet Broadcast AVC
2683 Video, which is not subject to any royalties for the life of the AVC
2684 License.  This would also apply in the scenario where a user creates a
2685 free online account in order to receive a customized offering of free
2686 AVC Video content.  In other words, as long as the End User is given
2687 access to or views AVC Video content at no cost to the End User, then
2688 no royalties would be payable under our AVC License.</p>
2689
2690 <p>On the other hand, if End Users pay for access to AVC Video for a
2691 specific period of time (e.g., one month, one year, etc.), then such
2692 video would constitute Subscription AVC Video.  In cases where AVC
2693 Video is delivered to End Users on a pay-per-view basis, then such
2694 content would constitute Title-by-Title AVC Video.  If a party offers
2695 Subscription or Title-by-Title AVC Video to End Users, then they would
2696 be responsible for paying the applicable royalties you noted below.</p>
2697
2698 <p>Finally, in the case where AVC Video is distributed for free
2699 through an "over-the-air, satellite and/or cable transmission", then
2700 such content would constitute Free Television AVC Video and would be
2701 subject to the applicable royalties.</p>
2702
2703 <p>For your reference, I have attached
2704 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-07-07-mpegla.pdf">a
2705 .pdf copy of the AVC License</a>. You will find the relevant
2706 sublicense information regarding AVC Video in Sections 2.2 through
2707 2.5, and the corresponding royalties in Section 3.1.2 through 3.1.4.
2708 You will also find the definitions of Title-by-Title AVC Video,
2709 Subscription AVC Video, Free Television AVC Video, and Internet
2710 Broadcast AVC Video in Section 1 of the License.  Please note that the
2711 electronic copy is provided for informational purposes only and cannot
2712 be used for execution.</p>
2713
2714 <p>I hope the above information is helpful.  If you have additional
2715 questions or need further assistance with the AVC License, please feel
2716 free to contact me directly.</p>
2717 </blockquote></p>
2718
2719 <p>Having a fresh copy of the license text was useful, and knowing
2720 that the definition of Title-by-Title required payment per title made
2721 me aware that my earlier understanding of that phrase had been wrong.
2722 But I still had a few questions:</p>
2723
2724 <p><blockquote>
2725 <p>I have a small followup question.  Would it be possible for me to get
2726 a license with MPEG LA even if there are no royalties to be paid?  The
2727 reason I ask, is that some video related products have a copyright
2728 clause limiting their use without a license with MPEG LA.  The clauses
2729 typically look similar to this:
2730
2731 <p><blockquote>
2732   This product is licensed under the AVC patent portfolio license for
2733   the personal and non-commercial use of a consumer to (a) encode
2734   video in compliance with the AVC standard ("AVC video") and/or (b)
2735   decode AVC video that was encoded by a consumer engaged in a
2736   personal and non-commercial activity and/or AVC video that was
2737   obtained from a video provider licensed to provide AVC video. No
2738   license is granted or shall be implied for any other use. additional
2739   information may be obtained from MPEG LA L.L.C.
2740 </blockquote></p>
2741
2742 <p>It is unclear to me if this clause mean that I need to enter into
2743 an agreement with MPEG LA to use the product in question, even if
2744 there are no royalties to be paid to MPEG LA.  I suspect it will
2745 differ depending on the jurisdiction, and mine is Norway.  What is
2746 MPEG LAs view on this?</p>
2747 </blockquote></p>
2748
2749 <p>According to the answer, MPEG LA believe those using such tools for
2750 non-personal or commercial use need a license with them:</p>
2751
2752 <p><blockquote>
2753
2754 <p>With regard to the Notice to Customers, I would like to begin by
2755 clarifying that the Notice from Section 7.1 of the AVC License
2756 reads:</p>
2757
2758 <p>THIS PRODUCT IS LICENSED UNDER THE AVC PATENT PORTFOLIO LICENSE FOR
2759 THE PERSONAL USE OF A CONSUMER OR OTHER USES IN WHICH IT DOES NOT
2760 RECEIVE REMUNERATION TO (i) ENCODE VIDEO IN COMPLIANCE WITH THE AVC
2761 STANDARD ("AVC VIDEO") AND/OR (ii) DECODE AVC VIDEO THAT WAS ENCODED
2762 BY A CONSUMER ENGAGED IN A PERSONAL ACTIVITY AND/OR WAS OBTAINED FROM
2763 A VIDEO PROVIDER LICENSED TO PROVIDE AVC VIDEO. NO LICENSE IS GRANTED
2764 OR SHALL BE IMPLIED FOR ANY OTHER USE. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION MAY BE
2765 OBTAINED FROM MPEG LA, L.L.C. SEE HTTP://WWW.MPEGLA.COM</p>
2766
2767 <p>The Notice to Customers is intended to inform End Users of the
2768 personal usage rights (for example, to watch video content) included
2769 with the product they purchased, and to encourage any party using the
2770 product for commercial purposes to contact MPEG LA in order to become
2771 licensed for such use (for example, when they use an AVC Product to
2772 deliver Title-by-Title, Subscription, Free Television or Internet
2773 Broadcast AVC Video to End Users, or to re-Sell a third party's AVC
2774 Product as their own branded AVC Product).</p>
2775
2776 <p>Therefore, if a party is to be licensed for its use of an AVC
2777 Product to Sell AVC Video on a Title-by-Title, Subscription, Free
2778 Television or Internet Broadcast basis, that party would need to
2779 conclude the AVC License, even in the case where no royalties were
2780 payable under the License.  On the other hand, if that party (either a
2781 Consumer or business customer) simply uses an AVC Product for their
2782 own internal purposes and not for the commercial purposes referenced
2783 above, then such use would be included in the royalty paid for the AVC
2784 Products by the licensed supplier.</p>
2785
2786 <p>Finally, I note that our AVC License provides worldwide coverage in
2787 countries that have AVC Patent Portfolio Patents, including
2788 Norway.</p>
2789
2790 <p>I hope this clarification is helpful.  If I may be of any further
2791 assistance, just let me know.</p>
2792 </blockquote></p>
2793
2794 <p>The mentioning of Norwegian patents made me a bit confused, so I
2795 asked for more information:</p>
2796
2797 <p><blockquote>
2798
2799 <p>But one minor question at the end.  If I understand you correctly,
2800 you state in the quote above that there are patents in the AVC Patent
2801 Portfolio that are valid in Norway.  This make me believe I read the
2802 list available from &lt;URL:
2803 <a href="http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/PatentList.aspx">http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/AVC/Pages/PatentList.aspx</a>
2804 &gt; incorrectly, as I believed the "NO" prefix in front of patents
2805 were Norwegian patents, and the only one I could find under Mitsubishi
2806 Electric Corporation expired in 2012.  Which patents are you referring
2807 to that are relevant for Norway?</p>
2808
2809 </blockquote></p>
2810
2811 <p>Again, the quick answer explained how to read the list of patents
2812 in that list:</p>
2813
2814 <p><blockquote>
2815
2816 <p>Your understanding is correct that the last AVC Patent Portfolio
2817 Patent in Norway expired on 21 October 2012.  Therefore, where AVC
2818 Video is both made and Sold in Norway after that date, then no
2819 royalties would be payable for such AVC Video under the AVC License.
2820 With that said, our AVC License provides historic coverage for AVC
2821 Products and AVC Video that may have been manufactured or Sold before
2822 the last Norwegian AVC patent expired.  I would also like to clarify
2823 that coverage is provided for the country of manufacture and the
2824 country of Sale that has active AVC Patent Portfolio Patents.</p>
2825
2826 <p>Therefore, if a party offers AVC Products or AVC Video for Sale in
2827 a country with active AVC Patent Portfolio Patents (for example,
2828 Sweden, Denmark, Finland, etc.), then that party would still need
2829 coverage under the AVC License even if such products or video are
2830 initially made in a country without active AVC Patent Portfolio
2831 Patents (for example, Norway).  Similarly, a party would need to
2832 conclude the AVC License if they make AVC Products or AVC Video in a
2833 country with active AVC Patent Portfolio Patents, but eventually Sell
2834 such AVC Products or AVC Video in a country without active AVC Patent
2835 Portfolio Patents.</p>
2836 </blockquote></p>
2837
2838 <p>As far as I understand it, MPEG LA believe anyone using Adobe
2839 Premiere and other video related software with a H.264 distribution
2840 license need a license agreement with MPEG LA to use such tools for
2841 anything non-private or commercial, while it is OK to set up a
2842 Youtube-like service as long as no-one pays to get access to the
2843 content.  I still have no clear idea how this applies to Norway, where
2844 none of the patents MPEG LA is licensing are valid.  Will the
2845 copyright terms take precedence or can those terms be ignored because
2846 the patents are not valid in Norway?</p>
2847
2848       </div>
2849       <div class="tags">
2850
2851
2852         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
2853
2854
2855       </div>
2856     </div>
2857     <div class="padding"></div>
2858
2859     <div class="entry">
2860       <div class="title">
2861         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_laptop___some_more_clues_and_ideas_based_on_feedback.html">New laptop - some more clues and ideas based on feedback</a>
2862       </div>
2863       <div class="date">
2864          5th July 2015
2865       </div>
2866       <div class="body">
2867         <p>Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my
2868 need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback.  I wish to
2869 thank every one of these.  Several pointed me to the possibility of
2870 fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to
2871 do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the
2872 machine.  But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it
2873 with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live
2874 for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement.  If I did
2875 not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts
2876 using <a href="http://www.francecrans.com/">FrancEcrans</a>, but it
2877 might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.</p>
2878
2879 <p>One tip I got was to use the
2880 <a href="https://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=nb">Skinflint</a> web service to
2881 compare laptop models.  It seem to have more models available than
2882 prisjakt.no.  Another tip I got from someone I know have similar
2883 keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not
2884 very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook
2885 keyboards I tested.  Because of this, I will not consider it any further.
2886
2887 <p>When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the
2888 newest Thinkpad X model.  The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons
2889 (which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with
2890 Debian Sid/Unstable according to
2891 <a href="http://www.corsac.net/X250/">Corsac.net</a>.  The reports I
2892 got on the keyboard quality are not consistent.  Some say the keyboard
2893 is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good.
2894 Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250
2895 keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I
2896 keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to
2897 replace it.  I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk
2898 activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230.  I'm
2899 also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit
2900 noisy.  In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian
2901 Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.</p>
2902
2903 <p>I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was
2904 <a href="http://pro-star.com">Pro-Star</a>, another was
2905 <a href="http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/product/libreboot-x200/">Libreboot</a>.
2906 The latter look very attractive to me.</p>
2907
2908 <p>Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback.  It help a lot
2909 as I keep looking for a replacement.</p>
2910
2911 <p>Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the
2912 <a href="">lapstore.de</a> web shop for used laptops.  They got several
2913 different
2914 <a href="http://www.lapstore.de/f.php/shop/lapstore/f/411/lang/x/kw/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X_Serie/">old
2915 thinkpad X models</a>, and provide one year warranty.</p>
2916
2917       </div>
2918       <div class="tags">
2919
2920
2921         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2922
2923
2924       </div>
2925     </div>
2926     <div class="padding"></div>
2927
2928     <div class="entry">
2929       <div class="title">
2930         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_to_find_a_new_laptop__as_the_old_one_is_broken_after_only_two_years.html">Time to find a new laptop, as the old one is broken after only two years</a>
2931       </div>
2932       <div class="date">
2933          3rd July 2015
2934       </div>
2935       <div class="body">
2936         <p>My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a
2937 replacement soon.  The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230
2938 started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken
2939 cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the
2940 flickering.</p>
2941
2942 <p>My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is
2943 still as
2944 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">I
2945 described them in 2013</a>.  The last time I bought a laptop, I had
2946 good help from
2947 <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/category.php?k=353">prisjakt.no</a>
2948 where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin,
2949 wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually.  Three button mouse
2950 and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three
2951 laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and
2952 G2) lack three mouse buttons).  It is also unclear to me how good the
2953 keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are.  I hope Lenovo have not messed up
2954 the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have
2955 deteriorated since X41.</p>
2956
2957 <p>I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options
2958 seem sensible to me?  Are there better services around to search the
2959 set of available laptops for features?  Please send me an email if you
2960 have suggestions.</p>
2961
2962 <p>Update 2015-07-23: I got a suggestion to check out the FSF
2963 <a href="http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom">list
2964 of endorsed hardware</a>, which is useful background information.</p>
2965
2966       </div>
2967       <div class="tags">
2968
2969
2970         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2971
2972
2973       </div>
2974     </div>
2975     <div class="padding"></div>
2976
2977     <div class="entry">
2978       <div class="title">
2979         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/MakerCon_Nordic_videos_now_available_on_Frikanalen.html">MakerCon Nordic videos now available on Frikanalen</a>
2980       </div>
2981       <div class="date">
2982          2nd July 2015
2983       </div>
2984       <div class="body">
2985         <p>Last oktober I was involved on behalf of
2986 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">NUUG</a> with recording the talks at
2987 <a href="http://www.makercon.no/">MakerCon Nordic</a>, a conference for
2988 the Maker movement.  Since then it has been the plan to publish the
2989 recordings on <a href="http://www.frikanalen.no/">Frikanalen</a>, which
2990 finally happened the last few days.  A few talks are missing because
2991 the speakers asked the organizers to not publish them, but most of the
2992 talks are available.  The talks are being broadcasted on RiksTV
2993 channel 50 and using multicast on Uninett, as well as being available
2994 from the Frikanalen web site.  The unedited recordings are
2995 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/MakerConNordic/">available on
2996 Youtube too</a>.</p>
2997
2998 <p>This is the list of talks available at the moment.  Visit the
2999 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.no/video/?q=makercon">Frikanalen video
3000 pages</a> to view them.</p>
3001
3002 <ul>
3003
3004   <li>Evolutionary algorithms as a design tool - from art
3005       to robotics (Kyrre Glette)</li>
3006
3007   <li>Make and break (Hans Gerhard Meier)</li>
3008
3009   <li>Making a one year school course for young makers
3010       (Olav Helland)</li>
3011
3012   <li>Innovation Inspiration - IPR Databases as a Source of
3013       Inspiration (Hege Langlo)</li>
3014
3015   <li>Making a toy for makers (Erik Torstensson)</li>
3016
3017   <li>How to make 3D printer electronics (Elias Bakken)</li>
3018
3019   <li>Hovering Clouds: Looking at online tool offerings for Product
3020       Design and 3D Printing (William Kempton)</li>
3021
3022   <li>Travelling maker stories (Øyvind Nydal Dahl)</li>
3023
3024   <li>Making the first Maker Faire in Sweden (Nils Olander)</li>
3025
3026   <li>Breaking the mold: Printing 1000’s of parts (Espen Sivertsen)</li>
3027
3028   <li>Ultimaker — and open source 3D printing (Erik de Bruijn)</li>
3029
3030   <li>Autodesk’s 3D Printing Platform: Sparking innovation (Hilde
3031       Sevens)</li>
3032
3033   <li>How Making is Changing the World – and How You Can Too!
3034       (Jennifer Turliuk)</li>
3035
3036   <li>Open-Source Adventuring: OpenROV, OpenExplorer and the Future of
3037       Connected Exploration (David Lang)</li>
3038
3039   <li>Making in Norway (Haakon Karlsen Jr., Graham Hayward and Jens
3040       Dyvik)</li>
3041
3042   <li>The Impact of the Maker Movement (Mike Senese)</li>
3043
3044 </ul>
3045
3046 <p>Part of the reason this took so long was that the scripts NUUG had
3047 to prepare a recording for publication were five years old and no
3048 longer worked with the current video processing tools (command line
3049 argument changes).  In addition, we needed better audio normalization,
3050 which sent me on a detour to
3051 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Measuring_and_adjusting_the_loudness_of_a_TV_channel_using_bs1770gain.html">package
3052 bs1770gain for Debian</a>.  Now this is in place and it became a lot
3053 easier to publish NUUG videos on Frikanalen.</p>
3054
3055       </div>
3056       <div class="tags">
3057
3058
3059         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
3060
3061
3062       </div>
3063     </div>
3064     <div class="padding"></div>
3065
3066     <div class="entry">
3067       <div class="title">
3068         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Graphing_the_Norwegian_company_ownership_structure.html">Graphing the Norwegian company ownership structure</a>
3069       </div>
3070       <div class="date">
3071         15th June 2015
3072       </div>
3073       <div class="body">
3074         <p>It is a bit work to figure out the ownership structure of companies
3075 in Norway.  The information is publicly available, but one need to
3076 recursively look up ownership for all owners to figure out the complete
3077 ownership graph of a given set of companies.  To save me the work in
3078 the future, I wrote a script to do this automatically, outputting the
3079 ownership structure using the Graphviz/dotty format.  The data source
3080 is web scraping from <a href="http://www.proff.no/">Proff</a>, because
3081 I failed to find a useful source directly from the official keepers of
3082 the ownership data, <a href="http://www.brreg.no/">Brønnøysundsregistrene</a>.</p>
3083
3084 <p>To get an ownership graph for a set of companies, fetch
3085 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/brreg-norway-ownership-graph">the code from git</a> and run it using the organisation number.  I'm
3086 using the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet as an example here, as its
3087 ownership structure is very simple:</p>
3088
3089 <pre>
3090 % time ./bin/eierskap-dotty 958033540 > dagbladet.dot
3091
3092 real    0m2.841s
3093 user    0m0.184s
3094 sys     0m0.036s
3095 %
3096 </pre>
3097
3098 <p>The script accept several organisation numbers on the command line,
3099 allowing a cluster of companies to be graphed in the same image.  The
3100 resulting dot file for the example above look like this.  The edges
3101 are labeled with the ownership percentage, and the nodes uses the
3102 organisation number as their name and the name as the label:</p>
3103
3104 <pre>
3105 digraph ownership {
3106 rankdir = LR;
3107 "Aller Holding A/s" -> "910119877" [label="100%"]
3108 "910119877" -> "998689015" [label="100%"]
3109 "998689015" -> "958033540" [label="99%"]
3110 "974530600" -> "958033540" [label="1%"]
3111 "958033540" [label="AS DAGBLADET"]
3112 "998689015" [label="Berner Media Holding AS"]
3113 "974530600" [label="Dagbladets Stiftelse"]
3114 "910119877" [label="Aller Media AS"]
3115 }
3116 </pre>
3117
3118 <p>To view the ownership graph, run "<tt>dotty dagbladet.dot</tt>" or
3119 convert it to a PNG using "<tt>dot -T png dagbladet.dot >
3120 dagbladet.png</tt>".  The result can be seen below:</p>
3121
3122 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-06-15-ownership-graphs-norway-dagbladet.png" width="80%">
3123
3124 <p>Note that I suspect the "Aller Holding A/S" entry to be incorrect
3125 data in the official ownership register, as that name is not
3126 registered in the official company register for Norway.  The ownership
3127 register is sensitive to typos and there seem to be no strict checking
3128 of the ownership links.</p>
3129
3130 <p>Let me know if you improve the script or find better data sources.
3131 The code is licensed according to GPL 2 or newer.</p>
3132
3133 <p>Update 2015-06-15: Since the initial post I've been told that
3134 "<a href="http://www.proff.dk/firma/carl-allers-etablissement-aktieselskab/københavn-v/hovedkontorer/13624518-3/">Aller
3135 Holding A/S</a>" is a Danish company, which explain why it did not
3136 have a Norwegian organisation number.  I've also been told that there
3137 is a <a href="http://www.brreg.no/automatiske/webservices/">web
3138 services API available</a> from Brønnøysundsregistrene, for those
3139 willing to accept the terms or pay the price.</p>
3140
3141       </div>
3142       <div class="tags">
3143
3144
3145         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn</a>.
3146
3147
3148       </div>
3149     </div>
3150     <div class="padding"></div>
3151
3152     <div class="entry">
3153       <div class="title">
3154         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Measuring_and_adjusting_the_loudness_of_a_TV_channel_using_bs1770gain.html">Measuring and adjusting the loudness of a TV channel using bs1770gain</a>
3155       </div>
3156       <div class="date">
3157         11th June 2015
3158       </div>
3159       <div class="body">
3160         <p>Television loudness is the source of frustration for viewers
3161 everywhere.  Some channels are very load, others are less loud, and
3162 ads tend to shout very high to get the attention of the viewers, and
3163 the viewers do not like this.  This fact is well known to the TV
3164 channels.  See for example the BBC white paper
3165 "<a href="http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp-pdf-files/WHP202.pdf">Terminology
3166 for loudness and level dBTP, LU, and all that</a>" from 2011 for a
3167 summary of the problem domain.  To better address the need for even
3168 loadness, the TV channels got together several years ago to agree on a
3169 new way to measure loudness in digital files as one step in
3170 standardizing loudness.  From this came the ITU-R standard BS.1770,
3171 "<a href="http://www.itu.int/rec/R-REC-BS.1770/en">Algorithms to
3172 measure audio programme loudness and true-peak audio level</a>".</p>
3173
3174 <p>The ITU-R BS.1770 specification describe an algorithm to measure
3175 loadness in LUFS (Loudness Units, referenced to Full Scale). But
3176 having a way to measure is not enough.  To get the same loudness
3177 across TV channels, one also need to decide which value to standardize
3178 on.  For European TV channels, this was done in the EBU Recommondaton
3179 R128, "<a href="https://tech.ebu.ch/docs/r/r128.pdf">Loudness
3180 normalisation and permitted maximum level of audio signals</a>", which
3181 specifies a recommended level of -23 LUFS.  In Norway, I have been
3182 told that NRK, TV2, MTG and SBS have decided among themselves to
3183 follow the R128 recommondation for playout from 2016-03-01.</p>
3184
3185 <p>There are free software available to measure and adjust the loudness
3186 level using the LUFS.  In Debian, I am aware of a library named
3187 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libebur128">libebur128</a>
3188 able to measure the loudness and since yesterday morning a new binary
3189 named <a href="http://bs1770gain.sourceforge.net">bs1770gain</a>
3190 capable of both measuring and adjusting was uploaded and is waiting
3191 for NEW processing.  I plan to maintain the latter in Debian under the
3192 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?email=pkg-multimedia-maintainers%40lists.alioth.debian.org">Debian
3193 multimedia</a> umbrella.</p>
3194
3195 <p>The free software based TV channel I am involved in,
3196 <a href="http://www.frikanalen.no/">Frikanalen</a>, plan to follow the
3197 R128 recommondation ourself as soon as we can adjust the software to
3198 do so, and the bs1770gain tool seem like a good fit for that part of
3199 the puzzle to measure loudness on new video uploaded to Frikanalen.
3200 Personally, I plan to use bs1770gain to adjust the loudness of videos
3201 I upload to Frikanalen on behalf of <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
3202 NUUG member organisation</a>.  The program seem to be able to measure
3203 the LUFS value of any media file handled by ffmpeg, but I've only
3204 successfully adjusted the LUFS value of WAV files.  I suspect it
3205 should be able to adjust it for all the formats handled by ffmpeg.</p>
3206
3207       </div>
3208       <div class="tags">
3209
3210
3211         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
3212
3213
3214       </div>
3215     </div>
3216     <div class="padding"></div>
3217
3218     <div class="entry">
3219       <div class="title">
3220         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Norwegian_citizens_now_required_by_law_to_give_their_fingerprint_to_the_police.html">Norwegian citizens now required by law to give their fingerprint to the police</a>
3221       </div>
3222       <div class="date">
3223         10th May 2015
3224       </div>
3225       <div class="body">
3226         <p>5 days ago, the Norwegian Parliament decided, unanimously, that all
3227 citizens of Norway, no matter if they are suspected of something
3228 criminal or not, are
3229 <a href="https://www.holderdeord.no/votes/1430838871e">required to
3230 give fingerprints to the police</a> (vote details from Holder de
3231 ord).  The law make it sound like it will be optional, but in a few
3232 years there will be no option any more.  The ID will be required to
3233 vote, to get a bank account, a bank card, to change address on the
3234 post office, to receive an electronic ID or to get a drivers license
3235 and many other tasks required to function in Norway.  The banks plan
3236 to stop providing their own ID on the bank cards when this new
3237 national ID is introduced, and the national road authorities plan to
3238 change the drivers license to no longer be usable as identity cards.
3239 In effect, to function as a citizen in Norway a national ID card will
3240 be required, and to get it one need to provide the fingerprints to
3241 the police.</p>
3242
3243 <p>In addition to handing the fingerprint to the police (which
3244 promised to not make a copy of the fingerprint image at that point in
3245 time, but say nothing about doing it later), a picture of the
3246 fingerprint will be stored on the RFID chip, along with a picture of
3247 the face and other information about the person.  Some of the
3248 information will be encrypted, but the encryption will be the same
3249 system as currently used in the passports.  The codes to decrypt will
3250 be available to a lot of government offices and their suppliers around
3251 the globe, but for those that do not know anyone in those circles it
3252 is good to know that
3253 <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2006/nov/17/news.homeaffairs">the
3254 encryption is already broken</a>.  And they
3255 <a href="http://www.networkworld.com/article/2215057/wireless/bad-guys-could-read-rfid-passports-at-217-feet--maybe-a-lot-more.html">can
3256 be read from 70 meters away</a>.  This can be mitigated a bit by
3257 keeping it in a Faraday cage (metal box or metal wire container), but
3258 one will be required to take it out of there often enough to expose
3259 ones private and personal information to a lot of people that have no
3260 business getting access to that information.</p>
3261
3262 <p>The new Norwegian national IDs are a vehicle for identity theft,
3263 and I feel sorry for us all having politicians accepting such invasion
3264 of privacy without any objections.  So are the Norwegian passports,
3265 but it has been possible to function in Norway without those so far.
3266 That option is going away with the passing of the new law.  In this, I
3267 envy the Germans, because for them it is optional how much biometric
3268 information is stored in their national ID.</p>
3269
3270 <p>And if forced collection of fingerprints was not bad enough, the
3271 information collected in the national ID card register can be handed
3272 over to foreign intelligence services and police authorities, "when
3273 extradition is not considered disproportionate".</p>
3274
3275 <p>Update 2015-05-12: For those unable to believe that the Parliament
3276 really could make such decision, I wrote
3277 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Blir_det_virkelig_krav_om_fingeravtrykk_i_nasjonale_ID_kort_.html">a
3278 summary of the sources I have</a> for concluding the way I do
3279 (Norwegian Only, as the sources are all in Norwegian).</p>
3280
3281       </div>
3282       <div class="tags">
3283
3284
3285         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
3286
3287
3288       </div>
3289     </div>
3290     <div class="padding"></div>
3291
3292     <div class="entry">
3293       <div class="title">
3294         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_would_it_cost_to_store_all_phone_calls_in_Norway_.html">What would it cost to store all phone calls in Norway?</a>
3295       </div>
3296       <div class="date">
3297          1st May 2015
3298       </div>
3299       <div class="body">
3300         <p>Many years ago, a friend of mine calculated how much it would cost
3301 to store the sound of all phone calls in Norway, and came up with the
3302 cost of around 20 million NOK (2.4 mill EUR) for all the calls in a
3303 year.  I got curious and wondered what the same calculation would look
3304 like today.  To do so one need an idea of how much data storage is
3305 needed for each minute of sound, how many minutes all the calls in
3306 Norway sums up to, and the cost of data storage.</p>
3307
3308 <p>The 2005 numbers are from
3309 <a href="http://www.digi.no/analyser/2005/10/04/vi-prater-stadig-mindre-i-roret">digi.no</a>,
3310 the 2012 numbers are from
3311 <a href="http://www.nkom.no/aktuelt/nyheter/fortsatt-vekst-i-det-norske-ekommarkedet">a
3312 NKOM report</a>, and I got the 2013 numbers after asking NKOM via
3313 email.  I was told the numbers for 2014 will be presented May 20th,
3314 and decided not to wait for those, as I doubt they will be very
3315 different from the numbers from 2013.</p>
3316
3317 <p>The amount of data storage per minute sound depend on the wanted
3318 quality, and for phone calls it is generally believed that 8 Kbit/s is
3319 enough.  See for example a
3320 <a href="http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/docs/voice/voice-quality/7934-bwidth-consume.html#topic1">summary
3321 on voice quality from Cisco</a> for some alternatives.  8 Kbit/s is 60
3322 Kbytes/min, and this can be multiplied with the number of call minutes
3323 to get the storage requirements.</p>
3324
3325 <p>Storage prices varies a lot, depending on speed, backup strategies,
3326 availability requirements etc.  But a simple way to calculate can be
3327 to use the price of a TiB-disk (around 1000 NOK / 120 EUR) and double
3328 it to take space, power and redundancy into account.  It could be much
3329 higher with high speed and good redundancy requirements.</p>
3330
3331 <p>But back to the question, What would it cost to store all phone
3332 calls in Norway?  Not much.  Here is a small table showing the
3333 estimated cost, which is within the budget constraint of most medium
3334 and large organisations:</p>
3335
3336 <table border="1">
3337 <tr><th>Year</th><th>Call minutes</th><th>Size</th><th>Price in NOK / EUR</th></tr>
3338 <tr><td>2005</td><td align="right">24 000 000 000</td><td align="right">1.3 PiB</td><td align="right">3 mill / 358 000</td></tr>
3339 <tr><td>2012</td><td align="right">18 000 000 000</td><td align="right">1.0 PiB</td><td align="right">2.2 mill / 262 000</td></tr>
3340 <tr><td>2013</td><td align="right">17 000 000 000</td><td align="right">950 TiB</td><td align="right">2.1 mill / 250 000</td></tr>
3341 </table>
3342
3343 <p>This is the cost of buying the storage.  Maintenance need to be
3344 taken into account too, but calculating that is left as an exercise
3345 for the reader.  But it is obvious to me from those numbers that
3346 recording the sound of all phone calls in Norway is not going to be
3347 stopped because it is too expensive.  I wonder if someone already is
3348 collecting the data?</p>
3349
3350       </div>
3351       <div class="tags">
3352
3353
3354         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
3355
3356
3357       </div>
3358     </div>
3359     <div class="padding"></div>
3360
3361     <div class="entry">
3362       <div class="title">
3363         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Jessie_based_Debian_Edu_beta_release.html">First Jessie based Debian Edu beta release</a>
3364       </div>
3365       <div class="date">
3366         26th April 2015
3367       </div>
3368       <div class="body">
3369         <p>I am happy to report that the Debian Edu team sent out
3370 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2015/04/msg00000.html">this
3371 announcement today</a>:</p>
3372
3373 <pre>
3374 the Debian Edu / Skolelinux project is pleased to announce the first
3375 *beta* release of Debian Edu "Jessie" 8.0+edu0~b1, which for the first
3376 time is composed entirely of packages from the current Debian stable
3377 release, Debian 8 "Jessie".
3378
3379 (As most reading this will know, Debian "Jessie" hasn't actually been
3380 released by now. The release is still in progress but should finish
3381 later today ;)
3382
3383 We expect to make a final release of Debian Edu "Jessie" in the coming
3384 weeks, timed with the first point release of Debian Jessie. Upgrades
3385 from this beta release of Debian Edu Jessie to the final release will
3386 be possible and encouraged!
3387
3388 Please report feedback to debian-edu@lists.debian.org and/or submit
3389 bugs: http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs
3390
3391 Debian Edu - sometimes also known as "Skolelinux" - is a complete
3392 operating system for schools, universities and other
3393 organisations. Through its pre- prepared installation profiles
3394 administrators can install servers, workstations and laptops which
3395 will work in harmony on the school network.  With Debian Edu, the
3396 teachers themselves or their technical support staff can roll out a
3397 complete multi-user, multi-machine study environment within hours or
3398 days.
3399
3400 Debian Edu is already in use at several hundred schools all over the
3401 world, particularly in Germany, Spain and Norway. Installations come
3402 with hundreds of applications pre-installed, plus the whole Debian
3403 archive of thousands of compatible packages within easy reach.
3404
3405 For those who want to give Debian Edu Jessie a try, download and
3406 installation instructions are available, including detailed
3407 instructions in the manual explaining the first steps, such as setting
3408 up a network or adding users.  Please note that the password for the
3409 user your prompted for during installation must have a length of at
3410 least 5 characters!
3411
3412 == Where to download ==
3413
3414 A multi-architecture CD / usbstick image (649 MiB) for network booting
3415 can be downloaded at the following locations:
3416
3417     http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~b1-CD.iso
3418     rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~b1-CD.iso .
3419
3420 The SHA1SUM of this image is: 54a524d16246cddd8d2cfd6ea52f2dd78c47ee0a
3421
3422 Alternatively an extended DVD / usbstick image (4.9 GiB) is also
3423 available, with more software included (saving additional download
3424 time):
3425
3426     http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~b1-USB.iso
3427     rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~b1-USB.iso
3428
3429 The SHA1SUM of this image is: fb1f1504a490c077a48653898f9d6a461cb3c636
3430
3431 Sources are available from the Debian archive, see
3432 http://ftp.debian.org/debian-cd/8.0.0/source/ for some download
3433 options.
3434
3435 == Debian Edu Jessie manual in seven languages ==
3436
3437 Please see https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/ for
3438 the English version of the Debian Edu jessie manual.
3439
3440 This manual has been fully translated to German, French, Italian,
3441 Danish, Dutch and Norwegian Bokmål. A partly translated version exists
3442 for Spanish.  See http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/ for
3443 online version of the translated manual.
3444
3445 More information about Debian 8 "Jessie" itself is provided in the
3446 release notes and the installation manual:
3447 - http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes
3448 - http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual
3449
3450
3451 == Errata / known problems ==
3452
3453     It takes up to 15 minutes for a changed hostname to be updated via
3454     DHCP (#780461).
3455
3456     The hostname script fails to update LTSP server hostname (#783087).
3457
3458 Workaround: run update-hostname-from-ip on the client to update the
3459 hostname immediately.
3460
3461 Check https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie for a possibly
3462 more current and complete list.
3463
3464 == Some more details about Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~b1 Codename Jessie released 2015-04-25 ==
3465
3466 === Software updates ===
3467
3468 Everything which is new in Debian 8 Jessie, e.g.:
3469
3470  * Linux kernel 3.16.7-ctk9; for the i386 architecture, support for
3471    i486 processors has been dropped; oldest supported ones: i586 (like
3472    Intel Pentium and AMD K5).
3473
3474  * Desktop environments KDE Plasma Workspaces 4.11.13, GNOME 3.14,
3475    Xfce 4.12, LXDE 0.5.6
3476    * new optional desktop environment: MATE 1.8
3477    * KDE Plasma Workspaces is installed by default; to choose one of
3478      the others see the manual.
3479  * the browsers Iceweasel 31 ESR and Chromium 41
3480  * LibreOffice 4.3.3
3481  * GOsa 2.7.4
3482  * LTSP 5.5.4
3483  * CUPS print system 1.7.5
3484  * new boot framework: systemd
3485  * Educational toolbox GCompris 14.12
3486  * Music creator Rosegarden 14.02
3487  * Image editor Gimp 2.8.14
3488  * Virtual stargazer Stellarium 0.13.1
3489  * golearn 0.9
3490  * tuxpaint 0.9.22
3491  * New version of debian-installer from Debian Jessie.
3492  * Debian Jessie includes about 43000 packages available for installation.
3493  * More information about Debian 8 Jessie is provided in its release
3494    notes and the installation manual, see the link above.
3495
3496 === Installation changes ===
3497
3498     Installations done via PXE now also install firmware automatically
3499     for the hardware present.
3500
3501 === Fixed bugs ===
3502
3503 A number of bugs have been fixed in this release; the most noticeable
3504 from a user perspective:
3505
3506  * Inserting incorrect DNS information in Gosa will no longer break
3507    DNS completely, but instead stop DNS updates until the incorrect
3508    information is corrected (710362)
3509
3510  * shutdown-at-night now shuts the system down if gdm3 is used (775608).
3511
3512 === Sugar desktop removed ===
3513
3514 As the Sugar desktop was removed from Debian Jessie, it is also not
3515 available in Debian Edu jessie.
3516
3517
3518 == About Debian Edu / Skolelinux ==
3519
3520 Debian Edu, also known as Skolelinux, is a Linux distribution based on
3521 Debian providing an out-of-the box environment of a completely
3522 configured school network. Directly after installation a school server
3523 running all services needed for a school network is set up just
3524 waiting for users and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable
3525 Web-UI. A netbooting environment is prepared using PXE, so after
3526 initial installation of the main server from CD or USB stick all other
3527 machines can be installed via the network. The provided school server
3528 provides LDAP database and Kerberos authentication service,
3529 centralized home directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other
3530 services.  The desktop contains more than 60 educational software
3531 packages and more are available from the Debian archive, and schools
3532 can choose between KDE, GNOME, LXDE, Xfce and MATE desktop
3533 environment.
3534
3535 == About Debian ==
3536
3537 The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly
3538 free community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of
3539 the largest and most influential open source projects. Thousands of
3540 volunteers from all over the world work together to create and
3541 maintain Debian software. Available in 70 languages, and supporting a
3542 huge range of computer types, Debian calls itself the universal
3543 operating system.
3544
3545 == Thanks ==
3546
3547 Thanks to everyone making Debian and Debian Edu / Skolelinux happen!
3548 You rock.
3549 </pre>
3550
3551       </div>
3552       <div class="tags">
3553
3554
3555         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3556
3557
3558       </div>
3559     </div>
3560     <div class="padding"></div>
3561
3562     <div class="entry">
3563       <div class="title">
3564         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Shirish_Agarwal.html">Debian Edu interview: Shirish Agarwal</a>
3565       </div>
3566       <div class="date">
3567         15th April 2015
3568       </div>
3569       <div class="body">
3570         <p>It was a surprise to me to learn that project to create a complete
3571 computer system for schools I've involved in,
3572 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>, was
3573 being used in India.  But apparently it is, and I managed to get an
3574 interview with one of the friends of the project there, Shirish
3575 Agarwal.</p>
3576
3577 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
3578
3579 <p>My name is Shirish Agarwal. Based out of the educational and
3580 historical city of Pune, from the western state of Maharashtra, India.
3581 My bread comes from giving training, giving policy tips,
3582 installations on free software to mom and pop shops in different
3583 fields from Desktop publishing to retail shops as well as work with
3584 few software start-ups as well.</p>
3585
3586 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
3587 project?</strong></p>
3588
3589 <p>It started innocently enough. I have been using Debian for a few
3590 years and in one local minidebconf / debutsav I was asked if there was
3591 anything for schools or education. I had worked / played with free
3592 educational softwares such as Gcompris and Stellarium for my many
3593 nieces and nephews so researched and found Debian Edu or Skolelinux as
3594 it was known then.  Since then I have started using the various
3595 education meta-packages provided by the project.</p>
3596
3597 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
3598 Edu?</strong></p>
3599
3600 <p>It's closest I have seen where a package full of educational
3601 software are packed, which are free and open (both literally and
3602 figuratively).  Even if I take the simplest software which is
3603 gcompris, the number of activities therein are amazing. Another one of
3604 the softwares that I have liked for a long time is stellarium. Even
3605 pysycache is cool except for couple of issues I encountered
3606 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/781841">#781841</a> and
3607 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/781842">#781842</a>.</p>
3608
3609 <p>I prefer software installed on the system over web based solutions,
3610 as a web site can disappear any time but the software on disk has the
3611 possibility of a larger life span.  Of course with both it's more a
3612 question if it has enough users who make it fun or sustainable or both
3613 for the developer per-se.</p>
3614
3615 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
3616 Edu?</strong></p>
3617
3618 <p>I do see that the Debian Edu team seems to be short-handed and I
3619 think more efforts should be made to make it popular and ask and take
3620 help from people and the larger community wherever possible.</p>
3621
3622 <p>I don't see any disadvantage to use Skolelinux apart from the fact
3623 that most apps. are generic which is good or bad how you see it.
3624 However, saying that I do acknowledge the fact that the canvas is
3625 pretty big and there are lot of interesting ideas that could be done
3626 but for reasons not known not done or if done I don't know about them.
3627 Let me share some of the ideas (these are more upstream based but
3628 still) I have had for a long time :</p>
3629
3630 <p>1. Classical maths question of two trains in opposing directions
3631 each running @x kmph/mph at y distance, when they will meet and how
3632 far would each travel and similar questions like these.
3633
3634 <p>The computer is a fantastic system where questions like these can
3635 be drawn, animated and the methodology and answers teased out in
3636 interactive manner. While sites such as the
3637 <a href="http://mathforum.org/dr.math/faq/faq.two.trains.html">Ask
3638 Dr. Math FAQ on The Two Trains problem</a> (as an example or point of
3639 inspiration) can be used there is lot more that can be done.  I dunno
3640 if there is a free software which does something like this.  The idea
3641 being a blend of objects + animation + interaction which does
3642 this. The whole interaction could be gamified with points or sounds or
3643 colourful celebration whenever the user gets even part of the question
3644 or/and methodology right. That would help reinforce good behaviour.
3645 This understanding could be used to share/showcase everything from how
3646 the first wheel came to be, to evolution to how astronomy started,
3647 psychics and everything in-between.</p>
3648
3649 <p>One specific idea in the train part was having the Linux mascot on
3650 one train and the BSD or GNU mascot on the other train and they
3651 meeting somewhere in-between. Characters from blender movies could
3652 also be used.</p>
3653
3654 <p>2. Loads of crossword-puzzles with reference to subjects: We have
3655 enormous data sets in Wikipedia and Wikitionary.  I don't think it
3656 should be a big job to design crossword puzzles. Using categories and
3657 sub-categories it should be doable to have Q&A single word answers
3658 from the existing data-sets. What would make it easy or hard could be
3659 the length of the word + existence of many or few vowels depending on
3660 the user's input.</p>
3661
3662 <p>3. Jigsaw puzzles - We already have a great software called
3663 palapeli with number of slicers making it pretty interesting. What
3664 needs to be done is to download large number of public domain and
3665 copyleft images, tease and use IPTC tags to categorise them into
3666 nature, history etc.  and let it loose. This could turn to be really
3667 huge collection of images. One source could be taken from
3668 commons.wikimedia.org, others could be huge collection of royalty-free
3669 stock photos. Potential is immense.</p>
3670
3671 <p>Apart from this, free software suffers in two directions, we lag
3672 both in development (of using new features per-se) and maintenance a
3673 lot.  This is more so in educational software as these applications
3674 need to be timely and the opportunity cost of missing deadlines is
3675 immense. If we are able to solve issues of funding for development and
3676 maintenance of such software I don't see any big difficulties. I know
3677 of few start-ups in and around India who would love to develop and
3678 maintain such software if funding issues could be solved.</p>
3679
3680 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
3681
3682 <p>That would be huge list. Some of the softwares are obviously apt,
3683 aptitude, debdelta, leafpad, the shell of course (zsh nowadays),
3684 quassel for IRC. In games I use shisen-sho while card-games are evenly
3685 between kpat and Aiselriot.  In desktops it's a tie between
3686 gnome-flashback and mate.</p>
3687
3688 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
3689 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
3690
3691 <p>I think it should first start with using specific FOSS apps. in
3692 whatever environment they are. If it's MS-Windows or Mac so be it.
3693 Once they are habitual with the apps. and there is buy-in from the
3694 school management then it could be installed anywhere. Most of the
3695 people now understand the concept of a repository because of the
3696 various online stores so it isn't hard to convince on that front.</p>
3697
3698 <p>What is harder is having enough people with technical skills and
3699 passion to service them. If you get buy-in from one or two teachers
3700 then ideas like above could also be asked to be done as a project as
3701 well.</p>
3702
3703 <p>I think where we fall short more than anything is in marketing. For
3704 instance, Debian has this whole range of fonts in its archive but
3705 there isn't even a page where all those different fonts in the La
3706 Ipsum format could be tried out for newcomers.</p>
3707
3708 <p>One of the issues faced constantly in installations is with updates
3709 and upgrades.  People have this myth that each update and upgrade
3710 means the user interface will / has to change. I have seen this
3711 innumerable times.  That perhaps is one of the reasons which browsers
3712 like Iceweasel / Firefox change user interfaces so much, not because
3713 it might be needed or be functional but because people believe that
3714 changed user interfaces are better. This, can easily be pointed with
3715 the user interfaces changed with almost every MS-Windows and Mac OS
3716 releases.</p>
3717
3718 <p>The problems with Debian Edu for deployment are many. The biggest
3719 is the huge gap between what is taught in schools and what Debian Edu
3720 is aimed at.
3721
3722 <p>Me and my friends did teach on week-ends in a government school for
3723 around 2 years, and
3724 <a href="https://flossexperiences.wordpress.com/2012/10/08/sharings/">gathered
3725 some experience</a> there.  Some of the things we learnt/discovered
3726 there was :</p>
3727
3728 <ol>
3729
3730   <li>Most of the teachers are very territorial about their subjects
3731    and they do not want you to teach anything out of the
3732    portion/syllabus given.</li>
3733
3734   <li>They want any activity on the system in accordance to whatever
3735    is in the syllabus.</li>
3736
3737   <li>There are huge barriers both with the English language and at
3738    times with objects or whatever. An example, let's say in gcompris
3739    you have objects falling down and you have to name them and let's
3740    say the falling object is a hat or a fedora hat, this would not be
3741    as recognizable as say a
3742    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puneri_Pagadi">Puneri
3743    Pagdi</a> so there is need to inject local objects, words wherever
3744    possible. Especially for word-games there are so many hindi words
3745    which have become part of english vocabulary (for instance in
3746    parley), those could be made into a hinglish collection or
3747    something but that is something for upstream to do.</li>
3748
3749 </ol>
3750
3751       </div>
3752       <div class="tags">
3753
3754
3755         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
3756
3757
3758       </div>
3759     </div>
3760     <div class="padding"></div>
3761
3762     <div class="entry">
3763       <div class="title">
3764         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_m_going_to_the_Open_Source_Developers__Conference_Nordic_2015_.html">I'm going to the Open Source Developers' Conference Nordic 2015!</a>
3765       </div>
3766       <div class="date">
3767          7th April 2015
3768       </div>
3769       <div class="body">
3770         <p>I am happy to let you all know that I'm going to the <a
3771 href="http://act.osdc.no/osdc2015no/">Open Source Developers'
3772 Conference Nordic 2015</a>!</p>
3773
3774 <p>It take place Friday 8th to Sunday 10th of May in Oslo next to
3775 where I work, and I finally got around to submitting
3776 <a href="http://act.osdc.no/osdc2015no/talk/6192">a talk proposal for
3777 it</a> (dead link for most people until the talk is accepted).  As
3778 part of my involvement with the
3779 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group member
3780 association</a> I have been slightly involved in the planning of this
3781 conference for a while now, with a focus on organising a Civic Hacking
3782 Hackathon with our friends
3783 over at <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> and
3784 <a href="http://www.holderdeord.no/">Holder de ord</a>.  This part is
3785 named the 'My Society' track in the program.  There is still space for
3786 more talks and participants.  I hope to see you there.</p>
3787
3788 <p>Check out <a href="http://act.osdc.no/osdc2015no/talks">the talks
3789 submitted and accepted so far</a>.</p>
3790
3791       </div>
3792       <div class="tags">
3793
3794
3795         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn</a>.
3796
3797
3798       </div>
3799     </div>
3800     <div class="padding"></div>
3801
3802     <div class="entry">
3803       <div class="title">
3804         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Proof_reading_the_Norwegian_translation_of_Free_Culture_by_Lessig.html">Proof reading the Norwegian translation of Free Culture by Lessig</a>
3805       </div>
3806       <div class="date">
3807          4th April 2015
3808       </div>
3809       <div class="body">
3810         <p>During eastern I had some time to continue working on the Norwegian
3811 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">docbook</a> version of the 2004 book
3812 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> by Lawrence Lessig.
3813 At the moment I am proof reading the finished text, looking for typos,
3814 inconsistent wordings and sentences that do not flow as they should.
3815 I'm more than two thirds done with the text, and welcome others to
3816 check the text up to chapter 13.  The current status is available on the
3817 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>
3818 project pages.  You can also check out the
3819 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf?raw=true">PDF</a>,
3820 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub?raw=true">EPUB</a>
3821 and HTML version available in the
3822 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/tree/master/archive">archive
3823 directory</a>.</p>
3824
3825 <p>Please report typos, bugs and improvements to the github project if
3826 you find any.</p>
3827
3828       </div>
3829       <div class="tags">
3830
3831
3832         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
3833
3834
3835       </div>
3836     </div>
3837     <div class="padding"></div>
3838
3839     <div class="entry">
3840       <div class="title">
3841         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Frikanalen__Norwegian_TV_channel_for_technical_topics.html">Frikanalen, Norwegian TV channel for technical topics</a>
3842       </div>
3843       <div class="date">
3844          9th March 2015
3845       </div>
3846       <div class="body">
3847         <p>The <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a>,
3848 where I am a member, and where people interested in free software,
3849 open standards and UNIX like operating systems like Linux and the BSDs
3850 come together, record our monthly technical presentations on video.
3851 The purpose is to document the talks and spread them to a wider
3852 audience.  For this, the the Norwegian nationwide open channel
3853 <a href="http://www.frikanalen.no/">Frikanalen</a> is a useful venue.
3854 Since a few days ago, when I figured out the
3855 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.no/api/">REST API</a> to program the
3856 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/guide/">channel time schedule</a>,
3857 the channel has been filled with NUUG talks, related recordings and
3858 some Creative Commons licensed TED talks (from archive.org).  I fill
3859 all "leftover bits" on the channel with content from NUUG, which at
3860 the moment is almost 17 of 24 hours every day.</p>
3861
3862 <p>The list of NUUG videos
3863 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/organization/82">uploaded so far</a>
3864 include things like a
3865 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/video/625090">one hour talk by John
3866 Perry Barlow when he visited Oslo</a>, a presentation of
3867 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/video/624275">Haiku, the BeOS
3868 re-implementation</a>, the
3869 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/video/624493">history of FiksGataMi,
3870 the Norwegian version of FixMyStreet</a>, the good old
3871 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/video/623566">Warriors of the net
3872 video</A> and many others.</p>
3873
3874 <p>We have a large backlog of NUUG talks not yet uploaded to
3875 Frikanalen, and plan to upload every useful bit to the channel to
3876 spread the word there.  I also hope to find useful recordings from the
3877 Chaos Computer Club and Debian conferences and spread them on the
3878 channel as well.  But this require locating the videos and their meta
3879 information (title, description, license, etc), and preparing the
3880 recordings for broadcast, and I have not yet had the spare time to
3881 focus on this.  Perhaps you want to help.  Please join us on IRC,
3882 <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/%23nuug">#nuug on irc.freenode.net</a>
3883 if you want to help make this happen.</p>
3884
3885 <p>But as I said, already the channel is already almost exclusively
3886 filled with technical topics, and if you want to learn something new
3887 today, check out the <a href="http://www.frikanalen.tv/se">Ogg Theora
3888 web stream</a> or use one of the other ways to get access to the
3889 channel.  Unfortunately the Ogg Theora recoding for distribution still
3890 do not properly sync the video and sound.  It is generated by recoding
3891 a internal MPEG transport stream with MPEG4 coded video (ie H.264) to
3892 Ogg Theora / Vorbis, and we have not been able to find a way that
3893 produces acceptable quality.  Help needed, please get in touch if you
3894 know how to fix it using free software.</p>
3895
3896       </div>
3897       <div class="tags">
3898
3899
3900         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
3901
3902
3903       </div>
3904     </div>
3905     <div class="padding"></div>
3906
3907     <div class="entry">
3908       <div class="title">
3909         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Citizenfour_documentary_on_the_Snowden_confirmations_to_Norway.html">The Citizenfour documentary on the Snowden confirmations to Norway</a>
3910       </div>
3911       <div class="date">
3912         28th February 2015
3913       </div>
3914       <div class="body">
3915         <p>Today I was happy to learn that the documentary
3916 <a href="https://citizenfourfilm.com/">Citizenfour</a> by
3917 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Poitras">Laura Poitras</a>
3918 finally will show up in Norway.  According to the magazine
3919 <a href="http://montages.no/">Montages</a>, a deal has finally been
3920 made for
3921 <a href="http://montages.no/nyheter/snowden-dokumentaren-citizenfour-far-norsk-kinodistribusjon/">Cinema
3922 distribution in Norway</a> and the movie will have its premiere soon.
3923 This is great news.  As part of my involvement with
3924 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the Norwegian Unix User Group</a>, me and
3925 a friend have
3926 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Dokumentar_om_Snowdenbekreftelsene_til_Norge_.shtml">tried
3927 to get the movie to Norway</a> ourselves, but obviously
3928 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Dokumentar_om_Snowdenbekreftelsene_endelig_til_Norge_.shtml">we
3929 were too late</a> and Tor Fosse beat us to it.  I am happy he did, as
3930 the movie will make its way to the public and we do not have to make
3931 it happen ourselves.
3932 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiGwAvd5mvM">The trailer</a>
3933 can be seen on youtube, if you are curious what kind of film this
3934 is.</p>
3935
3936 <p>The whistle blower Edward Snowden really deserve political asylum
3937 here in Norway, but I am afraid he would not be safe.</p>
3938
3939       </div>
3940       <div class="tags">
3941
3942
3943         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
3944
3945
3946       </div>
3947     </div>
3948     <div class="padding"></div>
3949
3950     <div class="entry">
3951       <div class="title">
3952         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Norwegian_open_channel_Frikanalen___24x7_on_the_Internet.html">The Norwegian open channel Frikanalen - 24x7 on the Internet</a>
3953       </div>
3954       <div class="date">
3955         25th February 2015
3956       </div>
3957       <div class="body">
3958         <p>The Norwegian nationwide open channel
3959 <a href="http://www.frikanalen.no/">Frikanalen</a> is still going
3960 strong.  It allow everyone to send the video they want on national
3961 television.  It is a TV station administrated completely using a web
3962 browser, running only <ahref="https://github.com/Frikanalen">Free
3963 Software</a>, providing <ahref="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/api">a REST
3964 api</a> for administrators and members, and with distribution on the
3965 national DVB-T distribution network RiksTV.  But only between 12:00
3966 and 17:30 Norwegian time.  This has finally changed, after many years
3967 with limited distribution.  A few weeks ago, we set up a Ogg Theora
3968 stream via icecast to allow everyone with Internet access to check out
3969 the channel the rest of the day.  This is presented on
3970 <a href="http://www.frikanalen.tv/se">the Frikanalen web site now</a>.  And
3971 since a few days ago, the channel is also available
3972 via <a href="https://www.uninett.no/iptv-tilgang">multicast on
3973 UNINETT</a>, available for those using IPTV TVs and set-top boxes in
3974 the Norwegian National Research and Education network.</p>
3975
3976 <p>If you want to see what is on the channel, point your media player
3977 to one of these sources.  The first should work with most players and
3978 browsers, while as far as I know, the multicast UDP stream only work
3979 with VLC.</p>
3980
3981 <ul>
3982   <li><a href="http://video.nuug.no/frikanalen.ogv">http://video.nuug.no/frikanalen.ogv</a></li>
3983   <li>udp://@224.17.43.129:1234</li>
3984 </ul>
3985
3986 <p>The Ogg Theora / icecast stream is not working well, as the video
3987 and audio is slightly out of sync.  We have not been able to figure
3988 out how to fix it.  It is generated by recoding a internal MPEG
3989 transport stream with MPEG4 coded video (ie H.264) to Ogg Theora /
3990 Vorbis, and the result is less then stellar.  If you have ideas how to
3991 fix it, please let us know on frikanalen (at) nuug.no.  We currently
3992 use this with ffmpeg2theora 0.29:</p>
3993
3994 <blockquote><pre>
3995 ./ffmpeg2theora.linux &lt;OBE_gemini_URL.ts&gt; -F 25 -x 720 -y 405 \
3996  --deinterlace --inputfps 25 -c 1 -H 48000 --keyint 8 --buf-delay 100 \
3997  --nosync -V 700 -o - | oggfwd video.nuug.no 8000 &lt;pw&gt; /frikanalen.ogv
3998 </pre></blockquote>
3999
4000 <p>If you get the multicast UDP stream working, please let me know, as
4001 I am curious how far the multicast stream reach.  It do not make it to
4002 my home network, nor any other commercially available network in
4003 Norway that I am aware of.</p>
4004
4005       </div>
4006       <div class="tags">
4007
4008
4009         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
4010
4011
4012       </div>
4013     </div>
4014     <div class="padding"></div>
4015
4016     <div class="entry">
4017       <div class="title">
4018         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Nude_body_scanner_now_present_on_Norwegian_airport.html">Nude body scanner now present on Norwegian airport</a>
4019       </div>
4020       <div class="date">
4021         10th February 2015
4022       </div>
4023       <div class="body">
4024         <p>Aftenposten, one of the largest newspapers in Norway, today report
4025 that
4026 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/reise/Slik-skannes-kroppen-din-i-fremtidens-sikkerhetskontroll-490666_1.snd">three
4027 of the nude body scanners now is put to use at Gardermoen</a>, the
4028 main airport in Norway.  This way the travelers can have their body
4029 photographed without cloths when visiting Norway.  Of course this
4030 horrible news is presented with a positive spin, stating that "now
4031 travelers can move past the security check point faster and more
4032 efficiently", but fail to mention that the machines in question take
4033 pictures of their nude bodies and store them internally in the
4034 computer, while only presenting sketch figure of the body to the
4035 public.  The article is written in a way that leave the impression
4036 that the new machines do not take these nude pictures and only create
4037 the sketch figures.  In reality the same nude pictures are still
4038 taken, but not presented to everyone.  They are still available for
4039 the owners of the system and the people doing maintenance of the
4040 scanners, as long as they are taken and stored.</p>
4041
4042 <p>Wikipedia have a more on
4043 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_body_scanner">Full body
4044 scanners</a>, including example images and a summary of the
4045 controversy about these scanners.</p>
4046
4047 <p>Personally I will decline to use these machines, as I believe strip
4048 searches of my body is a very intrusive attack on my privacy, and not
4049 something everyone should have to accept to travel.</p>
4050
4051       </div>
4052       <div class="tags">
4053
4054
4055         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>.
4056
4057
4058       </div>
4059     </div>
4060     <div class="padding"></div>
4061
4062     <div class="entry">
4063       <div class="title">
4064         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Nagios_module_to_check_if_the_Frikanalen_video_stream_is_working.html">Nagios module to check if the Frikanalen video stream is working</a>
4065       </div>
4066       <div class="date">
4067          8th February 2015
4068       </div>
4069       <div class="body">
4070         <p>When running a TV station with both broadcast and web stream
4071 distribution, it is useful to know that the stream is working.  As I
4072 am involved in the Norwegian open channel
4073 <a href="http://www.frikanalen.no/">Frikanalen</a> as part of my
4074 activity in the <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">NUUG member
4075 organisation</a>, I wrote a script to use mplayer to connect to a
4076 video stream, pick two images 35 seconds apart and compare them.  If
4077 the images are missing or identical, something is probably wrong with
4078 the stream and an alarm should be triggered.  The script is written as
4079 a Nagios plugin, allowing us to use Nagios to run the check regularly
4080 and sound the alarm when something is wrong.  It is able to detect
4081 both a hanging and a broken video stream.</p>
4082
4083 <p>I just uploaded the code for the script into the
4084 <a href="https://github.com/Frikanalen/frikanalen/blob/master/nagios-plugin/check_video_stream_images">Frikanalen
4085 git repository</a> on github.  If you run a TV station with web
4086 streaming, perhaps you can find it useful too.</p>
4087
4088 <p>Last year, the Frikanalen public TV station transformed into using
4089 only Linux based free software to administrate, schedule and
4090 distribute the TV content.  The
4091 <a href="https://github.com/Frikanalen">source code for the entire TV
4092 station</a> is available from the Github project page.  Everyone can
4093 use it to send their content on national TV, and we provide both a web
4094 GUI and <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/api/">a web API</a> to
4095 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/login/?next=/members/video/">add</a>
4096 and <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/members/plan/">schedule
4097 content</a>.  And thanks to last weeks developer gathering and
4098 following activity, we now have the schedule
4099 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/xmltv/2015/01/01">available as
4100 XMLTV</a> too.  Still a lot of work left to do, especially with the
4101 process to add videos and with the scheduling, so your contribution is
4102 most welcome.  Perhaps you want to set up your own TV station?</p>
4103
4104 <p>Update 2015-02-25: Got a tip from Uninett about their
4105 <a href="https://scm.uninett.no/maalepaaler/qstream/">qstream
4106 monitoring system</a>, which gather connection time, jitter, packet
4107 loss and burst bandwidth usage.  It look useful to check if UDP
4108 streams are working as they should.</p>
4109
4110       </div>
4111       <div class="tags">
4112
4113
4114         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
4115
4116
4117       </div>
4118     </div>
4119     <div class="padding"></div>
4120
4121     <div class="entry">
4122       <div class="title">
4123         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Norwegian_Bokm_l_subtitles_for_the_FSF_video_User_Liberation.html">Norwegian Bokmål subtitles for the FSF video User Liberation</a>
4124       </div>
4125       <div class="date">
4126         12th January 2015
4127       </div>
4128       <div class="body">
4129         <p>A few days ago, the <a href="https://www.fsf.org/">Free Software
4130 Foundation</a> announced a new video
4131 <a href="https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/user-liberation-watch-and-share-our-new-video">explaining
4132 Free software</a> in simple terms.  The video named User Liberation is
4133 3 minutes long, and I recommend showing it to everyone you know as a
4134 way to explain what Free Software is all about.  Unfortunately several
4135 of the people I know do not understand English and Spanish, so it did
4136 not make sense to show it to them.</p>
4137
4138 <p>But today I was told that
4139 <a href="https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/user-liberation-watch-and-share-our-new-video">English
4140 subtitles were available</a> and set out to provide Norwegian Bokmål
4141 subtitles based on these.  The result has been sent to FSF and made
4142 available in
4143 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/fsf-video-user-liberation-subtitles">a
4144 git repository</a> provided by Github.  Please let me know if you find
4145 errors or have improvements to the subtitles.</p>
4146
4147 <p>Update 2015-02-03: Since I publised this post, FSF created a
4148 Libreplanet
4149 <a href="http://libreplanet.org/wiki/Group:FSF/User_Liberation_Video_Translation">project
4150 to track subtitles</A> for the video.</p>
4151
4152       </div>
4153       <div class="tags">
4154
4155
4156         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
4157
4158
4159       </div>
4160     </div>
4161     <div class="padding"></div>
4162
4163     <div class="entry">
4164       <div class="title">
4165         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Updated_version_of_the_Norwegian_web_service_FiksGataMi.html">Updated version of the Norwegian web service FiksGataMi</a>
4166       </div>
4167       <div class="date">
4168         30th December 2014
4169       </div>
4170       <div class="body">
4171         <p>I am very happy that we in the
4172 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User group (NUUG)</a>,
4173 spearheaded by Marius Halden from NUUG and Matthew Somerville from
4174 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a>, finally managed to
4175 upgrade the code base for the Norwegian version of
4176 <a href="http://fixmystreet.org/">FixMyStreet</a>.  This
4177 was the first major update since 2011. The refurbished
4178 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is already live, and
4179 seem to hold up the pressure.  The
4180 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Pressemelding__FiksGataMi_i_oppdatert_og_mobilvennlig_klesdrakt.shtml">press
4181 release and announcement</a> went out this morning.</p>
4182
4183 <p>FixMyStreet is a web platform for allowing the citizens to easily
4184 report problems with public infrastructure to the responsible
4185 authorities.  Think of it as a shared mail client with map support,
4186 allowing everyone to see what already was reported and comment on the
4187 reports in public.</p>
4188
4189       </div>
4190       <div class="tags">
4191
4192
4193         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
4194
4195
4196       </div>
4197     </div>
4198     <div class="padding"></div>
4199
4200     <div class="entry">
4201       <div class="title">
4202         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Of_course_USA_loses_in_cyber_war___NSA_and_friends_made_sure_it_would_happen.html">Of course USA loses in cyber war - NSA and friends made sure it would happen</a>
4203       </div>
4204       <div class="date">
4205         19th December 2014
4206       </div>
4207       <div class="body">
4208         <p>So, Sony caved in
4209 (<a href="https://twitter.com/RobLowe/status/545338568512917504">according
4210 to Rob Lowe</a>) and demonstrated that America lost its first cyberwar
4211 (<a href="https://twitter.com/newtgingrich/status/545339074975109122">according
4212 to Newt Gingrich</a>).  It should not surprise anyone, after the
4213 whistle blower Edward Snowden documented that the government of USA
4214 and their allies for many years have done their best to make sure the
4215 technology used by its citizens is filled with security holes allowing
4216 the secret services to spy on its own population.  No one in their
4217 right minds could believe that the ability to snoop on the people all
4218 over the globe could only be used by the personnel authorized to do so
4219 by the president of the United States of America.  If the capabilities
4220 are there, they will be used by friend and foe alike, and now they are
4221 being used to bring Sony on its knees.</p>
4222
4223 <p>I doubt it will a lesson learned, and expect USA to lose its next
4224 cyber war too, given how eager the western intelligence communities
4225 (and probably the non-western too, but it is less in the news) seem to
4226 be to continue its current dragnet surveillance practice.</p>
4227
4228 <p>There is a reason why China and others are trying to move away from
4229 Windows to Linux and other alternatives, and it is not to avoid
4230 sending its hard earned dollars to Cayman Islands (or whatever
4231 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_haven">tax haven</a>
4232 Microsoft is using these days to collect the majority of its
4233 income. :)</p>
4234
4235       </div>
4236       <div class="tags">
4237
4238
4239         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
4240
4241
4242       </div>
4243     </div>
4244     <div class="padding"></div>
4245
4246     <div class="entry">
4247       <div class="title">
4248         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_stay_with_sysvinit_in_Debian_Jessie.html">How to stay with sysvinit in Debian Jessie</a>
4249       </div>
4250       <div class="date">
4251         22nd November 2014
4252       </div>
4253       <div class="body">
4254         <p>By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
4255 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
4256 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
4257 courtesy of
4258 <a href="http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html">Erich
4259 Schubert</a> and
4260 <a href="http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/">Simon
4261 McVittie</a>.
4262
4263 <p>If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
4264 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
4265 <tt>/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit</tt> with this content before
4266 you upgrade:</p>
4267
4268 <p><blockquote><pre>
4269 Package: systemd-sysv
4270 Pin: release o=Debian
4271 Pin-Priority: -1
4272 </pre></blockquote><p>
4273
4274 <p>This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
4275 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
4276 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
4277 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
4278 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.</p>
4279
4280 <p>If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
4281 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
4282 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
4283 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
4284 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
4285 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
4286
4287 <p><blockquote><pre>
4288 preseed/late_command="in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core"
4289 </pre></blockquote><p>
4290
4291 <p>Next, the line to use in a preseed file:</p>
4292
4293 <p><blockquote><pre>
4294 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
4295 </pre></blockquote><p>
4296
4297 <p>One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
4298 the sysvinit-core package.</p>
4299
4300 <p>I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
4301 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
4302 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
4303 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
4304 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
4305 Jessie is released.</p>
4306
4307 <p>Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
4308 <ahref="https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg">a
4309 blog post by Torsten Glaser</a>, added --purge to the preseed
4310 line.</p>
4311
4312       </div>
4313       <div class="tags">
4314
4315
4316         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4317
4318
4319       </div>
4320     </div>
4321     <div class="padding"></div>
4322
4323     <div class="entry">
4324       <div class="title">
4325         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Debian_package_for_SMTP_via_Tor__aka_SMTorP__using_exim4.html">A Debian package for SMTP via Tor (aka SMTorP) using exim4</a>
4326       </div>
4327       <div class="date">
4328         10th November 2014
4329       </div>
4330       <div class="body">
4331         <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
4332 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
4333 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.</p>
4334
4335 <p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
4336 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
4337 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
4338 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
4339 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
4340 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
4341 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
4342 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed
4343 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a
4344 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
4345 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
4346 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
4347 <a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the
4348 Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems
4349 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p>
4350
4351 <p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
4352 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
4353 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
4354 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
4355 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
4356 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
4357 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
4358 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
4359 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
4360 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
4361 were fairly easy, and
4362 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the
4363 source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github.  I
4364 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
4365 useful approach.</p>
4366
4367 <p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
4368 mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to
4369 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
4370 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
4371 <tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow
4372 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
4373 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
4374 this:</p>
4375
4376 <p><blockquote><pre>
4377 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
4378   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
4379 </pre></blockquote></p>
4380
4381 <p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
4382 address with your own address to test your server. :)</p>
4383
4384 <p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
4385 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
4386 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
4387 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
4388 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
4389 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
4390 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
4391 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
4392 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
4393 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
4394 system.</p>
4395
4396 <p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
4397 <tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over
4398 SMTorP. :)</p>
4399
4400       </div>
4401       <div class="tags">
4402
4403
4404         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
4405
4406
4407       </div>
4408     </div>
4409     <div class="padding"></div>
4410
4411     <div class="entry">
4412       <div class="title">
4413         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Jessie_based_Debian_Edu_released__alpha0_.html">First Jessie based Debian Edu released (alpha0)</a>
4414       </div>
4415       <div class="date">
4416         27th October 2014
4417       </div>
4418       <div class="body">
4419         <p>I am happy to report that I on behalf of the Debian Edu team just
4420 sent out
4421 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2014/10/msg00000.html">this
4422 announcement</a>:</p>
4423
4424 <pre>
4425 The Debian Edu Team is pleased to announce the release of Debian Edu
4426 Jessie 8.0+edu0~alpha0
4427
4428 Debian Edu is a complete operating system for schools. Through its
4429 various installation profiles you can install servers, workstations
4430 and laptops which will work together on the school network. With
4431 Debian Edu, the teachers themselves or their technical support can
4432 roll out a complete multi-user multi-machine study environment within
4433 hours or a few days. Debian Edu comes with hundreds of applications
4434 pre-installed, but you can always add more packages from Debian.
4435
4436 For those who want to give Debian Edu Jessie a try, download and
4437 installation instructions are available, including detailed
4438 instructions in the manual[1] explaining the first steps, such as
4439 setting up a network or adding users. Please note that the password
4440 for the user your prompted for during installation must have a length
4441 of at least 5 characters!
4442
4443  [1] &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie">https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie</a> &gt;
4444
4445 Would you like to give your school's computer a longer life? Are you
4446 tired of sneaker administration, running from computer to computer
4447 reinstalling the operating system? Would you like to administrate all
4448 the computers in your school using only a couple of hours every week?
4449 Check out Debian Edu Jessie!
4450
4451 Skolelinux is used by at least two hundred schools all over the world,
4452 mostly in Germany and Norway.
4453
4454 About Debian Edu and Skolelinux
4455 ===============================
4456
4457 Debian Edu, also known as Skolelinux[2], is a Linux distribution based
4458 on Debian providing an out-of-the box environment of a completely
4459 configured school network. Immediately after installation a school
4460 server running all services needed for a school network is set up just
4461 waiting for users and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable
4462 Web-UI. A netbooting environment is prepared using PXE, so after
4463 initial installation of the main server from CD or USB stick all other
4464 machines can be installed via the network.  The provided school server
4465 provides LDAP database and Kerberos authentication service,
4466 centralized home directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other
4467 services.  The desktop contains more than 60 educational software
4468 packages[3] and more are available from the Debian archive, and
4469 schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE, Xfce and MATE desktop
4470 environment.
4471
4472  [2] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">http://www.skolelinux.org/</a> &gt;
4473  [3] &lt;URL: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html</a> &gt;
4474
4475 Full release notes and manual
4476 =============================
4477
4478 Below the download URLs there is a list of some of the new features
4479 and bugfixes of Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie. The full
4480 list is part of the manual. (See the feature list in the manual[4] for
4481 the English version.) For some languages manual translations are
4482 available, see the manual translation overview[5].
4483
4484  [4] &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/Features">https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Jessie/Features</a> &gt;
4485  [5] &lt;URL: <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/</a> &gt;
4486
4487 Where to get it
4488 ---------------
4489
4490 To download the multiarch netinstall CD release (624 MiB) you can use
4491
4492  * <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso</a>
4493  * <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso</a>
4494  * rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/debian-edu-8.0+edu0~alpha0-CD.iso .
4495
4496 The SHA1SUM of this image is: 361188818e036ce67280a572f757de82ebfeb095
4497
4498 New features for Debian Edu 8.0+edu0~alpha0 Codename Jessie released 2014-10-27
4499 ===============================================================================
4500
4501
4502 Installation changes
4503 --------------------
4504
4505  * PXE installation now installs firmware automatically for the hardware present.
4506
4507 Software updates
4508 ----------------
4509
4510 Everything which is new in Debian Jessie 8.0, eg:
4511
4512  * Linux kernel 3.16.x
4513  * Desktop environments KDE "Plasma" 4.11.12, GNOME 3.14, Xfce 4.10,
4514    LXDE 0.5.6 and MATE 1.8 (KDE "Plasma" is installed by default; to
4515    choose one of the others see manual.)
4516  * the browsers Iceweasel 31 ESR and Chromium 38
4517  * !LibreOffice 4.3.3
4518  * GOsa 2.7.4
4519  * LTSP 5.5.4
4520  * CUPS print system 1.7.5
4521  * new boot framework: systemd
4522  * Educational toolbox GCompris 14.07
4523  * Music creator Rosegarden 14.02
4524  * Image editor Gimp 2.8.14
4525  * Virtual stargazer Stellarium 0.13.0
4526  * golearn 0.9
4527  * tuxpaint 0.9.22
4528  * New version of debian-installer from Debian Jessie.
4529  * Debian Jessie includes about 42000 packages available for
4530    installation.
4531  * More information about Debian Jessie 8.0 is provided in the release
4532    notes[6] and the installation manual[7].
4533
4534  [6] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes">http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/releasenotes</a> &gt;
4535  [7] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual">http://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/installmanual</a> &gt;
4536
4537 Fixed bugs
4538 ----------
4539
4540  * Inserting incorrect DNS information in Gosa will no longer break
4541    DNS completely, but instead stop DNS updates until the incorrect
4542    information is corrected (Debian bug #710362)
4543  * and many others.
4544
4545 Documentation and translation updates
4546 -------------------------------------
4547
4548  * The Debian Edu Jessie Manual is fully translated to German, French,
4549    Italian, Danish and Dutch. Partly translated versions exist for
4550    Norwegian Bokmal and Spanish.
4551
4552 Other changes
4553 -------------
4554
4555  * Due to new Squid settings, powering off or rebooting the main
4556    server takes more time.
4557  * To manage printers localhost:631 has to be used, currently www:631
4558    doesn't work.
4559
4560 Regressions / known problems
4561 ----------------------------
4562
4563  * Installing LTSP chroot fails with a bug related to eatmydata about
4564    exim4-config failing to run its postinst (see Debian bug #765694
4565    and Debian bug #762103).
4566  * Munin collection is not properly configured on clients (Debian bug
4567    #764594).  The fix is available in a newer version of munin-node.
4568  * PXE setup for Main Server and Thin Client Server setup does not
4569    work when installing on a machine without direct Internet access.
4570    Will be fixed when Debian bug #766960 is fixed in Jessie.
4571
4572 See the status page[8] for the complete list.
4573
4574  [8] &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie</a> &gt;
4575
4576 How to report bugs
4577 ------------------
4578
4579 &lt;URL: <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a> &gt;
4580
4581 About Debian
4582 ============
4583
4584 The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly
4585 free community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of
4586 the largest and most influential open source projects. Thousands of
4587 volunteers from all over the world work together to create and
4588 maintain Debian software. Available in 70 languages, and supporting a
4589 huge range of computer types, Debian calls itself the universal
4590 operating system.
4591
4592 Contact Information
4593 For further information, please visit the Debian web pages[9] or send
4594 mail to press@debian.org.
4595
4596  [9] &lt;URL: <a href="http://www.debian.org/">http://www.debian.org/</a> &gt;
4597 </pre>
4598
4599       </div>
4600       <div class="tags">
4601
4602
4603         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4604
4605
4606       </div>
4607     </div>
4608     <div class="padding"></div>
4609
4610     <div class="entry">
4611       <div class="title">
4612         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/I_spent_last_weekend_recording_MakerCon_Nordic.html">I spent last weekend recording MakerCon Nordic</a>
4613       </div>
4614       <div class="date">
4615         23rd October 2014
4616       </div>
4617       <div class="body">
4618         <p>I spent last weekend at <a href="http://www.makercon.no/">Makercon
4619 Nordic</a>, a great conference and workshop for makers in Norway and
4620 the surrounding countries.  I had volunteered on behalf of the
4621 Norwegian Unix Users Group (NUUG) to video record the talks, and we
4622 had a great and exhausting time recording the entire day, two days in
4623 a row.  There were only two of us, Hans-Petter and me, and we used the
4624 regular video equipment for NUUG, with a
4625 <a href="http://dvswitch.alioth.debian.org/wiki/">dvswitch</a>, a
4626 camera and a VGA to DV convert box, and mixed video and slides
4627 live.</p>
4628
4629 <p>Hans-Petter did the post-processing, consisting of uploading the
4630 around 180 GiB of raw video to Youtube, and the result is
4631 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/user/MakerConNordic/">now becoming
4632 public</a> on the MakerConNordic account.  The videos have the license
4633 NUUG always use on our recordings, which is
4634 <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/no/">Creative
4635 Commons Navngivelse-Del på samme vilkår 3.0 Norge</a>.  Many great
4636 talks available.  Check it out! :)</p>
4637
4638       </div>
4639       <div class="tags">
4640
4641
4642         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
4643
4644
4645       </div>
4646     </div>
4647     <div class="padding"></div>
4648
4649     <div class="entry">
4650       <div class="title">
4651         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/listadmin__the_quick_way_to_moderate_mailman_lists___nice_free_software.html">listadmin, the quick way to moderate mailman lists - nice free software</a>
4652       </div>
4653       <div class="date">
4654         22nd October 2014
4655       </div>
4656       <div class="body">
4657         <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
4658 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
4659 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
4660 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
4661 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
4662 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
4663 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
4664 <a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the
4665 listadmin program</a>.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
4666 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
4667 lists I recently took over:</p>
4668
4669 <p><blockquote><pre>
4670 % time listadmin xiph
4671 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4672 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
4673
4674 real    0m1.709s
4675 user    0m0.232s
4676 sys     0m0.012s
4677 %
4678 </pre></blockquote></p>
4679
4680 <p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
4681 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
4682 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
4683 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
4684 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
4685 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
4686 program.</p>
4687
4688 <p>If you install
4689 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin
4690 package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt>
4691 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p>
4692
4693 <p><blockquote><pre>
4694 username username@example.org
4695 spamlevel 23
4696 default discard
4697 discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
4698
4699 password secret
4700 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
4701 mailman-list@lists.example.com
4702
4703 password hidden
4704 other-list@otherserver.example.org
4705 </pre></blockquote></p>
4706
4707 <p>There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
4708 learn the details.</p>
4709
4710 <p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
4711 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
4712 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
4713 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p>
4714
4715 <p><blockquote><pre>
4716 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
4717 </pre></blockquote></p>
4718
4719 <p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
4720 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
4721 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
4722 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
4723 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
4724 email.</p>
4725
4726 <p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
4727 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
4728 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
4729 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
4730 software.</p>
4731
4732 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
4733 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
4734 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
4735
4736 <p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in
4737 configuration example.  Also, I've been told that the
4738 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
4739 sure why.</p>
4740
4741       </div>
4742       <div class="tags">
4743
4744
4745         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
4746
4747
4748       </div>
4749     </div>
4750     <div class="padding"></div>
4751
4752     <div class="entry">
4753       <div class="title">
4754         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html">Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</a>
4755       </div>
4756       <div class="date">
4757         17th October 2014
4758       </div>
4759       <div class="body">
4760         <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
4761 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
4762 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
4763 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
4764 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram
4765 package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
4766 to do this using simple preseeding.</p>
4767
4768 <p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
4769 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
4770 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
4771 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
4772 of this story.)</p>
4773
4774 <p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
4775 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
4776 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
4777 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
4778 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
4779 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
4780 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
4781 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
4782 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
4783 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p>
4784
4785 <p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
4786 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
4787 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
4788 hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p>
4789
4790 <p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
4791 firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p>
4792
4793 <p><blockquote><pre>
4794 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
4795 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
4796 </pre></blockquote></p>
4797
4798 <p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
4799 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
4800 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
4801 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
4802 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
4803 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
4804 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
4805 implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p>
4806
4807 <p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
4808 this recipe work for you. :)</p>
4809
4810 <p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
4811 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
4812 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
4813 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
4814 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p>
4815
4816 <p><blockquote><pre>
4817 Task: isenkram-packages
4818 Section: hardware
4819 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4820  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
4821  proposed.
4822 Test-new-install: show show
4823 Relevance: 8
4824 Packages: for-current-hardware
4825
4826 Task: isenkram-firmware
4827 Section: hardware
4828 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4829  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
4830  packages are proposed.
4831 Test-new-install: mark show
4832 Relevance: 8
4833 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
4834 </pre></blockquote></p>
4835
4836 <p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
4837 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
4838 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
4839 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
4840 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
4841
4842 <p><blockquote><pre>
4843 #!/bin/sh
4844 #
4845 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
4846 export PATH
4847 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
4848 </pre></blockquote></p>
4849
4850 <p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
4851 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p>
4852
4853 <p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
4854 installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
4855 --new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would
4856 install.</p>
4857
4858 <p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be
4859 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
4860 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p>
4861
4862       </div>
4863       <div class="tags">
4864
4865
4866         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin</a>.
4867
4868
4869       </div>
4870     </div>
4871     <div class="padding"></div>
4872
4873     <div class="entry">
4874       <div class="title">
4875         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ubuntu_used_to_show_the_bread_prizes_at_ICA_Storo.html">Ubuntu used to show the bread prizes at ICA Storo</a>
4876       </div>
4877       <div class="date">
4878          4th October 2014
4879       </div>
4880       <div class="body">
4881         <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
4882 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
4883 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
4884 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p>
4885
4886 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p>
4887
4888 <p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
4889 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
4890 <a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p>
4891
4892       </div>
4893       <div class="tags">
4894
4895
4896         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
4897
4898
4899       </div>
4900     </div>
4901     <div class="padding"></div>
4902
4903     <div class="entry">
4904       <div class="title">
4905         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_lsdvd_release_version_0_17_is_ready.html">New lsdvd release version 0.17 is ready</a>
4906       </div>
4907       <div class="date">
4908          4th October 2014
4909       </div>
4910       <div class="body">
4911         <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a>
4912 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
4913 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
4914 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
4915 Dibb.</p>
4916
4917 <p>I just wrapped up
4918 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a
4919 new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from
4920 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the
4921 download page</a>.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
4922 0.17.</p>
4923
4924 <ul>
4925
4926  <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li>
4927  <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
4928    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li>
4929  <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li>
4930  <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li>
4931  <li>Fix include orders</li>
4932  <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li>
4933  <li>Fix the chapter count</li>
4934  <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
4935    the palette size is the same.</li>
4936  <li>Fix array printing.</li>
4937  <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li>
4938  <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li>
4939  <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
4940    with more GCC compiler warnings.</li>
4941
4942 </ul>
4943
4944 <p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
4945 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
4946 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)</p>
4947
4948       </div>
4949       <div class="tags">
4950
4951
4952         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
4953
4954
4955       </div>
4956     </div>
4957     <div class="padding"></div>
4958
4959     <div class="entry">
4960       <div class="title">
4961         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_Debian_Edu_Jessie_despite_some_fatal_problems_with_the_installer.html">How to test Debian Edu Jessie despite some fatal problems with the installer</a>
4962       </div>
4963       <div class="date">
4964         26th September 2014
4965       </div>
4966       <div class="body">
4967         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4968 project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
4969 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
4970 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
4971 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
4972 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
4973 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
4974 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
4975 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
4976 future.  The
4977 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current
4978 status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
4979 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
4980 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
4981 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p>
4982
4983 <p>First, download the test ISO via
4984 <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>,
4985 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a>
4986 or rsync (use
4987 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
4988 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
4989 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
4990 install with some tweaking.</p>
4991
4992 <p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
4993 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p>
4994
4995 <p><blockquote><pre>
4996 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
4997 </pre></blockquote></p>
4998
4999 <p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
5000 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
5001 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
5002 due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p>
5003
5004 <p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
5005 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
5006 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
5007 your need.</p>
5008
5009 <p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
5010 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
5011 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
5012 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
5013 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
5014 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
5015 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
5016 days.</p>
5017
5018 <p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
5019 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
5020 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
5021 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
5022 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
5023 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
5024 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
5025 provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>.
5026 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p>
5027
5028 <p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
5029 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
5030 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p>
5031
5032       </div>
5033       <div class="tags">
5034
5035
5036         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5037
5038
5039       </div>
5040     </div>
5041     <div class="padding"></div>
5042
5043     <div class="entry">
5044       <div class="title">
5045         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Suddenly_I_am_the_new_upstream_of_the_lsdvd_command_line_tool.html">Suddenly I am the new upstream of the lsdvd command line tool</a>
5046       </div>
5047       <div class="date">
5048         25th September 2014
5049       </div>
5050       <div class="body">
5051         <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a>
5052 to handle my fairly large DVD collection.  It is a nice command line
5053 tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length,
5054 etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format.  But lsdvd have not seen
5055 any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting
5056 its use with some DVDs.  Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I
5057 sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the
5058 project, without any reply.  But I use it regularly and would like to
5059 get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version
5060 into Debian</a>.  So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with
5061 the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that
5062 he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take
5063 over.  And yesterday, I became project admin.</p>
5064
5065 <p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian
5066 maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream
5067 project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly,
5068 collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place.
5069 I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git
5070 repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too.  If you got
5071 a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out
5072 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join
5073 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing
5074 list</a>. :)</p>
5075
5076       </div>
5077       <div class="tags">
5078
5079
5080         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
5081
5082
5083       </div>
5084     </div>
5085     <div class="padding"></div>
5086
5087     <div class="entry">
5088       <div class="title">
5089         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">Speeding up the Debian installer using eatmydata and dpkg-divert</a>
5090       </div>
5091       <div class="date">
5092         16th September 2014
5093       </div>
5094       <div class="body">
5095         <p>The <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> installer could be
5096 a lot quicker.  When we install more than 2000 packages in
5097 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> using
5098 tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever.
5099 A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in
5100 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/613428">bug #613428</a> about too
5101 much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package
5102 responsible for unpacking the binary packages.  Other parts (like code
5103 executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during
5104 installation.  All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to
5105 me.  If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try
5106 to salvage the half installed system.  So the failure sync-ing is
5107 supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really
5108 relevant while the installer is running.</p>
5109
5110 <p>A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file
5111 system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to
5112 change the code in several packages.  The idea is not new, but I have
5113 not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before.  It
5114 depend on the small and clever package
5115 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/eatmydata">eatmydata</a>, which
5116 uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to
5117 disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live
5118 dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly.  Instead of
5119 modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the
5120 packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages),
5121 it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace
5122 them with a simple shell wrapper calling
5123 "eatmydata&nbsp;$program&nbsp;$@", to get the same effect.
5124 Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple
5125 implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.</p>
5126
5127 <p>The effect was stunning.  In my first test it reduced the running
5128 time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44
5129 minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell
5130 Latitude D505 machine.  I am not quite sure what the optimised time
5131 would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf
5132 priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during
5133 installation.  As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation
5134 along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the
5135 installation.  I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie,
5136 and got these results.  The time measured is the time stamp in
5137 /var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the
5138 "pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement
5139 yourself.  In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the
5140 timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel
5141 dialog.</p>
5142
5143 <p><table>
5144
5145 <tr>
5146 <th>Machine/setup</th>
5147 <th>Original tasksel</th>
5148 <th>Optimised tasksel</th>
5149 <th>Reduction</th>
5150 </tr>
5151
5152 <tr>
5153 <td>Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE</td>
5154 <td>64 min (07:46-08:50)</td>
5155 <td><44 min (11:27-12:11)</td>
5156 <td>>20 min 18%</td>
5157 </tr>
5158
5159 <tr>
5160 <td>Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE</td>
5161 <td>57 min (08:48-09:45)</td>
5162 <td>34 min (07:43-08:17)</td>
5163 <td>23 min 40%</td>
5164 </tr>
5165
5166 <tr>
5167 <td>Latitude D505 Minimal</td>
5168 <td>22 min (10:37-10:59)</td>
5169 <td>11 min (11:16-11:27)</td>
5170 <td>11 min 50%</td>
5171 </tr>
5172
5173 <tr>
5174 <td>Thinkpad X200 Minimal</td>
5175 <td>6 min (08:19-08:25)</td>
5176 <td>4 min (08:04-08:08)</td>
5177 <td>2 min 33%</td>
5178 </tr>
5179
5180 <tr>
5181 <td>Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE</td>
5182 <td>19 min (09:21-09:40)</td>
5183 <td>15 min (10:25-10:40)</td>
5184 <td>4 min 21%</td>
5185 </tr>
5186
5187 </table></p>
5188
5189 <p>The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the
5190 time is spent downloading packages.  The connection to the Internet
5191 was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a
5192 significant factor in the measurement.  Download typically took a few
5193 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being
5194 installed.</p>
5195
5196 <p>The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in
5197 <a href="https://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/">Debian
5198 Installer</a>, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the
5199 finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the
5200 installation.  I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the
5201 post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the
5202 eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in
5203 Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO.  The
5204 negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this
5205 optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i.  If the code is
5206 moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger
5207 for the entire installation.</p>
5208
5209 <p>I've implemented this in the
5210 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-install">debian-edu-install</a>
5211 git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the
5212 Debian Edu installation.  If you want to test this yourself, you can
5213 create two files in the installer (or in an udeb).  One shell script
5214 need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:</p>
5215
5216 <p><blockquote><pre>
5217 #!/bin/sh
5218 set -e
5219 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5220 info() {
5221     logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
5222 }
5223 error() {
5224     logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
5225 }
5226 override_install() {
5227     apt-install eatmydata || true
5228     if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
5229         for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5230             file=/usr/bin/$bin
5231             # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
5232             if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
5233                 info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
5234                 printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
5235                     > /target$file.edu
5236                 chmod 755 /target$file.edu
5237                 in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5238                     --rename --quiet --add $file
5239                 ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
5240             else
5241                 error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
5242             fi
5243         done
5244     else
5245         error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
5246     fi
5247 }
5248
5249 override_install
5250 </pre></blockquote></p>
5251
5252 <p>To clean up, another shell script should go into
5253 /usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this:
5254
5255 <p><blockquote><pre>
5256 #! /bin/sh -e
5257 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5258 error() {
5259     logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
5260 }
5261 remove_install_override() {
5262     for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5263         file=/usr/bin/$bin
5264         if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
5265             rm /target$file
5266             in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5267                 --rename --quiet --remove $file
5268             rm /target$file.edu
5269         else
5270             error "Missing divert for $file."
5271         fi
5272     done
5273     sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
5274 }
5275
5276 remove_install_override
5277 </pre></blockquote></p>
5278
5279 <p>In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script
5280 edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and
5281 finish-install.d scripts.</p>
5282
5283 <p>By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal
5284 Debian installer too?  I suspect it should, but am not sure the
5285 current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough.  It also
5286 depend on the side effects of the change.  I'm not aware of any, but I
5287 guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing.
5288 Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and
5289 fsync() having effect?  Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to
5290 allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting
5291 everyone.</p>
5292
5293 <p>Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization
5294 will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of
5295 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">bug #702711</a>.  An updated
5296 eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.</p>
5297
5298 <p>Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and
5299 the optimization work again.  And I have discovered that the
5300 dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly
5301 simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package.  See
5302 tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.</p>
5303
5304 <p>Update 2014-11-11: Unfortunately, a new
5305 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/765738">bug #765738</a> in eatmydata only
5306 triggering on i386 made it into testing, and broke this installation
5307 optimization again.  If <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/768893">unblock
5308 request 768893</a> is accepted, it should be working again.</p>
5309
5310       </div>
5311       <div class="tags">
5312
5313
5314         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5315
5316
5317       </div>
5318     </div>
5319     <div class="padding"></div>
5320
5321     <div class="entry">
5322       <div class="title">
5323         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Good_bye_subkeys_pgp_net__welcome_pool_sks_keyservers_net.html">Good bye subkeys.pgp.net, welcome pool.sks-keyservers.net</a>
5324       </div>
5325       <div class="date">
5326         10th September 2014
5327       </div>
5328       <div class="body">
5329         <p>Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk with the
5330 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> about
5331 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20140909-sks-keyservers/">the
5332 OpenPGP keyserver pool sks-keyservers.net</a>, and was very happy to
5333 learn that there is a large set of publicly available key servers to
5334 use when looking for peoples public key.  So far I have used
5335 subkeys.pgp.net, and some times wwwkeys.nl.pgp.net when the former
5336 were misbehaving, but those days are ended.  The servers I have used
5337 up until yesterday have been slow and some times unavailable.  I hope
5338 those problems are gone now.</p>
5339
5340 <p>Behind the round robin DNS entry of the
5341 <a href="https://sks-keyservers.net/">sks-keyservers.net</a> service
5342 there is a pool of more than 100 keyservers which are checked every
5343 day to ensure they are well connected and up to date.  It must be
5344 better than what I have used so far. :)</p>
5345
5346 <p>Yesterdays speaker told me that the service is the default
5347 keyserver provided by the default configuration in GnuPG, but this do
5348 not seem to be used in Debian.  Perhaps it should?</p>
5349
5350 <p>Anyway, I've updated my ~/.gnupg/options file to now include this
5351 line:</p>
5352
5353 <p><blockquote><pre>
5354 keyserver pool.sks-keyservers.net
5355 </pre></blockquote></p>
5356
5357 <p>With GnuPG version 2 one can also locate the keyserver using SRV
5358 entries in DNS.  Just for fun, I did just that at work, so now every
5359 user of GnuPG at the University of Oslo should find a OpenGPG
5360 keyserver automatically should their need it:</p>
5361
5362 <p><blockquote><pre>
5363 % host -t srv _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no
5364 _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no has SRV record 0 100 11371 pool.sks-keyservers.net.
5365 %
5366 </pre></blockquote></p>
5367
5368 <p>Now if only
5369 <a href="http://ietfreport.isoc.org/idref/draft-shaw-openpgp-hkp/">the
5370 HKP lookup protocol</a> supported finding signature paths, I would be
5371 very happy.  It can look up a given key or search for a user ID, but I
5372 normally do not want that, but to find a trust path from my key to
5373 another key.  Given a user ID or key ID, I would like to find (and
5374 download) the keys representing a signature path from my key to the
5375 key in question, to be able to get a trust path between the two keys.
5376 This is as far as I can tell not possible today.  Perhaps something
5377 for a future version of the protocol?</p>
5378
5379       </div>
5380       <div class="tags">
5381
5382
5383         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
5384
5385
5386       </div>
5387     </div>
5388     <div class="padding"></div>
5389
5390     <div class="entry">
5391       <div class="title">
5392         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Do_you_need_an_agreement_with_MPEG_LA_to_publish_and_broadcast_H_264_video_in_Norway_.html">Do you need an agreement with MPEG-LA to publish and broadcast H.264 video in Norway?</a>
5393       </div>
5394       <div class="date">
5395         25th August 2014
5396       </div>
5397       <div class="body">
5398         <p>Two years later, I am still not sure if it is legal here in Norway
5399 to use or publish a video in H.264 or MPEG4 format edited by the
5400 commercially licensed video editors, without limiting the use to
5401 create "personal" or "non-commercial" videos or get a license
5402 agreement with <a href="http://www.mpegla.com">MPEG LA</a>.  If one
5403 want to publish and broadcast video in a non-personal or commercial
5404 setting, it might be that those tools can not be used, or that video
5405 format can not be used, without breaking their copyright license.  I
5406 am not sure.
5407 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Trenger_en_avtale_med_MPEG_LA_for___publisere_og_kringkaste_H_264_video_.html">Back
5408 then</a>, I found that the copyright license terms for Adobe Premiere
5409 and Apple Final Cut Pro both specified that one could not use the
5410 program to produce anything else without a patent license from MPEG
5411 LA.  The issue is not limited to those two products, though.  Other
5412 much used products like those from Avid and Sorenson Media have terms
5413 of use are similar to those from Adobe and Apple.  The complicating
5414 factor making me unsure if those terms have effect in Norway or not is
5415 that the patents in question are not valid in Norway, but copyright
5416 licenses are.</p>
5417
5418 <p>These are the terms for Avid Artist Suite, according to their
5419 <a href="http://www.avid.com/US/about-avid/legal-notices/legal-enduserlicense2">published
5420 end user</a>
5421 <a href="http://www.avid.com/static/resources/common/documents/corporate/LICENSE.pdf">license
5422 text</a> (converted to lower case text for easier reading):</p>
5423
5424 <p><blockquote>
5425 <p>18.2. MPEG-4. MPEG-4 technology may be included with the
5426 software. MPEG LA, L.L.C. requires this notice: </p>
5427
5428 <p>This product is licensed under the MPEG-4 visual patent portfolio
5429 license for the personal and non-commercial use of a consumer for (i)
5430 encoding video in compliance with the MPEG-4 visual standard (“MPEG-4
5431 video”) and/or (ii) decoding MPEG-4 video that was encoded by a
5432 consumer engaged in a personal and non-commercial activity and/or was
5433 obtained from a video provider licensed by MPEG LA to provide MPEG-4
5434 video.  No license is granted or shall be implied for any other
5435 use. Additional information including that relating to promotional,
5436 internal and commercial uses and licensing may be obtained from MPEG
5437 LA, LLC.  See http://www.mpegla.com. This product is licensed under
5438 the MPEG-4 systems patent portfolio license for encoding in compliance
5439 with the MPEG-4 systems standard, except that an additional license
5440 and payment of royalties are necessary for encoding in connection with
5441 (i) data stored or replicated in physical media which is paid for on a
5442 title by title basis and/or (ii) data which is paid for on a title by
5443 title basis and is transmitted to an end user for permanent storage
5444 and/or use, such additional license may be obtained from MPEG LA,
5445 LLC. See http://www.mpegla.com for additional details.</p>
5446
5447 <p>18.3. H.264/AVC. H.264/AVC technology may be included with the
5448 software.  MPEG LA, L.L.C. requires this notice:</p>
5449
5450 <p>This product is licensed under the AVC patent portfolio license for
5451 the personal use of a consumer or other uses in which it does not
5452 receive remuneration to (i) encode video in compliance with the AVC
5453 standard (“AVC video”) and/or (ii) decode AVC video that was encoded
5454 by a consumer engaged in a personal activity and/or was obtained from
5455 a video provider licensed to provide AVC video. No license is granted
5456 or shall be implied for any other use. Additional information may be
5457 obtained from MPEG LA, L.L.C. See http://www.mpegla.com.</p>
5458 </blockquote></p>
5459
5460 <p>Note the requirement that the videos created can only be used for
5461 personal or non-commercial purposes.</p>
5462
5463 <p>The Sorenson Media software have
5464 <a href="http://www.sorensonmedia.com/terms/">similar terms</a>:</p>
5465
5466 <p><blockquote>
5467
5468 <p>With respect to a license from Sorenson pertaining to MPEG-4 Video
5469 Decoders and/or Encoders: Any such product is licensed under the
5470 MPEG-4 visual patent portfolio license for the personal and
5471 non-commercial use of a consumer for (i) encoding video in compliance
5472 with the MPEG-4 visual standard (“MPEG-4 video”) and/or (ii) decoding
5473 MPEG-4 video that was encoded by a consumer engaged in a personal and
5474 non-commercial activity and/or was obtained from a video provider
5475 licensed by MPEG LA to provide MPEG-4 video. No license is granted or
5476 shall be implied for any other use. Additional information including
5477 that relating to promotional, internal and commercial uses and
5478 licensing may be obtained from MPEG LA, LLC. See
5479 http://www.mpegla.com.</p>
5480
5481 <p>With respect to a license from Sorenson pertaining to MPEG-4
5482 Consumer Recorded Data Encoder, MPEG-4 Systems Internet Data Encoder,
5483 MPEG-4 Mobile Data Encoder, and/or MPEG-4 Unique Use Encoder: Any such
5484 product is licensed under the MPEG-4 systems patent portfolio license
5485 for encoding in compliance with the MPEG-4 systems standard, except
5486 that an additional license and payment of royalties are necessary for
5487 encoding in connection with (i) data stored or replicated in physical
5488 media which is paid for on a title by title basis and/or (ii) data
5489 which is paid for on a title by title basis and is transmitted to an
5490 end user for permanent storage and/or use. Such additional license may
5491 be obtained from MPEG LA, LLC. See http://www.mpegla.com for
5492 additional details.</p>
5493
5494 </blockquote></p>
5495
5496 <p>Some free software like
5497 <a href="https://handbrake.fr/">Handbrake</A> and
5498 <a href="http://ffmpeg.org/">FFMPEG</a> uses GPL/LGPL licenses and do
5499 not have any such terms included, so for those, there is no
5500 requirement to limit the use to personal and non-commercial.</p>
5501
5502       </div>
5503       <div class="tags">
5504
5505
5506         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
5507
5508
5509       </div>
5510     </div>
5511     <div class="padding"></div>
5512
5513     <div class="entry">
5514       <div class="title">
5515         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Bernd_Zeitzen.html">Debian Edu interview: Bernd Zeitzen</a>
5516       </div>
5517       <div class="date">
5518         31st July 2014
5519       </div>
5520       <div class="body">
5521         <p>The complete and free “out of the box” software solution for
5522 schools, <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
5523 Skolelinux</a>, is used quite a lot in Germany, and one of the people
5524 involved is Bernd Zeitzen, who show up on the project mailing lists
5525 from time to time with interesting questions and tips on how to adjust
5526 the setup.  I managed to interview him this summer.</p>
5527
5528 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
5529
5530 <p>My name is Bernd Zeitzen and I'm married with Hedda, a self
5531 employed physiotherapist.  My former profession is tool maker, but I
5532 haven't worked for 30 years in this job.  30 years ago I started to
5533 support my wife and become her officeworker and a few years later the
5534 administrator for a small computer network, today based on Ubuntu
5535 Server (Samba, OpenVPN). For her daily work she has to use Windows
5536 Desktops because the software she needs to organize her business only
5537 works with Windows . :-(</p>
5538
5539 <p>In 1988 we started with one PC and DOS, then I learned to use
5540 Windows 98, 2000, XP, …, 8, Ubuntu, MacOSX.  Today we are running a
5541 Linux server with 6 Windows clients and 10 persons (teacher of
5542 children with special needs, speech therapist, occupational therapist,
5543 psychologist and officeworkers) using our Samba shares via OpenVPN to
5544 work with the documentations of our patients.</p>
5545
5546 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
5547 project?</strong></p>
5548
5549 <p>Two years ago a friend of mine asked me, if I want to get a job in
5550 his school (<a href="http://www.gymnasium-harsewinkel.de/">Gymnasium
5551 Harsewinkel</a>).  They started with Skolelinux / Debian Edu and they
5552 were looking for people to give support to the teachers using the
5553 software and the network and teaching the pupils increasing their
5554 computer skills in optional lessons.  I'm spending 4-6 hours a week
5555 with this job.</p>
5556
5557 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
5558 Edu?</strong></p>
5559
5560 <p>The independence.</p>
5561
5562 <p>First: Every person is allowed to use, share and develop the
5563 software. Even if you are poor, you are allowed to use the software
5564 included in Skolelinux/Debian Edu and all the other Free Software.</p>
5565
5566 <p>Second: The software runs on old machines and this gives us the
5567 possibility to recycle computers, weeded out from offices.  The
5568 servers and desktops are running for more than two years and they are
5569 working reliable. </p>
5570
5571 <p>We have two servers (one tjener and one terminal server), 45
5572 workstations in three classrooms and seven laptops as a mobile
5573 solution for all classrooms.  These machines are all booting from the
5574 terminal server.  In the moment we are installing 30 laptops as mobile
5575 workstations.  Then the pupils have the possibility to work with these
5576 machines in their classrooms.  Internet access is realized by a WLAN
5577 router, connected to the schools network. This is all done without a
5578 dedicated system administrator or a computer science teacher.</p>
5579
5580 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
5581 Edu?</strong></p>
5582
5583 <p>Teachers and pupils are Windows users.  &lt;Irony on&gt; And Linux
5584 isn't cool. It's software for freaks using the command line. &lt;Irony
5585 off&gt; They don't realize the stability of the system. </p>
5586
5587 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
5588
5589 <p>Firefox, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, Ubuntu Server 12.04 (Samba,
5590 Apache, MySQL, Joomla!, … and Skolelinux / Debian Edu)</p>
5591
5592 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
5593 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
5594
5595 <p>In Germany we have the situation: every school is free to decide
5596 which software they want to use. This decision is influenced by
5597 teachers who learned to use Windows and MS Office. They buy a PC with
5598 Windows preinstalled and an additional testing version of MS
5599 Office. They don't know about the possibility to use Free Software
5600 instead.  Another problem are the publisher of school books.  They
5601 develop their software, added to the school books, for Windows.</p>
5602
5603       </div>
5604       <div class="tags">
5605
5606
5607         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
5608
5609
5610       </div>
5611     </div>
5612     <div class="padding"></div>
5613
5614     <div class="entry">
5615       <div class="title">
5616         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/98_6_percent_done_with_the_Norwegian_draft_translation_of_Free_Culture.html">98.6 percent done with the Norwegian draft translation of Free Culture</a>
5617       </div>
5618       <div class="date">
5619         23rd July 2014
5620       </div>
5621       <div class="body">
5622         <p>This summer I finally had time to continue working on the Norwegian
5623 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">docbook</a> version of the 2004 book
5624 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> by Lawrence Lessig,
5625 to get a Norwegian text explaining the problems with todays copyright
5626 law.  Yesterday, I finally completed translated the book text.  There
5627 are still some foot/end notes left to translate, the colophon page
5628 need to be rewritten, and a few words and phrases still need to be
5629 translated, but the Norwegian text is ready for the first proof
5630 reading. :) More spell checking is needed, and several illustrations
5631 need to be cleaned up.  The work stopped up because I had to give
5632 priority to other projects the last year, and the progress graph of
5633 the translation show this very well:</p>
5634
5635 <p><img width="80%" align="center" src="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/progress.png"></p>
5636
5637 <p>If you want to read the result, check out the
5638 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>
5639 project pages and the
5640 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf?raw=true">PDF</a>,
5641 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub?raw=true">EPUB</a>
5642 and HTML version available in the
5643 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/tree/master/archive">archive
5644 directory</a>.</p>
5645
5646 <p>Please report typos, bugs and improvements to the github project if
5647 you find any.</p>
5648
5649       </div>
5650       <div class="tags">
5651
5652
5653         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
5654
5655
5656       </div>
5657     </div>
5658     <div class="padding"></div>
5659
5660     <div class="entry">
5661       <div class="title">
5662         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/From_English_wiki_to_translated_PDF_and_epub_via_Docbook.html">From English wiki to translated PDF and epub via Docbook</a>
5663       </div>
5664       <div class="date">
5665         17th June 2014
5666       </div>
5667       <div class="body">
5668         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
5669 project</a> provide an instruction manual for teachers, system
5670 administrators and other users that contain useful tips for setting up
5671 and maintaining a Debian Edu installation.  This text is about how the
5672 text processing of this manual is handled in the project.</p>
5673
5674 <p>One goal of the project is to provide information in the native
5675 language of its users, and for this we need to handle translations.
5676 But we also want to make sure each language contain the same
5677 information, so for this we need a good way to keep the translations
5678 in sync.  And we want it to be easy for our users to improve the
5679 documentation, avoiding the need to learn special formats or tools to
5680 contribute, and the obvious way to do this is to make it possible to
5681 edit the documentation using a web browser.  We also want it to be
5682 easy for translators to keep the translation up to date, and give them
5683 help in figuring out what need to be translated. Here is the list of
5684 tools and the process we have found trying to reach all these
5685 goals.</p>
5686
5687 <p>We maintain the authoritative source of our manual in the
5688 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">Debian
5689 wiki</a>, as several wiki pages written in English.  It consist of one
5690 front page with references to the different chapters, several pages
5691 for each chapter, and finally one "collection page" gluing all the
5692 chapters together into one large web page (aka
5693 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/AllInOne">the
5694 AllInOne page</a>).  The AllInOne page is the one used for further
5695 processing and translations.  Thanks to the fact that the
5696 <a href="http://moinmo.in/">MoinMoin</a> installation on
5697 wiki.debian.org support exporting pages in
5698 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">the Docbook format</a>, we can fetch
5699 the list of pages to export using the raw version of the AllInOne
5700 page, loop over each of them to generate a Docbook XML version of the
5701 manual.  This process also download images and transform image
5702 references to use the locally downloaded images.  The generated
5703 Docbook XML files are slightly broken, so some post-processing is done
5704 using the <tt>documentation/scripts/get_manual</tt> program, and the
5705 result is a nice Docbook XML file (debian-edu-wheezy-manual.xml) and
5706 a handfull of images.  The XML file can now be used to generate PDF, HTML
5707 and epub versions of the English manual.  This is the basic step of
5708 our process, making PDF (using dblatex), HTML (using xsltproc) and
5709 epub (using dbtoepub) version from Docbook XML, and the resulting files
5710 are placed in the debian-edu-doc-en binary package.</p>
5711
5712 <p>But English documentation is not enough for us.  We want translated
5713 documentation too, and we want to make it easy for translators to
5714 track the English original.  For this we use the
5715 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/poxml.html">poxml</a> package,
5716 which allow us to transform the English Docbook XML file into a
5717 translation file (a .pot file), usable with the normal gettext based
5718 translation tools used by those translating free software.  The pot
5719 file is used to create and maintain translation files (several .po
5720 files), which the translations update with the native language
5721 translations of all titles, paragraphs and blocks of text in the
5722 original.  The next step is combining the original English Docbook XML
5723 and the translation file (say debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.po), to
5724 create a translated Docbook XML file (in this case
5725 debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.xml).  This translated (or partly
5726 translated, if the translation is not complete) Docbook XML file can
5727 then be used like the original to create a PDF, HTML and epub version
5728 of the documentation.</p>
5729
5730 <p>The translators use different tools to edit the .po files.  We
5731 recommend using
5732 <a href="http://www.kde.org/applications/development/lokalize/">lokalize</a>,
5733 while some use emacs and vi, others can use web based editors like
5734 <a href="http://pootle.translatehouse.org/">Poodle</a> or
5735 <a href="https://www.transifex.com/">Transifex</a>.  All we care about
5736 is where the .po file end up, in our git repository.  Updated
5737 translations can either be committed directly to git, or submitted as
5738 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/src:debian-edu-doc">bug reports
5739 against the debian-edu-doc package</a>.</p>
5740
5741 <p>One challenge is images, which both might need to be translated (if
5742 they show translated user applications), and are needed in different
5743 formats when creating PDF and HTML versions (epub is a HTML version in
5744 this regard).  For this we transform the original PNG images to the
5745 needed density and format during build, and have a way to provide
5746 translated images by storing translated versions in
5747 images/$LANGUAGECODE/.  I am a bit unsure about the details here.  The
5748 package maintainers know more.</p>
5749
5750 <p>If you wonder what the result look like, we provide
5751 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">the content
5752 of the documentation packages on the web</a>.  See for example the
5753 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/it/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.pdf">Italian
5754 PDF version</a> or the
5755 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/de/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.html">German
5756 HTML version</a>.  We do not yet build the epub version by default,
5757 but perhaps it will be done in the future.</p>
5758
5759 <p>To learn more, check out
5760 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-edu-doc.html">the
5761 debian-edu-doc package</a>,
5762 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">the
5763 manual on the wiki</a> and
5764 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/Translations">the
5765 translation instructions</a> in the manual.</p>
5766
5767       </div>
5768       <div class="tags">
5769
5770
5771         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5772
5773
5774       </div>
5775     </div>
5776     <div class="padding"></div>
5777
5778     <div class="entry">
5779       <div class="title">
5780         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_software_car_computer_solution_.html">Free software car computer solution?</a>
5781       </div>
5782       <div class="date">
5783         29th May 2014
5784       </div>
5785       <div class="body">
5786         <p>Dear lazyweb.  I'm planning to set up a small Raspberry Pi computer
5787 in my car, connected to
5788 <a href="http://www.dx.com/p/400a-4-0-tft-lcd-digital-monitor-for-vehicle-parking-reverse-camera-1440x272-12v-dc-57776">a
5789 small screen</a> next to the rear mirror.  I plan to hook it up with a
5790 GPS and a USB wifi card too.  The idea is to get my own
5791 "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carputer">Carputer</a>".  But I
5792 wonder if someone already created a good free software solution for
5793 such car computer.</p>
5794
5795 <p>This is my current wish list for such system:</p>
5796
5797 <ul>
5798
5799  <li>Work on Raspberry Pi.</li>
5800
5801  <li>Show current speed limit based on location, and warn if going too
5802    fast (for example using color codes yellow and red on the screen,
5803    or make a sound).  This could be done either using either data from
5804    <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">Openstreetmap</a> or OCR
5805    info gathered from a dashboard camera.</li>
5806
5807  <li>Track automatic toll road passes and their cost, show total spent
5808    and make it possible to calculate toll costs for planned
5809    route.</li>
5810
5811  <li>Collect GPX tracks for use with OpenStreetMap.</li>
5812
5813  <li>Automatically detect and use any wireless connection to connect
5814    to home server.  Try IP over DNS
5815    (<a href="http://dev.kryo.se/iodine/">iodine</a>) or ICMP
5816    (<a href="http://code.gerade.org/hans/">Hans</a>) if direct
5817    connection do not work.</li>
5818
5819  <li>Set up mesh network to talk to other cars with the same system,
5820    or some standard car mesh protocol.</li>
5821
5822  <li>Warn when approaching speed cameras and speed camera ranges
5823    (speed calculated between two cameras).</li>
5824
5825  <li>Suport dashboard/front facing camera to discover speed limits and
5826    run OCR to track registration number of passing cars.</li>
5827
5828 </ul>
5829
5830 <p>If you know of any free software car computer system supporting
5831 some or all of these features, please let me know.</p>
5832
5833       </div>
5834       <div class="tags">
5835
5836
5837         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
5838
5839
5840       </div>
5841     </div>
5842     <div class="padding"></div>
5843
5844     <div class="entry">
5845       <div class="title">
5846         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Half_the_Coverity_issues_in_Gnash_fixed_in_the_next_release.html">Half the Coverity issues in Gnash fixed in the next release</a>
5847       </div>
5848       <div class="date">
5849         29th April 2014
5850       </div>
5851       <div class="body">
5852         <p>I've been following <a href="http://www.getgnash.org/">the Gnash
5853 project</a> for quite a while now.  It is a free software
5854 implementation of Adobe Flash, both a standalone player and a browser
5855 plugin.  Gnash implement support for the AVM1 format (and not the
5856 newer AVM2 format - see
5857 <a href="http://lightspark.github.io/">Lightspark</a> for that one),
5858 allowing several flash based sites to work.  Thanks to the friendly
5859 developers at Youtube, it also work with Youtube videos, because the
5860 Javascript code at Youtube detect Gnash and serve a AVM1 player to
5861 those users. :) Would be great if someone found time to implement AVM2
5862 support, but it has not happened yet.  If you install both Lightspark
5863 and Gnash, Lightspark will invoke Gnash if it find a AVM1 flash file,
5864 so you can get both handled as free software.  Unfortunately,
5865 Lightspark so far only implement a small subset of AVM2, and many
5866 sites do not work yet.</p>
5867
5868 <p>A few months ago, I started looking at
5869 <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/">Coverity</a>, the static source
5870 checker used to find heaps and heaps of bugs in free software (thanks
5871 to the donation of a scanning service to free software projects by the
5872 company developing this non-free code checker), and Gnash was one of
5873 the projects I decided to check out.  Coverity is able to find lock
5874 errors, memory errors, dead code and more.  A few days ago they even
5875 extended it to also be able to find the heartbleed bug in OpenSSL.
5876 There are heaps of checks being done on the instrumented code, and the
5877 amount of bogus warnings is quite low compared to the other static
5878 code checkers I have tested over the years.</p>
5879
5880 <p>Since a few weeks ago, I've been working with the other Gnash
5881 developers squashing bugs discovered by Coverity.  I was quite happy
5882 today when I checked the current status and saw that of the 777 issues
5883 detected so far, 374 are marked as fixed.  This make me confident that
5884 the next Gnash release will be more stable and more dependable than
5885 the previous one.  Most of the reported issues were and are in the
5886 test suite, but it also found a few in the rest of the code.</p>
5887
5888 <p>If you want to help out, you find us on
5889 <a href="https://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnash-dev">the
5890 gnash-dev mailing list</a> and on
5891 <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/#gnash">the #gnash channel on
5892 irc.freenode.net IRC server</a>.</p>
5893
5894       </div>
5895       <div class="tags">
5896
5897
5898         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
5899
5900
5901       </div>
5902     </div>
5903     <div class="padding"></div>
5904
5905     <div class="entry">
5906       <div class="title">
5907         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Install_hardware_dependent_packages_using_tasksel__Isenkram_0_7_.html">Install hardware dependent packages using tasksel (Isenkram 0.7)</a>
5908       </div>
5909       <div class="date">
5910         23rd April 2014
5911       </div>
5912       <div class="body">
5913         <p>It would be nice if it was easier in Debian to get all the hardware
5914 related packages relevant for the computer installed automatically.
5915 So I implemented one, using
5916 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">my Isenkram
5917 package</a>.  To use it, install the tasksel and isenkram packages and
5918 run tasksel as user root.  You should be presented with a new option,
5919 "Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)".  When you
5920 select it, tasksel will install the packages isenkram claim is fit for
5921 the current hardware, hot pluggable or not.<p>
5922
5923 <p>The implementation is in two files, one is the tasksel menu entry
5924 description, and the other is the script used to extract the list of
5925 packages to install.  The first part is in
5926 <tt>/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc</tt> and look like
5927 this:</p>
5928
5929 <p><blockquote><pre>
5930 Task: isenkram
5931 Section: hardware
5932 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5933  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
5934  proposed.
5935 Test-new-install: mark show
5936 Relevance: 8
5937 Packages: for-current-hardware
5938 </pre></blockquote></p>
5939
5940 <p>The second part is in
5941 <tt>/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/for-current-hardware</tt> and look like
5942 this:</p>
5943
5944 <p><blockquote><pre>
5945 #!/bin/sh
5946 #
5947 (
5948     isenkram-lookup
5949     isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
5950 ) | sort -u
5951 </pre></blockquote></p>
5952
5953 <p>All in all, a very short and simple implementation making it
5954 trivial to install the hardware dependent package we all may want to
5955 have installed on our machines.  I've not been able to find a way to
5956 get tasksel to tell you exactly which packages it plan to install
5957 before doing the installation.  So if you are curious or careful,
5958 check the output from the isenkram-* command line tools first.</p>
5959
5960 <p>The information about which packages are handling which hardware is
5961 fetched either from the isenkram package itself in
5962 /usr/share/isenkram/, from git.debian.org or from the APT package
5963 database (using the Modaliases header).  The APT package database
5964 parsing have caused a nasty resource leak in the isenkram daemon (bugs
5965 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/719837">#719837</a> and
5966 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/730704">#730704</a>).  The cause is in
5967 the python-apt code (bug
5968 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/745487">#745487</a>), but using a
5969 workaround I was able to get rid of the file descriptor leak and
5970 reduce the memory leak from ~30 MiB per hardware detection down to
5971 around 2 MiB per hardware detection.  It should make the desktop
5972 daemon a lot more useful.  The fix is in version 0.7 uploaded to
5973 unstable today.</p>
5974
5975 <p>I believe the current way of mapping hardware to packages in
5976 Isenkram is is a good draft, but in the future I expect isenkram to
5977 use the AppStream data source for this.  A proposal for getting proper
5978 AppStream support into Debian is floating around as
5979 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a>, and
5980 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2014/Projects#SummerOfCode2014.2FProjects.2FAppStreamDEP11Implementation.AppStream.2FDEP-11_for_the_Debian_Archive">GSoC
5981 project</a> will take place this summer to improve the situation.  I
5982 look forward to seeing the result, and welcome patches for isenkram to
5983 start using the information when it is ready.</p>
5984
5985 <p>If you want your package to map to some specific hardware, either
5986 add a "Xb-Modaliases" header to your control file like I did in
5987 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">the pymissile
5988 package</a> or submit a bug report with the details to the isenkram
5989 package.  See also
5990 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">all my
5991 blog posts tagged isenkram</a> for details on the notation.  I expect
5992 the information will be migrated to AppStream eventually, but for the
5993 moment I got no better place to store it.</p>
5994
5995       </div>
5996       <div class="tags">
5997
5998
5999         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
6000
6001
6002       </div>
6003     </div>
6004     <div class="padding"></div>
6005
6006     <div class="entry">
6007       <div class="title">
6008         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/FreedomBox_milestone___all_packages_now_in_Debian_Sid.html">FreedomBox milestone - all packages now in Debian Sid</a>
6009       </div>
6010       <div class="date">
6011         15th April 2014
6012       </div>
6013       <div class="body">
6014         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
6015 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware to make
6016 it easy for non-technical people to host their data and communication
6017 at home, and being able to communicate with their friends and family
6018 encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It is still going strong, and
6019 today a major mile stone was reached.</p>
6020
6021 <p>Today, the last of the packages currently used by the project to
6022 created the system images were accepted into Debian Unstable.  It was
6023 the freedombox-setup package, which is used to configure the images
6024 during build and on the first boot.  Now all one need to get going is
6025 the build code from the freedom-maker git repository and packages from
6026 Debian.  And once the freedombox-setup package enter testing, we can
6027 build everything directly from Debian. :)</p>
6028
6029 <p>Some key packages used by Freedombox are
6030 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>,
6031 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/plinth">plinth</a>,
6032 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pagekite">pagekite</a>,
6033 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/tor">tor</a>,
6034 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>,
6035 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/owncloud">owncloud</a> and
6036 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/dnsmasq">dnsmasq</a>.  There
6037 are plans to integrate more packages into the setup.  User
6038 documentation is maintained on the Debian wiki.  Please
6039 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Manual/Jessie">check out
6040 the manual</a> and help us improve it.</p>
6041
6042 <p>To test for yourself and create boot images with the FreedomBox
6043 setup, run this on a Debian machine using a user with sudo rights to
6044 become root:</p>
6045
6046 <p><pre>
6047 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
6048   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
6049   u-boot-tools
6050 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
6051   freedom-maker
6052 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
6053 </pre></p>
6054
6055 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
6056 devices.  See the README in the freedom-maker git repo for more
6057 details on the build.  If you do not want all three images, trim the
6058 make line.  Note that the virtualbox-image target is not really
6059 virtualbox specific.  It create a x86 image usable in kvm, qemu,
6060 vmware and any other x86 virtual machine environment.  You might need
6061 the version of vmdebootstrap in Jessie to get the build working, as it
6062 include fixes for a race condition with kpartx.</p>
6063
6064 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
6065 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
6066 the preseed values:</p>
6067
6068 <p><pre>
6069 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
6070 </pre></p>
6071
6072 <p>I have not tested it myself the last few weeks, so I do not know if
6073 it still work.</p>
6074
6075 <p>If you wonder how to help, one task you could look at is using
6076 systemd as the boot system.  It will become the default for Linux in
6077 Jessie, so we need to make sure it is usable on the Freedombox.  I did
6078 a simple test a few weeks ago, and noticed dnsmasq failed to start
6079 during boot when using systemd.  I suspect there are other problems
6080 too. :) To detect problems, there is a test suite included, which can
6081 be run from the plinth web interface.</p>
6082
6083 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
6084 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
6085 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
6086 irc.debian.org)</a> and
6087 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6088 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6089
6090       </div>
6091       <div class="tags">
6092
6093
6094         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
6095
6096
6097       </div>
6098     </div>
6099     <div class="padding"></div>
6100
6101     <div class="entry">
6102       <div class="title">
6103         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/S3QL__a_locally_mounted_cloud_file_system___nice_free_software.html">S3QL, a locally mounted cloud file system - nice free software</a>
6104       </div>
6105       <div class="date">
6106          9th April 2014
6107       </div>
6108       <div class="body">
6109         <p>For a while now, I have been looking for a sensible offsite backup
6110 solution for use at home.  My requirements are simple, it must be
6111 cheap and locally encrypted (in other words, I keep the encryption
6112 keys, the storage provider do not have access to my private files).
6113 One idea me and my friends had many years ago, before the cloud
6114 storage providers showed up, was to use Google mail as storage,
6115 writing a Linux block device storing blocks as emails in the mail
6116 service provided by Google, and thus get heaps of free space.  On top
6117 of this one can add encryption, RAID and volume management to have
6118 lots of (fairly slow, I admit that) cheap and encrypted storage.  But
6119 I never found time to implement such system.  But the last few weeks I
6120 have looked at a system called
6121 <a href="https://bitbucket.org/nikratio/s3ql/">S3QL</a>, a locally
6122 mounted network backed file system with the features I need.</p>
6123
6124 <p>S3QL is a fuse file system with a local cache and cloud storage,
6125 handling several different storage providers, any with Amazon S3,
6126 Google Drive or OpenStack API.  There are heaps of such storage
6127 providers.  S3QL can also use a local directory as storage, which
6128 combined with sshfs allow for file storage on any ssh server.  S3QL
6129 include support for encryption, compression, de-duplication, snapshots
6130 and immutable file systems, allowing me to mount the remote storage as
6131 a local mount point, look at and use the files as if they were local,
6132 while the content is stored in the cloud as well.  This allow me to
6133 have a backup that should survive fire.  The file system can not be
6134 shared between several machines at the same time, as only one can
6135 mount it at the time, but any machine with the encryption key and
6136 access to the storage service can mount it if it is unmounted.</p>
6137
6138 <p>It is simple to use.  I'm using it on Debian Wheezy, where the
6139 package is included already.  So to get started, run <tt>apt-get
6140 install s3ql</tt>.  Next, pick a storage provider.  I ended up picking
6141 Greenqloud, after reading their nice recipe on
6142 <a href="https://greenqloud.zendesk.com/entries/44611757-How-To-Use-S3QL-to-mount-a-StorageQloud-bucket-on-Debian-Wheezy">how
6143 to use S3QL with their Amazon S3 service</a>, because I trust the laws
6144 in Iceland more than those in USA when it come to keeping my personal
6145 data safe and private, and thus would rather spend money on a company
6146 in Iceland.  Another nice recipe is available from the article
6147 <a href="http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/Articles/HPC-Cloud-Storage">S3QL
6148 Filesystem for HPC Storage</a> by Jeff Layton in the HPC section of
6149 Admin magazine.  When the provider is picked, figure out how to get
6150 the API key needed to connect to the storage API.  With Greencloud,
6151 the key did not show up until I had added payment details to my
6152 account.</p>
6153
6154 <p>Armed with the API access details, it is time to create the file
6155 system.  First, create a new bucket in the cloud.  This bucket is the
6156 file system storage area.  I picked a bucket name reflecting the
6157 machine that was going to store data there, but any name will do.
6158 I'll refer to it as <tt>bucket-name</tt> below.  In addition, one need
6159 the API login and password, and a locally created password.  Store it
6160 all in ~root/.s3ql/authinfo2 like this:
6161
6162 <p><blockquote><pre>
6163 [s3c]
6164 storage-url: s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6165 backend-login: API-login
6166 backend-password: API-password
6167 fs-passphrase: local-password
6168 </pre></blockquote></p>
6169
6170 <p>I create my local passphrase using <tt>pwget 50</tt> or similar,
6171 but any sensible way to create a fairly random password should do it.
6172 Armed with these details, it is now time to run mkfs, entering the API
6173 details and password to create it:</p>
6174
6175 <p><blockquote><pre>
6176 # mkdir -m 700 /var/lib/s3ql-cache
6177 # mkfs.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6178   --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6179 Enter backend login:
6180 Enter backend password:
6181 Before using S3QL, make sure to read the user's guide, especially
6182 the 'Important Rules to Avoid Loosing Data' section.
6183 Enter encryption password:
6184 Confirm encryption password:
6185 Generating random encryption key...
6186 Creating metadata tables...
6187 Dumping metadata...
6188 ..objects..
6189 ..blocks..
6190 ..inodes..
6191 ..inode_blocks..
6192 ..symlink_targets..
6193 ..names..
6194 ..contents..
6195 ..ext_attributes..
6196 Compressing and uploading metadata...
6197 Wrote 0.00 MB of compressed metadata.
6198 # </pre></blockquote></p>
6199
6200 <p>The next step is mounting the file system to make the storage available.
6201
6202 <p><blockquote><pre>
6203 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6204   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
6205 Using 4 upload threads.
6206 Downloading and decompressing metadata...
6207 Reading metadata...
6208 ..objects..
6209 ..blocks..
6210 ..inodes..
6211 ..inode_blocks..
6212 ..symlink_targets..
6213 ..names..
6214 ..contents..
6215 ..ext_attributes..
6216 Mounting filesystem...
6217 # df -h /s3ql
6218 Filesystem                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
6219 s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name  1.0T     0  1.0T   0% /s3ql
6220 #
6221 </pre></blockquote></p>
6222
6223 <p>The file system is now ready for use.  I use rsync to store my
6224 backups in it, and as the metadata used by rsync is downloaded at
6225 mount time, no network traffic (and storage cost) is triggered by
6226 running rsync.  To unmount, one should not use the normal umount
6227 command, as this will not flush the cache to the cloud storage, but
6228 instead running the umount.s3ql command like this:
6229
6230 <p><blockquote><pre>
6231 # umount.s3ql /s3ql
6232 #
6233 </pre></blockquote></p>
6234
6235 <p>There is a fsck command available to check the file system and
6236 correct any problems detected.  This can be used if the local server
6237 crashes while the file system is mounted, to reset the "already
6238 mounted" flag.  This is what it look like when processing a working
6239 file system:</p>
6240
6241 <p><blockquote><pre>
6242 # fsck.s3ql --force --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6243 Using cached metadata.
6244 File system seems clean, checking anyway.
6245 Checking DB integrity...
6246 Creating temporary extra indices...
6247 Checking lost+found...
6248 Checking cached objects...
6249 Checking names (refcounts)...
6250 Checking contents (names)...
6251 Checking contents (inodes)...
6252 Checking contents (parent inodes)...
6253 Checking objects (reference counts)...
6254 Checking objects (backend)...
6255 ..processed 5000 objects so far..
6256 ..processed 10000 objects so far..
6257 ..processed 15000 objects so far..
6258 Checking objects (sizes)...
6259 Checking blocks (referenced objects)...
6260 Checking blocks (refcounts)...
6261 Checking inode-block mapping (blocks)...
6262 Checking inode-block mapping (inodes)...
6263 Checking inodes (refcounts)...
6264 Checking inodes (sizes)...
6265 Checking extended attributes (names)...
6266 Checking extended attributes (inodes)...
6267 Checking symlinks (inodes)...
6268 Checking directory reachability...
6269 Checking unix conventions...
6270 Checking referential integrity...
6271 Dropping temporary indices...
6272 Backing up old metadata...
6273 Dumping metadata...
6274 ..objects..
6275 ..blocks..
6276 ..inodes..
6277 ..inode_blocks..
6278 ..symlink_targets..
6279 ..names..
6280 ..contents..
6281 ..ext_attributes..
6282 Compressing and uploading metadata...
6283 Wrote 0.89 MB of compressed metadata.
6284 #
6285 </pre></blockquote></p>
6286
6287 <p>Thanks to the cache, working on files that fit in the cache is very
6288 quick, about the same speed as local file access.  Uploading large
6289 amount of data is to me limited by the bandwidth out of and into my
6290 house.  Uploading 685 MiB with a 100 MiB cache gave me 305 kiB/s,
6291 which is very close to my upload speed, and downloading the same
6292 Debian installation ISO gave me 610 kiB/s, close to my download speed.
6293 Both were measured using <tt>dd</tt>.  So for me, the bottleneck is my
6294 network, not the file system code.  I do not know what a good cache
6295 size would be, but suspect that the cache should e larger than your
6296 working set.</p>
6297
6298 <p>I mentioned that only one machine can mount the file system at the
6299 time.  If another machine try, it is told that the file system is
6300 busy:</p>
6301
6302 <p><blockquote><pre>
6303 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6304   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
6305 Using 8 upload threads.
6306 Backend reports that fs is still mounted elsewhere, aborting.
6307 #
6308 </pre></blockquote></p>
6309
6310 <p>The file content is uploaded when the cache is full, while the
6311 metadata is uploaded once every 24 hour by default.  To ensure the
6312 file system content is flushed to the cloud, one can either umount the
6313 file system, or ask S3QL to flush the cache and metadata using
6314 s3qlctrl:
6315
6316 <p><blockquote><pre>
6317 # s3qlctrl upload-meta /s3ql
6318 # s3qlctrl flushcache /s3ql
6319 #
6320 </pre></blockquote></p>
6321
6322 <p>If you are curious about how much space your data uses in the
6323 cloud, and how much compression and deduplication cut down on the
6324 storage usage, you can use s3qlstat on the mounted file system to get
6325 a report:</p>
6326
6327 <p><blockquote><pre>
6328 # s3qlstat /s3ql
6329 Directory entries:    9141
6330 Inodes:               9143
6331 Data blocks:          8851
6332 Total data size:      22049.38 MB
6333 After de-duplication: 21955.46 MB (99.57% of total)
6334 After compression:    21877.28 MB (99.22% of total, 99.64% of de-duplicated)
6335 Database size:        2.39 MB (uncompressed)
6336 (some values do not take into account not-yet-uploaded dirty blocks in cache)
6337 #
6338 </pre></blockquote></p>
6339
6340 <p>I mentioned earlier that there are several possible suppliers of
6341 storage.  I did not try to locate them all, but am aware of at least
6342 <a href="https://www.greenqloud.com/">Greenqloud</a>,
6343 <a href="http://drive.google.com/">Google Drive</a>,
6344 <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/">Amazon S3 web serivces</a>,
6345 <a href="http://www.rackspace.com/">Rackspace</a> and
6346 <a href="http://crowncloud.net/">Crowncloud</A>.  The latter even
6347 accept payment in Bitcoin.  Pick one that suit your need.  Some of
6348 them provide several GiB of free storage, but the prize models are
6349 quite different and you will have to figure out what suits you
6350 best.</p>
6351
6352 <p>While researching this blog post, I had a look at research papers
6353 and posters discussing the S3QL file system.  There are several, which
6354 told me that the file system is getting a critical check by the
6355 science community and increased my confidence in using it.  One nice
6356 poster is titled
6357 "<a href="http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/adtsc/publications/science_highlights_2013/docs/pg68_69.pdf">An
6358 Innovative Parallel Cloud Storage System using OpenStack’s SwiftObject
6359 Store and Transformative Parallel I/O Approach</a>" by Hsing-Bung
6360 Chen, Benjamin McClelland, David Sherrill, Alfred Torrez, Parks Fields
6361 and Pamela Smith.  Please  have a look.</p>
6362
6363 <p>Given my problems with different file systems earlier, I decided to
6364 check out the mounted S3QL file system to see if it would be usable as
6365 a home directory (in other word, that it provided POSIX semantics when
6366 it come to locking and umask handling etc).  Running
6367 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">my
6368 test code to check file system semantics</a>, I was happy to discover that
6369 no error was found.  So the file system can be used for home
6370 directories, if one chooses to do so.</p>
6371
6372 <p>If you do not want a locally file system, and want something that
6373 work without the Linux fuse file system, I would like to mention the
6374 <a href="http://www.tarsnap.com/">Tarsnap service</a>, which also
6375 provide locally encrypted backup using a command line client.  It have
6376 a nicer access control system, where one can split out read and write
6377 access, allowing some systems to write to the backup and others to
6378 only read from it.</p>
6379
6380 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
6381 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
6382 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
6383
6384       </div>
6385       <div class="tags">
6386
6387
6388         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
6389
6390
6391       </div>
6392     </div>
6393     <div class="padding"></div>
6394
6395     <div class="entry">
6396       <div class="title">
6397         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ReactOS_Windows_clone___nice_free_software.html">ReactOS Windows clone - nice free software</a>
6398       </div>
6399       <div class="date">
6400          1st April 2014
6401       </div>
6402       <div class="body">
6403         <p>Microsoft have announced that Windows XP reaches its end of life
6404 2014-04-08, in 7 days.  But there are heaps of machines still running
6405 Windows XP, and depending on Windows XP to run their applications, and
6406 upgrading will be expensive, both when it comes to money and when it
6407 comes to the amount of effort needed to migrate from Windows XP to a
6408 new operating system.  Some obvious options (buy new a Windows
6409 machine, buy a MacOSX machine, install Linux on the existing machine)
6410 are already well known and covered elsewhere.  Most of them involve
6411 leaving the user applications installed on Windows XP behind and
6412 trying out replacements or updated versions. In this blog post I want
6413 to mention one strange bird that allow people to keep the hardware and
6414 the existing Windows XP applications and run them on a free software
6415 operating system that is Windows XP compatible.</p>
6416
6417 <p><a href="http://www.reactos.org/">ReactOS</a> is a free software
6418 operating system (GNU GPL licensed) working on providing a operating
6419 system that is binary compatible with Windows, able to run windows
6420 programs directly and to use Windows drivers for hardware directly.
6421 The project goal is for Windows user to keep their existing machines,
6422 drivers and software, and gain the advantages from user a operating
6423 system without usage limitations caused by non-free licensing.  It is
6424 a Windows clone running directly on the hardware, so quite different
6425 from the approach taken by <a href="http://www.winehq.org/">the Wine
6426 project</a>, which make it possible to run Windows binaries on
6427 Linux.</p>
6428
6429 <p>The ReactOS project share code with the Wine project, so most
6430 shared libraries available on Windows are already implemented already.
6431 There is also a software manager like the one we are used to on Linux,
6432 allowing the user to install free software applications with a simple
6433 click directly from the Internet.  Check out the
6434 <a href="http://www.reactos.org/screenshots">screen shots on the
6435 project web site</a> for an idea what it look like (it looks just like
6436 Windows before metro).</p>
6437
6438 <p>I do not use ReactOS myself, preferring Linux and Unix like
6439 operating systems.  I've tested it, and it work fine in a virt-manager
6440 virtual machine.  The browser, minesweeper, notepad etc is working
6441 fine as far as I can tell.  Unfortunately, my main test application
6442 is the software included on a CD with the Lego Mindstorms NXT, which
6443 seem to install just fine from CD but fail to leave any binaries on
6444 the disk after the installation.  So no luck with that test software.
6445 No idea why, but hope someone else figure out and fix the problem.
6446 I've tried the ReactOS Live ISO on a physical machine, and it seemed
6447 to work just fine.  If you like Windows and want to keep running your
6448 old Windows binaries, check it out by
6449 <a href="http://www.reactos.org/download">downloading</a> the
6450 installation CD, the live CD or the preinstalled virtual machine
6451 image.</p>
6452
6453       </div>
6454       <div class="tags">
6455
6456
6457         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos</a>.
6458
6459
6460       </div>
6461     </div>
6462     <div class="padding"></div>
6463
6464     <div class="entry">
6465       <div class="title">
6466         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Roger_Marsal.html">Debian Edu interview: Roger Marsal</a>
6467       </div>
6468       <div class="date">
6469         30th March 2014
6470       </div>
6471       <div class="body">
6472         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>
6473 keep gaining new users.  Some weeks ago, a person showed up on IRC,
6474 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-edu">#debian-edu</a>, with a
6475 wish to contribute, and I managed to get a interview with this great
6476 contributor Roger Marsal to learn more about his background.</p>
6477
6478 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
6479
6480 <p>My name is Roger Marsal, I'm 27 years old (1986 generation) and I
6481 live in Barcelona, Spain. I've got a strong business background and I
6482 work as a patrimony manager and as a real estate agent.  Additionally,
6483 I've co-founded a British based tech company that is nowadays on the
6484 last development phase of a new social networking concept.</p>
6485
6486 <p>I'm a Linux enthusiast that started its journey with Ubuntu four years
6487 ago and have recently switched to Debian seeking rock solid stability
6488 and as a necessary step to gain expertise.</p>
6489
6490 <p>In a nutshell, I spend my days working and learning as much as I
6491 can to face both my job, entrepreneur project and feed my Linux
6492 hunger.</p>
6493
6494 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
6495 project?</strong></p>
6496
6497 <p>I discovered the <a href="http://www.ltsp.org/">LTSP</a> advantages
6498 with "Ubuntu 12.04 alternate install" and after a year of use I
6499 started looking for an alternative.  Even though I highly value and
6500 respect the Ubuntu project, I thought it was necessary for me to
6501 change to a more robust and stable alternative.  As far as I was using
6502 Debian on my personal laptop I thought it would be fine to install
6503 Debian and configure an LTSP server myself.  Surprised, I discovered
6504 that the Debian project also supported a kind of Edubuntu equivalent,
6505 and after having some pain I obtained a Debian Edu network up and
6506 running.  I just loved it.</p>
6507
6508 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
6509 Edu?</strong></p>
6510
6511 <p>I found a main advantage in that, once you know "the tips and
6512 tricks", a new installation just works out of the box. It's the most
6513 complete alternative I've found to create an LTSP network. All the
6514 other distributions seems to be made of plastic, Debian Edu seems to
6515 be made of steel.</p>
6516
6517 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
6518 Edu?</strong></p>
6519
6520 <p>I found two main disadvantages.</p>
6521
6522 <p>I'm not an expert but I've got notions and I had to spent a considerable
6523 amount of time trying to bring up a standard network topology. I'm quite
6524 stubborn and I just worked until I did but I'm sure many people with few
6525 resources (not big schools, but academies for example) would have switched
6526 or dropped.</p>
6527
6528 <p>It's amazing how such a complex system like Debian Edu has achieved
6529 this out-of-the-box state. Even though tweaking without breaking gets
6530 more difficult, as more factors have to be considered. This can
6531 discourage many people too.</p>
6532
6533 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
6534
6535 <p>I use Debian, Firefox, Okular, Inkscape, LibreOffice and
6536 Virtualbox.</p>
6537
6538
6539 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
6540 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
6541
6542 <p>I don't think there is a need for a particular strategy. The free
6543 attribute in both "freedom" and "no price" meanings is what will
6544 really bring free software to schools. In my experience I can think of
6545 the <a href="http://www.r-project.org/">"R" statistical language</a>; a
6546 few years a ago was an extremely nerd tool for university people.
6547 Today it's being increasingly used to teach statistics at many
6548 different level of studies.  I believe free and open software will
6549 increasingly gain popularity, but I'm sure schools will be one of the
6550 first scenarios where this will happen.</p>
6551
6552       </div>
6553       <div class="tags">
6554
6555
6556         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
6557
6558
6559       </div>
6560     </div>
6561     <div class="padding"></div>
6562
6563     <div class="entry">
6564       <div class="title">
6565         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Public_Trusted_Timestamping_services_for_everyone.html">Public Trusted Timestamping services for everyone</a>
6566       </div>
6567       <div class="date">
6568         25th March 2014
6569       </div>
6570       <div class="body">
6571         <p>Did you ever need to store logs or other files in a way that would
6572 allow it to be used as evidence in court, and needed a way to
6573 demonstrate without reasonable doubt that the file had not been
6574 changed since it was created?  Or, did you ever need to document that
6575 a given document was received at some point in time, like some
6576 archived document or the answer to an exam, and not changed after it
6577 was received?  The problem in these settings is to remove the need to
6578 trust yourself and your computers, while still being able to prove
6579 that a file is the same as it was at some given time in the past.</p>
6580
6581 <p>A solution to these problems is to have a trusted third party
6582 "stamp" the document and verify that at some given time the document
6583 looked a given way.  Such
6584 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Notarius">notarius</a> service
6585 have been around for thousands of years, and its digital equivalent is
6586 called a
6587 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trusted_timestamping">trusted
6588 timestamping service</a>.  <a href="http://www.ietf.org/">The Internet
6589 Engineering Task Force</a> standardised how such service could work a
6590 few years ago as <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3161">RFC
6591 3161</a>.  The mechanism is simple.  Create a hash of the file in
6592 question, send it to a trusted third party which add a time stamp to
6593 the hash and sign the result with its private key, and send back the
6594 signed hash + timestamp.  Both email, FTP and HTTP can be used to
6595 request such signature, depending on what is provided by the service
6596 used. Anyone with the document and the signature can then verify that
6597 the document matches the signature by creating their own hash and
6598 checking the signature using the trusted third party public key.
6599 There are several commercial services around providing such
6600 timestamping.  A quick search for
6601 "<a href="https://duckduckgo.com/?q=rfc+3161+service">rfc 3161
6602 service</a>" pointed me to at least
6603 <a href="https://www.digistamp.com/technical/how-a-digital-time-stamp-works/">DigiStamp</a>,
6604 <a href="http://www.quovadisglobal.co.uk/CertificateServices/SigningServices/TimeStamp.aspx">Quo
6605 Vadis</a>,
6606 <a href="https://www.globalsign.com/timestamp-service/">Global Sign</a>
6607 and <a href="http://www.globaltrustfinder.com/TSADefault.aspx">Global
6608 Trust Finder</a>.  The system work as long as the private key of the
6609 trusted third party is not compromised.</p>
6610
6611 <p>But as far as I can tell, there are very few public trusted
6612 timestamp services available for everyone.  I've been looking for one
6613 for a while now. But yesterday I found one over at
6614 <a href="https://www.pki.dfn.de/zeitstempeldienst/">Deutches
6615 Forschungsnetz</a> mentioned in
6616 <a href="http://www.d-mueller.de/blog/dealing-with-trusted-timestamps-in-php-rfc-3161/">a
6617 blog by David Müller</a>.  I then found
6618 <a href="http://www.rz.uni-greifswald.de/support/dfn-pki-zertifikate/zeitstempeldienst.html">a
6619 good recipe on how to use the service</a> over at the University of
6620 Greifswald.</p>
6621
6622 <p><a href="http://www.openssl.org/">The OpenSSL library</a> contain
6623 both server and tools to use and set up your own signing service.  See
6624 the ts(1SSL), tsget(1SSL) manual pages for more details.  The
6625 following shell script demonstrate how to extract a signed timestamp
6626 for any file on the disk in a Debian environment:</p>
6627
6628 <p><blockquote><pre>
6629 #!/bin/sh
6630 set -e
6631 url="http://zeitstempel.dfn.de"
6632 caurl="https://pki.pca.dfn.de/global-services-ca/pub/cacert/chain.txt"
6633 reqfile=$(mktemp -t tmp.XXXXXXXXXX.tsq)
6634 resfile=$(mktemp -t tmp.XXXXXXXXXX.tsr)
6635 cafile=chain.txt
6636 if [ ! -f $cafile ] ; then
6637     wget -O $cafile "$caurl"
6638 fi
6639 openssl ts -query -data "$1" -cert | tee "$reqfile" \
6640     | /usr/lib/ssl/misc/tsget -h "$url" -o "$resfile"
6641 openssl ts -reply -in "$resfile" -text 1>&2
6642 openssl ts -verify -data "$1" -in "$resfile" -CAfile "$cafile" 1>&2
6643 base64 < "$resfile"
6644 rm "$reqfile" "$resfile"
6645 </pre></blockquote></p>
6646
6647 <p>The argument to the script is the file to timestamp, and the output
6648 is a base64 encoded version of the signature to STDOUT and details
6649 about the signature to STDERR.  Note that due to
6650 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=742553">a bug
6651 in the tsget script</a>, you might need to modify the included script
6652 and remove the last line.  Or just write your own HTTP uploader using
6653 curl. :) Now you too can prove and verify that files have not been
6654 changed.</p>
6655
6656 <p>But the Internet need more public trusted timestamp services.
6657 Perhaps something for <a href="http://www.uninett.no/">Uninett</a> or
6658 my work place the <a href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a>
6659 to set up?</p>
6660
6661       </div>
6662       <div class="tags">
6663
6664
6665         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
6666
6667
6668       </div>
6669     </div>
6670     <div class="padding"></div>
6671
6672     <div class="entry">
6673       <div class="title">
6674         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Video_DVD_reader_library___python_dvdvideo___nice_free_software.html">Video DVD reader library / python-dvdvideo - nice free software</a>
6675       </div>
6676       <div class="date">
6677         21st March 2014
6678       </div>
6679       <div class="body">
6680         <p>Keeping your DVD collection safe from scratches and curious
6681 children fingers while still having it available when you want to see a
6682 movie is not straight forward.  My preferred method at the moment is
6683 to store a full copy of the ISO on a hard drive, and use VLC, Popcorn
6684 Hour or other useful players to view the resulting file.  This way the
6685 subtitles and bonus material are still available and using the ISO is
6686 just like inserting the original DVD record in the DVD player.</p>
6687
6688 <p>Earlier I used dd for taking security copies, but it do not handle
6689 DVDs giving read errors (which are quite a few of them).  I've also
6690 tried using
6691 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ripping_problematic_DVDs_using_dvdbackup_and_genisoimage.html">dvdbackup
6692 and genisoimage</a>, but these days I use the marvellous python library
6693 and program
6694 <a href="http://bblank.thinkmo.de/blog/new-software-python-dvdvideo">python-dvdvideo</a>
6695 written by Bastian Blank.  It is
6696 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/python-dvdvideo.html">in Debian
6697 already</a> and the binary package name is python3-dvdvideo. Instead
6698 of trying to read every block from the DVD, it parses the file
6699 structure and figure out which block on the DVD is actually in used,
6700 and only read those blocks from the DVD.  This work surprisingly well,
6701 and I have been able to almost backup my entire DVD collection using
6702 this method.</p>
6703
6704 <p>So far, python-dvdvideo have failed on between 10 and
6705 20 DVDs, which is a small fraction of my collection.  The most common
6706 problem is
6707 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=720831">DVDs
6708 using UTF-16 instead of UTF-8 characters</a>, which according to
6709 Bastian is against the DVD specification (and seem to cause some
6710 players to fail too).  A rarer problem is what seem to be inconsistent
6711 DVD structures, as the python library
6712 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=723079">claim
6713 there is a overlap between objects</a>.  An equally rare problem claim
6714 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=741878">some
6715 value is out of range</a>.  No idea what is going on there.  I wish I
6716 knew enough about the DVD format to fix these, to ensure my movie
6717 collection will stay with me in the future.</p>
6718
6719 <p>So, if you need to keep your DVDs safe, back them up using
6720 python-dvdvideo. :)</p>
6721
6722       </div>
6723       <div class="tags">
6724
6725
6726         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
6727
6728
6729       </div>
6730     </div>
6731     <div class="padding"></div>
6732
6733     <div class="entry">
6734       <div class="title">
6735         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Freedombox_on_Dreamplug__Raspberry_Pi_and_virtual_x86_machine.html">Freedombox on Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and virtual x86 machine</a>
6736       </div>
6737       <div class="date">
6738         14th March 2014
6739       </div>
6740       <div class="body">
6741         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
6742 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware for
6743 making it easy for non-technical people to host their data and
6744 communication at home, and being able to communicate with their
6745 friends and family encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It has been
6746 going on for a while, and is slowly progressing towards a new test
6747 release (0.2).</p>
6748
6749 <p>And what day could be better than the Pi day to announce that the
6750 new version will provide "hard drive" / SD card / USB stick images for
6751 Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and VirtualBox (or any other virtualization
6752 system), and can also be installed using a Debian installer preseed
6753 file.  The Debian based Freedombox is now based on Debian Jessie,
6754 where most of the needed packages used are already present.  Only one,
6755 the freedombox-setup package, is missing.  To try to build your own
6756 boot image to test the current status, fetch the freedom-maker scripts
6757 and build using
6758 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/vmdebootstrap">vmdebootstrap</a>
6759 with a user with sudo access to become root:
6760
6761 <pre>
6762 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
6763   freedom-maker
6764 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
6765   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
6766   u-boot-tools
6767 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
6768 </pre>
6769
6770 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
6771 devices.  See the README for more details on the build. If you do not
6772 want all three images, trim the make line.  But note that thanks to <a
6773 href="https://bugs.debian.org/741407">a race condition in
6774 vmdebootstrap</a>, the build might fail without the patch to the
6775 kpartx call.</p>
6776
6777 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
6778 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
6779 the preseed values:</p>
6780
6781 <pre>
6782 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
6783 </pre>
6784
6785 <p>But note that due to <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/740673">a
6786 recently introduced bug in apt in Jessie</a>, the installer will
6787 currently hang while setting up APT sources.  Killing the
6788 '<tt>apt-cdrom ident</tt>' process when it hang a few times during the
6789 installation will get the installation going.  This affect all
6790 installations in Jessie, and I expect it will be fixed soon.</p>
6791
6792 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
6793 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
6794 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
6795 irc.debian.org)</a> and
6796 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6797 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6798
6799       </div>
6800       <div class="tags">
6801
6802
6803         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
6804
6805
6806       </div>
6807     </div>
6808     <div class="padding"></div>
6809
6810     <div class="entry">
6811       <div class="title">
6812         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_add_extra_storage_servers_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux.html">How to add extra storage servers in Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>
6813       </div>
6814       <div class="date">
6815         12th March 2014
6816       </div>
6817       <div class="body">
6818         <p>On larger sites, it is useful to use a dedicated storage server for
6819 storing user home directories and data.  The design for handling this
6820 in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>, is
6821 to update the automount rules in LDAP and let the automount daemon on
6822 the clients take care of the rest.  I was reminded about the need to
6823 document this better when one of the customers of
6824 <a href="http://www.slxdrift.no/">Skolelinux Drift AS</a>, where I am
6825 on the board of directors, asked about how to do this.  The steps to
6826 get this working are the following:</p>
6827
6828 <p><ol>
6829
6830 <li>Add new storage server in DNS.  I use nas-server.intern as the
6831 example host here.</li>
6832
6833 <li>Add automoun LDAP information about this server in LDAP, to allow
6834 all clients to automatically mount it on reqeust.</li>
6835
6836 <li>Add the relevant entries in tjener.intern:/etc/fstab, because
6837 tjener.intern do not use automount to avoid mounting loops.</li>
6838
6839 </ol></p>
6840
6841 <p>DNS entries are added in GOsa², and not described here.  Follow the
6842 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/GettingStarted">instructions
6843 in the manual</a> (Machine Management with GOsa² in section Getting
6844 started).</p>
6845
6846 <p>Ensure that the NFS export points on the server are exported to the
6847 relevant subnets or machines:</p>
6848
6849 <p><blockquote><pre>
6850 root@tjener:~# showmount -e nas-server
6851 Export list for nas-server:
6852 /storage         10.0.0.0/8
6853 root@tjener:~#
6854 </pre></blockquote></p>
6855
6856 <p>Here everything on the backbone network is granted access to the
6857 /storage export.  With NFSv3 it is slightly better to limit it to
6858 netgroup membership or single IP addresses to have some limits on the
6859 NFS access.</p>
6860
6861 <p>The next step is to update LDAP.  This can not be done using GOsa²,
6862 because it lack a module for automount.  Instead, use ldapvi and add
6863 the required LDAP objects using an editor.</p>
6864
6865 <p><blockquote><pre>
6866 ldapvi --ldap-conf -ZD '(cn=admin)' -b ou=automount,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
6867 </pre></blockquote></p>
6868
6869 <p>When the editor show up, add the following LDAP objects at the
6870 bottom of the document.  The "/&" part in the last LDAP object is a
6871 wild card matching everything the nas-server exports, removing the
6872 need to list individual mount points in LDAP.</p>
6873
6874 <p><blockquote><pre>
6875 add cn=nas-server,ou=auto.skole,ou=automount,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
6876 objectClass: automount
6877 cn: nas-server
6878 automountInformation: -fstype=autofs --timeout=60 ldap:ou=auto.nas-server,ou=automount,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
6879
6880 add ou=auto.nas-server,ou=automount,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
6881 objectClass: top
6882 objectClass: automountMap
6883 ou: auto.nas-server
6884
6885 add cn=/,ou=auto.nas-server,ou=automount,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
6886 objectClass: automount
6887 cn: /
6888 automountInformation: -fstype=nfs,tcp,rsize=32768,wsize=32768,rw,intr,hard,nodev,nosuid,noatime nas-server.intern:/&
6889 </pre></blockquote></p>
6890
6891 <p>The last step to remember is to mount the relevant mount points in
6892 tjener.intern by adding them to /etc/fstab, creating the mount
6893 directories using mkdir and running "mount -a" to mount them.</p>
6894
6895 <p>When this is done, your users should be able to access the files on
6896 the storage server directly by just visiting the
6897 /tjener/nas-server/storage/ directory using any application on any
6898 workstation, LTSP client or LTSP server.</p>
6899
6900       </div>
6901       <div class="tags">
6902
6903
6904         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>.
6905
6906
6907       </div>
6908     </div>
6909     <div class="padding"></div>
6910
6911     <div class="entry">
6912       <div class="title">
6913         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_home_and_release_1_0_for_netgroup_and_innetgr__aka_ng_utils_.html">New home and release 1.0 for netgroup and innetgr (aka ng-utils)</a>
6914       </div>
6915       <div class="date">
6916         22nd February 2014
6917       </div>
6918       <div class="body">
6919         <p>Many years ago, I wrote a GPL licensed version of the netgroup and
6920 innetgr tools, because I needed them in
6921 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>.  I called the project
6922 ng-utils, and it has served me well.  I placed the project under the
6923 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/">Hungry Programmer</a> umbrella, and it was maintained in our CVS
6924 repository.  But many years ago, the CVS repository was dropped (lost,
6925 not migrated to new hardware, not sure), and the project have lacked a
6926 proper home since then.</p>
6927
6928 <p>Last summer, I had a look at the package and made a new release
6929 fixing a irritating crash bug, but was unable to store the changes in
6930 a proper source control system.  I applied for a project on
6931 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/">Alioth</a>, but did not have time
6932 to follow up on it.  Until today. :)</p>
6933
6934 <p>After many hours of cleaning and migration, the ng-utils project
6935 now have a new home, and a git repository with the highlight of the
6936 history of the project.  I published all release tarballs and imported
6937 them into the git repository.  As the project is really stable and not
6938 expected to gain new features any time soon, I decided to make a new
6939 release and call it 1.0.  Visit the new project home on
6940 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/">https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/</a>
6941 if you want to check it out.  The new version is also uploaded into
6942 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/ng-utils.html">Debian Unstable</a>.</p>
6943
6944       </div>
6945       <div class="tags">
6946
6947
6948         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
6949
6950
6951       </div>
6952     </div>
6953     <div class="padding"></div>
6954
6955     <div class="entry">
6956       <div class="title">
6957         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_sysvinit_from_experimental_in_Debian_Hurd.html">Testing sysvinit from experimental in Debian Hurd</a>
6958       </div>
6959       <div class="date">
6960          3rd February 2014
6961       </div>
6962       <div class="body">
6963         <p>A few days ago I decided to try to help the Hurd people to get
6964 their changes into sysvinit, to allow them to use the normal sysvinit
6965 boot system instead of their old one.  This follow up on the
6966 <a href="https://teythoon.cryptobitch.de//categories/gsoc.html">great
6967 Google Summer of Code work</a> done last summer by Justus Winter to
6968 get Debian on Hurd working more like Debian on Linux.  To get started,
6969 I downloaded a prebuilt hard disk image from
6970 <a href="http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian-cd/hurd-i386/current/debian-hurd.img.tar.gz">http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian-cd/hurd-i386/current/debian-hurd.img.tar.gz</a>,
6971 and started it using virt-manager.</p>
6972
6973 <p>The first think I had to do after logging in (root without any
6974 password) was to get the network operational.  I followed
6975 <a href="https://www.debian.org/ports/hurd/hurd-install">the
6976 instructions on the Debian GNU/Hurd ports page</a> and ran these
6977 commands as root to get the machine to accept a IP address from the
6978 kvm internal DHCP server:</p>
6979
6980 <p><blockquote><pre>
6981 settrans -fgap /dev/netdde /hurd/netdde
6982 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[p]finet/ { print $2}')
6983 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[d]evnode/ { print $2}')
6984 dhclient /dev/eth0
6985 </pre></blockquote></p>
6986
6987 <p>After this, the machine had internet connectivity, and I could
6988 upgrade it and install the sysvinit packages from experimental and
6989 enable it as the default boot system in Hurd.</p>
6990
6991 <p>But before I did that, I set a password on the root user, as ssh is
6992 running on the machine it for ssh login to work a password need to be
6993 set.  Also, note that a bug somewhere in openssh on Hurd block
6994 compression from working.  Remember to turn that off on the client
6995 side.</p>
6996
6997 <p>Run these commands as root to upgrade and test the new sysvinit
6998 stuff:</p>
6999
7000 <p><blockquote><pre>
7001 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/experimental.list &lt;&lt;EOF
7002 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ experimental main
7003 EOF
7004 apt-get update
7005 apt-get dist-upgrade
7006 apt-get install -t experimental initscripts sysv-rc sysvinit \
7007     sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils
7008 update-alternatives --config runsystem
7009 </pre></blockquote></p>
7010
7011 <p>To reboot after switching boot system, you have to use
7012 <tt>reboot-hurd</tt> instead of just <tt>reboot</tt>, as there is not
7013 yet a sysvinit process able to receive the signals from the normal
7014 'reboot' command.  After switching to sysvinit as the boot system,
7015 upgrading every package and rebooting, the network come up with DHCP
7016 after boot as it should, and the settrans/pkill hack mentioned at the
7017 start is no longer needed.  But for some strange reason, there are no
7018 longer any login prompt in the virtual console, so I logged in using
7019 ssh instead.
7020
7021 <p>Note that there are some race conditions in Hurd making the boot
7022 fail some times.  No idea what the cause is, but hope the Hurd porters
7023 figure it out.  At least Justus said on IRC (#debian-hurd on
7024 irc.debian.org) that they are aware of the problem.  A way to reduce
7025 the impact is to upgrade to the Hurd packages built by Justus by
7026 adding this repository to the machine:</p>
7027
7028 <p><blockquote><pre>
7029 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/hurd-ci.list &lt;&lt;EOF
7030 deb http://darnassus.sceen.net/~teythoon/hurd-ci/ sid main
7031 EOF
7032 </pre></blockquote></p>
7033
7034 <p>At the moment the prebuilt virtual machine get some packages from
7035 http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian, because some of the packages in
7036 unstable do not yet include the required patches that are lingering in
7037 BTS.  This is the completely list of "unofficial" packages installed:</p>
7038
7039 <p><blockquote><pre>
7040 # aptitude search '?narrow(?version(CURRENT),?origin(Debian Ports))'
7041 i   emacs                   - GNU Emacs editor (metapackage)
7042 i   gdb                     - GNU Debugger
7043 i   hurd-recommended        - Miscellaneous translators
7044 i   isc-dhcp-client         - ISC DHCP client
7045 i   isc-dhcp-common         - common files used by all the isc-dhcp* packages
7046 i   libc-bin                - Embedded GNU C Library: Binaries
7047 i   libc-dev-bin            - Embedded GNU C Library: Development binaries
7048 i   libc0.3                 - Embedded GNU C Library: Shared libraries
7049 i A libc0.3-dbg             - Embedded GNU C Library: detached debugging symbols
7050 i   libc0.3-dev             - Embedded GNU C Library: Development Libraries and Hea
7051 i   multiarch-support       - Transitional package to ensure multiarch compatibilit
7052 i A x11-common              - X Window System (X.Org) infrastructure
7053 i   xorg                    - X.Org X Window System
7054 i A xserver-xorg            - X.Org X server
7055 i A xserver-xorg-input-all  - X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
7056 #
7057 </pre></blockquote></p>
7058
7059 <p>All in all, testing hurd has been an interesting experience. :)
7060 X.org did not work out of the box and I never took the time to follow
7061 the porters instructions to fix it.  This time I was interested in the
7062 command line stuff.<p>
7063
7064       </div>
7065       <div class="tags">
7066
7067
7068         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7069
7070
7071       </div>
7072     </div>
7073     <div class="padding"></div>
7074
7075     <div class="entry">
7076       <div class="title">
7077         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_fist_full_of_non_anonymous_Bitcoins.html">A fist full of non-anonymous Bitcoins</a>
7078       </div>
7079       <div class="date">
7080         29th January 2014
7081       </div>
7082       <div class="body">
7083         <p>Bitcoin is a incredible use of peer to peer communication and
7084 encryption, allowing direct and immediate money transfer without any
7085 central control.  It is sometimes claimed to be ideal for illegal
7086 activity, which I believe is quite a long way from the truth.  At least
7087 I would not conduct illegal money transfers using a system where the
7088 details of every transaction are kept forever.  This point is
7089 investigated in
7090 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login">USENIX ;login:</a>
7091 from December 2013, in the article
7092 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/system/files/login/articles/03_meiklejohn-online.pdf">A
7093 Fistful of Bitcoins - Characterizing Payments Among Men with No
7094 Names</a>" by Sarah Meiklejohn, Marjori Pomarole,Grant Jordan, Kirill
7095 Levchenko, Damon McCoy, Geoffrey M. Voelker, and Stefan Savage.  They
7096 analyse the transaction log in the Bitcoin system, using it to find
7097 addresses belong to individuals and organisations and follow the flow
7098 of money from both Bitcoin theft and trades on Silk Road to where the
7099 money end up.  This is how they wrap up their article:</p>
7100
7101 <p><blockquote>
7102 <p>"To demonstrate the usefulness of this type of analysis, we turned
7103 our attention to criminal activity. In the Bitcoin economy, criminal
7104 activity can appear in a number of forms, such as dealing drugs on
7105 Silk Road or simply stealing someone else’s bitcoins. We followed the
7106 flow of bitcoins out of Silk Road (in particular, from one notorious
7107 address) and from a number of highly publicized thefts to see whether
7108 we could track the bitcoins to known services. Although some of the
7109 thieves attempted to use sophisticated mixing techniques (or possibly
7110 mix services) to obscure the flow of bitcoins, for the most part
7111 tracking the bitcoins was quite straightforward, and we ultimately saw
7112 large quantities of bitcoins flow to a variety of exchanges directly
7113 from the point of theft (or the withdrawal from Silk Road).</p>
7114
7115 <p>As acknowledged above, following stolen bitcoins to the point at
7116 which they are deposited into an exchange does not in itself identify
7117 the thief; however, it does enable further de-anonymization in the
7118 case in which certain agencies can determine (through, for example,
7119 subpoena power) the real-world owner of the account into which the
7120 stolen bitcoins were deposited.  Because such exchanges seem to serve
7121 as chokepoints into and out of the Bitcoin economy (i.e., there are
7122 few alternative ways to cash out), we conclude that using Bitcoin for
7123 money laundering or other illicit purposes does not (at least at
7124 present) seem to be particularly attractive."</p>
7125 </blockquote><p>
7126
7127 <p>These researches are not the first to analyse the Bitcoin
7128 transaction log.  The 2011 paper
7129 "<a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/1107.4524">An Analysis of Anonymity in
7130 the Bitcoin System</A>" by Fergal Reid and Martin Harrigan is
7131 summarized like this:</p>
7132
7133 <p><blockquote>
7134 "Anonymity in Bitcoin, a peer-to-peer electronic currency system, is a
7135 complicated issue. Within the system, users are identified by
7136 public-keys only. An attacker wishing to de-anonymize its users will
7137 attempt to construct the one-to-many mapping between users and
7138 public-keys and associate information external to the system with the
7139 users. Bitcoin tries to prevent this attack by storing the mapping of
7140 a user to his or her public-keys on that user's node only and by
7141 allowing each user to generate as many public-keys as required. In
7142 this chapter we consider the topological structure of two networks
7143 derived from Bitcoin's public transaction history. We show that the
7144 two networks have a non-trivial topological structure, provide
7145 complementary views of the Bitcoin system and have implications for
7146 anonymity. We combine these structures with external information and
7147 techniques such as context discovery and flow analysis to investigate
7148 an alleged theft of Bitcoins, which, at the time of the theft, had a
7149 market value of approximately half a million U.S. dollars."
7150 </blockquote></p>
7151
7152 <p>I hope these references can help kill the urban myth that Bitcoin
7153 is anonymous.  It isn't really a good fit for illegal activites.  Use
7154 cash if you need to stay anonymous, at least until regular DNA
7155 sampling of notes and coins become the norm. :)</p>
7156
7157 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
7158 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
7159 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
7160
7161       </div>
7162       <div class="tags">
7163
7164
7165         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix</a>.
7166
7167
7168       </div>
7169     </div>
7170     <div class="padding"></div>
7171
7172     <div class="entry">
7173       <div class="title">
7174         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html">New chrpath release 0.16</a>
7175       </div>
7176       <div class="date">
7177         14th January 2014
7178       </div>
7179       <div class="body">
7180         <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to
7181 find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code
7182 analysis.  It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very
7183 useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of
7184 the source.  The company behind it provide
7185 <a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as
7186 a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are
7187 already checked.  A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at
7188 the Coverity system, and discovered that the
7189 <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and
7190 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a>
7191 projects I am involved with was already registered.  But these are
7192 fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to
7193 check, and decided to <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request
7194 checking of the chrpath project</a>.  It was
7195 added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects.  Six of
7196 these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an
7197 error.  Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction
7198 of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it
7199 is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in
7200 the future end up in a library.  Having fixed all defects and added
7201 <a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a
7202 mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to
7203 publish a new release.  These are the release notes:</p>
7204
7205 <p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p>
7206
7207 <ul>
7208
7209   <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li>
7210   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li>
7211   <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li>
7212
7213 </ul>
7214
7215 <p>You can
7216 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
7217 new version 0.16 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
7218 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
7219 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
7220 include a test suite check.</p>
7221
7222       </div>
7223       <div class="tags">
7224
7225
7226         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7227
7228
7229       </div>
7230     </div>
7231     <div class="padding"></div>
7232
7233     <div class="entry">
7234       <div class="title">
7235         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Dominik_George.html">Debian Edu interview: Dominik George</a>
7236       </div>
7237       <div class="date">
7238         25th December 2013
7239       </div>
7240       <div class="body">
7241         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
7242 project</a> consist of both newcomers and old timers, and this time I
7243 was able to get an interview with a newcomer in the project who showed
7244 up on the IRC channel a few weeks ago to let us know about his
7245 successful installation of Debian Edu Wheezy in his School.  Say hello
7246 to <a href="https://www.ohloh.net/accounts/Natureshadow">Dominik
7247 George</a>.</p>
7248
7249 <!-- http://www.dominik-george.de/images/foto.jpg -->
7250
7251 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
7252
7253 <p>I am a 23 year-old student from Germany who has spent half of his
7254 life with open source. In "real life", I am, as already mentioned, a
7255 student in the fields of Computer Science, Electrical Engineering,
7256 Information Technologies and Anglistics. Due to my (only partially
7257 voluntary) huge engagement in the open source world, these things are
7258 a bit vacant right now however.</p>
7259
7260 <p>I also have been working as a project teacher at a Gymasnium
7261 (public school) for various years now. I took up that work some time
7262 around 2005 when still attending that school myself and have continued
7263 it until today. I also had been running the (kind of very advanced)
7264 network of that school together with a team of very interested and
7265 talented students in the age of 11 to 15 years, who took the chance to
7266 learn a lot about open source and networking before I left the school
7267 to help building another school's informational education concept from
7268 scratch.</p>
7269
7270 <p>That said, one might see me as a kind of "glue" between school kids
7271 and the elderly of teachers as well as between the open source
7272 ecosystem and the (even more complex) educational ecosystem.</p>
7273
7274 <p>When I am not busy with open source or education, I like Geocaching
7275 and cycling.</p>
7276
7277 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
7278 project?</strong></p>
7279
7280 <p>I think that happened some time around 2009 when I first attended
7281 <a href="http://www.froscon.org">FrOSCon</a> and visited the project
7282 booth. I think I wasn't too interested back then because I used to
7283 have an attitude of disliking software that does too much stuff on its
7284 own. Maybe I was too inexperienced to realise the upsides of an
7285 "out-of-the-box" solution ;).</p>
7286
7287 <p>The first time I actively talked to Skolelinux people was at
7288 <a href="http://www.openrheinruhr.de">OpenRheinRuhr</a> 2011 when the
7289 BiscuIT project, a home-grewn software used by my school for various
7290 really cool things from timetables and class contact lists to lunch
7291 ordering, student ID card printing and project elections first got to
7292 a stage where it could have been published. I asked the Skolelinux
7293 guys running the booth if the project were interested in it and gave a
7294 small demonstration, but there wasn't any real feedback and the guys
7295 seemed rather uninterested.</p>
7296
7297 <p>After I left the school where I developed the software, it got
7298 mostly lost, but I am now reimplementing it for my new school. I have
7299 reusability and compatibility in mind, and I hop there will be a new
7300 basis for contributing it to the Skolelinux project ;)!</p>
7301
7302 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
7303 Edu?</strong></p>
7304
7305 <p>The most important advantage seems to be that it "just
7306 works". After overcoming some minor (but still very annoying) glitches
7307 in the installer, I got a fully functional, working school network,
7308 without the month-long hassle I experienced when setting all that up
7309 from scratch in earlier years. And above that, it rocked - I didn't
7310 have any real hardware at hand, because the school was just founded
7311 and has no money whatsoever, so I installed a combined server (main
7312 server, terminal services and workstation) in a VM on my personal
7313 notebook, bridging the LTSP network interface to the ethernet port,
7314 and then PXE-booted the Windows notebooks that were lying around from
7315 it. I could use 8 clients without any performance issues, by using a
7316 tiny little VM on a tiny little notebook. I think that's enough to say
7317 that it rocks!</p>
7318
7319 <p>Secondly, there are marketing reasons. Life's bad, and so no
7320 politician will ever permit a setup described as "Debian, an universal
7321 operating system, with some really cool educational tools" while they
7322 will be jsut fine with "Skolelinux, a single-purpose solution for your
7323 school network", even if both turn out to be the very same thing (yes,
7324 this is unfair towards the Skolelinux project, and must not be taken
7325 too seriously - you get the idea, anyway).</p>
7326
7327 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
7328 Edu?</strong></p>
7329
7330 <p>I have not been involved with Skolelinux long enough to really
7331 answer this question in a fair way. Thus, please allow me to put it in
7332 other words: "What do you expect from Skolelinux to keep liking it?" I
7333 can list a few points about that:</p>
7334
7335 <ul>
7336
7337  <li>always strive to get all things integrated into Debian upstream
7338  <li>be open to discussion about changes and the like, even with newcomers
7339  <li>be helpful at being helpful ;)
7340
7341 </ul>
7342
7343 <p>I'm really sorry I cannot say much more about that :(!</p>
7344
7345 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
7346
7347 <p>First of all, all software I use is free and open. I have abandoned
7348 all non-free software (except for firmware on my darned phone) this
7349 year.</p>
7350
7351 <p>I run Debian GNU/Linux on all PC systems I use. On that, I mostly
7352 run text tools. I use
7353 <a href="https://www.mirbsd.org/mksh.htm">mksh</a> as shell,
7354 <a href="https://www.mirbsd.org/jupp.htm">jupp</a> as very advanced
7355 text editor (I even got the developer to help me write a script/macro
7356 based full-featured student management software with the two),
7357 <a href="http://mcabber.com/">mcabber</a> for XMPP and
7358 <a href="http://www.irssi.org/">irssi</a> for IRC. For that overly
7359 coloured world called the WWW, I use
7360 <a href="https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/">Iceweasel
7361 (Firefox)</a>. Oh, and <a href="http://www.mutt.org/">mutt</a> for
7362 e-mail.</p>
7363
7364 <p>However, while I am personally aware of the fact that text tools
7365 are more efficient and powerful than anything else, I also use (or at
7366 least operate) some tools that are suitable to bring open source to
7367 kids. One of these things is <a href="http://jappix.org/">Jappix</a>,
7368 which I already introduced to some kids even before they got aware of
7369 Facebook, making them see for themselves that they do not need
7370 Facebook now ;).</p>
7371
7372 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
7373 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
7374
7375 <p>Well, that's a two-sided thing. One side is what I believe, and one
7376 side is what I have experienced.</p>
7377
7378 <p>I believe that the right strategy is showing them the benefits. But
7379 that won't work out as long as the acceptance of free alternatives
7380 grows globally. What I mean is that if all the kids are almost forced
7381 to use Windows, Facebook, Skype, you name it at home, they will not
7382 see why they would want to use alternatives at school. I have seen
7383 students take seat in front of a fully-functional, modern Debian
7384 desktop that could do anything their Windows at home could do, and
7385 they jsut refused to use it because "Linux sucks". It is something
7386 that makes the council of our city spend around 600000 € to buy
7387 software - not including hardware, mind you - for operating school
7388 networks, and for installing a system that, as has been proved, does
7389 not work. For those of you readers who are good at maths, have you
7390 already found out how many lives could have been saved with that money
7391 if we had instead used it to bring education to parts of the world
7392 that need it? I have, and found it to be nothing less dramatic than
7393 plain criminal.</p>
7394
7395 <p>That said, the only feasible way appears to be the bottom up
7396 method. We have to bring free software to kids and parents. I have
7397 founded an association named
7398 <a href="https://www.teckids.org">Teckids</a> here in Germany that does
7399 just that. We organise several events for kids and adolescents in the
7400 area of free and open source software, for example the
7401 <a href="http://kids.froscon.org">FrogLabs</a>, which share staff with
7402 Teckids and are the youth programme of
7403 <a href="http://www.froscon.org">the Free and Open Source Software
7404 Conference (FrOSCon)</a>. We do a lot more than most other conferences
7405 - this year, we first offered the FrogLabs as a holiday camp for kids
7406 aged 10 to 16. It was a huge success, with approx. 30 kids taking part
7407 and learning with and about free software through a whole weekend. All
7408 of us had a lot of fun, and the results were really exciting.</p>
7409
7410 <p>Apart from that, we are preparing a campaign that is supposed to bring
7411 the message of free alternatives to stuff kids use every day to them and
7412 their parents, e.g. the use of Jabber / Jappix instead of Facebook and
7413 Skype. To make that possible, we are planning to get together a team of
7414 clever kids who understand very well what their peers need and can bring
7415 it across to them. So we will have a peer-driven network of adolescents
7416 who teach each other and collect feedback from the community of minors.
7417 We then take that feedback and our own experience to work closely with
7418 open source projects, such as Skolelinux or Jappix, at improving their
7419 software in a way that makes it more and more attractive for the target
7420 group. At least I hope that we will have good cooperation with
7421 Skolelinux in the future ;)!</p>
7422
7423 <p>So in conclusion, what I believe is that, if it weren't for the world
7424 being so bad, it should be very clear to the political decision makers
7425 that the only way to go nowadays is free software for various reasons,
7426 but I have learnt that the only way that seems to work is bottom up.</p>
7427
7428 <!--
7429
7430 >  * Who should be interviewed with this questions in the future?
7431
7432 That's probably the hardest question of them all, as I do not know the
7433 community. However, I would be willing to do the following:
7434
7435  <li>Run an interview with a German headteacher who is very open to
7436    free software, and also prefers it, but cannot really use it because
7437    of the decision makers above;
7438  <li>Run interviews with some kids, both with and without previous
7439    knowledge about free software
7440
7441 If that is wanted, just let me know ;).
7442
7443 -->
7444
7445       </div>
7446       <div class="tags">
7447
7448
7449         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
7450
7451
7452       </div>
7453     </div>
7454     <div class="padding"></div>
7455
7456     <div class="entry">
7457       <div class="title">
7458         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Klaus_Knopper.html">Debian Edu interview: Klaus Knopper</a>
7459       </div>
7460       <div class="date">
7461          6th December 2013
7462       </div>
7463       <div class="body">
7464         <p>It has been a while since I managed to publish the last interview,
7465 but the <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
7466 Skolelinux</a> community is still going strong, and yesterday we even
7467 had a new school administrator show up on
7468 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-edu">#debian-edu</a> to share
7469 his success story with installing Debian Edu at their school.  This
7470 time I have been able to get some helpful comments from the creator of
7471 Knoppix, Klaus Knopper, who was involved in a Skolelinux project in
7472 Germany a few years ago.</p>
7473
7474 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
7475
7476 <p>I am Klaus Knopper.  I have a master degree in electrical
7477 engineering, and is currently professor in information management at
7478 the university of applied sciences Kaiserslautern / Germany and
7479 freelance Open Source software developer and consultant.</p>
7480
7481 <p>All of this is pretty much of the work I spend my days with. Apart
7482 from teaching, I'm also conducting some more or less experimental
7483 projects like the <a href="http://www.knoppix.org">Knoppix GNU/Linux live
7484 system</a> (Debian-based like Skolelinux),
7485 <a href="http://www.knopper.net/knoppix-adriane/index-en.html">ADRIANE</a>
7486 (a blind-friendly talking desktop system) and
7487 <a href="http://www.knopper.net/linbo/index-en.html">LINBO</a>
7488 (Linux-based network boot console, a fast remote install and repair
7489 system supporting various operating systems).</p>
7490
7491 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
7492 project?</strong></p>
7493
7494 <p>The credit for this have to go to Kurt Gramlich, who is the German
7495 coordinator for Skolelinux.  We were looking for an all-in-one open
7496 source community-supported distribution for schools, and Kurt
7497 introduced us to Skolelinux for this purpose.</p>
7498
7499 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
7500 Edu?</strong></p>
7501
7502 <ul>
7503   <li>Quick installation,</li>
7504   <li>works (almost) out of the box,</li>
7505   <li>contains many useful software packages for teaching and learning,</li>
7506   <li>is a purely community-based distro and not controlled by a
7507     single company,</li>
7508   <li>has a large number of supporters and teachers who share their
7509     experience and problem solutions.</li>
7510 </ul>
7511
7512 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
7513 Edu?</strong></p>
7514
7515 <ul>
7516   <li>Skolelinux is - as we had to learn - not easily upgradable to
7517   the next version.  Opposed to its genuine Debian base, upgrading to
7518   a new version means a full new installation from scratch to get it
7519   working again reliably.
7520
7521   <li>Skolelinux is based on Debian/stable, and therefore always a
7522   little outdated in terms of program versions compared to Edubuntu or
7523   similar educational Linux distros, which rather use Debian/testing
7524   as their base.
7525
7526   <li>Skolelinux has some very self-opinionated and stubborn default
7527   configuration which in my opinion adds unnecessary complexity and is
7528   not always suitable for a schools needs, the preset network
7529   configuration is actually a core definition feature of Skolelinux
7530   and not easy to change, so schools sometimes have to change their
7531   network configuration to make it "Skolelinux-compatible".
7532
7533   <li>Some proposed extensions, which were made available as
7534   contribution, like secure examination mode and lecture material
7535   distribution and collection, were not accepted into the mainline
7536   Skolelinux development and are now not easy to maintain in the
7537   future because of Skolelinux somewhat undeterministic update
7538   schemes.</li>
7539
7540   <li>Skolelinux has only a very tiny number of base developers
7541   compared to Debian.</li>
7542
7543 </ul>
7544
7545 <p>For these reasons and experience from our project, I would now
7546 rather consider using plain Debian for schools next time, until
7547 Skolelinux is more closely integrated into Debian and becomes
7548 upgradeable without reinstallation.</p>
7549
7550 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
7551
7552 <p>GNU/Linux with LXDE desktop, bash for interactive dialog and
7553 programming, texlive for documentation and correspondence,
7554 occasionally LibreOffice for document format conversion. Various
7555 programming languages for teaching.</p>
7556
7557 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
7558 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
7559
7560 <p>Strong arguments are</p>
7561
7562 <ul>
7563
7564   <li>Knowledge is free, and so should be methods and tools for
7565     teaching and learning.</li>
7566
7567   <li>Students can learn with and use the same software at school, at
7568     home, and at their working place without running into license or
7569     conversion problems.</li>
7570
7571   <li>Closed source or proprietary software hides knowledge rather
7572     than exposing it, and proprietary software vendors try to bind
7573     customers to certain products.  But teachers need to teach
7574     science, not products.</li>
7575
7576   <li>If you have everything you for daily work as open source, what
7577     would you need proprietary software for?</li>
7578
7579 </ul>
7580
7581       </div>
7582       <div class="tags">
7583
7584
7585         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
7586
7587
7588       </div>
7589     </div>
7590     <div class="padding"></div>
7591
7592     <div class="entry">
7593       <div class="title">
7594         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnadsnett_for_alle__a_wireless_community_network_in_Oslo__take_shape.html">Dugnadsnett for alle, a wireless community network in Oslo, take shape</a>
7595       </div>
7596       <div class="date">
7597         30th November 2013
7598       </div>
7599       <div class="body">
7600         <p>If you want the ability to electronically communicate directly with
7601 your neighbors and friends using a network controlled by your peers in
7602 stead of centrally controlled by a few corporations, or would like to
7603 experiment with interesting network technology, the
7604 <a href="http://www.dugnadsnett.no/">Dugnasnett for alle i Oslo</a>
7605 might be project for you.  39 mesh nodes are currently being planned,
7606 in the freshly started initiative from NUUG and Hackeriet to create a
7607 wireless community network.  The work is inspired by
7608 <a href="http://freifunk.net/">Freifunk</a>,
7609 <a href="http://www.awmn.net/">Athens Wireless Metropolitan
7610 Network</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roofnet">Roofnet</a>
7611 and other successful mesh networks around the globe.  Two days ago we
7612 held a workshop to try to get people started on setting up their own
7613 mesh node, and there we decided to create a new mailing list
7614 <a href="http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/dugnadsnett">dugnadsnett
7615 (at) nuug.no</a> and IRC channel
7616 <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/#dugnadsnett.no">#dugnadsnett.no</a> to
7617 coordinate the work.  See also the NUUG blog post
7618 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/E_postliste_og_IRC_kanal_for_Dugnadsnett_for_alle_i_Oslo.shtml">announcing
7619 the mailing list and IRC channel</a>.</p>
7620
7621       </div>
7622       <div class="tags">
7623
7624
7625         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
7626
7627
7628       </div>
7629     </div>
7630     <div class="padding"></div>
7631
7632     <div class="entry">
7633       <div class="title">
7634         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html">New chrpath release 0.15</a>
7635       </div>
7636       <div class="date">
7637         24th November 2013
7638       </div>
7639       <div class="body">
7640         <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that
7641 development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my
7642 acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath,
7643 the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already
7644 compiled ELF programs.  The update was triggered by the persistence of
7645 Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get
7646 support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he
7647 is working on.  I checked the
7648 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>,
7649 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and
7650 <a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a>
7651 packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from
7652 OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes.
7653 These are the release notes:</p>
7654
7655 <p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p>
7656
7657 <ul>
7658
7659   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work
7660    with newer architectures.  Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads
7661    up.</li>
7662
7663   <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li>
7664
7665   <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and
7666    Matthias Klose.</li>
7667
7668   <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by
7669    Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li>
7670
7671   <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in
7672    .dynamic is a NULL terminated string.  Based on patch found in
7673    Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li>
7674
7675 </ul>
7676
7677 <p>You can
7678 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
7679 new version 0.15 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
7680 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
7681 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
7682 include a testsuite check.</p>
7683
7684       </div>
7685       <div class="tags">
7686
7687
7688         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
7689
7690
7691       </div>
7692     </div>
7693     <div class="padding"></div>
7694
7695     <div class="entry">
7696       <div class="title">
7697         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/All_drones_should_be_radio_marked_with_what_they_do_and_who_they_belong_to.html">All drones should be radio marked with what they do and who they belong to</a>
7698       </div>
7699       <div class="date">
7700         21st November 2013
7701       </div>
7702       <div class="body">
7703         <p>Drones, flying robots, are getting more and more popular.  The most
7704 know ones are the killer drones used by some government to murder
7705 people they do not like without giving them the chance of a fair
7706 trial, but the technology have many good uses too, from mapping and
7707 forest maintenance to photography and search and rescue.  I am sure it
7708 is just a question of time before "bad drones" are in the hands of
7709 private enterprises and not only state criminals but petty criminals
7710 too.  The drone technology is very useful and very dangerous.  To have
7711 some control over the use of drones, I agree with Daniel Suarez in his
7712 TED talk
7713 "<a href="https://archive.org/details/DanielSuarez_2013G">The kill
7714 decision shouldn't belong to a robot</a>", where he suggested this
7715 little gem to keep the good while limiting the bad use of drones:</p>
7716
7717 <blockquote>
7718
7719 <p>Each robot and drone should have a cryptographically signed
7720 I.D. burned in at the factory that can be used to track its movement
7721 through public spaces. We have license plates on cars, tail numbers on
7722 aircraft. This is no different. And every citizen should be able to
7723 download an app that shows the population of drones and autonomous
7724 vehicles moving through public spaces around them, both right now and
7725 historically. And civic leaders should deploy sensors and civic drones
7726 to detect rogue drones, and instead of sending killer drones of their
7727 own up to shoot them down, they should notify humans to their
7728 presence. And in certain very high-security areas, perhaps civic
7729 drones would snare them and drag them off to a bomb disposal facility.</p>
7730
7731 <p>But notice, this is more an immune system than a weapons system. It
7732 would allow us to avail ourselves of the use of autonomous vehicles
7733 and drones while still preserving our open, civil society.</p>
7734
7735 </blockquote>
7736
7737 <p>The key is that <em>every citizen</em> should be able to read the
7738 radio beacons sent from the drones in the area, to be able to check
7739 both the government and others use of drones.  For such control to be
7740 effective, everyone must be able to do it.  What should such beacon
7741 contain?  At least formal owner, purpose, contact information and GPS
7742 location.  Probably also the origin and target position of the current
7743 flight.  And perhaps some registration number to be able to look up
7744 the drone in a central database tracking their movement.  Robots
7745 should not have privacy.  It is people who need privacy.</p>
7746
7747       </div>
7748       <div class="tags">
7749
7750
7751         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
7752
7753
7754       </div>
7755     </div>
7756     <div class="padding"></div>
7757
7758     <div class="entry">
7759       <div class="title">
7760         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_wireless_community_network_in_Oslo_.html">Lets make a wireless community network in Oslo!</a>
7761       </div>
7762       <div class="date">
7763         13th November 2013
7764       </div>
7765       <div class="body">
7766         <p>Today NUUG and Hackeriet announced
7767 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Bli_med___bygge_dugnadsnett_for_alle_i_Oslo.shtml">our
7768 plans to join forces and create a wireless community network in
7769 Oslo</a>.  The workshop to help people get started will take place
7770 Thursday 2013-11-28, but we already are collecting the geolocation of
7771 people joining forces to make this happen.  We have
7772 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/meshfx-node/blob/master/oslo-nodes.geojson">9
7773 locations plotted on the map</a>, but we will need more before we have
7774 a connected mesh spread across Oslo.  If this sound interesting to
7775 you, please join us at the workshop.  If you are too impatient to wait
7776 15 days, please join us on the IRC channel
7777 <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/%23nuug">#nuug on irc.freenode.net</a>
7778 right away. :)</p>
7779
7780       </div>
7781       <div class="tags">
7782
7783
7784         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
7785
7786
7787       </div>
7788     </div>
7789     <div class="padding"></div>
7790
7791     <div class="entry">
7792       <div class="title">
7793         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Running_TP_Link_MR3040_as_a_batman_adv_mesh_node_using_openwrt.html">Running TP-Link MR3040 as a batman-adv mesh node using openwrt</a>
7794       </div>
7795       <div class="date">
7796         10th November 2013
7797       </div>
7798       <div class="body">
7799         <p>Continuing my research into mesh networking, I was recommended to
7800 use TP-Link 3040 and 3600 access points as mesh nodes, and the pair I
7801 bought arrived on Friday.  Here are my notes on how to set up the
7802 MR3040 as a mesh node using
7803 <a href="http://www.openwrt.org/">OpenWrt</a>.</p>
7804
7805 <p>I started by following the instructions on the OpenWRT wiki for
7806 <a href="http://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tl-mr3040">TL-MR3040</a>,
7807 and downloaded
7808 <a href="http://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/trunk/ar71xx/openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-mr3040-v2-squashfs-factory.bin">the
7809 recommended firmware image</a>
7810 (openwrt-ar71xx-generic-tl-mr3040-v2-squashfs-factory.bin) and
7811 uploaded it into the original web interface.  The flashing went fine,
7812 and the machine was available via telnet on the ethernet port.  After
7813 logging in and setting the root password, ssh was available and I
7814 could start to set it up as a batman-adv mesh node.</p>
7815
7816 <p>I started off by reading the instructions from
7817 <a href="http://wirelessafrica.meraka.org.za/wiki/index.php?title=Antoine's_Research">Wireless
7818 Africa</a>, which had quite a lot of useful information, but
7819 eventually I followed the recipe from the Open Mesh wiki for
7820 <a href="http://www.open-mesh.org/projects/batman-adv/wiki/Batman-adv-openwrt-config">using
7821 batman-adv on OpenWrt</a>.  A small snag was the fact that the
7822 <tt>opkg install kmod-batman-adv</tt> command did not work as it
7823 should.  The batman-adv kernel module would fail to load because its
7824 dependency crc16 was not already loaded.  I
7825 <a href="https://dev.openwrt.org/ticket/14452">reported the bug</a> to
7826 the openwrt project and hope it will be fixed soon.  But the problem
7827 only seem to affect initial testing of batman-adv, as configuration
7828 seem to work when booting from scratch.</p>
7829
7830 <p>The setup is done using files in /etc/config/.  I did not bridge
7831 the Ethernet and mesh interfaces this time, to be able to hook up the
7832 box on my local network and log into it for configuration updates.
7833 The following files were changed and look like this after modifying
7834 them:</p>
7835
7836 <p><tt>/etc/config/network</tt></p>
7837
7838 <pre>
7839
7840 config interface 'loopback'
7841         option ifname 'lo'
7842         option proto 'static'
7843         option ipaddr '127.0.0.1'
7844         option netmask '255.0.0.0'
7845
7846 config globals 'globals'
7847         option ula_prefix 'fdbf:4c12:3fed::/48'
7848
7849 config interface 'lan'
7850         option ifname 'eth0'
7851         option type 'bridge'
7852         option proto 'dhcp'
7853         option ipaddr '192.168.1.1'
7854         option netmask '255.255.255.0'
7855         option hostname 'tl-mr3040'
7856         option ip6assign '60'
7857
7858 config interface 'mesh'
7859         option ifname 'adhoc0'
7860         option mtu '1528'
7861         option proto 'batadv'
7862         option mesh 'bat0'
7863 </pre>
7864
7865 <p><tt>/etc/config/wireless</tt></p>
7866 <pre>
7867
7868 config wifi-device 'radio0'
7869         option type 'mac80211'
7870         option channel '11'
7871         option hwmode '11ng'
7872         option path 'platform/ar933x_wmac'
7873         option htmode 'HT20'
7874         list ht_capab 'SHORT-GI-20'
7875         list ht_capab 'SHORT-GI-40'
7876         list ht_capab 'RX-STBC1'
7877         list ht_capab 'DSSS_CCK-40'
7878         option disabled '0'
7879
7880 config wifi-iface 'wmesh'
7881         option device 'radio0'
7882         option ifname 'adhoc0'
7883         option network 'mesh'
7884         option encryption 'none'
7885         option mode 'adhoc'
7886         option bssid '02:BA:00:00:00:01'
7887         option ssid 'meshfx@hackeriet'
7888 </pre>
7889 <p><tt>/etc/config/batman-adv</tt></p>
7890 <pre>
7891
7892 config 'mesh' 'bat0'
7893         option interfaces 'adhoc0'
7894         option 'aggregated_ogms'
7895         option 'ap_isolation'
7896         option 'bonding'
7897         option 'fragmentation'
7898         option 'gw_bandwidth'
7899         option 'gw_mode'
7900         option 'gw_sel_class'
7901         option 'log_level'
7902         option 'orig_interval'
7903         option 'vis_mode'
7904         option 'bridge_loop_avoidance'
7905         option 'distributed_arp_table'
7906         option 'network_coding'
7907         option 'hop_penalty'
7908
7909 # yet another batX instance
7910 # config 'mesh' 'bat5'
7911 #       option 'interfaces' 'second_mesh'
7912 </pre>
7913
7914 <p>The mesh node is now operational.  I have yet to test its range,
7915 but I hope it is good.  I have not yet tested the TP-Link 3600 box
7916 still wrapped up in plastic.</p>
7917
7918       </div>
7919       <div class="tags">
7920
7921
7922         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
7923
7924
7925       </div>
7926     </div>
7927     <div class="padding"></div>
7928
7929     <div class="entry">
7930       <div class="title">
7931         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_init_d_boot_script_example_for_rsyslog.html">Debian init.d boot script example for rsyslog</a>
7932       </div>
7933       <div class="date">
7934          2nd November 2013
7935       </div>
7936       <div class="body">
7937         <p>If one of the points of switching to a new init system in Debian is
7938 <a href="http://thomas.goirand.fr/blog/?p=147">to get rid of huge
7939 init.d scripts</a>, I doubt we need to switch away from sysvinit and
7940 init.d scripts at all.  Here is an example init.d script, ie a rewrite
7941 of /etc/init.d/rsyslog:</p>
7942
7943 <p><pre>
7944 #!/lib/init/init-d-script
7945 ### BEGIN INIT INFO
7946 # Provides:          rsyslog
7947 # Required-Start:    $remote_fs $time
7948 # Required-Stop:     umountnfs $time
7949 # X-Stop-After:      sendsigs
7950 # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
7951 # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
7952 # Short-Description: enhanced syslogd
7953 # Description:       Rsyslog is an enhanced multi-threaded syslogd.
7954 #                    It is quite compatible to stock sysklogd and can be
7955 #                    used as a drop-in replacement.
7956 ### END INIT INFO
7957 DESC="enhanced syslogd"
7958 DAEMON=/usr/sbin/rsyslogd
7959 </pre></p>
7960
7961 <p>Pretty minimalistic to me... For the record, the original sysv-rc
7962 script was 137 lines, and the above is just 15 lines, most of it meta
7963 info/comments.</p>
7964
7965 <p>How to do this, you ask?  Well, one create a new script
7966 /lib/init/init-d-script looking something like this:
7967
7968 <p><pre>
7969 #!/bin/sh
7970
7971 # Define LSB log_* functions.
7972 # Depend on lsb-base (>= 3.2-14) to ensure that this file is present
7973 # and status_of_proc is working.
7974 . /lib/lsb/init-functions
7975
7976 #
7977 # Function that starts the daemon/service
7978
7979 #
7980 do_start()
7981 {
7982         # Return
7983         #   0 if daemon has been started
7984         #   1 if daemon was already running
7985         #   2 if daemon could not be started
7986         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON --test > /dev/null \
7987                 || return 1
7988         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON -- \
7989                 $DAEMON_ARGS \
7990                 || return 2
7991         # Add code here, if necessary, that waits for the process to be ready
7992         # to handle requests from services started subsequently which depend
7993         # on this one.  As a last resort, sleep for some time.
7994 }
7995
7996 #
7997 # Function that stops the daemon/service
7998 #
7999 do_stop()
8000 {
8001         # Return
8002         #   0 if daemon has been stopped
8003         #   1 if daemon was already stopped
8004         #   2 if daemon could not be stopped
8005         #   other if a failure occurred
8006         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --retry=TERM/30/KILL/5 --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
8007         RETVAL="$?"
8008         [ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2
8009         # Wait for children to finish too if this is a daemon that forks
8010         # and if the daemon is only ever run from this initscript.
8011         # If the above conditions are not satisfied then add some other code
8012         # that waits for the process to drop all resources that could be
8013         # needed by services started subsequently.  A last resort is to
8014         # sleep for some time.
8015         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --retry=0/30/KILL/5 --exec $DAEMON
8016         [ "$?" = 2 ] && return 2
8017         # Many daemons don't delete their pidfiles when they exit.
8018         rm -f $PIDFILE
8019         return "$RETVAL"
8020 }
8021
8022 #
8023 # Function that sends a SIGHUP to the daemon/service
8024 #
8025 do_reload() {
8026         #
8027         # If the daemon can reload its configuration without
8028         # restarting (for example, when it is sent a SIGHUP),
8029         # then implement that here.
8030         #
8031         start-stop-daemon --stop --signal 1 --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
8032         return 0
8033 }
8034
8035 SCRIPTNAME=$1
8036 scriptbasename="$(basename $1)"
8037 echo "SN: $scriptbasename"
8038 if [ "$scriptbasename" != "init-d-library" ] ; then
8039     script="$1"
8040     shift
8041     . $script
8042 else
8043     exit 0
8044 fi
8045
8046 NAME=$(basename $DAEMON)
8047 PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
8048
8049 # Exit if the package is not installed
8050 #[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0
8051
8052 # Read configuration variable file if it is present
8053 [ -r /etc/default/$NAME ] && . /etc/default/$NAME
8054
8055 # Load the VERBOSE setting and other rcS variables
8056 . /lib/init/vars.sh
8057
8058 case "$1" in
8059   start)
8060         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
8061         do_start
8062         case "$?" in
8063                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
8064                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
8065         esac
8066         ;;
8067   stop)
8068         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
8069         do_stop
8070         case "$?" in
8071                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
8072                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
8073         esac
8074         ;;
8075   status)
8076         status_of_proc "$DAEMON" "$NAME" && exit 0 || exit $?
8077         ;;
8078   #reload|force-reload)
8079         #
8080         # If do_reload() is not implemented then leave this commented out
8081         # and leave 'force-reload' as an alias for 'restart'.
8082         #
8083         #log_daemon_msg "Reloading $DESC" "$NAME"
8084         #do_reload
8085         #log_end_msg $?
8086         #;;
8087   restart|force-reload)
8088         #
8089         # If the "reload" option is implemented then remove the
8090         # 'force-reload' alias
8091         #
8092         log_daemon_msg "Restarting $DESC" "$NAME"
8093         do_stop
8094         case "$?" in
8095           0|1)
8096                 do_start
8097                 case "$?" in
8098                         0) log_end_msg 0 ;;
8099                         1) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Old process is still running
8100                         *) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Failed to start
8101                 esac
8102                 ;;
8103           *)
8104                 # Failed to stop
8105                 log_end_msg 1
8106                 ;;
8107         esac
8108         ;;
8109   *)
8110         echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|status|restart|force-reload}" >&2
8111         exit 3
8112         ;;
8113 esac
8114
8115 :
8116 </pre></p>
8117
8118 <p>It is based on /etc/init.d/skeleton, and could be improved quite a
8119 lot.  I did not really polish the approach, so it might not always
8120 work out of the box, but you get the idea.  I did not try very hard to
8121 optimize it nor make it more robust either.</p>
8122
8123 <p>A better argument for switching init system in Debian than reducing
8124 the size of init scripts (which is a good thing to do anyway), is to
8125 get boot system that is able to handle the kernel events sensibly and
8126 robustly, and do not depend on the boot to run sequentially.  The boot
8127 and the kernel have not behaved sequentially in years.</p>
8128
8129       </div>
8130       <div class="tags">
8131
8132
8133         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8134
8135
8136       </div>
8137     </div>
8138     <div class="padding"></div>
8139
8140     <div class="entry">
8141       <div class="title">
8142         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Browser_plugin_for_SPICE__spice_xpi__uploaded_to_Debian.html">Browser plugin for SPICE (spice-xpi) uploaded to Debian</a>
8143       </div>
8144       <div class="date">
8145          1st November 2013
8146       </div>
8147       <div class="body">
8148         <p><a href="http://www.spice-space.org/">The SPICE protocol</a> for
8149 remote display access is the preferred solution with oVirt and RedHat
8150 Enterprise Virtualization, and I was sad to discover the other day
8151 that the browser plugin needed to use these systems seamlessly was
8152 missing in Debian.  The <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/668284">request
8153 for a package</a> was from 2012-04-10 with no progress since
8154 2013-04-01, so I decided to wrap up a package based on the great work
8155 from Cajus Pollmeier and put it in a collab-maint maintained git
8156 repository to get a package I could use.  I would very much like
8157 others to help me maintain the package (or just take over, I do not
8158 mind), but as no-one had volunteered so far, I just uploaded it to
8159 NEW.  I hope it will be available in Debian in a few days.</p>
8160
8161 <p>The source is now available from
8162 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/spice-xpi.git;a=summary">http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/spice-xpi.git;a=summary</a>.</p>
8163
8164       </div>
8165       <div class="tags">
8166
8167
8168         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8169
8170
8171       </div>
8172     </div>
8173     <div class="padding"></div>
8174
8175     <div class="entry">
8176       <div class="title">
8177         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Teaching_vmdebootstrap_to_create_Raspberry_Pi_SD_card_images.html">Teaching vmdebootstrap to create Raspberry Pi SD card images</a>
8178       </div>
8179       <div class="date">
8180         27th October 2013
8181       </div>
8182       <div class="body">
8183         <p>The
8184 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/v/vmdebootstrap.html">vmdebootstrap</a>
8185 program is a a very nice system to create virtual machine images.  It
8186 create a image file, add a partition table, mount it and run
8187 debootstrap in the mounted directory to create a Debian system on a
8188 stick.  Yesterday, I decided to try to teach it how to make images for
8189 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi</a>, as part
8190 of a plan to simplify the build system for
8191 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the FreedomBox
8192 project</a>.  The FreedomBox project already uses vmdebootstrap for
8193 the virtualbox images, but its current build system made multistrap
8194 based system for Dreamplug images, and it is lacking support for
8195 Raspberry Pi.</p>
8196
8197 <p>Armed with the knowledge on how to build "foreign" (aka non-native
8198 architecture) chroots for Raspberry Pi, I dived into the vmdebootstrap
8199 code and adjusted it to be able to build armel images on my amd64
8200 Debian laptop.  I ended up giving vmdebootstrap five new options,
8201 allowing me to replicate the image creation process I use to make
8202 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">Debian
8203 Jessie based mesh node images for the Raspberry Pi</a>.  First, the
8204 <tt>--foreign /path/to/binfm_handler</tt> option tell vmdebootstrap to
8205 call debootstrap with --foreign and to copy the handler into the
8206 generated chroot before running the second stage.  This allow
8207 vmdebootstrap to create armel images on an amd64 host.  Next I added
8208 two new options <tt>--bootsize size</tt> and <tt>--boottype
8209 fstype</tt> to teach it to create a separate /boot/ partition with the
8210 given file system type, allowing me to create an image with a vfat
8211 partition for the /boot/ stuff.  I also added a <tt>--variant
8212 variant</tt> option to allow me to create smaller images without the
8213 Debian base system packages installed.  Finally, I added an option
8214 <tt>--no-extlinux</tt> to tell vmdebootstrap to not install extlinux
8215 as a boot loader.  It is not needed on the Raspberry Pi and probably
8216 most other non-x86 architectures.  The changes were accepted by the
8217 upstream author of vmdebootstrap yesterday and today, and is now
8218 available from
8219 <a href="http://git.liw.fi/cgi-bin/cgit/cgit.cgi/vmdebootstrap/">the
8220 upstream project page</a>.</p>
8221
8222 <p>To use it to build a Raspberry Pi image using Debian Jessie, first
8223 create a small script (the customize script) to add the non-free
8224 binary blob needed to boot the Raspberry Pi and the APT source
8225 list:</p>
8226
8227 <p><pre>
8228 #!/bin/sh
8229 set -e # Exit on first error
8230 rootdir="$1"
8231 cd "$rootdir"
8232 cat &lt;&lt;EOF > etc/apt/sources.list
8233 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
8234 EOF
8235 # Install non-free binary blob needed to boot Raspberry Pi.  This
8236 # install a kernel somewhere too.
8237 wget https://raw.github.com/Hexxeh/rpi-update/master/rpi-update \
8238     -O $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
8239 chmod a+x $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
8240 mkdir -p $rootdir/lib/modules
8241 touch $rootdir/boot/start.elf
8242 chroot $rootdir rpi-update
8243 </pre></p>
8244
8245 <p>Next, fetch the latest vmdebootstrap script and call it like this
8246 to build the image:</p>
8247
8248 <pre>
8249 sudo ./vmdebootstrap \
8250     --variant minbase \
8251     --arch armel \
8252     --distribution jessie \
8253     --mirror http://http.debian.net/debian \
8254     --image test.img \
8255     --size 600M \
8256     --bootsize 64M \
8257     --boottype vfat \
8258     --log-level debug \
8259     --verbose \
8260     --no-kernel \
8261     --no-extlinux \
8262     --root-password raspberry \
8263     --hostname raspberrypi \
8264     --foreign /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static \
8265     --customize `pwd`/customize \
8266     --package netbase \
8267     --package git-core \
8268     --package binutils \
8269     --package ca-certificates \
8270     --package wget \
8271     --package kmod
8272 </pre></p>
8273
8274 <p>The list of packages being installed are the ones needed by
8275 rpi-update to make the image bootable on the Raspberry Pi, with the
8276 exception of netbase, which is needed by debootstrap to find
8277 /etc/hosts with the minbase variant.  I really wish there was a way to
8278 set up an Raspberry Pi using only packages in the Debian archive, but
8279 that is not possible as far as I know, because it boots from the GPU
8280 using a non-free binary blob.</p>
8281
8282 <p>The build host need debootstrap, kpartx and qemu-user-static and
8283 probably a few others installed.  I have not checked the complete
8284 build dependency list.</p>
8285
8286 <p>The resulting image will not use the hardware floating point unit
8287 on the Raspberry PI, because the armel architecture in Debian is not
8288 optimized for that use.  So the images created will be a bit slower
8289 than <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/">Raspbian</a> based images.</p>
8290
8291       </div>
8292       <div class="tags">
8293
8294
8295         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network</a>.
8296
8297
8298       </div>
8299     </div>
8300     <div class="padding"></div>
8301
8302     <div class="entry">
8303       <div class="title">
8304         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">A Raspberry Pi based batman-adv Mesh network node</a>
8305       </div>
8306       <div class="date">
8307         21st October 2013
8308       </div>
8309       <div class="body">
8310         <p>The last few days I have been experimenting with
8311 <a href="http://www.open-mesh.org/projects/batman-adv/wiki">the
8312 batman-adv mesh technology</a>.  I want to gain some experience to see
8313 if it will fit <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the
8314 Freedombox project</a>, and together with my neighbors try to build a
8315 mesh network around the park where I live.  Batman-adv is a layer 2
8316 mesh system ("ethernet" in other words), where the mesh network appear
8317 as if all the mesh clients are connected to the same switch.</p>
8318
8319 <p>My hardware of choice was the Linksys WRT54GL routers I had lying
8320 around, but I've been unable to get them working with batman-adv.  So
8321 instead, I started playing with a
8322 <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org/">Raspberry Pi</a>, and tried to
8323 get it working as a mesh node.  My idea is to use it to create a mesh
8324 node which function as a switch port, where everything connected to
8325 the Raspberry Pi ethernet plug is connected (bridged) to the mesh
8326 network.  This allow me to hook a wifi base station like the Linksys
8327 WRT54GL to the mesh by plugging it into a Raspberry Pi, and allow
8328 non-mesh clients to hook up to the mesh.  This in turn is useful for
8329 Android phones using <a href="http://servalproject.org/">the Serval
8330 Project</a> voip client, allowing every one around the playground to
8331 phone and message each other for free.  The reason is that Android
8332 phones do not see ad-hoc wifi networks (they are filtered away from
8333 the GUI view), and can not join the mesh without being rooted.  But if
8334 they are connected using a normal wifi base station, they can talk to
8335 every client on the local network.</p>
8336
8337 <p>To get this working, I've created a debian package
8338 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/meshfx-node">meshfx-node</a>
8339 and a script
8340 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/meshfx-node/blob/master/build-rpi-mesh-node">build-rpi-mesh-node</a>
8341 to create the Raspberry Pi boot image.  I'm using Debian Jessie (and
8342 not Raspbian), to get more control over the packages available.
8343 Unfortunately a huge binary blob need to be inserted into the boot
8344 image to get it booting, but I'll ignore that for now.  Also, as
8345 Debian lack support for the CPU features available in the Raspberry
8346 Pi, the system do not use the hardware floating point unit.  I hope
8347 the routing performance isn't affected by the lack of hardware FPU
8348 support.</p>
8349
8350 <p>To create an image, run the following with a sudo enabled user
8351 after inserting the target SD card into the build machine:</p>
8352
8353 <p><pre>
8354 % wget -O build-rpi-mesh-node \
8355     https://raw.github.com/petterreinholdtsen/meshfx-node/master/build-rpi-mesh-node
8356 % sudo bash -x ./build-rpi-mesh-node > build.log 2>&1
8357 % dd if=/root/rpi/rpi_basic_jessie_$(date +%Y%m%d).img of=/dev/mmcblk0 bs=1M
8358 %
8359 </pre></p>
8360
8361 <p>Booting with the resulting SD card on a Raspberry PI with a USB
8362 wifi card inserted should give you a mesh node.  At least it does for
8363 me with a the wifi card I am using. The default mesh settings are the
8364 ones used by the Oslo mesh project at Hackeriet, as I mentioned in
8365 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Oslo_community_mesh_network___with_NUUG_and_Hackeriet_at_Hausmania.html">an
8366 earlier blog post about this mesh testing</a>.</p>
8367
8368 <p>The mesh node was not horribly expensive either.  I bought
8369 everything over the counter in shops nearby.  If I had ordered online
8370 from the lowest bidder, the price should be significantly lower:</p>
8371
8372 <p><table>
8373
8374 <tr><th>Supplier</th><th>Model</th><th>NOK</th></tr>
8375 <tr><td>Teknikkmagasinet</td><td>Raspberry Pi model B</td><td>349.90</td></tr>
8376 <tr><td>Teknikkmagasinet</td><td>Raspberry Pi type B case</td><td>99.90</td></tr>
8377 <tr><td>Lefdal</td><td>Jensen Air:Link 25150</td><td>295.-</td></tr>
8378 <tr><td>Clas Ohlson</td><td>Kingston 16 GB SD card</td><td>199.-</td></tr>
8379 <tr><td>Total cost</td><td></td><td>943.80</td></tr>
8380
8381 </table></p>
8382
8383 <p>Now my mesh network at home consist of one laptop in the basement
8384 connected to my production network, one Raspberry Pi node on the 1th
8385 floor that can be seen by my neighbor across the park, and one
8386 play-node I use to develop the image building script.  And some times
8387 I hook up my work horse laptop to the mesh to test it.  I look forward
8388 to figuring out what kind of latency the batman-adv setup will give,
8389 and how much packet loss we will experience around the park. :)</p>
8390
8391       </div>
8392       <div class="tags">
8393
8394
8395         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
8396
8397
8398       </div>
8399     </div>
8400     <div class="padding"></div>
8401
8402     <div class="entry">
8403       <div class="title">
8404         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Perl_library_to_control_the_Spykee_robot_moved_to_github.html">Perl library to control the Spykee robot moved to github</a>
8405       </div>
8406       <div class="date">
8407         19th October 2013
8408       </div>
8409       <div class="body">
8410         <p>Back in 2010, I created a Perl library to talk to
8411 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spykee">the Spykee robot</a>
8412 (with two belts, wifi, USB and Linux) and made it available from my
8413 web page.  Today I concluded that it should move to a site that is
8414 easier to use to cooperate with others, and moved it to github.  If
8415 you got a Spykee robot, you might want to check out
8416 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/libspykee-perl">the
8417 libspykee-perl github repository</a>.</p>
8418
8419       </div>
8420       <div class="tags">
8421
8422
8423         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
8424
8425
8426       </div>
8427     </div>
8428     <div class="padding"></div>
8429
8430     <div class="entry">
8431       <div class="title">
8432         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Good_causes__Debian_Outreach_Program_for_Women__EFF_documenting_the_spying_and_Open_access_in_Norway.html">Good causes: Debian Outreach Program for Women, EFF documenting the spying and Open access in Norway</a>
8433       </div>
8434       <div class="date">
8435         15th October 2013
8436       </div>
8437       <div class="body">
8438         <p>The last few days I came across a few good causes that should get
8439 wider attention.  I recommend signing and donating to each one of
8440 these. :)</p>
8441
8442 <p>Via <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2013/18/">Debian
8443 Project News for 2013-10-14</a> I came across the Outreach Program for
8444 Women program which is a Google Summer of Code like initiative to get
8445 more women involved in free software.  One debian sponsor has offered
8446 to match <a href="http://debian.ch/opw2013">any donation done to Debian
8447 earmarked</a> for this initiative.  I donated a few minutes ago, and
8448 hope you will to. :)</p>
8449
8450 <p>And the Electronic Frontier Foundation just announced plans to
8451 create <a href="https://supporters.eff.org/donate/nsa-videos">video
8452 documentaries about the excessive spying</a> on every Internet user that
8453 take place these days, and their need to fund the work.  I've already
8454 donated.  Are you next?</p>
8455
8456 <p>For my Norwegian audience, the organisation Studentenes og
8457 Akademikernes Internasjonale Hjelpefond is collecting signatures for a
8458 statement under the heading
8459 <a href="http://saih.no/Bloggers_United/">Bloggers United for Open
8460 Access</a> for those of us asking for more focus on open access in the
8461 Norwegian government.  So far 499 signatures.  I hope you will sign it
8462 too.</p>
8463
8464       </div>
8465       <div class="tags">
8466
8467
8468         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
8469
8470
8471       </div>
8472     </div>
8473     <div class="padding"></div>
8474
8475     <div class="entry">
8476       <div class="title">
8477         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Oslo_community_mesh_network___with_NUUG_and_Hackeriet_at_Hausmania.html">Oslo community mesh network - with NUUG and Hackeriet at Hausmania</a>
8478       </div>
8479       <div class="date">
8480         11th October 2013
8481       </div>
8482       <div class="body">
8483         <p>Wireless mesh networks are self organising and self healing
8484 networks that can be used to connect computers across small and large
8485 areas, depending on the radio technology used.  Normal wifi equipment
8486 can be used to create home made radio networks, and there are several
8487 successful examples like
8488 <a href="http://www.freifunk.net/">Freifunk</a> and
8489 <a href="http://www.awmn.net/">Athens Wireless Metropolitan Network</a>
8490 (see
8491 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wireless_community_networks_by_region#Greece">wikipedia
8492 for a large list</a>) around the globe.  To give you an idea how it
8493 work, check out the nice overview of the Kiel Freifunk community which
8494 can be seen from their
8495 <a href="http://freifunk.in-kiel.de/ffmap/nodes.html">dynamically
8496 updated node graph and map</a>, where one can see how the mesh nodes
8497 automatically handle routing and recover from nodes disappearing.
8498 There is also a small community mesh network group in Oslo, Norway,
8499 and that is the main topic of this blog post.</p>
8500
8501 <p>I've wanted to check out mesh networks for a while now, and hoped
8502 to do it as part of my involvement with the <a
8503 href="http://www.nuug.no/">NUUG member organisation</a> community, and
8504 my recent involvement in
8505 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the Freedombox project</a>
8506 finally lead me to give mesh networks some priority, as I suspect a
8507 Freedombox should use mesh networks to connect neighbours and family
8508 when possible, given that most communication between people are
8509 between those nearby (as shown for example by research on Facebook
8510 communication patterns).  It also allow people to communicate without
8511 any central hub to tap into for those that want to listen in on the
8512 private communication of citizens, which have become more and more
8513 important over the years.</p>
8514
8515 <p>So far I have only been able to find one group of people in Oslo
8516 working on community mesh networks, over at the hack space
8517 <a href="http://hackeriet.no/">Hackeriet</a> at Husmania.  They seem to
8518 have started with some Freifunk based effort using OLSR, called
8519 <a href="http://oslo.freifunk.net/index.php?title=Main_Page">the Oslo
8520 Freifunk project</a>, but that effort is now dead and the people
8521 behind it have moved on to a batman-adv based system called
8522 <a href="http://meshfx.org/trac">meshfx</a>.  Unfortunately the wiki
8523 site for the Oslo Freifunk project is no longer possible to update to
8524 reflect this fact, so the old project page can't be updated to point to
8525 the new project.  A while back, the people at Hackeriet invited people
8526 from the Freifunk community to Oslo to talk about mesh networks.  I
8527 came across this video where Hans Jørgen Lysglimt interview the
8528 speakers about this talk (from
8529 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2Kd7CLkhSY">youtube</a>):</p>
8530
8531 <p><iframe width="420" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/N2Kd7CLkhSY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
8532
8533 <p>I mentioned OLSR and batman-adv, which are mesh routing protocols.
8534 There are heaps of different protocols, and I am still struggling to
8535 figure out which one would be "best" for some definitions of best, but
8536 given that the community mesh group in Oslo is so small, I believe it
8537 is best to hook up with the existing one instead of trying to create a
8538 completely different setup, and thus I have decided to focus on
8539 batman-adv for now.  It sure help me to  know that the very cool
8540 <a href="http://www.servalproject.org/">Serval project in Australia</a>
8541 is using batman-adv as their meshing technology when it create a self
8542 organizing and self healing telephony system for disaster areas and
8543 less industrialized communities.  Check out this cool video presenting
8544 that project (from
8545 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30qNfzJCQOA">youtube</a>):</p>
8546
8547 <p><iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/30qNfzJCQOA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe></p>
8548
8549 <p>According to the wikipedia page on
8550 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wireless_mesh_network">Wireless
8551 mesh network</a> there are around 70 competing schemes for routing
8552 packets across mesh networks, and OLSR, B.A.T.M.A.N. and
8553 B.A.T.M.A.N. advanced are protocols used by several free software
8554 based community mesh networks.</p>
8555
8556 <p>The batman-adv protocol is a bit special, as it provide layer 2
8557 (as in ethernet ) routing, allowing ipv4 and ipv6 to work on the same
8558 network.  One way to think about it is that it provide a mesh based
8559 vlan you can bridge to or handle like any other vlan connected to your
8560 computer.  The required drivers are already in the Linux kernel at
8561 least since Debian Wheezy, and it is fairly easy to set up.  A
8562 <a href="http://www.open-mesh.org/projects/batman-adv/wiki/Quick-start-guide">good
8563 introduction</a> is available from the Open Mesh project.  These are
8564 the key settings needed to join the Oslo meshfx network:</p>
8565
8566 <p><table>
8567 <tr><th>Setting</th><th>Value</th></tr>
8568 <tr><td>Protocol / kernel module</td><td>batman-adv</td></tr>
8569 <tr><td>ESSID</td><td>meshfx@hackeriet</td></tr>
8570 <td>Channel / Frequency</td><td>11 / 2462</td></tr>
8571 <td>Cell ID</td><td>02:BA:00:00:00:01</td>
8572 </table></p>
8573
8574 <p>The reason for setting ad-hoc wifi Cell ID is to work around bugs
8575 in firmware used in wifi card and wifi drivers.  (See a nice post from
8576 VillageTelco about
8577 "<a href="http://tiebing.blogspot.no/2009/12/ad-hoc-cell-splitting-re-post-original.html">Information
8578 about cell-id splitting, stuck beacons, and failed IBSS merges!</a>
8579 for details.)  When these settings are activated and you have some
8580 other mesh node nearby, your computer will be connected to the mesh
8581 network and can communicate with any mesh node that is connected to
8582 any of the nodes in your network of nodes. :)</p>
8583
8584 <p>My initial plan was to reuse my old Linksys WRT54GL as a mesh node,
8585 but that seem to be very hard, as I have not been able to locate a
8586 firmware supporting batman-adv.  If anyone know how to use that old
8587 wifi access point with batman-adv these days, please let me know.</p>
8588
8589 <p>If you find this project interesting and want to join, please join
8590 us on IRC, either channel
8591 <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/#oslohackerspace">#oslohackerspace</a>
8592 or <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/#nuug">#nuug</a> on
8593 irc.freenode.net.</p>
8594
8595 <p>While investigating mesh networks in Oslo, I came across an old
8596 research paper from the university of Stavanger and Telenor Research
8597 and Innovation called
8598 <a href="http://folk.uio.no/paalee/publications/netrel-egeland-iswcs-2008.pdf">The
8599 reliability of wireless backhaul mesh networks</a> and elsewhere
8600 learned that Telenor have been experimenting with mesh networks at
8601 Grünerløkka in Oslo.  So mesh networks are also interesting for
8602 commercial companies, even though Telenor discovered that it was hard
8603 to figure out a good business plan for mesh networking and as far as I
8604 know have closed down the experiment.  Perhaps Telenor or others would
8605 be interested in a cooperation?</p>
8606
8607 <p><strong>Update 2013-10-12</strong>: I was just
8608 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2013-October/005900.html">told
8609 by the Serval project developers</a> that they no longer use
8610 batman-adv (but are compatible with it), but their own crypto based
8611 mesh system.</p>
8612
8613       </div>
8614       <div class="tags">
8615
8616
8617         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
8618
8619
8620       </div>
8621     </div>
8622     <div class="padding"></div>
8623
8624     <div class="entry">
8625       <div class="title">
8626         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Skolelinux___Debian_Edu_7_1_install_and_overview_video_from_Marcelo_Salvador.html">Skolelinux / Debian Edu 7.1 install and overview video from Marcelo Salvador</a>
8627       </div>
8628       <div class="date">
8629          8th October 2013
8630       </div>
8631       <div class="body">
8632         <p>The other day I was pleased and surprised to discover that Marcelo
8633 Salvador had published a
8634 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-GgpdqgLFc">video on
8635 Youtube</a> showing how to install the standalone Debian Edu /
8636 Skolelinux profile.  This is the profile intended for use at home or
8637 on laptops that should not be integrated into the provided network
8638 services (no central home directory, no Kerberos / LDAP directory etc,
8639 in other word a single user machine).  The result is 11 minutes long,
8640 and show some user applications (seem to be rather randomly picked).
8641 Missed a few of my favorites like celestia, planets and chromium
8642 showing the <a href="http://www.zygotebody.com/">Zygote Body 3D model
8643 of the human body</a>, but I guess he did not know about those or find
8644 other programs more interesting. :) And the video do not show the
8645 advantages I believe is one of the most valuable featuers in Debian
8646 Edu, its central school server making it possible to run hundreds of
8647 computers without hard drives by installing one central
8648 <a href="http://www.ltsp.org/">LTSP server</a>.</p>
8649
8650 <p>Anyway, check out the video, embedded below and linked to above:</p>
8651
8652 <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/w-GgpdqgLFc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
8653
8654 <p>Are there other nice videos demonstrating Skolelinux?  Please let
8655 me know. :)</p>
8656
8657       </div>
8658       <div class="tags">
8659
8660
8661         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
8662
8663
8664       </div>
8665     </div>
8666     <div class="padding"></div>
8667
8668     <div class="entry">
8669       <div class="title">
8670         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Finally__Debian_Edu_Wheezy_is_released_today_.html">Finally, Debian Edu Wheezy is released today!</a>
8671       </div>
8672       <div class="date">
8673         29th September 2013
8674       </div>
8675       <div class="body">
8676         <p>A few hours ago, the announcement for the first stable release of
8677 Debian Edu Wheezy went out from the Debian publicity team.  The
8678 complete announcement text can be found at
8679 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130928">the Debian News
8680 section</a>, translated to several languages.  Please check it out.</p>
8681
8682 <p>There is one minor known problem that we will fix very soon.  One
8683 can not install a amd64 Thin Client Server using PXE, as the /var/
8684 partition is too small.  A workaround is to extend the partition (use
8685 lvresize + resize2fs in tty 2 while installing).</p>
8686
8687       </div>
8688       <div class="tags">
8689
8690
8691         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8692
8693
8694       </div>
8695     </div>
8696     <div class="padding"></div>
8697
8698     <div class="entry">
8699       <div class="title">
8700         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Videos_about_the_Freedombox_project___for_inspiration_and_learning.html">Videos about the Freedombox project - for inspiration and learning</a>
8701       </div>
8702       <div class="date">
8703         27th September 2013
8704       </div>
8705       <div class="body">
8706         <p>The <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox
8707 project</a> have been going on for a while, and have presented the
8708 vision, ideas and solution several places.  Here is a little
8709 collection of videos of talks and presentation of the project.</p>
8710
8711 <ul>
8712
8713 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukvUz5taxvA">FreedomBox -
8714 2,5 minute marketing film</a> (Youtube)</li>
8715
8716 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzW25QTVWsE">Eben Moglen
8717 discusses the Freedombox on CBS news 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
8718
8719 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae8SZbxfE0g">Eben Moglen -
8720 Freedom in the Cloud - Software Freedom, Privacy and and Security for
8721 Web 2.0 and Cloud computing at ISOC-NY Public Meeting 2010</a>
8722 (Youtube)</li>
8723
8724 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNaIji_3xBE">Fosdem 2011
8725 Keynote by Eben Moglen presenting the Freedombox</a> (Youtube)</li>
8726
8727 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bDDUyJSQ9s">Presentation of
8728 the Freedombox by James Vasile at Elevate in Gratz 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
8729
8730 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQTmnk27g9s"> Freedombox -
8731 Discovery, Identity, and Trust by Nick Daly at Freedombox Hackfest New
8732 York City in 2012</a> (Youtube)</li>
8733
8734 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbSB4Ba7Ck">Introduction
8735 to the Freedombox at Freedombox Hackfest New York City in 2012</a>
8736 (Youtube)</li>
8737
8738 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-P2Jaeg0aQ">Freedom, Out
8739 of the Box! by Bdale Garbee at linux.conf.au Ballarat, 2012</a> (Youtube) </li>
8740
8741 <li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/freedombox/">Freedombox
8742 1.0 by Eben Moglen and Bdale Garbee at Fosdem 2013</a> (FOSDEM) </li>
8743
8744 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LpYX2zVYg">What is the
8745 FreedomBox today by Bdale Garbee at Debconf13 in Vaumarcus
8746 2013</a> (Youtube)</li>
8747
8748 </ul>
8749
8750 <p>A larger list is available from
8751 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/TalksAndPresentations">the
8752 Freedombox Wiki</a>.</p>
8753
8754 <p>On other news, I am happy to report that Freedombox based on Debian
8755 Jessie is coming along quite well, and soon both Owncloud and using
8756 Tor should be available for testers of the Freedombox solution. :) In
8757 a few weeks I hope everything needed to test it is included in Debian.
8758 The withsqlite package is already in Debian, and the plinth package is
8759 pending in NEW.  The third and vital part of that puzzle is the
8760 metapackage/setup framework, which is still pending an upload.  Join
8761 us on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC
8762 (#freedombox on irc.debian.org)</a> and
8763 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
8764 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
8765
8766       </div>
8767       <div class="tags">
8768
8769
8770         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
8771
8772
8773       </div>
8774     </div>
8775     <div class="padding"></div>
8776
8777     <div class="entry">
8778       <div class="title">
8779         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_and_probably_last_beta_release_of_Debian_Edu_Wheezy.html">Third and probably last beta release of Debian Edu Wheezy</a>
8780       </div>
8781       <div class="date">
8782         16th September 2013
8783       </div>
8784       <div class="body">
8785         <p>The third wheezy based beta release of Debian Edu was wrapped up
8786 today.  This is the release announcement from Holger Levsen:</p>
8787
8788 <blockquote>
8789 <p>Hi,</p>
8790
8791 <p>it is my pleasure to announce the third beta release (beta 2 for
8792 short) of <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
8793 Skolelinux</a> based on Debian Wheezy!</p>
8794
8795 <p>Please test these images extensivly, if no new problems are found
8796 we plan to do this final Debian Edu Wheezy release this coming
8797 weekend.  We are not aware of any major problems or blockers in beta2,
8798 if you find something, please notify us immediately!</p>
8799
8800 <p>(More about the remaining steps for the Edu Wheezy release in
8801 another mail to the edu list tonight or tomorrow...)</p>
8802
8803 <p>Noteworthy changes and software updates for Debian Edu 7.1+edu0~b2
8804 compared to beta1:</p>
8805
8806 <ul>
8807
8808 <li>The KDE proxy setup has been adjusted to use the provided wpad.dat. This
8809 also gets Chromium to use this proxy.</li>
8810 <li>Install kdepim-groupware with KDE desktops to make sure korganizer
8811 understand ical/dav sources.</li>
8812 <li>Increased default maximum size of /var/spool/squid and /skole/backup on the
8813 main server.</li>
8814 <li>A source DVD image containing all source packages is now available as well.</li>
8815 <li>Updates for chromium (29.0.1547.57-1~deb7u1), imagemagick
8816 (6.7.7.10-5+deb7u2), php5 (5.4.4-14+deb7u4), libmodplug
8817 (0.8.8.4-3+deb7u1+git20130828), tiff (4.0.2-6+deb7u2), linux-image
8818 (3.2.0-4-486_3.2.46-1+deb7u1).</li>
8819
8820 </ul>
8821
8822 <p>Where to get it:</p>
8823
8824 <p>To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use</p>
8825
8826 <ul>
8827 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-CD.iso</a></li>
8828 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-CD.iso</a></li>
8829 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-CD.iso .</li>
8830 </ul>
8831
8832 <p>The SHA1SUM of this image is:  3a1c89f4666df80eebcd46c5bf5fedb866f9472f</p>
8833
8834 <p>To download the multiarch USB stick ISO release you can use
8835 <ul>
8836 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-USB.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-USB.iso</a></li>
8837 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-USB.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-USB.iso</a></li>
8838 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-USB.iso .</li>
8839 </ul>
8840
8841 <p>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 702d1718548f401c74bfa6df9f032cc3ee16597e</p>
8842
8843 <p>The Source DVD image has the filename
8844 debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b2-source-DVD.iso and the SHA1SUM
8845 089eed8b3f962db47aae1f6a9685e9bb2fa30ca5 and is available the same way
8846 as the other isos.</p>
8847
8848 <p>How to report bugs</p>
8849
8850 <p>For information how to report bugs please see
8851 <br><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a></p>
8852
8853
8854 <p>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</p>
8855
8856 <p>Debian Edu, also known as Skolelinux, is a Linux distribution based
8857 on Debian providing an out-of-the box environment of a completely
8858 configured school network. Immediately after installation a school
8859 server running all services needed for a school network is set up just
8860 waiting for users and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable
8861 Web-UI. A netbooting environment is prepared using PXE, so after
8862 initial installation of the main server from CD or USB stick all other
8863 machines can be installed via the network. The provided school server
8864 provides LDAP database and Kerberos authentication service,
8865 centralized home directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other
8866 services.  The desktop contains more than 60 educational software
8867 packages and more are available from the Debian archive, and schools
8868 can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE and Xfce desktop environment.</p>
8869
8870 <p>This is the seventh test release based on Debian Wheezy. Basically
8871 this is an updated and slightly improved version compared to the
8872 Squeeze release.</p>
8873
8874 <p>Notes for upgrades from Alpha Prereleases</p>
8875
8876 <p>Alpha based installations should reinstall or downgrade the
8877 versions of gosa and libpam-mklocaluser to the ones used in this beta
8878 release. Both alpha and beta0 based installations should reinstall or
8879 deal with gosa.conf manually; there are two options: (1) Keep
8880 gosa.conf and edit this file as outlined on the mailing list. (2)
8881 Accept the new version of gosa.conf and replace both contained admin
8882 password placeholders with the password hashes found in the old one
8883 (backup copy!). In both cases all users need to change their password
8884 to make sure a password is set for CIFS access to their home
8885 directory.</p>
8886
8887
8888 <p>cheers,
8889 <br>        Holger</p>
8890 </blockquote>
8891
8892       </div>
8893       <div class="tags">
8894
8895
8896         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
8897
8898
8899       </div>
8900     </div>
8901     <div class="padding"></div>
8902
8903     <div class="entry">
8904       <div class="title">
8905         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Recipe_to_test_the_Freedombox_project_on_amd64_or_Raspberry_Pi.html">Recipe to test the Freedombox project on amd64 or Raspberry Pi</a>
8906       </div>
8907       <div class="date">
8908         10th September 2013
8909       </div>
8910       <div class="body">
8911         <p>I was introduced to the
8912 <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox project</a>
8913 in 2010, when Eben Moglen presented his vision about serving the need
8914 of non-technical people to keep their personal information private and
8915 within the legal protection of their own homes.  The idea is to give
8916 people back the power over their network and machines, and return
8917 Internet back to its intended peer-to-peer architecture.  Instead of
8918 depending on a central service, the Freedombox will give everyone
8919 control over their own basic infrastructure.</p>
8920
8921 <p>I've intended to join the effort since then, but other tasks have
8922 taken priority.  But this summers nasty news about the misuse of trust
8923 and privilege exercised by the "western" intelligence gathering
8924 communities increased my eagerness to contribute to a point where I
8925 actually started working on the project a while back.</p>
8926
8927 <p>The <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/freedombox/">initial
8928 Debian initiative</a> based on the vision from Eben Moglen, is to
8929 create a simple and cheap Debian based appliance that anyone can hook
8930 up in their home and get access to secure and private services and
8931 communication.  The initial deployment platform have been the
8932 <a href="http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-dreamplugdetails.aspx">Dreamplug</a>,
8933 which is a piece of hardware I do not own.  So to be able to test what
8934 the current Freedombox setup look like, I had to come up with a way to install
8935 it on some hardware I do have access to.  I have rewritten the
8936 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedom-maker">freedom-maker</a>
8937 image build framework to use .deb packages instead of only copying
8938 setup into the boot images, and thanks to this rewrite I am able to
8939 set up any machine supported by Debian Wheezy as a Freedombox, using
8940 the previously mentioned deb (and a few support debs for packages
8941 missing in Debian).</p>
8942
8943 <p>The current Freedombox setup consist of a set of bootstrapping
8944 scripts
8945 (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>),
8946 and a administrative web interface
8947 (<a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/Plinth">plinth</a> + exmachina +
8948 withsqlite), as well as a privacy enhancing proxy based on
8949 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>
8950 (freedombox-privoxy).  There is also a web/javascript based XMPP
8951 client (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/jwchat">jwchat</a>)
8952 trying (unsuccessfully so far) to talk to the XMPP server
8953 (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/ejabberd">ejabberd</a>).  The
8954 web interface is pluggable, and the goal is to use it to enable OpenID
8955 services, mesh network connectivity, use of TOR, etc, etc.  Not much of
8956 this is really working yet, see
8957 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedombox-todos/blob/master/TODO">the
8958 project TODO</a> for links to GIT repositories.  Most of the code is
8959 on github at the moment.  The HTTP proxy is operational out of the
8960 box, and the admin web interface can be used to add/remove plinth
8961 users.  I've not been able to do anything else with it so far, but
8962 know there are several branches spread around github and other places
8963 with lots of half baked features.</p>
8964
8965 <p>Anyway, if you want to have a look at the current state, the
8966 following recipes should work to give you a test machine to poke
8967 at.</p>
8968
8969 <p><strong>Debian Wheezy amd64</strong></p>
8970
8971 <ol>
8972
8973 <li>Fetch normal Debian Wheezy installation ISO.</li>
8974 <li>Boot from it, either as CD or USB stick.</li>
8975 <li><p>Press [tab] on the boot prompt and add this as a boot argument
8976 to the Debian installer:<p>
8977 <pre>url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat</a></pre></li>
8978
8979 <li>Answer the few language/region/password questions and pick disk to
8980 install on.</li>
8981
8982 <li>When the installation is finished and the machine have rebooted a
8983 few times, your Freedombox is ready for testing.</li>
8984
8985 </ol>
8986
8987 <p><strong>Raspberry Pi Raspbian</strong></p>
8988
8989 <ol>
8990
8991 <li>Fetch a Raspbian SD card image, create SD card.</li>
8992 <li>Boot from SD card, extend file system to fill the card completely.</li>
8993 <li><p>Log in and add this to /etc/sources.list:</p>
8994 <pre>
8995 deb <a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox</a> wheezy main
8996 </pre></li>
8997 <li><p>Run this as root:</p>
8998 <pre>
8999 wget -O - http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/BE1A583D.asc | \
9000    apt-key add -
9001 apt-get update
9002 apt-get install freedombox-setup
9003 /usr/lib/freedombox/setup
9004 </pre></li>
9005 <li>Reboot into your freshly created Freedombox.</li>
9006
9007 </ol>
9008
9009 <p>You can test it on other architectures too, but because the
9010 freedombox-privoxy package is binary, it will only work as intended on
9011 the architectures where I have had time to build the binary and put it
9012 in my APT repository.  But do not let this stop you.  It is only a
9013 short "<tt>apt-get source -b freedombox-privoxy</tt>" away. :)</p>
9014
9015 <p>Note that by default Freedombox is a DHCP server on the
9016 192.168.1.0/24 subnet, so if this is your subnet be careful and turn
9017 off the DHCP server by running "<tt>update-rc.d isc-dhcp-server
9018 disable</tt>" as root.</p>
9019
9020 <p>Please let me know if this works for you, or if you have any
9021 problems.  We gather on the IRC channel
9022 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">#freedombox</a> on
9023 irc.debian.org and the
9024 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">project
9025 mailing list</a>.</p>
9026
9027 <p>Once you get your freedombox operational, you can visit
9028 <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/</tt> to see the state of the plint
9029 welcome screen (dead end - do not be surprised if you are unable to
9030 get past it), and next visit <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/help/</tt>
9031 to look at the rest of plinth.  The default user is 'admin' and the
9032 default password is 'secret'.</p>
9033
9034       </div>
9035       <div class="tags">
9036
9037
9038         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
9039
9040
9041       </div>
9042     </div>
9043     <div class="padding"></div>
9044
9045     <div class="entry">
9046       <div class="title">
9047         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_beta_release__beta_1__of_Debian_Edu_Skolelinux_based_on_Debian_Wheezy.html">Second beta release (beta 1) of Debian Edu/Skolelinux based on Debian Wheezy</a>
9048       </div>
9049       <div class="date">
9050         22nd August 2013
9051       </div>
9052       <div class="body">
9053         <p>The second wheezy based beta release of Debian Edu was wrapped up
9054 today, slightly delayed because of some bugs in the initial Windows
9055 integration fixes .  This is the release announcement:</p>
9056
9057 <p><strong>New features for Debian Edu 7.1+edu0~b1 released 2013-08-22</strong></p>
9058
9059 <p>These are the release notes for Debian Edu / Skolelinux
9060 7.1+edu0~b1, based on Debian with codename "Wheezy".</p>
9061
9062 <p><strong>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</strong></p>
9063
9064 <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu, also known as
9065 Skolelinux</a>, is a Linux distribution based on Debian providing an
9066 out-of-the box environment of a completely configured school
9067 network. Immediately after installation a school server running all
9068 services needed for a school network is set up just waiting for users
9069 and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable Web-UI. A netbooting
9070 environment is prepared using PXE, so after initial installation of
9071 the main server from CD or USB stick all other machines can be
9072 installed via the network. The provided school server provides LDAP
9073 database and Kerberos authentication service, centralized home
9074 directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other services. The
9075 desktop contains
9076 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">more
9077 than 60 educational software packages</a> and more are available from
9078 the Debian archive, and schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE
9079 and Xfce desktop environment.</p>
9080
9081 <p>This is the sixth test release based on Debian Wheezy. Basically this
9082 is an updated and slightly improved version compared to the Squeeze
9083 release.</p>
9084
9085 <p>ALERT: Alpha based installations should reinstall or downgrade the
9086 versions of gosa and libpam-mklocaluser to the ones used in this beta
9087 release. Both alpha and beta0 based installations should reinstall or
9088 deal with gosa.conf manually; there are two options: (1) Keep
9089 gosa.conf and edit this file as outlined
9090 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/08/msg00127.html">on
9091 the mailing list</a>. (2) Accept the new version of gosa.conf and
9092 replace both contained admin password placeholders with the password
9093 hashes found in the old one (backup copy!). In both cases every user
9094 need to change their their password to make sure a password is set for
9095 CIFS access to their home directory.</p>
9096
9097 <p><strong>Software updates</strong></p>
9098
9099 <ul>
9100
9101 <li>Added ssh askpass packages to default installation, to ensure ssh
9102     work also without a attached tty.</li>
9103 <li>Add the command-not-found package to the default installation to
9104     make it easier to figure out where to find missing command line
9105     tools. Please note, that the command 'update-command-not-found'
9106     has to be run as root to actually make it useful (internet access
9107     required).</li>
9108
9109 </ul>
9110
9111 <p><strong>Other changes</strong></p>
9112
9113 <ul>
9114
9115 <li>Adjusted the USB stick ISO image build to include every tool
9116 needed for desktop=xfce installations.</li>
9117 <li>Adjust thin-client-server task to work when installing from USB
9118 stick ISO image.</li>
9119 <li>Made new grub artwork (changed png from indexed to RGB format).</li>
9120 <li>Minor cleanup in the CUPS setup.</li>
9121 <li>Make sure that bootstrapping of the Samba domain really happens
9122     during installation of the main server and adjust SID handling to
9123     cope with this.</li>
9124 <li>Make Samba passwords changeable (again) via GOsa².</li>
9125 <li>Fix generation of LM and NT password hashes via GOsa² to avoid
9126     empty password hashes.</li>
9127 <li>Adapted Samba machine domain joining to latest change in the
9128     smbldap-tools Perl package, fixing bugs blocking Windows machines
9129     from joining the Samba domain.</li>
9130
9131 </ul>
9132
9133 <p><strong>Known issues</strong></p>
9134
9135 <ul>
9136
9137 <li>KDE fails to understand the wpad.dat file provided, causing it to
9138     not use the http proxy as it should.</li>
9139 <li>Chromium also fails to use the proxy when using the KDE desktop
9140     (using the KDE configuration).</li>
9141
9142 </ul>
9143
9144 <p><strong>Where to get it</strong></p>
9145
9146 <p>To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use</p>
9147
9148 <ul>
9149
9150 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-CD.iso</a></li>
9151
9152 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-CD.iso</a></li>
9153
9154 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-CD.iso .</li>
9155
9156 </ul>
9157
9158 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 1e357f80b55e703523f2254adde6d78b
9159 <br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 7157f9be5fd27c7694d713c6ecfed61c3edda3b2</p>
9160
9161 <p>To download the multiarch USB stick ISO release you can use</p>
9162
9163 <ul>
9164
9165 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-USB.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-USB.iso</a></li>
9166 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-USB.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-USB.iso</a></li>
9167 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b1-USB.iso .</li>
9168
9169 </ul>
9170
9171 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 7a8408ead59cf7e3cef25afb6e91590b
9172 <br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: f1817c031f02790d5edb3bfa0dcf8451088ad119</p>
9173
9174
9175 <p><strong>How to report bugs</strong></p>
9176
9177 <p><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a>
9178
9179       </div>
9180       <div class="tags">
9181
9182
9183         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9184
9185
9186       </div>
9187     </div>
9188     <div class="padding"></div>
9189
9190     <div class="entry">
9191       <div class="title">
9192         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Intel_180_SSD_disk_with_Lenovo_firmware_can_not_use_Intel_firmware.html">Intel 180 SSD disk with Lenovo firmware can not use Intel firmware</a>
9193       </div>
9194       <div class="date">
9195         18th August 2013
9196       </div>
9197       <div class="body">
9198         <p>Earlier, I reported about
9199 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">my
9200 problems using an Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB disk</a>.  Friday I was
9201 told by IBM that the original disk should be thrown away.  And as
9202 there no longer was a problem if I bricked the firmware, I decided
9203 today to try to install Intel firmware to replace the Lenovo firmware
9204 currently on the disk.</p>
9205
9206 <p>I searched the Intel site for firmware, and found
9207 <a href="https://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?agr=Y&ProdId=3472&DwnldID=18363&ProductFamily=Solid-State+Drives+and+Caching&ProductLine=Intel%c2%ae+High+Performance+Solid-State+Drive&ProductProduct=Intel%c2%ae+SSD+520+Series+(180GB%2c+2.5in+SATA+6Gb%2fs%2c+25nm%2c+MLC)&lang=eng">issdfut_2.0.4.iso</a>
9208 (aka Intel SATA Solid-State Drive Firmware Update Tool) which
9209 according to the site should contain the latest firmware for SSD
9210 disks.  I inserted the broken disk in one of my spare laptops and
9211 booted the ISO from a USB stick.  The disk was recognized, but the
9212 program claimed the newest firmware already were installed and refused
9213 to insert any Intel firmware.  So no change, and the disk is still
9214 unable to handle write load. :( I guess the only way to get them
9215 working would be if Lenovo releases new firmware.  No idea how likely
9216 that is.  Anyway, just blogging about this test for completeness.  I
9217 got a working Samsung disk, and see no point in spending more time on
9218 the broken disks.</p>
9219
9220       </div>
9221       <div class="tags">
9222
9223
9224         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9225
9226
9227       </div>
9228     </div>
9229     <div class="padding"></div>
9230
9231     <div class="entry">
9232       <div class="title">
9233         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/90_percent_done_with_the_Norwegian_draft_translation_of_Free_Culture.html">90 percent done with the Norwegian draft translation of Free Culture</a>
9234       </div>
9235       <div class="date">
9236          2nd August 2013
9237       </div>
9238       <div class="body">
9239         <p>It has been a while since my last update.  Since last summer, I
9240 have worked on a Norwegian
9241 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">docbook</a> version of the 2004 book
9242 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> by Lawrence Lessig,
9243 to get a Norwegian text explaining the problems with the copyright
9244 law.  Yesterday, I finally broken the 90% mark, when counting the
9245 number of strings to translate.  Due to real life constraints, I have
9246 not had time to work on it since March, but when the summer broke out,
9247 I found time to work on it again.  Still lots of work left, but the
9248 first draft is nearing completion.  I created a graph to show the
9249 progress of the translation:</p>
9250
9251 <p><img width="80%" align="center" src="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/progress.png"></p>
9252
9253 <p>When the first draft is done, the translated text need to be
9254 proof read, and the remaining formatting problems with images and SVG
9255 drawings need to be fixed.  There are probably also some index entries
9256 missing that need to be added.  This can be done by comparing the
9257 index entries listed in the SiSU version of the book, or comparing the
9258 English docbook version with the paper version.  Last, the colophon
9259 page with ISBN numbers etc need to be wrapped up before the release is
9260 done.  I should also figure out how to get correct Norwegian sorting
9261 of the index pages.  All docbook tools I have tried so far (xmlto,
9262 docbook-xsl, dblatex) get the order of symbols and the special
9263 Norwegian letters ÆØÅ wrong.</p>
9264
9265 <p>There is still need for translators and people with docbook
9266 knowledge, to be able to get a good looking book (I still struggle
9267 with dblatex, xmlto and docbook-xsl) as well as to do the draft
9268 translation and proof reading.  And I would like the figures to be
9269 redrawn as SVGs to make it easy to translate them.  Any SVG master
9270 around?  There are also some legal terms that are unfamiliar to me.
9271 If you want to help, please get in touch with me, and check out the
9272 project files currently available from
9273 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>.</p>
9274
9275 <p>If you are curious what the translated book currently look like,
9276 the updated
9277 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf?raw=true">PDF</a>
9278 and
9279 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub?raw=true">EPUB</a>
9280 are published on github.  The HTML version is published as well, but
9281 github hand it out with MIME type text/plain, confusing browsers, so I
9282 saw no point in linking to that version.</p>
9283
9284       </div>
9285       <div class="tags">
9286
9287
9288         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
9289
9290
9291       </div>
9292     </div>
9293     <div class="padding"></div>
9294
9295     <div class="entry">
9296       <div class="title">
9297         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_beta_release_of_Debian_Edu_Skolelinux_based_on_Debian_Wheezy.html">First beta release of Debian Edu/Skolelinux based on Debian Wheezy</a>
9298       </div>
9299       <div class="date">
9300         27th July 2013
9301       </div>
9302       <div class="body">
9303         <p>The first wheezy based beta release of Debian Edu was wrapped up
9304 today.  This is the release announcement:</p>
9305
9306 <p><strong>New features for Debian Edu 7.1+edu0~b0 released
9307 2013-07-27</strong></p>
9308
9309 <p>These are the release notes for for Debian Edu / Skolelinux
9310 7.1+edu0~b0, based on Debian with codename "Wheezy".</p>
9311
9312 <p><strong>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</strong></p>
9313
9314 <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu, also known as
9315 Skolelinux</a>, is a Linux distribution based on Debian providing an
9316 out-of-the box environment of a completely configured school
9317 network. Immediately after installation a school server running all
9318 services needed for a school network is set up just waiting for users
9319 and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable Web-UI. A netbooting
9320 environment is prepared using PXE, so after initial installation of
9321 the main server from CD, DVD or USB stick all other machines can be
9322 installed via the network. The provided school server provides LDAP
9323 database and Kerberos authentication service, centralized home
9324 directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other services. The
9325 desktop contains
9326 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">more
9327 than 60 educational software packages</a> and more are available from
9328 the Debian archive, and schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE
9329 and Xfce desktop environment.</p>
9330
9331 <p>This is the fifth test release based on Debian Wheezy. Basically
9332 this is an updated and slightly improved version compared to the
9333 Squeeze release.</p>
9334
9335 <p>ALERT: Alpha based installations should reinstall or downgrade the
9336 versions of gosa and libpam-mklocaluser to the ones used in this beta
9337 release.</p>
9338
9339 <p><strong>Software updates</strong></p>
9340
9341 <ul>
9342
9343 <li>Switched roaming workstation profiles from wicd to network-manager
9344    for network configuration, as wicd didn't work any more.</li>
9345 <li>Changed version numbers of patched gosa and libpam-mklocaluser
9346    packages to make sure our locally patched versions will be replaced
9347    by the official packages when they are released from Debian. Those
9348    installing alpha version need to reinstall or manually downgrade gosa
9349    and libpam-mklocaluser.</li>
9350 <li>Added bluetooth tools to the default desktop (bluedevil, blueman).</li>
9351 <li>Added tools for sharing the desktop on KDE (krdc, krfb).</li>
9352 <li>Added valgrind to the default installation for easier debugging of
9353    crash bugs.</li>
9354
9355 </ul>
9356
9357 <p><strong>Other changes</strong></p>
9358
9359 <ul>
9360
9361 <li>Fixed artwork package to work with gnome, no longer break
9362    desktop=gnome installations.</li>
9363 <li>Adjusted installer to now work when forced to use a proxy with the
9364    netinst CD.</li>
9365 <li>Fixed code detecting and setting/loading hardware specific
9366    setup/firmware to work more robust out of the box.</li>
9367 <li>Adjusted Kerberos setup to detect realm and server settings at
9368    install time instead of dynamically at run time. This avoid a crash
9369    with krb5-auth-dialog on diskless workstations without a DNS name.</li>
9370 <li>Worked around misfeature in network-manager not calling the dhclient
9371    exit hooks, causing automatic proxy configuration and automatic host
9372    name setting at run time to work again.</li>
9373 <li>Fixed feature setting the default Iceweasel start page from URL
9374    fetched from LDAP, to allow schools to set the global default by
9375    updating the dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no LDAP object.</li>
9376 <li>Changed default host name on all networked machines to be unique
9377    (generated from MAC or reverse DNS) after boot.</li>
9378 <li>Adjusted partition sizes to make sure they are big enough.</li>
9379
9380 </ul>
9381
9382 <p><strong>Known issues</strong></p>
9383
9384 <ul>
9385
9386 <li>Grub is missing the new artwork.</li>
9387 <li>KDE fail to understand the wpad.dat file provided, causing it to
9388     not use the http proxy as it should.</li>
9389 <li>Chromium also fail to use the proxy.</li>
9390
9391 </ul>
9392
9393 <p><strong>Where to get it</strong></p>
9394
9395 <p>To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use</p>
9396
9397 <ul>
9398
9399 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-CD.iso</a></li>
9400
9401 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-CD.iso</a></li>
9402
9403 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-CD.iso .</li>
9404
9405 </ul>
9406
9407 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 55d5de9765b6dccd5d9ec33cf1a07109
9408 <br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 996a1d9517740e4d627d100de2d12b23dd545a3f</p>
9409
9410 <p>To download the multiarch USB stick ISO release you can use</p>
9411
9412 <ul>
9413
9414 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-USB.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-USB.iso</a></li>
9415 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-USB.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-USB.iso</a></li>
9416 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~b0-USB.iso .</li>
9417
9418 </ul>
9419
9420 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: d8f0818c51a78d357de794066f289f69
9421 <br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 49185ca354e8d0543240423746924f76a6cee733</p>
9422
9423
9424 <p><strong>How to report bugs</strong></p>
9425
9426 <p><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a>
9427
9428       </div>
9429       <div class="tags">
9430
9431
9432         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9433
9434
9435       </div>
9436     </div>
9437     <div class="padding"></div>
9438
9439     <div class="entry">
9440       <div class="title">
9441         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">How to fix a Thinkpad X230 with a broken 180 GB SSD disk</a>
9442       </div>
9443       <div class="date">
9444         17th July 2013
9445       </div>
9446       <div class="body">
9447         <p>Today I switched to
9448 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
9449 new laptop</a>.  I've previously written about the problems I had with
9450 my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
9451 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Intel_SSD_520_Series_180_GB_with_Lenovo_firmware_still_lock_up_from_sustained_writes.html">180
9452 GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
9453 sustained writes.  My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
9454 trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
9455 identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
9456 disk instead to fix it once and for all.  The Samsung disk survived
9457 the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
9458 random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
9459 decided to trust it with my data.  I have installed it as a Debian Edu
9460 Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
9461 server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
9462 station from now on.</p>
9463
9464 <p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
9465 Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
9466 performance and increase life time of the disk.  The Linux kernel and
9467 user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
9468 environment.  To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
9469 package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning.  The
9470 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
9471 for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
9472 is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
9473 package.  If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
9474 will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
9475 file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
9476
9477 <p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
9478 set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD.  It is adjusted to my use case,
9479 where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
9480 addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
9481 top of this again.  See the README file in the package source for the
9482 references I used to pick the settings.  At the moment these
9483 parameters are tuned:</p>
9484
9485 <ul>
9486
9487 <li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
9488     (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
9489
9490 <li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
9491     this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
9492     0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
9493
9494 <li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
9495     systems.</li>
9496
9497 <li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
9498     /etc/fstab.</li>
9499
9500 <li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
9501
9502 <li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
9503     cron.daily).</li>
9504
9505 <li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
9506     to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
9507
9508 </ul>
9509
9510 <p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
9511 the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
9512 little gain.  My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
9513 those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
9514 computer.  I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
9515 from getting the data on the disk (see
9516 <a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
9517 Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
9518 right thing to do.</p>
9519
9520 <p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
9521 it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
9522 indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
9523
9524 <p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
9525 and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
9526 file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
9527 instead of during my work.</p>
9528
9529 <p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
9530 this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
9531
9532 <p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning.  I expect
9533 iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
9534 have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
9535
9536 <p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
9537 there.</p>
9538
9539 <p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
9540 as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
9541 disk.  It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
9542 the Lenovo firmware.  But I have not tried and did not want to do so
9543 without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
9544 disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
9545 back.</p>
9546
9547       </div>
9548       <div class="tags">
9549
9550
9551         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9552
9553
9554       </div>
9555     </div>
9556     <div class="padding"></div>
9557
9558     <div class="entry">
9559       <div class="title">
9560         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Intel_SSD_520_Series_180_GB_with_Lenovo_firmware_still_lock_up_from_sustained_writes.html">Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB with Lenovo firmware still lock up from sustained writes</a>
9561       </div>
9562       <div class="date">
9563         10th July 2013
9564       </div>
9565       <div class="body">
9566         <p>A few days ago, I wrote about
9567 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
9568 problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
9569 was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
9570 sustained write.  My supplier is in contact with
9571 <a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
9572 replacement disk to try to fix the problem.  They decided to send an
9573 identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
9574
9575 <p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
9576 Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it.  The new disk have the
9577 same firmware version as the original.  This time my hope raised
9578 slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
9579 die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
9580 going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%.  But around 60%, the disk
9581 died again and I was back on square one.  I still do not have a new
9582 laptop with a disk I can trust.  I can not live with a disk that might
9583 lock up when I download a new
9584 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
9585 other large files.  I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
9586 the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
9587
9588 <p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
9589 11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
9590 LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
9591 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
9592 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
9593 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
9594
9595 <p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
9596 11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
9597 LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
9598 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
9599 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
9600 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
9601
9602 <p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
9603 SA, date and WNPP values.  Mentioning all the details here in case
9604 someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
9605 failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
9606 exist).</p>
9607
9608       </div>
9609       <div class="tags">
9610
9611
9612         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9613
9614
9615       </div>
9616     </div>
9617     <div class="padding"></div>
9618
9619     <div class="entry">
9620       <div class="title">
9621         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/July_13th__Debian_Ubuntu_BSP_and_Skolelinux_Debian_Edu_developer_gathering_in_Oslo.html">July 13th: Debian/Ubuntu BSP and Skolelinux/Debian Edu developer gathering in Oslo</a>
9622       </div>
9623       <div class="date">
9624          9th July 2013
9625       </div>
9626       <div class="body">
9627         <p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
9628 Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
9629 party in Oslo.  It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
9630 member assosiation NUUG</a> and
9631 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
9632 project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
9633 Bitraf</a>.</p>
9634
9635 <p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening.  Everyone is
9636 welcome, and there is no fee to participate.  There is on the other
9637 hand limited space, and only room for 30 people.  Please put your name
9638 on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
9639 wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
9640
9641       </div>
9642       <div class="tags">
9643
9644
9645         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
9646
9647
9648       </div>
9649     </div>
9650     <div class="padding"></div>
9651
9652     <div class="entry">
9653       <div class="title">
9654         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">The Thinkpad is dead, long live the Thinkpad X230?</a>
9655       </div>
9656       <div class="date">
9657          5th July 2013
9658       </div>
9659       <div class="body">
9660         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
9661 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
9662 for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>.  Unfortunately I did not have much
9663 time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
9664 will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived.  I
9665 ended up picking a
9666 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
9667 with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
9668 a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly.  But my
9669 second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful.  More
9670 on that below.</p>
9671
9672 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
9673 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
9674 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
9675 feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
9676 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
9677 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
9678 to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
9679 disks from my search parameters.  I also asked around among friends to
9680 get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
9681
9682 <p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
9683 X41.  I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
9684 significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
9685 hand a lot more to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly
9686 good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
9687 I will get used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
9688 needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
9689
9690 <p>Turning off the touch pad was simple.  All it took was a quick
9691 visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
9692
9693 <p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop.  The 180 GB SSD disk
9694 lock up during load.  And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
9695 with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
9696 I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
9697 reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
9698 default in Ubuntu).  And the bug with is already known.  It was
9699 reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
9700 report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
9701 Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD).  It is also reported to the Linux
9702 kernel developers as
9703 <a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
9704 report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
9705 (SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
9706 Lenovo forums, both for
9707 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
9708 2012-11-10</a> and for
9709 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/X-Series-ThinkPad-Laptops/x230-SATA-errors-with-180GB-Intel-520-SSD-under-heavy-write-load/m-p/1068147">X230
9710 03-20-2013</a>.  The problem do not only affect installation.  The
9711 reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
9712 on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
9713 problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
9714 There is even a
9715 <a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
9716 available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
9717 minutes by writing to a file.</p>
9718
9719 <p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
9720 contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
9721 requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
9722 firmware.  Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
9723 Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i).  I
9724 hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
9725 fixed. :)</p>
9726
9727       </div>
9728       <div class="tags">
9729
9730
9731         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9732
9733
9734       </div>
9735     </div>
9736     <div class="padding"></div>
9737
9738     <div class="entry">
9739       <div class="title">
9740         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230.html">The Thinkpad is dead, long live the Thinkpad X230</a>
9741       </div>
9742       <div class="date">
9743          4th July 2013
9744       </div>
9745       <div class="body">
9746         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
9747 trusty old Thinkpad X41.  Unfortunately I did not have much time to
9748 spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived.  I ended up
9749 picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
9750 X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu
9751 Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly.  As I write
9752 this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
9753 with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
9754 with an expencive door stop.</p>
9755
9756 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
9757 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
9758 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
9759 feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
9760 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
9761 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
9762 to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
9763
9764 <p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
9765 wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
9766 to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly good and the
9767 individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
9768 used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
9769 new laptop now. :)</p>
9770
9771 <p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
9772
9773       </div>
9774       <div class="tags">
9775
9776
9777         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9778
9779
9780       </div>
9781     </div>
9782     <div class="padding"></div>
9783
9784     <div class="entry">
9785       <div class="title">
9786         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fourth_alpha_release_of_Debian_Edu_Skolelinux_based_on_Debian_Wheezy.html">Fourth alpha release of Debian Edu/Skolelinux based on Debian Wheezy</a>
9787       </div>
9788       <div class="date">
9789          3rd July 2013
9790       </div>
9791       <div class="body">
9792         <p>The fourth wheezy based alpha release of Debian Edu was wrapped up
9793 today.  This is the release announcement:</p>
9794
9795 <p><strong>New features for Debian Edu 7.1+edu0~alpha3 released
9796 2013-07-03</strong></p>
9797
9798 <p>These are the release notes for for Debian Edu / Skolelinux
9799 7.1+edu0~alpha3, based on Debian with codename "Wheezy".</p>
9800
9801 <p><strong>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</strong></p>
9802
9803 <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu, also known as
9804 Skolelinux</a>, is a Linux distribution based on Debian providing an
9805 out-of-the box environment of a completely configured school
9806 network. Immediately after installation a school server running all
9807 services needed for a school network is set up just waiting for users
9808 and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable Web-UI. A netbooting
9809 environment is prepared using PXE, so after initial installation of
9810 the main server from CD, DVD or USB stick all other machines can be
9811 installed via the network. The provided school server provides LDAP
9812 database and Kerberos authentication service, centralized home
9813 directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other services. The
9814 desktop contains
9815 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">more
9816 than 60 educational software packages</a> and more are available from
9817 the Debian archive, and schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE
9818 and Xfce desktop environment.</p>
9819
9820 <p>This is the fourth test release based on Debian Wheezy. Basically
9821 this is an updated and slightly improved version compared to the
9822 Squeeze release.</p>
9823
9824 <p><strong>Software updates</strong></p>
9825 <ul>
9826   <li>Dropped ispell dictionaries from our default installation.</li>
9827   <li>Dropped menu-xdg from the KDE desktop option, to drop the Debian
9828     submenu.  It was not included with Gnome, LXDE or Xfce, so this
9829     brings KDE in line with the others.</li>
9830   <li>Dropped xdrawchem, xjig and xsok from our default installation as
9831     they don't have a desktop menu entry and thus won't show up in the
9832     menu now that menu-xdg was removed.</li>
9833   <li>Removed the killer system to kill left behind processes on
9834     multi-user machines, as it was no longer able to understand when a
9835     X display was in use and killed the processes of the active users
9836     too.</li>
9837   <li>Dropped the golearn (from goplay) package as the debtags in wheezy
9838     are too few to make the package useful.</li>
9839 </ul>
9840 <p><strong>Other changes</strong></p>
9841 <ul>
9842   <li>Updated artwork matching http://wiki.debian.org/DebianArt/Themes/Joy
9843   <li>Multi-arch i386/amd64 USB stick ISO available.</li>
9844   <li>Got rid of ispell/wordlist related debconf questions that showed
9845     up for some language options.</li>
9846   <li>Switched to using http.debian.net as APT source by default.</li>
9847   <li>Fixed proxy configuration on Main Server installations.</li>
9848   <li>Changed LTSP setup to ask dpkg to use force-unsafe-io the same way
9849     d-i is doing it.</li>
9850   <li>Made sure root and user passwords were not left behind in the
9851     debconf database after installation on Main Server installations.</li>
9852   <li>Made Roaming Workstation dynamic setup more robust and added draft
9853     script setup-ad-client to hook a Roaming Workstation up to a
9854     Active Directory server instead of a Debian Edu Main Server.</li>
9855   <li>Update system to install needed firmware packages during
9856     installation, to work properly in Wheezy.</li>
9857   <li>Update system to handle hardware quirks (debian-edu-hwsetup).</li>
9858   <li>Corrected PXE installation setup to properly pass selected desktop
9859     and keymap settings to PXE installation clients.</li>
9860   <li>LTSP diskless workstations use sshfs by default, allowing them to
9861     work without adding them to DNS and NIS netgroups for NFS access.</li>
9862 </ul>
9863 <p><strong>Known issues</strong></p>
9864 <ul>
9865   <li>No mass import of user account data in GOsa (ldif or csv)
9866     available yet (698840).</li>
9867   <li>Artwork not enabled for all desktops.</li>
9868 </ul>
9869 <p><strong>Where to get it</strong></p>
9870
9871 <p>To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use</p>
9872 <ul>
9873   <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso</a></li>
9874   <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso</a></li>
9875   <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso .</li>
9876 </ul>
9877
9878 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 2b161a99d2a848c376d8d04e3854e30c
9879 <br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 498922e9c508c0a7ee9dbe1dfe5bf830d779c3c8</p>
9880
9881 <p>To download the multiarch USB stick ISO release you can use</p>
9882 <ul>
9883   <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso</a></li>
9884   <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso</a></li>
9885   <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso .</li>
9886 </ul>
9887
9888 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 25e808e403a4c15dbef1d13c37d572ac
9889 <br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 15ecfc93eb6b4f453b7eb0bc04b6a279262d9721</p>
9890
9891 <p><strong>How to report bugs</strong></p>
9892
9893 <p><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a></p>
9894
9895       </div>
9896       <div class="tags">
9897
9898
9899         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
9900
9901
9902       </div>
9903     </div>
9904     <div class="padding"></div>
9905
9906     <div class="entry">
9907       <div class="title">
9908         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_locate_and_install_required_firmware_packages_on_Debian__Isenkram_0_4_.html">Automatically locate and install required firmware packages on Debian (Isenkram 0.4)</a>
9909       </div>
9910       <div class="date">
9911         25th June 2013
9912       </div>
9913       <div class="body">
9914         <p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
9915 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
9916 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
9917 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
9918 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
9919 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
9920 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
9921 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
9922 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
9923 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
9924 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
9925
9926 <p><pre>
9927 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
9928 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
9929 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
9930 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
9931 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
9932 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
9933 firmware-ipw2x00
9934 firmware-ipw2x00
9935 Preconfiguring packages ...
9936 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
9937 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
9938 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
9939 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
9940 #
9941 </pre></p>
9942
9943 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
9944 printed instead:</p>
9945
9946 <p><pre>
9947 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
9948 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
9949 #
9950 </pre></p>
9951
9952 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
9953 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
9954
9955 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
9956 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
9957 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
9958 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
9959 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
9960 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
9961 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
9962 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
9963 machine.</p>
9964
9965 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
9966 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
9967 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
9968 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
9969 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
9970 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
9971
9972       </div>
9973       <div class="tags">
9974
9975
9976         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
9977
9978
9979       </div>
9980     </div>
9981     <div class="padding"></div>
9982
9983     <div class="entry">
9984       <div class="title">
9985         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_value_of_a_good_distro_wide_test_suite___.html">The value of a good distro wide test suite...</a>
9986       </div>
9987       <div class="date">
9988         22nd June 2013
9989       </div>
9990       <div class="body">
9991         <p>In the <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
9992 Skolelinux</a> project, we include a post-installation test suite,
9993 which check that services are running, working, and return the
9994 expected results.  It runs automatically just after the first boot on
9995 test installations (using test ISOs), but not on production
9996 installations (using non-test ISOs).  It test that the LDAP service is
9997 operating, Kerberos is responding, DNS is replying, file systems are
9998 online resizable, etc, etc.  And it check that the PXE service is
9999 configured, which is the topic of this post.</p>
10000
10001 <p>The last week I've fixed the DVD and USB stick ISOs for our Debian
10002 Edu Wheezy release.  These ISOs are supposed to be able to install a
10003 complete system without any Internet connection, but for that to
10004 happen all the needed packages need to be on them.  Thanks to our test
10005 suite, I discovered that we had forgotten to adjust our PXE setup to
10006 cope with the new names and paths used by the netboot d-i packages.
10007 When Internet connectivity was available, the installer fall back to
10008 using wget to fetch d-i boot images, but when offline it require
10009 working packages to get it working.  And the packages changed name
10010 from debian-installer-6.0-netboot-$arch to
10011 debian-installer-7.0-netboot-$arch, we no longer pulled in the
10012 packages during installation.  Without our test suite, I suspect we
10013 would never have discovered this before release.  Now it is fixed
10014 right after we got the ISOs operational.</p>
10015
10016 <p>Another by-product of the test suite is that we can ask system
10017 administrators with problems getting Debian Edu to work, to run the
10018 test suite using <tt>/usr/sbin/debian-edu-test-install</tt> and see if
10019 any errors are detected.  This usually pinpoint the subsystem causing
10020 the problem.</p>
10021
10022 <p>If you want to help us help kids learn how to share and create,
10023 please join us on
10024 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">#debian-edu on
10025 irc.debian.org</a> and the
10026 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/">debian-edu@</a> mailing
10027 list.</p>
10028
10029       </div>
10030       <div class="tags">
10031
10032
10033         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10034
10035
10036       </div>
10037     </div>
10038     <div class="padding"></div>
10039
10040     <div class="entry">
10041       <div class="title">
10042         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Victor_Ni_u.html">Debian Edu interview: Victor Nițu</a>
10043       </div>
10044       <div class="date">
10045         17th June 2013
10046       </div>
10047       <div class="body">
10048         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and
10049 Skolelinux</a> distribution have users and contributors all around the
10050 globe.  And a while back, an enterprising young man showed up on
10051 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">our IRC channel
10052 #debian-edu</a> and started asking questions about how Debian Edu
10053 worked.  We answered as good as we could, and even convinced him to
10054 help us with translations.  And today I managed to get an interview
10055 with him, to learn more about him.</p>
10056
10057 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
10058
10059 <p>I'm a 25 year old free software enthusiast, living in Romania,
10060 which is also my country of origin. Back in 2009, at a New Year's Eve
10061 party, I had a very nice <strike>beer</strike> discussion with a
10062 friend, when we realized we have no organised Debian community in our
10063 country. A few days later, we put together the infrastructure for such
10064 community and even gathered a nice Debian-ish crowd. Since then, I
10065 began my quest as a free software hacker and activist and I am
10066 constantly trying to cover as much ground as possible on that
10067 field.</p>
10068
10069 <p>A few years ago I founded a small web development company, which
10070 provided me the flexible schedule I needed so much for my
10071 activities. For the last 13 months, I have been the Technical Director
10072 of <a href="http://ceata.org/">Fundația Ceata</a>, which is a free
10073 software activist organisation endorsed by the FSF and the FSFE, and
10074 the only one we have in our country.</p>
10075
10076 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
10077 project?</strong></p>
10078
10079 <p>The idea of participating in the Debian Edu project was a surprise
10080 even to me, since I never used it before I began getting involved in
10081 it. This year I had a great opportunity to deliver a talk on
10082 educational software, and I knew immediately where to look. It was a
10083 love at first sight, since I was previously involved with some of the
10084 technologies the project incorporates, and I rapidly found a lot of
10085 ways to contribute.</p>
10086
10087 <p>My first contributions consisted in translating the installer and
10088 configuration dialogs, then I found some bugs to squash (I still
10089 haven't fixed them yet though), and I even got my eyes on some other
10090 areas where I can prove myself helpful. Since the appetite for free
10091 software in my country is pretty low, I'll be happy to be the first
10092 one around here advocating for the project's adoption in educational
10093 environments, and maybe even get my hands dirty in creating a flavour
10094 for our own needs. I am not used to make very advanced plannings, so
10095 from now on, time will tell what I'll be doing next, but I think I
10096 have a pretty consistent starting point.</p>
10097
10098 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
10099 Edu?</strong></p>
10100
10101 <p>Not a long time ago, I was in the position of configuring and
10102 maintaining a LDAP server on some Debian derivative, and I must say it
10103 took me a while. A long time ago, I was maintaining a bigger
10104 Samba-powered infrastructure, and I must say I spent quite a lot of
10105 time on it. I have similar stories about many of the services included
10106 with Skolelinux, and the main advantage I see about it is the
10107 out-of-the box availability of them, making it quite competitive when
10108 it comes to managing a school's network, for example.</p>
10109
10110 <p>Of course, there is more to say about Skolelinux than the
10111 availability of the software included, its flexibility in various
10112 scenarios is something I can't wait to experiment "into the wild" (I
10113 only played with virtual machines so far). And I am sure there is a
10114 lot more I haven't discovered yet about it, being so new within the
10115 project.</p>
10116
10117 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
10118 Edu?</strong></p>
10119
10120 <p>As usual, when it comes to Debian Blends, I see as the biggest
10121 disadvantage the lack of a numerous team dedicated to the
10122 project. Every day I see the same names in the changelogs, and I have
10123 a constantly fear of the bus factor in this story.  I'd like to see
10124 Debian Edu advertised more as an entry point into the Debian
10125 ecosystem, especially amongst newcomers and students. IMHO there are a
10126 lot low-hanging fruits in terms of bug squashing, and enough
10127 opportunities to get the feeling of the Debian Project's dynamics. Not
10128 to mention it's a very fun blend to work on!</p>
10129
10130 <p>Derived from the previous statement, is the delay in catching up
10131 with the main Debian release and documentation. This is common though
10132 to all blends and derivatives, but it's an issue we can all work
10133 on.</p>
10134
10135 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
10136
10137 <p>I can hardly imagine myself spending a day without Vim, since my
10138 daily routine covers writing code and hacking configuration files. I
10139 am a fan of the Awesome window manager (but I also like the
10140 Enlightenment project a lot!),
10141 <a href="http://www.claws-mail.org/‎">Claws Mail</a> due to its ease of
10142 use and very configurable behaviour. Recently I fell in love with
10143 <a href="https://launchpad.net/redshift">Redshift</a>, which helps me
10144 get through the night without headaches. Of course, there is much more
10145 stuff in this bag, but I'll need a blog on my own for doing this!</p>
10146
10147 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
10148 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
10149
10150 <p>Well, on this field, I cannot do much more than experiment right
10151 now. So, being far from having a recipe for success, I can only assume
10152 that:</p>
10153
10154 <ul>
10155
10156 <li>schools would like to get rid of proprietary software</li>
10157
10158 <li>students will love the openness of the system, and will want to
10159     experiment with it - maybe we need to harvest the native curiosity
10160     of teenagers more?</li>
10161
10162 <li>there is no "right one" when it comes to strategies, but it would
10163     be useful to have some success stories published somewhere, so
10164     other can get some inspiration from them (I know I'd promote
10165     them!)</li>
10166
10167 <li>more active promotion - talks, conferences, even small school
10168     lectures can do magical things if they encounter at least one
10169     person interested. Who knows who that person might be? ;-)</li>
10170
10171 </ul>
10172
10173 <p>I also see some problems in getting Skolelinux into schools; for
10174 example, in our country we have a great deal of corruption issues, so
10175 it might be hard(er) to fight against proprietary solutions. Also,
10176 people who relied on commercial software for all their lives, would be
10177 very hard to convert against their will.</p>
10178
10179       </div>
10180       <div class="tags">
10181
10182
10183         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
10184
10185
10186       </div>
10187     </div>
10188     <div class="padding"></div>
10189
10190     <div class="entry">
10191       <div class="title">
10192         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Jonathan_Carter.html">Debian Edu interview: Jonathan Carter</a>
10193       </div>
10194       <div class="date">
10195         12th June 2013
10196       </div>
10197       <div class="body">
10198         <p>There is a certain cross-over between the
10199 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
10200 project</a> and <a href="http://www.edubuntu.org/">the Edubuntu
10201 project</a>, and for example the LTSP packages in Debian are a joint
10202 effort between the projects.  One person with a foot in both camps is
10203 Jonathan Carter, which I am now happy to present to you.</p>
10204
10205 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
10206
10207 <p>I'm a South-African free software geek who lives in Cape Town. My
10208 days vary quite a bit since I'm involved in too many things. As I'm
10209 getting older I'm learning how to focus a bit more :)</p>
10210
10211 <p>I'm also an Edubuntu contributor and I love when there are
10212 opportunities for the Edubuntu and Debian Edu projects to benefit from
10213 each other.</p>
10214
10215 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
10216 project?</strong></p>
10217
10218 <p>I've been somewhat familiar with the project before, but I think my
10219 first direct exposure to the project was when I met Petter
10220 [Reinholdtsen] and Knut [Yrvin] at the Edubuntu summit in 2005 in
10221 London. They provided great feedback that helped the bootstrapping of
10222 Edubuntu. Back then Edubuntu (and even Ubuntu) was still very new and
10223 it was great getting input from people who have been around longer. I
10224 was also still very excitable and said yes to everything and to this
10225 day I have a big todo list backlog that I'm catching up with. I think
10226 over the years the relationship between Edubuntu and Debian-Edu has
10227 been gradually improving, although I think there's a lot that we could
10228 still improve on in terms of working together on packages. I'm sure
10229 we'll get there one day.</p>
10230
10231 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
10232 Edu?</strong></p>
10233
10234 <p>Debian itself already has so many advantages. I could go on about
10235 it for pages, but in essence I love that it's a very honest project
10236 that puts its users first with no hidden agendas and also produces
10237 very high quality work.</p>
10238
10239 <p>I think the advantage of Debian Edu is that it makes many common
10240 set-up tasks simpler so that administrators can get up and running
10241 with a lot less effort and frustration. At the same time I think it
10242 helps to standardise installations in schools so that it's easier for
10243 community members and commercial suppliers to support.</p>
10244
10245 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
10246 Edu?</strong></p>
10247
10248 <p>I had to re-type this one a few times because I'm trying to
10249 separate "disadvantages" from "areas that need improvement" (which is
10250 what I originally rambled on about)</p>
10251
10252 <p>The biggest disadvantage I can think of is lack of manpower. The
10253 project could do so much more if there were more good contributors. I
10254 think some of the problems are external too. Free software and free
10255 content in education is a no-brainer but it takes some time to catch
10256 on. When you've been working with the same proprietary eco-system for
10257 years and have gotten used to it, it can be hard to adjust to some
10258 concepts in the free software world. It would be nice if there were
10259 more Debian Edu consultants across the world. I'd love to be one
10260 myself but I'm already so over-committed that it's just not possible
10261 currently.</p>
10262
10263 <p>I think the best short-term solution to that large-scale problem is
10264 for schools to be pro-active and share their experiences and grow
10265 their skills in-house. I'm often saddened to see how much money
10266 educational institutions spend on 3rd party solutions that they don't
10267 have access to after the service has ended and they could've gotten so
10268 much more value otherwise by being more self-sustainable and
10269 autonomous.</p>
10270
10271 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
10272
10273 <p>My main laptop dual-boots between Debian and Windows 7. I was
10274 Windows free for years but started dual-booting again last year for
10275 some games which help me focus and relax (Starcraft II in
10276 particular). Gaming support on Linux is improving in leaps and bounds
10277 so I suppose I'll soon be able to regain that disk space :)</p>
10278
10279 <p>Besides that I rely on Icedove, Chromium, Terminator, Byobu, irssi,
10280 git, Tomboy, KVM, VLC and LibreOffice. Recently I've been torn on
10281 which desktop environment I like and I'm taking some refuge in Xfce
10282 while I figure that out. I like tools that keep things simple. I enjoy
10283 Python and shell scripting. I went to an Arduino workshop recently and
10284 it was awesome seeing how easy and simple the IDE software was to get
10285 up and running in Debian compared to the users running Windows and OS
10286 X.</p>
10287
10288 <p>I also use mc which some people frown upon slightly. I got used to
10289 using Norton Commander in the early 90's and it stuck (I think the
10290 people who sneer at it is just jealous that they don't know how to use
10291 it :p)
10292
10293 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
10294 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
10295
10296 <p>I think trying to force it is unproductive. I also think that in
10297 many cases it's appropriate for schools to use non-free systems and I
10298 don't think that there's any particular moral or ethical problem with
10299 that.</p>
10300
10301 <p>I do think though that free software can already solve so so many
10302 problems in educational institutions and it's just a shame not taking
10303 advantage of that.</p>
10304
10305 <p>I also think that some curricula need serious review. For example,
10306 some areas of the world rely heavily on very specific versions of MS
10307 Office, teaching students to parrot menu items instead of learning the
10308 general concepts. I think that's very unproductive because firstly, MS
10309 Office's interface changes drastically every few years and on top of
10310 that it also locks in a generation to a product that might not be the
10311 best solution for them.</p>
10312
10313 <p>To answer your question, I believe that the right strategy is to
10314 educate and inform, giving someone the information they require to
10315 make a decision that would work for them.</p>
10316
10317       </div>
10318       <div class="tags">
10319
10320
10321         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
10322
10323
10324       </div>
10325     </div>
10326     <div class="padding"></div>
10327
10328     <div class="entry">
10329       <div class="title">
10330         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fixing_the_Linux_black_screen_of_death_on_machines_with_Intel_HD_video.html">Fixing the Linux black screen of death on machines with Intel HD video</a>
10331       </div>
10332       <div class="date">
10333         11th June 2013
10334       </div>
10335       <div class="body">
10336         <p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
10337 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
10338 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
10339 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
10340 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
10341 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
10342 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
10343 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
10344 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
10345 i915 driver used by the
10346 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
10347 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
10348
10349 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
10350 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
10351 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
10352 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
10353 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
10354
10355 <pre>
10356 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
10357 update-initramfs -u -k all
10358 </pre>
10359
10360 <p>Since March 2012 there is
10361 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
10362 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
10363 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
10364 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
10365 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
10366 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
10367 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
10368 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
10369 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
10370 number.</p>
10371
10372 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
10373 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
10374
10375 <p><pre>
10376 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
10377     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
10378     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
10379  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
10380  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
10381     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
10382  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
10383     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
10384  Latency: 0
10385  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
10386  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
10387  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
10388  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
10389  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
10390  Capabilities: <access denied>
10391  Kernel driver in use: i915
10392 </pre></p>
10393
10394 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
10395
10396 <p><pre>
10397 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
10398        ...
10399         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
10400         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
10401        ...
10402 }
10403 </pre></p>
10404
10405 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
10406 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
10407 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
10408 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
10409 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
10410 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
10411 yet shown up in
10412 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
10413 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
10414 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
10415 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
10416 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
10417 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
10418
10419 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
10420 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
10421 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
10422 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
10423 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
10424 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
10425 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
10426 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
10427 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
10428 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
10429 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
10430 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
10431
10432 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
10433 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
10434 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
10435 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
10436 backlight.</p>
10437
10438       </div>
10439       <div class="tags">
10440
10441
10442         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10443
10444
10445       </div>
10446     </div>
10447     <div class="padding"></div>
10448
10449     <div class="entry">
10450       <div class="title">
10451         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_alpha_release_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Debian_Wheezy.html">Third alpha release of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Debian Wheezy</a>
10452       </div>
10453       <div class="date">
10454         10th June 2013
10455       </div>
10456       <div class="body">
10457         <p>The third wheezy based alpha release of Debian Edu was wrapped up
10458 today.  This is the release announcement:</p>
10459
10460 <p><strong>New features for Debian Edu 7.0.0 alpha2 released
10461 2013-06-10</strong></p>
10462
10463 <p>This is the release notes for for Debian Edu / Skolelinux 7.0.0 edu
10464 alpha2, based on Debian with codename "Wheezy".</p>
10465
10466 <p><strong>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</strong></p>
10467
10468 <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu, also known as
10469 Skolelinux</a>, is a Linux distribution based on Debian providing an
10470 out-of-the box environment of a completely configured school
10471 network. Immediately after installation a school server running all
10472 services needed for a school network is set up just waiting for users
10473 and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable Web-UI. A netbooting
10474 environment is prepared using PXE, so after initial installation of
10475 the main server from CD, DVD or USB stick all other machines can be
10476 installed via the network. The provided school server provides LDAP
10477 database and Kerberos authentication service, centralized home
10478 directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other services. The
10479 desktop contains
10480 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">more
10481 than 60 educational software packages</a> and more are available from
10482 the Debian archive, and schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE
10483 and Xfce desktop environment.</p>
10484
10485 <p>This is the third test release based on Debian Wheezy. Basically
10486 this is an updated and slightly improved version compared to the
10487 Squeeze release.</p>
10488
10489 <p><strong>Software updates</strong></p>
10490
10491 <ul>
10492
10493 <li>Iceweasel was updated from 10 to 17. (DSA 2699-1)
10494 <li>Updated libxv (DSA-2674), libxvmc (DSA-2675), libxfixes (DSA-2676), libxrender (DSA-2677), mesa (DSA-2678), xserver-xorg-video-openchrome (DSA-2679), libxt (DSA-2680), libxcursor (DSA-2681), libxext (DSA-2682), libxi (DSA-2683), libxrandr (DSA-2684), libxp (DSA-2685), libxcb (DSA-2686), libfs (DSA-2687), libxres (DSA-2688), libxtst (DSA-2689), libxxf86dga (DSA-2690), libxinerama (DSA-2691), libxxf86vm (DSA-2692), libx11 (DSA-2693), chromium-browser (DSA-2695), gnutls26 (DSA-2697), wireshark (DSA-2700), krb5 (DSA-2701), telepathy-gabble (DSA-2702) and subversion (DSA-2703).
10495 <li>Switched xrdp on thin client servers to use tightvncserver instead of xvnc4.
10496 <li>Now install software oscilloscope xoscope by default.
10497 <li>Now install music tools gtick, lingot and pianobooster by default.
10498
10499 </ul>
10500
10501 <p><strong>Other changes</strong></p>
10502
10503 <ul>
10504
10505 <li>The subnet-change script is now able to change all files needing a change on the main-server when changing the IP network used.
10506 <li>Updated translation of the installation.
10507 <li>New Romanian translation.
10508 <li>Fix security problem causing root and first user password to no longer show up in /var/cache/debconf/templates.dat.
10509 <li>Fix roaming workstation setup (Closed in libpam-mklocaluser/0.8, libpam-mklocaluser/0.8~deb7u1: #706753: libpam-mklocaluser: Fail to create local user during first login).
10510 <li>Made roaming workstation setup more robust in non-Debian Edu environments.
10511 <li>New script debian-edu-bless to transform a Debian installation to a Debian Edu profile.
10512 <li>Adjust Iceweasel setup to improve performance when $HOME is on NFS.
10513 <li>More testsuite tests.
10514 <li>Make automatic proxy configuration more robust.
10515 <li>Adjust GOsa² GUI configuration.
10516
10517 <li>Update thin client and diskless workstation setup to work with
10518 LTSP in Wheezy.</li>
10519
10520 <li>Diskless workstations now run out of the box -- no need to set
10521 them up with GOsa².</li>
10522
10523 <li>Update IMAP server setup. </li>
10524
10525 <li>Fix login into Skolelinux Backup Tool (Closed in
10526 slbackup-php/0.4.4-1: #700257: slbackup-php: Fails to submit correctly
10527 entered password). </li>
10528
10529 </ul>
10530
10531 <p><strong>Known issues</strong></p>
10532
10533 <ul>
10534
10535 <li>DVD binary and source images are not yet ready.</li>
10536
10537 <li>No mass import of user account data in GOsa (ldif or csv)
10538 available yet (Open in gosa/2.7.4-4: #698840: gosa-plugin-ldapmanager:
10539 missing import feature).</li>
10540
10541 <li>Missing artwork for the KDE desktop (and probably a few others). </li>
10542
10543 <li>KDE Debian submenu lacks icons (Closed: #502192: menu-xdg: invents
10544 own icon names instead of using existing). This will remain
10545 unfixed.</li>
10546
10547 </ul>
10548
10549 <p><strong>Where to get it</strong></p>
10550
10551 <p>To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use</p>
10552
10553 <ul>
10554
10555 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.0+edu0~a2-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.0+edu0~a2-CD.iso</a></li>
10556
10557 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.0+edu0~a2-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.0+edu0~a2-CD.iso</a></li>
10558
10559 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.0+edu0~a2-CD.iso .</li>
10560
10561 </ul>
10562
10563 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 27bbcace407743382f3c42c08dbe8178
10564 <br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: e35f7d7908566cd3075375b3721fa10ee420d419</p>
10565
10566 <p><strong>How to report bugs</strong></p>
10567
10568 <p><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a>
10569
10570       </div>
10571       <div class="tags">
10572
10573
10574         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10575
10576
10577       </div>
10578     </div>
10579     <div class="padding"></div>
10580
10581     <div class="entry">
10582       <div class="title">
10583         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_there_a_PHP_expert_in_the_building___Debian_Edu_need_help_.html">Is there a PHP expert in the building?  Debian Edu need help!</a>
10584       </div>
10585       <div class="date">
10586          5th June 2013
10587       </div>
10588       <div class="body">
10589         <p>Here is a call for help from the Debian Edu / Skolelinux project.
10590 We have two problems blocking the release of the Wheezy version we
10591 hope to get released soon.  The two problems require some with PHP
10592 skills, and we seem to lack anyone with both time and PHP skills in
10593 the project:
10594
10595 <ol>
10596
10597 <li>It is impossible to log into the slbackup web interface
10598   (slbackup-php) using the root user and password.  This is
10599   <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/700257">BTS report #700257</a>.
10600   This used to work, but stopped working some time since Squeeze.
10601   Perhaps some obsolete PHP feature was used?</li>
10602
10603 <li>It is not possible to "mass import" user lists in Gosa, neither
10604   using ldif nor using CSV files.  The feature was disabled after a
10605   major rewrite of Gosa, and need to be ported to the new system.
10606   This is <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698840">BTS report
10607   #698840</a>.</li>
10608
10609 </ol>
10610
10611 <p>If you can help us, please join us on IRC
10612 (<a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">#debian-edu on
10613 irc.debian.org</a>) and provide patches via the BTS.</p>
10614
10615       </div>
10616       <div class="tags">
10617
10618
10619         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10620
10621
10622       </div>
10623     </div>
10624     <div class="padding"></div>
10625
10626     <div class="entry">
10627       <div class="title">
10628         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__C_dric_Boutillier.html">Debian Edu interview: Cédric Boutillier</a>
10629       </div>
10630       <div class="date">
10631          4th June 2013
10632       </div>
10633       <div class="body">
10634         <p>It has been a while since my last English
10635 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>
10636 interview last November.  But the developers and translators are still
10637 pulling along to get the Wheezy based release out the door, and this
10638 time I managed to get an interview from one of the French translators
10639 in the project, Cédric Boutillier.</p>
10640
10641 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
10642
10643 <p>I am 34 year old. I live near Paris, France. I am an assistant
10644 professor in probability theory. I spend my daytime teaching
10645 mathematics at the university and doing fundamental research in
10646 probability in connexion with combinatorics and statistical physics.</p>
10647
10648 <p>I have been involved in the Debian project for a couple of years
10649 and became Debian Developer a few months ago. I am working on Ruby
10650 packaging, publicity and translation.</p>
10651
10652 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
10653 project?</strong></p>
10654
10655 <p>I came to the Debian Edu project after a call for translation of
10656 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Manuals">the
10657 Debian Edu manual</a> for the release of Debian Edu Squeeze. Since
10658 then, I have been working on updating the French translation of the
10659 manual.
10660
10661 <p>I had the opportunity to make an installation of Debian Edu in a
10662 virtual machine when I was preparing localised version of some screen
10663 shots for the manual. I was amazed to see it worked out of the box and
10664 how comprehensive the list of software installed by default was.</p>
10665
10666 <p>What amazed me was the complete network infrastructure directly
10667 ready to use, which can and the nice administration interface provided
10668 by <a href="https://oss.gonicus.de/labs/gosa/">GOsa²</a>.  What pleased
10669 me also was the fact that among the software installed by default,
10670 there were many "traditional" educative software to learn languages,
10671 to count, to program... but also software to develop creativity and
10672 artistic skills with music (<a href="http://ardour.org/">Ardour</a>,
10673 <a href="http://audacity.sourceforge.net/">Audacity</a>) and
10674 movies/animation (I was especially thinking of
10675 <a href="http://linuxstopmotion.sourceforge.net/">Stopmotion</a>).</p>
10676
10677 <p>I am following the development of Debian Edu and am hanging out on
10678 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">#debian-edu</a>.
10679 Unfortunately, I don't much time to get more involved in this
10680 beautiful project.</p>
10681
10682 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
10683 Edu?</strong></p>
10684
10685 <p>For me, the main advantages of Skolelinux/Debian Edu are its
10686 community of experts and its precise documentation, as well as the
10687 fact that it provides a solution ready to use.</p>
10688
10689 <p>I would add also the fact that it is based on the rock solid Debian
10690 distribution, which ensures stability and provides a huge collection
10691 of educational free software.</p>
10692
10693 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
10694 Edu?</strong></p>
10695
10696 <p>Maybe the lack of manpower to do lobbying on the
10697 project. Sometimes, people who need to take decisions concerning IT do
10698 not have all the elements to evaluate properly free software
10699 solutions. The fact that support by a company may be difficult to find
10700 is probably a problem if the school does not have IT personnel.</p>
10701
10702 <p>One can find support from a company by looking at
10703 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Help/ProfessionalHelp">the
10704 wiki dokumentation</a>, where some countries already have a number of
10705 companies providing support for Debian Edu, like Germany or
10706 Norway. This list is easy to find readily from the manual. However,
10707 for other countries, like France, the list is empty. I guess that
10708 consultants proposing support for Debian would be able to provide some
10709 support for Debian Edu as well.</p>
10710
10711 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
10712
10713 <p>I am using the KDE Plasma Desktop. But the pieces of software I use
10714 most runs in a terminal: Mutt and OfflineIMAP for emails, latex for
10715 scientific documents, mpd for music. VIM is my editor of choice.  I am
10716 also using the mathematical software
10717 <a href="http://www.scilab.org/en/scilab/about‎">Scilab</a> and
10718 <a href="http://www.sagemath.org/index.html‎">Sage</a> (built from
10719 source as not completely packaged for Debian, yet).
10720
10721 <p><strong>Do you have any suggestions for teachers interested in
10722 using the free software in Debian to teach mathematics and
10723 statistics?</strong></p>
10724
10725 <p>I do not have any "nice" recommendations for statistics. At our
10726 university, we use both <a href="http://www.r-project.org/‎">R</a> and
10727 Scilab to teach statistics and probabilistic simulations. For
10728 geometry, there are nice programs:</p>
10729
10730 <ul>
10731
10732 <li><a href="http://www.drgeo.eu/">drgeo</a> and
10733 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/applications/all/kig‎">kig</a> to do
10734 constructions in planar geometry
10735
10736 <li><a href="http://www.geom.uiuc.edu/software/download/kali.html">kali</a>
10737 to discover symmetry groups (the so-called wallpapers and frieze
10738 groups), although the interface looks a bit old.</li>
10739
10740 </ul>
10741
10742 <p>I like also
10743 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/applications/all/cantor">cantor</a>, which
10744 provides a uniform interface to SciLab, Sage,
10745 <a href="http://directory.fsf.org/wiki/Octave‎">Octave</a>, etc...</p>
10746
10747 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
10748 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
10749
10750 <p>My suggestions would be to</p>
10751
10752 <ul>
10753
10754 <li>advertise the reduction of costs when free software is used.</li>
10755
10756 <li>communicate about the quality of free software projects, using
10757     well known examples like Firefox, ThunderBird and
10758     OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice.</li>
10759
10760 <li>advertise the living and strong community around the project.</li>
10761
10762 <li>show that it is not more difficult to use than any other
10763     system.</li>
10764
10765 </ul>
10766
10767       </div>
10768       <div class="tags">
10769
10770
10771         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
10772
10773
10774       </div>
10775     </div>
10776     <div class="padding"></div>
10777
10778     <div class="entry">
10779       <div class="title">
10780         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">Educational applications included in Debian Edu / Skolelinux (the screenshot collection :-)</a>
10781       </div>
10782       <div class="date">
10783          1st June 2013
10784       </div>
10785       <div class="body">
10786         <p>Included in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
10787 Skolelinux</a>, there are quite a lot of educational software.
10788 Created to help teachers teach, and pupils learn.  We have tried to
10789 tag them all using debtags use::learning and role::program, and using
10790 the debtags I was happy to be able to create a collage of the
10791 educational software packages installed by default, sorted by the
10792 debtag field.  Here it is.  Click on a image to learn more about the
10793 program.</p>
10794
10795 <!-- for f in $(debtags tagcat|grep field::|awk '{print $2}'); do   echo; echo "<p><strong>$f</strong></p>"; echo "<p>";   (     for p in $(debtags search --names "use::learning && interface::x11 && role::program && $f"); do img="<img src='http://screenshots.debian.net/thumbnail/$p' alt='$p'>"; if dpkg -s $p > /dev/null 2>&1; then           echo "<a href='http://packages.qa.debian.org/$p'>$img</a>"; fi;     done;   ) | LANG=C sort; echo "</p>"; done -->
10796
10797 <p><strong>field::arts</strong></p>
10798 <p>
10799 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=audacity'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/audacity.png' alt='audacity'></a>
10800 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=childsplay'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/childsplay.png' alt='childsplay'></a>
10801 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=denemo'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/denemo.png' alt='denemo'></a>
10802 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=freebirth'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/freebirth.png' alt='freebirth'></a>
10803 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gcompris'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gcompris.png' alt='gcompris'></a>
10804 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gimp'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gimp.png' alt='gimp'></a>
10805 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=hydrogen'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/hydrogen.png' alt='hydrogen'></a>
10806 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=lilypond'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/lilypond.png' alt='lilypond'></a>
10807 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=lmms'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/lmms.png' alt='lmms'></a>
10808 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=rosegarden'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/rosegarden.png' alt='rosegarden'></a>
10809 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=scribus'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/scribus.png' alt='scribus'></a>
10810 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=solfege'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/solfege.png' alt='solfege'></a>
10811 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=stopmotion'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/stopmotion.png' alt='stopmotion'></a>
10812 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=tuxpaint'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/tuxpaint.png' alt='tuxpaint'></a>
10813 </p>
10814
10815 <p><strong>field::astronomy</strong></p>
10816 <p>
10817 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=celestia-gnome'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/celestia-gnome.png' alt='celestia-gnome'></a>
10818 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gpredict'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gpredict.png' alt='gpredict'></a>
10819 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kstars'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kstars.png' alt='kstars'></a>
10820 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=planets'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/planets.png' alt='planets'></a>
10821 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=stellarium'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/stellarium.png' alt='stellarium'></a>
10822 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=xplanet'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/xplanet.png' alt='xplanet'></a>
10823 </p>
10824
10825 <p><strong>field::biology:structural</strong></p>
10826 <p>
10827 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=pymol'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/pymol.png' alt='pymol'></a>
10828 </p>
10829
10830 <p><strong>field::chemistry</strong></p>
10831 <p>
10832 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=atomix'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/atomix.png' alt='atomix'></a>
10833 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=chemtool'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/chemtool.png' alt='chemtool'></a>
10834 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=easychem'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/easychem.png' alt='easychem'></a>
10835 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gchempaint'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gchempaint.png' alt='gchempaint'></a>
10836 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gdis'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gdis.png' alt='gdis'></a>
10837 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=ghemical'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/ghemical.png' alt='ghemical'></a>
10838 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gperiodic'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gperiodic.png' alt='gperiodic'></a>
10839 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kalzium'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kalzium.png' alt='kalzium'></a>
10840 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=pymol'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/pymol.png' alt='pymol'></a>
10841 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=viewmol'>[viewmol]</a>
10842 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=xdrawchem'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/xdrawchem.png' alt='xdrawchem'></a>
10843 </p>
10844
10845 <p><strong>field::electronics</strong></p>
10846 <p>
10847 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gcompris'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gcompris.png' alt='gcompris'></a>
10848 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gpsim'>[gpsim]</a>
10849 </p>
10850
10851 <p><strong>field::geography</strong></p>
10852 <p>
10853 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kgeography'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kgeography.png' alt='kgeography'></a>
10854 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=marble'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/marble.png' alt='marble'></a>
10855 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=xplanet'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/xplanet.png' alt='xplanet'></a>
10856 </p>
10857
10858 <p><strong>field::linguistics</strong></p>
10859 <p>
10860 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gcompris'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gcompris.png' alt='gcompris'></a>
10861 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kanagram'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kanagram.png' alt='kanagram'></a>
10862 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=khangman'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/khangman.png' alt='khangman'></a>
10863 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=klettres'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/klettres.png' alt='klettres'></a>
10864 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=parley'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/parley.png' alt='parley'></a>
10865 </p>
10866
10867 <p><strong>field::mathematics</strong></p>
10868 <p>
10869 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=childsplay'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/childsplay.png' alt='childsplay'></a>
10870 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=drgeo'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/drgeo.png' alt='drgeo'></a>
10871 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gcompris'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gcompris.png' alt='gcompris'></a>
10872 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=geogebra'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/geogebra.png' alt='geogebra'></a>
10873 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=geomview'>[geomview]</a>
10874 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=grace'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/grace.png' alt='grace'></a>
10875 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=graphmonkey'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/graphmonkey.png' alt='graphmonkey'></a>
10876 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=graphthing'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/graphthing.png' alt='graphthing'></a>
10877 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kalgebra'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kalgebra.png' alt='kalgebra'></a>
10878 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kbruch'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kbruch.png' alt='kbruch'></a>
10879 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kig'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kig.png' alt='kig'></a>
10880 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=kmplot'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/kmplot.png' alt='kmplot'></a>
10881 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=mathwar'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/mathwar.png' alt='mathwar'></a>
10882 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=rocs'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/rocs.png' alt='rocs'></a>
10883 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=scratch'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/scratch.png' alt='scratch'></a>
10884 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=tuxmath'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/tuxmath.png' alt='tuxmath'></a>
10885 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=xabacus'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/xabacus.png' alt='xabacus'></a>
10886 </p>
10887
10888 <p><strong>field::physics</strong></p>
10889 <p>
10890 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gcompris'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gcompris.png' alt='gcompris'></a>
10891 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=step'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/step.png' alt='step'></a>
10892 </p>
10893
10894 <p><strong>field::TODO</strong></p>
10895 <p>
10896 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=blinken'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/blinken.png' alt='blinken'></a>
10897 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=cgoban'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/cgoban.png' alt='cgoban'></a>
10898 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=childsplay'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/childsplay.png' alt='childsplay'></a>
10899 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gcompris'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gcompris.png' alt='gcompris'></a>
10900 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gnuchess'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gnuchess.png' alt='gnuchess'></a>
10901 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gnugo'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gnugo.png' alt='gnugo'></a>
10902 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=gtans'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/gtans.png' alt='gtans'></a>
10903 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=ktouch'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/ktouch.png' alt='ktouch'></a>
10904 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=librecad'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/librecad.png' alt='librecad'></a>
10905 <a href='http://packages.debian.org/search?searchon=names&exact=1&suite=all&section=all&keywords=scratch'><img src='http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-06-01-debian-edu-apps/scratch.png' alt='scratch'></a>
10906 </p>
10907
10908 <p>In total, 61 applications.  3 of them lacked screen shots on
10909 <a href="http://screenshot.debian.net">screenshot.debian.net</a>.  If
10910 you know of some packages we should install by default, please let us
10911 know on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">IRC, #debian-edu
10912 on irc.debian.org</a>, or our
10913 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/">mailing list
10914 debian-edu@</a>.</p>
10915
10916       </div>
10917       <div class="tags">
10918
10919
10920         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10921
10922
10923       </div>
10924     </div>
10925     <div class="padding"></div>
10926
10927     <div class="entry">
10928       <div class="title">
10929         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_install_Linux_on_a_Packard_Bell_Easynote_LV_preinstalled_with_Windows_8.html">How to install Linux on a Packard Bell Easynote LV preinstalled with Windows 8</a>
10930       </div>
10931       <div class="date">
10932         27th May 2013
10933       </div>
10934       <div class="body">
10935         <p>Two days ago, I asked
10936 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_can_I_install_Linux_on_a_Packard_Bell_Easynote_LV_preinstalled_with_Windows_8_.html">how
10937 I could install Linux on a Packard Bell EasyNote LV computer
10938 preinstalled with Windows 8</a>.  I found a solution, but am horrified
10939 with the obstacles put in the way of Linux users on a laptop with UEFI
10940 and Windows 8.</p>
10941
10942 <p>I never found out if the cause of my problems were the use of UEFI
10943 secure booting or fast boot.  I suspect fast boot was the problem,
10944 causing the firmware to boot directly from HD without considering any
10945 key presses and alternative devices, but do not know UEFI settings
10946 enough to tell.</p>
10947
10948 <p>There is no way to install Linux on the machine in question without
10949 opening the box and disconnecting the hard drive!  This is as far as I
10950 can tell, the only way to get access to the firmware setup menu
10951 without accepting the Windows 8 license agreement.  I am told (and
10952 found description on how to) that it is possible to configure the
10953 firmware setup once booted into Windows 8.  But as I believe the terms
10954 of that agreement are completely unacceptable, accepting the license
10955 was never an alternative.  I do not enter agreements I do not intend
10956 to follow.</p>
10957
10958 <p>I feared I had to return the laptops and ask for a refund, and
10959 waste many hours on this, but luckily there was a way to get it to
10960 work.  But I would not recommend it to anyone planning to run Linux on
10961 it, and I have become sceptical to Windows 8 certified laptops.  Is
10962 this the way Linux will be forced out of the market place, by making
10963 it close to impossible for "normal" users to install Linux without
10964 accepting the Microsoft Windows license terms?  Or at least not
10965 without risking to loose the warranty?</p>
10966
10967 <p>I've updated the
10968 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Linux Laptop
10969 wiki page for Packard Bell EasyNote LV</a>, to ensure the next person
10970 do not have to struggle as much as I did to get Linux into the
10971 machine.</p>
10972
10973 <p>Thanks to Bob Rosbag, Florian Weimer, Philipp Kern, Ben Hutching,
10974 Michael Tokarev and others for feedback and ideas.</p>
10975
10976       </div>
10977       <div class="tags">
10978
10979
10980         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
10981
10982
10983       </div>
10984     </div>
10985     <div class="padding"></div>
10986
10987     <div class="entry">
10988       <div class="title">
10989         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_can_I_install_Linux_on_a_Packard_Bell_Easynote_LV_preinstalled_with_Windows_8_.html">How can I install Linux on a Packard Bell Easynote LV preinstalled with Windows 8?</a>
10990       </div>
10991       <div class="date">
10992         25th May 2013
10993       </div>
10994       <div class="body">
10995         <p>I've run into quite a problem the last few days.  I bought three
10996 new laptops for my parents and a few others.  I bought Packard Bell
10997 Easynote LV to run Kubuntu on and use as their home computer.  But I
10998 am completely unable to figure out how to install Linux on it.  The
10999 computer is preinstalled with Windows 8, and I suspect it uses UEFI
11000 instead of a BIOS to boot.</p>
11001
11002 <p>The problem is that I am unable to get it to PXE boot, and unable
11003 to get it to boot the Linux installer from my USB stick.  I have yet
11004 to try the DVD install, and still hope it will work.  when I turn on
11005 the computer, there is no information on what buttons to press to get
11006 the normal boot menu.  I expect to get some boot menu to select PXE or
11007 USB stick booting.  When booting, it first ask for the language to
11008 use, then for some regional settings, and finally if I will accept the
11009 Windows 8 terms of use.  As these terms are completely unacceptable to
11010 me, I have no other choice but to turn off the computer and try again
11011 to get it to boot the Linux installer.</p>
11012
11013 <p>I have gathered my findings so far on a Linlap page about the
11014 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
11015 EasyNote LV</a> model.  If you have any idea how to get Linux
11016 installed on this machine, please get in touch or update that wiki
11017 page.  If I can't find a way to install Linux, I will have to return
11018 the laptop to the seller and find another machine for my parents.</p>
11019
11020 <p>I wonder, is this the way Linux will be forced out of the market
11021 using UEFI and "secure boot" by making it impossible to install Linux
11022 on new Laptops?</p>
11023
11024       </div>
11025       <div class="tags">
11026
11027
11028         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11029
11030
11031       </div>
11032     </div>
11033     <div class="padding"></div>
11034
11035     <div class="entry">
11036       <div class="title">
11037         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_transform_a_Debian_based_system_to_a_Debian_Edu_installation.html">How to transform a Debian based system to a Debian Edu installation</a>
11038       </div>
11039       <div class="date">
11040         17th May 2013
11041       </div>
11042       <div class="body">
11043         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is
11044 an operating system based on Debian intended for use in schools.  It
11045 contain a turn-key solution for the computer network provided to
11046 pupils in the primary schools.  It provide both the central server,
11047 network boot servers and desktop environments with heaps of
11048 educational software.  The project was founded almost 12 years ago,
11049 2001-07-02.  If you want to support the project, which is in need for
11050 cash to fund developer gatherings and other project related activity,
11051 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">please
11052 donate some money</a>.
11053
11054 <p>A topic that come up again and again on the Debian Edu mailing
11055 lists and elsewhere, is the question on how to transform a Debian or
11056 Ubuntu installation into a Debian Edu installation.  It isn't very
11057 hard, and last week I wrote a script to replicate the steps done by
11058 the Debian Edu installer.</p>
11059
11060 <p>The script,
11061 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/branches/wheezy/debian-edu-config/share/debian-edu-config/tools/debian-edu-bless?view=markup">debian-edu-bless<a/>
11062 in the debian-edu-config package, will go through these six steps and
11063 transform an existing Debian Wheezy or Ubuntu (untested) installation
11064 into a Debian Edu Workstation:</p>
11065
11066 <ol>
11067
11068 <li>Add skolelinux related APT sources.</li>
11069 <li>Create /etc/debian-edu/config with the wanted configuration.</li>
11070 <li>Install debian-edu-install to load preseeding values and pull in
11071     our configuration.</li>
11072 <li>Preseed debconf database with profile setup in
11073     /etc/debian-edu/config, and run tasksel to install packages
11074     according to the profile specified in the config above,
11075     overriding some of the Debian automation machinery.</li>
11076 <li>Run debian-edu-cfengine-D installation to configure everything
11077     that could not be done using preseeding.</li>
11078 <li>Ask for a reboot to enable all the configuration changes.</li>
11079
11080 </ol>
11081
11082 <p>There are some steps in the Debian Edu installation that can not be
11083 replicated like this.  Disk partitioning and LVM setup, for example.
11084 So this script just assume there is enough disk space to install all
11085 the needed packages.</p>
11086
11087 <p>The script was created to help a Debian Edu student working on
11088 setting up <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org">Raspberry Pi</a> as a
11089 Debian Edu client, and using it he can take the existing
11090 <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/FrontPage‎">Raspbian</a> installation and
11091 transform it into a fully functioning Debian Edu Workstation (or
11092 Roaming Workstation, or whatever :).</p>
11093
11094 <p>The default setting in the script is to create a KDE Workstation.
11095 If a LXDE based Roaming workstation is wanted instead, modify the
11096 PROFILE and DESKTOP values at the top to look like this instead:</p>
11097
11098 <p><pre>
11099 PROFILE="Roaming-Workstation"
11100 DESKTOP="lxde"
11101 </pre></p>
11102
11103 <p>The script could even become useful to set up Debian Edu servers in
11104 the cloud, by starting with a virtual Debian installation at some
11105 virtual hosting service and setting up all the services on first
11106 boot.</p>
11107
11108       </div>
11109       <div class="tags">
11110
11111
11112         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11113
11114
11115       </div>
11116     </div>
11117     <div class="padding"></div>
11118
11119     <div class="entry">
11120       <div class="title">
11121         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_alpha_release_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Debian_Wheezy.html">Second alpha release of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Debian Wheezy</a>
11122       </div>
11123       <div class="date">
11124         14th May 2013
11125       </div>
11126       <div class="body">
11127         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
11128 project</a> is making great progress and made its second Wheezy based
11129 release today.  This is the release announcement:</p>
11130
11131 <p><strong>New features for Debian Edu 7.0.0 alpha1 released
11132 2013-05-14</strong></p>
11133
11134 <p>This is the release notes for for Debian Edu / Skolelinux 7.0.0 edu
11135 alpha1, based on <a href="http://www.debian.org">Debian</a> with
11136 codename "Wheezy".</p>
11137
11138 <p><strong>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</strong></p>
11139
11140 <p>Debian Edu, also known as Skolelinux, is a Linux distribution based
11141 on Debian providing an out-of-the box environment of a completely
11142 configured school network. Immediatly after installation a school
11143 server running all services needed for a school network is set up just
11144 waiting for users and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable
11145 Web-UI. A netbooting environment is prepared using PXE, so after
11146 initial installation of the main server from CD, DVD or USB stick all
11147 other machines can be installed via the network.</p>
11148
11149 <p>This is the first test release based on Wheezy (which currently is
11150 not released yet). Basically this is an updated and slightly improved
11151 version compared to the Squeeze release.</p>
11152
11153 <p><strong>Software updates</strong></p>
11154 <ul>
11155   <li>Install freemind (0.9.0) by default, and stop installing vym by
11156     default.</li>
11157   <li>Install chromium (26.0.1410.43) by default.</li>
11158   <li>Install goplay (0.5-1.1) to make golearn available by default.</li>
11159   <li>Updated support for Japanese input methods, now based on
11160     ibus-anthy.</li>
11161 </ul>
11162
11163 <p><strong>Other changes</strong></p>
11164 <ul>
11165
11166   <li>Switched default file system from ext3 to ext4 for speed and
11167     reliability improvements.</li>
11168   <li>Got rid of unwanted winbind daemon and PAM setup activated because
11169     of <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/706434">706434</a>.</li>
11170   <li>Extended and improved the testsuite tests to detect more possible
11171     problems.</li>
11172   <li>Corrected proxy handling to not set http_proxy to a bogus
11173     direct:// URL.</li>
11174   <li>Corrected proxy setup for diskless workstations.</li>
11175   <li>Corrected PXE setup to use our updated udebs during installation.</li>
11176   <li>Made installation handling of low entropy level more robust.</li>
11177   <li>Create larger partitions for Roaming workstations and Thin client
11178     servers, to make room for all the software installed.</li>
11179   <li>Fix bug in Roaming workstation PAM setup, making it impossible to
11180     log in (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/706753">706753</a>).</li>
11181 </ul>
11182
11183 <p><strong>Known issues</strong></p>
11184 <ul>
11185
11186   <li>IP resolution for the local hostname give useless IPv6 address
11187     (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/705900">705900</a>).  Only install
11188     libnss-myhostname on roaming workstations until it is fixed.</li>
11189   <li>DVD images are not yet ready.</li>
11190   <li>No mass import of user account data in GOsa (ldif or csv)
11191     available yet (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698840">698840</a>).</li>
11192   <li>Missing artwork for the KDE desktop (and probably a few others).</li>
11193   <li>KDE Debian submenu lacks icons.</li>
11194   <li>LXDE menu lacks entry for changing GOsa password
11195     (website). Installing gosa-desktop will be an option.</li>
11196   <li>Backup configuration via web interface is impossible due to
11197     password submission problem
11198     (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/700257">700257</a>).</li>
11199
11200 </ul>
11201
11202 <p><strong>Where to get it</strong></p>
11203
11204 <p>To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use</p>
11205 <ul>
11206
11207   <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu~7.0+edu0~a1-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu~7.0+edu0~a1-CD.iso</a></li>
11208   <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu~7.0+edu0~a1-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu~7.0+edu0~a1-CD.iso</a></li>
11209   <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu~7.0+edu0~a1-CD.iso debian-edu~7.0+edu0~a1-CD.iso</li>
11210
11211 </ul>
11212
11213 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 685ed76c1aa8e44b12d3fde21faf450b</p>
11214
11215 <p>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 6c874de157024da13e115bab29c068080a11ec4c</p>
11216
11217 <p><strong>How to report bugs</strong></p>
11218
11219 <p><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a></p>
11220
11221       </div>
11222       <div class="tags">
11223
11224
11225         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11226
11227
11228       </div>
11229     </div>
11230     <div class="padding"></div>
11231
11232     <div class="entry">
11233       <div class="title">
11234         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian__the_Linux_distribution_of_choice_for_LEGO_designers_.html">Debian, the Linux distribution of choice for LEGO designers?</a>
11235       </div>
11236       <div class="date">
11237         11th May 2013
11238       </div>
11239       <div class="body">
11240         <P>In January,
11241 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
11242 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
11243 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
11244 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
11245 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
11246 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
11247 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
11248 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
11249 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
11250 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
11251 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
11252 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
11253
11254 <p><table>
11255 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/brickos">brickos</a></td><td>alternative OS for LEGO Mindstorms RCX. Supports development in C/C++</td></tr>
11256 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
11257 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/libnxt">libnxt</a></td><td>utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NX</td></tr>
11258 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
11259 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
11260 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
11261 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/python-nxt">python-nxt</a></td><td>python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot</td></tr>
11262 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/python-nxt-filer">python-nxt-filer</a></td><td>simple GUI to manage files on a LEGO Mindstorms NXT</td></tr>
11263 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/scratch">scratch</a></td><td>easy to use programming environment for ages 8 and up</td></tr>
11264 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
11265 </table></p>
11266
11267 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
11268 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
11269 available in experimental.</p>
11270
11271 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
11272 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
11273 for LEGO designers.</p>
11274
11275       </div>
11276       <div class="tags">
11277
11278
11279         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
11280
11281
11282       </div>
11283     </div>
11284     <div class="padding"></div>
11285
11286     <div class="entry">
11287       <div class="title">
11288         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Wheezy_is_out___and_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_should_soon_follow___newinwheezy.html">Debian Wheezy is out - and Debian Edu / Skolelinux should soon follow! #newinwheezy</a>
11289       </div>
11290       <div class="date">
11291          5th May 2013
11292       </div>
11293       <div class="body">
11294         <p>When I woke up this morning, I was very happy to see that the
11295 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130504">release announcement
11296 for Debian Wheezy</a> was waiting in my mail box.  This is a great
11297 Debian release, and I expect to move my machines at home over to it fairly
11298 soon.</p>
11299
11300 <p>The new debian release contain heaps of new stuff, and one program
11301 in particular make me very happy to see included.  The
11302 <a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">Scratch</a> program, made famous by
11303 the <a href="http://www.code.org/">Teach kids code</a> movement, is
11304 included for the first time.  Alongside similar programs like
11305 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/kturtle/">kturtle</a> and
11306 <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/Turtle_Art">turtleart</a>,
11307 it allow for visual programming where syntax errors can not happen,
11308 and a friendly programming environment for learning to control the
11309 computer.  Scratch will also be included in the next release of Debian
11310 Edu.</a>
11311
11312 <p>And now that Wheezy is wrapped up, we can wrap up the next Debian
11313 Edu/Skolelinux release too.  The
11314 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/04/msg00132.html">first
11315 alpha release</a> went out last week, and the next should soon
11316 follow.<p>
11317
11318       </div>
11319       <div class="tags">
11320
11321
11322         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11323
11324
11325       </div>
11326     </div>
11327     <div class="padding"></div>
11328
11329     <div class="entry">
11330       <div class="title">
11331         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_alpha_release_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Debian_Wheezy.html">First alpha release of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Debian Wheezy</a>
11332       </div>
11333       <div class="date">
11334         26th April 2013
11335       </div>
11336       <div class="body">
11337         <p>The Debian Edu / Skolelinux project is still going strong and made
11338 its first Wheezy based release today.  This is the release
11339 announcement:</p>
11340
11341 <p><strong>New features for Debian Edu ~7.0.0 alpha0 released
11342 2013-04-26</strong></p>
11343
11344 <p>This is the release notes for for Debian Edu / Skolelinux ~7.0.0
11345 edu alpha0, based on Debian with codename "Wheezy".</p>
11346
11347 <p><strong>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</strong></p>
11348
11349 <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu, also known as
11350 Skolelinux</a>, is a Linux distribution based on Debian providing an
11351 out-of-the box environment of a completely configured school
11352 network. Immediatly after installation a school server running all
11353 services needed for a school network is set up just waiting for users
11354 and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable Web-UI. A netbooting
11355 environment is prepared using PXE, so after initial installation of
11356 the main server from CD, DVD or USB stick all other machines can be
11357 installed via the network.</p>
11358
11359 <p>This is the first test release based on Wheezy (which currently is
11360 not released yet). Basically this is an updated and slightly improved
11361 version compared to the Squeeze release.</p>
11362
11363 <p><strong>Software updates</strong></p>
11364
11365 <ul>
11366 <li>Everything which is new in Debian Wheezy, eg:
11367   <ul>
11368      <li>Linux kernel 3.2.x</li>
11369      <li>Desktop environments KDE "Plasma" 4.8.4, GNOME 3.4, and LXDE 4
11370          (KDE is installed by default; to choose GNOME or LXDE: see
11371          manual.)</li>
11372      <li>Web browser Iceweasel 10 ESR</li>
11373      <li>LibreOffice 3.5.4</li>
11374      <li>LTSP 5.4.2</li>
11375      <li>GOsa 2.7.4</li>
11376      <li>CUPS print system 1.5.3</li>
11377      <li>Educational toolbox GCompris 12.01</li>
11378      <li>Music creator Rosegarden 12.04</li>
11379      <li>Image editor Gimp 2.8.2</li>
11380      <li>Virtual universe Celestia 1.6.1</li>
11381      <li>Virtual stargazer Stellarium 0.11.3</li>
11382      <li>Scratch visual programming environment 1.4.0.6</li>
11383      <li>New version of debian-installer from Debian Wheezy, see
11384          <a href="http://www.debian.org/releases/wheezy/installmanual">installation
11385          manual</a> for more details.</li>
11386      <li>Debian Wheezy includes about 37000 packages available for
11387          installation.</li>
11388      <li>More information about Debian Wheezy 7.0 is provided in the
11389          <a href="http://www.debian.org/releases/wheezy/releasenotes">release notes</a> and the <a href="http://www.debian.org/releases/wheezy/installmanual">installation manual</a>.</li>
11390   </ul></li>
11391 </ul>
11392
11393 <p><strong>Documentation</strong></p>
11394 <ul>
11395 <li>The (<a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy">English</a>) Debian Edu Wheezy Manual is fully translated to
11396     German, French, Italian and Danish. Partly translated versions exist
11397     for Norwegian Bokmal and Spanish.</li>
11398 </ul>
11399
11400 <p><Strong>LDAP related changes</strong></p>
11401 <ul>
11402 <li>Slight changes to some objects and acls to have more types to
11403     choose from when adding systems in GOsa. Now systems can be of type
11404     server, workstation, printer, terminal or netdevice.</li>
11405 </ul>
11406
11407 <p><strong>Other changes</strong></p>
11408 <ul>
11409 <li>LTSP clients start as diskless workstation / thin client can be
11410     configured via command line argument -- or individually adding an
11411     entry in lts.conf or LDAP.<li>
11412 <li>GOsa gui: Now some options that seemed to be available, but are non
11413     functional, are greyed out (or are not clickable). Some tabs are
11414     completely hidden to the end user, others even to the GOsa admin.</li>
11415 </ul>
11416
11417 <p><strong>Regressions</strong></p>
11418 <ul>
11419 <li>No mass import of user account data in GOsa (ldif or csv) available
11420     yet.</li>
11421 </ul>
11422
11423 <p><strong>No updated artwork</strong></p>
11424
11425 <ul>
11426 <li>Updated artwork which is visible during installation, in the login
11427     screen and as desktop wallpaper is still missing or the same as we
11428     had for our Squeeze based release.</li>
11429 </ul>
11430
11431 <p><strong>Where to get it</strong></p>
11432
11433 To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use
11434 <ul>
11435 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/</a></li>
11436 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/</a></li>
11437 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/</li>
11438 </ul>
11439
11440 <p>The MD5SUM of this image is: c5e773ddafdaa4f48c409c682f598b6c</p>
11441
11442 <p>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 25934fabb9b7d20235499a0a51f08ce6c54215f2</p>
11443
11444 <p><strong>How to report bugs</strong></p>
11445
11446 <p><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a></p>
11447
11448       </div>
11449       <div class="tags">
11450
11451
11452         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11453
11454
11455       </div>
11456     </div>
11457     <div class="padding"></div>
11458
11459     <div class="entry">
11460       <div class="title">
11461         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_developer_gathering_in_2013_take_place_in_Trondheim.html">First Debian Edu / Skolelinux developer gathering in 2013 take place in Trondheim</a>
11462       </div>
11463       <div class="date">
11464         16th April 2013
11465       </div>
11466       <div class="body">
11467         <p>This years first <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux /
11468 Debian Edu</a> developer gathering take place the coming weekend in Trondheim.
11469 Details about the gathering can be found
11470 <a href="http://www.friprogramvareiskolen.no/Gathering/2013-04-19-21-Trondheim">on
11471 the FRiSK wiki</a>.  The dates are 19-21th of April 2013, and online
11472 participation for those unable to make it in person is very welcome,
11473 and I plan to participate online myself as I could not leave Oslo this
11474 weekend.</p>
11475
11476 <p>The focus of the gathering is to work on the web pages and project
11477 infrastructure, and to continue the work on the Wheezy based Debian
11478 Edu release.</p>
11479
11480 <p>See you on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">IRC, #debian-edu on irc.debian.org,</a> then?</p>
11481
11482       </div>
11483       <div class="tags">
11484
11485
11486         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11487
11488
11489       </div>
11490     </div>
11491     <div class="padding"></div>
11492
11493     <div class="entry">
11494       <div class="title">
11495         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram_0_2_finally_in_the_Debian_archive.html">Isenkram 0.2 finally in the Debian archive</a>
11496       </div>
11497       <div class="date">
11498          3rd April 2013
11499       </div>
11500       <div class="body">
11501         <p>Today the <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram
11502 package</a> finally made it into the archive, after lingering in NEW
11503 for many months.  I uploaded it to the Debian experimental suite
11504 2013-01-27, and today it was accepted into the archive.</p>
11505
11506 <p>Isenkram is a system for suggesting to users what packages to
11507 install to work with a pluggable hardware device.  The suggestion pop
11508 up when the device is plugged in.  For example if a Lego Mindstorm NXT
11509 is inserted, it will suggest to install the program needed to program
11510 the NXT controller.  Give it a go, and report bugs and suggestions to
11511 BTS. :)</p>
11512
11513       </div>
11514       <div class="tags">
11515
11516
11517         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
11518
11519
11520       </div>
11521     </div>
11522     <div class="padding"></div>
11523
11524     <div class="entry">
11525       <div class="title">
11526         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Change_the_font__save_the_world__and_save_some_money_in_the_process_.html">Change the font, save the world (and save some money in the process)</a>
11527       </div>
11528       <div class="date">
11529         26th March 2013
11530       </div>
11531       <div class="body">
11532         <p>Would you like to help the environment and save money at the same
11533 time, without much sacrifice?  A small step could be to change the
11534 font you use when printing.</p>
11535
11536 <p>Three years ago,
11537 <a href="http://arstechnica.com/business/2010/04/last-year-printer-comparison-website/">Ars
11538 Technica</a> reported how the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay
11539 changed their default front from
11540 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arial">Arial</a> to
11541 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_Gothic">Century
11542 Gothic</a> to save money.  The Century Gothic font uses 30% less toner
11543 than Arial to print the same text.  In other word, you could cut your
11544 toner costs by 30% (or actually, increase your toner supply life time
11545 by more than 30%), by simply changing the default font used in your
11546 prints.</p>
11547
11548 <p>But it is not quite obvious how much one will save by switching.
11549 The University of Wisconsin-Green Bay said it used $100,000 per year
11550 on ink and toner cartridges, according to
11551 <a href="http://www.twincities.com/ci_14833097">a report from
11552 TwinCities.com</a>, and expected to save between $5,000 and $10,000
11553 per year by asking staff and students to use a different font.  Not
11554 all PDFs and documents are created internally, and those from external
11555 sources will most likely still use a different font.  Also, the
11556 Century Gothic font is slightly wider than Arial, and thus might use
11557 more sheets of paper to print the same text, so the total saving
11558 depend on the documents printed.</p>
11559
11560 <p>But it is definitely something to consider, if you want to reduce
11561 the amount of trash, decrease the amount of toner used in the world,
11562 and save some money in the process.</p>
11563
11564 <p>Update 2013-04-10: If you want to know how much ink/toner could be
11565 saved when switching between fonts, Inkfarm got a
11566 <a href="http://www.inkfarm.com/What-the-Font">service to calculate the
11567 difference between font pairs</a>.  They also
11568 <a href="http://www.inkfarm.com/Recommended-Ink-Saving-Fonts---">recommend
11569 which fonts to use</a> to save ink.  Check it out. :) While updating
11570 this blog post, I also came across a blog post from InkCloners,
11571 <a href="http://inkcloners.com/blog/ink-cartridges/change-fonts-to-save-ink-costs/">listing
11572 the fonts they recommend</a>, with Centory Gothic at the top.</p>
11573
11574       </div>
11575       <div class="tags">
11576
11577
11578         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11579
11580
11581       </div>
11582     </div>
11583     <div class="padding"></div>
11584
11585     <div class="entry">
11586       <div class="title">
11587         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Typesetting_a_short_story_using_docbook_for_PDF__HTML_and_EPUB.html">Typesetting a short story using docbook for PDF, HTML and EPUB</a>
11588       </div>
11589       <div class="date">
11590         24th March 2013
11591       </div>
11592       <div class="body">
11593         <p>A few days ago, during a discussion in
11594 <a href="http://www.efn.no/">EFN</a> about interesting books to read
11595 about copyright and the data retention directive, a suggestion to read
11596 the 1968 short story Kodémus by
11597 <a href="http://web2.gyldendal.no/toraage/">Tore Åge Bringsværd</a>
11598 came up.  The text was only available in old paper books, and thus not
11599 easily available for current and future generations.  Some of the
11600 people participating in the discussion contacted the author, and
11601 reported back 2013-03-19 that the author was OK with releasing the
11602 short story using a <a href="http://www.creativecommons.org/">Creative
11603 Commons</a> license.  The text was quickly scanned and OCR-ed, and we
11604 were ready to start on the editing and typesetting.</p>
11605
11606 <p>As I already had some experience formatting text in my project to
11607 provide a Norwegian version of the Free Culture book by Lawrence
11608 Lessig, I chipped in and set up a
11609 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">DocBook</a> processing framework to
11610 generate PDF, HTML and EPUB version of the short story.  The tools to
11611 transform DocBook to different formats are already in my Linux
11612 distribution of choice, <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>, so
11613 all I had to do was to use the
11614 <a href="http://dblatex.sourceforge.net/">dblatex</a>,
11615 <a href="http://docbook.sourceforge.net/release/xsl/current/epub/README">dbtoepub</a>
11616 and <a href="https://fedorahosted.org/xmlto/">xmlto</a> tools to do the
11617 conversion.  After a few days, we decided to replace dblatex with
11618 xsltproc/fop (aka
11619 <a href="http://wiki.docbook.org/DocBookXslStylesheets">docbook-xsl</a>),
11620 to get the copyright information to show up in the PDF and to get a
11621 nicer &lt;variablelist&gt; typesetting, but that is just a minor
11622 technical detail.</p>
11623
11624 <p>There were a few challenges, of course.  We want to typeset the
11625 short story to look like the original, and that require fairly good
11626 control over the layout.  The original short story have three
11627 parts/scenes separated by a single horizontally centred star (*), and
11628 the paragraphs do not contain only flowing text, but dialogs and text
11629 that started on a new line in the middle of the paragraph.</p>
11630
11631 <p>I initially solved the first challenge by using a paragraph with a
11632 single star in it, ie &lt;para&gt;*&lt;/para&gt;, but it made sure a
11633 placeholder indicated where the scene shifted.  This did not look too
11634 good without the centring.  The next approach was to create a new
11635 preprocessor directive &lt;?newscene?&gt;, mapping to "&lt;hr/&gt;"
11636 for HTML and "&lt;fo:block text-align="center"&gt;&lt;fo:leader
11637 leader-pattern="rule" rule-thickness="0.5pt"/&gt;&lt;/fo:block&gt;"
11638 for FO/PDF output (did not try to implement this in dblatex, as we had
11639 switched at this time).  The HTML XSL file looked like this:</p>
11640
11641 <p><blockquote><pre>
11642 &lt;?xml version='1.0'?&gt;
11643 &lt;xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version='1.0'&gt;
11644   &lt;xsl:template match="processing-instruction('newscene')"&gt;
11645     &lt;hr/&gt;
11646   &lt;/xsl:template&gt;
11647 &lt;/xsl:stylesheet&gt;
11648 </pre></blockquote></p>
11649
11650 <p>And the FO/PDF XSL file looked like this:</p>
11651
11652 <p><blockquote><pre>
11653 &lt;?xml version='1.0'?&gt;
11654 &lt;xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version='1.0'&gt;
11655   &lt;xsl:template match="processing-instruction('newscene')"&gt;
11656     &lt;fo:block text-align="center"&gt;
11657       &lt;fo:leader leader-pattern="rule" rule-thickness="0.5pt"/&gt;
11658     &lt;/fo:block&gt;
11659   &lt;/xsl:template&gt;
11660 &lt;/xsl:stylesheet&gt;
11661 </pre></blockquote></p>
11662
11663 <p>Finally, I came across the &lt;bridgehead&gt; tag, which seem to be
11664 a good fit for the task at hand, and I replaced &lt;?newscene?&gt;
11665 with &lt;bridgehead&gt;*&lt;/bridgehead&gt;.  It isn't centred, but we
11666 can fix it with some XSL rule if the current visual layout isn't
11667 enough.</p>
11668
11669 <p>I did not find a good DocBook compliant way to solve the
11670 linebreak/paragraph challenge, so I ended up creating a new processor
11671 directive &lt;?linebreak?&gt;, mapping to &lt;br/&gt; in HTML, and
11672 &lt;fo:block/&gt; in FO/PDF.  I suspect there are better ways to do
11673 this, and welcome ideas and patches on github.  The HTML XSL file now
11674 look like this:</p>
11675
11676 <p><blockquote><pre>
11677 &lt;?xml version='1.0'?&gt;
11678 &lt;xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version='1.0'&gt;
11679   &lt;xsl:template match="processing-instruction('linebreak)"&gt;
11680     &lt;br/&gt;
11681   &lt;/xsl:template&gt;
11682 &lt;/xsl:stylesheet&gt;
11683 </pre></blockquote></p>
11684
11685 <p>And the FO/PDF XSL file looked like this:</p>
11686
11687 <p><blockquote><pre>
11688 &lt;?xml version='1.0'?&gt;
11689 &lt;xsl:stylesheet xmlns:xsl="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Transform" version='1.0'
11690   xmlns:fo="http://www.w3.org/1999/XSL/Format"&gt;
11691   &lt;xsl:template match="processing-instruction('linebreak)"&gt;
11692     &lt;fo:block/&gt;
11693   &lt;/xsl:template&gt;
11694 &lt;/xsl:stylesheet&gt;
11695 </pre></blockquote></p>
11696
11697 <p>One unsolved challenge is our wish to expose different ISBN numbers
11698 per publication format, while keeping all of them in some conditional
11699 structure in the DocBook source.  No idea how to do this, so we ended
11700 up listing all the ISBN numbers next to their format in the colophon
11701 page.</p>
11702
11703 <p>If you want to check out the finished result, check out the
11704 <a href="https://github.com/sickel/kodemus">source repository at
11705 github</a>
11706 (<a href="https://github.com/EFN/kodemus">future/new/official
11707 repository</a>).  We expect it to be ready and announced in a few
11708 days.</p>
11709
11710       </div>
11711       <div class="tags">
11712
11713
11714         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
11715
11716
11717       </div>
11718     </div>
11719     <div class="padding"></div>
11720
11721     <div class="entry">
11722       <div class="title">
11723         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Skolelinux_6_got_a_video_review_from_Pcwizz.html">Skolelinux 6 got a video review from Pcwizz</a>
11724       </div>
11725       <div class="date">
11726         17th March 2013
11727       </div>
11728       <div class="body">
11729         <p>Via
11730 <a href="https://twitter.com/pcwizz/status/313044373262716930">twitter</a>
11731 I just discovered that <a href="http://pcwizz.net/">Pcwizz</a> have
11732 done a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPzTZ61Pcuc">video
11733 review</a> on Youtube of <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux
11734 / Debian Edu</a> version 6.  He installed the standalone profile and
11735 the video show a walk-through of of the menu content, demonstration of
11736 a few programs and his view of our distribution.</p>
11737
11738 <p>There is also some really nice quotes (transcribed by me, might
11739 have heard wrong).  While looking thought the Graphics menu:</p>
11740
11741 <blockquote>
11742 "Basically everything you ever need in a school environment."
11743 </blockquote>
11744
11745 <p>And as a general evaluation of the entire distribution:</p>
11746
11747 <blockquote>
11748 "So, yeah, a bit bloated.  It kept all the Debian stuff in there, just
11749 to keep it nice and GNU.  So, I do not want to go on about it, but
11750 lets give it 7 out of 10.  I am not going to use it.  That is because
11751 I am not deploying a school network.  There may be some mythical
11752 feature to help you deploy Skolelinux on a school network."
11753 </blockquote>
11754
11755 <p>To bad he did not test the server profile, and discovered the PXE
11756 installation option.  It make it possible to install only the main
11757 server from CD, and the rest of the machines via the net, and might be
11758 considered the mythical feature he talk about. :)</p>
11759
11760 <p>While looking through the menus, there is also this funny comment
11761 about the part of the K menu generated from the Debian menu subsystem:
11762
11763 <blockquote>
11764 "[The K menu] have a special Debian section for software that no-one
11765 is going to look at, because it contain lots of junky stuff that you
11766 actually don't need in the education distribution, but have just been
11767 included because it isn't stripped out for some reason."
11768 </blockquote>
11769
11770 <p>I guess it is yet another argument for merging the Debian menu and
11771 Gnome/KDE desktop menu entries into
11772 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/Proposals/DebianMenuUsingDesktopEntries">one
11773 consistent menu system</a> instead of two incomplete and partly
11774 inconsistent menu systems.</p>
11775
11776 <p>The entire video is available below for those accepting iframe
11777 embedding:</p>
11778
11779 <iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/wPzTZ61Pcuc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
11780
11781       </div>
11782       <div class="tags">
11783
11784
11785         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
11786
11787
11788       </div>
11789     </div>
11790     <div class="padding"></div>
11791
11792     <div class="entry">
11793       <div class="title">
11794         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Skolelinux___Debian_Edu_Squeeze_update_released.html">First Skolelinux / Debian Edu Squeeze update released</a>
11795       </div>
11796       <div class="date">
11797          8th March 2013
11798       </div>
11799       <div class="body">
11800         <p>Last Sunday, 2013-03-03,, Holger Levsen announced the first update
11801 of <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a>
11802 based on Debian Squeeze.  This is the first update since
11803 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/03/msg00001.html">the
11804 initial release 2012-03-11</a>.  This is the
11805 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2013/03/msg00000.html">release
11806 announcement email from Holger</a>:</p>
11807
11808 <blockquote><p>Hi,</p>
11809
11810 <p>it's my pleasure to announce the immediate availability of Debian
11811 Edu 6.0.7+r1 ("Debian Edu Squeeze").</p>
11812
11813 <p>Debian Edu 6.0.7+r1 is an incremental update to Debian Edu
11814 6.0.4+r0, containing all the changes between Debian 6.0.4 and 6.0.7 as
11815 well Debian Edu specific bugfixes and enhancements. See below (in this
11816 mail) for the full list of (edu) changes.  Please see
11817 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311">http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311</a>
11818 for more information on "Debian Edu Squeeze".</p>
11819
11820 <p>Images are available for download at
11821 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/</a></p>
11822
11823 <p>md5sums:
11824 <br>1fe79eb4f0f9ae1c58fc318e26cc1e2e  debian-edu-6.0.7+r1-CD.iso
11825 <br>a6ddd924a8bd9a1b5ca122e8fe1c34ec  debian-edu-6.0.7+r1-DVD.iso
11826 <br>ac6c72cd7925ccec51bfbf58e2a7c69c  debian-edu-6.0.7+r1-source-DVD.iso</p>
11827
11828 <p>sha1sums:
11829 <br>a4b58233b672a99c7df8dc24fb6de3327654a5c3  debian-edu-6.0.7+r1-CD.iso
11830 <br>9b524915e0ff2aa793f13d93123e5bd2bab2dbaa  debian-edu-6.0.7+r1-DVD.iso
11831 <br>43997614893fc5e9e59ad6ce066b05d07fd836fa  debian-edu-6.0.7+r1-source-DVD.iso</p>
11832
11833 <p>These images are suitable for amd64+i386.</p>
11834
11835 <p>Changes for Debian Edu 6.0.7+r1 Codename "Squeeze", released
11836 2013-03-03:</p>
11837
11838 <ul>
11839   <li>sitesummary was updated from 0.1.3 to 0.1.8
11840   <ul>
11841         <li>Make Nagios configuration more robust and efficient</li>
11842         <li>Comply with 3.X kernel</li>
11843   </ul></li>
11844   <li>debian-edu-doc from 1.4~20120310~6.0.4+r0 to 1.4~20130228~6.0.7+r1
11845   <ul>
11846         <li>Minor updates from the wiki</li>
11847         <li>Danish translation now complete</li>
11848   </ul></li>
11849   <li>debian-edu-config from 1.453 to 1.455
11850      <ul>
11851         <li>Fix /etc/hosts for LTSP diskless workstations. Closes: #699880</li>
11852         <li>Make ltsp_local_mount script work for multiple devices.</li>
11853         <li>Correct Kerberos user policy: don't expire password after 2 days.
11854                 Closes: #664596</li>
11855         <li>Handle '#' characters in the root or first users password.
11856                 Closes: #664976</li>
11857         <li>Fixes for gosa-sync:
11858            <ul>
11859                 <li>Don't fail if password contains "</li>
11860                 <li>Don't disclose new password string in syslog</li>
11861            </ul></li>
11862         <li>Fixes for gosa-create:
11863            <ul>
11864                 <li>Invalidate libnss cache before applying changes</li>
11865                 <li>Multiple failures during mass user import into GOsa²</li>
11866                 <li>gosa-netgroups plugin: don't erase entries of attribute type
11867                          "memberNisNetgroup". Closes: #687256</li>
11868                 <li>First user now uses the same Kerberos policy as all other users</li>
11869            </ul></li>
11870         <li>Add Danish web page</li>
11871     </ul>
11872   <li>debian-edu-install from 1.528 to 1.530
11873     <ul>
11874         <li>Improve preseeding support and documentation</li>
11875     </ul></li>
11876 </ul>
11877
11878 <p>End-user documentation in English is available at
11879 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze/">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze/</a>
11880 - translations to French, Italian, Danish and German are available in
11881 the debian-edu-doc package. (Other languages could use your help!)</p>
11882
11883 <p>If you want to contribute to Debian Edu, please join our
11884 mailinglist
11885 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/">debian-edu@lists.debian.org</a>!
11886 </p></blockquote>
11887
11888 <p>I am very happy to see the fruits of a year of hard work. :)</p>
11889
11890       </div>
11891       <div class="tags">
11892
11893
11894         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
11895
11896
11897       </div>
11898     </div>
11899     <div class="padding"></div>
11900
11901     <div class="entry">
11902       <div class="title">
11903         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Frikanalen___Complete_TV_station_organised_using_the_web.html">Frikanalen - Complete TV station organised using the web</a>
11904       </div>
11905       <div class="date">
11906          3rd March 2013
11907       </div>
11908       <div class="body">
11909         <p>Do you want to set up your own TV station, schedule videos and
11910 broadcast them on the air?  Using free software?  With video on demand
11911 support using
11912 <a href="http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition">free and
11913 open standards</a>?  Included a web based video stream as well?  And
11914 administrate it all in your web browser from anywhere in the world?  A
11915 few years now the Norwegian public access TV-channel
11916 <a href="http://www.frikanalen.no/">Frikanalen</a> have been building a
11917 system to do just this.  The source code for the solution is licensed
11918 using the GNU LGPL, and
11919 <a href="http://github.com/Frikanalen">available from github</a>.</p>
11920
11921 <p>The idea is simple.  You upload a video file over the web, and
11922 attach meta information to the file.  You select a time slot in the
11923 program schedule, and when the time come it is played on the air and
11924 in the web stream.  It is also made available in a video on demand
11925 solution for anyone to see it also outside its scheduled time.  All
11926 you need to run a TV station - using your web browser.</p>
11927
11928 <p>There are several parts to this web based solution.  I'll mention
11929 the three most important ones.  The first part is the database of
11930 videos and the schedule.  This is written in Django and include a REST
11931 API.  The current database is SQLite, but the plan is to migrate it to
11932 PostgreSQL.  At the moment this system can be tested on
11933 <a href="http://beta.frikanalen.tv/">beta.frikanalen.tv</a>.  The
11934 second part is the video playout, taking the schedule information from
11935 the database and providing a video stream to broadcast.  This is done
11936 using <a href="http://www.casparcg.com/">CasparCG from SVT</a> and
11937 <a href="http://www.mltframework.org/">Media Lovin' Toolkit</a>.  Video
11938 signal distribution is handled using
11939 <a href="http://www.ob-encoder.com/">Open Broadcast Encoder</a>.  The
11940 third part is the converter, handling the transformation of uploaded
11941 video files to a format useful for broadcasting, streaming and video
11942 on demand.  It is still very much work in progress, so it is not yet
11943 decided what it will end up using.  Note that the source of the latter
11944 two parts are not yet pushed to github.  The lead author want to clean
11945 them up a bit more first.</p>
11946
11947 <p>The development is coordinated on the
11948 <a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/%23frikanalen">#frikanalen IRC
11949 channel</a> (irc.freenode.net), and discussed on
11950 <a href="http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/frikanalen">the
11951 frikanalen mailing list</a>. The lead developer is Benjamin Bruheim
11952 (phed on IRC).  Anyone is welcome to participate in the
11953 development.</p>
11954
11955       </div>
11956       <div class="tags">
11957
11958
11959         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
11960
11961
11962       </div>
11963     </div>
11964     <div class="padding"></div>
11965
11966     <div class="entry">
11967       <div class="title">
11968         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dr__Richard_Stallman__founder_of_Free_Software_Foundation__give_a_talk_in_Oslo_March_1st_2013.html">Dr. Richard Stallman, founder of Free Software Foundation, give a talk in Oslo March 1st 2013</a>
11969       </div>
11970       <div class="date">
11971         27th February 2013
11972       </div>
11973       <div class="body">
11974         <p>Dr. <a href="http://www.stallman.org/">Richard Stallman</a>,
11975 founder of <a href="http://www.fsf.org/">Free Software Foundation</a>,
11976 is giving <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20130301-rms/">a
11977 talk in Oslo March 1st 2013 17:00 to 19:00</a>.  The event is public
11978 and organised by <a href="">Norwegian Unix Users Group (NUUG)</a>
11979 (where I am the chair of the board) and
11980 <a href="http://www.friprog.no/">The Norwegian Open Source Competence
11981 Center</a>.  The title of the talk is «The Free Software Movement and
11982 GNU», with this description:
11983
11984 <p><blockquote>
11985 The Free Software Movement campaigns for computer users' freedom to
11986 cooperate and control their own computing. The Free Software Movement
11987 developed the GNU operating system, typically used together with the
11988 kernel Linux, specifically to make these freedoms possible.
11989 </blockquote></p>
11990
11991 <p>The meeting is open for everyone.  Due to space limitations, the
11992 doors opens for NUUG members at 16:15, and everyone else at 16:45.  I
11993 am really curious how many will show up.  See
11994 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20130301-rms/">the event
11995 page</a> for the location details.</p>
11996
11997       </div>
11998       <div class="tags">
11999
12000
12001         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
12002
12003
12004       </div>
12005     </div>
12006     <div class="padding"></div>
12007
12008     <div class="entry">
12009       <div class="title">
12010         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Frikart___Free_Garmin_maps_for_European_countries_based_on_OpenStreetmap.html">Frikart - Free Garmin maps for European countries based on OpenStreetmap</a>
12011       </div>
12012       <div class="date">
12013         15th February 2013
12014       </div>
12015       <div class="body">
12016         <p>If you, like me, want an updated a map for your Garmin GPS, there is
12017 now a great source of free maps available from
12018 <a href="http://www.frikart.no/garmin/index.html">Frikart</a>.  To
12019 download a map, just click on the country you are interested in, and
12020 download the map type you want.  There are 8 different maps available,
12021 using different colours and data selection.  Pick one of Roadmap, Topo
12022 Summer, Topo Winter, Roadmap II, Topo Summer II, Topo Winter II,
12023 "Trails - overlay map" and "Cross country - overlay map" (see the web
12024 page for descriptions).</p>
12025
12026 <p>The maps are updated weekly, so if you find something wrong in the
12027 map you can just edit the
12028 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> map source
12029 (anyone can contribute) and fetch a fixed map a week later. :)</p>
12030
12031       </div>
12032       <div class="tags">
12033
12034
12035         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart</a>.
12036
12037
12038       </div>
12039     </div>
12040     <div class="padding"></div>
12041
12042     <div class="entry">
12043       <div class="title">
12044         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_Electronic__paper_invoices___using_vCard_in_a_QR_code.html">"Electronic" paper invoices - using vCard in a QR code</a>
12045       </div>
12046       <div class="date">
12047         12th February 2013
12048       </div>
12049       <div class="body">
12050         <p>Here in Norway, electronic invoices are spreading, and the
12051 <a href="http://www.anskaffelser.no/e-handel/faktura">solution promoted
12052 by the Norwegian government</a> require that invoices are sent through
12053 one of the approved facilitators, and it is not possible to send
12054 electronic invoices without an agreement with one of these
12055 facilitators.  This seem like a needless limitation to be able to
12056 transfer invoice information between buyers and sellers.  My preferred
12057 solution would be to just transfer the invoice information directly
12058 between seller and buyer, for example using SMTP, or some HTTP based
12059 protocol like REST or SOAP.  But this might also be overkill, as the
12060 "electronic" information can be transferred using paper invoices too,
12061 using a simple bar code.  My bar code encoding of choice would be QR
12062 codes, as this encoding can be read by any smart phone out there.  The
12063 content of the code could be anything, but I would go with
12064 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VCard">the vCard format</a>, as
12065 it too is supported by a lot of computer equipment these days.</p>
12066
12067 <p>The vCard format support extentions, and the invoice specific
12068 information can be included using such extentions.  For example an
12069 invoice from SLX Debian Labs (picked because we
12070 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">ask
12071 for donations to the Debian Edu project</a> and thus have bank account
12072 information publicly available) for NOK 1000.00 could have these extra
12073 fields:</p>
12074
12075 <p><pre>
12076 X-INVOICE-NUMBER:1
12077 X-INVOICE-AMOUNT:NOK1000.00
12078 X-INVOICE-KID:123412341234
12079 X-INVOICE-MSG:Donation to Debian Edu
12080 X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER:16040884339
12081 X-BANK-IBAN-NUMBER:NO8516040884339
12082 X-BANK-SWIFT-NUMBER:DNBANOKKXXX
12083 </pre></p>
12084
12085 <p>The X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER field was proposed in a stackoverflow
12086 answer regarding
12087 <a href="http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10045664/storing-bank-account-in-vcard-file">how
12088 to put bank account information into a vCard</a>.  For payments in
12089 Norway, either X-INVOICE-KID (payment ID) or X-INVOICE-MSG could be
12090 used to pass on information to the seller when paying the invoice.</p>
12091
12092 <p>The complete vCard could look like this:</p>
12093
12094 <p><pre>
12095 BEGIN:VCARD
12096 VERSION:2.1
12097 ORG:SLX Debian Labs Foundation
12098 ADR;WORK:;;Gunnar Schjelderups vei 29D;OSLO;;0485;Norway
12099 URL;WORK:http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/
12100 EMAIL;PREF;INTERNET:sdl-styret@rt.nuug.no
12101 REV:20130212T095000Z
12102 X-INVOICE-NUMBER:1
12103 X-INVOICE-AMOUNT:NOK1000.00
12104 X-INVOICE-MSG:Donation to Debian Edu
12105 X-BANK-ACCOUNT-NUMBER:16040884339
12106 X-BANK-IBAN-NUMBER:NO8516040884339
12107 X-BANK-SWIFT-NUMBER:DNBANOKKXXX
12108 END:VCARD
12109 </pre></p>
12110
12111 <p>The resulting QR code created using
12112 <a href="http://fukuchi.org/works/qrencode/">qrencode</a> would look
12113 like this, and should be readable (and thus checkable) by any smart
12114 phone, or for example the <a href="http://zbar.sourceforge.net/">zbar
12115 bar code reader</a> and feed right into the approval and accounting
12116 system.</p>
12117
12118 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-02-12-qr-invoice.png"></p>
12119
12120 <p>The extension fields will most likely not show up in any normal
12121 vCard reader, so those parts would have to go directly into a system
12122 handling invoices.  I am a bit unsure how vCards without name parts
12123 are handled, but a simple test indicate that this work just fine.</p>
12124
12125 <p><strong>Update 2013-02-12 11:30</strong>: Added KID to the proposal
12126 based on feedback from Sturle Sunde.</p>
12127
12128       </div>
12129       <div class="tags">
12130
12131
12132         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
12133
12134
12135       </div>
12136     </div>
12137     <div class="padding"></div>
12138
12139     <div class="entry">
12140       <div class="title">
12141         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sleep_until_morning___home_automation_for_the_kids.html">Sleep until morning - home automation for the kids</a>
12142       </div>
12143       <div class="date">
12144         10th February 2013
12145       </div>
12146       <div class="body">
12147         <p><img align="left" style="margin-right:25px;" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-02-10-morning-light.jpeg"></p>
12148
12149 <p>With kids in the house, one challenge is getting them to sleep
12150 during the night and wake up when it is morning.  I mean, when I
12151 believe it is morning, and not two hours earlier.  In our household we
12152 have decided that 07:00 is the turning point, but getting the kids to
12153 sleep until 07:00 is a small challenge every day.  They have adapted
12154 quite well, and rarely wake up at 05:00 any more, but some times wake
12155 up at times like 05:50, 06:15, 06:30 or 06:45, and it is hard to put
12156 the awake one to bed again without disturbing and waking the rest.
12157 And I understand perfectly well that they fail to sleep until 07:00
12158 some times, as there is no way for them to know if it is before or
12159 after the magic moment without coming and asking us parents.</p>
12160
12161 <p>But yesterday I came up with a method to solve this problem.  It
12162 involve home automation.  A few years ago I bought a
12163 <a href="http://www.telldus.se/products/tellstick">Tellstick</a> and RF
12164 switches at the local <a href="http://www.clasohlson.com/">Clas
12165 Ohlson</a> shop, allowing me to control lights and other electrical
12166 gadgets using my Linux server.  When I moved from the old flat to a
12167 small house, I put away all this equipment as most of the lighting in
12168 the house was not using wall sockets and thus not easy to connect to
12169 the gadgets I had.  But recently I bought a
12170 <a href="http://www.telldus.se/products/tellstick_net">Tellstick
12171 Net</a> to be able to read sensor input as well as control power
12172 sockets.  I want to control ovens in the basement to avoid the pipes
12173 to freeze, and monitor the humidity to detect flooding.  The default
12174 setup for Tellstick Net is to be controlled by the vendor web service,
12175 which to me is a security problem, but it is also possible to build
12176 ones own
12177 <a href="http://developer.telldus.com/blog/2012/03/02/help-us-develop-local-access-using-tellstick-net-build-your-own-firmware">firmware
12178 with local access</A> instead of being controlled by a Swedish
12179 company, thanks to the release of the GPL licensed firmware source
12180 code.  I plan to get that running before I let it control anything
12181 important.  But while working on this, one idea to make it easier for
12182 the kids came to me yesterday.  We can set up a night light controlled
12183 by the computer, and turn it automatically on at 07:00.  The kids can
12184 then check the light in the morning to know if they are supposed to
12185 get up or not.  They joined me in setting everything up, and I
12186 repeated the concept several times before bed times to make sure they
12187 remembered to check the light before getting up in the morning.</p>
12188
12189 <p>We tested it this morning, and all the kids stayed in bed until
12190 after 07:00, and every one of them commented on the fact that the
12191 "morning light" was turned on and signalled that the morning had
12192 arrived.  So this look like a success, and I am excited to see how
12193 this develops the next few days. :) I really hope this can allow us
12194 all to sleep a bit longer in the morning.</p>
12195
12196 <p>A nice advantage of this setup is that we can remote control when
12197 to tell the kids to get up.  We do not have to wait until 07:00, and
12198 can also delay it if we want to.</p>
12199
12200       </div>
12201       <div class="tags">
12202
12203
12204         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12205
12206
12207       </div>
12208     </div>
12209     <div class="padding"></div>
12210
12211     <div class="entry">
12212       <div class="title">
12213         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Bitcoin_GUI_now_available_from_Debian_unstable__and_Ubuntu_raring_.html">Bitcoin GUI now available from Debian/unstable (and Ubuntu/raring)</a>
12214       </div>
12215       <div class="date">
12216          2nd February 2013
12217       </div>
12218       <div class="body">
12219         <p>My
12220 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
12221 bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
12222 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
12223 Debian was waiting in NEW.  It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
12224 2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then.  It was
12225 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
12226 version too.</p>
12227
12228 <p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
12229 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
12230 architectures.  For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
12231 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
12232 architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
12233 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
12234 no-one have been able to propose a fix.  If you got an idea what is
12235 failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
12236
12237 <p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
12238 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
12239 if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
12240 #696715</a>).  So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
12241 it. :)</p>
12242
12243 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
12244 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
12245 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
12246
12247       </div>
12248       <div class="tags">
12249
12250
12251         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12252
12253
12254       </div>
12255     </div>
12256     <div class="padding"></div>
12257
12258     <div class="entry">
12259       <div class="title">
12260         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a>
12261       </div>
12262       <div class="date">
12263         22nd January 2013
12264       </div>
12265       <div class="body">
12266         <p>Yesterday, I
12267 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
12268 for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
12269 pluggable hardware devices, which I
12270 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
12271 out to create</a> earlier this month.  Several valuable testers showed
12272 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
12273 people.  But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
12274 for this project.  Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
12275 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name.  In the
12276 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
12277 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
12278 repository in Debian.  The new name?  It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
12279 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
12280
12281 <pre>
12282 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
12283 cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
12284 </pre>
12285
12286 <p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet.  If you
12287 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
12288 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
12289 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
12290
12291 <p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
12292 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc.  Typical hardware
12293 stuff, in other words.  I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
12294 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
12295 word.</p>
12296
12297 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
12298 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
12299 process.</p>
12300
12301 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
12302 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
12303
12304       </div>
12305       <div class="tags">
12306
12307
12308         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
12309
12310
12311       </div>
12312     </div>
12313     <div class="padding"></div>
12314
12315     <div class="entry">
12316       <div class="title">
12317         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">First prototype ready making hardware easier to use in Debian</a>
12318       </div>
12319       <div class="date">
12320         21st January 2013
12321       </div>
12322       <div class="body">
12323         <p>Early this month I set out to try to
12324 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
12325 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>.  Now my
12326 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience.  To test
12327 it, fetch the
12328 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
12329 from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
12330 package.  You might have to log out and in again activate the
12331 autostart script.</p>
12332
12333 <p>The design is simple:</p>
12334
12335 <ul>
12336
12337 <li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
12338 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
12339
12340 <li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
12341 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
12342 initially did.</li>
12343
12344 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
12345 the APT database, a database
12346 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
12347 via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
12348
12349 <li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
12350 isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
12351 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
12352 package or packages.</li>
12353
12354 <li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
12355 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
12356
12357 <li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
12358 package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
12359
12360 </ul>
12361
12362 <p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system.  Here
12363 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action.  First the
12364 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
12365 approve all the dependencies.  Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
12366
12367 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
12368 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
12369 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
12370 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
12371 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
12372
12373 <p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
12374 is already useful.  The database of hardware to package mappings also
12375 need more work.  It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
12376 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
12377 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
12378 method.  I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
12379 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
12380 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
12381
12382 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
12383 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
12384 '<tt>svn checkout
12385 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
12386 hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'.  If you lack debuild, install the
12387 devscripts package.</p>
12388
12389 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
12390 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
12391 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository.  See
12392 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
12393 instructions</a> for details.</p>
12394
12395       </div>
12396       <div class="tags">
12397
12398
12399         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
12400
12401
12402       </div>
12403     </div>
12404     <div class="padding"></div>
12405
12406     <div class="entry">
12407       <div class="title">
12408         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">Thank you Thinkpad X41, for your long and trustworthy service</a>
12409       </div>
12410       <div class="date">
12411         19th January 2013
12412       </div>
12413       <div class="body">
12414         <p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died.  It died quietly and
12415 suddenly in bed.  With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
12416 black.  The power button was no longer able to turn it on.  It was a
12417 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had.  Better than both
12418 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S.  Far better than the
12419 Compaq I had before that.  Now I need to find a replacement.  To keep
12420 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
12421 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
12422 not a durable solution.
12423
12424 <p>My laptop needs are fairly modest.  This is my wishlist from when I
12425 got a new one more than 10 years ago.  It still holds true.:)</p>
12426
12427 <ul>
12428
12429 <li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
12430   than A4).</li>
12431 <li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
12432 <li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
12433 <li>Long battery life time.  Preferable a week.</li>
12434 <li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
12435 <li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
12436 <li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
12437 <li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
12438 <li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
12439 size).</li>
12440 <li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
12441   X.org packages.</li>
12442 <li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
12443   the time).
12444
12445 </ul>
12446
12447 <p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
12448 list.  The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
12449 last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
12450 at other features to choose my laptop.  But are there still made as
12451 robust laptops as my X41?  The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
12452 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
12453 Lenovo took over.  But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
12454 still be useful.</p>
12455
12456 <p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
12457 external keyboard?  I'll have to check the
12458 <a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
12459 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
12460 of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
12461 Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
12462
12463       </div>
12464       <div class="tags">
12465
12466
12467         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12468
12469
12470       </div>
12471     </div>
12472     <div class="padding"></div>
12473
12474     <div class="entry">
12475       <div class="title">
12476         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_find_a_browser_plugin_supporting_a_given_MIME_type.html">How to find a browser plugin supporting a given MIME type</a>
12477       </div>
12478       <div class="date">
12479         18th January 2013
12480       </div>
12481       <div class="body">
12482         <p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
12483 install to get support for a given MIME type.  Thanks to
12484 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
12485 done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
12486 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
12487 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
12488 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
12489
12490 <pre>
12491 #!/usr/bin/python
12492 import sys
12493 import apt
12494 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
12495     cache = apt.Cache()
12496     cache.open(None)
12497     thepkgs = []
12498     for pkg in cache:
12499         version = pkg.candidate
12500         if version is None:
12501             version = pkg.installed
12502         if version is None:
12503             continue
12504         record = version.record
12505         if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
12506             continue
12507         mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
12508         for t in mime_types:
12509             t = t.rstrip().strip()
12510             if t == mimetype:
12511                 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
12512     return thepkgs
12513 mimetype = "audio/ogg"
12514 if 1 < len(sys.argv):
12515     mimetype = sys.argv[1]
12516 print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
12517 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
12518     print "  %s" %pkg
12519 </pre>
12520
12521 <p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
12522
12523 <pre>
12524 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
12525 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
12526   gecko-mediaplayer
12527 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
12528 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
12529   browser-plugin-gnash
12530 %
12531 </pre>
12532
12533 <p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
12534 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
12535 packages.  It would be great if Debian supported such feature too.  Is
12536 anyone working on adding it?</p>
12537
12538 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
12539 request for icweasel support for this feature is
12540 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
12541 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today).  Lack
12542 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
12543 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
12544
12545       </div>
12546       <div class="tags">
12547
12548
12549         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12550
12551
12552       </div>
12553     </div>
12554     <div class="padding"></div>
12555
12556     <div class="entry">
12557       <div class="title">
12558         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_.html">What is the most supported MIME type in Debian?</a>
12559       </div>
12560       <div class="date">
12561         16th January 2013
12562       </div>
12563       <div class="body">
12564         <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
12565 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
12566 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
12567 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
12568 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing.  With such
12569 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
12570 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
12571 downloaded by the browser.</p>
12572
12573 <p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
12574 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
12575 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there.  The result
12576 can be found on the
12577 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
12578 site</a>.  Using the collected information, it become possible to
12579 answer the question in the title.  Here are the 20 most supported MIME
12580 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
12581 The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
12582
12583 <p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
12584
12585 <pre>
12586   count MIME type
12587   ----- -----------------------
12588      32 text/plain
12589      30 audio/mpeg
12590      29 image/png
12591      28 image/jpeg
12592      27 application/ogg
12593      26 audio/x-mp3
12594      25 image/tiff
12595      25 image/gif
12596      22 image/bmp
12597      22 audio/x-wav
12598      20 audio/x-flac
12599      19 audio/x-mpegurl
12600      18 video/x-ms-asf
12601      18 audio/x-musepack
12602      18 audio/x-mpeg
12603      18 application/x-ogg
12604      17 video/mpeg
12605      17 audio/x-scpls
12606      17 audio/ogg
12607      16 video/x-ms-wmv
12608 </pre>
12609
12610 <p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
12611
12612 <pre>
12613   count MIME type
12614   ----- -----------------------
12615      33 text/plain
12616      32 image/png
12617      32 image/jpeg
12618      29 audio/mpeg
12619      27 image/gif
12620      26 image/tiff
12621      26 application/ogg
12622      25 audio/x-mp3
12623      22 image/bmp
12624      21 audio/x-wav
12625      19 audio/x-mpegurl
12626      19 audio/x-mpeg
12627      18 video/mpeg
12628      18 audio/x-scpls
12629      18 audio/x-flac
12630      18 application/x-ogg
12631      17 video/x-ms-asf
12632      17 text/html
12633      17 audio/x-musepack
12634      16 image/x-xbitmap
12635 </pre>
12636
12637 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
12638
12639 <pre>
12640   count MIME type
12641   ----- -----------------------
12642      31 text/plain
12643      31 image/png
12644      31 image/jpeg
12645      29 audio/mpeg
12646      28 application/ogg
12647      27 image/gif
12648      26 image/tiff
12649      26 audio/x-mp3
12650      23 audio/x-wav
12651      22 image/bmp
12652      21 audio/x-flac
12653      20 audio/x-mpegurl
12654      19 audio/x-mpeg
12655      18 video/x-ms-asf
12656      18 video/mpeg
12657      18 audio/x-scpls
12658      18 application/x-ogg
12659      17 audio/x-musepack
12660      16 video/x-ms-wmv
12661      16 video/x-msvideo
12662 </pre>
12663
12664 <p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
12665 information mentioned in DEP-11.  I have not yet had time to look at
12666 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
12667 issues.</p>
12668
12669 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
12670 discovering a typo in my script.</p>
12671
12672       </div>
12673       <div class="tags">
12674
12675
12676         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
12677
12678
12679       </div>
12680     </div>
12681     <div class="padding"></div>
12682
12683     <div class="entry">
12684       <div class="title">
12685         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_modalias_info_to_find_packages_handling_my_hardware.html">Using modalias info to find packages handling my hardware</a>
12686       </div>
12687       <div class="date">
12688         15th January 2013
12689       </div>
12690       <div class="body">
12691         <p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
12692 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
12693 values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
12694 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
12695 dongle support in Debian</a>.  Using this knowledge, I have tested how
12696 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
12697 to hardware.  This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
12698 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
12699 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
12700 packages.</p>
12701
12702 <p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
12703 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
12704 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
12705 modalias.</p>
12706
12707 <p><blockquote>
12708 Package: package-name
12709 <br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
12710 </blockquote></p>
12711
12712 <p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
12713 for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
12714
12715 <p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
12716 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
12717
12718 <p><blockquote>
12719 Package: cheese
12720 <br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
12721 </blockquote></p>
12722
12723 <p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
12724 CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
12725
12726 <p><blockquote>
12727 Package: pcmciautils
12728 <br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
12729 </blockquote></p>
12730
12731 <p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
12732 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
12733
12734 <p><blockquote>
12735 Package: colorhug-client
12736 <br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
12737 </blockquote></p>
12738
12739 <p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
12740 file in the Debian archive.  Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
12741 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
12742
12743 <p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
12744 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
12745 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
12746 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
12747 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information.  I've
12748 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
12749 is working as it should with my prototype.  It even made it to Ubuntu
12750 Raring.</p>
12751
12752 <p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
12753 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
12754 implementation of the lookup code.  The idea is to create files for
12755 each modalias and let the shell do the matching.  Please check out and
12756 try the
12757 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
12758 shell script.  It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
12759 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
12760 repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
12761
12762 <p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
12763 install yubikey-personalization:</p>
12764
12765 <p><blockquote>
12766 % ./hw-support-lookup
12767 <br>yubikey-personalization
12768 <br>%
12769 </blockquote></p>
12770
12771 <p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
12772 propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
12773
12774 <p><blockquote>
12775 % ./hw-support-lookup
12776 <br>pcmciautils
12777 <br>%
12778 </blockquote></p>
12779
12780 <p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
12781 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
12782 database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
12783
12784 <p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
12785 packages and hardware.  One source would be to look at packages with
12786 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
12787 extract their modalias information.  Another would be to look at
12788 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
12789 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
12790 generate a modalias matching rule.  I have not tested any of these to
12791 see if it work.</p>
12792
12793 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
12794 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
12795 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
12796 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
12797
12798       </div>
12799       <div class="tags">
12800
12801
12802         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
12803
12804
12805       </div>
12806     </div>
12807     <div class="padding"></div>
12808
12809     <div class="entry">
12810       <div class="title">
12811         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">Modalias strings - a practical way to map "stuff" to hardware</a>
12812       </div>
12813       <div class="date">
12814         14th January 2013
12815       </div>
12816       <div class="body">
12817         <p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
12818 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
12819 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
12820 to document the details.  Here are my findings so far, also available
12821 in
12822 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
12823 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
12824
12825 <p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
12826
12827 <p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
12828 values stands for.  It is in part based on information from
12829 &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> &gt;,
12830 &lt;URL: <a href="http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/26132/how-to-assign-usb-driver-to-device">http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/26132/how-to-assign-usb-driver-to-device</a> &gt;,
12831 &lt;URL: <a href="http://code.metager.de/source/history/linux/stable/scripts/mod/file2alias.c">http://code.metager.de/source/history/linux/stable/scripts/mod/file2alias.c</a> &gt; and
12832 &lt;URL: <a href="http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/dmidecode/dmidecode.c?root=dmidecode&view=markup">http://cvs.savannah.gnu.org/viewvc/dmidecode/dmidecode.c?root=dmidecode&view=markup</a> &gt;.
12833
12834 <p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
12835 this shell script:</p>
12836
12837 <pre>
12838 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
12839 </pre>
12840
12841 <p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
12842 using modinfo:</p>
12843
12844 <pre>
12845 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
12846 alias:          serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
12847 alias:          serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
12848 %
12849 </pre>
12850
12851 <p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
12852
12853 <p>A typical PCI entry can look like this.  This is an Intel Host
12854 Bridge memory controller:</p>
12855
12856 <p><blockquote>
12857 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
12858 </blockquote></p>
12859
12860 <p>This represent these values:</p>
12861
12862 <pre>
12863  v   00008086  (vendor)
12864  d   00002770  (device)
12865  sv  00001028  (subvendor)
12866  sd  000001AD  (subdevice)
12867  bc  06        (bus class)
12868  sc  00        (bus subclass)
12869  i   00        (interface)
12870 </pre>
12871
12872 <p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
12873 -n' as 8086:2770.  The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
12874 0600.  The 0600 class is a host bridge.  Other useful bus values are
12875 0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
12876
12877 <p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
12878 means.</p>
12879
12880 <p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
12881
12882 <p>Some typical USB entries can look like this.  This is an internal
12883 USB hub in a laptop:</p>
12884
12885 <p><blockquote>
12886 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
12887 </blockquote></p>
12888
12889 <p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
12890
12891 <pre>
12892  v    1D6B  (device vendor)
12893  p    0001  (device product)
12894  d    0206  (bcddevice)
12895  dc     09  (device class)
12896  dsc    00  (device subclass)
12897  dp     00  (device protocol)
12898  ic     09  (interface class)
12899  isc    00  (interface subclass)
12900  ip     00  (interface protocol)
12901 </pre>
12902
12903 <p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub.  Some times the relevant
12904 class is in the interface class section.  For a simple USB web camera,
12905 these alias entries show up:</p>
12906
12907 <p><blockquote>
12908 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
12909 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
12910 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
12911 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
12912 </blockquote></p>
12913
12914 <p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
12915 camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
12916 microphone).  Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
12917
12918 <p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
12919
12920 <p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff.  This is an IR
12921 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
12922
12923 <p><blockquote>
12924 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
12925 </blockquote></p>
12926
12927 <p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
12928
12929 <p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
12930
12931 <p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
12932 and model.  This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
12933 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
12934
12935 <p><blockquote>
12936 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
12937 </blockquote></p>
12938
12939 <p>The values present are</p>
12940
12941 <pre>
12942  bvn  IBM            (BIOS vendor)
12943  bvr  1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
12944  bd   06/15/2005     (BIOS date)
12945  svn  IBM            (system vendor)
12946  pn   2371H4G        (product name)
12947  pvr  ThinkPadX40    (product version)
12948  rvn  IBM            (board vendor)
12949  rn   2371H4G        (board name)
12950  rvr  NotAvailable   (board version)
12951  cvn  IBM            (chassis vendor)
12952  ct   10             (chassis type)
12953  cvr  NotAvailable   (chassis version)
12954 </pre>
12955
12956 <p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook.  Other interesting values can be
12957 found in the dmidecode source:</p>
12958
12959 <pre>
12960   3 Desktop
12961   4 Low Profile Desktop
12962   5 Pizza Box
12963   6 Mini Tower
12964   7 Tower
12965   8 Portable
12966   9 Laptop
12967  10 Notebook
12968  11 Hand Held
12969  12 Docking Station
12970  13 All In One
12971  14 Sub Notebook
12972  15 Space-saving
12973  16 Lunch Box
12974  17 Main Server Chassis
12975  18 Expansion Chassis
12976  19 Sub Chassis
12977  20 Bus Expansion Chassis
12978  21 Peripheral Chassis
12979  22 RAID Chassis
12980  23 Rack Mount Chassis
12981  24 Sealed-case PC
12982  25 Multi-system
12983  26 CompactPCI
12984  27 AdvancedTCA
12985  28 Blade
12986  29 Blade Enclosing
12987 </pre>
12988
12989 <p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
12990 table.  For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
12991 claim it is a desktop.</p>
12992
12993 <p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
12994
12995 <p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs.  One example is from my
12996 test machine:</p>
12997
12998 <p><blockquote>
12999 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
13000 </blockquote></p>
13001
13002 <p>The values present are</p>
13003
13004 <pre>
13005   ty  01  (type)
13006   pr  00  (prototype)
13007   id  00  (id)
13008   ex  00  (extra)
13009 </pre>
13010
13011 <p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver.  I am not sure what
13012 the valid values are.</p>
13013
13014 <p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
13015
13016 <p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
13017 file2alias.c.  There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
13018 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
13019 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
13020 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro.  I did not spend time documenting all of
13021 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
13022 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
13023
13024 <p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
13025
13026 <p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
13027 one can use the following shell script:</p>
13028
13029 <pre>
13030   for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
13031     echo "$id" ; \
13032     /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/  /' ; \
13033   done
13034 </pre>
13035
13036 <p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
13037 list is very long on my test machine):</p>
13038
13039 <pre>
13040   acpi:ACPI0003:
13041     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
13042   acpi:device:
13043   FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
13044   acpi:IBM0068:
13045     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
13046     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
13047     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
13048     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
13049   acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
13050     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
13051     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
13052     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
13053   [...]
13054 </pre>
13055
13056 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
13057 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
13058 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
13059 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
13060
13061 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
13062 "find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
13063 in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
13064
13065       </div>
13066       <div class="tags">
13067
13068
13069         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
13070
13071
13072       </div>
13073     </div>
13074     <div class="padding"></div>
13075
13076     <div class="entry">
13077       <div class="title">
13078         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Moved_the_pymissile_Debian_packaging_to_collab_maint.html">Moved the pymissile Debian packaging to collab-maint</a>
13079       </div>
13080       <div class="date">
13081         10th January 2013
13082       </div>
13083       <div class="body">
13084         <p>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
13085 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
13086 Launcher and updated the Debian package
13087 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">pymissile</a> to make
13088 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in.  I
13089 also added a "Modaliases" header to test it in the Debian archive and
13090 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
13091 plug in his rocket launcher.  In the process I moved the source to a
13092 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
13093 contribute.  <a href="http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/">Upstream</a>
13094 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
13095 years of relative silence.  The new git repository is not listed in
13096 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
13097 bit more before I upload the new version.  If you want to check out
13098 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
13099 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git">gitweb
13100 view</a> or use "<tt>git clone
13101 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git</tt>".</p>
13102
13103       </div>
13104       <div class="tags">
13105
13106
13107         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
13108
13109
13110       </div>
13111     </div>
13112     <div class="padding"></div>
13113
13114     <div class="entry">
13115       <div class="title">
13116         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">Lets make hardware dongles easier to use in Debian</a>
13117       </div>
13118       <div class="date">
13119          9th January 2013
13120       </div>
13121       <div class="body">
13122         <p>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
13123 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
13124 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
13125 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
13126 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
13127 machine.  Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
13128 Linux distribution.  When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
13129 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
13130 I need to talk to it.  When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
13131 yubikey-personalization package.  The information required to do this
13132 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.</p>
13133
13134 <p>Some years ago, I proposed to
13135 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg01206.html">use
13136 the discover subsystem to implement this</a>.  The idea is fairly
13137 simple:
13138
13139 <ul>
13140
13141 <li>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
13142   starting when a user log in.</li>
13143
13144 <li>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
13145   hardware is inserted into the computer.</li>
13146
13147 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
13148   database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
13149   packages.</li>
13150
13151 <li>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
13152   package, and make it easy to install it.</li>
13153
13154 </ul>
13155
13156 <p>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
13157 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
13158 discover database to find packages and
13159 <a href="http://www.packagekit.org/">PackageKit</a> to install
13160 packages.</p>
13161
13162 <p>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
13163 draft package is now checked into
13164 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
13165 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>.  In the process, I updated the
13166 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html">discover-data</a>
13167 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
13168 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
13169 2.2013.01.09 to unstable.  I also discovered that the current
13170 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html">discover</a>
13171 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
13172 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present.  I ported it to use
13173 libusb as a fall back option to get it working.  The fixed package
13174 version 2.1.2-6 is now in experimental (didn't upload it to unstable
13175 because of the freeze).</p>
13176
13177 <p>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
13178 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
13179 inserted):</p>
13180
13181 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-09-hw-autoinstall.png"></p>
13182
13183 <p>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
13184 install the proposed packages by pressing the "Please install
13185 program(s)" button should to be implemented.</p>
13186
13187 <p>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
13188 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
13189 from hardware to Debian packages.  Check if 'discover-pkginstall -l'
13190 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
13191 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
13192 reportbug if it isn't.  Or, if you know of a better way to provide
13193 such mapping, please let me know.</p>
13194
13195 <p>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
13196 should be considered before it is ready for production use.  Is dbus
13197 the correct way to detect new hardware?  At the moment I look for HAL
13198 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
13199 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop.  Are there better events to use?
13200 How should the user be notified?  Is the desktop notification
13201 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
13202 popup instead?  How should packages be installed?  When should they
13203 not be installed?</p>
13204
13205 <p>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
13206 please send me an email. :)</p>
13207
13208       </div>
13209       <div class="tags">
13210
13211
13212         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.
13213
13214
13215       </div>
13216     </div>
13217     <div class="padding"></div>
13218
13219     <div class="entry">
13220       <div class="title">
13221         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">New IRC channel for LEGO designers using Debian</a>
13222       </div>
13223       <div class="date">
13224          2nd January 2013
13225       </div>
13226       <div class="body">
13227         <p>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
13228 <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx">LEGO Mindstorm
13229 NXT</a>.  My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
13230 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
13231 already in Debian Squeeze.  If Debian support for LEGO is something
13232 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
13233 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> (server
13234 irc.debian.org).  There is a lot that could be done to improve the
13235 Debian support for LEGO designers.  For example both CAD software
13236 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)</p>
13237
13238 <p>Update 2012-01-03: A
13239 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">project page</a>
13240 including links to Lego related packages is now available.</p>
13241
13242       </div>
13243       <div class="tags">
13244
13245
13246         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
13247
13248
13249       </div>
13250     </div>
13251     <div class="padding"></div>
13252
13253     <div class="entry">
13254       <div class="title">
13255         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Christmas_present_for_Skolelinux___Debian_Edu.html">A Christmas present for Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a>
13256       </div>
13257       <div class="date">
13258         28th December 2012
13259       </div>
13260       <div class="body">
13261         <p>I was happy to discover a few days ago that the
13262 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a>
13263 project also this year received a Christmas present from Another
13264 Agency in Trondheim.  NOK 1000,- showed up on our donation account
13265 December 24th.  I want to express our thanks for this very welcome
13266 present.  As the Debian Edu / Skolelinux project is very short on
13267 funding these days, and thus lack the money to do regular developer
13268 gatherings, this donation was most welcome.  One developer gathering
13269 cost around NOK 15&nbsp;000,-, so we need quite a lot more to keep the
13270 development pace we want.  Thus, I hope their example this year is
13271 followed by many others. :)</p>
13272
13273 <p>The public list of donors can be found on
13274 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">the
13275 donation page</a> for the project, which also contain instructions if
13276 you want to donate to the project.</p>
13277
13278       </div>
13279       <div class="tags">
13280
13281
13282         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
13283
13284
13285       </div>
13286     </div>
13287     <div class="padding"></div>
13288
13289     <div class="entry">
13290       <div class="title">
13291         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">How to backport bitcoin-qt version 0.7.2-2 to Debian Squeeze</a>
13292       </div>
13293       <div class="date">
13294         25th December 2012
13295       </div>
13296       <div class="body">
13297         <p>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
13298 year!  I hope next year will prove to be a good year.</p>
13299
13300 <p><a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">Bitcoin</a>, the digital
13301 decentralised "currency" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
13302 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
13303 experiment.  And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
13304 <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> is about to improve a bit.
13305 The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">new debian source
13306 package</a> (version 0.7.2-2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
13307 in <a href="http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW queue</A>
13308 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
13309 name.</p>
13310
13311 <p>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
13312 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
13313 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:</p>
13314
13315 <blockquote><pre>
13316 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
13317 cd bitcoin
13318 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
13319 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
13320 </pre></blockquote>
13321
13322 <p>You might have to install some build dependencies as well.  The
13323 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
13324 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment.  Note that the
13325 client will download the complete set of bitcoin "blocks", which need
13326 around 5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment.  Make sure your
13327 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
13328 all the blocks.  The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
13329 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
13330 not be able to get all the features out of the client.</p>
13331
13332 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
13333 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
13334 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
13335
13336       </div>
13337       <div class="tags">
13338
13339
13340         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
13341
13342
13343       </div>
13344     </div>
13345     <div class="padding"></div>
13346
13347     <div class="entry">
13348       <div class="title">
13349         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html">A word on bitcoin support in Debian</a>
13350       </div>
13351       <div class="date">
13352         21st December 2012
13353       </div>
13354       <div class="body">
13355         <p>It has been a while since I wrote about
13356 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>, the decentralised
13357 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
13358 have been busy elsewhere.  But two days ago, I started looking at the
13359 state of <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin in
13360 Debian</a> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet.  The package
13361 is now maintained by a
13362 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/">team of
13363 people</a>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team.  We
13364 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
13365 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
13366 Wheezy.  It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
13367 backports).  The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
13368 it from entering testing.  To try to help the team and improve the
13369 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
13370 reports.  I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
13371 Corallo in a
13372 <a href="https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin">PPA for
13373 Ubuntu</a>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
13374 Debian package.</p>
13375
13376 <p>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
13377 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
13378 improve the package.  It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
13379 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
13380 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
13381 setup.  As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
13382 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-20121217/000041.html">a
13383 patch to backport</a> the latest version.  Jonas is going to look at
13384 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
13385 new version to unstable.
13386
13387 <p>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
13388 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system.  I
13389 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
13390 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
13391 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
13392 transactions to Wikileaks.  But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
13393 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
13394 they sell products and services.  Improving the bitcoin support in
13395 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
13396 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
13397 pay with bitcoin is still not very good.  The bitcoin: URI is a step
13398 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
13399 use.  Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
13400 quick transaction.  I believe there are other clients available, but
13401 have not tested them.</p>
13402
13403 <p>My
13404 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">experiment
13405 with bitcoins</a> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
13406 I received 20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
13407 years ago, as can be
13408 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">seen
13409 on the blockexplorer service</a>.  Thank you everyone for your
13410 donation.  The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
13411 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
13412 number of users have gone up since then.  If you use bitcoin and want
13413 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
13414 the same address as last time,
13415 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
13416
13417       </div>
13418       <div class="tags">
13419
13420
13421         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
13422
13423
13424       </div>
13425     </div>
13426     <div class="padding"></div>
13427
13428     <div class="entry">
13429       <div class="title">
13430         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ledger___double_entry_accounting_using_text_based_storage_format.html">Ledger - double-entry accounting using text based storage format</a>
13431       </div>
13432       <div class="date">
13433         18th December 2012
13434       </div>
13435       <div class="body">
13436         <p>A few days ago I came across
13437 <a href="http://joeyh.name/blog/entry/hledger/">a blog post from Joey
13438 Hess</a> describing <a href="http://ledger-cli.org/">ledger</a> and
13439 hledger, a text based system for double-entry accounting.  I found it
13440 interesting, as I am involved with several organizations where
13441 accounting is an issue, and I have not really become too friendly with
13442 the different web based systems we use.  I find it hard to find what I
13443 look for in the menus and even harder try to get sensible data out of
13444 the systems.  Ledger seem different.  The accounting data is kept in
13445 text files that can be stored in a version control system, and there
13446
13447 are at least <a href="https://github.com/ledger/ledger/wiki/Ports">five
13448 different implementations</a> able to read the format.  An example
13449 entry look like this, and is simple enough that it will be trivial to
13450 generate entries based on CVS files fetched from the bank:</p>
13451
13452 <blockquote><pre>
13453 2004-05-27 Book Store
13454       Expenses:Books                 $20.00
13455       Liabilities:Visa
13456 </pre></blockquote>
13457
13458 <p>The concept seemed interesting enough for me to check it out and
13459 look for others using it.  I found blog posts from
13460 <a href="http://blog.spang.cc/posts/hledger_rocks_my_world/">Christine
13461 Spang</a>,
13462 <a href="http://bugsplat.info/2010-05-23-keeping-finances-with-ledger.html">Pete
13463 Keen</a>,
13464 <a href="http://blog.andrewcantino.com/blog/2010/11/06/command-line-accounting-with-ledger-and-reckon/">Andrew
13465 Cantino</a> and
13466 <a href="http://blog.iphoting.com/blog/2012/11/29/command-line-double-entry-accounting/">Ronald
13467 Ip</a> describing how they use it, as well as a post from
13468 <a href="https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/ledger-cli/r0oWjwbQ9Bo">Bradley
13469 M. Kuhn</a> at the Software Freedom Conservancy.  All seemed like good
13470 recommendations fitting my need.</p>
13471
13472 <p>The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/l/ledger.html">ledger</a>
13473 package is available in Debian Squeeze, while the
13474 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/h/haskell-hledger.html">hledger</a>
13475 package only is available in Debian Sid.  As I use Squeeze, ledger
13476 seemed the best choice to get started.</p>
13477
13478 <p>To get some real data to test on, I wrote a
13479 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/tools/lodo2ledger">web scraper</a> for
13480 <a href="http://www.lodo.no/">LODO</a>, the accounting system used by
13481 the <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">NUUG</a> association, and started to
13482 play with the data set.  I'm not really deeply into accounting, but I
13483 am able to get a simple balance and accounting status for example
13484 using the "<tt>ledger balance</tt>" command.  But I will have to
13485 gather more experience before I know if the ledger way is a good fit
13486 for the organisations I am involved in.</p>
13487
13488       </div>
13489       <div class="tags">
13490
13491
13492         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
13493
13494
13495       </div>
13496     </div>
13497     <div class="padding"></div>
13498
13499     <div class="entry">
13500       <div class="title">
13501         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Scripting_the_Cerebrum_bofhd_user_administration_system_using_XML_RPC.html">Scripting the Cerebrum/bofhd user administration system using XML-RPC</a>
13502       </div>
13503       <div class="date">
13504          6th December 2012
13505       </div>
13506       <div class="body">
13507         <p>Where I work at the <a href="http://www.uio.no/">University of
13508 Oslo</a>, we use the
13509 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/cerebrum/">Cerebrum user
13510 administration system</a> to maintain users, groups, DNS, DHCP, etc.
13511 I've known since the system was written that the server is providing
13512 an <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML-RPC">XML-RPC</a> API, but
13513 I have never spent time to try to figure out how to use it, as we
13514 always use the bofh command line client at work.  Until today.  I want
13515 to script the updating of DNS and DHCP to make it easier to set up
13516 virtual machines.  Here are a few notes on how to use it with
13517 Python.</p>
13518
13519 <p>I started by looking at the source of the Java
13520 <a href="http://cerebrum.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/cerebrum/trunk/cerebrum/clients/jbofh/">bofh
13521 client</a>, to figure out how it connected to the API server.  I also
13522 googled for python examples on how to use XML-RPC, and found
13523 <a href="http://tldp.org/HOWTO/XML-RPC-HOWTO/xmlrpc-howto-python.html">a
13524 simple example in</a> the XML-RPC howto.</p>
13525
13526 <p>This simple example code show how to connect, get the list of
13527 commands (as a JSON dump), and how to get the information about the
13528 user currently logged in:</p>
13529
13530 <blockquote><pre>
13531 #!/usr/bin/env python
13532 import getpass
13533 import xmlrpclib
13534 server_url = 'https://cerebrum-uio.uio.no:8000';
13535 username = getpass.getuser()
13536 password = getpass.getpass()
13537 server = xmlrpclib.Server(server_url);
13538 #print server.get_commands(sessionid)
13539 sessionid = server.login(username, password)
13540 print server.run_command(sessionid, "user_info", username)
13541 result = server.logout(sessionid)
13542 print result
13543 </pre></blockquote>
13544
13545 <p>Armed with this knowledge I can now move forward and script the DNS
13546 and DHCP updates I wanted to do.</p>
13547
13548       </div>
13549       <div class="tags">
13550
13551
13552         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin</a>.
13553
13554
13555       </div>
13556     </div>
13557     <div class="padding"></div>
13558
13559     <div class="entry">
13560       <div class="title">
13561         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_the_value_of_copyright_taxed_.html">Why isn't the value of copyright taxed?</a>
13562       </div>
13563       <div class="date">
13564         17th November 2012
13565       </div>
13566       <div class="body">
13567         <p>While working on a
13568 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">Norwegian
13569 translation of the Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig</a> (76% done),
13570 which cover the problems with todays copyright law and how it stifles
13571 creativity, one idea occurred to me.  The idea is to get the tax
13572 office to help make more works enter the public domain and also help
13573 make it easier to clear rights for using copyrighted works.</p>
13574
13575 <p>I mentioned this idea briefly during Yesterdays
13576 <a href="http://www.farmann.no/2012/11/14/john-perry-barlow-in-oslo-friday-nov-16
13577 -15-30-19-00/">presentation
13578 by John Perry Barlow</a>, and concluded that it was best to put it
13579 in writing for a wider audience.  The idea is not really based on the
13580 argument that copyrighted works are "intellectual property", as the
13581 core requirement is that copyrighted work have value for the copyright
13582 holder and the tax office like to collect their share from any value
13583 controlled by the citizens in a country.  I'm sharing the idea here to
13584 let others consider it and perhaps shoot it down with a fresh set of
13585 arguments.</p>
13586
13587 <p>Most valuables are taxed by the government.  At least here in
13588 Norway, the amount of money you have, the value of our land property,
13589 the value of your house, the value of your car, the value of our
13590 stocks and other valuables are all added together.  If the tax value
13591 of these values exceed your debt, you have to pay the tax office some
13592 taxes for these values.  And copyrighted work have value.  It have
13593 value for the rights holder, who can earn money selling access to the
13594 work.  But it is not included in the tax calculations?  Why not?</p>
13595
13596 <p>If the government want to tax copyrighted works, it would want to
13597 maintain a database of all the copyrighted works and who are the
13598 rights holders for a given works, to be able to associate the works
13599 value to the right citizen or company for tax purposes.  If such
13600 database exist, it will become a lot easier to find out who to talk to
13601 for clearing permissions to use a copyrighted work, which is a very
13602 hard operation with todays copyright law.  To ensure that copyright
13603 holders keep the database up-to-date, it would have to become a
13604 requirement to be able to collect money for granting access to
13605 copyrighted works that the work is listed in the database with the
13606 correct right holder.</p>
13607
13608 <p>If copyright causes copyright holders to have to pay more taxes,
13609 they will have a small incentive to "disown" their copyright, and let
13610 the work enter the public domain. For works with several right holders
13611 one of the right holders could state (and get it registered in the
13612 database) that she do not need to be consulted when clearing rights to
13613 use the work in question and thus will not get any income from that
13614 work.  Stating this would have to be impossible to revert and stop the
13615 tax office from adding the value of that work to the given citizens
13616 tax calculation.  I assume the copyright law would stay the same,
13617 allowing creators to pick a license of their choosing, and also
13618 allowing them to put their work directly in the public domain.  The
13619 existence of such database will make it even easier to clear rights,
13620 and if the right holders listed in the database is taxed, this system
13621 would increase the amount of works that enter the public domain.</p>
13622
13623 <p>The effect would be that the tax office help to make it easier to
13624 get rights to use the works that have not yet entered the public
13625 domain and help to get more work into the public domain and .</p>
13626
13627 <p>Why have such taxing not happened yet?  I am sure the tax office
13628 would like to tax copyrighted work values if they could.</p>
13629
13630       </div>
13631       <div class="tags">
13632
13633
13634         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
13635
13636
13637       </div>
13638     </div>
13639     <div class="padding"></div>
13640
13641     <div class="entry">
13642       <div class="title">
13643         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Angela_Fu_.html">Debian Edu interview: Angela Fuß</a>
13644       </div>
13645       <div class="date">
13646         14th November 2012
13647       </div>
13648       <div class="body">
13649         <p>Here is another interview with one of the people in the <a
13650 href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>
13651 community.  I am running short on people willing to be interviewed, so
13652 if you know about someone I should interview, Please send me an email.
13653 After asking for many months, I finally managed to lure another one of
13654 the people behind the German
13655 "<a href="http://wiki.it-zukunft-schule.de/">IT-Zukunft Schule</a>"
13656 project out from maternity leave to conduct an interview.  Give a warm
13657 welcome to Angela Fuß. :)</p>
13658
13659 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
13660
13661 <p>I am a 39-year-old woman living in the very north of Germany near
13662 Denmark. I live in a patchwork family with "my man" Mike Gabriel, my
13663 two daughters, Mikes daughter and Mikes and my rather newborn son.
13664
13665 <p>At the moment - because of our little baby - I am spending most of
13666 the day by being a caring and organising mom for all the kids.
13667 Besides that I am really involved into and occupied with several inner
13668 growth processes: New born souls always bring the whole familiar
13669 system into movement and that needs time and focus ;-).  We are also
13670 in the middle of buying a house and moving to it.</p>
13671
13672 <p>In 2013 I will work again in my job in a German foundation for
13673 nature conservation. I am doing public relation work there.  Besides
13674 that - and that is the connection to Skolelinux / Debian Edu - I am
13675 working in our own school project "IT-Zukunft Schule" in North
13676 Germany. I am responsible for the quality assurance, the customer
13677 relationship management and the communication processes in the
13678 project.</p>
13679
13680 <p>Since 2001 I constantly have been training myself in communication
13681 and leadership. Besides that I am a forester, a landscaping gardener
13682 and a yoga teacher.</p>
13683
13684 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
13685 project?</strong></p>
13686
13687 <p>I fell in love with Mike ;-).</p>
13688
13689 <p>Very soon after getting to know him I was completely enrolled into
13690 Free Software.  At this time Mike did IT-services for one newly
13691 founded school in Kiel. Other schools in Kiel needed concepts for
13692 their IT environment.  Often when Mike came home from working at the
13693 newly founded school I found myself listening to his complaints about
13694 several points where the communication with the schools head or the
13695 teachers did not work.  So we were clear that he would not work for
13696 one more school if we did not set up a structure for communication
13697 between him, the schools head, the teachers, the students and the
13698 parents.</p>
13699
13700 <p>Together with our friend and hardware supplier Andreas Buchholz we
13701 started to get an overview of free software solutions suitable for
13702 schools. One day before Christmas 2010 Mike and I had a date with Kurt
13703 Gramlich in Gütersloh. As Kurt and I are really interested in building
13704 networks of people and in being in communication we dived into
13705 Skolelinux and brought it to the first grammar schools in Northern
13706 Germany.</p>
13707
13708 <p>For information about our school project you can read
13709 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Mike_Gabriel.html">the
13710 interview with Mike Gabriel</a>.</p>
13711
13712 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
13713 Edu?</strong></p>
13714
13715 <p>First I have to say: I cannot answer this question technically. My
13716 answer comes rather from a social point of view.</p>
13717
13718 <p>The biggest advantage of Skolelinux / Debian Edu I see is the large
13719 and strong international community of Debian Developers in the
13720 background which is very alive and connected over mailinglists, blogs
13721 and meetings. My constant feeling for the Debian Community is: If
13722 something does not work they will somehow fix it. All is well
13723 ;-). This is of course a user experience.  What I also get as a big
13724 advantage of Skolelinux / Debian Edu is that everybody who uses it and
13725 works with it can also contribute to it - that includes students,
13726 teachers, parents...</p>
13727
13728 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
13729 Edu?</strong></p>
13730
13731 <p>I will answer this question relating to the internal structure of
13732 Skolelinux / Debian Edu.</p>
13733
13734 <p>What I see as a major disadvantage is that there is a gap between
13735 the group of developers for Debian Edu and the people who make the
13736 marketing, that means the people that bring Skolelinux to the
13737 schools. There is a lack of communication between these two groups and
13738 I think that does not really work for Skolelinux / Debian Edu.</p>
13739
13740 <p>Further I appreciate that Skolelinux / Debian Edu is known as a
13741 do-ocracy. Nevertheless I keep asking myself if at some points a
13742 democracy or some kind of hierarchical project structure would be good
13743 and helpful.  I am also missing some kind of contact between the
13744 Skolelinux / Debian Edu communities in Europe or on an international
13745 level. I think it would be good if there was more sharing between the
13746 different countries using Skolelinux / Debian Edu.</p>
13747
13748 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
13749
13750 <p>On my laptop I am still using an Ubuntu 10.04 with a Gnome Desktop
13751 on.  As applications I use Openoffice.org, Gedit, Firefox, Pidgin,
13752 LaTeX and GnuCash. For mails I am using Horde. And I am really fond of
13753 my N900 running with Maemo.</p>
13754
13755 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
13756 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
13757
13758 <p>I am really convinced that in our school project "IT-Zukunft
13759 Schule" we have developed (and keep developing) a great way to get
13760 schools to use Free Software. We have written a detailed concept for
13761 that so I cannot explain the whole thing here. But in a nutshell the
13762 strategy has three crucial pillars:</p>
13763
13764 <ul>
13765
13766 <li>We really take time to get what sort of stories, questions and
13767 concerns the schools head and the teachers have about using different
13768 kinds of IT and we take time to enrol them into Free Software.</li>
13769
13770 <li>Our solution for schools is never just technical. In the centre
13771 are always the people who are going to use the software. From the very
13772 beginning of the planning for a school, we tell the schools head that
13773 they are paying us not only for a technical solution for their school,
13774 they also pay us for leading all the communication processes
13775 needed. If they do not want that, we are not working with them because
13776 we cannot give a guarantee for the quality of our work then.</li>
13777
13778 <li>Another focus lies in the training of teachers and students in
13779 co-administrating the IT-System at their school. They start getting in
13780 contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu community and they get the
13781 offer to become more and more independent from us.</li>
13782
13783 </ul>
13784
13785       </div>
13786       <div class="tags">
13787
13788
13789         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
13790
13791
13792       </div>
13793     </div>
13794     <div class="padding"></div>
13795
13796     <div class="entry">
13797       <div class="title">
13798         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_European_Central_Bank__ECB__take_a_look_at_bitcoin.html">The European Central Bank (ECB) take a look at bitcoin</a>
13799       </div>
13800       <div class="date">
13801          4th November 2012
13802       </div>
13803       <div class="body">
13804         <p>Slashdot just ran a story about the European Central Bank (ECB)
13805 <a href="http://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/other/virtualcurrencyschemes201210en.pdf">releasing
13806 a report (PDF)</a> about virtual currencies and
13807 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>.  It is interesting to
13808 see how a member of the bitcoin community
13809 <a href="http://blog.bitinstant.com/blog/2012/10/30/the-ecb-report-on-bitcoin-and-virtual-currencies.html">receive
13810 the report</a>.  As for the future, I suspect the central banks and
13811 the governments will outlaw bitcoin if it gain any popularity, to avoid
13812 competition.  My thoughts go to the
13813 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wörgl">Wörgl experiment</a> with
13814 negative inflation on cash which was such a success that it was
13815 terminated by the Austrian National Bank in 1933.  A successful
13816 alternative would be a threat to the current money system and gain
13817 powerful forces to work against it.</p>
13818
13819 <p>While checking out the current status of bitcoin, I also discovered
13820 that the community already seem to have
13821 <a href="http://www.theverge.com/2012/8/27/3271637/bitcoin-savings-trust-pyramid-scheme-shuts-down">experienced
13822 its first pyramid game / Ponzi scheme</a>.  Not very surprising, given
13823 how members of "small" communities tend to trust each other.  I guess
13824 enterprising crocks will try again and again, as they do anywhere
13825 wealth is available.</p>
13826
13827       </div>
13828       <div class="tags">
13829
13830
13831         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
13832
13833
13834       </div>
13835     </div>
13836     <div class="padding"></div>
13837
13838     <div class="entry">
13839       <div class="title">
13840         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/12_years_of_outages___summarised_by_Stuart_Kendrick.html">12 years of outages - summarised by Stuart Kendrick</a>
13841       </div>
13842       <div class="date">
13843         26th October 2012
13844       </div>
13845       <div class="body">
13846         <p>I work at the <a href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a>
13847 looking after the computers, mostly on the unix side, but in general
13848 all over the place.  I am also a member (and currently leader) of
13849 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the NUUG association</a>, which in turn
13850 make me a member of <a href="http://www.usenix.org/">USENIX</a>.  NUUG
13851 is an member organisation for us in Norway interested in free
13852 software, open standards and unix like operating systems, and USENIX
13853 is a US based member organisation with similar targets.  And thanks to
13854 these memberships, I get all issues of the great USENIX magazine
13855 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login">;login:</a> in the
13856 mail several times a year.  The magazine is great, and I read most of
13857 it every time.</p>
13858
13859 <p>In the last issue of the USENIX magazine ;login:, there is an
13860 article by <a href="http://www.skendric.com/">Stuart Kendrick</a> from
13861 Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center titled
13862 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/october-2012-volume-37-number-5/what-takes-us-down">What
13863 Takes Us Down</a>" (longer version also
13864 <a href="http://www.skendric.com/problem/incident-analysis/2012-06-30/What-Takes-Us-Down.pdf">available
13865 from his own site</a>), where he report what he found when he
13866 processed the outage reports (both planned and unplanned) from the
13867 last twelve years and classified them according to cause, time of day,
13868 etc etc.  The article is a good read to get some empirical data on
13869 what kind of problems affect a data centre, but what really inspired
13870 me was the kind of reporting they had put in place since 2000.<p>
13871
13872 <p>The centre set up a mailing list, and started to send fairly
13873 standardised messages to this list when a outage was planned or when
13874 it already occurred, to announce the plan and get feedback on the
13875 assumtions on scope and user impact.  Here is the two example from the
13876 article: First the unplanned outage:
13877
13878 <blockquote><pre>
13879 Subject:     Exchange 2003 Cluster Issues
13880 Severity:    Critical (Unplanned)
13881 Start:       Monday, May 7, 2012, 11:58
13882 End:         Monday, May 7, 2012, 12:38
13883 Duration:    40 minutes
13884 Scope:       Exchange 2003
13885 Description: The HTTPS service on the Exchange cluster crashed, triggering
13886              a cluster failover.
13887
13888 User Impact: During this period, all Exchange users were unable to
13889              access e-mail. Zimbra users were unaffected.
13890 Technician:  [xxx]
13891 </pre></blockquote>
13892
13893 Next the planned outage:
13894
13895 <blockquote><pre>
13896 Subject:     H Building Switch Upgrades
13897 Severity:    Major (Planned)
13898 Start:       Saturday, June 16, 2012, 06:00
13899 End:         Saturday, June 16, 2012, 16:00
13900 Duration:    10 hours
13901 Scope:       H2 Transport
13902 Description: Currently, Catalyst 4006s provide 10/100 Ethernet to end-
13903              stations. We will replace these with newer Catalyst
13904              4510s.
13905 User Impact: All users on H2 will be isolated from the network during
13906              this work. Afterward, they will have gigabit
13907              connectivity.
13908 Technician:  [xxx]
13909 </pre></blockquote>
13910
13911 <p>He notes in his article that the date formats and other fields have
13912 been a bit too free form to make it easy to automatically process them
13913 into a database for further analysis, and I would have used ISO 8601
13914 dates myself to make it easier to process (in other words I would ask
13915 people to write '2012-06-16 06:00 +0000' instead of the start time
13916 format listed above).  There are also other issues with the format
13917 that could be improved, read the article for the details.</p>
13918
13919 <p>I find the idea of standardising outage messages seem to be such a
13920 good idea that I would like to get it implemented here at the
13921 university too.  We do register
13922 <a href="http://www.uio.no/tjenester/it/aktuelt/planlagte-tjenesteavbrudd/">planned
13923 changes and outages in a calendar</a>, and report the to a mailing
13924 list, but we do not do so in a structured format and there is not a
13925 report to the same location for unplanned outages.  Perhaps something
13926 for other sites to consider too?</p>
13927
13928       </div>
13929       <div class="tags">
13930
13931
13932         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix</a>.
13933
13934
13935       </div>
13936     </div>
13937     <div class="padding"></div>
13938
13939     <div class="entry">
13940       <div class="title">
13941         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Amazon_steal_books_from_customer_and_throw_out_her_out_without_any_explanation.html">Amazon steal books from customer and throw out her out without any explanation</a>
13942       </div>
13943       <div class="date">
13944         22nd October 2012
13945       </div>
13946       <div class="body">
13947         <p>A blog post from Martin Bekkelund today tell the story of
13948 <a href="http://www.bekkelund.net/2012/10/22/outlawed-by-amazon-drm/">how
13949 Amazon erased the books from a customer's kindle, locked the account
13950 and refuse to tell the customer why</a>.  If a real book store did
13951 this to a customer, it would be called breaking into private property
13952 and theft.  The story has spread around the net today.  A bit more
13953 background information is available in Norwegian from
13954 <a href="http://www.digi.no/904658/hun-ble-kastet-ut-av-amazon">digi.no</a>.
13955 It is no surprise that digital restriction mechanisms (DRM) are used
13956 this way, as it has been warned about such abuse since DRM was
13957 introduced many years back.  And Amazon proved in 2009 that it was
13958 willing to
13959 <a href="http://boingboing.net/2009/07/20/amazons-orwellian-de.html">
13960 break into customers equipment and remove the books</a> people had
13961 bought, when it removed the book 1984 by George Orwell from all the
13962 customers who had bought it.  From the official comments, it even
13963 sounded like
13964 <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18amazon.html">Amazon
13965 would never do that again</a>.  And here we are, three years
13966 later.</p>
13967
13968 <p>And thought this action is
13969 <a href="http://www.itavisen.no/904648/forbrukerraadet-helt-haarreisende">against
13970 Norwegian regulations and law</a>, it is according to the terms of use
13971 as written by Amazon, and it is hard to hold Amazon accountable to
13972 Norwegian laws.  It is just yet another example of unacceptable terms
13973 of use on the web, and how they are used to remove customer
13974 rights.</p>
13975
13976 <p>Luckily for electronic books, there are alternatives without
13977 unacceptable terms.  For example
13978 <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/">Project Gutenberg</a> (about 40,000
13979 books), <a href="http://runeberg.org/">Project Runenberg</a> (1,652
13980 books) and <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/texts">The Internet
13981 Archive</a> (3,641,797 books) have heaps of books without DRM, which
13982 can read by anyone and shared with anyone.</p>
13983
13984 <p>Update 2012-10-23: This story broke in the morning on Monday. In
13985 the evening after the story had spread all across the Internet, Amazon
13986 restored the account of the user, as reported by
13987 <a href="http://www.digi.no/904675/helomvending-fra-amazon">digi.no</a>
13988 and <a href="http://nrk.no/kultur-og-underholdning/1.8368487">NRK</a>.
13989 Apparently public pressure work.  The story from Martin have seen
13990 several twitter messages per minute the last 24 hours, which is quite
13991 a lot, and is still drawing a lot of attention.  But even when the
13992 account is restored, the fundamental problem still exist.  I recommend
13993 reading two opinions from
13994 <a href="http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2012/10/rights-you-have-no-right-to-your-ebooks/index.htm">Simon
13995 Phipps</a> and
13996 <a href="http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/10/is-amazon-playing-fair/index.htm">Glen
13997 Moody</a> if you want to learn more about the fundamentals and more
13998 details about the original story.</p>
13999
14000       </div>
14001       <div class="tags">
14002
14003
14004         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>.
14005
14006
14007       </div>
14008     </div>
14009     <div class="padding"></div>
14010
14011     <div class="entry">
14012       <div class="title">
14013         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_fight_for_freedom_and_privacy.html">The fight for freedom and privacy</a>
14014       </div>
14015       <div class="date">
14016         18th October 2012
14017       </div>
14018       <div class="body">
14019         <p>Civil liberties and privacy in the western world are going down the
14020 drain, and it is hard to fight against it.  I try to do my best, but
14021 time is limited.  I hope you do your best too.  A few years ago I came
14022 across a marvellous drawing by
14023 <a href="http://www.claybennett.com/about.html">Clay Bennett</a>
14024 visualising some of what is going on.
14025
14026 <p><a href="http://www.claybennett.com/pages/security_fence.html">
14027 <img src="http://www.claybennett.com/images/archivetoons/security_fence.jpg"></a></p>
14028
14029 <blockquote>
14030 «They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
14031 safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.» - Benjamin Franklin
14032 </blockquote>
14033
14034 <p>Do you feel safe at the airport?  I do not.  Do you feel safe when
14035 you see a surveillance camera?  I do not.  Do you feel safe when you
14036 leave electronic traces of your behaviour and opinions?  I do not.  I
14037 just remember <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panopticon">the
14038 Panopticon</a>, and can not help to think that we are slowly
14039 transforming our society to a huge Panopticon on our own.</p>
14040
14041       </div>
14042       <div class="tags">
14043
14044
14045         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
14046
14047
14048       </div>
14049     </div>
14050     <div class="padding"></div>
14051
14052     <div class="entry">
14053       <div class="title">
14054         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ColonHelp_produser_sue_WordPress_to_silence_critic.html">ColonHelp produser sue WordPress to silence critic</a>
14055       </div>
14056       <div class="date">
14057         12th October 2012
14058       </div>
14059       <div class="body">
14060         <p>Thanks to a blog post by
14061 <a href="http://ramblingfoo.blogspot.no/2012/10/a-shitstorm-is-comming.html">Eddy
14062 Petrișor</a>, I became aware of yet another "alternative medicine"
14063 company using legal intimidation tactics to scare off critics.
14064 According to the originating blog post about the detox "cure"
14065 <a href="http://insulaindoielii.wordpress.com/2012/10/11/colon-help-sues-wordpress/">ColonHelp
14066 and its producers Zenyth Pharmaceuticals actions</a>, the producer
14067 sues Wordpress to get rid of the critical information.  To check if
14068 the story was for real, I contacted Automattic, the company behind
14069 wordpress.com, and they reply was "We can confirm that Zenyth is
14070 seeking a court order against WordPress / Automattic.  However, we
14071 don't believe the Terms of Service have been violated in this
14072 matter".</p>
14073
14074 <p>The story seem to be simply that a blogger checked the scientific
14075 foundation for a popular health product in Rumania, ColonHelp, and
14076 reported that there was no reason at all to believe it improved the
14077 health of its users.  This caused the company behind the product,
14078 Zenyth Pharmaceuticals, to use legal intimidation to try to silence
14079 the critic, instead of presenting its views and scientific foundation
14080 to argue its side.</p>
14081
14082 <p>This is the usual story, and the Zenyth Pharmaceuticals company
14083 deserve everyone to know how it failed to act properly.  Lets hope the
14084 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect">Streisand
14085 effect</a> can make it rethink its strategy.</p>
14086
14087 <p>What is the harm, you might think.  I suggest you take a look at
14088 <a href="http://www.whatstheharm.net/detoxification.html">a list of
14089 victims of detoxification</a>.</p>
14090
14091       </div>
14092       <div class="tags">
14093
14094
14095         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis</a>.
14096
14097
14098       </div>
14099     </div>
14100     <div class="padding"></div>
14101
14102     <div class="entry">
14103       <div class="title">
14104         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_is_your_local_library_collecting_the__wrong__computer_books_.html">Why is your local library collecting the "wrong" computer books?</a>
14105       </div>
14106       <div class="date">
14107          3rd October 2012
14108       </div>
14109       <div class="body">
14110         <p>I just read the blog post from Tim Retout
14111 <a href="http://retout.co.uk/blog/2012/10/02/the-library-challenge">about
14112 the computer science book collection available in his local
14113 library</a>, and just wanted to share my comment on his theory about
14114 computer books becoming obsolete so soon.  That is part of the reason
14115 why the selection is so sad in almost any local library (it is in mine
14116 too), but I believe the major contributing factor is that the people
14117 buying books to the library have no way to know a good and future
14118 computer classic from trash.  And they need to know which one will
14119 become a classic in the future, as they would normally buy one of the
14120 recently published books.</p>
14121
14122 <p>During my university years, I worked for a while at the university
14123 library, and even there the person in charge of buying computer
14124 related books (and in fact any natural science related book), did not
14125 know enough about computers to make a good educated guess.  Once, just
14126 before Christmas, they had some leftover money on the book budget and
14127 I was asked if I could pick out a lot of computer books in the
14128 university book store, for the library to buy for their collection.  I
14129 had a great time picking all the books I dreamt of buying and reading,
14130 and the books I knew were classics (like most of the
14131 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Richard_Stevens">Stevens
14132 collection</a>).  I picked several of the generic O'Reilly books (ie
14133 documenting protocols, formats and systems, not specific versions of
14134 products) and stayed away from the 'teach yourself X in N days' class.
14135 I had a great time, and probably picked out more than a hundred books
14136 for the library that evening.</p>
14137
14138 <p>The sad fact is that there is no way a overworked librarian is
14139 going to know that for example
14140 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Practice_of_Programming">The
14141 Practice of Programming</a> is a must-have in any computer library,
14142 and they will most of the time end up picking the wrong books to buy.
14143 Perhaps you can help your local library make better choices by giving
14144 the suggestions for books to get?  I know they would love to hear from
14145 you, even if their budget might block them from getting your favourite
14146 book right away.</p>
14147
14148       </div>
14149       <div class="tags">
14150
14151
14152         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
14153
14154
14155       </div>
14156     </div>
14157     <div class="padding"></div>
14158
14159     <div class="entry">
14160       <div class="title">
14161         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Seventy_percent_done_with_Norwegian_docbook_version_of_Free_Culture.html">Seventy percent done with Norwegian docbook version of Free Culture</a>
14162       </div>
14163       <div class="date">
14164         23rd September 2012
14165       </div>
14166       <div class="body">
14167         <p>Since this summer, I have worked in my spare time on a Norwegian <a
14168 href="http://www.docbook.org/">docbook</a> version of the 2004 book <a
14169 href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> by Lawrence Lessig.
14170 The reason is that this book is a great primer on what problems exist
14171 in the current copyright laws, and I want it to be available also for
14172 those that are reluctant do read an English book.
14173
14174 When I started, I
14175 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html">called
14176 for volunteers</a> to help me, but too few have volunteered so far,
14177 and progress is a bit slow.  Anyway, today I broken the 70 percent
14178 mark for the first rough translation.  At the moment, less than 700
14179 strings (paragraphs, index terms, titles) are left to translate.  With
14180 my current progress of 10-20 strings per day, it will take a while to
14181 complete the translation.  This graph show the updated progress:</p>
14182
14183 <img width="80%" align="center" src="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/progress.png">
14184
14185 <p>Progress have slowed down lately due to family and work
14186 commitments.  If you want to help, please get in touch, and check out
14187 the project files currently available from
14188 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>.</p>
14189
14190 <p>If you are curious what the translated book currently look like,
14191 the updated
14192 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf?raw=true">PDF</a>
14193 and
14194 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub?raw=true">EPUB</a>
14195 are published on github.  The HTML version is published as well, but
14196 github hand it out with MIME type text/plain, confusing browsers, so I
14197 saw no point in linking to that version.</p>
14198
14199       </div>
14200       <div class="tags">
14201
14202
14203         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
14204
14205
14206       </div>
14207     </div>
14208     <div class="padding"></div>
14209
14210     <div class="entry">
14211       <div class="title">
14212         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Giorgio_Pioda.html">Debian Edu interview: Giorgio Pioda</a>
14213       </div>
14214       <div class="date">
14215         17th September 2012
14216       </div>
14217       <div class="body">
14218         <p>After a long break in my row of interviews with people in the
14219 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>
14220 community, I finally found time to wrap up another.  This time it is
14221 Giorgio Pioda, which showed up on the mailing list at the start of
14222 this year, asking questions and inspiring us to improve the first time
14223 administrators experience with Skolelinux. :) The interview was
14224 conduced in May, but I only found time to publish it now.</p>
14225
14226 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
14227
14228 <p>I have a PhD in chemistry but since several years I work as teacher
14229 in secondary (15-18 year old students) and tertiary (a kind of "light"
14230 university) schools. Five years ago I started to manage a Learning
14231 Management Service server and slowly I got more and more involved with
14232 IT. 3 years ago the graduating schools moved completely to Linux and I
14233 got the head of the IT for this. The experience collected in chemistry
14234 labs computers (for example NMR analysis of protein folding) and in
14235 the IT-courses during university where sufficient to start. Self
14236 training is anyway very important</p>
14237
14238 <p>I live in the Italian speaking part of Switzerland, and the
14239 <a href="http://www.spse.ch/">SPSE school</a> (secondary) is a very
14240 special sport school for young people who try to became sport pro (for
14241 all sports, we have dozens of disciplines represented) and we are
14242 recognised by the Olympic Swiss Organisation.
14243
14244 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
14245 project?</strong></p>
14246
14247 <p>Looking for Linux / Primary Domain Controller (PDC) I found it
14248 already several years ago. But since the system was still not
14249 Kerberized and since our schools relies strongly on laptops I didn't
14250 use it. I plan to introduce it in the next future, probably for the
14251 next school year, since the squeeze release solved this security
14252 hole.</p>
14253
14254 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
14255 Edu?</strong></p>
14256
14257 <p>Many. First of all there is a strong and living community that is
14258 very generous for help and hints.  Chat help is crucial, together with
14259 the mailing list.  Second. With Skolelinux you get an already well
14260 engineered platform and you don't have to start to build up your PDC
14261 and your clients from GNU/scratch; I've already done this once and I
14262 can tell it, it is hard. Third, since Skolelinux is a standard
14263 platform, it is way easier to educate other IT people and even if the
14264 head IT is sick another one could pick up the task without too much
14265 hassle.</p>
14266
14267 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
14268 Edu?</strong></p>
14269
14270 <p>The only real problem I see is that it is a little too less
14271 flexible at client level. Debian stable is rocky and desirable, but
14272 there are many reasons that force for another choice. For example the
14273 need of new drivers for new PC, or the need for a specific OS for some
14274 devices that have specific software packages for another specific
14275 distribution (I have such a case for whiteboards that have only
14276 Ubuntu packages). Thus, I prepared compatibility packages educlient
14277 and eduroaming, hoping not to use them ;-)</p>
14278
14279 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
14280
14281 <p>I have a Debian Stable PDC at school (Kerberos, NIS, NFS) with
14282 mixed Debian and Ubuntu clients. If you think that this triad
14283 combination is exotic... well I discovered right yesterday that
14284 <a href="http://moo.nac.uci.edu/~hjm/Perceus-Report.html">Perceus</a>
14285 has the same...</p>
14286
14287 <p>For myself I run Debian wheezy/sid, but this combination is good
14288 only I you have enough competence to fix stuff for yourself, if
14289 something breaks.  Daily I use texmacs, gnumeric, a little bit of R
14290 statistics, kmplot, and less frequently OpenOffice.org.</p>
14291
14292 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
14293 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
14294
14295 <P>I think that the only real argument that school managers "hear" is
14296 cost reduction. They don't give too much weight on quality, stability,
14297 just because they are normally not open to change.</p>
14298
14299 <p>Students adapts very quickly to GNU/Linux (and for them being able
14300 to switch between different OS is a plus value); teachers and managers
14301 don't.</p>
14302
14303 <p>We decided to move to Linux because students at our school have own
14304 laptop and we have the responsibility to keep the laptop ready to use;
14305 we were really unsatisfied with Microsoft since every Monday we had 20
14306 machine to fix for viral infections... With Linux this has been
14307 reduced to zero, since people installs almost only from official
14308 repositories. I think that our special needs brought us to Linux.
14309 Those who don't have such needs will hardly move to Linux.</p>
14310
14311       </div>
14312       <div class="tags">
14313
14314
14315         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
14316
14317
14318       </div>
14319     </div>
14320     <div class="padding"></div>
14321
14322     <div class="entry">
14323       <div class="title">
14324         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_activity_to_standardise_video_codec.html">IETF activity to standardise video codec</a>
14325       </div>
14326       <div class="date">
14327         15th September 2012
14328       </div>
14329       <div class="body">
14330         <p>After the
14331 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_standardize_its_first_multimedia_codec__Opus.html">Opus
14332 codec made</a> it into <a href="http://www.ietf.org/">IETF</a> as
14333 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6716">RFC 6716</a>, I had a look
14334 to see if there is any activity in IETF to standardise a video codec
14335 too, and I was happy to discover that there is some activity in this
14336 area.  A non-"working group" mailing list
14337 <a href="https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/video-codec">video-codec</a>
14338 was
14339 <a href="http://ietf.10.n7.nabble.com/New-Non-WG-Mailing-List-video-codec-Video-codec-BoF-discussion-list-td119548.html">created 2012-08-20</a>.  It is intended to discuss the topic and if a
14340 formal working group should be formed.</p>
14341
14342 <p>I look forward to see how this plays out.  There is already
14343 <a href="http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/video-codec/current/msg00003.html">an
14344 email from someone</a> in the MPEG group at ISO asking people to
14345 participate in the ISO group.  Given how ISO failed with OOXML and given
14346 that it so far (as far as I can remember) only have produced
14347 multimedia formats requiring royalty payments, I suspect
14348 joining the ISO group would be a complete waste of time, but I am not
14349 involved in any codec work and my opinion will not matter much.</p>
14350
14351 <p>If one of my readers is involved with codec work, I hope she will
14352 join this work to standardise a royalty free video codec within
14353 IETF.</p>
14354
14355       </div>
14356       <div class="tags">
14357
14358
14359         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
14360
14361
14362       </div>
14363     </div>
14364     <div class="padding"></div>
14365
14366     <div class="entry">
14367       <div class="title">
14368         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IETF_standardize_its_first_multimedia_codec__Opus.html">IETF standardize its first multimedia codec: Opus</a>
14369       </div>
14370       <div class="date">
14371         12th September 2012
14372       </div>
14373       <div class="body">
14374         <p>Yesterday, <a href="http://www.ietf.org/">IETF</a> announced the
14375 publication of of
14376 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6716">RFC 6716, the Definition
14377 of the Opus Audio Codec</a>, a low latency, variable bandwidth, codec
14378 intended for both VoIP, film and music.  This is the first time, as
14379 far as I know, that IETF have standardized a multimedia codec.  In
14380 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3533">RFC 3533</a>, IETF
14381 standardized the OGG container format, and it has proven to be a great
14382 royalty free container for audio, video and movies.  I hope IETF will
14383 continue to standardize more royalty free codeces, after ISO and MPEG
14384 have proven incapable of securing everyone equal rights to publish
14385 multimedia content on the Internet.</p>
14386
14387 <p>IETF require two interoperating independent implementations to
14388 ratify a standard, and have so far ensured to only standardize royalty
14389 free specifications.  Both are key factors to allow everyone (rich and
14390 poor), to compete on equal terms on the Internet.</p>
14391
14392 <p>Visit the <a href="http://opus-codec.org/">Opus project page</a> if
14393 you want to learn more about the solution.</p>
14394
14395       </div>
14396       <div class="tags">
14397
14398
14399         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
14400
14401
14402       </div>
14403     </div>
14404     <div class="padding"></div>
14405
14406     <div class="entry">
14407       <div class="title">
14408         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Git_repository_for_song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Git repository for song book for Computer Scientists</a>
14409       </div>
14410       <div class="date">
14411          7th September 2012
14412       </div>
14413       <div class="body">
14414         <p>As I
14415 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">mentioned
14416 this summer</a>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
14417 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
14418 <a href="https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook">Gitorious
14419 repository for the project</a>.</p>
14420
14421 <p>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
14422 to the HTML version.  To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
14423 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
14424 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.</p>
14425
14426 <p>Want to sing?  You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
14427 PostScript formats at
14428 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's Computer
14429 Science Songbook</a>.</p>
14430
14431       </div>
14432       <div class="tags">
14433
14434
14435         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
14436
14437
14438       </div>
14439     </div>
14440     <div class="padding"></div>
14441
14442     <div class="entry">
14443       <div class="title">
14444         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_software_forced_Microsoft_to_open_Office__and_don_t_forget_Officeshots_.html">Free software forced Microsoft to open Office (and don't forget Officeshots)</a>
14445       </div>
14446       <div class="date">
14447         23rd August 2012
14448       </div>
14449       <div class="body">
14450         <p>I came across a great comment from Simon Phipps today, about how
14451 <a href="http://www.infoworld.com/d/open-source-software/how-microsoft-was-forced-open-office-200233">Microsoft
14452 have been forced to open Office</a>, and it made me remember and
14453 revisit the great site
14454 <a href="http://www.officeshots.org/">officeshots</a> which allow you
14455 to check out how different programs present the ODF file format.  I
14456 recommend both to those of my readers interested in ODF. :)</p>
14457
14458       </div>
14459       <div class="tags">
14460
14461
14462         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
14463
14464
14465       </div>
14466     </div>
14467     <div class="padding"></div>
14468
14469     <div class="entry">
14470       <div class="title">
14471         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Half_way_there_with_translated_docbook_version_of_Free_Culture.html">Half way there with translated docbook version of Free Culture</a>
14472       </div>
14473       <div class="date">
14474         17th August 2012
14475       </div>
14476       <div class="body">
14477         <p>In my spare time, I currently work on a Norwegian
14478 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">docbook</a> version of the 2004 book
14479 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> by Lawrence Lessig,
14480 to get a Norwegian text explaining the problems with the copyright law
14481 I can give to my parents and others that are reluctant to read an
14482 English book.  It is a marvellous set of examples on how the ever
14483 expanding copyright regulations hurt culture and society.  When the
14484 translation is done, I hope to find funding to print and ship a copy
14485 to all the members of the Norwegian parliament, before they sit down
14486 to debate the latest revisions to the Norwegian copyright law.  This
14487 summer I
14488 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html">called
14489 for volunteers</a> to help me, and I have been able to secure the
14490 valuable contribution from at least one other Norwegian.</p>
14491
14492 <p>Two days ago, we finally broke the 50% mark.  Then more than 50% of
14493 the number of strings to translate (normally paragraphs, but also
14494 titles and index entries are also counted).  All parts from the
14495 beginning up to and including chapter four is translated.  So is
14496 chapters six, seven and the conclusion.  I created a graph to show the
14497 progress:</p>
14498
14499 <img width="80%" align="center" src="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/raw/master/progress.png">
14500
14501 <p>The number of strings to translate increase as I insert the index
14502 entries into the docbook.  They were missing with the docbook version
14503 I initially started with.  There are still quite a few index entries
14504 missing, but everyone starting with A, B, O, Z and Y are done.  I
14505 currently focus on completing the index entries, to get a complete
14506 english version of the docbook source.</p>
14507
14508 <p>There is still need for translators and people with docbook
14509 knowledge, to be able to get a good looking book (I still struggle
14510 with dblatex, xmlto and docbook-xsl) as well as to do the draft
14511 translation and proof reading.  And I would like the figures to be
14512 redrawn as SVGs to make it easy to translate them.  Any SVG master
14513 around?  I am sure there are some legal terms that are unfamiliar to
14514 me.  If you want to help, please get in touch, and check out the
14515 project files currently available from <a
14516 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>.</p>
14517
14518 <p>If you are curious what the translated book currently look like,
14519 the updated
14520 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.pdf?raw=true">PDF</a>
14521 and
14522 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig/blob/master/archive/freeculture.nb.epub?raw=true">EPUB</a>
14523 are published on github.  The HTML version is published as well, but
14524 github hand it out with MIME type text/plain, confusing browsers, so I
14525 saw no point in linking to that version.</p>
14526
14527       </div>
14528       <div class="tags">
14529
14530
14531         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
14532
14533
14534       </div>
14535     </div>
14536     <div class="padding"></div>
14537
14538     <div class="entry">
14539       <div class="title">
14540         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Notes_on_language_codes_for_Norwegian_docbook_processing___.html">Notes on language codes for Norwegian docbook processing...</a>
14541       </div>
14542       <div class="date">
14543         10th August 2012
14544       </div>
14545       <div class="body">
14546         <p>In <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">docbook</a> one can specify
14547 the language used at the top, and the processing pipeline will use
14548 this information to pick the correct translations for 'chapter', 'see
14549 also', 'index' etc.  And for most languages used with docbook, I guess
14550 this work just fine.  For example a German user can start the document
14551 with &lt;book lang="de"&gt;, and the document will show up with the
14552 correct content with any of the docbook processors.  This is not the
14553 case for the language
14554 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Culture_in_Norwegian___5_chapters_done__74_percent_left_to_do.html">I
14555 am working with at the moment</a>, Norwegian Bokmål.</p>
14556
14557 <p>For a while, I was confused about which language code to use,
14558 because I was unable to find any language code that would work across
14559 all tools.  I am currently testing dblatex, xmlto, docbook-xsl, and
14560 dbtoepub, and they do not handle Norwegian Bokmål the same way.  Some
14561 of them do not handle it at all.</p>
14562
14563 <p>A bit of background information is probably needed to understand
14564 this mess.  Norwegian is not one, but two written variants.  The
14565 variants are Norwegian Nynorsk and Norwegian Bokmål.  There are three
14566 two letter language codes associated with these languages, Norwegian
14567 is 'no', Norwegian Nynorsk is 'nn' and Norwegian Bokmål is 'nb'.
14568 Historically the 'no' language code was used for Norwegian Bokmål, but
14569 many years ago this was found to be å bad idea, and the recommendation
14570 is to use the most specific language code instead, to avoid confusion.
14571 In the transition period it is a good idea to make sure 'no' was an
14572 alias for 'nb'.</p>
14573
14574 <p>Back to docbook processing tools in Debian.  The dblatex tool only
14575 understand 'nn'.  There are translations for 'no', but not 'nb' (BTS
14576 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/684391">#684391</a>), but due to a bug
14577 (BTS <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/682936">#682936</a>) the 'no'
14578 language code is not recognised.  The docbook-xsl tool chain only
14579 recognise 'nn' and 'nb', but not 'no'.  The xmlto tool only recognise
14580 'nn' and 'nb', but not 'no'.  The end result that there is no language
14581 code I can use to get the docbook file working with all of these tools
14582 at the same time. :(</p>
14583
14584 <p>The correct solution is to use &lt;book lang="nb"&gt;, but it will
14585 take time before that will work with all the free software docbook
14586 processors. :(</p>
14587
14588 <p>Oh, the joy of well integrated tools. :/</p>
14589
14590       </div>
14591       <div class="tags">
14592
14593
14594         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
14595
14596
14597       </div>
14598     </div>
14599     <div class="padding"></div>
14600
14601     <div class="entry">
14602       <div class="title">
14603         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Best_way_to_create_a_docbook_book_.html">Best way to create a docbook book?</a>
14604       </div>
14605       <div class="date">
14606         31st July 2012
14607       </div>
14608       <div class="body">
14609         <p>I tried to send this text to the
14610 <a href="https://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/docbook-apps/">docbook-apps
14611 mailing list at lists.oasis-open.org</a>, but it only accept messages
14612 from subscribers and rejected my post, and I completely lack the
14613 bandwidth required to subscribe to another mailing list, so instead I
14614 try to post my message here and hope my blog readers can help me
14615 out.</p>
14616
14617 <p>I am quite new to docbook processing, and am climbing a steep
14618 learning curve at the moment.</p>
14619
14620 <p>To give you some background, I am working on a Norwegian
14621 translation of the book Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig, and I use
14622 docbook to handle the process.  The files to build the book are
14623 available from
14624 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>.
14625 The book got around 400 pages with parts, images, footnotes, tables,
14626 index entries etc, which has proven to be a challenge for the free
14627 software docbook processors.  My build platform is Debian GNU/Linux
14628 Squeeze.</p>
14629
14630 <p>I want to build PDF, EPUB and HTML version of the book, and have
14631 tried different tool chains to do the conversion from docbook to these
14632 formats.  I am currently focusing on the PDF version, and have a few
14633 problems.</p>
14634
14635 <ul>
14636
14637 <li>Using dblatex, the &lt;part&gt; handling is not the way I want to,
14638    as &lt;/part&gt; do not really end the &lt;part&gt;. (See
14639    <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/683166">BTS report #683166</a>), the
14640    xetex backend (needed to process UTF-8) give incorrect hyphens in
14641    index references spanning several pages (See
14642    <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/682901">BTS report #682901</a>), and
14643    I am unable to get the norwegian template texts (See
14644    <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/682936">BTS report #682936</a>).</li>
14645
14646 <li>Using straight xmlto fail with some latex error (See
14647    <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/683163">BTS report
14648    #683163</a>).</li>
14649
14650 <li>Using xmlto with the fop backend fail to handle images (do not
14651    show up in the PDF), fail to handle a long footnote (overlap
14652    footnote and text body, see
14653    <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/683197">BTS report #683197</a>), and
14654    fail to create a correct index (some lack page ref, and the page
14655    refs listed are not right).</li>
14656
14657 <li>Using xmlto with the dblatex backend behave like dblatex.</li>
14658
14659 <li>Using docbook-xls with xsltproc + fop have the same footnote and
14660    index problems the xmlto + fop processing.</li>
14661
14662 </ul>
14663
14664 <p>So I wonder, what would be the best way to create the PDF version
14665 of this book?  Are some of the bugs found above solved in new or
14666 experimental versions of some docbook tool chain?</p>
14667
14668 <p>What about HTML and EPUB versions?</p>
14669
14670       </div>
14671       <div class="tags">
14672
14673
14674         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>.
14675
14676
14677       </div>
14678     </div>
14679     <div class="padding"></div>
14680
14681     <div class="entry">
14682       <div class="title">
14683         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Culture_in_Norwegian___5_chapters_done__74_percent_left_to_do.html">Free Culture in Norwegian - 5 chapters done, 74 percent left to do</a>
14684       </div>
14685       <div class="date">
14686         21st July 2012
14687       </div>
14688       <div class="body">
14689         <p>I reported earlier that I am working on
14690 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html">a
14691 norwegian version</a> of the book
14692 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> by Lawrence Lessig.
14693 Progress is good, and yesterday I got a major contribution from Anders
14694 Hagen Jarmund completing chapter six.  The source files as well as a
14695 PDF and EPUB version of this book are available from
14696 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>.</p>
14697
14698 <p>I am happy to report that the draft for the first two chapters
14699 (preface, introduction) is complete, and three other chapters are also
14700 completely translated.  This completes 26 percent of the number of
14701 strings (equivalent to paragraphs) in the book, and there is thus 74
14702 percent left to translate.  A graph of the progress is present at the
14703 bottom of the github project page.  There is still room for more
14704 contributors.  Get in touch or send github pull requests with fixes if
14705 you got time and are willing to help make this book make it to
14706 print. :)</p>
14707
14708 <p>The book translation framework could also be a good basis for other
14709 translations, if you want the book to be available in your
14710 language.</p>
14711
14712       </div>
14713       <div class="tags">
14714
14715
14716         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
14717
14718
14719       </div>
14720     </div>
14721     <div class="padding"></div>
14722
14723     <div class="entry">
14724       <div class="title">
14725         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Call_for_help_from_docbook_expert_to_tag_Free_Culture_by_Lawrence_Lessig.html">Call for help from docbook expert to tag Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig</a>
14726       </div>
14727       <div class="date">
14728         16th July 2012
14729       </div>
14730       <div class="body">
14731         <p>I am currently working on a
14732 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Dugnad_for___sende_norsk_versjon_av_Free_Culture_til_stortingets_representanter_.html">project
14733 to translate</a> the book
14734 <a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a> by Lawrence Lessig
14735 to Norwegian.  And the source we base our translation on is the
14736 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DocBook">docbook</a> version, to
14737 allow us to use po4a and .po files to handle the translation, and for
14738 this to work well the docbook source document need to be properly
14739 tagged.  The source files of this project is available from
14740 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">github</a>.</p>
14741
14742 <p>The problem is that the docbook source have flaws, and we have
14743 no-one involved in the project that is a docbook expert.  Is there a
14744 docbook expert somewhere that is interested in helping us create a
14745 well tagged docbook version of the book, and adjust our build process
14746 for the PDF, EPUB and HTML version of the book?  This will provide a
14747 well tagged English version (our source document), and make it a lot
14748 easier for us to create a good Norwegian version.  If you can and want
14749 to help, please get in touch with me or fork the github project and
14750 send pull requests with fixes. :)</p>
14751
14752       </div>
14753       <div class="tags">
14754
14755
14756         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
14757
14758
14759       </div>
14760     </div>
14761     <div class="padding"></div>
14762
14763     <div class="entry">
14764       <div class="title">
14765         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__George_Bredberg.html">Debian Edu interview: George Bredberg</a>
14766       </div>
14767       <div class="date">
14768          9th July 2012
14769       </div>
14770       <div class="body">
14771         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
14772 Skolelinux</a> project have users all over the globe, but until
14773 recently we have not known about any users in Norway's neighbour
14774 country Sweden.  This changed when George Bredberg showed up in March
14775 this year on the mailing list, asking interesting questions about how
14776 to adjust and scale the just released
14777 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311.html">Debian Edu
14778 Wheezy</a> setup to his liking.  He granted me an interview, and I am
14779 happy to share his answers with you here.</p>
14780
14781 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
14782
14783 <p>I'm a 44 year old country guy that have been working 12 years at
14784 the same school as 50% IT-manager and 50% Teacher. My educational
14785 background is fil.kand in history and religious beliefs, an exam as a
14786 "folkhighschool" teacher, that is, for teaching grownups.  In
14787 Norwegian I believe it's called "Vuxenupplaring". I also have a master
14788 in "Technology and social change". So I'm not really a tech guy, I
14789 just like to study how humans and technology interact and that is my
14790 perspective when working with IT.</p>
14791
14792 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
14793 project?</strong></p>
14794
14795 I have followed the Skolelinux project for quite some time by
14796 now. Earlier I tested out the K12-LTSP project, which we used for some
14797 time, but I really like the idea of having a distribution aimed to be
14798 a complete solution for schools with necessary tools integrated. When
14799 K12-LTSP abandoned that idea some years ago, I started to look more
14800 seriously into Skolelinux instead.
14801
14802 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
14803 Edu?</strong></p>
14804
14805 The big point of Skolelinux to me is that it is a complete
14806 distribution, ready to install. It has LDAP-support, MS Windows
14807 integration tools and so forth already configured, saving an
14808 administrator a lot of time and headache. We were using another Linux
14809 based thin-client system called Thinlinc, that has served us very
14810 well. But that Skolelinux is based on VNC and LTSP, to me, is better
14811 when it comes to the kind of multimedia used in schools. That is
14812 showing videos from Youtube or educational TV. It is also easier to
14813 mix thin clients with workstations, since the user settings will be the
14814 same. In our VNC-based solution you had to "beat around the bush" by
14815 setting up a second, hidden, home-directory for user settings for the
14816 workstations, because they will be different from the ones used on the
14817 thin clients. Skolelinux support for diskless workstations are very
14818 convenient since a school today often need to use a class room
14819 projector showing videos in full screen. That is easily done with a
14820 small integrated media computer running as a diskless workstation. You
14821 have only two installs to update and configure. One for the thin
14822 clients and one for the workstations. Also saving a lot of time.  Our
14823 old system was also based on Redhat and CentOS. They are both very
14824 nice distributions, but they are sometimes painfully slow when it
14825 comes to updating multimedia support and multimedia programs (even
14826 such as Gimp), leaving us with a bit "oldish" applications. Debian is
14827 quicker to update.
14828
14829 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
14830 Edu?</strong></p>
14831
14832 <p>Debian is a bit too quick when it comes to updating. As an example
14833 we use old HP terminals as thinclients, and two times already this
14834 year (2012) the updates you get from the repositories has stopped
14835 sound from working with them.  It's a kernel/ALSA issue. So you have
14836 to be more careful properly testing the updates before you run them in
14837 a production environment. This has never happened with CentOS.</p>
14838
14839 <p>I also would like to be able to set my own domain-settings at
14840 install time.  In Skolelinux they are kind of hard coded into the
14841 distribution, when it comes to LDAP and at least samba integration.
14842 That is more a cosmetic/translation issue, and not a real problem.
14843 Running MS Windows applications within the Skolelinux environment needs
14844 to be better supported. That is, running them seamlessly via RDP, and
14845 support for single-sign on.  That will make the transition to free
14846 software easier, because you can keep the applications you really
14847 need.  No support will make it impossible if you work in a school where
14848 some applications can't be open source. As for us we really need to
14849 run Adobe InDesign in our journalist classes.  We run a journalist
14850 education, and is one of the very few non university ones that is ok:d
14851 by Svenska journalistförbundet (Swedish journalist association).  Our
14852 education gives the pupils the right of membership there, once they
14853 are done.  This is important if you want to get a job.</p>
14854
14855 <p>Adobe InDesign is the program most commonly used in newspapers and
14856 magazines.  We used Quark Express before, but they seem to loose there
14857 market to Adobe. The only "equivalent" to InDesign in the opensource
14858 world is Scribus, and its not advanced enough. At least not according
14859 to the teacher. I think it would be possible to use it, because they
14860 are not supposed to learn a program, they are supposed to learn how to
14861 edit and compile a newspaper.  But politically at our school we are not
14862 there yet.  And Scribus lacks a lot of things you find i InDesign.</p>
14863
14864 <p>We used even a windows program for sound editing when it comes to
14865 the radio-journalist part. The year to come we are going to try
14866 Audacity. That software has the same kind of limitations compared to
14867 Adobe Audition, but that teacher is a bit more open minded. We have
14868 tried Ardour also, but that instead is more like a music studio
14869 program, not intended for the kind of editing taking place in a radio
14870 studio. Its way to complex and the GUI is to scattered when you only
14871 want to cut, make pass-overs, add extra channels and normalise.  Those
14872 things you can do in Audacity, but its not as easy as in Audition. You
14873 have to do more things manually with envelopes, and that is a bit old
14874 fashion and timewasting. Its also harder to cut and move sound from
14875 one channel to another, which is a thing that you do frequently
14876 because you often find yourself needing to rearrange parts of the
14877 sound file.</p>
14878
14879 <p>So, I am not sure we will succeed in replacing even Audition, but we
14880 will try.  The problem is the students have certain expectations when
14881 they start an education towards a profession.  So the programs has to
14882 look and feel professional.  Good thing with radio, there are many
14883 programs out there, that radio studios use, so its not as standardised
14884 as Newspaper editing. That means, it does not really matter what
14885 program they learn, because once they start working they still have to
14886 learn the program the studio uses, so instead focus has to be to learn
14887 the editing part without to much focus on a specific software.</p>
14888
14889 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
14890
14891 <p>Myself I'm running Linux Mint, or Ubuntu these days.  I use almost
14892 only open source software, and preferably Linux based. When it comes
14893 to most used applications its OpenOffice, and Firefox (of course ;)
14894 )</p>
14895
14896 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
14897 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
14898
14899 <p>To get schools to use free software there has to be good open
14900 source software that are windows based, to ease the transition. But
14901 it's also very important that the multimedia support is working
14902 flawlessly.  The problems with Youtube, Twitter, Facebook and whatever
14903 will create problems when it comes to both teachers and
14904 students. Economy are also important for schools, so using thin
14905 clients, as long as they have good multimedia support, is a very good
14906 idea. It's also important that the open source software works even for
14907 the administration.  It's hard to convince the teachers to stick with
14908 open source, if the principal has to run Windows.  It also creates a
14909 problem if some classes has to use Windows for there tasks, since that
14910 will create a difference in "status" between classes, so a good
14911 support for running windows applications via the thin client (Linux)
14912 desktop is essential.  At least at our school, where we have mixed
14913 level of educations, from high-school to journalist-school.</p>
14914
14915 <p>Update 2012-07-09 08:30: Paul Wise tipped me on IRC about three
14916 useful sources related to Free Software for radio stations: the LWN
14917 article <a href="https://lwn.net/Articles/481607/">Radio station
14918 management with Airtime</a>,
14919 <a href="http://www.sourcefabric.org/en/airtime/">Airtime</a> which
14920 claim to be a Free open source radio automation software and
14921 <a href="http://www.rivendellaudio.org/">Rivendell</a> which claim to
14922 be complete radio broadcast automation solution.  All of them seem
14923 useful to the aspiring radio producer.</p>
14924
14925       </div>
14926       <div class="tags">
14927
14928
14929         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
14930
14931
14932       </div>
14933     </div>
14934     <div class="padding"></div>
14935
14936     <div class="entry">
14937       <div class="title">
14938         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_do_schools_waste_money_on_IT_.html">Why do schools waste money on IT?</a>
14939       </div>
14940       <div class="date">
14941          8th July 2012
14942       </div>
14943       <div class="body">
14944         <p>In the Debian Edu / Skolelinux project, we have realised that one
14945 of the major blockers for the project success is the purchasing skills
14946 in schools and municipalities.  We provide what the happy users of
14947 Debian Edu / Skolelinux say they need and to a lower cost than the
14948 alternatives, and yet so few schools decide to use our solution.  I
14949 was pleased to discover the same observation done by mySociety and Tom
14950 Steinberg in his blog post
14951 "<a href="http://www.mysociety.org/2012/06/19/can-you-recognize-the-million-pound-chair/">Can
14952 you recognize the million pound chair?</a>".  Read it and weep for the
14953 spending of your tax money.</p>
14954
14955 <p>Of course there are other factors involved as well, like our
14956 projects bad marketing skills and the Linux community fragmentation
14957 causing worry with the people on the outside, so we as a project need
14958 to keep working hard to gain users, but it is a up-hill battle when
14959 public decision makers are unable to understand computer system
14960 purchases.</p>
14961
14962       </div>
14963       <div class="tags">
14964
14965
14966         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
14967
14968
14969       </div>
14970     </div>
14971     <div class="padding"></div>
14972
14973     <div class="entry">
14974       <div class="title">
14975         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Timetabling_Software___nice_free_software.html">Free Timetabling Software - nice free software</a>
14976       </div>
14977       <div class="date">
14978          7th July 2012
14979       </div>
14980       <div class="body">
14981         <p>Included in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
14982 Skolelinux</a> is a large collection of end user and school specific
14983 software.  It is one of the packages not installed by default but
14984 provided in the Debian archive for schools to install if they want to,
14985 is a system to automatically plan the school time table using
14986 information about available teachers, classes and rooms, combined with
14987 the list of required courses and how many hours each topic should
14988 receive.  The software is
14989
14990 <a href="http://lalescu.ro/liviu/fet/">named FET</a>, and it provide a
14991 graphical user interface to input the required information, save the
14992 result in a fairly simple XML format, and generate time tables for
14993 both teachers and students.  It is available both for
14994 <a href="http://lalescu.ro/liviu/fet/download.html">Linux, MacOSX and
14995 Windows</a>.</p>
14996
14997 <p>This is <a href="http://lalescu.ro/liviu/fet/features.html">the
14998 feature list</a>, liftet from the project web site:</p>
14999
15000 <p><ul>
15001
15002   <li>FET is free software, licensed under the GNU GPL v2 or later.
15003     You can freely use, copy, modify and redistribute it </li>
15004
15005   <li>Localized to en_US (US English, default), ar (Arabic), ca
15006     (Catalan), da (Danish), de (German), el (Greek), es (Spanish), fa
15007     (Persian), fr (French), gl (Galician), he (Hebrew), hu
15008     (Hungarian), id (Indonesian), it (Italian), lt (Lithuanian), mk
15009     (Macedonian), ms (Malay), nl (Dutch), pl (Polish), pt_BR
15010     (Brazilian Portuguese), ro (Romanian), ru (Russian), si (Sinhala),
15011     sk (Slovak), sr (Serbian), tr (Turkish), uk (Ukrainian), uz
15012     (Uzbek) and vi (Vietnamese) (incompletely for some languages)
15013     </li>
15014
15015   <li>Fully automatic generation algorithm, allowing also
15016     semi-automatic or manual allocation</li>
15017
15018   <li>Platform independent implementation, allowing running on
15019     GNU/Linux, Windows, Mac and any system that Qt supports </li>
15020
15021   <li>Flexible modular XML format for the input file, allowing editing
15022     with an XML editor or by hand (besides FET interface)</li>
15023
15024   <li>Import/export from CSV format</li>
15025
15026   <li>The resulted timetables are exported into HTML, XML and CSV
15027     formats </li>
15028
15029   <li>Flexible students structure, organized into sets: years, groups
15030     and subgroups. FET allows overlapping years and groups and
15031     non-overlapping subgroups. You can even define individual students
15032     (as separate sets)</li>
15033
15034   <li>Each constraint has a weight percentage, from 0.0% to 100.0%
15035     (but some special constraints are allowed to have only 100% weight
15036     percentage)</li>
15037
15038   <li>Limits for the algorithm (all these limits can be increased on
15039     demand, as a custom version, because this would require a bit more
15040     memory):
15041     <ul>
15042       <li>Maximum total number of hours (periods) per day: 60</li>
15043       <li>Maximum number of working days per week: 35</li>
15044       <li>Maximum total number of teachers: 6000</li>
15045       <li>Maximum total number of sets of students: 30000</li>
15046       <li>Maximum total number of subjects: 6000</li>
15047       <li>Virtually unlimited number of activity tags</li>
15048       <li>Maximum number of activities: 30000</li>
15049       <li>Maximum number of rooms: 6000</li>
15050       <li>Maximum number of buildings: 6000</li>
15051       <li>Possibility of adding multiple teachers and
15052           students sets for each activity.  (it is possible
15053           also to have no teachers or no students sets for an
15054           activity)</li>
15055       <li>Virtually unlimited number of time constraints</li>
15056       <li>Virtually unlimited number of space constraints</li>
15057     </ul></li>
15058
15059   <li>A large and flexible palette of time constraints:
15060     <ul>
15061       <li>Break periods</li>
15062       <li>For teacher(s):
15063         <ul>
15064           <li>Not available periods</li>
15065           <li>Max/min days per week</li>
15066           <li>Max gaps per day/week</li>
15067           <li>Max hours daily/continuously</li>
15068           <li>Min hours daily</li>
15069           <li>Max hours daily/continuously with an activity tag</li>
15070
15071           <li>Respect working in an hourly interval a max number of
15072             days per week</li>
15073         </ul></li>
15074       <li>For students (sets):
15075         <ul>
15076           <li>Not available periods</li>
15077           <li>Begins early (specify max allowed beginnings at second hour)</li>
15078           <li>Max gaps per day/week</li>
15079           <li>Max hours daily/continuously</li>
15080           <li>Min hours daily</li>
15081           <li>Max hours daily/continuously with an activity tag</li>
15082
15083           <li>Respect working in an hourly interval a max number of
15084             days per week</li>
15085         </ul></li>
15086       <li>For an activity or a set of activities/subactivities:
15087         <ul>
15088           <li>A single preferred starting time</li>
15089           <li>A set of preferred starting times</li>
15090           <li>A set of preferred time slots</li>
15091           <li>Min/max days between them</li>
15092           <li>End(s) students day</li>
15093           <li>Same starting time/day/hour</li>
15094           <li>Occupy max time slots from selection (a complex and
15095             flexible constraint, useful in many situations)</li>
15096           <li>Consecutive, ordered, grouped (for 2 or 3 (sub)activities)</li>
15097           <li>Not overlapping</li>
15098           <li>Max simultaneous in selected time slots</li>
15099           <li>Min gaps between a set of (sub)activities</li>
15100         </ul></li>
15101     </ul></li>
15102
15103   <li>A large and flexible palette of space constraints:
15104     <ul>
15105       <li>Room not available periods</li>
15106       <li>For teacher(s):
15107         <ul>
15108           <li>Home room(s)</li>
15109           <li>Max building changes per day/week</li>
15110           <li>Min gaps between building changes</li>
15111         </ul>
15112       </li>
15113
15114       <li>For students (sets):
15115         <ul>
15116           <li>Home room(s)</li>
15117           <li>Max building changes per day/week</li>
15118           <li>Min gaps between building changes</li>
15119         </ul>
15120       </li>
15121       <li>Preferred room(s):
15122         <ul>
15123           <li>For a subject</li>
15124           <li>For an activity tag</li>
15125           <li>For a subject and an activity tag</li>
15126           <li>Individually for a (sub)activity</li>
15127         </ul>
15128       </li>
15129
15130       <li>For a set of activities:
15131         <ul>
15132           <li>Occupy a maximum number of different rooms</li>
15133         </ul>
15134       </li>
15135     </ul>
15136   </li>
15137 </ul></p>
15138
15139 <p>I have not used it myself, as I am not involved in time table
15140 planning at a school, but it seem to work fine when I test it.  If you
15141 need to set up your schools time table, and is tired of doing it
15142 manually, check it out.
15143
15144 A quick summary on how to use it can be found in
15145 <a href="http://marvelsoft.co.in/wp/2012/03/generate-timetable-for-state-cbse-icse-igcse-schools-free/">a
15146 blog post from MarvelSoft</a>.  If you find FET useful, please provide
15147 a recipe for the Debian Edu project in the
15148 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu#Howtos">Debian Edu HowTo
15149 section</a>.</p>
15150
15151       </div>
15152       <div class="tags">
15153
15154
15155         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software</a>.
15156
15157
15158       </div>
15159     </div>
15160     <div class="padding"></div>
15161
15162     <div class="entry">
15163       <div class="title">
15164         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Can_Zimbra_be_told_to_send_autoreplies_to_the_From__address_.html">Can Zimbra be told to send autoreplies to the From: address?</a>
15165       </div>
15166       <div class="date">
15167          3rd July 2012
15168       </div>
15169       <div class="body">
15170         <p>In the NUUG <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a>
15171 project (Norwegian version of
15172 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> from
15173 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a>), we have discovered
15174 a problem with the municipalities using
15175 <a href="http://www.zimbra.com/">Zimbra</a>.  When FiksGataMi send a
15176 problem report to the government, the email From: address is set to
15177 the address of the person reporting the problem, while envelope sender
15178 is set to the FiksGataMi contact address.  The intention is to make
15179 sure the municipality send any replies to the person reporting the
15180 problem, while any email delivery problems are sent to us in NUUG.
15181 This work well in most cases, but not for Karmøy municipality using
15182 Zimbra.  Karmøy is using the vacation message function in Zimbra to
15183 send an automatic reply to report that the message has been received,
15184 and this message is sent to the envelope sender and not the address in
15185 the From: header.</p>
15186
15187 <p>This causes the automatic message from Karmøy to go to NUUGs
15188 request-tracker instance instead of to the person reporting the
15189 problem.  We can not really change the envelope sender address, as
15190 this would make it impossible for us to discover when there are
15191 problems with the MTAs receiving problem reports.  We have been in
15192 contact with the people at Karmøy municipality, and they are willing
15193 to adjust Zimbra if something can be changed there to get a better
15194 behaviour.</p>
15195
15196 <p>The default behaviour of Zimbra is as far as I can tell according
15197 to the specification in RFC 3834, which recommend that vacation
15198 messages are sent to the envelope sender and not to the From: address.
15199 But I wonder if it is possible to adjust or configure Zimbra to behave
15200 differently.  Anyone know?  Please let us know at
15201 <a href="http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/fiksgatami">fiksgatami
15202 (at) nuug.no</a>.</p>
15203
15204       </div>
15205       <div class="tags">
15206
15207
15208         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
15209
15210
15211       </div>
15212     </div>
15213     <div class="padding"></div>
15214
15215     <div class="entry">
15216       <div class="title">
15217         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Jos__Luis_Redrejo_Rodr_guez.html">Debian Edu interview: José Luis Redrejo Rodríguez</a>
15218       </div>
15219       <div class="date">
15220         26th June 2012
15221       </div>
15222       <div class="body">
15223         <p>I've been too busy at home, but finally I found time to wrap up
15224 another interview with the people behind
15225 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>.
15226 This time we get to know José Luis Redrejo Rodríguez, one of our great
15227 helpers from Spain.  His effort was the reason we added support for
15228 several desktop types (KDE, Gnome and most recently LXDE) in Debian
15229 Edu, and have all of these available in the recently published
15230 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311.html">Debian Edu
15231 Squeeze</a> version.</p>
15232
15233 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
15234
15235 <p>I'm a father, teacher and engineer who is working for the Education
15236 ministry of the Region of Extremadura (Spain) in the implementation of
15237 ICT in schools</p>
15238
15239 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
15240 project?</strong></p>
15241
15242 <p>At 2006, I verified that both, we in Extremadura and Skolelinux
15243 project, had been working in parallel for some years, doing very
15244 similar things, using very similar tools and with similar targets, so
15245 I decided it was time to join forces as much as possible.</p>
15246
15247 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
15248 Edu?</strong></p>
15249
15250 <p>A community of highly skilled experts working together, with a
15251 really open schema of collaboration and work. I really love the
15252 concepts of Do-ocracy and Merit-ocracy and the way these concepts are
15253 been used everyday inside Debian Edu.</p>
15254
15255 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
15256 Edu?</strong></p>
15257
15258 <p>Sometimes the differences in the implementations, laws or
15259 economical and technical resources in the different countries don't
15260 allow us to agree in the same solution for all of us, and several
15261 approaches are needed, what is a waste of effort. Also, there is a
15262 lack of more man power to be able to follow the fast evolution of the
15263 technologies in school.</p>
15264
15265 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
15266
15267 <p>Debian, of course, and due to my kind of job I am most of my time
15268 between Iceweasel, <a href="http://www.geany.org/">Geany</a> and
15269 <a href="http://www.ohloh.net/p/gnome-terminator">Terminator</a>.</p>
15270
15271 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
15272 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
15273
15274 <p>I think there is not a single strategy because there are very
15275 different scenarios: schools with mixed proprietary and free
15276 environments, schools using only workstations, other schools using
15277 laptops, netbooks, tablets, interactive white-boards, etc.</p>
15278
15279 <p>Also the range of ages of the students is very broad and you can
15280 not use the same solutions for primary schools and secondary or even
15281 universities. So different strategies are needed.</p>
15282
15283 <p>But, looking at these differences, and looking back to the things
15284 we've done and implemented, and the places were we have spent most of
15285 our forces, I think we should focus as much as possible in free
15286 multi-platform environments, using only standards tools, and moving
15287 more and more to Internet or network solutions that could be deployed
15288 using wireless. I think we'll see more and more personal devices in
15289 the schools, devices the students and teachers will take home with
15290 them, so the solutions must be able to be taken at home and continue
15291 working there.</p>
15292
15293       </div>
15294       <div class="tags">
15295
15296
15297         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
15298
15299
15300       </div>
15301     </div>
15302     <div class="padding"></div>
15303
15304     <div class="entry">
15305       <div class="title">
15306         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Song book for Computer Scientists</a>
15307       </div>
15308       <div class="date">
15309         24th June 2012
15310       </div>
15311       <div class="body">
15312         <p>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
15313 <a href="http://www.uit.no/">University of Tromsø</a>, I started
15314 collecting computer related songs for use at parties.  The original
15315 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
15316 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
15317 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format.  I have
15318 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
15319 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
15320 help me extend and update the book.  If anyone is volunteering to help
15321 me with this, send me an email.  Also let me know if there are songs
15322 missing in my book.</p>
15323
15324 <p>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
15325 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
15326 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
15327 Especially now that <a href="http://debconf12.debconf.org/">Debconf
15328 12</a> is about to start (and I am not going).  Want to sing?  Check
15329 out <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's
15330 Computer Science Songbook</a>.
15331
15332       </div>
15333       <div class="tags">
15334
15335
15336         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
15337
15338
15339       </div>
15340     </div>
15341     <div class="padding"></div>
15342
15343     <div class="entry">
15344       <div class="title">
15345         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu___some_ideas_for_the_future_versions.html">Debian Edu - some ideas for the future versions</a>
15346       </div>
15347       <div class="date">
15348         11th June 2012
15349       </div>
15350       <div class="body">
15351         <p>During my work on
15352 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311.nb.html">Debian Edu
15353 based on Squeeze</a>, I came across some issues that should be
15354 addressed in the Wheezy release.  I finally found time to wrap up my
15355 notes and provide quick summary of what I found, with a bit
15356 explanation.</p>
15357
15358 <p><ul>
15359
15360 <li>We need to rewrite our package installation framework, as tasksel
15361 changed from using tasksel tasks to using meta packages (aka packages
15362 with dependencies like our education-* packages), and our installation
15363 system depend on tasksel tasks in
15364 /usr/share/tasksel/debian-edu-tasks.desc for package
15365 installation.</li>
15366
15367 <li>Enable Kerberos login for more services.  Now with the Kerberos
15368 foundation in place, we should use it to get single sign on with more
15369 services, and avoiding unneeded password / login questions.  We should
15370 at least try to enable it for these services:
15371 <ul>
15372
15373   <li>CUPS for admins to add/configure printers and users when using
15374     quotas.</li>
15375   <li>Nagios for admins checking the system status.</li>
15376   <li>GOsa for admins updating LDAP and users changing their passwords.</li>
15377   <li>LDAP for admins updating LDAP.</li>
15378   <li>Squid for users when exam mode / filtering is active.</li>
15379   <li>ssh for admins and users to save a password prompt.</li>
15380
15381 </ul></li>
15382
15383 <li>When we move GOsa to use Kerberos instead of LDAP bind to
15384 authenticate users, we should try to block or at least limit access to
15385 use LDAP bind for authentication, to ensure Kerberos is used when it
15386 is intended, and nothing fall back to using the less safe LDAP bind</li>
15387
15388 <li>Merge debian-edu-config and debian-edu-install.  The split made
15389 sense when d-e-install did a lot more, but these days it is just an
15390 inconvenience when we update the debconf preseeding values.</li>
15391
15392 <li>Fix partman-auto to allow us to abort the installation before
15393 touching the disk if the disk is too small.  This is
15394 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/653305">BTS report #653305</a> and the
15395 d-i developers are fine with the patch and someone just need to apply
15396 it and upload.  After this is done we need to adjust
15397 debian-edu-install to use this new hook.</li>
15398
15399 <li>Adjust to new LTSP framework (boot time config instead of install
15400 time config).  LTSP changed its design, and our hooks to install
15401 packages and update the configuration is most likely not going to work
15402 in Wheezy.
15403
15404 <li>Consider switching to NBD instead of NFS for LTSP root, to allow
15405 the Kernel to cache files in its normal file cache, possibly speeding
15406 up KDE login on slow networks.</li>
15407
15408 <li>Make it possible to create expired user passwords that need to
15409 change on first login.  This is useful when handing out password on
15410 paper, to make sure only the user know the password.  This require
15411 fixes to the PAM handling of kdm and gdm.</li>
15412
15413 <li>Make GUI for adding new machines automatically from sitesummary.
15414 The current command line script is not very friendly to people most
15415 familiar with GUIs.  This should probably be integrated into GOsa to
15416 have it available where the admin will be looking for it..</li>
15417
15418 <li>We should find way for Nagios to check that the DHCP service
15419 actually is working (as in handling out IP addresses).  None of the
15420 Nagios checks I have found so far have been working for me.</li>
15421
15422 <li>We should switch from libpam-nss-ldapd to sssd for all profiles
15423 using LDAP, and not only on for roaming workstations, to have less
15424 packages to configure and consistent setup across all profiles.</li>
15425
15426 <li>We should configure Kerberos to update LDAP and Samba password
15427 when changing password using the Kerberos protocol.  The hook was
15428 requested in <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/588968">BTS report
15429 #588968</a> and is now available in Wheezy.  We might need to write a
15430 MIT Kerberos plugin in C to get this.</li>
15431
15432 <li>We should clean up the set of applications installed by default.
15433 <ul>
15434
15435 <li>reduce the number of chemistry visualisers</li>
15436 <li>consider dropping xpaint</li>
15437 <li>and probably more?</li>
15438 </ul></li>
15439
15440 <li>Some hardware need external firmware to work properly.  This is
15441 mostly the case for WiFi network cards, but there are some other
15442 examples too.  For popular laptops to work out of the box, such
15443 firmware need to be installed from non-free, and we should provide
15444 some GUI to do this.  Ubuntu already have this implemented, and we
15445 could consider using their packages.  At the moment we have some
15446 command line script to do this (one for the running system, another
15447 for the LTSP chroot).</li>
15448
15449
15450 <li>In Squeeze, we provide KDE, Gnome and LXDE as desktop options.  We
15451 should extend the list to Xfce and Sugar, and preferably find a way to
15452 install several and allow the admin or the user to select which one to
15453 use.</li>
15454
15455 <li>The golearn tool from the goplay package make it easy to check out
15456 interesting educational packages.  We should work on the package
15457 tagging in Debian to ensure it represent all the useful educational
15458 packages, and extend the tool to allow it to use packagekit to install
15459 new applications with a simple mouse click.</li>
15460
15461 <li>The Squeeze version got half a exam solution already in place,
15462 with the introduction of iptable based network blocking, but for it to
15463 be a complete exam solution the Squid proxy need to enable
15464 filtering/blocking as well when the exam mode is enabled.  We should
15465 implement a way to easily enable this for the schools that want it,
15466 instead of the "it is documented" method of today.</li>
15467
15468 <li>A feature used in several schools is the ability for a teacher to
15469 "take over" the desktop of individual or all computers in the room.
15470 There are at least three implementations,
15471 <a href="italc.sourceforge.net/">italc</a>,
15472 <a href="http://www.itais.net/help/en/">controlaula</a> og
15473 <a href="http://www.epoptes.org/">epoptes</a> and we should pick one of
15474 them and make it trivial to set it up in a school.  The challenges is
15475 how to distribute crypto keys and how to group computers in one room
15476 and how to set up which machine/user can control the machines in a
15477 given room.</li>
15478
15479 <li>Tablets and surf boards are getting more and more popular, and we
15480 should look into providing a good solution for integrating these into
15481 the Debian Edu network.  Not quite sure how.  Perhaps we should
15482 provide a installation profile with better touch screen support for
15483 them, or add some sync services to allow them to exchange
15484 configuration and data with the central server.  This should be
15485 investigated.</li>
15486
15487 </ul></p>
15488
15489 <p>I guess we will discover more as we continue to work on the Wheezy
15490 version.</p>
15491
15492       </div>
15493       <div class="tags">
15494
15495
15496         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
15497
15498
15499       </div>
15500     </div>
15501     <div class="padding"></div>
15502
15503     <div class="entry">
15504       <div class="title">
15505         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/TV_with_face_recognition__for_improved_viewer_experience.html">TV with face recognition, for improved viewer experience</a>
15506       </div>
15507       <div class="date">
15508          9th June 2012
15509       </div>
15510       <div class="body">
15511         <p>Slashdot got a story about Intel planning a
15512 <a href="http://entertainment.slashdot.org/story/12/06/09/0012247/intel-to-launch-tv-service-with-facial-recognition-by-end-of-the-year">TV
15513 with face recognition</a> to recognise the viewer, and it occurred to
15514 me that it would be more interesting to turn it around, and do face
15515 recognition on the TV image itself.  It could let the viewer know who
15516 is present on the screen, and perhaps look up their credibility,
15517 company affiliation, previous appearances etc for the viewer to better
15518 evaluate what is being said and done.  That would be a feature I would
15519 be willing to pay for.</p>
15520
15521 <p>I would not be willing to pay for a TV that point a camera on my
15522 household, like the big brother feature apparently proposed by Intel.
15523 It is the telescreen idea fetched straight out of the book
15524 <a href="http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks01/0100021.txt">1984 by George
15525 Orwell</a>.</p>
15526
15527       </div>
15528       <div class="tags">
15529
15530
15531         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
15532
15533
15534       </div>
15535     </div>
15536     <div class="padding"></div>
15537
15538     <div class="entry">
15539       <div class="title">
15540         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Web_service_to_look_up_HP_and_Dell_computer_hardware_support_status.html">Web service to look up HP and Dell computer hardware support status</a>
15541       </div>
15542       <div class="date">
15543          6th June 2012
15544       </div>
15545       <div class="body">
15546         <p>A few days ago
15547 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/SOAP_based_webservice_from_Dell_to_check_server_support_status.html">I
15548 reported how to get</a> the support status out of Dell using an
15549 unofficial and undocumented SOAP API, which I since have found out was
15550 <a href="http://lists.us.dell.com/pipermail/linux-poweredge/2012-February/045959.html">discovered
15551 by Daniel De Marco in february</a>.  Combined with my web scraping
15552 code for HP, Dell and IBM
15553 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Checking_server_hardware_support_status_for_Dell__HP_and_IBM_servers.html">from
15554 2009</a>, I got inspired and wrote
15555 <a href="https://views.scraperwiki.com/run/computer-hardware-support-status/">a
15556 web service</a> based on Scraperwiki to make it easy to look up the
15557 support status and get a machine readable result back.</p>
15558
15559 <p>This is what it look like at the moment when asking for the JSON
15560 output:
15561
15562 <blockquote><pre>
15563 % GET <a href="https://views.scraperwiki.com/run/computer-hardware-support-status/?format=json&vendor=Dell&servicetag=2v1xwn1">https://views.scraperwiki.com/run/computer-hardware-support-status/?format=json&vendor=Dell&servicetag=2v1xwn1</a>
15564 supportstatus({"servicetag": "2v1xwn1", "warrantyend": "2013-11-24", "shipped": "2010-11-24", "scrapestamputc": "2012-06-06T20:26:56.965847", "scrapedurl": "http://143.166.84.118/services/assetservice.asmx?WSDL", "vendor": "Dell", "productid": ""})
15565 %
15566 </pre></blockquote>
15567
15568 <p>It currently support Dell and HP, and I am hoping for help to add
15569 support for other vendors.  The python source is available on
15570 Scraperwiki and I welcome help with adding more features.</p>
15571
15572       </div>
15573       <div class="tags">
15574
15575
15576         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
15577
15578
15579       </div>
15580     </div>
15581     <div class="padding"></div>
15582
15583     <div class="entry">
15584       <div class="title">
15585         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Mike_Gabriel.html">Debian Edu interview: Mike Gabriel</a>
15586       </div>
15587       <div class="date">
15588          2nd June 2012
15589       </div>
15590       <div class="body">
15591         <p>Back in 2010, Mike Gabriel showed up on the
15592 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>
15593 mailing list.  He quickly proved to be a valuable developer, and
15594 thanks to his tireless effort we now have Kerberos integrated into the
15595 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311.html">Debian Edu
15596 Squeeze</a> version.</p>
15597
15598 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
15599
15600 <p>My name is Mike Gabriel, I am 38 years old and live near Kiel,
15601 Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. I live together with a wonderful partner
15602 (Angela Fuß) and two own children and two bonus children (contributed
15603 by Angela).</p>
15604
15605 <p>During the day I am part-time employed as a system administrator
15606 and part-time working as an IT consultant. The consultancy work
15607 touches free software topics wherever and whenever possible. During
15608 the nights I am a free software developer. In the gaps I also train in
15609 becoming an osteopath.</p>
15610
15611 <p>Starting in 2010 we (Andreas Buchholz, Angela Fuß, Mike Gabriel)
15612 have set up a free software project in the area of Kiel that aims at
15613 introducing free software into schools. The project's name is
15614 "IT-Zukunft Schule" (IT future for schools). The project links IT
15615 skills with communication skills.</p>
15616
15617 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
15618 project?</strong></p>
15619
15620 <p>While preparing our own customised Linux distribution for
15621 "IT-Zukunft Schule" we were repeatedly asked if we really wanted to
15622 reinvent the wheel. What schools really need is already available,
15623 people said.  From this impulse we started evaluating other Linux
15624 distributions that target being used for school networks.</p>
15625
15626 <p>At the end we short-listed two approaches and compared them: a
15627 commercial Linux distribution developed by a company in Bremen,
15628 Germany, and Skolelinux / Debian Edu. Between 12/2010 and 03/2011 we
15629 went to several events and met people being responsible for marketing
15630 and development of either of the distributions. Skolelinux / Debian
15631 Edu was by far much more convincing compared to the other product that
15632 got short-listed beforehand--across the full spectrum. What was most
15633 attractive for me personally: the perspective of collaboration within
15634 the developmental branch of the Debian Edu project itself.</p>
15635
15636 <p>In parallel with this, we talked to many local and not-so-local
15637 people.  People teaching at schools, headmasters, politicians, data
15638 protection experts, other IT professionals.</p>
15639
15640 <p>We came to two conclusions:</p>
15641
15642 <p>First, a technical conclusion: What schools need is available in
15643 bits and pieces here and there, and none of the solutions really fit
15644 by 100%. Any school we have seen has a very individual IT setup
15645 whereas most of each school's requirements could mapped by a standard
15646 IT solution.  The requirement to this IT solution is flexibility and
15647 customisability, so that individual adaptations here and there are
15648 possible.  In terms of re-distributing and rolling out such a
15649 standardised IT system for schools (a system that is still to some
15650 degree customisable) there is still a lot of work to do here
15651 locally. Debian Edu / Skolelinux has been our choice as the starting
15652 point.</p>
15653
15654 <p>Second, a holistic conclusion: What schools need does not exist at
15655 all (or we missed it so far). There are several technical solutions
15656 for handling IT at schools that tend to make a good impression. What
15657 has been missing completely here in Germany, though, is the enrolment
15658 of people into using IT and teaching with IT. "IT-Zukunft Schule"
15659 tries to provide an approach for this.</p>
15660
15661 <p>Only some schools have some sort of a media concept which explains,
15662 defines and gives guidance on how to use IT in class. Most schools in
15663 Northern Germany do not have an IT service provider, the school's IT
15664 equipment is managed by one or (if the school is lucky) two (admin)
15665 teachers, most of the workload these admin teachers get done in there
15666 spare time.</p>
15667
15668 <p>We were surprised that only a very few admin teachers were
15669 networked with colleagues from other schools. Basically, every school
15670 here around has its individual approach of providing IT equipment to
15671 teachers and students and the exchange of ideas has been quasi
15672 non-existent until 2010/2011.</p>
15673
15674 <p>Quite some (non-admin) teachers try to avoid using IT technology in
15675 class as a learning medium completely. Several reasons for this
15676 avoidance do exist.</p>
15677
15678 <p>We discovered that no-one has ever taken a closer look at this
15679 social part of IT management in schools, so far. On our quest journey
15680 for a technical IT solution for schools, we discussed this issue with
15681 several teachers, headmasters, politicians, other IT professionals and
15682 they all confirmed: a holistic approach of considering IT management
15683 at schools, an approach that includes the people in place, will be new
15684 and probably a gain for all.</p>
15685
15686 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
15687 Edu?</strong></p>
15688
15689 <p>There is a list of advantages: international context, openness to
15690 any kind of contributions, do-ocracy policy, the closeness to Debian,
15691 the different installation scenarios possible (from stand-alone
15692 workstation to complex multi-server sites), the transparency within
15693 project communication, honest communication within the group of
15694 developers, etc.</p>
15695
15696 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
15697 Edu?</strong></p>
15698
15699 <p>Every coin has two sides:</p>
15700
15701 <p>Technically: <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/311188">BTS issue
15702 #311188</a>, tricky upgradability of a Debian Edu main server, network
15703 client installations on top of a plain vanilla Debian installation
15704 should become possible sometime in the near future, one could think
15705 about splitting the very complex package debian-edu-config into
15706 several portions (to make it easier for new developers to
15707 contribute).</p>
15708
15709 <p>Another issue I see is that we (as Debian Edu developers) should
15710 find out more about the network of people who do the marketing for
15711 Debian Edu / Skolelinux. There is a very active group in Germany
15712 promoting Skolelinux on the bigger Linux Days within Germany. Are
15713 there other groups like that in other countries? How can we bring
15714 these marketing people together (marketing group A with group B and
15715 all of them with the group of Debian Edu developers)? During the last
15716 meeting of the German Skolelinux group, I got the impression of people
15717 there being rather disconnected from the development department of
15718 Debian Edu / Skolelinux.</p>
15719
15720 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
15721
15722 <p>For my daily business, I do not use commercial software at all.</p>
15723
15724 <p>For normal stuff I use Iceweasel/Firefox, Libreoffice.org. For
15725 serious text writing I prefer LaTeX. I use gimp, inkscape, scribus for
15726 more artistic tasks. I run virtual machines in KVM and Virtualbox.</p>
15727
15728 <p>I am one of the upstream developers of X2Go. In 2010 I started the
15729 development of a Python based X2Go Client, called PyHoca-GUI.
15730 PyHoca-GUI has brought forth a Python X2Go Client API that currently
15731 is being integrated in Ubuntu's software center.</p>
15732
15733 <p>For communications I have my own Kolab server running using Horde
15734 as web-based groupware client. For IRC I love to use irssi, for Jabber
15735 I have several clients that I use, mostly pidgin, though. I am also
15736 the Debian maintainer of Coccinella, a Jabber-based interactive
15737 whiteboard.</p>
15738
15739 <p>My favourite terminal emulator is KDE's Yakuake.</p>
15740
15741 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
15742 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
15743
15744 <p>Communicate, communicate, communicate. Enrol people, enrol people,
15745 enrol people.</p>
15746
15747       </div>
15748       <div class="tags">
15749
15750
15751         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
15752
15753
15754       </div>
15755     </div>
15756     <div class="padding"></div>
15757
15758     <div class="entry">
15759       <div class="title">
15760         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/SOAP_based_webservice_from_Dell_to_check_server_support_status.html">SOAP based webservice from Dell to check server support status</a>
15761       </div>
15762       <div class="date">
15763          1st June 2012
15764       </div>
15765       <div class="body">
15766         <p>A few years ago I wrote
15767 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Checking_server_hardware_support_status_for_Dell__HP_and_IBM_servers.html">how
15768 to extract support status</a> for your Dell and HP servers.  Recently
15769 I have learned from colleges here at the
15770 <a href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> that Dell have
15771 made this even easier, by providing a SOAP based web service.  Given
15772 the service tag, one can now query the Dell servers and get machine
15773 readable information about the support status.  This perl code
15774 demonstrate how to do it:</p>
15775
15776 <p><pre>
15777 use strict;
15778 use warnings;
15779 use SOAP::Lite;
15780 use Data::Dumper;
15781 my $GUID = '11111111-1111-1111-1111-111111111111';
15782 my $App = 'test';
15783 my $servicetag = $ARGV[0] or die "Please supply a servicetag. $!\n";
15784 my ($deal, $latest, @dates);
15785 my $s = SOAP::Lite
15786     -> uri('http://support.dell.com/WebServices/')
15787     -> on_action( sub { join '', @_ } )
15788     -> proxy('http://xserv.dell.com/services/assetservice.asmx')
15789     ;
15790 my $a = $s->GetAssetInformation(
15791     SOAP::Data->name('guid')->value($GUID)->type(''),
15792     SOAP::Data->name('applicationName')->value($App)->type(''),
15793     SOAP::Data->name('serviceTags')->value($servicetag)->type(''),
15794 );
15795 print Dumper($a -> result) ;
15796 </pre></p>
15797
15798 <p>The output can look like this:</p>
15799
15800 <p><pre>
15801 $VAR1 = {
15802           'Asset' => {
15803                      'Entitlements' => {
15804                                        'EntitlementData' => [
15805                                                             {
15806                                                               'EntitlementType' => 'Expired',
15807                                                               'EndDate' => '2009-07-29T00:00:00',
15808                                                               'Provider' => '',
15809                                                               'StartDate' => '2006-07-29T00:00:00',
15810                                                               'DaysLeft' => '0'
15811                                                             },
15812                                                             {
15813                                                               'EntitlementType' => 'Expired',
15814                                                               'EndDate' => '2009-07-29T00:00:00',
15815                                                               'Provider' => '',
15816                                                               'StartDate' => '2006-07-29T00:00:00',
15817                                                               'DaysLeft' => '0'
15818                                                             },
15819                                                             {
15820                                                               'EntitlementType' => 'Expired',
15821                                                               'EndDate' => '2007-07-29T00:00:00',
15822                                                               'Provider' => '',
15823                                                               'StartDate' => '2006-07-29T00:00:00',
15824                                                               'DaysLeft' => '0'
15825                                                             }
15826                                                           ]
15827                                      },
15828                      'AssetHeaderData' => {
15829                                           'SystemModel' => 'GX620',
15830                                           'ServiceTag' => '8DSGD2J',
15831                                           'SystemShipDate' => '2006-07-29T19:00:00-05:00',
15832                                           'Buid' => '2323',
15833                                           'Region' => 'Europe',
15834                                           'SystemID' => 'PLX_GX620',
15835                                           'SystemType' => 'OptiPlex'
15836                                         }
15837                    }
15838         };
15839 </pre></p>
15840
15841 <p>I have not been able to find any documentation from Dell about this
15842 service outside the
15843 <a href="http://xserv.dell.com/services/assetservice.asmx?op=GetAssetInformation">inline
15844 documentation</a>, and according to
15845 <a href="http://iboyd.net/index.php/2012/02/14/updated-dell-warranty-information-script/">one
15846 comment</a> it can have stability issues, but it is a lot better than
15847 scraping HTML pages. :)</p>
15848
15849 <p>Wonder if HP and other server vendors have a similar service.  If
15850 you know of one, drop me an email. :)</p>
15851
15852       </div>
15853       <div class="tags">
15854
15855
15856         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
15857
15858
15859       </div>
15860     </div>
15861     <div class="padding"></div>
15862
15863     <div class="entry">
15864       <div class="title">
15865         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_monitor_calibration_using_ColorHug.html">First monitor calibration using ColorHug</a>
15866       </div>
15867       <div class="date">
15868         31st May 2012
15869       </div>
15870       <div class="body">
15871         <p>A few days ago my color calibration gadget
15872 <a href="http://www.hughski.com/index.html">ColorHug</a> arrived in the
15873 mail, and I've had a few days to test it.  As all my machines are
15874 running Debian Squeeze, where
15875 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/c/colorhug-client.html">the
15876 calibration software</a> is missing (it is present in Wheezy and Sid),
15877 I ran the calibration using the Fedora based live CD.  This worked
15878 just fine.  So far I have only done the quick calibration.  It was
15879 slow enough for me, so I will leave the more extensive calibration for
15880 another day.</p>
15881
15882 <p>After calibration, I get a
15883 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICC_profile">ICC color
15884 profile</a> file that can be passed to programs understanding such
15885 tools.  KDE do not seem to understand it out of the box, so I searched
15886 for command line tools to use to load the color profile into X.
15887 xcalib was the first one I found, and it seem to work fine for single
15888 monitor setups.  But for my video player, a laptop with a flat screen
15889 attached, it was unable to load the color profile for the correct
15890 monitor.  After searching a bit, I
15891 <a href="http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1347896">discovered</a>
15892 that the dispwin tool from the argyll package would do what I wanted,
15893 and a simple</p>
15894
15895 <p><pre>
15896 dispwin -d 1 profile.icc
15897 </pre></p>
15898
15899 <p>later I had the color profile loaded for the correct monitor.  The
15900 result was a bit more pink than I expected.  I guess I picked the
15901 wrong monitor type for the "led" monitor I got, but the result is good
15902 enough for now.</p>
15903
15904       </div>
15905       <div class="tags">
15906
15907
15908         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
15909
15910
15911       </div>
15912     </div>
15913     <div class="padding"></div>
15914
15915     <div class="entry">
15916       <div class="title">
15917         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Ralf_Gesellensetter.html">Debian Edu interview: Ralf Gesellensetter</a>
15918       </div>
15919       <div class="date">
15920         27th May 2012
15921       </div>
15922       <div class="body">
15923         <p>In 2003, a German teacher showed up on the
15924 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>
15925 mailing list with interesting problems and reports proving he setting
15926 up Linux for a (for us at the time) lot of pupils.  His name was Ralf
15927 Gesellensetter, and he has been an important tester and contributor
15928 since then, helping to make sure the
15929 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311.html">Debian Edu
15930 Squeeze</a> release became as good as it is..</p>
15931
15932 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
15933
15934 <p>I am a teacher from Germany, and my subjects are Geography,
15935 Mathematics, and Computer Science ("Informatik"). During the past 12
15936 years (since 2000), I have been working for a comprehensive (and soon,
15937 also inclusive) school leading to all kind of general levels, such as
15938 O- or A-level ("Abitur").  For quite as long, I've been taking care of
15939 our computer network.</p>
15940
15941 <p>Now, in my early 40s, I enjoy the privilege of spending a lot of my
15942 spare time together with my wife, our son (3 years) and our daughter
15943 (4 months).</p>
15944
15945 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
15946 project?</strong></p>
15947
15948 <p>We had tried different Linux based school servers, when members of
15949 my local Linux User Group (LUG OWL) detected Skolelinux. I remember
15950 very well, being part of a party celebrating the Linux New Media Award
15951 ("Best Newcomer Distribution", also nominated: Ubuntu) that was given
15952 to Skolelinux at Linux World Exposition in Frankfurt, 2005 (IIRC). Few
15953 months later, I had the chance to join a developer meeting in Ulsrud
15954 (Oslo) and to hand out the award to Knut Yrvin and others.  For more
15955 than 7 years, Skolelinux is part of our schools infrastructure, namely
15956 our main server (tjener), one LTSP (today without thin clients), and
15957 approximately 50 work stations. Most of these have the option to boot a
15958 locally installed Skolelinux image.  As a consequence, I joined quite
15959 a few events dealing with free software or Linux, and met many Debian
15960 (Edu) developers. All of them seemed quite nice and competent to me,
15961 one more reason to stick to Skolelinux.</p>
15962
15963 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
15964 Edu?</strong></p>
15965
15966 <p>Debian driven, you are given all the advantages of a community
15967 project including well maintained updates. Once, you are familiar with
15968 the network layout, you can easily roll out an entire educational
15969 computer infrastructure, from just one installation media. As only
15970 free software (FOSS) is used, that supports even elderly hardware,
15971 up-sizing your IT equipment is only limited by space (i.e. available
15972 labs).  Especially if you run a LTSP thin client server, your
15973 administration costs tend towards zero.</p>
15974
15975 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
15976 Edu?</strong></p>
15977
15978 <p>While Debian's stability has loads of advantages for servers, this
15979 might be different in some cases for clients: Schools with unlimited
15980 budget might buy new hardware with components that are not yet
15981 supported by Debian stable, or wish to use more recent versions of
15982 office packages or desktop environments.  These schools have the
15983 option to run Debian testing or other distributions - if they have the
15984 capacity to do so.  Another issue is that Debian release cycles
15985 include a wide range of changes; therefor a high percentage of human
15986 power seems to be absorbed by just keeping the features of Skolelinux
15987 within the new setting of the version to come. During this process,
15988 the cogs of Debian Edu are getting more and more professional,
15989 i.e. harder to understand for novices.</p>
15990
15991 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
15992
15993 <p>LibreOffice, Wikipedia, Openstreetmap, Iceweasel (Mozilla Firefox),
15994 KMail, Gimp, Inkscape - and of course the Linux Kernel (not only on
15995 PC, Laptop, Mobile, but also our SAT receiver)</p>
15996
15997 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
15998 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
15999
16000 <p><ol>
16001
16002 <li>Support computer science as regular subject in schools to make
16003 people really "own" their hardware, to make them understand the
16004 difference between proprietary software products, and free software
16005 developing.</li>
16006
16007 <li>Make budget baskets corresponding: In Germany's public schools
16008 there are more or less fixed budgets for IT equipment (including
16009 licenses), so schools won't benefit from any savings here. This
16010 privilege is left to private schools which have consequently a large
16011 share among German Skolelinux schools.</li>
16012
16013 <li>Get free software in the seminars where would-be teachers are
16014 trained. In many cases, teachers' software customs are respected by
16015 decision makers rather than the expertise of any IT experts.</li>
16016
16017 <li>Don't limit ourself to free software run natively. Everybody uses
16018 free software or free licenses (for instance Wikipedia), and this
16019 general concept should get expanded to free educational content to be
16020 shared world wide (school books e.g.).</li>
16021
16022 <li>Make clear where ever you can that the market share of free (libre)
16023 office suites is much above 20 p.c. today, and that you pupils don't
16024 need to know the "ribbon menu" in order to get employed.</li>
16025
16026 <li>Talk about the difference between freeware and free software.</li>
16027
16028 <li>Spread free software, or even collections of portable free apps
16029 for USB pen drives. Endorse students to get a legal copy of
16030 Libreoffice rather than accepting them to use illegal serials.  And
16031 keep sending documents in ODF formats.</li>
16032
16033 </ol></p>
16034
16035       </div>
16036       <div class="tags">
16037
16038
16039         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
16040
16041
16042       </div>
16043     </div>
16044     <div class="padding"></div>
16045
16046     <div class="entry">
16047       <div class="title">
16048         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_cost_of_ODF_and_OOXML.html">The cost of ODF and OOXML</a>
16049       </div>
16050       <div class="date">
16051         26th May 2012
16052       </div>
16053       <div class="body">
16054         <p>I just come across a blog post from Glyn Moody reporting the
16055 claimed cost from Microsoft on requiring ODF to be used by the UK
16056 government.  I just sent him an email to let him know that his
16057 assumption are most likely wrong.  Sharing it here in case some of my
16058 blog readers have seem the same numbers float around in the UK.</p>
16059
16060 <p><blockquote> <p>Hi.  I just noted your
16061 <a href="http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-500-million/index.htm">http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/does-microsoft-office-lock-in-cost-the-uk-government-500-million/index.htm</a>
16062 comment:</p>
16063
16064 <p><blockquote>"They're all in Danish, not unreasonably, but even
16065 with the help of Google Translate I can't find any figures about the
16066 savings of "moving to a flexible two standard" as claimed by the
16067 Microsoft email. But I assume it is backed up somewhere, so let's take
16068 it, and the £500 million figure for the UK, on trust."
16069 </blockquote></p>
16070
16071 <p>I can tell you that the Danish reports are inflated.  I believe it is
16072 the same reports that were used in the Norwegian debate around 2007,
16073 and Gisle Hannemyr (a well known IT commentator in Norway) had a look
16074 at the content.  In short, the reason it is claimed that using ODF
16075 will be so costly, is based on the assumption that this mean every
16076 existing document need to be converted from one of the MS Office
16077 formats to ODF, transferred to the receiver, and converted back from
16078 ODF to one of the MS Office formats, and that the conversion will cost
16079 10 minutes of work time for both the sender and the receiver.  In
16080 reality the sender would have a tool capable of saving to ODF, and the
16081 receiver would have a tool capable of reading it, and the time spent
16082 would at most be a few seconds for saving and loading, not 20 minutes
16083 of wasted effort.</p>
16084
16085 <p>Microsoft claimed all these costs were saved by allowing people to
16086 transfer the original files from MS Office instead of spending 10
16087 minutes converting to ODF. :)</p>
16088
16089 <p>See
16090 <a href="http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php">http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12_vl02.php</a>
16091 and
16092 <a href="http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php">http://hannemyr.com/no/ms12.php</a>
16093 for background information.  Norwegian only, sorry. :)</p>
16094 </blockquote></p>
16095
16096       </div>
16097       <div class="tags">
16098
16099
16100         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
16101
16102
16103       </div>
16104     </div>
16105     <div class="padding"></div>
16106
16107     <div class="entry">
16108       <div class="title">
16109         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ColorHug___USB_and_free_software_based_screen_color_calibration.html">ColorHug - USB and free software based screen color calibration</a>
16110       </div>
16111       <div class="date">
16112         18th May 2012
16113       </div>
16114       <div class="body">
16115         <p>In january, I
16116 <a href="http://blog.cihar.com/archives/2012/01/17/colorhug-has-arrived/">discovered
16117 the ColorHug</a>, a USB dongle from
16118 <a href="http://www.hughski.com/index.html">Hughski</a> to calibrate
16119 the color on a computer screen.  The software required is
16120 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/c/colorhug-client.html">included
16121 in Debian</a>, and I decided back then to preorder from the next
16122 batch.  Yesterday I finally heard back from them, and got the
16123 opportunity to order.  Today I ordered mine, and eagerly await the
16124 delivery.  I hope it arrive next week, as I got a confirmation that it
16125 should go in the mail on monday. :)</p>
16126
16127 <p>If you want to ensure the colors on the screen match the intended
16128 colors, I suggest you check out this cheap tool with free software
16129 drivers. :)</p>
16130
16131       </div>
16132       <div class="tags">
16133
16134
16135         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
16136
16137
16138       </div>
16139     </div>
16140     <div class="padding"></div>
16141
16142     <div class="entry">
16143       <div class="title">
16144         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__J_rgen_Leibner.html">Debian Edu interview: Jürgen Leibner</a>
16145       </div>
16146       <div class="date">
16147         13th May 2012
16148       </div>
16149       <div class="body">
16150         <p>It has been a few busy weeks for me, but I am finally back to
16151 publish another interview with the people behind
16152 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>.
16153 This time it is one of our German developers, who have helped out over the
16154 years to make sure both a lot of major but also a lot of the minor
16155 details get right before release.
16156
16157 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
16158
16159 <p>My name is Jürgen Leibner, I'm 49 years old and living in
16160 Bielefeld, a town in northern Germany.  I worked nearly 20 years as
16161 certified engineer in the department for plant design and layout of an
16162 international company for machinery and equipment.  Since 2011 I'm a
16163 certified technical writer (tekom e.V.) and doing technical
16164 documentations for a steam turbine manufacturer.  From April this year
16165 I will manage the department of technical documentation at a
16166 manufacturer of automation and assembly line engineering.</p>
16167
16168 <p>My first contact with linux was around 1993. Since that time I used
16169 it at work and at home repeatedly but not exclusively as I do now at
16170 home since 2006.</p>
16171
16172 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
16173 project?</strong></p>
16174
16175 <p>Once a day in the early year of 2001 when I wanted to fetch my
16176 daughter from primary school, there was a teacher sitting in the
16177 middle of 20 old computers trying to boot them and he failed. I helped
16178 him to get them booting. That was seen by the school director and she
16179 asked me if I would like to manage that the school gets all that old
16180 computers in use. I answered: "Yes".</p>
16181
16182 <p>Some weeks later every of the 10 classrooms had one computer
16183 running Windows98. I began to collect old computers and equipment as
16184 gifts and installed the first computer room with a peer-to-peer
16185 network. I did my work at school without being payed in my spare time
16186 and with a lot of fun.  About one year later the school was connected
16187 to Internet and a local area network was installed in the school
16188 building.  That was the time to have a server and I knew it must be a
16189 Linux server to be able to fulfil all the wishes of the teachers and
16190 being able to do this in a transparent and economic way, without extra
16191 costs for things like licence and software.  So I searched for a
16192 school server system running under Linux and I found a couple of
16193 people nearby who founded 'skolelinux.de'. It was the Skolelinux
16194 prerelease 32 I first tried out for being used at the school.  I
16195 managed the IT of that school until the municipal authority took over
16196 the IT management and centralised the services for all schools in
16197 Bielefeld in December of 2006.</p>
16198
16199 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16200 Edu?</strong></p>
16201
16202 <p>When I'm looking back to the beginning, there were other advantages
16203 for me as today.</p>
16204
16205 <p>In the past there were advantages like:</p>
16206
16207 <p><ul>
16208
16209 <li>I don't need to buy it so it generates no costs to the school as
16210 they had little money to spent for computers and software.</li>
16211
16212 <li>It has a licence which grands all rights to use it without
16213 cost.</li>
16214
16215 <li>It was more able to fit all requirements of a server system for
16216 schools than a Microsoft server system, even if there are only Windows
16217 clients because of it's preconfigured overall concept of being a
16218 infrastructure solution and community for schools, not only a
16219 server</li>
16220
16221 <li>I was able to configure the server to the needs of the
16222 school.</li>
16223
16224 </ul></p>
16225
16226 <p>Today some of the advantages has been lost, changed or new ones
16227 came up in this way:</p>
16228
16229 <p><ul>
16230
16231 <li>Most schools here do have money to buy hardware and software
16232 now.</li>
16233
16234 <li>They are today mostly managed from central IT departments which
16235 have own concepts which often do not fit to Debian Edu concepts
16236 because they are to close to Microsoft ideology.</li>
16237
16238 <li>With the Squeeze version of Debian Edu which now uses GOsa² for
16239 management I feel more able to manage the daily tasks than with the
16240 interfaces used in the past.</li>
16241
16242 <li>It is more modular than in the past and fits even better to the
16243 different needs.</li>
16244
16245 <li>The documentation is usable and gets better every day.</li>
16246
16247 <li>More people than ever before are using Debian Edu all over the
16248 world and so the community, which is an very important part I think,
16249 is sharing knowledge and minds.</li>
16250
16251 <li>Most, maybe all, of the technical requirements for schools are
16252 solved today by Debian Edu. </li>
16253
16254 </ul></p>
16255
16256 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16257 Edu?</strong></p>
16258
16259 <p><ul>
16260
16261 <li>There are too few IT companies able to integrate Debian Edu into
16262 their product portfolio for serving schools with concepts or even
16263 whole municipality areas.</li>
16264
16265 <li>Debian Edu has beside other free and open software projects not
16266 enough lobbyists which promote free and open software to
16267 politicians.</li>
16268
16269 <li>Technically there are no disadvantages I'm aware of.</li>
16270
16271 </ul></p>
16272
16273 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
16274
16275 <p>I use Debian stable on my home server and on my little desktop
16276 computer. On my laptop I use Debian testing/sid. The applications I
16277 use on my laptop and my desktop are Open/Libre-office, Iceweasel,
16278 KMail, DigiKam, Amarok, Dolphin, okular and all the other programs I
16279 need from the KDE environment.  On console I use newsbeuter, mutt,
16280 screen, irssi and all the other famous and useful tools.</p>
16281
16282 <p>My home server provides mail services with exim, dovecot, roundcube
16283 and mutt over ssh on the console, file services with samba, NFS,
16284 rsync, web services with apache, moinmoin-wiki, multimedia services
16285 with gallery2 and mediatomb and database services with MySQL for me
16286 and the whole family.  I probably forgot something.</p>
16287
16288 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
16289 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
16290
16291 <p>I believe, we should provide concepts for IT companies to integrate
16292 Debian Edu into their product portfolio with use cases for different
16293 countries and areas all over the world.</p>
16294
16295       </div>
16296       <div class="tags">
16297
16298
16299         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
16300
16301
16302       </div>
16303     </div>
16304     <div class="padding"></div>
16305
16306     <div class="entry">
16307       <div class="title">
16308         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Cutting_it_short___and_picking_the_right_tool_for_the_job.html">Cutting it short - and picking the right tool for the job</a>
16309       </div>
16310       <div class="date">
16311         30th April 2012
16312       </div>
16313       <div class="body">
16314         <p><!-- IMG_5869.JPG -->
16315 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/panasonic-er-1611.jpeg"></p>
16316
16317 <p>I normally cut my hair short, and my tool of choice has been a
16318 common hair/beard cutter, bought in a electrical shop here in Norway.
16319 But the last ones have not really been up to the task.  My last
16320 cutter, some model from Braun, could only cut a few of my hairs at the
16321 time, and cutting my head took forever.  And the one before that did
16322 not work very well either.  We have looked for something better for a
16323 while, but it was not until I ended up visiting a hairdresser that we
16324 discovered that there are indeed better tools available.  But these
16325 are not marketed and sold to "regular consumers".  The hair saloons
16326 can get them through their suppliers, but their suppliers only sell
16327 companies.  The models they sell, are very different from the ones
16328 available from Elkjøp and Lefdal.  The main difference is their
16329 efficiency.  It would cut my hair in 5 minutes, instead of the 30-40
16330 minutes required by my impotent Braun.  The hairdresser I visited had
16331 a Panasonic ER160, which unfortunately is no longer available from the
16332 producer.  But I found it had a successor, the Panasonic ER1611.</p>
16333
16334 <p>The next step was to find somewhere to buy it.  This was not
16335 straight forward.  The list of suppliers I got from the hairdresser
16336 did not want to sell anything to me.  But searching for the model on
16337 the web we found a supplier in Norway willing to sell it to us for
16338 around NOK 4000,-.  This was a bit much.  We kept searching and
16339 finally found a Danish supplier
16340 <a href="http://nicehair.dk/panasonic-er-1611-professionel-hartrimmer.html">selling
16341 it for around NOK 1800,-</a>.  We ordered one, and it arrived a few
16342 days ago.</p>
16343
16344 <p>The instructions said it had to charge for 8 hours when we started
16345 to use it, so we left it charging over night.  Normally it will only
16346 need one hour to charge.  The following evening we successfully tested
16347 it, and I can warmly recommend it to anyone looking for a real hair
16348 cutter.  The ones we have used until now have been hair cutter
16349 toys.</p>
16350
16351       </div>
16352       <div class="tags">
16353
16354
16355         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
16356
16357
16358       </div>
16359     </div>
16360     <div class="padding"></div>
16361
16362     <div class="entry">
16363       <div class="title">
16364         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/HTC_One_X___Your_video___What_do_you_mean_.html">HTC One X - Your video?  What do you mean?</a>
16365       </div>
16366       <div class="date">
16367         26th April 2012
16368       </div>
16369       <div class="body">
16370         <p>In <a href="http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article243690.ece">an
16371 article today</a> published by Computerworld Norway, the photographer
16372 <a href="http://www.urke.com/eirik/">Eirik Helland Urke</a> reports
16373 that the video editor application included with
16374 <a href="http://www.htc.com/www/smartphones/htc-one-x/#specs">HTC One
16375 X</a> have some quite surprising terms of use.  The article is mostly
16376 based on the twitter message from mister Urke, stating:
16377
16378 <p><blockquote>
16379 "<a href="http://twitter.com/urke/status/194062269724897280">Drøy
16380 brukeravtale: HTC kan bruke MINE redigerte videoer kommersielt. Selv
16381 kan jeg KUN bruke dem privat.</a>"
16382 </blockquote></p>
16383
16384 <p>I quickly translated it to this English message:</p>
16385
16386 <p><blockquote>
16387 "Arrogant user agreement: HTC can use MY edited videos
16388 commercially.  Although I can ONLY use them privately."
16389 </blockquote></p>
16390
16391 <p>I've been unable to find the text of the license term myself, but
16392 suspect it is a variation of the MPEG-LA terms I
16393 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html">discovered
16394 with my Canon IXUS 130</a>.  The HTC One X specification specifies that
16395 the recording format of the phone is .amr for audio and .mp3 for
16396 video.  AMR is
16397 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_Multi-Rate_audio_codec#Licensing_and_patent_issues">Adaptive
16398 Multi-Rate audio codec</a> with patents which according to the
16399 Wikipedia article require an license agreement with
16400 <a href="http://www.voiceage.com/">VoiceAge</a>.  MP4 is
16401 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H.264/MPEG-4_AVC#Patent_licensing">MPEG4 with
16402 H.264</a>, which according to Wikipedia require a licence agreement
16403 with <a href="http://www.mpegla.com/">MPEG-LA</a>.</p>
16404
16405 <p>I know why I prefer
16406 <a href="http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition">free and open
16407 standards</a> also for video.</p>
16408
16409       </div>
16410       <div class="tags">
16411
16412
16413         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
16414
16415
16416       </div>
16417     </div>
16418     <div class="padding"></div>
16419
16420     <div class="entry">
16421       <div class="title">
16422         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/RAND_terms___non_reasonable_and_discriminatory.html">RAND terms - non-reasonable and discriminatory</a>
16423       </div>
16424       <div class="date">
16425         19th April 2012
16426       </div>
16427       <div class="body">
16428         <p>Here in Norway, the
16429 <a href="http://www.regjeringen.no/nb/dep/fad.html?id=339"> Ministry of
16430 Government Administration, Reform and Church Affairs</a> is behind
16431 a <a href="http://standard.difi.no/forvaltningsstandarder">directory of
16432 standards</a> that are recommended or mandatory for use by the
16433 government.  When the directory was created, the people behind it made
16434 an effort to ensure that everyone would be able to implement the
16435 standards and compete on equal terms to supply software and solutions
16436 to the government.  Free software and non-free software could compete
16437 on the same level.</p>
16438
16439 <p>But recently, some standards with RAND
16440 (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reasonable_and_non-discriminatory_licensing">Reasonable
16441 And Non-Discriminatory</a>) terms have made their way into the
16442 directory.  And while this might not sound too bad, the fact is that
16443 standard specifications with RAND terms often block free software from
16444 implementing them.  The reasonable part of RAND mean that the cost per
16445 user/unit is low,and the non-discriminatory part mean that everyone
16446 willing to pay will get a license.  Both sound great in theory.  In
16447 practice, to get such license one need to be able to count users, and
16448 be able to pay a small amount of money per unit or user.  By
16449 definition, users of free software do not need to register their use.
16450 So counting users or units is not possible for free software projects.
16451 And given that people will use the software without handing any money
16452 to the author, it is not really economically possible for a free
16453 software author to pay a small amount of money to license the rights
16454 to implement a standard when the income available is zero.  The result
16455 in these situations is that free software are locked out from
16456 implementing standards with RAND terms.</p>
16457
16458 <p>Because of this, when I see someone claiming the terms of a
16459 standard is reasonable and non-discriminatory, all I can think of is
16460 how this really is non-reasonable and discriminatory.  Because free
16461 software developers are working in a global market, it does not really
16462 help to know that software patents are not supposed to be enforceable
16463 in Norway.  The patent regimes in other countries affect us even here.
16464 I really hope the people behind the standard directory will pay more
16465 attention to these issues in the future.</p>
16466
16467 <p>You can find more on the issues with RAND, FRAND and RAND-Z terms
16468 from Simon Phipps
16469 (<a href="http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2010/11/rand-not-so-reasonable/">RAND:
16470 Not So Reasonable?</a>).</p>
16471
16472 <p>Update 2012-04-21: Just came across a
16473 <a href="http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/open-enterprise/2012/04/of-microsoft-netscape-patents-and-open-standards/index.htm">blog
16474 post from Glyn Moody</a> over at Computer World UK warning about the
16475 same issue, and urging people to speak out to the UK government.  I
16476 can only urge Norwegian users to do the same for
16477 <a href="http://www.standard.difi.no/hoyring/hoyring-om-nye-anbefalte-it-standarder">the
16478 hearing taking place at the moment</a> (respond before 2012-04-27).
16479 It proposes to require video conferencing standards including
16480 specifications with RAND terms.</p>
16481
16482       </div>
16483       <div class="tags">
16484
16485
16486         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
16487
16488
16489       </div>
16490     </div>
16491     <div class="padding"></div>
16492
16493     <div class="entry">
16494       <div class="title">
16495         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Andreas_Mundt.html">Debian Edu interview: Andreas Mundt</a>
16496       </div>
16497       <div class="date">
16498         15th April 2012
16499       </div>
16500       <div class="body">
16501         <p>Behind <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and
16502 Skolelinux</a> there are a lot of people doing the hard work of
16503 setting together all the pieces.  This time I present to you Andreas
16504 Mundt, who have been part of the technical development team several
16505 years.  He was also a key contributor in getting GOsa and Kerberos set
16506 up in the recently released
16507 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze">Debian
16508 Edu Squeeze</a> version.</p>
16509
16510 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
16511
16512 <p>My name is Andreas Mundt, I grew up in south Germany.  After
16513 studying Physics I spent several years at university doing research in
16514 Quantum Optics.  After that I worked some years in an optics company.
16515 Finally I decided to turn over a new leaf in my life and started
16516 teaching 10 to 19 years old kids at school.  I teach math, physics,
16517 information technology and science/technology.</p>
16518
16519 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
16520 project?</strong></p>
16521
16522 <p>Already before I switched to teaching, I followed the Debian Edu
16523 project because of my interest in education and Debian.  Within the
16524 qualification/training period for the teaching, I started
16525 contributing.</p>
16526
16527 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16528 Edu?</strong></p>
16529
16530 <p>The advantages of Debian Edu are the well known name, the
16531 out-of-the-box philosophy and of course the great free software of the
16532 Debian Project!</p>
16533
16534 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16535 Edu?</strong></p>
16536
16537 <p>As every coin has two sides, the out-of-the-box philosophy has its
16538 downside, too.  In my opinion, it is hard to modify and tweak the
16539 setup, if you need or want that.  Further more, it is not easily
16540 possible to upgrade the system to a new release.  It takes much too
16541 long after a Debian release to prepare the -Edu release, perhaps
16542 because the number of developers working on the core of the code is
16543 rather small and often busy elsewhere.</p>
16544
16545 <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianLAN">Debian LAN</a>
16546 project might fill the use case of a more flexible system.</p>
16547
16548 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
16549
16550 <p>I am only using non-free software if I am forced to and run Debian
16551 on all my machines.  For documents I prefer LaTeX and PGF/TikZ, then
16552 mutt and iceweasel for email respectively web browsing.  At school I
16553 have Arduino and Fritzing in use for a micro controller project.</p>
16554
16555 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
16556 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
16557
16558 <p>One of the major problems is the vendor lock-in from top to bottom:
16559 Especially in combination with ignorant government employees and
16560 politicians, this works out great for the "market-leader".  The school
16561 administration here in Baden-Wuerttemberg is occupied by that vendor.
16562 Documents have to be prepared in non-free, proprietary formats.  Even
16563 free browsers do not work for the school administration.  Publishers
16564 of school books provide software only for proprietary platforms.</p>
16565
16566 <p>To change this, political work is very important.  Parts of the
16567 political spectrum have become aware of the problem in the last years.
16568 However it takes quite some time and courageous politicians to 'free'
16569 the system.  There is currently some discussion about "Open Data" and
16570 "Free/Open Standards".  I am not sure if all the involved parties have
16571 a clue about the potential of these ideas, and probably only a
16572 fraction takes them seriously.  However it might slowly make free
16573 software and the philosophy behind it more known and popular.</p>
16574
16575       </div>
16576       <div class="tags">
16577
16578
16579         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
16580
16581
16582       </div>
16583     </div>
16584     <div class="padding"></div>
16585
16586     <div class="entry">
16587       <div class="title">
16588         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Justin_B__Rye.html">Debian Edu interview: Justin B. Rye</a>
16589       </div>
16590       <div class="date">
16591          8th April 2012
16592       </div>
16593       <div class="body">
16594         <p>It take all kind of contributions to create a Linux distribution
16595 like <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>,
16596 and this time I lend the ear to Justin B. Rye, who is listed as a big
16597 contributor to the
16598 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze">Debian
16599 Edu Squeeze release manual</a>.
16600
16601 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
16602
16603 <p>I'm a 44-year-old linguistics graduate living in Edinburgh who has
16604 occasionally been employed as a sysadmin.</p>
16605
16606 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
16607 project?</strong></p>
16608
16609 <p>I'm neither a developer nor a Skolelinux/Debian Edu user!  The only
16610 reason my name's in the credits for the documentation is that I hang
16611 around on debian-l10n-english waiting for people to mention things
16612 they'd like a native English speaker to proofread...  So I did a sweep
16613 through the wiki for typos and Norglish and inconsistent spellings of
16614 "localisation".</p>
16615
16616 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16617 Edu?</strong></p>
16618
16619 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16620 Edu?</strong></p>
16621
16622 <p>These questions are too hard for me - I don't use it!  In fact I
16623 had hardly any contact with I.T. until long after I'd got out of the
16624 education system.</p>
16625
16626 <p>I can tell you the advantages of Debian for me though: it soaks up
16627 as much of my free time as I want and no more, and lets me do
16628 everything I want a computer for without ever forcing me to spend
16629 money on the latest hardware.</p>
16630
16631 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
16632
16633 <p>I've been using Debian since Rex; popularity-contest says the
16634 software that I use most is xinit, xterm, and xulrunner (in other
16635 words, I use a distinctly retro sort of desktop).</p>
16636
16637 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
16638 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
16639
16640 <p>Well, I don't know.  I suppose I'd be inclined to try reasoning
16641 with the people who make the decisions, but obviously if that worked
16642 you would hardly need a strategy.</p>
16643
16644       </div>
16645       <div class="tags">
16646
16647
16648         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
16649
16650
16651       </div>
16652     </div>
16653     <div class="padding"></div>
16654
16655     <div class="entry">
16656       <div class="title">
16657         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_the_KDE_menu_is_slow_when__usr__is_NFS_mounted___and_a_workaround.html">Why the KDE menu is slow when /usr/ is NFS mounted - and a workaround</a>
16658       </div>
16659       <div class="date">
16660          6th April 2012
16661       </div>
16662       <div class="body">
16663         <p>Recently I have spent time with
16664 <a href="http://www.slxdrift.no/">Skolelinux Drift AS</a> on speeding
16665 up a <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>
16666 Lenny installation using LTSP diskless workstations, and in the
16667 process I discovered something very surprising.  The reason the KDE
16668 menu was responding slow when using it for the first time, was mostly
16669 due to the way KDE find application icons.  I discovered that showing
16670 the Multimedia menu would cause more than 20 000 IP packages to be
16671 passed between the LTSP client and the NFS server.  Most of these were
16672
16673 NFS LOOKUP calls, resulting in a NFS3ERR_NOENT response.  Because the
16674 ping times between the client and the server were in the range 2-20
16675 ms, the menus would be very slow.  Looking at the strace of kicker in
16676 Lenny (or plasma-desktop i Squeeze - same problem there), I see that
16677 the source of these NFS calls are access(2) system calls for
16678 non-existing files.  KDE can do hundreds of access(2) calls to find
16679 one icon file.  In my example, just finding the mplayer icon required
16680 around 230 access(2) calls.</p>
16681
16682 <p>The KDE code seem to search for icons using a list of icon
16683 directories, and the list of possible directories is large.  In
16684 (almost) each directory, it look for files ending in .png, .svgz, .svg
16685 and .xpm.  The result is a very slow KDE menu when /usr/ is NFS
16686 mounted.  Showing a single sub menu may result in thousands of NFS
16687 requests.  I am not the first one to discover this.  I found a
16688 <a href="https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=211416">KDE bug report
16689 from 2009</a> about this problem, and it is still unsolved.</p>
16690
16691 <p>My solution to speed up the KDE menu was to create a package
16692 kde-icon-cache that upon installation will look at all .desktop files
16693 used to generate the KDE menu, find their icons, search the icon paths
16694 for the file that KDE will end up finding at run time, and copying the
16695 icon file to /var/lib/kde-icon-cache/.  Finally, I add symlinks to
16696 these icon files in one of the first directories where KDE will look
16697 for them.  This cut down the number of file accesses required to find
16698 one icon from several hundred to less than 5, and make the KDE menu
16699 almost instantaneous.  I'm not quite sure where to make the package
16700 publicly available, so for now it is only available on request.</p>
16701
16702 <p>The bug report mention that this do not only affect the KDE menu
16703 and icon handling, but also the login process.  Not quite sure how to
16704 speed up that part without replacing NFS with for example NBD, and
16705 that is not really an option at the moment.</p>
16706
16707 <p>If you got feedback on this issue, please let us know on debian-edu
16708 (at) lists.debian.org.</p>
16709
16710 <p>Update 2015-08-04: The
16711 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/cgit/debian-edu/upstream/kde-icon-cache.git/">source
16712 of the scripts and associated Debian package</a> is available from the
16713 Debian Edu github repository.</p>
16714
16715       </div>
16716       <div class="tags">
16717
16718
16719         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
16720
16721
16722       </div>
16723     </div>
16724     <div class="padding"></div>
16725
16726     <div class="entry">
16727       <div class="title">
16728         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_in_the_Linux_Weekly_News.html">Debian Edu in the Linux Weekly News</a>
16729       </div>
16730       <div class="date">
16731          5th April 2012
16732       </div>
16733       <div class="body">
16734         <p>About two weeks ago, I was interviewed via email about
16735 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a> by
16736 Bruce Byfield in Linux Weekly News.  The result was made public for
16737 non-subscribers today.  I am pleased to see liked our Linux solution
16738 for schools.  Check out his article
16739 <a href="https://lwn.net/Articles/488805/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux: A
16740 distribution for education</a> if you want to learn more.</p>
16741
16742       </div>
16743       <div class="tags">
16744
16745
16746         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
16747
16748
16749       </div>
16750     </div>
16751     <div class="padding"></div>
16752
16753     <div class="entry">
16754       <div class="title">
16755         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Wolfgang_Schweer.html">Debian Edu interview: Wolfgang Schweer</a>
16756       </div>
16757       <div class="date">
16758          1st April 2012
16759       </div>
16760       <div class="body">
16761         <p>Germany is a core area for the
16762 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>
16763 user community, and this time I managed to get hold of Wolfgang
16764 Schweer, a valuable contributor to the project from Germany.
16765
16766 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
16767
16768 <p>I've studied Mathematics at the university 'Ruhr-Universität' in
16769 Bochum, Germany. Since 1981 I'm working as a teacher at the school
16770 "<a href="http://www.westfalenkolleg-dortmund.de/">Westfalen-Kolleg
16771 Dortmund</a>", a second chance school.  Here, young adults is given
16772 the opportunity to get further education in order to do the school
16773 examination 'Abitur', which will allow to study at a university. This
16774 second chance is of value for those who want a better job perspective
16775 or failed to get a higher school examination being teens.</p>
16776
16777 <p>Besides teaching I was involved in developing online courses for a
16778 blended learning project called 'abitur-online.nrw' and in some other
16779 information technology related projects. For about ten years I've been
16780 teacher and coordinator for the 'abitur-online' project at my
16781 school. Being now in my early sixties, I've decided to leave school at
16782 the end of April this year.</p>
16783
16784 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
16785 project?</strong></p>
16786
16787 <p>The first information about Skolelinux must have come to my
16788 attention years ago and somehow related to LTSP (Linux Terminal Server
16789 Project).  At school, we had set up a network at the beginning of 1997
16790 using Suse Linux on the desktop, replacing a Novell network. Since
16791 2002, we used old machines from the city council of Dortmund as thin
16792 clients (LTSP, later Ubuntu/Lessdisks) cause new hardware was out of
16793 reach. At home I'm using Debian since years and - subscribed to the
16794 Debian news letter - heard from time to time about Skolelinux. About
16795 two years ago I proposed to replace the (somehow undocumented and only
16796 known to me) system at school by a well known Debian based system:
16797 Skolelinux.</p>
16798
16799 <p>Students and teachers appreciated the new system because of a
16800 better look and feel and an enhanced access to local media on thin
16801 clients.  The possibility to alter and/or reset passwords using a GUI
16802 was welcomed, too. Being able to do administrative tasks using a GUI
16803 and to easily set up workstations using PXE was of very high value for
16804 the admin teachers.</p>
16805
16806 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16807 Edu?</strong></p>
16808
16809 <p>It's open source, easy to set up, stable and flexible due to it's
16810 Debian base. It integrates LTSP out-of-the-box. And it is documented!
16811 So it was a perfect choice.</p>
16812
16813 <p>Being open source, there are no license problems and so it's
16814 possible to point teachers and students to programs like
16815 OpenOffice.org, ViewYourMind (mind mapping) and The Gimp.  It's of
16816 high value to be able to adapt parts of the system to special needs of
16817 a school and to choose where to get support for this.</p>
16818
16819 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16820 Edu?</strong></p>
16821
16822 <p>Nothing yet.</p>
16823
16824 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
16825
16826 <p>At home (Debian Sid with Gnome Desktop): Iceweasel, LibreOffice,
16827 Mutt, Gedit, Document Viewer, Midnight Commander, flpsed (PDF
16828 Annotator).  At school (Skolelinux Lenny): Iceweasel, Gedit,
16829 LibreOffice.</p>
16830
16831 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
16832 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
16833
16834 <p>Some time ago I thought it was enough to tell people about it. But
16835 that doesn't seem to work quite well. Now I concentrate on those more
16836 interested and hope to get multiplicators that way.</p>
16837
16838       </div>
16839       <div class="tags">
16840
16841
16842         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
16843
16844
16845       </div>
16846     </div>
16847     <div class="padding"></div>
16848
16849     <div class="entry">
16850       <div class="title">
16851         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_screencast__Checking_email_with_kmail_using_Kerberos_authentication.html">Debian Edu screencast: Checking email with kmail using Kerberos authentication</a>
16852       </div>
16853       <div class="date">
16854         25th March 2012
16855       </div>
16856       <div class="body">
16857         <!-- Video HTML based on http://www.diveintohtml5.net/video.html -->
16858
16859 <p>The same Debian Edu developer that did the last screen cast I
16860 published, Wolfgang Schweer, has created a new screen cast showing how
16861 to set up Kmail in Debian Edu Squeze to authenticate using Kerberos,
16862 allowing users to check their local email account without providing
16863 any password. The video is embedded here in quarter size,
16864 and also available from <a href="https://vimeo.com/38601767">vimeo</a>
16865 and download as a
16866 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/2012-03-14-Debian-Edu_Configure_Kmail_for_internal_usage.ogv">Ogg
16867 Theora</a> file.  Check it out below.</p>
16868
16869 <p><video id="kmail-kerberos-movie" width="256" height="184" preload controls>
16870   <source src="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/2012-03-14-Debian-Edu_Configure_Kmail_for_internal_usage.ogv" type='video/ogg; codecs="theora, vorbis"' />
16871     <p>Download video as
16872       <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/2012-03-14-Debian-Edu_Configure_Kmail_for_internal_usage.ogv">Ogg</a>.</p>
16873 </video></p>
16874
16875       </div>
16876       <div class="tags">
16877
16878
16879         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
16880
16881
16882       </div>
16883     </div>
16884     <div class="padding"></div>
16885
16886     <div class="entry">
16887       <div class="title">
16888         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__John_Ingleby.html">Debian Edu interview: John Ingleby</a>
16889       </div>
16890       <div class="date">
16891         19th March 2012
16892       </div>
16893       <div class="body">
16894         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>
16895 users are spread all across the globe.  The second inteview after
16896 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/03/msg00001.html">the
16897 Squeeze release</a> was publised is with John Ingleby, a teacher and
16898 long time Linux user in United Kingdom.</p>
16899
16900 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
16901
16902 <p>I teach ICT part time at the Rudolf Steiner School in Kings
16903 Langley, near London, UK. Previously I worked as a technical
16904 author/trainer while my children attended the school, and I also
16905 contributed to the Schoolforge UK community with the aim of
16906 encouraging UK schools to adopt free/open source software. Five or six
16907 years ago we had about 50 schools interested in some way, but we
16908 weren't able to convert many of them into sustainable
16909 installations.</p>
16910
16911 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
16912 project?</strong></p>
16913
16914 <p>Skolelinux had two representatives at an early Edubuntu meeting in
16915 London which I attended. However at that time our school network had
16916 just been installed using CentOS, LTSP 4 and GNOME. When LTSP 5 came
16917 along we switched to Edubuntu thin client servers so now we have a
16918 mixed environment which includes Windows PCs and student laptops, as
16919 well as their MacBooks and iPads. However, the proprietary systems
16920 have always been rather problematic, and we never built a GUI for the
16921 LDAP server, so when I discovered Skolelinux is configured for all
16922 these things we decided to try it.</p>
16923
16924 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16925 Edu?</strong></p>
16926
16927 <p>By far the biggest advantage is the Debian Edu community. Apart
16928 from that I have always believed in the same "sustainable computing"
16929 goals that Skolelinux is built on: installing Linux on computers which
16930 would otherwise be thrown away, to provide a reliable, secure and
16931 low-cost IT environment for schools. From my own experience I know
16932 that a part-time person can teach and manage a network of about 25
16933 Linux computers, but it would take much more of my time if we had
16934 proprietary software everywhere.</p>
16935
16936 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
16937 Edu?</strong></p>
16938
16939 <p>As a newcomer I'm just finding out who's who in the community and
16940 how you're organised, and what your procedures are for dealing with
16941 various things such as editing manual pages and so-on. The only
16942 English language mailing list seems to be for developers as well as
16943 users, so my inbox needs heavy pruning each day!</p>
16944
16945 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
16946
16947 <p>Besides the software already mentioned at school we use Samba,
16948 OpenLDAP, CUPS, Nagios and Dansguardian for the network, and on the
16949 desktops we have LibreOffice, Firefox, GIMP and Inkscape. At home I
16950 use Ubuntu and an Android 4 eePad Transformer (but I'm not sure if
16951 that counts...)</p>
16952
16953 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
16954 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
16955
16956 <p>That's a tough question! For very many years UK schools installed
16957 and taught only proprietary software, so that at the highest levels
16958 the notion of "computer" means simply "proprietary office
16959 applications".  However, schools today are experiencing budget
16960 constraints, and many are having to think hard about upgrading Windows
16961 XP.  At the same time, we have students showing teachers how to use
16962 iPads, MacBooks and Android, so the choice of operating system is no
16963 longer quite so automatic. What is more, our government at last
16964 realised that we need people with programming skills, so they're
16965 putting coding back in the curriculum! And it's encouraging that the
16966 first 10,000 Raspberry Pi units sold out in 2 hours.</p>
16967
16968 <p>I don't really know what strategy is going to get UK schools to use
16969 free software, but building an active community of Skolelinux/Debian
16970 Edu users in this country has to be part of it.</p>
16971
16972       </div>
16973       <div class="tags">
16974
16975
16976         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
16977
16978
16979       </div>
16980     </div>
16981     <div class="padding"></div>
16982
16983     <div class="entry">
16984       <div class="title">
16985         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Writing_and_translating_documentation_in_Debian_Edu.html">Writing and translating documentation in Debian Edu</a>
16986       </div>
16987       <div class="date">
16988         16th March 2012
16989       </div>
16990       <div class="body">
16991         <p>Documentation in Debian Edu is provided in several languages, and
16992 it is important to make it both easy to contribute and to keep the
16993 translated versions in sync.  To do this we have come up with what we
16994 believe is a very efficient work flow.</p>
16995
16996 <ol>
16997
16998 <li>The documentation is written in a
16999 <a href="http://moinmo.in">moinmoin wiki</a> (see for example
17000 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze">the
17001 Squeeze release manual</a>) with support for exporting the content as
17002 docbook XML.</li>
17003
17004 <li>This docbook document is given to po4a to extract a gettext style
17005 .pot file with the content, which in turn is used to create .po files
17006 with the translated text.</li>
17007
17008 <li>The .po files are given to translators, and they can always tell
17009 which part of the original wiki document is new or changed.  They can
17010 use their normal translation tools like lokalize or poedit to write
17011 the translation.  There is even a system in place to handle translated
17012 images.</li>
17013
17014 <li>The translated .po files are combined with the original docbook
17015 XML document using po4a to create a translated docbook document.</li>
17016
17017 <li>The final step is to use all the generated docbook files and
17018 create PDF and HTML version of the original and translated documents.</li>
17019
17020 </ol>
17021
17022 <p>This setup work very well, but have a few issues.  The biggest
17023 issue is that <a href="http://moinmo.in/DocBook">the docbook support
17024 we use in moinmoin</a> is not actively maintained.  The docbook
17025 support is also buggy, and our build system contain workarounds to
17026 make sure the generated docbook is usable despite these bugs.</p>
17027
17028 <p>If you want to have a look at our setup, it is all there in the
17029 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-doc">debian-edu-doc
17030 package</a>.</p>
17031
17032       </div>
17033       <div class="tags">
17034
17035
17036         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17037
17038
17039       </div>
17040     </div>
17041     <div class="padding"></div>
17042
17043     <div class="entry">
17044       <div class="title">
17045         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Skolelinux___Debian_Edu_Squeeze_is_out_.html">Skolelinux / Debian Edu Squeeze is out!</a>
17046       </div>
17047       <div class="date">
17048         11th March 2012
17049       </div>
17050       <div class="body">
17051         <p>This weekend we finally published the first stable release of
17052 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> based
17053 on Debian/Squeeze.  The full announcement is
17054 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/03/msg00001.html">available</a>
17055 from the project announcement list.  Now is a good time to test if it
17056 you have not done so already.</p>
17057
17058 <p>I plan to present the new version at
17059 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20120313-skolelinux/">a NUUG
17060 meeting</a> on tuesday.  I look forward to seeing you there if you are
17061 in Oslo, Norway.</p>
17062
17063       </div>
17064       <div class="tags">
17065
17066
17067         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17068
17069
17070       </div>
17071     </div>
17072     <div class="padding"></div>
17073
17074     <div class="entry">
17075       <div class="title">
17076         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Nigel_Barker.html">Debian Edu interview: Nigel Barker</a>
17077       </div>
17078       <div class="date">
17079          9th March 2012
17080       </div>
17081       <div class="body">
17082         <p>Inspired by <a href="http://raphaelhertzog.com/tag/interview/">the
17083 interview series</a> conducted by Raphael, I started a Norwegian
17084 interview series with people involved in the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
17085 community.  This was so popular that I believe it is time to move to a
17086 more international audience.</p>
17087
17088 <p>While <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and
17089 Skolelinux</a> originated in France and Norway, and have most users in
17090 Europe, there are users all around the globe.  One of those far away
17091 from me is Nigel Barker, a long time Debian Edu system administrator
17092 and contributor.  It is thanks to him that Debian Edu is adjusted to
17093 work out of the box in Japan.  I got him to answer a few questions,
17094 and am happy to share the response with you. :)
17095
17096
17097 <p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
17098
17099 <p>My name is Nigel Barker, and I am British. I am married to Yumiko,
17100 and we have three lovely children, aged 15, 14 and 4(!) I am the IT
17101 Coordinator at Hiroshima International School, Japan. I am also a
17102 teacher, and in fact I spend most of my day teaching Mathematics,
17103 Science, IT, and Chemistry. I was originally a Chemistry teacher, but
17104 I have always had an interest in computers. Another teacher teaches
17105 primary school IT, but apart from that I am the only computer person,
17106 so that means I am the network manager, technician and webmaster,
17107 also, and I help people with their computer problems. I teach python
17108 to beginners in an after-school club. I am way too busy, so I really
17109 appreciate the simplicity of Skolelinux.</p>
17110
17111 <p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
17112 project?</strong></p>
17113
17114 <p>In around 2004 or 5 I discovered the ltsp project, and set up a
17115 server in the IT lab. I wanted some way to connect it to our central
17116 samba server, which I was also quite poor at configuring. I discovered
17117 Edubuntu when it came out, but it didn't really improve my setup. I
17118 did various desperate searches for things like "school Linux server"
17119 and ended up in a document called "Drift" something or other. Reading
17120 there it became clear that Skolelinux was going to solve all my
17121 problems in one go. I was very excited, but apprehensive, because my
17122 previous attempts to install Debian had ended in failure (I used
17123 Mandrake for everything - ltsp, samba, apache, mail, ns...). I
17124 downloaded a beta version, had some problems, so subscribed to the
17125 Debian Edu list for help. I have remained subscribed ever since, and
17126 my school has run a Skolelinux network since Sarge.</p>
17127
17128 <p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
17129 Edu?</strong></p>
17130
17131 <p>For me the integrated setup. This is not just the server, or the
17132 workstation, or the ltsp. Its all of them, and its all configured
17133 ready to go. I read somewhere in the early documentation that it is
17134 designed to be setup and managed by the Maths or Science teacher, who
17135 doesn't necessarily know much about computers, in a small Norwegian
17136 school. That describes me perfectly if you replace Norway with
17137 Japan.</p>
17138
17139 <p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
17140 Edu?</strong></p>
17141
17142 <p>The desktop is fairly plain. If you compare it with Edubuntu, who
17143 have fun themes for children, or with distributions such as Mint, who
17144 make the desktop beautiful. They create a good impression on people
17145 who don't need to understand how to use any of it, but who might be
17146 important to the school. School administrators or directors, for
17147 instance, or parents. Even kids. Debian itself usually has ugly
17148 default theme settings. It was my dream a few years back that some
17149 kind of integration would allow Edubuntu to do the desktop stuff and
17150 Debian Edu the servers, but now I realise how impossible that is.  A
17151 second disadvantage is that if something goes wrong, or you need to
17152 customise something, then suddenly the level of expertise required
17153 multiplies. For example, backup wasn't working properly in Lenny. It
17154 took me ages to learn how to set up my own server to do rsync backups.
17155 I am afraid of anything to do with ldap, but perhaps Gosa will
17156 help.</p>
17157
17158 <p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
17159
17160 <p>Nowadays I only use Debian on my personal computers. I have one for
17161 studio work (I play guitar and write songs), running AV Linux
17162 (customised Debian) a netbook running Squeeze, and a bigger laptop
17163 still running Skolelinux Lenny workstation. I have a Tjener in my
17164 house, that's very useful for the family photos and music.  At school
17165 the students only use Skolelinux. (Some teachers and the office still
17166 have windows). So that means we only use free software all day every
17167 day. Open office, The GIMP, Firefox/Iceweasel, VLC and Audacity are
17168 installed on every computer in school, irrespective of OS.  We also
17169 have Koha on Debian for the library, and Apache, Moodle, b2evolution
17170 and Etomite on Debian for the www. The firewall is Untangle.</p>
17171
17172 <p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
17173 get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
17174
17175 <p>Current trends are in our favour. Open source is big in industry,
17176 and ordinary people have heard of it. The spread of Android and the
17177 popularity of Apple have helped to weaken the impression that you have
17178 to have Microsoft on everything. People complain to me much less about
17179 file formats and Word than they did 5 years ago.  The Edu aspect is
17180 also a selling point. This is all customised for schools. Where is the
17181 Windows-edu, or the Mac-edu?  But of course the main attraction is
17182 budget.The trick is to convince people that the quality is not
17183 compromised when you stop paying and use free software instead. That
17184 is one reason why I say the desktop experience is a weakness. People
17185 are not impressed when their USB drive doesn't work, or their browser
17186 doesn't play flash, for example.</p>
17187
17188       </div>
17189       <div class="tags">
17190
17191
17192         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
17193
17194
17195       </div>
17196     </div>
17197     <div class="padding"></div>
17198
17199     <div class="entry">
17200       <div class="title">
17201         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_screencast__Mass_creation_of_user_accounts_in_Squeeze.html">Debian Edu screencast: Mass creation of user accounts in Squeeze</a>
17202       </div>
17203       <div class="date">
17204          7th March 2012
17205       </div>
17206       <div class="body">
17207         <!-- Video HTML based on http://www.diveintohtml5.net/video.html -->
17208
17209 <p>One of the Debian Edu developers, Wolfgang Schweer, just created a
17210 screen cast documenting how to create a lot of new users in LDAP on
17211 Debian Edu Squeeze.  The video is embedded here in quarter size, and
17212 also available from <a href="http://vimeo.com/37675399">vimeo</a> and
17213 download as a
17214 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/2012-02-29-debian_edu_mass_create_user_accounts.ogv">Ogg
17215 Theora</a> file.  Check it out below.</p>
17216
17217 <p><video id="gosa-mass-user-create-movie" width="256" height="184" preload controls>
17218   <source src="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/2012-02-29-debian_edu_mass_create_user_accounts.ogv" type='video/ogg; codecs="theora, vorbis"' />
17219     <p>Download video as
17220       <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux/press/screencasts/2012-02-29-debian_edu_mass_create_user_accounts.ogv">Ogg</a>.</p>
17221 </video></p>
17222
17223       </div>
17224       <div class="tags">
17225
17226
17227         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17228
17229
17230       </div>
17231     </div>
17232     <div class="padding"></div>
17233
17234     <div class="entry">
17235       <div class="title">
17236         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html">Third release candidate of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze</a>
17237       </div>
17238       <div class="date">
17239          4th March 2012
17240       </div>
17241       <div class="body">
17242         <p>This weekend we wrapped up and published the third release
17243 candidate for <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
17244 Skolelinux</a> based on Squeeze.  The full announcement is
17245 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/03/msg00000.html">available</a>
17246 from the project announcement list.  Check it out if you
17247 need a software solution for your school.</p>
17248
17249       </div>
17250       <div class="tags">
17251
17252
17253         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17254
17255
17256       </div>
17257     </div>
17258     <div class="padding"></div>
17259
17260     <div class="entry">
17261       <div class="title">
17262         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Stopmotion_for_making_stop_motion_animations_on_Linux___reloaded.html">Stopmotion for making stop motion animations on Linux - reloaded</a>
17263       </div>
17264       <div class="date">
17265          3rd March 2012
17266       </div>
17267       <div class="body">
17268         <p>Many years ago, the <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux
17269 / Debian Edu project</a> initiated a student project to create a tool
17270 for making stop motion movies.  The proposal came from a teacher
17271 needing such tool on Skolelinux.  The project, called "stopmotion",
17272 was manned by two extraordinary students and won a school award and a
17273 national aware with this great project.  The project was initiated and
17274 mentored by Herman Robak, and manned by the students Bjørn Erik Nilsen
17275 and Fredrik Berg Kjølstad.  They got in touch with people at Aardman
17276 Animation studio and received feedback on how professionals would like
17277 such stopmotion tool to work, and the end result was and is used by
17278 animators around the globe.  But as is usual after studying, both got
17279 jobs and went elsewhere, and did not have time to properly tend to the
17280 project, and it has been lingering for a few years now.  Until last
17281 year...</p>
17282
17283 <p>Last year some of the users got together with Herman, and moved the
17284 project to Sourceforge and in effect restarted the project under a new
17285 name,
17286 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/linuxstopmotion/">linuxstopmotion</a>.
17287 The name change was done to make it possible to find the project using
17288 Internet search engines (try to search for 'stopmotion' to see what I
17289 mean). I've been following
17290 <a href="https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/linuxstopmotion-community">the
17291 mailing list</a> and the improvement already in place and planned for
17292 the future is encouraging.  If you want to make stop motion movies.
17293 Check it out. :)</p>
17294
17295       </div>
17296       <div class="tags">
17297
17298
17299         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
17300
17301
17302       </div>
17303     </div>
17304     <div class="padding"></div>
17305
17306     <div class="entry">
17307       <div class="title">
17308         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html">Second release candidate of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze</a>
17309       </div>
17310       <div class="date">
17311         27th February 2012
17312       </div>
17313       <div class="body">
17314         <p>This weekend we wrapped up and published the second release
17315 candidate for <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
17316 Skolelinux</a> based on Squeeze.  The full announcement did for some
17317 reason not make it the project announcement list, but is
17318 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2012/02/msg00015.html">available</a>
17319 from the Debian development announcement list.  Check it out if you
17320 need a software solution for your school.</p>
17321
17322       </div>
17323       <div class="tags">
17324
17325
17326         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17327
17328
17329       </div>
17330     </div>
17331     <div class="padding"></div>
17332
17333     <div class="entry">
17334       <div class="title">
17335         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_release_candidate_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html">First release candidate of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze</a>
17336       </div>
17337       <div class="date">
17338         19th February 2012
17339       </div>
17340       <div class="body">
17341         <p>One week delayed due to DVD build problems, we managed today to
17342 wrap up and publish the first release candidate for
17343 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> based
17344 on Squeeze.  The full announcement is
17345 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/02/msg00001.html">available</a>
17346 on the project announcement list.  Check it out if you need a software
17347 solution for your school.</p>
17348
17349       </div>
17350       <div class="tags">
17351
17352
17353         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17354
17355
17356       </div>
17357     </div>
17358     <div class="padding"></div>
17359
17360     <div class="entry">
17361       <div class="title">
17362         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_figure_out_which_RAID_disk_to_replace_when_it_fail.html">How to figure out which RAID disk to replace when it fail</a>
17363       </div>
17364       <div class="date">
17365         14th February 2012
17366       </div>
17367       <div class="body">
17368         <p>Once in a while my home server have disk problems.  Thanks to Linux
17369 Software RAID, I have not lost data yet (but
17370 <a href="http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.linux.raid/34532">I was
17371 close</a> this summer :).  But once a disk is starting to behave
17372 funny, a practical problem present itself.  How to get from the Linux
17373 device name (like /dev/sdd) to something that can be used to identify
17374 the disk when the computer is turned off?  In my case I have SATA
17375 disks with a unique ID printed on the label.  All I need is a way to
17376 figure out how to query the disk to get the ID out.</p>
17377
17378 <p>After fumbling a bit, I
17379 <a href="http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/linux-getting-scsi-ide-harddisk-information/">found
17380 that hdparm -I</a> will report the disk serial number, which is
17381 printed on the disk label.  The following (almost) one-liner can be
17382 used to look up the ID of all the failed disks:</p>
17383
17384 <blockquote><pre>
17385 for d in $(cat /proc/mdstat |grep '(F)'|tr ' ' "\n"|grep '(F)'|cut -d\[ -f1|sort -u);
17386 do
17387     printf "Failed disk $d: "
17388     hdparm -I /dev/$d |grep 'Serial Num'
17389 done
17390 </blockquote></pre>
17391
17392 <p>Putting it here to make sure I do not have to search for it the
17393 next time, and in case other find it useful.</p>
17394
17395 <p>At the moment I have two failing disk. :(</p>
17396
17397 <blockquote><pre>
17398 Failed disk sdd1:       Serial Number:      WD-WCASJ1860823
17399 Failed disk sdd2:       Serial Number:      WD-WCASJ1860823
17400 Failed disk sde2:       Serial Number:      WD-WCASJ1840589
17401 </blockquote></pre>
17402
17403 <p>The last time I had failing disks, I added the serial number on
17404 labels I printed and stuck on the short sides of each disk, to be able
17405 to figure out which disk to take out of the box without having to
17406 remove each disk to look at the physical vendor label.  The vendor
17407 label is at the top of the disk, which is hidden when the disks are
17408 mounted inside my box.</p>
17409
17410 <p>I really wish the check_linux_raid Nagios plugin for checking Linux
17411 Software RAID in the
17412 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/nagios-plugins.html">nagios-plugins-standard</a>
17413 debian package would look up this value automatically, as it would
17414 make the plugin a lot more useful when my disks fail.  At the moment
17415 it only report a failure when there are no more spares left (it really
17416 should warn as soon as a disk is failing), and it do not tell me which
17417 disk(s) is failing when the RAID is running short on disks.</p>
17418
17419       </div>
17420       <div class="tags">
17421
17422
17423         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid</a>.
17424
17425
17426       </div>
17427     </div>
17428     <div class="padding"></div>
17429
17430     <div class="entry">
17431       <div class="title">
17432         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_proxy_configuration_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux.html">Automatic proxy configuration with Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>
17433       </div>
17434       <div class="date">
17435         13th February 2012
17436       </div>
17437       <div class="body">
17438         <p>New in the Squeeze version of
17439 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is the
17440 ability for clients to automatically configure their proxy settings
17441 based on their environment.  We want all systems on the client to use
17442 the WPAD based proxy definition fetched from <tt>http://wpad/wpad.dat</tt>, to
17443 allow sites to control the proxy setting from a central place and make
17444 sure clients do not have hard coded proxy settings.  The schools can
17445 change the global proxy setting by editing
17446 <tt>tjener:/etc/debian-edu/www/wpad.dat</tt> and the change propagate
17447 to all Debian Edu clients in the network.</p>
17448
17449 <p>The problem is that some systems do not understand the WPAD system.
17450 In other words, how do one get from a WPAD file like this (this is a
17451 simple one, they can run arbitrary code):</p>
17452
17453 <blockquote><pre>
17454 function FindProxyForURL(url, host)
17455 {
17456    if (!isResolvable(host) ||
17457        isPlainHostName(host) ||
17458        dnsDomainIs(host, ".intern"))
17459       return "DIRECT";
17460    else
17461       return "PROXY webcache:3128; DIRECT";
17462 }
17463 </pre></blockquote>
17464
17465 <p>to a proxy setting in the process environment looking like this:</p>
17466
17467 <blockquote><pre>
17468 http_proxy=http://webcache:3128/
17469 ftp_proxy=http://webcache:3128/
17470 </pre></blockquote>
17471
17472 <p>To do this conversion I developed a perl script that will execute
17473 the javascript fragment in the WPAD file and return the proxy that
17474 would be used for
17475 <tt><a href="http://www.debian.org/">http://www.debian.org/</a></tt>,
17476 and insert this extracted proxy URL in <tt>/etc/environment</tt> and
17477 <tt>/etc/apt/apt.conf</tt>.  The perl script wpad-extract work just
17478 fine in Squeeze, but in Wheezy the library it need to run the
17479 javascript code is <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/631045">no longer
17480 able to build</a> because the C library it depended on is now a C++
17481 library.  I hope someone find a solution to that problem before Wheezy
17482 is frozen.  An alternative would be for us to rewrite wpad-extract to
17483 use some other javascript library currently working in Wheezy, but no
17484 known alternative is known at the moment.</p>
17485
17486 <p>This automatic proxy system allow the roaming workstation (aka
17487 laptop) setup in Debian Edu/Squeeze to use the proxy when the laptop
17488 is connected to the backbone network in a Debian Edu setup, and to
17489 automatically use any proxy present and announced using the WPAD
17490 feature when it is connected to other networks.  And if no proxy is
17491 announced, direct connections will be used instead.</p>
17492
17493 <p>Silently using a proxy announced on the network might be a privacy
17494 or security problem.  But those controlling DHCP and DNS on a network
17495 could just as easily set up a transparent proxy, and force all HTTP
17496 and FTP connections to use a proxy anyway, so I consider that
17497 distinction to be academic.  If you are afraid of using the wrong
17498 proxy, you should avoid connecting to the network in question in the
17499 first place.  In Debian Edu, the proxy setup is updated using dhcp and
17500 ifupdown hooks, to make sure the configuration is updated every time
17501 the network setup changes.</p>
17502
17503 <p>The WPAD system is documented in a
17504 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-wrec-wpad-01">IETF
17505 draft</a> and a
17506 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Proxy_Autodiscovery_Protocol">Wikipedia
17507 page</a> for those that want to learn more.</p>
17508
17509       </div>
17510       <div class="tags">
17511
17512
17513         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17514
17515
17516       </div>
17517     </div>
17518     <div class="padding"></div>
17519
17520     <div class="entry">
17521       <div class="title">
17522         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Saving_power_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_using_shutdown_at_night.html">Saving power with Debian Edu / Skolelinux using shutdown-at-night</a>
17523       </div>
17524       <div class="date">
17525          5th February 2012
17526       </div>
17527       <div class="body">
17528         <p>Since the Lenny version of
17529 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>, a
17530 feature to save power have been included.  It is as simple as it is
17531 practical: Shut down unused clients at night, and turn them on again
17532 in the morning.  This is done using the
17533 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/s/shutdown-at-night.html">shutdown-at-night</a> Debian package.</p>
17534
17535 <p>To enable this feature on a client, the machine need to be added to
17536 the netgroup shutdown-at-night-hosts.  For Debian Edu, this is done in
17537 LDAP, and once this is in place, the machine in question will check
17538 every hour from 16:00 until 06:00 to see if the machine is unused, and
17539 shut it down if it is.  If the hardware in question is supported by
17540 the
17541 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/nvram-wakeup.html">nvram-wakeup</a>
17542 package, the BIOS is told to turn the machine back on around 07:00 +-
17543 10 minutes.  If this isn't working, one can configure wake-on-lan to
17544 try to turn on the client.  The wake-on-lan option is only documented
17545 and not enabled by default in Debian Edu.</p>
17546
17547 <p>It is important to not turn all machines on at once, as this can
17548 blow a fuse if several computers are connected to the same fuse like
17549 the common setup for a classroom.  The nvram-wakeup method only work
17550 for machines with a functioning hardware/BIOS clock.  I've seen old
17551 machines where the BIOS battery were dead and the hardware clock were
17552 starting from 0 (or was it 1990?) every boot.  If you have one of
17553 those, you have to turn on the computer manually.</p>
17554
17555 <p>The shutdown-at-night package is completely self contained, and can
17556 also be used outside the Debian Edu environment.  For those without a
17557 central LDAP server with netgroups, one can instead touch the file
17558 <tt>/etc/shutdown-at-night/shutdown-at-night</tt> to enable it.
17559 Perhaps you too can use it to save some power?</p>
17560
17561       </div>
17562       <div class="tags">
17563
17564
17565         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17566
17567
17568       </div>
17569     </div>
17570     <div class="padding"></div>
17571
17572     <div class="entry">
17573       <div class="title">
17574         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Third_beta_version_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html">Third beta version of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze</a>
17575       </div>
17576       <div class="date">
17577          4th February 2012
17578       </div>
17579       <div class="body">
17580         <p>I am happy to announce that finally we managed today to wrap up and
17581 publish the third beta version of
17582 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> based
17583 on Squeeze.  If you want to test a LDAP backed Kerberos server with
17584 out of the box PXE configuration for running diskless machines and
17585 installing new machines, check it out.  If you need a software
17586 solution for your school, check it out too.  The full announcement is
17587 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/02/msg00000.html">available</a>
17588 on the project announcement list.</p>
17589
17590 <p>I am very happy to report these changes and improvements since
17591 beta2 (there are more, see announcement for full list):</p>
17592
17593 <ul>
17594
17595 <li>It is now possible to change the pre-configured IP subnet from
17596   10.0.0.0/8 to something else by using the subnet-change tool after
17597   the installation.</li>
17598
17599 <li>Too full partitions are now automatically extended on the Main
17600   Server, based on the rules specified in /etc/fsautoresizetab.</li>
17601
17602 <li>The CUPS queues are now automatically flushed every night, and all
17603   disabled queues are restarted every hour.  This should cut down on
17604   the amount of manual administration needed for printers.</li>
17605
17606 <li>The set of initial users have been changed.  Now a personal user
17607   for the local system administrator is created during installation
17608   instead of the previously created localadmin and super-admin users,
17609   and this user is granted administrative privileges using group
17610   membership.  This reduces the number of passwords one need to keep
17611   up to date on the system.</li>
17612
17613 </ul>
17614
17615 <p>The new main server seem to work so well that I am testing it as my
17616 private DNS/LDAP/Kerberos/PXE/LTSP server at home.  I will use it look
17617 for issues we could fix to polish Debian Edu even further before the
17618 final Squeeze release is published.</p>
17619
17620 <p>Next weekend the project organise a
17621 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/01/msg00001.html">developer
17622 gathering</a> in Oslo.  We will continue the work on the Squeeze
17623 version, and start initial planning for the Wheezy version.  Perhaps I
17624 will see you there?</p>
17625
17626       </div>
17627       <div class="tags">
17628
17629
17630         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17631
17632
17633       </div>
17634     </div>
17635     <div class="padding"></div>
17636
17637     <div class="entry">
17638       <div class="title">
17639         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Handling_non_free_firmware_in_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html">Handling non-free firmware in Debian Edu/Squeeze</a>
17640       </div>
17641       <div class="date">
17642         27th January 2012
17643       </div>
17644       <div class="body">
17645         <p>With some computer hardware, one need non-free firmware blobs.
17646 This is the sad fact of todays computers.  In the next version of
17647 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> based
17648 on Squeeze, we provide several scripts and modifications to make
17649 firmware blobs easier to handle.  The common use case I run into is a
17650 laptop with a wireless network card requiring non-free firmware to
17651 work, but there are other use cases as well.</p>
17652
17653 <p>First and foremost, Debian Edu provide ISO images for DVD and CD
17654 with all firmware packages in the Debian sections main and non-free
17655 included, to ensure debian-installer find and can install all of them
17656 during installation.  This take care firmware for network devices used
17657 by the installer when installing from from local media.  But for
17658 example multimedia devices are not activated in the installer and are
17659 not taken care of by this.</p>
17660
17661 <p>For non-network devices, we provide the script
17662 <tt>/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/auto-addfirmware</tt> which
17663 search through the <tt>dmesg</tt> output for drivers requesting extra
17664 firmware.  The firmware file name is looked up in the Contents-ARCH.gz
17665 file available in the package repository, and the packages providing
17666 the requested firmware file(s) is installed.  I have proposed to do
17667 something similar in debian-installer (BTS report
17668 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">#655507</a>), to allow PXE
17669 installs of Debian to handle firmware installation better.  Run the
17670 script as root from the command line to fetch and install the needed
17671 firmware packages.</p>
17672
17673 <p>Debian Edu provide PXE installation of Debian out of the box, and
17674 because some machines need firmware to get their network cards
17675 working, the installation initrd some times need extra firmware
17676 included to be able to install at all.  To fill the PXE installation
17677 initrd with extra firmware, the
17678 <tt>/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/pxe-addfirmware</tt> script is
17679 provided.  Again, just run it as root on the command line to fill the
17680 PXE initrd with firmware packages.</p>
17681
17682 <p>Last, some LTSP clients might also need firmware to get their
17683 network cards working.  For this,
17684 <tt>/usr/share/debian-edu-config/tools/ltsp-addfirmware</tt> is
17685 provided to update the LTSP initrd with firmware blobs.  It is used
17686 the same way as the other firmware related tools.</p>
17687
17688 <p>At the moment, we do not run any of these during installation.  We
17689 do not know if this is acceptable for the local administrator to use
17690 non-free software, and it is their choice.</p>
17691
17692 <p>We plan to release beta3 this weekend.  You might want to give it a
17693 try.</p>
17694
17695       </div>
17696       <div class="tags">
17697
17698
17699         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17700
17701
17702       </div>
17703     </div>
17704     <div class="padding"></div>
17705
17706     <div class="entry">
17707       <div class="title">
17708         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Setting_up_a_new_school_with_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html">Setting up a new school with Debian Edu/Squeeze</a>
17709       </div>
17710       <div class="date">
17711         25th January 2012
17712       </div>
17713       <div class="body">
17714         <p>The next version of <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu
17715 / Skolelinux</a> will include a new tool
17716 <tt>sitesummary2ldapdhcp</tt>, which can be used to quickly set up all
17717 the computers in a school without much manual labour.  Here is a short
17718 summary on how to use it to set up a new school.</p>
17719
17720 <p>First, install a combined Main Server and Thin Client Server as the
17721 central server in the network.  Next, PXE boot all the client machines
17722 as thin clients and wait 5 minutes after the last client booted to
17723 allow the clients to report their existence to the central server.  When
17724 this is done, log on to the central server and run
17725 <tt>sitesummary2ldapdhcp -a</tt> in the <tt>konsole</tt> to use the
17726 collected information to generate system objects in LDAP.  The output
17727 will look similar to this:</p>
17728
17729 <p><blockquote><pre>
17730 % sitesummary2ldapdhcp -a
17731 info: Updating machine tjener.intern [10.0.2.2] id ether-00:01:02:03:04:05.
17732 info: Create GOsa machine for auto-mac-00-01-02-03-04-06 [10.0.16.20] id ether-00:01:02:03:04:06.
17733
17734 Enter password if you want to activate these changes, and ^c to abort.
17735
17736 Connecting to LDAP as cn=admin,ou=ldap-access,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
17737 enter password: *******
17738 %
17739 </pre></blockquote></p>
17740
17741 <p>After providing the LDAP administrative password (the same as the
17742 root password set during installation), the LDAP database will be
17743 populated with system objects for each PXE booted machine with
17744 automatically generated names.  The final step to set up the school is
17745 then to log into <a href="https://oss.gonicus.de/labs/gosa/">GOsa</a>,
17746 the web based user, group and system administration system to change
17747 system names, add systems to the correct host groups and finally
17748 enable DHCP and DNS for the systems.  All clients that should be used
17749 as diskless workstations should be added to the workstation-hosts
17750 group.  After this is done, all computers can be booted again via PXE
17751 and get their assigned names and group based configuration
17752 automatically.</p>
17753
17754 <p>We plan to release beta3 with the updated version of this feature
17755 enabled this weekend.  You might want to give it a try.</p>
17756
17757 <p>Update 2012-01-28: When calling sitesummary2ldapdhcp to add new
17758 hosts, one need to add the option -a.  I forgot to mention this in my
17759 original text, and have added it to the text now.</p>
17760
17761       </div>
17762       <div class="tags">
17763
17764
17765         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary</a>.
17766
17767
17768       </div>
17769     </div>
17770     <div class="padding"></div>
17771
17772     <div class="entry">
17773       <div class="title">
17774         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Changing_the_default_Iceweasel_start_page_in_Debian_Edu_Squeeze.html">Changing the default Iceweasel start page in Debian Edu/Squeeze</a>
17775       </div>
17776       <div class="date">
17777         10th January 2012
17778       </div>
17779       <div class="body">
17780         <p>In the Squeeze version of
17781 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> soon
17782 to be released, users of the system will get their default browser
17783 start page set from LDAP, allowing the system administrator to point
17784 all users to the school web page by updating one setting in LDAP.  In
17785 addition to setting the default start page when a machine boots, users
17786 are shown the same page as a welcome page when they log in for the
17787 first time.</p>
17788
17789 <p>The LDAP object dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no have an attribute
17790 labeledURI with "http://www/ LDAP for Debian Edu/Skolelinux" as the
17791 default content.  By changing this value to another URL, all users get
17792 to see the page behind this new URL.</p>
17793
17794 <p>An easy way to update it is by using the ldapvi tool.  It can be
17795 called as "<tt>ldapvi -ZD '(cn=admin)'</tt>' to update LDAP with the
17796 new setting.</p>
17797
17798 <p>We have written the code to adjust the default start page and show
17799 the welcome page, and I wonder if there is an easier way to do this
17800 from within Iceweasel instead.</p>
17801
17802       </div>
17803       <div class="tags">
17804
17805
17806         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
17807
17808
17809       </div>
17810     </div>
17811     <div class="padding"></div>
17812
17813     <div class="entry">
17814       <div class="title">
17815         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Second_beta_version_of_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Squeeze.html">Second beta version of Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Squeeze</a>
17816       </div>
17817       <div class="date">
17818          7th January 2012
17819       </div>
17820       <div class="body">
17821         <p>I am happy to announce that today we managed to wrap up and publish
17822 the second beta version of
17823 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a>.  If
17824 you want to test a LDAP backed Kerberos server with out of the box PXE
17825 configuration for running diskless machines and installing new
17826 machines, check it out.  If you need a software solution for your
17827 school, check it out too.  The full announcement is
17828 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2012/01/msg00000.html">available</a>
17829 on the project announcement list.</p>
17830
17831       </div>
17832       <div class="tags">
17833
17834
17835         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17836
17837
17838       </div>
17839     </div>
17840     <div class="padding"></div>
17841
17842     <div class="entry">
17843       <div class="title">
17844         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fixing_an_hanging_debian_installer_for_Debian_Edu.html">Fixing an hanging debian installer for Debian Edu</a>
17845       </div>
17846       <div class="date">
17847          3rd January 2012
17848       </div>
17849       <div class="body">
17850         <p>During christmas, I have been working getting the next version of
17851 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ready
17852 for release.  The initial problem I looked at was particularly
17853 interesting.</p>
17854
17855 <P>The installer would hang at the end when it was doing it
17856 post-installation configuration, and whatevery I did to try to find
17857 the cause and fix it always worked while I tested it, but never when I
17858 integrated it into the installer and ran the installation from
17859 scratch.  I would try to restart processes, close file descriptors,
17860 remove or create files, and the installer would always unblock and
17861 wrap up its tasks.</p>
17862
17863 <p>Eventually the cause was found.  The kernel was simply running out
17864 of entropy, causing the Kerberos setup to hang waiting for more.
17865 Pressing keys was adding entropy to the kernel, and thus all my tries
17866 to fix the problem worked not because what I was typing to fix it, but
17867 because I was typing.</P>
17868
17869 <p>The fix I implemented was to add a background process looking at
17870 the level of entropy in the kernel (by checking
17871 /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail), and if it was too small, the
17872 installer will flush the kernel file buffers and do 'find /' to
17873 generate some disk IO.  Disk IO generate entropy in the kernel, and is
17874 one of the few things that can be initated from within the system to
17875 generate entropy.</p>
17876
17877 <p>The fix is in
17878 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Squeeze/Installation">beta1
17879 of the Debian Edu/Squeeze</a> version, and we
17880 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu">welcome more testers and
17881 developers</a>.  We plan to release beta2 this weekend.</p>
17882
17883       </div>
17884       <div class="tags">
17885
17886
17887         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
17888
17889
17890       </div>
17891     </div>
17892     <div class="padding"></div>
17893
17894     <div class="entry">
17895       <div class="title">
17896         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html">Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge</a>
17897       </div>
17898       <div class="date">
17899         21st November 2011
17900       </div>
17901       <div class="body">
17902         <p>At work we have heaps of servers.  I believe the total count is
17903 around 1000 at the moment.  To be able to get help from the vendors
17904 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
17905 up to date.  If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the
17906 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
17907 firmware is upgraded.  So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
17908 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
17909 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
17910 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
17911 the tools to do so.</p>
17912
17913 <p>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
17914 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got.  Most of
17915 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
17916 so far.  This blog post is about the Dell part.</P>
17917
17918 <p>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
17919 <a href="ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz">an XML file</a>
17920 with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing
17921 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
17922 site I can find it.  Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
17923 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
17924 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
17925 be activated on the first reboot.</p>
17926
17927 <p>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
17928 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
17929 servers at a site?  Please get in touch and lets share resources.</p>
17930
17931 <p><pre>
17932 #!/usr/bin/perl
17933 use strict;
17934 use warnings;
17935 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
17936 BEGIN {
17937     # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
17938     my %rhelmodules = (
17939         'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
17940         );
17941     for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
17942         eval "use $module;";
17943         if ($@) {
17944             my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
17945             system("yum install -y $pkg");
17946             eval "use $module;";
17947         }
17948     }
17949 }
17950 my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
17951
17952 upgrade_dell();
17953
17954 exit 0;
17955
17956 sub run_firmware_script {
17957     my ($opts, $script) = @_;
17958     unless ($script) {
17959         print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
17960         exit 1
17961     }
17962     print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
17963
17964     if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
17965         print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
17966     } else {
17967         print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
17968     }
17969 }
17970
17971 sub run_firmware_scripts {
17972     my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
17973     # Run firmware packages
17974     for my $dir (@dirs) {
17975         print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
17976         opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
17977         while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
17978             next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
17979             run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
17980         }
17981         closedir $dh;
17982     }
17983 }
17984
17985 sub download {
17986     my $url = shift;
17987     print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
17988     system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
17989 }
17990
17991 sub upgrade_dell {
17992     my @dirs;
17993     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
17994     chomp $product;
17995
17996     if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
17997
17998         # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
17999         system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
18000
18001         my $tmpdir = tempdir(
18002             CLEANUP => 1
18003             );
18004         chdir($tmpdir);
18005         fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
18006         system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
18007         my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
18008         # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
18009         my $fwopts = "-q";
18010         if (@paths) {
18011             for my $url (@paths) {
18012                 fetch_dell_fw($url);
18013             }
18014             run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
18015         } else {
18016             print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
18017             print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
18018         }
18019         chdir('/');
18020     } else {
18021         print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
18022         print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
18023     }
18024 }
18025
18026 sub fetch_dell_fw {
18027     my $path = shift;
18028     my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
18029     download($url);
18030 }
18031
18032 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
18033 # firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
18034 # machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
18035 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
18036     my $filename = shift;
18037
18038     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
18039     chomp $product;
18040     my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
18041
18042     print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
18043
18044     my $xml = XMLin($filename);
18045     my @paths;
18046     for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
18047         my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
18048         my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
18049         my $oscode;
18050         if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
18051             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
18052         } else {
18053             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
18054         }
18055         if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
18056         {
18057             @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
18058         }
18059     }
18060     for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
18061         my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
18062
18063         # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
18064         next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
18065
18066         my $cpath = $component->{path};
18067         for my $path (@paths) {
18068             if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
18069                 push(@paths, $cpath);
18070             }
18071         }
18072     }
18073     return @paths;
18074 }
18075 </pre>
18076
18077 <p>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
18078 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking.  Anyone know a
18079 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers?  At the
18080 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
18081 outdated.</p>
18082
18083       </div>
18084       <div class="tags">
18085
18086
18087         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
18088
18089
18090       </div>
18091     </div>
18092     <div class="padding"></div>
18093
18094     <div class="entry">
18095       <div class="title">
18096         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_e_book_kiosk_for_the_public_libraries_.html">Free e-book kiosk for the public libraries?</a>
18097       </div>
18098       <div class="date">
18099          7th October 2011
18100       </div>
18101       <div class="body">
18102         <p>Here in Norway the public libraries are debating with the
18103 publishing houses how to handle electronic books.  Surprisingly, the
18104 libraries seem to be willing to accept digital restriction mechanisms
18105 (DRM) on books and renting e-books with artificial scarcity from the
18106 publishing houses.  Time limited renting (2-3 years) is one proposed
18107 model, and only allowing X borrowers for each book is another.
18108 Personally I find it amazing that libraries are even considering such
18109 models.</p>
18110
18111 <p>Anyway, while reading <a href="http://boklaben.no/?p=220">part of
18112 this debate</a>, it occurred to me that someone should present a more
18113 sensible approach to the libraries, to allow its borrowers to get used
18114 to a better model.  The idea is simple:</p>
18115
18116 <p>Create a computer system for the libraries, either in the form of a
18117 Live DVD or a installable distribution, that provide a simple kiosk
18118 solution to hand out free e-books.  As a start, the books distributed
18119 by <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/">Project Gutenberg</a> (about
18120 36,000 books), <a href="http://runeberg.org/">Project Runenberg</a>
18121 (1149 books) and <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/texts">The
18122 Internet Archive</a> (3,033,748 books) could be included, but any book
18123 where the copyright has expired or with a free licence could be
18124 distributed.</p>
18125
18126 <p>The computer system would make it easy to:</p>
18127
18128 <ul>
18129
18130 <li>Copy e-books into a USB stick, reading tablets, cell phones and
18131   other relevant equipment.</li>
18132
18133 <li>Show the books for reading on the the screen in the library.</li>
18134
18135 </ul>
18136
18137 <p>In addition to such kiosk solution, there should probably be a web
18138 site as well to allow people easy access to these books without
18139 visiting the library.  The site would be the distribution point for
18140 the kiosk systems, which would connect regularly to fetch any new
18141 books available.</p>
18142
18143 <p>Are there anyone working on a system like this?  I guess it would
18144 fit any library in the world, and not just the Norwegian public
18145 libraries. :)</p>
18146
18147       </div>
18148       <div class="tags">
18149
18150
18151         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
18152
18153
18154       </div>
18155     </div>
18156     <div class="padding"></div>
18157
18158     <div class="entry">
18159       <div class="title">
18160         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Ripping_problematic_DVDs_using_dvdbackup_and_genisoimage.html">Ripping problematic DVDs using dvdbackup and genisoimage</a>
18161       </div>
18162       <div class="date">
18163         17th September 2011
18164       </div>
18165       <div class="body">
18166         <p>For convenience, I want to store copies of all my DVDs on my file
18167 server.  It allow me to save shelf space flat while still having my
18168 movie collection easily available.  It also make it possible to let
18169 the kids see their favourite DVDs without wearing the physical copies
18170 down.  I prefer to store the DVDs as ISOs to keep the DVD menu and
18171 subtitle options intact.  It also ensure that the entire film is one
18172 file on the disk.  As this is for personal use, the ripping is
18173 perfectly legal here in Norway.</p>
18174
18175 <p>Normally I rip the DVDs using dd like this:</p>
18176
18177 <blockquote><pre>
18178 #!/bin/sh
18179 # apt-get install lsdvd
18180 title=$(lsdvd 2>/dev/null|awk '/Disc Title: / {print $3}')
18181 dd if=/dev/dvd of=/storage/dvds/$title.iso bs=1M
18182 </pre></blockquote>
18183
18184 <p>But some DVDs give a input/output error when I read it, and I have
18185 been looking for a better alternative.  I have no idea why this I/O
18186 error occur, but suspect my DVD drive, the Linux kernel driver or
18187 something fishy with the DVDs in question.  Or perhaps all three.</p>
18188
18189 <p>Anyway, I believe I found a solution today using dvdbackup and
18190 genisoimage.  This script gave me a working ISO for a problematic
18191 movie by first extracting the DVD file system and then re-packing it
18192 back as an ISO.
18193
18194 <blockquote><pre>
18195 #!/bin/sh
18196 # apt-get install lsdvd dvdbackup genisoimage
18197 set -e
18198 tmpdir=/storage/dvds/
18199 title=$(lsdvd 2>/dev/null|awk '/Disc Title: / {print $3}')
18200 dvdbackup -i /dev/dvd -M -o $tmpdir -n$title
18201 genisoimage -dvd-video -o $tmpdir/$title.iso $tmpdir/$title
18202 rm -rf $tmpdir/$title
18203 </pre></blockquote>
18204
18205 <p>Anyone know of a better way available in Debian/Squeeze?</p>
18206
18207 <p>Update 2011-09-18: I got a tip from Konstantin Khomoutov about the
18208 readom program from the wodim package.  It is specially written to
18209 read optical media, and is called like this: <tt>readom dev=/dev/dvd
18210 f=image.iso</tt>.  It got 6 GB along with the problematic Cars DVD
18211 before it failed, and failed right away with a Timmy Time DVD.</p>
18212
18213 <p>Next, I got a tip from Bastian Blank about
18214 <a href="http://bblank.thinkmo.de/blog/new-software-python-dvdvideo">his
18215 program python-dvdvideo</a>, which seem to be just what I am looking
18216 for.  Tested it with my problematic Timmy Time DVD, and it succeeded
18217 creating a ISO image.  The git source built and installed just fine in
18218 Squeeze, so I guess this will be my tool of choice in the future.</p>
18219
18220       </div>
18221       <div class="tags">
18222
18223
18224         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
18225
18226
18227       </div>
18228     </div>
18229     <div class="padding"></div>
18230
18231     <div class="entry">
18232       <div class="title">
18233         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_is_booting_into_runlevel_1_different_from_single_user_boots_.html">How is booting into runlevel 1 different from single user boots?</a>
18234       </div>
18235       <div class="date">
18236          4th August 2011
18237       </div>
18238       <div class="body">
18239         <p>Wouter Verhelst have some
18240 <a href="http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot">interesting
18241 comments and opinions</a> on my blog post on
18242 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">the
18243 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian</a> and my blog post about
18244 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">the
18245 default KDE desktop in Debian</a>.  I only have time to address one
18246 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
18247 misunderstanding he bring forward:</p>
18248
18249 <p><blockquote>
18250 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
18251 single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line;
18252 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
18253 </blockquote></p>
18254
18255 <p>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
18256 and booting into runlevel 1 is the same.  I am not surprised he
18257 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
18258 thing to believe.  But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
18259 runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user
18260 mode.  I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
18261 hard to explain.</p>
18262
18263 <p>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
18264 "<tt>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin</tt>".  This means the only thing that is
18265 executed in single user mode is sulogin.  Single user mode is a boot
18266 state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
18267 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
18268 enters the single user state.  When switching to runlevel 1, the state
18269 is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1
18270 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
18271 runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
18272 1.  It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the
18273 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
18274 mode).</p>
18275
18276 <p>This summary might make it clearer.  When booting for the first
18277 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
18278 "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  When booting into
18279 runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc
18280 S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  A problem show up when
18281 trying to continue after visiting single user mode.  Not all services
18282 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
18283 unpredicatble state.  This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
18284 after visiting single user mode.</p>
18285
18286 <p>A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of
18287 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/.  When switching from say runlevel 2
18288 to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
18289 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
18290 started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels
18291 2-5.  I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
18292 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not <strong>required</strong> to get a
18293 functioning single user mode during boot.</p>
18294
18295 <p>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
18296 and discovered this problem a few years ago.  I suspect it originates
18297 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.</p>
18298
18299       </div>
18300       <div class="tags">
18301
18302
18303         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
18304
18305
18306       </div>
18307     </div>
18308     <div class="padding"></div>
18309
18310     <div class="entry">
18311       <div class="title">
18312         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">What should start from /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian? - almost nothing</a>
18313       </div>
18314       <div class="date">
18315         30th July 2011
18316       </div>
18317       <div class="body">
18318         <p>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
18319 are started from /etc/rcS.d/.  In fact, there is a bite more of them
18320 than make sense, and this causes a few problems.  What kind of
18321 problems, you might ask.  There are at least two problems.  The first
18322 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
18323 runlevel 1.  One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
18324 the expected state.  The other is that single user boot will sometimes
18325 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
18326 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
18327 machine from a problem in that subsystem.  A minor additional point is
18328 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
18329 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
18330 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.</p>
18331
18332 <p>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/.  In short, only the
18333 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
18334 presented during a single user boot should go there.  Everything else
18335 should go into the numeric runlevels.  This means things like
18336 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
18337 the numeric runlevels.  Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d
18338 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
18339 out.  Do your package have one of them?  Please help us make single
18340 user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.</p>
18341
18342 <p>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
18343 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
18344 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
18345 is presented.</p>
18346
18347 <p>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound.  To keep
18348 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
18349 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
18350 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
18351 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
18352 moved first.  This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
18353 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
18354 the system state correct.  This will require some coordination when it
18355 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
18356 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
18357 on them.  Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
18358 package, while others are still left to do.  I wish I had time to work
18359 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
18360 find time to push this forward.</p>
18361
18362       </div>
18363       <div class="tags">
18364
18365
18366         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
18367
18368
18369       </div>
18370     </div>
18371     <div class="padding"></div>
18372
18373     <div class="entry">
18374       <div class="title">
18375         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">What is missing in the Debian desktop, or why my parents use Kubuntu</a>
18376       </div>
18377       <div class="date">
18378         29th July 2011
18379       </div>
18380       <div class="body">
18381         <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
18382 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
18383 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
18384 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
18385 issues.</p>
18386
18387 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
18388 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
18389 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
18390
18391 <ol>
18392
18393 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
18394 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
18395 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
18396 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
18397 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
18398 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
18399 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
18400 Debian.</li>
18401
18402 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
18403 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
18404 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
18405 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
18406 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
18407 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
18408 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
18409 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
18410 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
18411 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
18412 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
18413 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
18414 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
18415
18416 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
18417 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
18418 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
18419 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
18420 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
18421 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
18422 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
18423 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
18424 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
18425 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
18426
18427 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
18428 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
18429 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
18430 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
18431 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
18432 latter behaviour.</li>
18433
18434 </ol>
18435
18436 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
18437 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
18438 it do not matter much.</p>
18439
18440 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
18441 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
18442 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>
18443
18444       </div>
18445       <div class="tags">
18446
18447
18448         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
18449
18450
18451       </div>
18452     </div>
18453     <div class="padding"></div>
18454
18455     <div class="entry">
18456       <div class="title">
18457         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Perl_modules_used_by_FixMyStreet_which_are_missing_in_Debian_Squeeze.html">Perl modules used by FixMyStreet which are missing in Debian/Squeeze</a>
18458       </div>
18459       <div class="date">
18460         26th July 2011
18461       </div>
18462       <div class="body">
18463         <p>The Norwegian <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</A>
18464 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
18465 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10
18466 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
18467 security support for a few years.</p>
18468
18469 <p>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
18470 that are missing in Debian at the moment.  It would be great if these
18471 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
18472 their own <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com">FixMyStreet</a> clone
18473 in their own country using only Debian packages.  The list of modules
18474 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group
18475 will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
18476 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
18477 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
18478 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
18479 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
18480 easier in the future.</p>
18481
18482 <p>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
18483 installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name'
18484 and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package.  But this leave me
18485 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
18486 do not have time for.</p>
18487
18488       </div>
18489       <div class="tags">
18490
18491
18492         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>.
18493
18494
18495       </div>
18496     </div>
18497     <div class="padding"></div>
18498
18499     <div class="entry">
18500       <div class="title">
18501         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Free_Software_vs__proprietary_softare___.html">Free Software vs. proprietary softare...</a>
18502       </div>
18503       <div class="date">
18504         20th June 2011
18505       </div>
18506       <div class="body">
18507         <p>Reading
18508 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2011/06/20/open-source-vs-closed-source-eulas/">the
18509 thingiverse blog</a>, I came across two highlights of interesting
18510 parts of the
18511 <a href="http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Autodesk_EULA">Autodesk</a>
18512 and
18513 <a href="http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2011/06/things-you-cant-do-with-the-microsoft-kinect-sdk.html">Microsoft
18514 Kinect</a> End User License Agreements (EULAs), which illustrates
18515 quite well why I stay away from software with EULAs.  Whenever I take
18516 the time to read their content, the terms are simply unacceptable.</p>
18517
18518       </div>
18519       <div class="tags">
18520
18521
18522         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>.
18523
18524
18525       </div>
18526     </div>
18527     <div class="padding"></div>
18528
18529     <div class="entry">
18530       <div class="title">
18531         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experimental_Open311_API_for_the_mySociety_fixmystreet_system.html">Experimental Open311 API for the mySociety fixmystreet system</a>
18532       </div>
18533       <div class="date">
18534         30th April 2011
18535       </div>
18536       <div class="body">
18537         <p>Today, the first draft implementation of an
18538 <a href="http://www.open311.org/">Open311 API</a> for the Norwegian
18539 service <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> started to
18540 work.  It is only available on the developer server for now, and I
18541 have not tested it using any existing Open311 client (I lack the
18542 platforms needed to run the clients I have found so far), but it is
18543 able to query the database and extract a list of open and closed
18544 requests within a given category and reported to a given municipality.
18545 I believe that is a good start to create a useful service for those
18546 that want to do data mining on the requests submitted so far.</p>
18547
18548 <p>Where is it?  Visit
18549 <a href="http://fiksgatami-dev.nuug.no/open311.cgi/v2/">http://fiksgatami-dev.nuug.no/open311.cgi/v2/</a>
18550 to have a look.  Please send feedback to the
18551 <a href="http://lists.nuug.no/mailman/listinfo/fiksgatami">fiksgatami
18552 (at) nuug.no</a> mailing list.</p>
18553
18554       </div>
18555       <div class="tags">
18556
18557
18558         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311</a>.
18559
18560
18561       </div>
18562     </div>
18563     <div class="padding"></div>
18564
18565     <div class="entry">
18566       <div class="title">
18567         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Initial_notes_on_adding_Open311_server_API_on_FixMyStreet.html">Initial notes on adding Open311 server API on FixMyStreet</a>
18568       </div>
18569       <div class="date">
18570         29th April 2011
18571       </div>
18572       <div class="body">
18573         <p>The last few days I have spent some time trying to add support for
18574 the <a href="http://www.open311.org/">Open311 API</a> in the
18575 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">Norwegian FixMyStreet service</a>.
18576 Earlier I believed Open311 would be a useful API to use to submit
18577 reports to the municipalities, but when I noticed that the
18578 <a href="http://fixmystreet.org.nz/">New Zealand version</a> of
18579 FixMyStreet had implemented Open311 on the server side, it occurred to
18580 me that this was a nice way to allow the public, press and
18581 municipalities to do data mining directly in the FixMyStreet service.
18582 Thus I went to work implementing the Open311 specification for
18583 FixMyStreet.  The implementation is not yet ready, but I am starting
18584 to get a draft limping along.  In the process, I have discovered a few
18585 issues with the Open311 specification.</p>
18586
18587 <p>One obvious missing feature is the lack of natural language
18588 handling in the specification.  The specification seem to assume all
18589 reports will be written in English, and do not provide a way for the
18590 receiving end to specify which languages are understood there.  To be
18591 able to use the same client and submit to several Open311 receivers,
18592 it would be useful to know which language to use when writing reports.
18593 I believe the specification should be extended to allow the receivers
18594 of problem reports to specify which language they accept, and the
18595 submitter to specify which language the report is written in.
18596 Language of a text can also be automatically guessed using statistical
18597 methods, but for multi-lingual persons like myself, it is useful to
18598 know which language to use when writing a problem report.  I suspect
18599 some lang=nb,nn kind of attribute would solve it.</p>
18600
18601 <p>A key part of the Open311 API is the list of services provided,
18602 which is similar to the categories used by FixMyStreet.  One issue I
18603 run into is the need to specify both name and unique identifier for
18604 each category.  The specification do not state that the identifier
18605 should be numeric, but all example implementations have used numbers
18606 here.  In FixMyStreet, there is no number associated with each
18607 category.  As the specification do not forbid it, I will use the name
18608 as the unique identifier for now and see how open311 clients handle
18609 it.</p>
18610
18611 <p>The report format in open311 and the report format in FixMyStreet
18612 differ in a key part.  FixMyStreet have a title and a description,
18613 while Open311 only have a description and lack the title.  I'm not
18614 quite sure how to best handle this yet.  When asking for a FixMyStreet
18615 report in Open311 format, I just merge title an description into the
18616 open311 description, but this is not going to work if the open311 API
18617 should be used for submitting new reports to FixMyStreet.</p>
18618
18619 <p>The search feature in Open311 is missing a way to ask for problems
18620 near a geographic location.  I believe this is important if one is to
18621 use Open311 as the query language for mobile units.  The specification
18622 should be extended to handle this, probably using some new lat=, lon=
18623 and range= options.</p>
18624
18625 <p>The final challenge I see is that the FixMyStreet code handle
18626 several administrations in one interface, while the Open311 API seem
18627 to assume only one administration.  For FixMyStreet, this mean a
18628 report can be sent to several administrations, and the categories
18629 available depend on the location of the problem.  Not quite sure how
18630 to best handle this.  I've noticed
18631 <a href="http://seeclickfix.com/open311/">SeeClickFix</a> added
18632 latitude and longitude options to the services request, but it do not
18633 solve the problem of what to return when no location is specified.
18634 Will have to investigate this a bit more.</p>
18635
18636 <p>My distaste for web forums have kept me from bringing these issues
18637 up with the open311 developer group.  I really wish they had a email
18638 list available via <a href="http://www.gmane.org/">Gmane</a> to use for
18639 discussions instead of only
18640 <a href="http://lists.open311.org/groups/discuss">a forum<a/>.  Oh,
18641 well.  That will probably resolve itself, one way or another.  I've
18642 also tried visiting the IRC channel #open311 on FreeNode, but no-one
18643 seem to reply to my questions there.  This make me wonder if I just
18644 fail to understand how the open311 community work.  It sure do not
18645 work like the free software project communities I am used to.</p>
18646
18647       </div>
18648       <div class="tags">
18649
18650
18651         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311</a>.
18652
18653
18654       </div>
18655     </div>
18656     <div class="padding"></div>
18657
18658     <div class="entry">
18659       <div class="title">
18660         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_enteres_Google_Summer_of_Code_2011.html">Gnash enteres Google Summer of Code 2011</a>
18661       </div>
18662       <div class="date">
18663          6th April 2011
18664       </div>
18665       <div class="body">
18666         <p><a href="http://www.getgnash.org/">The Gnash project</a> is still
18667 the most promising solution for a Free Software Flash implementation.
18668 A few days ago the project
18669 <a href="http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/gnash-dev/2011-04/msg00011.html">announced</a>
18670 that it will participate in Google Summer of Code.  I hope many
18671 students apply, and that some of them succeed in getting AVM2 support
18672 into Gnash.</p>
18673
18674       </div>
18675       <div class="tags">
18676
18677
18678         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
18679
18680
18681       </div>
18682     </div>
18683     <div class="padding"></div>
18684
18685     <div class="entry">
18686       <div class="title">
18687         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Norwegian_FixMyStreet_have_kept_me_busy_the_last_few_weeks.html">A Norwegian FixMyStreet have kept me busy the last few weeks</a>
18688       </div>
18689       <div class="date">
18690          3rd April 2011
18691       </div>
18692       <div class="body">
18693         <p>Here is a small update for my English readers.  Most of my blog
18694 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
18695 update in English.</p>
18696
18697 <p>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
18698 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
18699 of the British service
18700 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> up and running,
18701 and it has been running for a month now.  The entire project has been
18702 organised by me and two others.  Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
18703 to fund the development work.  In January I drafted a contract with
18704 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> on what to develop,
18705 and in February the development took place.  Most of it involved
18706 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
18707 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
18708 running in any country by now.  The Norwegian
18709 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is using
18710 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> as the map
18711 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
18712 support for this had to be added/fixed.</p>
18713
18714 <p>The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend
18715 polishing the system before we announced it March 7th.  The system is
18716 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000
18717 problem reports in a few weeks.  Soon we hope to announce the Android
18718 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
18719 public infrastructure.</p>
18720
18721 <p>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
18722 such service?</p>
18723
18724       </div>
18725       <div class="tags">
18726
18727
18728         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart</a>.
18729
18730
18731       </div>
18732     </div>
18733     <div class="padding"></div>
18734
18735     <div class="entry">
18736       <div class="title">
18737         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_NVD_and_CPE_to_track_CVEs_in_locally_maintained_software.html">Using NVD and CPE to track CVEs in locally maintained software</a>
18738       </div>
18739       <div class="date">
18740         28th January 2011
18741       </div>
18742       <div class="body">
18743         <p>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
18744 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo.  My idea is that
18745 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
18746 available on the Internet, and check our locally
18747 maintained/distributed software against this information.  It should
18748 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten.  The
18749 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
18750 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
18751 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
18752 out which security holes were present in our free software
18753 collection.</p>
18754
18755 <p>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
18756 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
18757 consistent way across data sources.  I considered several ways to do
18758 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
18759 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
18760 existing naming scheme.  And it seem like I am not the first one to
18761 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
18762 solution.  Enter the <a href="http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html">Common
18763 Platform Enumeration</a> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
18764 software, hardware and other platform components.  The CPE ids are
18765 mapped to CVEs in the <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/">National
18766 Vulnerability Database</a>, allowing me to look up know security
18767 issues for any CPE name.  With this in place, all I need to do is to
18768 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
18769 This is fairly trivial (I google for 'cve cpe $package' and check the
18770 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).</p>
18771
18772 <p>To give you an example.  The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
18773 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip.  If the old version 1.3.3 was the package to
18774 check out, one could look up
18775 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/search?cpe=cpe%3A%2Fa%3Agnu%3Agzip:1.3.3">cpe:/a:gnu:gzip:1.3.3
18776 in NVD</a> and get a list of 6 security holes with public CVE entries.
18777 The most recent one is
18778 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-0001">CVE-2010-0001</a>,
18779 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
18780 list of affected versions is provided.</p>
18781
18782 <p>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
18783 for offline processing of issues.  Using this dump, I've written a
18784 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
18785 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs.  One give it CPEs
18786 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
18787 security issues out.</p>
18788
18789 <p>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
18790 information need to be high.  For that to happen, I believe as many as
18791 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database.  I notice
18792 RHEL is providing
18793 <a href="https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt">a
18794 map from CVE to CPE</a>, indicating that they are using the CPE
18795 information.  I'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.</p>
18796
18797 <p>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
18798 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
18799 the CVE database in NVD.  The result look fairly good, but there are
18800 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
18801 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
18802 Debian believe are affected by a CVE).  Hope to find time to improve
18803 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
18804 someone maintaining it.  So far my three emails with questions and
18805 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
18806 established soon.</p>
18807
18808 <p>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
18809 mapping.  It would be useful to know which packages in for example
18810 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
18811 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
18812 for their packages.</p>
18813
18814       </div>
18815       <div class="tags">
18816
18817
18818         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
18819
18820
18821       </div>
18822     </div>
18823     <div class="padding"></div>
18824
18825     <div class="entry">
18826       <div class="title">
18827         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Which_module_is_loaded_for_a_given_PCI_and_USB_device_.html">Which module is loaded for a given PCI and USB device?</a>
18828       </div>
18829       <div class="date">
18830         23rd January 2011
18831       </div>
18832       <div class="body">
18833         <p>In the
18834 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data">discover-data</a>
18835 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
18836 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
18837 information.  One part of this script that I find very useful when
18838 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
18839 to the PCI device it claims.  It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
18840 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with.  To see
18841 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
18842 <tt>/usr/share/bug/discover-data 3>&1</tt>.  The relevant output on
18843 one of my machines like this:</p>
18844
18845 <pre>
18846 loaded modules:
18847 10de:03eb i2c_nforce2
18848 10de:03f1 ohci_hcd
18849 10de:03f2 ehci_hcd
18850 10de:03f0 snd_hda_intel
18851 10de:03ec pata_amd
18852 10de:03f6 sata_nv
18853 1022:1103 k8temp
18854 109e:036e bttv
18855 109e:0878 snd_bt87x
18856 11ab:4364 sky2
18857 </pre>
18858
18859 <p>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
18860 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor 3:</p>
18861
18862 <pre>
18863 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
18864     echo loaded pci modules:
18865     (
18866         cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
18867         for address in * ; do
18868             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
18869                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
18870                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
18871                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
18872                     id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $3}'`
18873                     echo "$id $module"
18874                 fi
18875             fi
18876         done
18877     )
18878     echo
18879 fi
18880 </pre>
18881
18882 <p>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
18883 mappings:</p>
18884
18885 <pre>
18886 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
18887     echo loaded usb modules:
18888     (
18889         cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
18890         for address in * ; do
18891             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
18892                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
18893                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
18894                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
18895                     id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $6}')
18896                     if [ "$id" ] ; then
18897                         echo "$id $module"
18898                     fi
18899                 fi
18900             fi
18901         done
18902     )
18903     echo
18904 fi
18905 </pre>
18906
18907 <p>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
18908 well.</p>
18909
18910       </div>
18911       <div class="tags">
18912
18913
18914         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
18915
18916
18917       </div>
18918     </div>
18919     <div class="padding"></div>
18920
18921     <div class="entry">
18922       <div class="title">
18923         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_video_format_most_supported_in_web_browsers_.html">The video format most supported in web browsers?</a>
18924       </div>
18925       <div class="date">
18926         16th January 2011
18927       </div>
18928       <div class="body">
18929         <p>The video format struggle on the web continues, and the three
18930 contenders seem to be Ogg Theora, H.264 and WebM.  Most video sites
18931 seem to use H.264, while others use Ogg Theora.  Interestingly enough,
18932 the comments I see give me the feeling that a lot of people believe
18933 H.264 is the most supported video format in browsers, but according to
18934 the Wikipedia article on
18935 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video">HTML5 video</a>,
18936 this is not true.  Check out the nice table of supprted formats in
18937 different browsers there.  The format supported by most browsers is
18938 Ogg Theora, supported by released versions of Mozilla Firefox, Google
18939 Chrome, Chromium, Opera, Konqueror, Epiphany, Origyn Web Browser and
18940 BOLT browser, while not supported by Internet Explorer nor Safari.
18941 The runner up is WebM supported by released versions of Google Chrome
18942 Chromium Opera and Origyn Web Browser, and test versions of Mozilla
18943 Firefox.  H.264 is supported by released versions of Safari, Origyn
18944 Web Browser and BOLT browser, and the test version of Internet
18945 Explorer.  Those wanting Ogg Theora support in Internet Explorer and
18946 Safari can install plugins to get it.</p>
18947
18948 <p>To me, the simple conclusion from this is that to reach most users
18949 without any extra software installed, one uses Ogg Theora with the
18950 HTML5 video tag.   Of course to reach all those without a browser
18951 handling HTML5, one need fallback mechanisms.  In
18952 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">NUUG</a>, we provide first fallback to a
18953 plugin capable of playing MPEG1 video, and those without such support
18954 we have a second fallback to the Cortado java applet playing Ogg
18955 Theora.  This seem to work quite well, as can be seen in an <a
18956 href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20110111-semantic-web/">example
18957 from last week</a>.</p>
18958
18959 <p>The reason Ogg Theora is the most supported format, and H.264 is
18960 the least supported is simple.  Implementing and using H.264
18961 require royalty payment to MPEG-LA, and the terms of use from MPEG-LA
18962 are incompatible with free software licensing.  If you believed H.264
18963 was without royalties and license terms, check out
18964 "<a href="http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/">H.264 – Not The Kind Of
18965 Free That Matters</a>" by Simon Phipps.</p>
18966
18967 <p>A incomplete list of sites providing video in Ogg Theora is
18968 available from
18969 <a href="http://wiki.xiph.org/index.php/List_of_Theora_videos">the
18970 Xiph.org wiki</a>, if you want to have a look.  I'm not aware of a
18971 similar list for WebM nor H.264.</p>
18972
18973 <p>Update 2011-01-16 09:40: A question from Tollef on IRC made me
18974 realise that I failed to make it clear enough this text is about the
18975 &lt;video&gt; tag support in browsers and not the video support
18976 provided by external plugins like the Flash plugins.</p>
18977
18978       </div>
18979       <div class="tags">
18980
18981
18982         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
18983
18984
18985       </div>
18986     </div>
18987     <div class="padding"></div>
18988
18989     <div class="entry">
18990       <div class="title">
18991         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Chrome_plan_to_drop_H_264_support_for_HTML5__lt_video_gt_.html">Chrome plan to drop H.264 support for HTML5 &lt;video&gt;</a>
18992       </div>
18993       <div class="date">
18994         12th January 2011
18995       </div>
18996       <div class="body">
18997         <p>Today I discovered
18998 <a href="http://www.digi.no/860070/google-dropper-h264-stotten-i-chrome">via
18999 digi.no</a> that the Chrome developers, in a surprising announcement,
19000 <a href="http://blog.chromium.org/2011/01/html-video-codec-support-in-chrome.html">yesterday
19001 announced</a> plans to drop H.264 support for HTML5 &lt;video&gt; in
19002 the browser.  The argument used is that H.264 is not a "completely
19003 open" codec technology.  If you believe H.264 was free for everyone
19004 to use, I recommend having a look at the essay
19005 "<a href="http://webmink.com/essays/h-264/">H.264 – Not The Kind Of
19006 Free That Matters</a>".  It is not free of cost for creators of video
19007 tools, nor those of us that want to publish on the Internet, and the
19008 terms provided by MPEG-LA excludes free software projects from
19009 licensing the patents needed for H.264.  Some background information
19010 on the Google announcement is available from
19011 <a href="http://www.osnews.com/story/24243/Google_To_Drop_H264_Support_from_Chrome">OSnews</a>.
19012 A good read. :)</p>
19013
19014 <p>Personally, I believe it is great that Google is taking a stand to
19015 promote equal terms for everyone when it comes to video publishing on
19016 the Internet.  This can only be done by publishing using free and open
19017 standards, which is only possible if the web browsers provide support
19018 for these free and open standards.  At the moment there seem to be two
19019 camps in the web browser world when it come to video support.  Some
19020 browsers support H.264, and others support
19021 <a href="http://www.theora.org/">Ogg Theora</a> and
19022 <a href="http://www.webmproject.org/">WebM</a>
19023 (<a href="http://www.diracvideo.org/">Dirac</a> is not really an option
19024 yet), forcing those of us that want to publish video on the Internet
19025 and which can not accept the terms of use presented by MPEG-LA for
19026 H.264 to not reach all potential viewers.
19027 Wikipedia keep <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTML5_video">an
19028 updated summary</a> of the current browser support.</p>
19029
19030 <p>Not surprising, several people would prefer Google to keep
19031 promoting H.264, and John Gruber
19032 <a href="http://daringfireball.net/2011/01/simple_questions">presents
19033 the mind set</a> of these people quite well.  His rhetorical questions
19034 provoked a reply from Thom Holwerda with another set of questions
19035 <a href="http://www.osnews.com/story/24245/10_Questions_for_John_Gruber_Regarding_H_264_WebM">presenting
19036 the issues with H.264</a>. Both are worth a read.</p>
19037
19038 <p>Some argue that if Google is dropping H.264 because it isn't free,
19039 they should also drop support for the Adobe Flash plugin.  This
19040 argument was covered by Simon Phipps in
19041 <a href="http://blogs.computerworlduk.com/simon-says/2011/01/google-and-h264---far-from-hypocritical/index.htm">todays
19042 blog post</a>, which I find to put the issue in context.  To me it
19043 make perfect sense to drop native H.264 support for HTML5 in the
19044 browser while still allowing plugins.</p>
19045
19046 <p>I suspect the reason this announcement make so many people protest,
19047 is that all the users and promoters of H.264 suddenly get an uneasy
19048 feeling that they might be backing the wrong horse.  A lot of TV
19049 broadcasters have been moving to H.264 the last few years, and a lot
19050 of money has been invested in hardware based on the belief that they
19051 could use the same video format for both broadcasting and web
19052 publishing.  Suddenly this belief is shaken.</p>
19053
19054 <p>An interesting question is why Google is doing this.  While the
19055 presented argument might be true enough, I believe Google would only
19056 present the argument if the change make sense from a business
19057 perspective.  One reason might be that they are currently negotiating
19058 with MPEG-LA over royalties or usage terms, and giving MPEG-LA the
19059 feeling that dropping H.264 completely from Chroome, Youtube and
19060 Google Video would improve the negotiation position of Google.
19061 Another reason might be that Google want to save money by not having
19062 to pay the video tax to MPEG-LA at all, and thus want to move to a
19063 video format not requiring royalties at all.  A third reason might be
19064 that the Chrome development team simply want to avoid the
19065 Chrome/Chromium split to get more help with the development of Chrome.
19066 I guess time will tell.</p>
19067
19068 <p>Update 2011-01-15: The Google Chrome team provided
19069 <a href="http://blog.chromium.org/2011/01/more-about-chrome-html-video-codec.html">more
19070 background and information on the move</a> it a blog post yesterday.</p>
19071
19072       </div>
19073       <div class="tags">
19074
19075
19076         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
19077
19078
19079       </div>
19080     </div>
19081     <div class="padding"></div>
19082
19083     <div class="entry">
19084       <div class="title">
19085         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_standards_are_Free_and_Open_as_defined_by_Digistan_.html">What standards are Free and Open as defined by Digistan?</a>
19086       </div>
19087       <div class="date">
19088         30th December 2010
19089       </div>
19090       <div class="body">
19091         <p>After trying to
19092 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html">compare
19093 Ogg Theora</a> to
19094 <a href="http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition">the Digistan
19095 definition</a> of a free and open standard, I concluded that this need
19096 to be done for more standards and started on a framework for doing
19097 this.  As a start, I want to get the status for all the standards in
19098 the Norwegian reference directory, which include UTF-8, HTML, PDF, ODF,
19099 JPEG, PNG, SVG and others.  But to be able to complete this in a
19100 reasonable time frame, I will need help.</p>
19101
19102 <p>If you want to help out with this work, please visit
19103 <a href="http://wiki.nuug.no/grupper/standard/digistan-analyse">the
19104 wiki pages I have set up for this</a>, and let me know that you want
19105 to help out.  The IRC channel #nuug on irc.freenode.net is a good
19106 place to coordinate this for now, as it is the IRC channel for the
19107 NUUG association where I have created the framework (I am the leader
19108 of the Norwegian Unix User Group).</p>
19109
19110 <p>The framework is still forming, and a lot is left to do.  Do not be
19111 scared by the sketchy form of the current pages. :)</p>
19112
19113       </div>
19114       <div class="tags">
19115
19116
19117         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
19118
19119
19120       </div>
19121     </div>
19122     <div class="padding"></div>
19123
19124     <div class="entry">
19125       <div class="title">
19126         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_many_definitions_of_a_open_standard.html">The many definitions of a open standard</a>
19127       </div>
19128       <div class="date">
19129         27th December 2010
19130       </div>
19131       <div class="body">
19132         <p>One of the reasons I like the Digistan definition of
19133 "<a href="http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition">Free and
19134 Open Standard</a>" is that this is a new term, and thus the meaning of
19135 the term has been decided by Digistan.  The term "Open Standard" has
19136 become so misunderstood that it is no longer very useful when talking
19137 about standards.  One end up discussing which definition is the best
19138 one and with such frame the only one gaining are the proponents of
19139 de-facto standards and proprietary solutions.</p>
19140
19141 <p>But to give us an idea about the diversity of definitions of open
19142 standards, here are a few that I know about.  This list is not
19143 complete, but can be a starting point for those that want to do a
19144 complete survey.  More definitions are available on the
19145 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_standard">wikipedia
19146 page</a>.</p>
19147
19148 <p>First off is my favourite, the definition from the European
19149 Interoperability Framework version 1.0.  Really sad to notice that BSA
19150 and others has succeeded in getting it removed from version 2.0 of the
19151 framework by stacking the committee drafting the new version with
19152 their own people.  Anyway, the definition is still available and it
19153 include the key properties needed to make sure everyone can use a
19154 specification on equal terms.</p>
19155
19156 <blockquote>
19157
19158 <p>The following are the minimal characteristics that a specification
19159 and its attendant documents must have in order to be considered an
19160 open standard:</p>
19161
19162 <ul>
19163
19164 <li>The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
19165 organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
19166 open decision-making procedure available to all interested parties
19167 (consensus or majority decision etc.).</li>
19168
19169 <li>The standard has been published and the standard specification
19170 document is available either freely or at a nominal charge. It must be
19171 permissible to all to copy, distribute and use it for no fee or at a
19172 nominal fee.</li>
19173
19174 <li>The intellectual property - i.e. patents possibly present - of
19175 (parts of) the standard is made irrevocably available on a royalty-
19176 free basis.</li>
19177
19178 <li>There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.</li>
19179
19180 </ul>
19181 </blockquote>
19182
19183 <p>Another one originates from my friends over at
19184 <a href="http://www.dkuug.dk/">DKUUG</a>, who coined and gathered
19185 support for <a href="http://www.aaben-standard.dk/">this
19186 definition</a> in 2004.  It even made it into the Danish parlament as
19187 <a href="http://www.ft.dk/dokumenter/tingdok.aspx?/samling/20051/beslutningsforslag/B103/som_fremsat.htm">their
19188 definition of a open standard</a>.  Another from a different part of
19189 the Danish government is available from the wikipedia page.</p>
19190
19191 <blockquote>
19192
19193 <p>En åben standard opfylder følgende krav:</p>
19194
19195 <ol>
19196
19197 <li>Veldokumenteret med den fuldstændige specifikation offentligt
19198 tilgængelig.</li>
19199
19200 <li>Frit implementerbar uden økonomiske, politiske eller juridiske
19201 begrænsninger på implementation og anvendelse.</li>
19202
19203 <li>Standardiseret og vedligeholdt i et åbent forum (en såkaldt
19204 "standardiseringsorganisation") via en åben proces.</li>
19205
19206 </ol>
19207
19208 </blockquote>
19209
19210 <p>Then there is <a href="http://www.fsfe.org/projects/os/def.html">the
19211 definition</a> from Free Software Foundation Europe.</p>
19212
19213 <blockquote>
19214
19215 <p>An Open Standard refers to a format or protocol that is</p>
19216
19217 <ol>
19218
19219 <li>subject to full public assessment and use without constraints in a
19220 manner equally available to all parties;</li>
19221
19222 <li>without any components or extensions that have dependencies on
19223 formats or protocols that do not meet the definition of an Open
19224 Standard themselves;</li>
19225
19226 <li>free from legal or technical clauses that limit its utilisation by
19227 any party or in any business model;</li>
19228
19229 <li>managed and further developed independently of any single vendor
19230 in a process open to the equal participation of competitors and third
19231 parties;</li>
19232
19233 <li>available in multiple complete implementations by competing
19234 vendors, or as a complete implementation equally available to all
19235 parties.</li>
19236
19237 </ol>
19238
19239 </blockquote>
19240
19241 <p>A long time ago, SUN Microsystems, now bought by Oracle, created
19242 its
19243 <a href="http://blogs.sun.com/dennisding/resource/Open%20Standard%20Definition.pdf">Open
19244 Standards Checklist</a> with a fairly detailed description.</p>
19245
19246 <blockquote>
19247 <p>Creation and Management of an Open Standard
19248
19249 <ul>
19250
19251 <li>Its development and management process must be collaborative and
19252   democratic:
19253
19254          <ul>
19255
19256          <li>Participation must be accessible to all those who wish to
19257             participate and can meet fair and reasonable criteria
19258             imposed by the organization under which it is developed
19259             and managed.</li>
19260
19261          <li>The processes must be documented and, through a known
19262             method, can be changed through input from all
19263             participants.</li>
19264
19265          <li>The process must be based on formal and binding commitments for
19266             the disclosure and licensing of intellectual property rights.</li>
19267
19268          <li>Development and management should strive for consensus,
19269             and an appeals process must be clearly outlined.</li>
19270
19271          <li>The standard specification must be open to extensive
19272             public review at least once in its life-cycle, with
19273             comments duly discussed and acted upon, if required.</li>
19274
19275          </ul>
19276
19277 </li>
19278
19279 </ul>
19280
19281 <p>Use and Licensing of an Open Standard</p>
19282 <ul>
19283
19284 <li>The standard must describe an interface, not an implementation,
19285   and the industry must be capable of creating multiple, competing
19286   implementations to the interface described in the standard without
19287   undue or restrictive constraints.  Interfaces include APIs,
19288   protocols, schemas, data formats and their encoding.</li>
19289
19290 <li> The standard must not contain any proprietary "hooks" that create
19291   a technical or economic barriers</li>
19292
19293 <li>Faithful implementations of the standard must
19294   interoperate. Interoperability means the ability of a computer
19295   program to communicate and exchange information with other computer
19296   programs and mutually to use the information which has been
19297   exchanged. This includes the ability to use, convert, or exchange
19298   file formats, protocols, schemas, interface information or
19299   conventions, so as to permit the computer program to work with other
19300   computer programs and users in all the ways in which they are
19301   intended to function.</li>
19302
19303 <li>It must be permissible for anyone to copy, distribute and read the
19304   standard for a nominal fee, or even no fee. If there is a fee, it
19305   must be low enough to not preclude widespread use.</li>
19306
19307 <li>It must be possible for anyone to obtain free (no royalties or
19308   fees; also known as "royalty free"), worldwide, non-exclusive and
19309   perpetual licenses to all essential patent claims to make, use and
19310   sell products based on the standard.  The only exceptions are
19311   terminations per the reciprocity and defensive suspension terms
19312   outlined below. Essential patent claims include pending, unpublished
19313   patents, published patents, and patent applications. The license is
19314   only for the exact scope of the standard in question.
19315
19316       <ul>
19317
19318       <li> May be conditioned only on reciprocal licenses to any of
19319         licensees' patent claims essential to practice that standard
19320         (also known as a reciprocity clause)</li>
19321
19322       <li> May be terminated as to any licensee who sues the licensor
19323         or any other licensee for infringement of patent claims
19324         essential to practice that standard (also known as a
19325         "defensive suspension" clause)</li>
19326
19327       <li> The same licensing terms are available to every potential
19328         licensor</li>
19329
19330       </ul>
19331 </li>
19332
19333 <li>The licensing terms of an open standards must not preclude
19334   implementations of that standard under open source licensing terms
19335   or restricted licensing terms</li>
19336
19337 </ul>
19338
19339 </blockquote>
19340
19341 <p>It is said that one of the nice things about standards is that
19342 there are so many of them.  As you can see, the same holds true for
19343 open standard definitions.  Most of the definitions have a lot in
19344 common, and it is not really controversial what properties a open
19345 standard should have, but the diversity of definitions have made it
19346 possible for those that want to avoid a level marked field and real
19347 competition to downplay the significance of open standards.  I hope we
19348 can turn this tide by focusing on the advantages of Free and Open
19349 Standards.</p>
19350
19351       </div>
19352       <div class="tags">
19353
19354
19355         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
19356
19357
19358       </div>
19359     </div>
19360     <div class="padding"></div>
19361
19362     <div class="entry">
19363       <div class="title">
19364         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Is_Ogg_Theora_a_free_and_open_standard_.html">Is Ogg Theora a free and open standard?</a>
19365       </div>
19366       <div class="date">
19367         25th December 2010
19368       </div>
19369       <div class="body">
19370         <p><a href="http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition">The
19371 Digistan definition</a> of a free and open standard reads like this:</p>
19372
19373 <blockquote>
19374
19375 <p>The Digital Standards Organization defines free and open standard
19376 as follows:</p>
19377
19378 <ol>
19379
19380 <li>A free and open standard is immune to vendor capture at all stages
19381 in its life-cycle. Immunity from vendor capture makes it possible to
19382 freely use, improve upon, trust, and extend a standard over time.</li>
19383
19384 <li>The standard is adopted and will be maintained by a not-for-profit
19385 organisation, and its ongoing development occurs on the basis of an
19386 open decision-making procedure available to all interested
19387 parties.</li>
19388
19389 <li>The standard has been published and the standard specification
19390 document is available freely. It must be permissible to all to copy,
19391 distribute, and use it freely.</li>
19392
19393 <li>The patents possibly present on (parts of) the standard are made
19394 irrevocably available on a royalty-free basis.</li>
19395
19396 <li>There are no constraints on the re-use of the standard.</li>
19397
19398 </ol>
19399
19400 <p>The economic outcome of a free and open standard, which can be
19401 measured, is that it enables perfect competition between suppliers of
19402 products based on the standard.</p>
19403 </blockquote>
19404
19405 <p>For a while now I have tried to figure out of Ogg Theora is a free
19406 and open standard according to this definition.  Here is a short
19407 writeup of what I have been able to gather so far.  I brought up the
19408 topic on the Xiph advocacy mailing list
19409 <a href="http://lists.xiph.org/pipermail/advocacy/2009-July/001632.html">in
19410 July 2009</a>, for those that want to see some background information.
19411 According to Ivo Emanuel Gonçalves and Monty Montgomery on that list
19412 the Ogg Theora specification fulfils the Digistan definition.</p>
19413
19414 <p><strong>Free from vendor capture?</strong></p>
19415
19416 <p>As far as I can see, there is no single vendor that can control the
19417 Ogg Theora specification.  It can be argued that the
19418 <a href="http://www.xiph.org/">Xiph foundation</A> is such vendor, but
19419 given that it is a non-profit foundation with the expressed goal
19420 making free and open protocols and standards available, it is not
19421 obvious that this is a real risk.  One issue with the Xiph
19422 foundation is that its inner working (as in board member list, or who
19423 control the foundation) are not easily available on the web.  I've
19424 been unable to find out who is in the foundation board, and have not
19425 seen any accounting information documenting how money is handled nor
19426 where is is spent in the foundation.  It is thus not obvious for an
19427 external observer who control The Xiph foundation, and for all I know
19428 it is possible for a single vendor to take control over the
19429 specification.  But it seem unlikely.</p>
19430
19431 <p><strong>Maintained by open not-for-profit organisation?</strong></p>
19432
19433 <p>Assuming that the Xiph foundation is the organisation its web pages
19434 claim it to be, this point is fulfilled.  If Xiph foundation is
19435 controlled by a single vendor, it isn't, but I have not found any
19436 documentation indicating this.</p>
19437
19438 <p>According to
19439 <a href="http://media.hiof.no/diverse/fad/rapport_4.pdf">a report</a>
19440 prepared by Audun Vaaler og Børre Ludvigsen for the Norwegian
19441 government, the Xiph foundation is a non-commercial organisation and
19442 the development process is open, transparent and non-Discrimatory.
19443 Until proven otherwise, I believe it make most sense to believe the
19444 report is correct.</p>
19445
19446 <p><strong>Specification freely available?</strong></p>
19447
19448 <p>The specification for the <a href="http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/">Ogg
19449 container format</a> and both the
19450 <a href="http://www.xiph.org/vorbis/doc/">Vorbis</a> and
19451 <a href="http://theora.org/doc/">Theora</a> codeces are available on
19452 the web.  This are the terms in the Vorbis and Theora specification:
19453
19454 <blockquote>
19455
19456 Anyone may freely use and distribute the Ogg and [Vorbis/Theora]
19457 specifications, whether in private, public, or corporate
19458 capacity. However, the Xiph.Org Foundation and the Ogg project reserve
19459 the right to set the Ogg [Vorbis/Theora] specification and certify
19460 specification compliance.
19461
19462 </blockquote>
19463
19464 <p>The Ogg container format is specified in IETF
19465 <a href="http://www.xiph.org/ogg/doc/rfc3533.txt">RFC 3533</a>, and
19466 this is the term:<p>
19467
19468 <blockquote>
19469
19470 <p>This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
19471 others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
19472 or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published and
19473 distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any kind,
19474 provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
19475 included on all such copies and derivative works.  However, this
19476 document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
19477 the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
19478 Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of developing
19479 Internet standards in which case the procedures for copyrights defined
19480 in the Internet Standards process must be followed, or as required to
19481 translate it into languages other than English.</p>
19482
19483 <p>The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
19484 revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.</p>
19485 </blockquote>
19486
19487 <p>All these terms seem to allow unlimited distribution and use, an
19488 this term seem to be fulfilled.  There might be a problem with the
19489 missing permission to distribute modified versions of the text, and
19490 thus reuse it in other specifications.  Not quite sure if that is a
19491 requirement for the Digistan definition.</p>
19492
19493 <p><strong>Royalty-free?</strong></p>
19494
19495 <p>There are no known patent claims requiring royalties for the Ogg
19496 Theora format.
19497 <a href="http://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/ReadArticle.aspx?ArticleID=65782">MPEG-LA</a>
19498 and
19499 <a href="http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/04/30/237238/Steve-Jobs-Hints-At-Theora-Lawsuit">Steve
19500 Jobs</a> in Apple claim to know about some patent claims (submarine
19501 patents) against the Theora format, but no-one else seem to believe
19502 them.  Both Opera Software and the Mozilla Foundation have looked into
19503 this and decided to implement Ogg Theora support in their browsers
19504 without paying any royalties.  For now the claims from MPEG-LA and
19505 Steve Jobs seem more like FUD to scare people to use the H.264 codec
19506 than any real problem with Ogg Theora.</p>
19507
19508 <p><strong>No constraints on re-use?</strong></p>
19509
19510 <p>I am not aware of any constraints on re-use.</p>
19511
19512 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
19513
19514 <p>3 of 5 requirements seem obviously fulfilled, and the remaining 2
19515 depend on the governing structure of the Xiph foundation.  Given the
19516 background report used by the Norwegian government, I believe it is
19517 safe to assume the last two requirements are fulfilled too, but it
19518 would be nice if the Xiph foundation web site made it easier to verify
19519 this.</p>
19520
19521 <p>It would be nice to see other analysis of other specifications to
19522 see if they are free and open standards.</p>
19523
19524       </div>
19525       <div class="tags">
19526
19527
19528         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
19529
19530
19531       </div>
19532     </div>
19533     <div class="padding"></div>
19534
19535     <div class="entry">
19536       <div class="title">
19537         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_reply_from_Edgar_Villanueva_to_Microsoft_in_Peru.html">The reply from Edgar Villanueva to Microsoft in Peru</a>
19538       </div>
19539       <div class="date">
19540         25th December 2010
19541       </div>
19542       <div class="body">
19543         <p>A few days ago
19544 <a href="http://www.idg.no/computerworld/article189879.ece">an
19545 article</a> in the Norwegian Computerworld magazine about how version
19546 2.0 of
19547 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Interoperability_Framework">European
19548 Interoperability Framework</a> has been successfully lobbied by the
19549 proprietary software industry to remove the focus on free software.
19550 Nothing very surprising there, given
19551 <a href="http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/03/29/2115235/Open-Source-Open-Standards-Under-Attack-In-Europe">earlier
19552 reports</a> on how Microsoft and others have stacked the committees in
19553 this work.  But I find this very sad.   The definition of
19554 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/dokumenter/standard-presse-def-200506.txt">an
19555 open standard from version 1</a> was very good, and something I
19556 believe should be used also in the future, alongside
19557 <a href="http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition">the
19558 definition from Digistan</A>.  Version 2 have removed the open
19559 standard definition from its content.</p>
19560
19561 <p>Anyway, the news reminded me of the great reply sent by Dr. Edgar
19562 Villanueva, congressman in Peru at the time, to Microsoft as a reply
19563 to Microsofts attack on his proposal regarding the use of free software
19564 in the public sector in Peru.  As the text was not available from a
19565 few of the URLs where it used to be available, I copy it here from
19566 <a href="http://gnuwin.epfl.ch/articles/en/reponseperou/villanueva_to_ms.html">my
19567 source</a> to ensure it is available also in the future.  Some
19568 background information about that story is available in
19569 <a href="http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6099">an article</a> from
19570 Linux Journal in 2002.</p>
19571
19572 <blockquote>
19573 <p>Lima, 8th of April, 2002<br>
19574 To: Señor JUAN ALBERTO GONZÁLEZ<br>
19575 General Manager of Microsoft Perú</p>
19576
19577 <p>Dear Sir:</p>
19578
19579 <p>First of all, I thank you for your letter of March 25, 2002 in which you state the official position of Microsoft relative to Bill Number 1609, Free Software in Public Administration, which is indubitably inspired by the desire for Peru to find a suitable place in the global technological context. In the same spirit, and convinced that we will find the best solutions through an exchange of clear and open ideas, I will take this opportunity to reply to the commentaries included in your letter.</p>
19580
19581 <p>While acknowledging that opinions such as yours constitute a significant contribution, it would have been even more worthwhile for me if, rather than formulating objections of a general nature (which we will analyze in detail later) you had gathered solid arguments for the advantages that proprietary software could bring to the Peruvian State, and to its citizens in general, since this would have allowed a more enlightening exchange in respect of each of our positions.</p>
19582
19583 <p>With the aim of creating an orderly debate, we will assume that what you call "open source software" is what the Bill defines as "free software", since there exists software for which the source code is distributed together with the program, but which does not fall within the definition established by the Bill; and that what you call "commercial software" is what the Bill defines as "proprietary" or "unfree", given that there exists free software which is sold in the market for a price like any other good or service.</p>
19584
19585 <p>It is also necessary to make it clear that the aim of the Bill we are discussing is not directly related to the amount of direct savings that can by made by using free software in state institutions. That is in any case a marginal aggregate value, but in no way is it the chief focus of the Bill. The basic principles which inspire the Bill are linked to the basic guarantees of a state of law, such as:</p>
19586
19587 <p>
19588 <ul>
19589 <li>Free access to public information by the citizen. </li>
19590 <li>Permanence of public data. </li>
19591 <li>Security of the State and citizens.</li>
19592 </ul>
19593 </p>
19594
19595 <p>To guarantee the free access of citizens to public information, it is indispensable that the encoding of data is not tied to a single provider. The use of standard and open formats gives a guarantee of this free access, if necessary through the creation of compatible free software.</p>
19596
19597 <p>To guarantee the permanence of public data, it is necessary that the usability and maintenance of the software does not depend on the goodwill of the suppliers, or on the monopoly conditions imposed by them. For this reason the State needs systems the development of which can be guaranteed due to the availability of the source code.</p>
19598
19599 <p>To guarantee national security or the security of the State, it is indispensable to be able to rely on systems without elements which allow control from a distance or the undesired transmission of information to third parties. Systems with source code freely accessible to the public are required to allow their inspection by the State itself, by the citizens, and by a large number of independent experts throughout the world. Our proposal brings further security, since the knowledge of the source code will eliminate the growing number of programs with *spy code*. </p>
19600
19601 <p>In the same way, our proposal strengthens the security of the citizens, both in their role as legitimate owners of information managed by the state, and in their role as consumers. In this second case, by allowing the growth of a widespread availability of free software not containing *spy code* able to put at risk privacy and individual freedoms.</p>
19602
19603 <p>In this sense, the Bill is limited to establishing the conditions under which the state bodies will obtain software in the future, that is, in a way compatible with these basic principles.</p>
19604
19605
19606 <p>From reading the Bill it will be clear that once passed:<br>
19607 <li>the law does not forbid the production of proprietary software</li>
19608 <li>the law does not forbid the sale of proprietary software</li>
19609 <li>the law does not specify which concrete software to use</li>
19610 <li>the law does not dictate the supplier from whom software will be bought</li>
19611 <li>the law does not limit the terms under which a software product can be licensed.</li>
19612
19613 </p>
19614
19615 <p>What the Bill does express clearly, is that, for software to be acceptable for the state it is not enough that it is technically capable of fulfilling a task, but that further the contractual conditions must satisfy a series of requirements regarding the license, without which the State cannot guarantee the citizen adequate processing of his data, watching over its integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility throughout time, as these are very critical aspects for its normal functioning.</p>
19616
19617 <p>We agree, Mr. Gonzalez, that information and communication technology have a significant impact on the quality of life of the citizens (whether it be positive or negative). We surely also agree that the basic values I have pointed out above are fundamental in a democratic state like Peru. So we are very interested to know of any other way of guaranteeing these principles, other than through the use of free software in the terms defined by the Bill.</p>
19618
19619 <p>As for the observations you have made, we will now go on to analyze them in detail:</p>
19620
19621 <p>Firstly, you point out that: "1. The bill makes it compulsory for all public bodies to use only free software, that is to say open source software, which breaches the principles of equality before the law, that of non-discrimination and the right of free private enterprise, freedom of industry and of contract, protected by the constitution."</p>
19622
19623 <p>This understanding is in error. The Bill in no way affects the rights you list; it limits itself entirely to establishing conditions for the use of software on the part of state institutions, without in any way meddling in private sector transactions. It is a well established principle that the State does not enjoy the wide spectrum of contractual freedom of the private sector, as it is limited in its actions precisely by the requirement for transparency of public acts; and in this sense, the preservation of the greater common interest must prevail when legislating on the matter.</p>
19624
19625 <p>The Bill protects equality under the law, since no natural or legal person is excluded from the right of offering these goods to the State under the conditions defined in the Bill and without more limitations than those established by the Law of State Contracts and Purchasing (T.U.O. by Supreme Decree No. 012-2001-PCM).</p>
19626
19627 <p>The Bill does not introduce any discrimination whatever, since it only establishes *how* the goods have to be provided (which is a state power) and not *who* has to provide them (which would effectively be discriminatory, if restrictions based on national origin, race religion, ideology, sexual preference etc. were imposed). On the contrary, the Bill is decidedly antidiscriminatory. This is so because by defining with no room for doubt the conditions for the provision of software, it prevents state bodies from using software which has a license including discriminatory conditions.</p>
19628
19629 <p>It should be obvious from the preceding two paragraphs that the Bill does not harm free private enterprise, since the latter can always choose under what conditions it will produce software; some of these will be acceptable to the State, and others will not be since they contradict the guarantee of the basic principles listed above. This free initiative is of course compatible with the freedom of industry and freedom of contract (in the limited form in which the State can exercise the latter). Any private subject can produce software under the conditions which the State requires, or can refrain from doing so. Nobody is forced to adopt a model of production, but if they wish to provide software to the State, they must provide the mechanisms which guarantee the basic principles, and which are those described in the Bill.</p>
19630
19631 <p>By way of an example: nothing in the text of the Bill would prevent your company offering the State bodies an office "suite", under the conditions defined in the Bill and setting the price that you consider satisfactory. If you did not, it would not be due to restrictions imposed by the law, but to business decisions relative to the method of commercializing your products, decisions with which the State is not involved.</p>
19632
19633 <p>To continue; you note that:" 2. The bill, by making the use of open source software compulsory, would establish discriminatory and non competitive practices in the contracting and purchasing by public bodies..."</p>
19634
19635 <p>This statement is just a reiteration of the previous one, and so the response can be found above. However, let us concern ourselves for a moment with your comment regarding "non-competitive ... practices."</p>
19636
19637 <p>Of course, in defining any kind of purchase, the buyer sets conditions which relate to the proposed use of the good or service. From the start, this excludes certain manufacturers from the possibility of competing, but does not exclude them "a priori", but rather based on a series of principles determined by the autonomous will of the purchaser, and so the process takes place in conformance with the law. And in the Bill it is established that *no one* is excluded from competing as far as he guarantees the fulfillment of the basic principles.</p>
19638
19639 <p>Furthermore, the Bill *stimulates* competition, since it tends to generate a supply of software with better conditions of usability, and to better existing work, in a model of continuous improvement.</p>
19640
19641 <p>On the other hand, the central aspect of competivity is the chance to provide better choices to the consumer. Now, it is impossible to ignore the fact that marketing does not play a neutral role when the product is offered on the market (since accepting the opposite would lead one to suppose that firms' expenses in marketing lack any sense), and that therefore a significant expense under this heading can influence the decisions of the purchaser. This influence of marketing is in large measure reduced by the bill that we are backing, since the choice within the framework proposed is based on the *technical merits* of the product and not on the effort put into commercialization by the producer; in this sense, competitiveness is increased, since the smallest software producer can compete on equal terms with the most powerful corporations.</p>
19642
19643 <p>It is necessary to stress that there is no position more anti-competitive than that of the big software producers, which frequently abuse their dominant position, since in innumerable cases they propose as a solution to problems raised by users: "update your software to the new version" (at the user's expense, naturally); furthermore, it is common to find arbitrary cessation of technical help for products, which, in the provider's judgment alone, are "old"; and so, to receive any kind of technical assistance, the user finds himself forced to migrate to new versions (with non-trivial costs, especially as changes in hardware platform are often involved). And as the whole infrastructure is based on proprietary data formats, the user stays "trapped" in the need to continue using products from the same supplier, or to make the huge effort to change to another environment (probably also proprietary).</p>
19644
19645 <p>You add: "3. So, by compelling the State to favor a business model based entirely on open source, the bill would only discourage the local and international manufacturing companies, which are the ones which really undertake important expenditures, create a significant number of direct and indirect jobs, as well as contributing to the GNP, as opposed to a model of open source software which tends to have an ever weaker economic impact, since it mainly creates jobs in the service sector."</p>
19646
19647 <p>I do not agree with your statement. Partly because of what you yourself point out in paragraph 6 of your letter, regarding the relative weight of services in the context of software use. This contradiction alone would invalidate your position. The service model, adopted by a large number of companies in the software industry, is much larger in economic terms, and with a tendency to increase, than the licensing of programs.</p>
19648
19649 <p>On the other hand, the private sector of the economy has the widest possible freedom to choose the economic model which best suits its interests, even if this freedom of choice is often obscured subliminally by the disproportionate expenditure on marketing by the producers of proprietary software.</p>
19650
19651 <p>In addition, a reading of your opinion would lead to the conclusion that the State market is crucial and essential for the proprietary software industry, to such a point that the choice made by the State in this bill would completely eliminate the market for these firms. If that is true, we can deduce that the State must be subsidizing the proprietary software industry. In the unlikely event that this were true, the State would have the right to apply the subsidies in the area it considered of greatest social value; it is undeniable, in this improbable hypothesis, that if the State decided to subsidize software, it would have to do so choosing the free over the proprietary, considering its social effect and the rational use of taxpayers money.</p>
19652
19653 <p>In respect of the jobs generated by proprietary software in countries like ours, these mainly concern technical tasks of little aggregate value; at the local level, the technicians who provide support for proprietary software produced by transnational companies do not have the possibility of fixing bugs, not necessarily for lack of technical capability or of talent, but because they do not have access to the source code to fix it. With free software one creates more technically qualified employment and a framework of free competence where success is only tied to the ability to offer good technical support and quality of service, one stimulates the market, and one increases the shared fund of knowledge, opening up alternatives to generate services of greater total value and a higher quality level, to the benefit of all involved: producers, service organizations, and consumers.</p>
19654
19655 <p>It is a common phenomenon in developing countries that local software industries obtain the majority of their takings in the service sector, or in the creation of "ad hoc" software. Therefore, any negative impact that the application of the Bill might have in this sector will be more than compensated by a growth in demand for services (as long as these are carried out to high quality standards). If the transnational software companies decide not to compete under these new rules of the game, it is likely that they will undergo some decrease in takings in terms of payment for licenses; however, considering that these firms continue to allege that much of the software used by the State has been illegally copied, one can see that the impact will not be very serious. Certainly, in any case their fortune will be determined by market laws, changes in which cannot be avoided; many firms traditionally associated with proprietary software have already set out on the road (supported by copious expense) of providing services associated with free software, which shows that the models are not mutually exclusive.</p>
19656
19657 <p>With this bill the State is deciding that it needs to preserve certain fundamental values. And it is deciding this based on its sovereign power, without affecting any of the constitutional guarantees. If these values could be guaranteed without having to choose a particular economic model, the effects of the law would be even more beneficial. In any case, it should be clear that the State does not choose an economic model; if it happens that there only exists one economic model capable of providing software which provides the basic guarantee of these principles, this is because of historical circumstances, not because of an arbitrary choice of a given model.</p>
19658
19659 <p>Your letter continues: "4. The bill imposes the use of open source software without considering the dangers that this can bring from the point of view of security, guarantee, and possible violation of the intellectual property rights of third parties."</p>
19660
19661 <p>Alluding in an abstract way to "the dangers this can bring", without specifically mentioning a single one of these supposed dangers, shows at the least some lack of knowledge of the topic. So, allow me to enlighten you on these points.</p>
19662
19663 <p>On security:</p>
19664
19665 <p>National security has already been mentioned in general terms in the initial discussion of the basic principles of the bill. In more specific terms, relative to the security of the software itself, it is well known that all software (whether proprietary or free) contains errors or "bugs" (in programmers' slang). But it is also well known that the bugs in free software are fewer, and are fixed much more quickly, than in proprietary software. It is not in vain that numerous public bodies responsible for the IT security of state systems in developed countries require the use of free software for the same conditions of security and efficiency.</p>
19666
19667 <p>What is impossible to prove is that proprietary software is more secure than free, without the public and open inspection of the scientific community and users in general. This demonstration is impossible because the model of proprietary software itself prevents this analysis, so that any guarantee of security is based only on promises of good intentions (biased, by any reckoning) made by the producer itself, or its contractors.</p>
19668
19669 <p>It should be remembered that in many cases, the licensing conditions include Non-Disclosure clauses which prevent the user from publicly revealing security flaws found in the licensed proprietary product.</p>
19670
19671 <p>In respect of the guarantee:</p>
19672
19673 <p>As you know perfectly well, or could find out by reading the "End User License Agreement" of the products you license, in the great majority of cases the guarantees are limited to replacement of the storage medium in case of defects, but in no case is compensation given for direct or indirect damages, loss of profits, etc... If as a result of a security bug in one of your products, not fixed in time by yourselves, an attacker managed to compromise crucial State systems, what guarantees, reparations and compensation would your company make in accordance with your licensing conditions? The guarantees of proprietary software, inasmuch as programs are delivered ``AS IS'', that is, in the state in which they are, with no additional responsibility of the provider in respect of function, in no way differ from those normal with free software.</p>
19674
19675 <p>On Intellectual Property:</p>
19676
19677 <p>Questions of intellectual property fall outside the scope of this bill, since they are covered by specific other laws. The model of free software in no way implies ignorance of these laws, and in fact the great majority of free software is covered by copyright. In reality, the inclusion of this question in your observations shows your confusion in respect of the legal framework in which free software is developed. The inclusion of the intellectual property of others in works claimed as one's own is not a practice that has been noted in the free software community; whereas, unfortunately, it has been in the area of proprietary software. As an example, the condemnation by the Commercial Court of Nanterre, France, on 27th September 2001 of Microsoft Corp. to a penalty of 3 million francs in damages and interest, for violation of intellectual property (piracy, to use the unfortunate term that your firm commonly uses in its publicity).</p>
19678
19679 <p>You go on to say that: "The bill uses the concept of open source software incorrectly, since it does not necessarily imply that the software is free or of zero cost, and so arrives at mistaken conclusions regarding State savings, with no cost-benefit analysis to validate its position."</p>
19680
19681 <p>This observation is wrong; in principle, freedom and lack of cost are orthogonal concepts: there is software which is proprietary and charged for (for example, MS Office), software which is proprietary and free of charge (MS Internet Explorer), software which is free and charged for (Red Hat, SuSE etc GNU/Linux distributions), software which is free and not charged for (Apache, Open Office, Mozilla), and even software which can be licensed in a range of combinations (MySQL).</p>
19682
19683 <p>Certainly free software is not necessarily free of charge. And the text of the bill does not state that it has to be so, as you will have noted after reading it. The definitions included in the Bill state clearly *what* should be considered free software, at no point referring to freedom from charges. Although the possibility of savings in payments for proprietary software licenses are mentioned, the foundations of the bill clearly refer to the fundamental guarantees to be preserved and to the stimulus to local technological development. Given that a democratic State must support these principles, it has no other choice than to use software with publicly available source code, and to exchange information only in standard formats.</p>
19684
19685 <p>If the State does not use software with these characteristics, it will be weakening basic republican principles. Luckily, free software also implies lower total costs; however, even given the hypothesis (easily disproved) that it was more expensive than proprietary software, the simple existence of an effective free software tool for a particular IT function would oblige the State to use it; not by command of this Bill, but because of the basic principles we enumerated at the start, and which arise from the very essence of the lawful democratic State.</p>
19686
19687 <p>You continue: "6. It is wrong to think that Open Source Software is free of charge. Research by the Gartner Group (an important investigator of the technological market recognized at world level) has shown that the cost of purchase of software (operating system and applications) is only 8% of the total cost which firms and institutions take on for a rational and truly beneficial use of the technology. The other 92% consists of: installation costs, enabling, support, maintenance, administration, and down-time."</p>
19688
19689 <p>This argument repeats that already given in paragraph 5 and partly contradicts paragraph 3. For the sake of brevity we refer to the comments on those paragraphs. However, allow me to point out that your conclusion is logically false: even if according to Gartner Group the cost of software is on average only 8% of the total cost of use, this does not in any way deny the existence of software which is free of charge, that is, with a licensing cost of zero.</p>
19690
19691 <p>In addition, in this paragraph you correctly point out that the service components and losses due to down-time make up the largest part of the total cost of software use, which, as you will note, contradicts your statement regarding the small value of services suggested in paragraph 3. Now the use of free software contributes significantly to reduce the remaining life-cycle costs. This reduction in the costs of installation, support etc. can be noted in several areas: in the first place, the competitive service model of free software, support and maintenance for which can be freely contracted out to a range of suppliers competing on the grounds of quality and low cost. This is true for installation, enabling, and support, and in large part for maintenance. In the second place, due to the reproductive characteristics of the model, maintenance carried out for an application is easily replicable, without incurring large costs (that is, without paying more than once for the same thing) since modifications, if one wishes, can be incorporated in the common fund of knowledge. Thirdly, the huge costs caused by non-functioning software ("blue screens of death", malicious code such as virus, worms, and trojans, exceptions, general protection faults and other well-known problems) are reduced considerably by using more stable software; and it is well known that one of the most notable virtues of free software is its stability.</p>
19692
19693 <p>You further state that: "7. One of the arguments behind the bill is the supposed freedom from costs of open-source software, compared with the costs of commercial software, without taking into account the fact that there exist types of volume licensing which can be highly advantageous for the State, as has happened in other countries."</p>
19694
19695 <p>I have already pointed out that what is in question is not the cost of the software but the principles of freedom of information, accessibility, and security. These arguments have been covered extensively in the preceding paragraphs to which I would refer you.</p>
19696
19697 <p>On the other hand, there certainly exist types of volume licensing (although unfortunately proprietary software does not satisfy the basic principles). But as you correctly pointed out in the immediately preceding paragraph of your letter, they only manage to reduce the impact of a component which makes up no more than 8% of the total.</p>
19698
19699 <p>You continue: "8. In addition, the alternative adopted by the bill (I) is clearly more expensive, due to the high costs of software migration, and (II) puts at risk compatibility and interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector, given the hundreds of versions of open source software on the market."</p>
19700
19701 <p>Let us analyze your statement in two parts. Your first argument, that migration implies high costs, is in reality an argument in favor of the Bill. Because the more time goes by, the more difficult migration to another technology will become; and at the same time, the security risks associated with proprietary software will continue to increase. In this way, the use of proprietary systems and formats will make the State ever more dependent on specific suppliers. Once a policy of using free software has been established (which certainly, does imply some cost) then on the contrary migration from one system to another becomes very simple, since all data is stored in open formats. On the other hand, migration to an open software context implies no more costs than migration between two different proprietary software contexts, which invalidates your argument completely.</p>
19702
19703 <p>The second argument refers to "problems in interoperability of the IT platforms within the State, and between the State and the private sector" This statement implies a certain lack of knowledge of the way in which free software is built, which does not maximize the dependence of the user on a particular platform, as normally happens in the realm of proprietary software. Even when there are multiple free software distributions, and numerous programs which can be used for the same function, interoperability is guaranteed as much by the use of standard formats, as required by the bill, as by the possibility of creating interoperable software given the availability of the source code.</p>
19704
19705 <p>You then say that: "9. The majority of open source code does not offer adequate levels of service nor the guarantee from recognized manufacturers of high productivity on the part of the users, which has led various public organizations to retract their decision to go with an open source software solution and to use commercial software in its place."</p>
19706
19707 <p>This observation is without foundation. In respect of the guarantee, your argument was rebutted in the response to paragraph 4. In respect of support services, it is possible to use free software without them (just as also happens with proprietary software), but anyone who does need them can obtain support separately, whether from local firms or from international corporations, again just as in the case of proprietary software.</p>
19708
19709 <p>On the other hand, it would contribute greatly to our analysis if you could inform us about free software projects *established* in public bodies which have already been abandoned in favor of proprietary software. We know of a good number of cases where the opposite has taken place, but not know of any where what you describe has taken place.</p>
19710
19711 <p>You continue by observing that: "10. The bill discourages the creativity of the Peruvian software industry, which invoices 40 million US$/year, exports 4 million US$ (10th in ranking among non-traditional exports, more than handicrafts) and is a source of highly qualified employment. With a law that encourages the use of open source, software programmers lose their intellectual property rights and their main source of payment."</p>
19712
19713 <p>It is clear enough that nobody is forced to commercialize their code as free software. The only thing to take into account is that if it is not free software, it cannot be sold to the public sector. This is not in any case the main market for the national software industry. We covered some questions referring to the influence of the Bill on the generation of employment which would be both highly technically qualified and in better conditions for competition above, so it seems unnecessary to insist on this point.</p>
19714
19715 <p>What follows in your statement is incorrect. On the one hand, no author of free software loses his intellectual property rights, unless he expressly wishes to place his work in the public domain. The free software movement has always been very respectful of intellectual property, and has generated widespread public recognition of its authors. Names like those of Richard Stallman, Linus Torvalds, Guido van Rossum, Larry Wall, Miguel de Icaza, Andrew Tridgell, Theo de Raadt, Andrea Arcangeli, Bruce Perens, Darren Reed, Alan Cox, Eric Raymond, and many others, are recognized world-wide for their contributions to the development of software that is used today by millions of people throughout the world. On the other hand, to say that the rewards for authors rights make up the main source of payment of Peruvian programmers is in any case a guess, in particular since there is no proof to this effect, nor a demonstration of how the use of free software by the State would influence these payments.</p>
19716
19717 <p>You go on to say that: "11. Open source software, since it can be distributed without charge, does not allow the generation of income for its developers through exports. In this way, the multiplier effect of the sale of software to other countries is weakened, and so in turn is the growth of the industry, while Government rules ought on the contrary to stimulate local industry."</p>
19718
19719 <p>This statement shows once again complete ignorance of the mechanisms of and market for free software. It tries to claim that the market of sale of non- exclusive rights for use (sale of licenses) is the only possible one for the software industry, when you yourself pointed out several paragraphs above that it is not even the most important one. The incentives that the bill offers for the growth of a supply of better qualified professionals, together with the increase in experience that working on a large scale with free software within the State will bring for Peruvian technicians, will place them in a highly competitive position to offer their services abroad.</p>
19720
19721 <p>You then state that: "12. In the Forum, the use of open source software in education was discussed, without mentioning the complete collapse of this initiative in a country like Mexico, where precisely the State employees who founded the project now state that open source software did not make it possible to offer a learning experience to pupils in the schools, did not take into account the capability at a national level to give adequate support to the platform, and that the software did not and does not allow for the levels of platform integration that now exist in schools."</p>
19722
19723 <p>In fact Mexico has gone into reverse with the Red Escolar (Schools Network) project. This is due precisely to the fact that the driving forces behind the Mexican project used license costs as their main argument, instead of the other reasons specified in our project, which are far more essential. Because of this conceptual mistake, and as a result of the lack of effective support from the SEP (Secretary of State for Public Education), the assumption was made that to implant free software in schools it would be enough to drop their software budget and send them a CD ROM with Gnu/Linux instead. Of course this failed, and it couldn't have been otherwise, just as school laboratories fail when they use proprietary software and have no budget for implementation and maintenance. That's exactly why our bill is not limited to making the use of free software mandatory, but recognizes the need to create a viable migration plan, in which the State undertakes the technical transition in an orderly way in order to then enjoy the advantages of free software.</p>
19724
19725 <p>You end with a rhetorical question: "13. If open source software satisfies all the requirements of State bodies, why do you need a law to adopt it? Shouldn't it be the market which decides freely which products give most benefits or value?"</p>
19726
19727 <p>We agree that in the private sector of the economy, it must be the market that decides which products to use, and no state interference is permissible there. However, in the case of the public sector, the reasoning is not the same: as we have already established, the state archives, handles, and transmits information which does not belong to it, but which is entrusted to it by citizens, who have no alternative under the rule of law. As a counterpart to this legal requirement, the State must take extreme measures to safeguard the integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility of this information. The use of proprietary software raises serious doubts as to whether these requirements can be fulfilled, lacks conclusive evidence in this respect, and so is not suitable for use in the public sector.</p>
19728
19729 <p>The need for a law is based, firstly, on the realization of the fundamental principles listed above in the specific area of software; secondly, on the fact that the State is not an ideal homogeneous entity, but made up of multiple bodies with varying degrees of autonomy in decision making. Given that it is inappropriate to use proprietary software, the fact of establishing these rules in law will prevent the personal discretion of any state employee from putting at risk the information which belongs to citizens. And above all, because it constitutes an up-to-date reaffirmation in relation to the means of management and communication of information used today, it is based on the republican principle of openness to the public.</p>
19730
19731 <p>In conformance with this universally accepted principle, the citizen has the right to know all information held by the State and not covered by well- founded declarations of secrecy based on law. Now, software deals with information and is itself information. Information in a special form, capable of being interpreted by a machine in order to execute actions, but crucial information all the same because the citizen has a legitimate right to know, for example, how his vote is computed or his taxes calculated. And for that he must have free access to the source code and be able to prove to his satisfaction the programs used for electoral computations or calculation of his taxes.</p>
19732
19733 <p>I wish you the greatest respect, and would like to repeat that my office will always be open for you to expound your point of view to whatever level of detail you consider suitable.</p>
19734
19735 <p>Cordially,<br>
19736 DR. EDGAR DAVID VILLANUEVA NUÑEZ<br>
19737 Congressman of the Republic of Perú.</p>
19738 </blockquote>
19739
19740       </div>
19741       <div class="tags">
19742
19743
19744         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
19745
19746
19747       </div>
19748     </div>
19749     <div class="padding"></div>
19750
19751     <div class="entry">
19752       <div class="title">
19753         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_still_going_strong.html">Officeshots still going strong</a>
19754       </div>
19755       <div class="date">
19756         25th December 2010
19757       </div>
19758       <div class="body">
19759         <p>Half a year ago I
19760 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html">wrote
19761 a bit</a> about <a href="http://www.officeshots.org/">OfficeShots</a>,
19762 a web service to allow anyone to test how ODF documents are handled by
19763 the different programs reading and writing the ODF format.</p>
19764
19765 <p>I just had a look at the service, and it seem to be going strong.
19766 Very interesting to see the results reported in the gallery, how
19767 different Office implementations handle different ODF features.  Sad
19768 to see that KOffice was not doing it very well, and happy to see that
19769 LibreOffice has been tested already (but sadly not listed as a option
19770 for OfficeShots users yet).  I am glad to see that the ODF community
19771 got such a great test tool available.</p>
19772
19773       </div>
19774       <div class="tags">
19775
19776
19777         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
19778
19779
19780       </div>
19781     </div>
19782     <div class="padding"></div>
19783
19784     <div class="entry">
19785       <div class="title">
19786         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_test_if_a_laptop_is_working_with_Linux.html">How to test if a laptop is working with Linux</a>
19787       </div>
19788       <div class="date">
19789         22nd December 2010
19790       </div>
19791       <div class="body">
19792         <p>The last few days I have spent at work here at the <a
19793 href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> testing if the new
19794 batch of computers will work with Linux.  Every year for the last few
19795 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
19796 computers, and this year HP won the bid.  Two different desktops and
19797 five different laptops are on the list this year.  We in the UNIX
19798 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
19799 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
19800 university.</p>
19801
19802 <p>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
19803 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well.  To test, I PXE
19804 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
19805 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware.  When
19806 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
19807 on.  If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
19808 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
19809 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.</p>
19810
19811 <p>Anyway, to get to the point of this post.  Here is the simple tests
19812 I perform on a new model.</p>
19813
19814 <ul>
19815
19816 <li>Is PXE installation working?  I'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
19817 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment.  If I feel like it, I also test with
19818 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.</li>
19819
19820 <li>Is X.org working?  If the graphical login screen show up after
19821 installation, X.org is working.</li>
19822
19823 <li>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working?  Running glxgears (in
19824 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
19825 reported by the program.</li>
19826
19827 <li>Is sound working?  With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
19828 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful.  If there
19829 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
19830 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound.  I
19831 normally test this by playing
19832 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20101012-chef/ ">a HTML5
19833 video</a> in Firefox/Iceweasel.</li>
19834
19835 <li>Is the USB subsystem working?  I test this by plugging in a USB
19836 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
19837
19838 <li>Is the CD/DVD player working?  I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
19839 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
19840
19841 <li>Is any built in camera working?  Test using cheese, and see if a
19842 picture from the v4l device show up.</li>
19843
19844 <li>Is bluetooth working?  Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
19845 any bluetooth devices are discovered.  In my office, I normally see a
19846 few.</li>
19847
19848 <li>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working.  I have
19849 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
19850 notice this.</li>
19851
19852 <li>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working?  I'm testing if the
19853 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
19854 resume.</li>
19855
19856 <li>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
19857 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
19858 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc?  The set of buttons differ from
19859 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
19860 not.</li>
19861
19862 <li>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
19863 acceleration sensors etc.  I rarely test these, as I do not know how
19864 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
19865 existence.</li>
19866
19867 </ul>
19868
19869 <p>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
19870 for the HP machines I am testing.  I'm not done yet, so I will report
19871 the test results later.  For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work
19872 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
19873 and audio fail on RHEL6.  Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p.  As you
19874 can see, I have most machines left to test.  One interesting
19875 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
19876 RHEL6 with glxgears.  No idea why.</p>
19877
19878       </div>
19879       <div class="tags">
19880
19881
19882         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
19883
19884
19885       </div>
19886     </div>
19887     <div class="padding"></div>
19888
19889     <div class="entry">
19890       <div class="title">
19891         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html">Some thoughts on BitCoins</a>
19892       </div>
19893       <div class="date">
19894         11th December 2010
19895       </div>
19896       <div class="body">
19897         <p>As I continue to explore
19898 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>, I've starting to wonder
19899 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
19900 and regulations here in Norway.  Here are some random notes.</p>
19901
19902 <p>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
19903 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
19904 is known to everyone.  This means that if a BitCoin address has been
19905 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
19906 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
19907 that address.  There is even a web service to look at the details for
19908 all transactions.  There I can see that my address
19909 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a>
19910 have received 16.06 Bitcoin, the
19911 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3</a>
19912 address of Simon Phipps have received 181.97 BitCoin and the address
19913 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt</A>
19914 of EFF have received 2447.38 BitCoins so far.  Thank you to each and
19915 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
19916 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
19917 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
19918 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction.  I'm told
19919 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
19920 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
19921 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.</p>
19922
19923 <p>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
19924 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
19925 without declaring it.  There are money laundering, tax and accounting
19926 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
19927 If the Skolelinux foundation
19928 (<a href="http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">SLX
19929 Debian Labs</a>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
19930 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
19931 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
19932 not, should everything or nothing be declared?  What exchange rate
19933 should be used when calculating taxes?  Would receivers have to pay
19934 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
19935 BitCoin?  I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.</p>
19936
19937 <p>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
19938 accepted by a lot of users.  It must be possible to get easy access to
19939 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
19940 easy to spend it.  At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
19941 access to, but there are very few places to spend it.  I am not really
19942 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
19943 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins.  I
19944 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
19945 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
19946 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
19947 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular.  I'm sure they
19948 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
19949 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
19950 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
19951 currencies.</p>
19952
19953 <p>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
19954 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
19955 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
19956 to see which one get the next lump of cash).  The "winner" get 50
19957 BitCoin when this happen.  Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
19958 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
19959 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
19960 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the 50
19961 BitCoins.  Check out
19962 <a href="http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/">BitCoin Pool</a>
19963 if this sounds interesting.  I have not had time to try to set up a
19964 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
19965 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
19966 yet.</p>
19967
19968 <p>Update 2010-12-15: Found an <a
19969 href="http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi">interesting
19970 criticism</a> of bitcoin.  Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
19971 it was interesting to read.  The arguments presented seem to be
19972 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.</p>
19973
19974       </div>
19975       <div class="tags">
19976
19977
19978         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
19979
19980
19981       </div>
19982     </div>
19983     <div class="padding"></div>
19984
19985     <div class="entry">
19986       <div class="title">
19987         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">Now accepting bitcoins - anonymous and distributed p2p crypto-money</a>
19988       </div>
19989       <div class="date">
19990         10th December 2010
19991       </div>
19992       <div class="body">
19993         <p>With this weeks lawless
19994 <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/06/wikileaks/index.html">governmental
19995 attacks</a> on Wikileak and
19996 <a href="http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/2010/12/06/war_on_speech">free
19997 speech</a>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
19998 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
19999 A blog post from
20000 <a href="http://webmink.com/2010/12/06/now-accepting-bitcoin/">Simon
20001 Phipps on bitcoin</a> reminded me about a project that a friend of
20002 mine mentioned earlier.  I decided to follow Simon's example, and get
20003 involved with <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>.  I got
20004 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
20005 some bitcoins to get started.  I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
20006 for helping me remember BitCoin.</p>
20007
20008 <p>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder?  It is a digital
20009 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
20010 networks.  It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
20011 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
20012 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions.  The
20013 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets 2.9
20014 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
20015 line client builds just fine.  Hopefully Jonas
20016 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/578157">will get the package into
20017 Debian</a> soon.</p>
20018
20019 <p>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
20020 There are <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/trade">companies accepting
20021 bitcoins</a> when selling services and goods, and there are even
20022 currency "stock" markets where the exchange rate is decided.  There
20023 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising.  If you
20024 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
20025 you can even get
20026 <a href="https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/">some for free</a> (0.05
20027 bitcoin at the time of writing).  Use
20028 <a href="http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/">BitcoinWatch</a> to keep an eye
20029 on the current exchange rates.</p>
20030
20031 <p>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
20032 machines.  If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
20033 donations to the address
20034 <b>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</b>.  Thank you!</p>
20035
20036       </div>
20037       <div class="tags">
20038
20039
20040         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
20041
20042
20043       </div>
20044     </div>
20045     <div class="padding"></div>
20046
20047     <div class="entry">
20048       <div class="title">
20049         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Student_group_continue_the_work_on_my_Reprap_3D_printer.html">Student group continue the work on my Reprap 3D printer</a>
20050       </div>
20051       <div class="date">
20052          9th December 2010
20053       </div>
20054       <div class="body">
20055         <p>A few days ago, I was introduces to some students in the robot
20056 student assosiation <a href="http://www.robotica.no/">Robotica
20057 Osloensis</a> at the University of Oslo where I work, who planned to
20058 get their own 3D printer.  They wanted to learn from me based on my
20059 work in the area.  After having a short lunch meeting with them, I
20060 offered them to borrow my reprap kit, as I never had time to complete
20061 the build and this seem unlike to change any time soon.  I look
20062 forward to see how this goes.  This monday their volunteer driver
20063 picked up my kit and drove it to their lab, and tomorrow I am told the
20064 last exam is over so they can start work on getting the 3D printer
20065 operational.</p>
20066
20067 <p>The robotic group have already build several robots on their own,
20068 and seem capable of getting the reprap operational.  I really look
20069 forward to being able to print all the cool 3D designs published on
20070 <a href="http://www.thingiverse.com/">Thingiverse</a>.  I even got
20071 some 3D scans I got made during Dagen@IFI when one of the groups at
20072 the computer science department at the university demonstrated their
20073 very cool 3D scanner.</p>
20074
20075       </div>
20076       <div class="tags">
20077
20078
20079         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap</a>.
20080
20081
20082       </div>
20083     </div>
20084     <div class="padding"></div>
20085
20086     <div class="entry">
20087       <div class="title">
20088         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_development_gathering_and_General_Assembly_for_FRiSK.html">Debian Edu development gathering and General Assembly for FRiSK</a>
20089       </div>
20090       <div class="date">
20091         29th November 2010
20092       </div>
20093       <div class="body">
20094         <p>On friday, the first Debian Edu / Skolelinux
20095 <a href="http://www.friprogramvareiskolen.no/Gathering/2010-12-03-05-Oslo">development
20096 gathering</a> in a long time take place here in Oslo, Norway.  I
20097 really look forward to seeing all the good people working on the
20098 Squeeze release.  The gathering is open for everyone interested in
20099 learning more about Debian Edu / Skolelinux.</p>
20100
20101 <p>On Saturday, the Norwegian member organization taking care of
20102 organizing these development gatherings, Fri Programvare i Skolen,
20103 will hold its
20104 <a href="http://friprogramvareiskolen.no/Genfors/2010">General Assembly
20105 for 2010</a>.  Membership is open for all, and currently there are 388
20106 people registered as members.  Last year 32 members cast their vote in
20107 the memberdb based election system.  I hope more people find time to
20108 vote this year.</p>
20109
20110       </div>
20111       <div class="tags">
20112
20113
20114         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
20115
20116
20117       </div>
20118     </div>
20119     <div class="padding"></div>
20120
20121     <div class="entry">
20122       <div class="title">
20123         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html">Why isn't Debian Edu using VLC?</a>
20124       </div>
20125       <div class="date">
20126         27th November 2010
20127       </div>
20128       <div class="body">
20129         <p>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
20130 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
20131 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
20132 to play a video file or stream.  Only if VLC fail will I drag out
20133 gmplayer to see if it can do better.  The reason is mostly the failure
20134 model and trust.  When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
20135 reporting the problem.  When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
20136 just hangs.  The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.<p>
20137
20138 <p>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
20139 mplayer in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
20140 Edu/Skolelinux</a>.  The reason is simple.  We need a good browser
20141 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
20142 not very good.  For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
20143 is no way for the user to pause the video.  Also, when I
20144 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">last
20145 tested the browser plugins</a> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
20146 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked.  If
20147 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
20148 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.</P>
20149
20150 <p>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
20151 annoying.  The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
20152 keyboard shortcuts.  When the player is in full screen mode, its
20153 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
20154 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode.  I
20155 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
20156 window mode.  Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
20157 the current video.  It is very nice when playing short videos from the
20158 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
20159 what is going on.</p>
20160
20161       </div>
20162       <div class="tags">
20163
20164
20165         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
20166
20167
20168       </div>
20169     </div>
20170     <div class="padding"></div>
20171
20172     <div class="entry">
20173       <div class="title">
20174         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades_of_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop__now_with_apt_get_autoremove.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades of the Gnome and KDE desktop, now with apt-get autoremove</a>
20175       </div>
20176       <div class="date">
20177         22nd November 2010
20178       </div>
20179       <div class="body">
20180         <p>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
20181 upgrade testing of the
20182 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
20183 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a> to do <tt>apt-get autoremove</tt> when using apt-get.
20184 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
20185 can now present the updated result from today:</p>
20186
20187 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
20188
20189 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
20190
20191 <blockquote><p>
20192   apache2.2-bin
20193   aptdaemon
20194   baobab
20195   binfmt-support
20196   browser-plugin-gnash
20197   cheese-common
20198   cli-common
20199   cups-pk-helper
20200   dmz-cursor-theme
20201   empathy
20202   empathy-common
20203   freedesktop-sound-theme
20204   freeglut3
20205   gconf-defaults-service
20206   gdm-themes
20207   gedit-plugins
20208   geoclue
20209   geoclue-hostip
20210   geoclue-localnet
20211   geoclue-manual
20212   geoclue-yahoo
20213   gnash
20214   gnash-common
20215   gnome
20216   gnome-backgrounds
20217   gnome-cards-data
20218   gnome-codec-install
20219   gnome-core
20220   gnome-desktop-environment
20221   gnome-disk-utility
20222   gnome-screenshot
20223   gnome-search-tool
20224   gnome-session-canberra
20225   gnome-system-log
20226   gnome-themes-extras
20227   gnome-themes-more
20228   gnome-user-share
20229   gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
20230   gstreamer0.10-tools
20231   gtk2-engines
20232   gtk2-engines-pixbuf
20233   gtk2-engines-smooth
20234   hamster-applet
20235   libapache2-mod-dnssd
20236   libapr1
20237   libaprutil1
20238   libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
20239   libaprutil1-ldap
20240   libart2.0-cil
20241   libboost-date-time1.42.0
20242   libboost-python1.42.0
20243   libboost-thread1.42.0
20244   libchamplain-0.4-0
20245   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0
20246   libcheese-gtk18
20247   libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
20248   libcryptui0
20249   libdiscid0
20250   libelf1
20251   libepc-1.0-2
20252   libepc-common
20253   libepc-ui-1.0-2
20254   libfreerdp-plugins-standard
20255   libfreerdp0
20256   libgconf2.0-cil
20257   libgdata-common
20258   libgdata7
20259   libgdu-gtk0
20260   libgee2
20261   libgeoclue0
20262   libgexiv2-0
20263   libgif4
20264   libglade2.0-cil
20265   libglib2.0-cil
20266   libgmime2.4-cil
20267   libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
20268   libgnome2.24-cil
20269   libgnomepanel2.24-cil
20270   libgpod-common
20271   libgpod4
20272   libgtk2.0-cil
20273   libgtkglext1
20274   libgtksourceview2.0-common
20275   libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
20276   libmono-addins0.2-cil
20277   libmono-cairo2.0-cil
20278   libmono-corlib2.0-cil
20279   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
20280   libmono-posix2.0-cil
20281   libmono-security2.0-cil
20282   libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
20283   libmono-system2.0-cil
20284   libmtp8
20285   libmusicbrainz3-6
20286   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
20287   libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
20288   libopal3.6.8
20289   libpolkit-gtk-1-0
20290   libpt2.6.7
20291   libpython2.6
20292   librpm1
20293   librpmio1
20294   libsdl1.2debian
20295   libsrtp0
20296   libssh-4
20297   libtelepathy-farsight0
20298   libtelepathy-glib0
20299   libtidy-0.99-0
20300   media-player-info
20301   mesa-utils
20302   mono-2.0-gac
20303   mono-gac
20304   mono-runtime
20305   nautilus-sendto
20306   nautilus-sendto-empathy
20307   p7zip-full
20308   pkg-config
20309   python-aptdaemon
20310   python-aptdaemon-gtk
20311   python-axiom
20312   python-beautifulsoup
20313   python-bugbuddy
20314   python-clientform
20315   python-coherence
20316   python-configobj
20317   python-crypto
20318   python-cupshelpers
20319   python-elementtree
20320   python-epsilon
20321   python-evolution
20322   python-feedparser
20323   python-gdata
20324   python-gdbm
20325   python-gst0.10
20326   python-gtkglext1
20327   python-gtksourceview2
20328   python-httplib2
20329   python-louie
20330   python-mako
20331   python-markupsafe
20332   python-mechanize
20333   python-nevow
20334   python-notify
20335   python-opengl
20336   python-openssl
20337   python-pam
20338   python-pkg-resources
20339   python-pyasn1
20340   python-pysqlite2
20341   python-rdflib
20342   python-serial
20343   python-tagpy
20344   python-twisted-bin
20345   python-twisted-conch
20346   python-twisted-core
20347   python-twisted-web
20348   python-utidylib
20349   python-webkit
20350   python-xdg
20351   python-zope.interface
20352   remmina
20353   remmina-plugin-data
20354   remmina-plugin-rdp
20355   remmina-plugin-vnc
20356   rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
20357   rhythmbox-plugins
20358   rpm-common
20359   rpm2cpio
20360   seahorse-plugins
20361   shotwell
20362   software-center
20363   system-config-printer-udev
20364   telepathy-gabble
20365   telepathy-mission-control-5
20366   telepathy-salut
20367   tomboy
20368   totem
20369   totem-coherence
20370   totem-mozilla
20371   totem-plugins
20372   transmission-common
20373   xdg-user-dirs
20374   xdg-user-dirs-gtk
20375   xserver-xephyr
20376 </p></blockquote>
20377
20378 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
20379
20380 <blockquote><p>
20381   cheese
20382   ekiga
20383   eog
20384   epiphany-extensions
20385   evolution-exchange
20386   fast-user-switch-applet
20387   file-roller
20388   gcalctool
20389   gconf-editor
20390   gdm
20391   gedit
20392   gedit-common
20393   gnome-games
20394   gnome-games-data
20395   gnome-nettool
20396   gnome-system-tools
20397   gnome-themes
20398   gnuchess
20399   gucharmap
20400   guile-1.8-libs
20401   libavahi-ui0
20402   libdmx1
20403   libgalago3
20404   libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
20405   libgtksourceview2.0-0
20406   liblircclient0
20407   libsdl1.2debian-alsa
20408   libspeexdsp1
20409   libsvga1
20410   rhythmbox
20411   seahorse
20412   sound-juicer
20413   system-config-printer
20414   totem-common
20415   transmission-gtk
20416   vinagre
20417   vino
20418 </p></blockquote>
20419
20420 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
20421
20422 <blockquote><p>
20423   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
20424 </p></blockquote>
20425
20426 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
20427
20428 <blockquote><p>
20429 [nothing]
20430 </p></blockquote>
20431
20432 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
20433
20434 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
20435
20436 <blockquote><p>
20437   ksmserver
20438 </p></blockquote>
20439
20440 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
20441
20442 <blockquote><p>
20443   kwin
20444   network-manager-kde
20445 </p></blockquote>
20446
20447 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
20448
20449 <blockquote><p>
20450   arts
20451   dolphin
20452   freespacenotifier
20453   google-gadgets-gst
20454   google-gadgets-xul
20455   kappfinder
20456   kcalc
20457   kcharselect
20458   kde-core
20459   kde-plasma-desktop
20460   kde-standard
20461   kde-window-manager
20462   kdeartwork
20463   kdeartwork-emoticons
20464   kdeartwork-style
20465   kdeartwork-theme-icon
20466   kdebase
20467   kdebase-apps
20468   kdebase-workspace
20469   kdebase-workspace-bin
20470   kdebase-workspace-data
20471   kdeeject
20472   kdelibs
20473   kdeplasma-addons
20474   kdeutils
20475   kdewallpapers
20476   kdf
20477   kfloppy
20478   kgpg
20479   khelpcenter4
20480   kinfocenter
20481   konq-plugins-l10n
20482   konqueror-nsplugins
20483   kscreensaver
20484   kscreensaver-xsavers
20485   ktimer
20486   kwrite
20487   libgle3
20488   libkde4-ruby1.8
20489   libkonq5
20490   libkonq5-templates
20491   libnetpbm10
20492   libplasma-ruby
20493   libplasma-ruby1.8
20494   libqt4-ruby1.8
20495   marble-data
20496   marble-plugins
20497   netpbm
20498   nuvola-icon-theme
20499   plasma-dataengines-workspace
20500   plasma-desktop
20501   plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
20502   plasma-runners-addons
20503   plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
20504   plasma-scriptengine-python
20505   plasma-scriptengine-qedje
20506   plasma-scriptengine-ruby
20507   plasma-scriptengine-webkit
20508   plasma-scriptengines
20509   plasma-wallpapers-addons
20510   plasma-widget-folderview
20511   plasma-widget-networkmanagement
20512   ruby
20513   sweeper
20514   update-notifier-kde
20515   xscreensaver-data-extra
20516   xscreensaver-gl
20517   xscreensaver-gl-extra
20518   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
20519 </p></blockquote>
20520
20521 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
20522
20523 <blockquote><p>
20524   ark
20525   google-gadgets-common
20526   google-gadgets-qt
20527   htdig
20528   kate
20529   kdebase-bin
20530   kdebase-data
20531   kdepasswd
20532   kfind
20533   klipper
20534   konq-plugins
20535   konqueror
20536   ksysguard
20537   ksysguardd
20538   libarchive1
20539   libcln6
20540   libeet1
20541   libeina-svn-06
20542   libggadget-1.0-0b
20543   libggadget-qt-1.0-0b
20544   libgps19
20545   libkdecorations4
20546   libkephal4
20547   libkonq4
20548   libkonqsidebarplugin4a
20549   libkscreensaver5
20550   libksgrd4
20551   libksignalplotter4
20552   libkunitconversion4
20553   libkwineffects1a
20554   libmarblewidget4
20555   libntrack-qt4-1
20556   libntrack0
20557   libplasma-geolocation-interface4
20558   libplasmaclock4a
20559   libplasmagenericshell4
20560   libprocesscore4a
20561   libprocessui4a
20562   libqalculate5
20563   libqedje0a
20564   libqtruby4shared2
20565   libqzion0a
20566   libruby1.8
20567   libscim8c2a
20568   libsmokekdecore4-3
20569   libsmokekdeui4-3
20570   libsmokekfile3
20571   libsmokekhtml3
20572   libsmokekio3
20573   libsmokeknewstuff2-3
20574   libsmokeknewstuff3-3
20575   libsmokekparts3
20576   libsmokektexteditor3
20577   libsmokekutils3
20578   libsmokenepomuk3
20579   libsmokephonon3
20580   libsmokeplasma3
20581   libsmokeqtcore4-3
20582   libsmokeqtdbus4-3
20583   libsmokeqtgui4-3
20584   libsmokeqtnetwork4-3
20585   libsmokeqtopengl4-3
20586   libsmokeqtscript4-3
20587   libsmokeqtsql4-3
20588   libsmokeqtsvg4-3
20589   libsmokeqttest4-3
20590   libsmokeqtuitools4-3
20591   libsmokeqtwebkit4-3
20592   libsmokeqtxml4-3
20593   libsmokesolid3
20594   libsmokesoprano3
20595   libtaskmanager4a
20596   libtidy-0.99-0
20597   libweather-ion4a
20598   libxklavier16
20599   libxxf86misc1
20600   okteta
20601   oxygencursors
20602   plasma-dataengines-addons
20603   plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
20604   plasma-widget-lancelot
20605   plasma-widgets-addons
20606   plasma-widgets-workspace
20607   polkit-kde-1
20608   ruby1.8
20609   systemsettings
20610   update-notifier-common
20611 </p></blockquote>
20612
20613 <p>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
20614 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
20615 differences.  I have no idea what packages should be installed after
20616 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.</p>
20617
20618       </div>
20619       <div class="tags">
20620
20621
20622         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
20623
20624
20625       </div>
20626     </div>
20627     <div class="padding"></div>
20628
20629     <div class="entry">
20630       <div class="title">
20631         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Migrating_Xen_virtual_machines_using_LVM_to_KVM_using_disk_images.html">Migrating Xen virtual machines using LVM to KVM using disk images</a>
20632       </div>
20633       <div class="date">
20634         22nd November 2010
20635       </div>
20636       <div class="body">
20637         <p>Most of the computers in use by the
20638 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project</a>
20639 are virtual machines.  And they have been Xen machines running on a
20640 fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
20641 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge 2950 host machine.  This was a
20642 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
20643 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
20644 know is not supported by KVM.  So to migrate, we had to convert
20645 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.</p>
20646
20647 <p>I found
20648 <a href="http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM">a
20649 nice recipe</a> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
20650 migration.  It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
20651 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
20652 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data.  I NFS mounted the
20653 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.</p>
20654
20655 <pre>
20656 #!/bin/sh
20657
20658 # Based on
20659 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
20660
20661 set -e
20662 set -x
20663
20664 if [ -z "$1" ] ; then
20665     echo "Usage: $0 &lt;hostname&gt;"
20666     exit 1
20667 else
20668     host="$1"
20669 fi
20670
20671 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
20672     echo "error: unable to find LVM volume for $host"
20673     exit 1
20674 fi
20675
20676 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs.  not sure why.
20677 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
20678 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
20679 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
20680
20681 img=$host.img
20682 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
20683 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
20684
20685 parted $img mklabel msdos
20686 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap 0 $disksize
20687 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
20688 parted $img set 1 boot on
20689
20690 modprobe dm-mod
20691 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
20692 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
20693
20694 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=1M
20695 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
20696 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
20697
20698 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
20699 losetup -d /dev/loop0
20700 </pre>
20701
20702 <p>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
20703 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.</p>
20704
20705 <p>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
20706 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and
20707 set up grub to boot from the disk image.  After this, the KVM machines
20708 seem to work just fine.</p>
20709
20710       </div>
20711       <div class="tags">
20712
20713
20714         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
20715
20716
20717       </div>
20718     </div>
20719     <div class="padding"></div>
20720
20721     <div class="entry">
20722       <div class="title">
20723         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_and_KDE_desktop.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades, apt vs aptitude with the Gnome and KDE desktop</a>
20724       </div>
20725       <div class="date">
20726         20th November 2010
20727       </div>
20728       <div class="body">
20729         <p>I'm still running upgrade testing of the
20730 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
20731 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
20732 status.  Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.</p>
20733
20734 <p>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
20735 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
20736 can see if anything should be changed.</p>
20737
20738 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
20739
20740 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
20741
20742 <blockquote><p>
20743   apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
20744   browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-4.3 cups-pk-helper
20745   dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
20746   freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
20747   gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
20748   geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
20749   gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
20750   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
20751   gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
20752   gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
20753   gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
20754   gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
20755   gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
20756   libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
20757   libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-0 libboost-date-time1.42.0
20758   libboost-python1.42.0 libboost-thread1.42.0 libchamplain-0.4-0
20759   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
20760   libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-1.0-2
20761   libepc-common libepc-ui-1.0-2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
20762   libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
20763   libgdl-1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-0 libgif4
20764   libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
20765   libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
20766   libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
20767   libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
20768   libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
20769   libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
20770   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
20771   libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
20772   libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-6
20773   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6.8
20774   libpolkit-gtk-1-0 libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
20775   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
20776   libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-4
20777   libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-0.99-0
20778   libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
20779   mono-2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
20780   nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
20781   openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-4suite-xml
20782   python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
20783   python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
20784   python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
20785   python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
20786   python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
20787   python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
20788   python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
20789   python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
20790   python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
20791   python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
20792   python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
20793   python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
20794   python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
20795   remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
20796   rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
20797   software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
20798   telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-5 telepathy-salut tomboy
20799   totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
20800   transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
20801   zip
20802 </p></blockquote>
20803
20804 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
20805
20806 <blockquote><p>
20807   arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
20808   epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
20809   fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
20810   gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
20811   gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
20812   gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
20813   guile-1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
20814   libavahi-ui0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7
20815   libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
20816   libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1
20817   libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3 libfaad0 libgadu3
20818   libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
20819   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
20820   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
20821   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
20822   libgtkhtml2-0 libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgtksourceview2.0-0
20823   libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
20824   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
20825   libmagick++10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
20826   libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
20827   libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpisock9
20828   libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8
20829   libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
20830   libspeexdsp1 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libsvga1
20831   libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
20832   libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
20833   libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
20834   sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
20835   totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
20836 </p></blockquote>
20837
20838 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
20839
20840 <blockquote><p>
20841   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
20842 </p></blockquote>
20843
20844 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
20845
20846 <blockquote><p>
20847 [nothing]
20848 </p></blockquote>
20849
20850 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
20851
20852 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
20853
20854 <blockquote><p>
20855   autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-4.3 dcoprss
20856   edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
20857   ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
20858   gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
20859   kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
20860   kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
20861   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
20862   kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
20863   kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
20864   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
20865   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
20866   kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
20867   killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
20868   kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
20869   ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42.0
20870   libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
20871   libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
20872   libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
20873   libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
20874   libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
20875   libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
20876   libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
20877   libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
20878   libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
20879   lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
20880   openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
20881   parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
20882   pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
20883   speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
20884   ttf-sazanami-gothic
20885 </p></blockquote>
20886
20887 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
20888
20889 <blockquote><p>
20890   amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
20891   dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
20892   kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
20893   kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
20894   keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
20895   kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
20896   kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
20897   klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
20898   kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
20899   kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
20900   kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
20901   ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
20902   ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
20903   kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
20904   kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
20905   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
20906   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2
20907   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
20908   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
20909   libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0 libicu38
20910   libiec61883-0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
20911   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
20912   libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
20913   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
20914   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
20915   libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
20916   libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
20917   libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 librss1 libsensors3
20918   libsmbios2 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90
20919   libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
20920   mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
20921   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
20922   ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
20923 </p></blockquote>
20924
20925 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
20926
20927 <blockquote><p>
20928   dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
20929   kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
20930   kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
20931   kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
20932   netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
20933   xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra
20934   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
20935 </p></blockquote>
20936
20937 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
20938
20939 <blockquote><p>
20940   kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
20941 </p></blockquote>
20942
20943       </div>
20944       <div class="tags">
20945
20946
20947         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
20948
20949
20950       </div>
20951     </div>
20952     <div class="padding"></div>
20953
20954     <div class="entry">
20955       <div class="title">
20956         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html">Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd</a>
20957       </div>
20958       <div class="date">
20959         20th November 2010
20960       </div>
20961       <div class="body">
20962         <p>Answering
20963 <a href="http://www.listware.net/201011/gnash-dev/67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html">the
20964 call from the Gnash project</a> for
20965 <a href="http://www.gnashdev.org:8010">buildbot</a> slaves to test the
20966 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
20967 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
20968 Debian/Squeeze.  I hope this can help the developers in getting new
20969 releases out more often.</p>
20970
20971 <p>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
20972 I have considered setting up a <a
20973 href="http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/">Debian/kfreebsd</a>
20974 machine as well.  I have also considered using the kfreebsd
20975 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the 5
20976 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video.  Because of this, I
20977 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
20978 kfreebsd.  Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
20979 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
20980 screen at random locations).  Have not gotten very far with the
20981 testing.  Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
20982 fatal problem.  Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
20983 useful as a file server for NUUG.  Will try to find time to set up a
20984 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.</p>
20985
20986       </div>
20987       <div class="tags">
20988
20989
20990         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
20991
20992
20993       </div>
20994     </div>
20995     <div class="padding"></div>
20996
20997     <div class="entry">
20998       <div class="title">
20999         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html">Debian in 3D</a>
21000       </div>
21001       <div class="date">
21002          9th November 2010
21003       </div>
21004       <div class="body">
21005         <p><img src="http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/23/e0/c4/f9/2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg"></p>
21006
21007 <p>3D printing is just great.  I just came across this Debian logo in
21008 3D linked in from
21009 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2010/11/09/participatory-branding/">the
21010 thingiverse blog</a>.</p>
21011
21012       </div>
21013       <div class="tags">
21014
21015
21016         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
21017
21018
21019       </div>
21020     </div>
21021     <div class="padding"></div>
21022
21023     <div class="entry">
21024       <div class="title">
21025         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Making_room_on_the_Debian_Edu_Sqeeze_DVD.html">Making room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD</a>
21026       </div>
21027       <div class="date">
21028          7th November 2010
21029       </div>
21030       <div class="body">
21031         <p>Prioritising packages for the Debian Edu /
21032 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> DVD, which is
21033 supposed provide a school with all the services and user applications
21034 needed on the pupils computer network has always been hard.  Even
21035 schools without Internet connections should be able to get Debian Edu
21036 working using this DVD.</p>
21037
21038 <p>The job became a lot harder when apt and aptitude started
21039 installing recommended packages by default.  We want the same set of
21040 packages to be installed when using the DVD and the netinst CD, and
21041 that means all recommended packages need to be on the DVD.  I created
21042 a patch for debian-cd in <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/601203">BTS
21043 report #601203</a> to do this, and since this change was applied to
21044 the Debian Edu DVD build, we have been seriously short on space.</p>
21045
21046 <p>A few days ago we decided to drop blender, wxmaxima and kicad from
21047 the default installation to save space on the DVD, believing that
21048 those needing these applications are few and can get them from the
21049 Debian archive.</p>
21050
21051 <p>Yesterday, I had a look what source packages to see which packages
21052 were using most space.  A few large packages are well know;
21053 openoffice.org, openclipart and fluid-soundfont.  But I also
21054 discovered that lilypond used 106 MiB and fglrx-driver used 53 MiB.
21055 The lilypond package is pulled in as a dependency for rosegarden, and
21056 when looking a bit closer I discovered that 99 MiB of the 106 MiB were
21057 the documentation package, which is recommended by the binary package.
21058 I decided to drop this documentation package from our DVD, as most of
21059 our users will use the GUI front-ends and do not need the lilypond
21060 documentation.  Similarly, I dropped the non-free fglrx-driver package
21061 which might be installed by d-i when its hardware is detected, as the
21062 free X driver should work.</p>
21063
21064 <p>With this change, we finally got space for the LXDE and Gnome
21065 desktop packages as well as the language specific packages making the
21066 DVD more useful again.</p>
21067
21068       </div>
21069       <div class="tags">
21070
21071
21072         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
21073
21074
21075       </div>
21076     </div>
21077     <div class="padding"></div>
21078
21079     <div class="entry">
21080       <div class="title">
21081         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html">Software updates 2010-10-24</a>
21082       </div>
21083       <div class="date">
21084         24th October 2010
21085       </div>
21086       <div class="body">
21087         <p>Some updates.</p>
21088
21089 <p>My <a href="http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">gnash pledge</a> to
21090 raise money for the project is going well.  The lower limit of 10
21091 signers was reached in 24 hours, and so far 13 people have signed it.
21092 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
21093 how far we can get before the time limit of December 24 is reached.
21094 :)</p>
21095
21096 <p>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
21097 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
21098 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
21099 It is called
21100 <a href="http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html">kcov</a>,
21101 and can be used using <tt>kcov &lt;directory&gt; &lt;binary&gt;</tt>.
21102 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
21103 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
21104 libglib2.0-dev.  Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
21105 solvable.  I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.</p>
21106
21107 <p>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for <a
21108 href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2010/10/msg00002.html">a
21109 new alpha release of Debian Edu</a>, and just published the second
21110 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
21111 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>
21112 release.  Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
21113 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
21114 client servers and diskless workstations.  A nice touch added
21115 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
21116 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.</p>
21117
21118       </div>
21119       <div class="tags">
21120
21121
21122         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>.
21123
21124
21125       </div>
21126     </div>
21127     <div class="padding"></div>
21128
21129     <div class="entry">
21130       <div class="title">
21131         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Pledge_for_funding_to_the_Gnash_project_to_get_AVM2_support.html">Pledge for funding to the Gnash project to get AVM2 support</a>
21132       </div>
21133       <div class="date">
21134         19th October 2010
21135       </div>
21136       <div class="body">
21137         <p><a href="http://www.getgnash.org/">The Gnash project</a> is the
21138 most promising solution for a Free Software Flash implementation. It
21139 has done great so far, but there is still far to go, and recently its
21140 funding has dried up.  I believe AVM2 support in Gnash is vital to the
21141 continued progress of the project, as more and more sites show up with
21142 AVM2 flash files.</p>
21143
21144 <p>To try to get funding for developing such support, I have started
21145 <a href="http://www.pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">a pledge</a> with the
21146 following text:</P>
21147
21148 <p><blockquote>
21149
21150   <p>"I will pay 100$ to the Gnash project to develop AVM2 support but
21151   only if 10 other people will do the same."</p>
21152
21153   <p>- Petter Reinholdtsen, free software developer</p>
21154
21155   <p>Deadline to sign up by: 24th December 2010</p>
21156
21157   <p>The Gnash project need to get support for the new Flash file
21158   format AVM2 to work with a lot of sites using Flash on the
21159   web. Gnash already work with a lot of Flash sites using the old AVM1
21160   format, but more and more sites are using the AVM2 format these
21161   days. The project web page is available from
21162   http://www.getgnash.org/ . Gnash is a free software implementation
21163   of Adobe Flash, allowing those of us that do not accept the terms of
21164   the Adobe Flash license to get access to Flash sites.</p>
21165
21166   <p>The project need funding to get developers to put aside enough
21167   time to develop the AVM2 support, and this pledge is my way to try
21168   to get this to happen.</p>
21169
21170   <p>The project accept donations via the OpenMediaNow foundation,
21171   <a href="http://www.openmedianow.org/?q=node/32">http://www.openmedianow.org/?q=node/32</a> .</p>
21172
21173 </blockquote></p>
21174
21175 <p>I hope you will support this effort too.  I hope more than 10
21176 people will participate to make this happen.  The more money the
21177 project gets, the more features it can develop using these funds.
21178 :)</p>
21179
21180       </div>
21181       <div class="tags">
21182
21183
21184         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
21185
21186
21187       </div>
21188     </div>
21189     <div class="padding"></div>
21190
21191     <div class="entry">
21192       <div class="title">
21193         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_version_of_a_Perl_library_to_control_the_Spykee_robot.html">First version of a Perl library to control the Spykee robot</a>
21194       </div>
21195       <div class="date">
21196          9th October 2010
21197       </div>
21198       <div class="body">
21199         <p>This summer I got the chance to buy cheap Spykee robots, and since
21200 then I have worked on getting Linux software in place to control them.
21201 The firmware for the robot is available from the producer, and using
21202 that source it was trivial to figure out the protocol specification.
21203 I've started on a perl library to control it, and made some demo
21204 programs using this perl library to allow one to control the
21205 robots.</p>
21206
21207 <p>The library is quite functional already, and capable of controlling
21208 the driving, fetching video, uploading MP3s and play them.  There are
21209 a few less important features too.</p>
21210
21211 <p>Since a few weeks ago, I ran out of time to spend on this project,
21212 but I never got around to releasing the current source.  I decided
21213 today that it was time to do something about it, and uploaded the
21214 source to my Debian package store at people.skolelinux.org.</p>
21215
21216 <p>Because it was simpler for me, I made a Debian package and
21217 published the source and deb.  If you got a spykee robot, grab the
21218 source or binary package:</p>
21219
21220 <p><ul>
21221 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian/packages/lenny/libspykee-perl_0.0.20101009-1.tar.gz">libspykee-perl_0.0.20101009-1.tar.gz</a></li>
21222 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian/packages/lenny/libspykee-perl_0.0.20101009-1.dsc">libspykee-perl_0.0.20101009-1.dsc</a></li>
21223 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian/packages/lenny/libspykee-perl_0.0.20101009-1_all.deb">libspykee-perl_0.0.20101009-1_all.deb</a></li>
21224 </ul></p>
21225
21226 <p>If you are interested in helping out with developing this library,
21227 please let me know.</p>
21228
21229       </div>
21230       <div class="tags">
21231
21232
21233         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
21234
21235
21236       </div>
21237     </div>
21238     <div class="padding"></div>
21239
21240     <div class="entry">
21241       <div class="title">
21242         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Links_for_2010_10_03.html">Links for 2010-10-03</a>
21243       </div>
21244       <div class="date">
21245          3rd October 2010
21246       </div>
21247       <div class="body">
21248         <p><ul>
21249
21250 <li><a href="http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2010/09/there-is-no-plan-b-why-the-ipv4-to-ipv6-transition-will-be-ugly.ars">There
21251 is no Plan B: why the IPv4-to-IPv6 transition will be ugly</a></li>
21252
21253 <li>Scanner looking under clothes
21254 <a href="http://www.dagbladet.no/2010/10/03/nyheter/utenriks/reise/overvakingskamera/flyplasser/13667192/">has
21255 already been misused at Heathrow</a>.</li>
21256
21257 <li><a href="http://wiki.softwarelivre.org/Landell">Landell
21258 Webcasting</a> - interesting alternative for
21259 <ahref="http://dvswitch.alioth.debian.org/wiki/">DVSwitch</a> with
21260 simple setup.
21261
21262 </ul></p>
21263
21264       </div>
21265       <div class="tags">
21266
21267
21268         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
21269
21270
21271       </div>
21272     </div>
21273     <div class="padding"></div>
21274
21275     <div class="entry">
21276       <div class="title">
21277         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Terms_of_use_for_video_produced_by_a_Canon_IXUS_130_digital_camera.html">Terms of use for video produced by a Canon IXUS 130 digital camera</a>
21278       </div>
21279       <div class="date">
21280          9th September 2010
21281       </div>
21282       <div class="body">
21283         <p>A few days ago I had the mixed pleasure of bying a new digital
21284 camera, a Canon IXUS 130.  It was instructive and very disturbing to
21285 be able to verify that also this camera producer have the nerve to
21286 specify how I can or can not use the videos produced with the camera.
21287 Even thought I was aware of the issue, the options with new cameras
21288 are limited and I ended up bying the camera anyway.  What is the
21289 problem, you might ask?  It is software patents, MPEG-4, H.264 and the
21290 MPEG-LA that is the problem, and our right to record our experiences
21291 without asking for permissions that is at risk.
21292
21293 <p>On page 27 of the Danish instruction manual, this section is
21294 written:</p>
21295
21296 <blockquote>
21297 <p>This product is licensed under AT&T patents for the MPEG-4 standard
21298 and may be used for encoding MPEG-4 compliant video and/or decoding
21299 MPEG-4 compliant video that was encoded only (1) for a personal and
21300 non-commercial purpose or (2) by a video provider licensed under the
21301 AT&T patents to provide MPEG-4 compliant video.</p>
21302
21303 <p>No license is granted or implied for any other use for MPEG-4
21304 standard.</p>
21305 </blockquote>
21306
21307 <p>In short, the camera producer have chosen to use technology
21308 (MPEG-4/H.264) that is only provided if I used it for personal and
21309 non-commercial purposes, or ask for permission from the organisations
21310 holding the knowledge monopoly (patent) for technology used.</p>
21311
21312 <p>This issue has been brewing for a while, and I recommend you to
21313 read
21314 "<a href="http://www.osnews.com/story/23236/Why_Our_Civilization_s_Video_Art_and_Culture_is_Threatened_by_the_MPEG-LA">Why
21315 Our Civilization's Video Art and Culture is Threatened by the
21316 MPEG-LA</a>" by Eugenia Loli-Queru and
21317 "<a href="http://webmink.com/2010/09/03/h-264-and-foss/">H.264 Is Not
21318 The Sort Of Free That Matters</a>" by Simon Phipps to learn more about
21319 the issue.  The solution is to support the
21320 <a href="http://www.digistan.org/open-standard:definition">free and
21321 open standards</a> for video, like <a href="http://www.theora.org/">Ogg
21322 Theora</a>, and avoid MPEG-4 and H.264 if you can.</p>
21323
21324       </div>
21325       <div class="tags">
21326
21327
21328         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
21329
21330
21331       </div>
21332     </div>
21333     <div class="padding"></div>
21334
21335     <div class="entry">
21336       <div class="title">
21337         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_notes_on_Flash_in_Debian_and_Debian_Edu.html">Some notes on Flash in Debian and Debian Edu</a>
21338       </div>
21339       <div class="date">
21340          4th September 2010
21341       </div>
21342       <div class="body">
21343         <p>In the <a href="http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote">Debian
21344 popularity-contest numbers</a>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
21345 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian.  The sixth
21346 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla.  This is a clear indication that
21347 working flash is important for Debian users.  Around 10 percent of the
21348 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
21349 installed.</p>
21350
21351 <p>In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008
21352 («<a href="http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile&do=view&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf">Skolelinux
21353 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
21354 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs</a>»), one of the most important problems
21355 schools experienced with <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
21356 Edu/Skolelinux</a> was the lack of working Flash.  A lot of educational
21357 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
21358 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
21359 good reason to stay with Windows.</p>
21360
21361 <p>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
21362 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
21363 everything you told him but could work fairly well.  This was a
21364 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
21365 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
21366 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
21367 example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
21368 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
21369 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
21370 pages they want to visit.</p>
21371
21372 <p>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
21373 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
21374 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
21375 Video to working out of the box.  For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
21376 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
21377 the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
21378 unstable.  The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7.
21379 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
21380 release team have not had time to reply to it yet.  I hope they agree
21381 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
21382 accept the new package into Squeeze.</p>
21383
21384       </div>
21385       <div class="tags">
21386
21387
21388         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
21389
21390
21391       </div>
21392     </div>
21393     <div class="padding"></div>
21394
21395     <div class="entry">
21396       <div class="title">
21397         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_first_perl_GUI_application___controlling_a_Spykee_robot.html">My first perl GUI application - controlling a Spykee robot</a>
21398       </div>
21399       <div class="date">
21400          1st September 2010
21401       </div>
21402       <div class="body">
21403         <p>This evening I made my first Perl GUI application.  The last few
21404 days I have worked on a Perl module for controlling my recently
21405 aquired Spykee robots, and the module is now getting complete enought
21406 that it is possible to use it to control the robot driving at least.
21407 It was now time to figure out how to use it to create some GUI to
21408 allow me to drive the robot around.  I picked PerlQt as I have had
21409 positive experiences with the Qt API before, and spent a few minutes
21410 browsing the web for examples.  Using Qt Designer seemed like a short
21411 cut, so I ended up writing the perl GUI using Qt Designer and
21412 compiling it into a perl program using the puic program from
21413 libqt-perl.  Nothing fancy yet, but it got buttons to connect and
21414 drive around.</p>
21415
21416 <p>The perl module I have written provide a object oriented API for
21417 controlling the robot.  Here is an small example on how to use it:</p>
21418
21419 <p><pre>
21420 use Spykee;
21421 Spykee::discover(sub {$robot{$_[0]} = $_[1]});
21422 my $host = (keys %robot)[0];
21423 my $spykee = Spykee->new();
21424 $spykee->contact($host, "admin", "admin");
21425 $spykee->left();
21426 sleep 2;
21427 $spykee->right();
21428 sleep 2;
21429 $spykee->forward();
21430 sleep 2;
21431 $spykee->back();
21432 sleep 2;
21433 $spykee->stop();
21434 </pre></p>
21435
21436 <p>Thanks to the release of the source of the robot firmware, I could
21437 peek into the implementation at the other end to figure out how to
21438 implement the protocol used by the robot.  I've implemented several of
21439 the commands the robot understand, but is still missing the camera
21440 support to make it possible to control the robot from remote.  First I
21441 want to implement support for uploading new firmware and configuring
21442 the wireless network, to make it possible to bootstrap a Spykee robot
21443 without the producers Windows and MacOSX software (I only have Linux,
21444 so I had to ask a friend to come over to get the robot testing
21445 going. :).</p>
21446
21447 <p>Will release the source to the public soon, but need to figure out
21448 where to make it available first.  I will add a link to
21449 <a href="http://wiki.nuug.no/grupper/robot/">the NUUG wiki</a> for
21450 those that want to check back later to find it.</p>
21451
21452       </div>
21453       <div class="tags">
21454
21455
21456         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
21457
21458
21459       </div>
21460     </div>
21461     <div class="padding"></div>
21462
21463     <div class="entry">
21464       <div class="title">
21465         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_hard_link_handling_with_sshfs.html">Broken hard link handling with sshfs</a>
21466       </div>
21467       <div class="date">
21468         30th August 2010
21469       </div>
21470       <div class="body">
21471         <p>Just got an email from Tobias Gruetzmacher as a followup on my
21472 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_umask_handling_with_sshfs.html">previous
21473 post about sshfs</a>.  He reported another problem with sshfs.  It
21474 fail to handle hard links properly.  A simple way to spot this is to
21475 look at the . and .. entries in the directory tree.  These should have
21476 a link count >1, but on sshfs the count is 1.  I just tested to see
21477 what happen when trying to hardlink, and this fail as well:</p>
21478
21479 <pre>
21480 % ln foo bar
21481 ln: creating hard link `bar' => `foo': Function not implemented
21482 %
21483 </pre>
21484
21485 <p>I have not yet found time to implement a test for this in my file
21486 system test code, but believe having working hard links is useful to
21487 avoid surprised unix programs.  Not as useful as working file locking
21488 and symlinks, which are required to get a working desktop, but useful
21489 nevertheless. :)</p>
21490
21491 <p>The latest version of the file system test code is available via
21492 git from
21493 <a href="http://github.com/gebi/fs-test">http://github.com/gebi/fs-test</a></p>
21494
21495       </div>
21496       <div class="tags">
21497
21498
21499         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
21500
21501
21502       </div>
21503     </div>
21504     <div class="padding"></div>
21505
21506     <div class="entry">
21507       <div class="title">
21508         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Broken_umask_handling_with_sshfs.html">Broken umask handling with sshfs</a>
21509       </div>
21510       <div class="date">
21511         26th August 2010
21512       </div>
21513       <div class="body">
21514         <p>My file system sematics program
21515 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">presented
21516 a few days ago</a> is very useful to verify that a file system can
21517 work as a unix home directory,and today I had to extend it a bit.  I'm
21518 looking into alternatives for home directory access here at the
21519 University of Oslo, and one of the options is sshfs.  My friend
21520 Finn-Arne mentioned a while back that they had used sshfs with Debian
21521 Edu, but stopped because of problems.  I asked today what the problems
21522 where, and he mentioned that sshfs failed to handle umask properly.
21523 Trying to detect the problem I wrote this addition to my fs testing
21524 script:</p>
21525
21526 <pre>
21527 mode_t touch_get_mode(const char *name, mode_t mode) {
21528   mode_t retval = 0;
21529   int fd = open(name, O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_LARGEFILE, mode);
21530   if (-1 != fd) {
21531     unlink(name);
21532     struct stat statbuf;
21533     if (-1 != fstat(fd, &statbuf)) {
21534       retval = statbuf.st_mode & 0x1ff;
21535     }
21536     close(fd);
21537   }
21538   return retval;
21539 }
21540
21541 /* Try to detect problem discovered using sshfs */
21542 int test_umask(void) {
21543   printf("info: testing umask effect on file creation\n");
21544
21545   mode_t orig_umask = umask(000);
21546   mode_t newmode;
21547   if (0666 != (newmode = touch_get_mode("foobar", 0666))) {
21548     printf("  error: Wrong file mode %o when creating using mode 666 and umask 000\n",
21549            newmode);
21550   }
21551   umask(007);
21552   if (0660 != (newmode = touch_get_mode("foobar", 0666))) {
21553     printf("  error: Wrong file mode %o when creating using mode 666 and umask 007\n",
21554            newmode);
21555   }
21556
21557   umask (orig_umask);
21558   return 0;
21559 }
21560
21561 int main(int argc, char **argv) {
21562   [...]
21563   test_umask();
21564   return 0;
21565 }
21566 </pre>
21567
21568 <p>Sure enough.  On NFS to a netapp, I get this result:</p>
21569
21570 <pre>
21571 Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system
21572 info: testing symlink creation
21573 info: testing subdirectory creation
21574 info: testing fcntl locking
21575   Read-locking 1 byte from 1073741824
21576   Read-locking 510 byte from 1073741826
21577   Unlocking 1 byte from 1073741824
21578   Write-locking 1 byte from 1073741824
21579   Write-locking 510 byte from 1073741826
21580   Unlocking 2 byte from 1073741824
21581 info: testing umask effect on file creation
21582 </pre>
21583
21584 <p>When mounting the same directory using sshfs, I get this
21585 result:</p>
21586
21587 <pre>
21588 Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system
21589 info: testing symlink creation
21590 info: testing subdirectory creation
21591 info: testing fcntl locking
21592   Read-locking 1 byte from 1073741824
21593   Read-locking 510 byte from 1073741826
21594   Unlocking 1 byte from 1073741824
21595   Write-locking 1 byte from 1073741824
21596   Write-locking 510 byte from 1073741826
21597   Unlocking 2 byte from 1073741824
21598 info: testing umask effect on file creation
21599   error: Wrong file mode 644 when creating using mode 666 and umask 000
21600   error: Wrong file mode 640 when creating using mode 666 and umask 007
21601 </pre>
21602
21603 <p>So, I can conclude that sshfs is better than smb to a Netapp or a
21604 Windows server, but not good enough to be used as a home
21605 directory.</p>
21606
21607 <p>Update 2010-08-26: Reported the issue in
21608 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/594498">BTS report #594498</a></p>
21609
21610 <p>Update 2010-08-27: Michael Gebetsroither report that he found the
21611 script so useful that he created a GIT repository and stored it in
21612 <a href="http://github.com/gebi/fs-test">http://github.com/gebi/fs-test</a>.</p>
21613
21614       </div>
21615       <div class="tags">
21616
21617
21618         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
21619
21620
21621       </div>
21622     </div>
21623     <div class="padding"></div>
21624
21625     <div class="entry">
21626       <div class="title">
21627         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Rob_Weir__How_to_Crush_Dissent.html">Rob Weir: How to Crush Dissent</a>
21628       </div>
21629       <div class="date">
21630         15th August 2010
21631       </div>
21632       <div class="body">
21633         <p>I found the notes from Rob Weir on
21634 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/VGb23-kta8c/how-to-crush-dissent.html">how
21635 to crush dissent</a> matching my own thoughts on the matter quite
21636 well.  Highly recommended for those wondering which road our society
21637 should go down.  In my view we have been heading the wrong way for a
21638 long time.</p>
21639
21640       </div>
21641       <div class="tags">
21642
21643
21644         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
21645
21646
21647       </div>
21648     </div>
21649     <div class="padding"></div>
21650
21651     <div class="entry">
21652       <div class="title">
21653         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/No_hardcoded_config_on_Debian_Edu_clients.html">No hardcoded config on Debian Edu clients</a>
21654       </div>
21655       <div class="date">
21656          9th August 2010
21657       </div>
21658       <div class="body">
21659         <p>As reported earlier, the last few days I have looked at how Debian
21660 Edu clients are configured, and tried to get rid of all hardcoded
21661 configuration settings on the clients.  I believe the work to be
21662 mostly done, and the clients seem to work just fine with dynamically
21663 generated configuration.</p>
21664
21665 <p>What is the point, you might ask?  The point is to allow a Debian
21666 Edu desktop to integrate into an existing network infrastructure
21667 without any manual configuration.</p>
21668
21669 <p>This is what happens when installing a Debian Edu client here at
21670 the University of Oslo using PXE.  With the PXE installation, I am
21671 asked for language (Norwegian Bokmål), locality (Norway) and keyboard
21672 layout (no-latin1), Debian Edu profile (Roaming Workstation), if I
21673 accept to reformat the hard drive (yes), if I want to submit info to
21674 popcon.debian.org (no) and root password (secret).  After answering
21675 these questions, the installer goes ahead and does its thing, and
21676 after around 50 minutes it is done.  I press enter to finish the
21677 installation, and the machine reboots into KDE.  When the machine is
21678 ready and kdm asks for login information, I enter my university
21679 username and password, am told by kdm that a local home directory has
21680 been created and that I must log in again, and finally log in with the
21681 same username and password to the KDE 4.4 desktop.  At no point during
21682 this process did it ask for university specific settings, and all the
21683 required configuration was dynamically detected using information
21684 fetched via DHCP and DNS.  The roaming workstation is now ready for
21685 use.</p>
21686
21687 <p>How was this done, you might wonder?  First of all, here is the
21688 list of things that need to be configured on the client to get it
21689 working properly out of the box:</p>
21690
21691 <ul>
21692 <li>IP address/netmask and DNS server.</li>
21693 <li>Web proxy URL.</li>
21694 <li>LDAP server for NSS directory information (user, group, etc).</li>
21695 <li>Kerberos server for PAM password checking.</li>
21696 <li>SMB mount point to access the network home directory. (*)</li>
21697 <li>Central syslog server to send syslog messages to. (*)</li>
21698 <li>Sitesummary collector URL to submit info to central server. (*)</li>
21699 </ul>
21700
21701 <p>(Hm, did I forget anything?  Let me knew if I did.)</p>
21702
21703 <p>The points marked (*) are not required to be able to use the
21704 machine, but needed to provide central storage and allowing system
21705 administrators to track their machines.  Since yesterday, everything
21706 but the sitesummary collector URL is dynamically discovered at boot
21707 and installation time in the svn version of Debian Edu.</p>
21708
21709 <p>The IP and DNS setup is fetched during boot using DHCP as usual.
21710 When a DHCP update arrives, the proxy setup is updated by looking for
21711 http://wpat/wpad.dat and using the content of this WPAD file to
21712 configure the http and ftp proxy in /etc/environment and
21713 /etc/apt/apt.conf.  I decided to update the proxy setup using a DHCP
21714 hook to ensure that the client stops using the Debian Edu proxy when
21715 it is moved outside the Debian Edu network, and instead uses any local
21716 proxy present on the new network when it moves around.</p>
21717
21718 <p>The DNS names of the LDAP, Kerberos and syslog server and related
21719 configuration are generated using DNS information at boot.  First the
21720 installer looks for a host named ldap in the current DNS domain.  If
21721 not found, it looks for _ldap._tcp SRV records in DNS instead.  If an
21722 LDAP server is found, its root DSE entry is requested and the
21723 attributes namingContexts and defaultNamingContext are used to
21724 determine which LDAP base to use for NSS.  If there are several
21725 namingContexts attibutes and the defaultNamingContext is present, that
21726 LDAP subtree is used as the base.  If defaultNamingContext is missing,
21727 the subtrees listed as namingContexts are searched in sequence for any
21728 object with class posixAccount or posixGroup, and the first one with
21729 such an object is used as the LDAP base.  For Kerberos, a similar
21730 search is done by first looking for a host named kerberos, and then
21731 for the _kerberos._tcp SRV record.  I've been unable to find a way to
21732 look up the Kerberos realm, so for this the upper case string of the
21733 current DNS domain is used.</p>
21734
21735 <p>For the syslog server, the hosts syslog and loghost are searched
21736 for, and the _syslog._udp SRV record is consulted if no such host is
21737 found.  This algorithm works for both Debian Edu and the University of
21738 Oslo.  A similar strategy would work for locating the sitesummary
21739 server, but have not been implemented yet.  I decided to fetch and
21740 save these settings during installation, to make sure moving to a
21741 different network does not change the set of users being allowed to
21742 log in nor the passwords required to log in.  Usernames and passwords
21743 will be cached by sssd when the user logs in on the Debian Edu
21744 network, and will not change as the laptop move around.  For a
21745 non-roaming machine, there is no caching, but given that it is
21746 supposed to stay in place it should not matter much.  Perhaps we
21747 should switch those to use sssd too?</p>
21748
21749 <p>The user's SMB mount point for the network home directory is
21750 located when the user logs in for the first time.  The LDAP server is
21751 consulted to look for the user's LDAP object and the sambaHomePath
21752 attribute is used if found.  If it isn't found, the home directory
21753 path fetched from NSS is used instead.  Assuming the path is of the
21754 form /site/server/directory/username, the second part is looked up in
21755 DNS and used to generate a SMB URL of the form
21756 smb://server.domain/username.  This algorithm works for both Debian
21757 edu and the University of Oslo.  Perhaps there are better attributes
21758 to use or a better algorithm that works for more sites, but this will
21759 do for now. :)</p>
21760
21761 <p>This work should make it easier to integrate the Debian Edu clients
21762 into any LDAP/Kerberos infrastructure, and make the current setup even
21763 more flexible than before.  I suspect it will also work for thin
21764 client servers, allowing one to easily set up LTSP and hook it into a
21765 existing network infrastructure, but I have not had time to test this
21766 yet.</p>
21767
21768 <p>If you want to help out with implementing these things for Debian
21769 Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
21770
21771 <p>Update 2010-08-09: Simon Farnsworth gave me a heads-up on how to
21772 detect Kerberos realm from DNS, by looking for _kerberos TXT entries
21773 before falling back to the upper case DNS domain name.  Will have to
21774 implement it for Debian Edu. :)</p>
21775
21776       </div>
21777       <div class="tags">
21778
21779
21780         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
21781
21782
21783       </div>
21784     </div>
21785     <div class="padding"></div>
21786
21787     <div class="entry">
21788       <div class="title">
21789         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">Testing if a file system can be used for home directories...</a>
21790       </div>
21791       <div class="date">
21792          8th August 2010
21793       </div>
21794       <div class="body">
21795         <p>A few years ago, I was involved in a project planning to use
21796 Windows file servers as home directory servers for Debian
21797 Edu/Skolelinux machines.  This was thought to be no problem, as the
21798 access would be through the SMB network file system protocol, and we
21799 knew other sites used SMB with unix and samba as the file server to
21800 mount home directories without any problems.  But, after months of
21801 struggling, we had to conclude that our goal was impossible.</p>
21802
21803 <p>The reason is simply that while SMB can be used for home
21804 directories when the file server is Samba running on Unix, this only
21805 work because of Samba have some extensions and the fact that the
21806 underlying file system is a unix file system.  When using a Windows
21807 file server, the underlying file system do not have POSIX semantics,
21808 and several programs will fail if the users home directory where they
21809 want to store their configuration lack POSIX semantics.</p>
21810
21811 <p>As part of this work, I wrote a small C program I want to share
21812 with you all, to replicate a few of the problematic applications (like
21813 OpenOffice.org and GCompris) and see if the file system was working as
21814 it should.  If you find yourself in spooky file system land, it might
21815 help you find your way out again.  This is the fs-test.c source:</p>
21816
21817 <pre>
21818 /*
21819  * Some tests to check the file system sematics.  Used to verify that
21820  * CIFS from a windows server do not work properly as a linux home
21821  * directory.
21822  * License: GPL v2 or later
21823  *
21824  * needs libsqlite3-dev and build-essential installed
21825  * compile with: gcc -Wall -lsqlite3 -DTEST_SQLITE fs-test.c -o fs-test
21826 */
21827
21828 #define _FILE_OFFSET_BITS 64
21829 #define _LARGEFILE_SOURCE 1
21830 #define _LARGEFILE64_SOURCE 1
21831
21832 #define _GNU_SOURCE /* for asprintf() */
21833
21834 #include &lt;errno.h>
21835 #include &lt;fcntl.h>
21836 #include &lt;stdio.h>
21837 #include &lt;string.h>
21838 #include &lt;stdlib.h>
21839 #include &lt;sys/file.h>
21840 #include &lt;sys/stat.h>
21841 #include &lt;sys/types.h>
21842 #include &lt;unistd.h>
21843
21844 #ifdef TEST_SQLITE
21845 /*
21846  * Test sqlite open, as done by gcompris require the libsqlite3-dev
21847  * package and linking with -lsqlite3.  A more low level test is
21848  * below.
21849  * See also &lt;URL: http://www.sqlite.org./faq.html#q5 >.
21850  */
21851 #include &lt;sqlite3.h>
21852 #define CREATE_TABLE_USERS                                              \
21853   "CREATE TABLE users (user_id INT UNIQUE, login TEXT, lastname TEXT, firstname TEXT, birthdate TEXT, class_id INT ); "
21854 int test_sqlite_open(void) {
21855   char *zErrMsg;
21856   char *name = "testsqlite.db";
21857   sqlite3 *db=NULL;
21858   unlink(name);
21859   int rc = sqlite3_open(name, &db);
21860   if( rc ){
21861     printf("error: sqlite open of %s failed: %s\n", name, sqlite3_errmsg(db));
21862     sqlite3_close(db);
21863     return -1;
21864   }
21865
21866   /* create tables */
21867   rc = sqlite3_exec(db,CREATE_TABLE_USERS, NULL,  0, &zErrMsg);
21868   if( rc != SQLITE_OK ){
21869     printf("error: sqlite table create failed: %s\n", zErrMsg);
21870     sqlite3_close(db);
21871     return -1;
21872   }
21873   printf("info: sqlite worked\n");
21874   sqlite3_close(db);
21875   return 0;
21876 }
21877 #endif /* TEST_SQLITE */
21878
21879 /*
21880  * Demonstrate locking issue found in gcompris using sqlite3.  This
21881  * work with ext3, but not with cifs server on Windows 2003.  This is
21882  * done in the sqlite3 library.
21883  * See also
21884  * &lt;URL:http://www.cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2001-08/msg00854.html> and the
21885  * POSIX specification
21886  * &lt;URL:http://www.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/009695399/functions/fcntl.html>.
21887  */
21888 int test_gcompris_locking(void) {
21889   struct flock fl;
21890   char *name = "testsqlite.db";
21891   unlink(name);
21892   int fd = open(name, O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_LARGEFILE, 0644);
21893   printf("info: testing fcntl locking\n");
21894
21895   fl.l_whence = SEEK_SET;
21896   fl.l_pid    = getpid();
21897   printf("  Read-locking 1 byte from 1073741824");
21898   fl.l_start  = 1073741824;
21899   fl.l_len    = 1;
21900   fl.l_type   = F_RDLCK;
21901   if (0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK, &fl) ) printf(" - error!\n"); else printf("\n");
21902
21903   printf("  Read-locking 510 byte from 1073741826");
21904   fl.l_start  = 1073741826;
21905   fl.l_len    = 510;
21906   fl.l_type   = F_RDLCK;
21907   if (0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK, &fl) ) printf(" - error!\n"); else printf("\n");
21908
21909   printf("  Unlocking 1 byte from 1073741824");
21910   fl.l_start  = 1073741824;
21911   fl.l_len    = 1;
21912   fl.l_type   = F_UNLCK;
21913   if (0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK, &fl) ) printf(" - error!\n"); else printf("\n");
21914
21915   printf("  Write-locking 1 byte from 1073741824");
21916   fl.l_start  = 1073741824;
21917   fl.l_len    = 1;
21918   fl.l_type   = F_WRLCK;
21919   if (0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK, &fl) ) printf(" - error!\n"); else printf("\n");
21920
21921   printf("  Write-locking 510 byte from 1073741826");
21922   fl.l_start  = 1073741826;
21923   fl.l_len    = 510;
21924   if (0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK, &fl) ) printf(" - error!\n"); else printf("\n");
21925
21926   printf("  Unlocking 2 byte from 1073741824");
21927   fl.l_start  = 1073741824;
21928   fl.l_len    = 2;
21929   fl.l_type   = F_UNLCK;
21930   if (0 != fcntl(fd, F_SETLK, &fl) ) printf(" - error!\n"); else printf("\n");
21931
21932   close(fd);
21933   return 0;
21934 }
21935
21936 /*
21937  * Test if permissions of freshly created directories allow entries
21938  * below them.  This was a problem with OpenOffice.org and gcompris.
21939  * Mounting with option 'sync' seem to solve this problem while
21940  * slowing down file operations.
21941  */
21942 int test_subdirectory_creation(void) {
21943 #define LEVELS 5
21944   char *path = strdup("test");
21945   char *dirs[LEVELS];
21946   int level;
21947   printf("info: testing subdirectory creation\n");
21948   for (level = 0; level &lt; LEVELS; level++) {
21949     char *newpath = NULL;
21950     if (-1 == mkdir(path, 0777)) {
21951       printf("  error: Unable to create directory '%s': %s\n",
21952              path, strerror(errno));
21953       break;
21954     }
21955     asprintf(&newpath, "%s/%s", path, "test");
21956     free(path);
21957     path = newpath;
21958   }
21959   return 0;
21960 }
21961
21962 /*
21963  * Test if symlinks can be created.  This was a problem detected with
21964  * KDE.
21965  */
21966 int test_symlinks(void) {
21967   printf("info: testing symlink creation\n");
21968   unlink("symlink");
21969   if (-1 == symlink("file", "symlink"))
21970     printf("  error: Unable to create symlink\n");
21971   return 0;
21972 }
21973
21974 int main(int argc, char **argv) {
21975   printf("Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system\n");
21976   test_symlinks();
21977   test_subdirectory_creation();
21978 #ifdef TEST_SQLITE
21979   test_sqlite_open();
21980 #endif /* TEST_SQLITE */
21981   test_gcompris_locking();
21982   return 0;
21983 }
21984 </pre>
21985
21986 <p>When everything is working, it should print something like
21987 this:</p>
21988
21989 <pre>
21990 Testing POSIX/Unix sematics on file system
21991 info: testing symlink creation
21992 info: testing subdirectory creation
21993 info: sqlite worked
21994 info: testing fcntl locking
21995   Read-locking 1 byte from 1073741824
21996   Read-locking 510 byte from 1073741826
21997   Unlocking 1 byte from 1073741824
21998   Write-locking 1 byte from 1073741824
21999   Write-locking 510 byte from 1073741826
22000   Unlocking 2 byte from 1073741824
22001 </pre>
22002
22003 <p>I do not remember the exact details of the problems we saw, but one
22004 of them was with locking, where if I remember correctly, POSIX allow a
22005 read-only lock to be upgraded to a read-write lock without unlocking
22006 the read-only lock (while Windows do not).  Another was a bug in the
22007 CIFS/SMB client implementation in the Linux kernel where directory
22008 meta information would be wrong for a fraction of a second, making
22009 OpenOffice.org fail to create its deep directory tree because it was
22010 not allowed to create files in its freshly created directory.</p>
22011
22012 <p>Anyway, here is a nice tool for your tool box, might you never need
22013 it. :)</p>
22014
22015 <p>Update 2010-08-27: Michael Gebetsroither report that he found the
22016 script so useful that he created a GIT repository and stored it in
22017 <a href="http://github.com/gebi/fs-test">http://github.com/gebi/fs-test</a>.</p>
22018
22019       </div>
22020       <div class="tags">
22021
22022
22023         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22024
22025
22026       </div>
22027     </div>
22028     <div class="padding"></div>
22029
22030     <div class="entry">
22031       <div class="title">
22032         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Autodetecting_Client_setup_for_roaming_workstations_in_Debian_Edu.html">Autodetecting Client setup for roaming workstations in Debian Edu</a>
22033       </div>
22034       <div class="date">
22035          7th August 2010
22036       </div>
22037       <div class="body">
22038         <p>A few days ago, I
22039 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_roaming_workstation___at_the_university_of_Oslo.html">tried
22040 to install</a> a Roaming workation profile from Debian Edu/Squeeze
22041 while on the university network here at the University of Oslo, and
22042 noticed how much had to change to get it operational using the
22043 university infrastructure.  It was fairly easy, but it occured to me
22044 that Debian Edu would improve a lot if I could get the client to
22045 connect without any changes at all, and thus let the client configure
22046 itself during installation and first boot to use the infrastructure
22047 around it.  Now I am a huge step further along that road.</p>
22048
22049 <p>With our current squeeze-test packages, I can select the roaming
22050 workstation profile and get a working laptop connecting to the
22051 university LDAP server for user and group and our active directory
22052 servers for Kerberos authentication.  All this without any
22053 configuration at all during installation.  My users home directory got
22054 a bookmark in the KDE menu to mount it via SMB, with the correct URL.
22055 In short, openldap and sssd is correctly configured.  In addition to
22056 this, the client look for http://wpad/wpad.dat to configure a web
22057 proxy, and when it fail to find it no proxy settings are stored in
22058 /etc/environment and /etc/apt/apt.conf.  Iceweasel and KDE is
22059 configured to look for the same wpad configuration and also do not use
22060 a proxy when at the university network.  If the machine is moved to a
22061 network with such wpad setup, it would automatically use it when DHCP
22062 gave it a IP address.</p>
22063
22064 <p>The LDAP server is located using DNS, by first looking for the DNS
22065 entry ldap.$domain.  If this do not exist, it look for the
22066 _ldap._tcp.$domain SRV records and use the first one as the LDAP
22067 server.  Next, it connects to the LDAP server and search all
22068 namingContexts entries for posixAccount or posixGroup objects, and
22069 pick the first one as the LDAP base.  For Kerberos, a similar
22070 algorithm is used to locate the LDAP server, and the realm is the
22071 uppercase version of $domain.</p>
22072
22073 <p>So, what is not working, you might ask.  SMB mounting my home
22074 directory do not work.  No idea why, but suspected the incorrect
22075 Kerberos settings in /etc/krb5.conf and /etc/samba/smb.conf might be
22076 the cause.  These are not properly configured during installation, and
22077 had to be hand-edited to get the correct Kerberos realm and server,
22078 but SMB mounting still do not work. :(</p>
22079
22080 <p>With this automatic configuration in place, I expect a Debian Edu
22081 roaming profile installation would be able to automatically detect and
22082 connect to any site using LDAP and Kerberos for NSS directory and PAM
22083 authentication.  It should also work out of the box in a Active
22084 Directory environment providing posixAccount and posixGroup objects
22085 with UID and GID values.</p>
22086
22087 <p>If you want to help out with implementing these things for Debian
22088 Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
22089
22090       </div>
22091       <div class="tags">
22092
22093
22094         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22095
22096
22097       </div>
22098     </div>
22099     <div class="padding"></div>
22100
22101     <div class="entry">
22102       <div class="title">
22103         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_roaming_workstation___at_the_university_of_Oslo.html">Debian Edu roaming workstation - at the university of Oslo</a>
22104       </div>
22105       <div class="date">
22106          3rd August 2010
22107       </div>
22108       <div class="body">
22109         <p>The new roaming workstation profile in Debian Edu/Squeeze is fairly
22110 similar to the laptop setup am I working on using Ubuntu for the
22111 University of Oslo, and just for the heck of it, I tested today how
22112 hard it would be to integrate that profile into the university
22113 infrastructure.  In this case, it is the university LDAP server,
22114 Active Directory Kerberos server and SMB mounting from the Netapp file
22115 servers.</p>
22116
22117 <p>I was pleasantly surprised that the only three files needed to be
22118 changed (/etc/sssd/sssd.conf, /etc/ldap.conf and
22119 /etc/mklocaluser.d/20-debian-edu-config) and one file had to be added
22120 (/usr/share/perl5/Debian/Edu_Local.pm), to get the client working.
22121 Most of the changes were to get the client to use the university LDAP
22122 for NSS and Kerberos server for PAM, but one was to change a hard
22123 coded DNS domain name in the mklocaluser hook from .intern to
22124 .uio.no.</p>
22125
22126 <p>This testing was so encouraging, that I went ahead and adjusted the
22127 Debian Edu scripts and setup in subversion to centralise the roaming
22128 workstation setup a bit more and avoid the hardcoded DNS domain name,
22129 so that when I test this tomorrow, I expect to get away with modifying
22130 only /etc/sssd/sssd.conf and /etc/ldap.conf to get it to use the
22131 university servers.</p>
22132
22133 <p>My goal is to get the clients to have no hardcoded settings and
22134 fetch all their initial setup during installation and first boot, to
22135 allow them to be inserted also into environments where the default
22136 setup in Debian Edu has been changed or as with the university, where
22137 the environment is different but provides the protocols Debian Edu
22138 uses.</p>
22139
22140       </div>
22141       <div class="tags">
22142
22143
22144         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22145
22146
22147       </div>
22148     </div>
22149     <div class="padding"></div>
22150
22151     <div class="entry">
22152       <div class="title">
22153         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html">Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery</a>
22154       </div>
22155       <div class="date">
22156         27th July 2010
22157       </div>
22158       <div class="body">
22159         <p>I discovered this while doing
22160 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">automated
22161 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze</a>.  A few packages
22162 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
22163 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
22164 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.</p>
22165
22166 <p>An example is from todays
22167 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt">upgrade
22168 of KDE using aptitude</a>.  In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
22169 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade.  The cause is simple.  If a
22170 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
22171 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
22172 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
22173 because its dependencies are unavailable.</p>
22174
22175 <p>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:</p>
22176
22177 <blockquote><pre>
22178 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
22179  perl-modules depends on perl (>= 5.10.1-1); however:
22180   Version of perl on system is 5.10.0-19lenny2.
22181 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
22182  dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
22183 </pre></blockquote>
22184
22185 <p>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
22186 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/527917">reported as a bug</a>, and will
22187 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
22188 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
22189 failures.  Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
22190 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
22191 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
22192 of dependency loops.</p>
22193
22194 <p>Thanks to
22195 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/06/msg00116.html">the
22196 tireless effort by Bill Allombert</a>, the number of circular
22197 dependencies
22198 <a href="http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html">left in Debian
22199 is dropping</a>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)</p>
22200
22201 <p>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
22202 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590605">update-notifier</a> and
22203 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590604">different behaviour</a> between
22204 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
22205 dependency.  Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
22206 it.</p>
22207
22208       </div>
22209       <div class="tags">
22210
22211
22212         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22213
22214
22215       </div>
22216     </div>
22217     <div class="padding"></div>
22218
22219     <div class="entry">
22220       <div class="title">
22221         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_Debian_Edu_test_release__alpha0__based_on_Squeeze_is_released.html">First Debian Edu test release (alpha0) based on Squeeze is released</a>
22222       </div>
22223       <div class="date">
22224         27th July 2010
22225       </div>
22226       <div class="body">
22227         <p>I just posted this announcement culminating several months of work
22228 with the next Debian Edu release.  Not nearly done, but one major step
22229 completed.</p>
22230
22231 <blockquote>
22232 <p>This is the first test release based on Squeeze. The focus of this
22233 release is to test the user application selection. To have a look,
22234 install the standalone profile and let the developers know if the set
22235 of installed packages i.e. applications should be modified. If some
22236 user application is missing, or if there are some applications that no
22237 longer make sense to be included in Debian Edu, please let us know.
22238 Also, if a useful application is missing the translation for your
22239 language of choice, please let us know too.</p>
22240
22241 <p>In addition, feedback and help to polish the desktop (menus,
22242 artwork, starters, etc.) is appreciated. We would like to ship a nice
22243 and handy KDE4 desktop targeted for schools out of the box.</p>
22244
22245 <p>The other profiles should be installable, but there is a lot more
22246 work left to be done before they are ready, so do not expect to
22247 much.</p>
22248
22249 <p>Changes compared to the lenny based version</p>
22250
22251 <ul>
22252 <li>Everything from Debian Squeeze
22253 <ul>
22254   <li>Desktop environment KDE 4.4 => the new KDE desktop in
22255          combination with some new artwork
22256   <li>Web browser Iceweasel 3.5
22257   <li>OpenOffice.org 3.2
22258   <li>Educational toolbox GCompris 9.3
22259   <li>Music creator Rosegarden 10.04.2
22260   <li>Image editor Gimp 2.6.10
22261   <li>Virtual universe Celestia 1.6.0
22262   <li>Virtual stargazer Stellarium 0.10.4
22263   <li>3D modeler Blender 2.49.2 (new application)
22264   <li>Video editor Kdenlive 0.7.7 (new application)
22265 </ul></li>
22266 <li>Now using Kerberos for password checking (migration not finished).
22267     Enabled for:
22268 <ul>
22269   <li>PAM
22270   <li>LDAP
22271   <li>IMAP
22272   <li>SMTP (sender verification)
22273 </ul>
22274 </li>
22275 <li>New experimental roaming workstation profile for laptops.</li>
22276 <li>Show welcome page to users when they first log in. The URL is
22277     fetched from LDAP.</li>
22278 <li>New LXDE desktop option, in addition to KDE (default) and Gnome.</li>
22279 <li>General cleanup (not finished)</li>
22280 </ul>
22281 <p>The following features are not working as they should</p>
22282
22283 <ul>
22284 <li>No web based administration tool for creating users and groups. The
22285     scripts ldap-createuser-krb and ldap-add-user-to-group can be used
22286     for testing.</li>
22287 <li>DVD installs are missing debian-installer images for the PXE boot,
22288     and do not set up the PXE menu on eth0 because of this. LTSP
22289     clients should still boot from eth1 on thin client servers.</li>
22290 <li>The restructured KDE menu is not implemented.</li>
22291 <li>The LDAP server setup need to be reviewed for security.</li>
22292 <li>The LDAP directory structure need to be reworked.</li>
22293 <li>Different sets of packages are installed when using the DVD and the
22294     netinst CD. More packages are installed using the netinst CD.</li>
22295 <li>The jackd package fail to install. This is believed to be caused by
22296     some ongoing transition, and hopefully should be solved soon. The
22297     jackd1 package can be installed manually for those that need it.</li>
22298 <li>Some packages lack translations. See
22299     http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Squeeze for updated status,
22300     and help out with translations.</li>
22301 </ul>
22302
22303 <p>To download this multiarch netinstall release you can use</p>
22304
22305 <ul>
22306 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso</a></li>
22307 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso</a></li>
22308 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso</li>
22309 </ul>
22310 <p>To download this multiarch dvd release you can use</p>
22311
22312 <ul>
22313 <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso</a></li>
22314 <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso</a></li>
22315 <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/squeeze-alpha/debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso</li>
22316 </ul>
22317
22318 <p>There is no source DVD available yet. It will be prepared when we
22319 get closer to the final release.</p>
22320
22321 <p>The MD5SUM of these images are</p>
22322
22323 <ul>
22324 <li>3dbf45d59f42a53518b6e3c9ec3b5eb6 debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso</li>
22325 <li>22f2cbfce281d1c6e478be452638675d debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso</li>
22326 </ul>
22327
22328 <p>The SHA1SUM of these images are</p>
22329 <ul>
22330 <li>c53d1b69b40cf37cd27aefaf33f6f6a3821bedf0 debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-CD.iso</li>
22331 <li>2ec29d7db676d59d32197b05c277ffe16348376c debian-edu-6.0.0+edua0-DVD.iso</li>
22332 </ul>
22333 <p>How to report bugs:
22334 http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugsInBugzilla</p>
22335
22336 <p>Please direct replies to debian-edu@lists.debian.org</p>
22337 </blockquote>
22338
22339       </div>
22340       <div class="tags">
22341
22342
22343         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22344
22345
22346       </div>
22347     </div>
22348     <div class="padding"></div>
22349
22350     <div class="entry">
22351       <div class="title">
22352         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/One_step_closer_to_single_signon_in_Debian_Edu.html">One step closer to single signon in Debian Edu</a>
22353       </div>
22354       <div class="date">
22355         25th July 2010
22356       </div>
22357       <div class="body">
22358         <p>The last few months me and the other Debian Edu developers have
22359 been working hard to get the Debian/Squeeze based version of Debian
22360 Edu/Skolelinux into shape.  This future version will use Kerberos for
22361 authentication, and services are slowly migrated to single signon,
22362 getting rid of password questions one at the time.</p>
22363
22364 <p>It will also feature a roaming workstation profile with local home
22365 directory, for laptops that are only some times on the Skolelinux
22366 network, and for this profile a shortcut is created in Gnome and KDE
22367 to gain access to the users home directory on the file server.  This
22368 shortcut uses SMB at the moment, and yesterday I had time to test if
22369 SMB mounting had started working in KDE after we added the cifs-utils
22370 package.  I was pleasantly surprised how well it worked.</p>
22371
22372 <p>Thanks to the recent changes to our samba configuration to get it
22373 to use Kerberos for authentication, there were no question about user
22374 password when mounting the SMB volume.  A simple click on the shortcut
22375 in the KDE menu, and a window with the home directory popped
22376 up. :)</p>
22377
22378 <p>One step closer to a single signon solution out of the box in
22379 Debian Edu.  We already had PAM, LDAP, IMAP and SMTP in place, and now
22380 also Samba.  Next step is Cups and hopefully also NFS.</p>
22381
22382 <p>We had planned a alpha0 release of Debian Edu for today, but thanks
22383 to the autobuilder administrators for some architectures being slow to
22384 sign packages, we are still missing the fixed LTSP package we need for
22385 the release.  It was uploaded three days ago with urgency=high, and if
22386 it had entered testing yesterday we would have been able to test it in
22387 time for a alpha0 release today.  As the binaries for ia64 and powerpc
22388 still not uploaded to the Debian archive, we need to delay the alpha
22389 release another day.</p>
22390
22391 <p>If you want to help out with implementing Kerberos for Debian Edu,
22392 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
22393
22394       </div>
22395       <div class="tags">
22396
22397
22398         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
22399
22400
22401       </div>
22402     </div>
22403     <div class="padding"></div>
22404
22405     <div class="entry">
22406       <div class="title">
22407         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/OpenStreetmap_one_step_closer_to_having_routing_on_its_front_page.html">OpenStreetmap one step closer to having routing on its front page</a>
22408       </div>
22409       <div class="date">
22410         18th July 2010
22411       </div>
22412       <div class="body">
22413         <p>Thanks to
22414 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Opengeodata/~3/wUTCzDZk3lc/project-of-the-week-which-way-home">todays
22415 opengeodata blog entry</a>, I just discovered that the
22416 OpenStreetmap.org site have gotten
22417 <a href="http://nroets.dev.openstreetmap.org/demo/index.html?layers=B000FTFTT">support
22418 for calculating routes</a>.  The support is still experimental and
22419 only available from the development server, until more experience is
22420 gathered on the user interface and any scalability issues.</p>
22421
22422 <p>Earlier, the routing I knew about using the OpenStreetmap.org data
22423 was provided by <a href="http://maps.cloudmade.com/">Cloudmade</a>,
22424 but having it on the main page is required to make everyone aware of
22425 the issue.  I've had people reject Openstreetmap.org as a viable
22426 alternative for them because the front page lacked routing support,
22427 and I hope their needs will be catered for when routing show up on the
22428 www.openstreetmap.org front page.</p>
22429
22430       </div>
22431       <div class="tags">
22432
22433
22434         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
22435
22436
22437       </div>
22438     </div>
22439     <div class="padding"></div>
22440
22441     <div class="entry">
22442       <div class="title">
22443         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_are_they_searching_for___PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_in_LDAP.html">What are they searching for - PowerDNS and ISC DHCP in LDAP</a>
22444       </div>
22445       <div class="date">
22446         17th July 2010
22447       </div>
22448       <div class="body">
22449         <p>This is a
22450 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">followup</a>
22451 on my
22452 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_a_change_to_LDAP_schemas_allowing_DNS_and_DHCP_info_to_be_combined_into_one_object.html">previous
22453 work</a> on
22454 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">merging
22455 all</a> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.</p>
22456
22457 <p>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
22458 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
22459 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server.  The two
22460 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.</p>
22461
22462 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
22463 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
22464 on a Debian Edu main-server.  Here is a summary.
22465
22466 <p><strong>powerdns</strong></p>
22467
22468 <a href="http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend">Clues
22469 on how to</a> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
22470 the web.
22471
22472 <p>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
22473 One "strict" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
22474 using the same LDAP objects, and a "tree" mode where the forward and
22475 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
22476 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
22477 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.</p>
22478
22479 <p>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
22480 base, and uses a "base" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
22481 "dc=tjener,dc=intern," to the base with a filter for
22482 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" for the forward entry and
22483 "dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa," with a filter for
22484 "(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)" for the reverse entry.  For
22485 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
22486 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
22487 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
22488 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
22489 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
22490 spfrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entries it is looking for
22491 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
22492 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
22493 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  The equivalent
22494 ldapsearch commands could look like this:</p>
22495
22496 <blockquote><pre>
22497 ldapsearch -h ldap \
22498   -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
22499   -s base -x '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
22500   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
22501   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
22502   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
22503   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
22504
22505 ldapsearch -h ldap \
22506   -b dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
22507   -s base -x '(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)'
22508   dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
22509   hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
22510   srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
22511 </pre></blockquote>
22512
22513 <p>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
22514 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
22515 example LDAP objects used there.  In addition to these objects, the
22516 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22517 also exist.</p>
22518
22519 <blockquote><pre>
22520 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22521 objectclass: top
22522 objectclass: dnsdomain
22523 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
22524 dc: tjener
22525 arecord: 10.0.2.2
22526 associateddomain: tjener.intern
22527
22528 dn: dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22529 objectclass: top
22530 objectclass: dnsdomain2
22531 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
22532 dc: 2
22533 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
22534 associateddomain: 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
22535 </pre></blockquote>
22536
22537 <p>In strict mode, the server behaves differently.  When looking for
22538 forward DNS entries, it is doing a "subtree" scoped search with the
22539 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
22540 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
22541 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
22542 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
22543 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entires it also do a
22544 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is "(arecord=10.0.2.2)"
22545 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
22546 modifytimestamp.  In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
22547 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
22548 instead.</p>
22549
22550 <p>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
22551 like this:</p>
22552
22553 <blockquote><pre>
22554 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
22555   '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
22556   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
22557   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
22558   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
22559   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
22560
22561 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
22562   '(arecord=10.0.2.2)' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
22563 </pre></blockquote>
22564
22565 <p>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
22566 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
22567 reverse lookups.</p>
22568
22569 <p>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
22570 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
22571 need to generate a DNS reply.  This make it able to work with any
22572 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.</p>
22573
22574 <p>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC 1274) and
22575 dnsdomain2 schemas.  The latter is used for reverse entries like
22576 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.</p>
22577
22578 <p>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
22579 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
22580 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain).  The use
22581 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
22582 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.</p>
22583
22584 <p>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
22585 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
22586 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
22587 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
22588 (zonename and relativedomainname).</p>
22589
22590 <p>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
22591 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
22592 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
22593 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
22594 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
22595 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):</p>
22596
22597 <blockquote><pre>
22598 objectclass ( some-oid NAME 'dnsDomainAux'
22599     SUP top
22600     AUXILIARY
22601     MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
22602           DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
22603           TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
22604           NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
22605           A6Record $ DNAMERecord
22606     ))
22607 </pre></blockquote>
22608
22609 <p>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
22610 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
22611 all the attributes PowerDNS wants.  I've sent an email to the PowerDNS
22612 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
22613 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
22614 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.</p>
22615
22616 <p><strong>ISC dhcp</strong></p>
22617
22618 <p>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
22619 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want.  This
22620 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
22621 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
22622 what is needed without having to read the source code.</p>
22623
22624 <p>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
22625 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
22626 stored.  These are the relevant entries from
22627 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:</p>
22628
22629 <blockquote><pre>
22630 ldap-base-dn "dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no";
22631 ldap-dhcp-server-cn "dhcp";
22632 </pre></blockquote>
22633
22634 <p>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
22635 configuration it need.  The cn "dhcp" is located using the given LDAP
22636 base and the filter "(&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))".  The
22637 search result is this entry:</p>
22638
22639 <blockquote><pre>
22640 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22641 cn: dhcp
22642 objectClass: top
22643 objectClass: dhcpServer
22644 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22645 </pre></blockquote>
22646
22647 <p>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
22648 subtree with DHCP configuration.  The DHCP configuration subtree base
22649 is located using a base scope search with base "cn=DHCP
22650 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" and filter
22651 "(&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))".
22652 The search result is this entry:</p>
22653
22654 <blockquote><pre>
22655 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22656 cn: DHCP Config
22657 objectClass: top
22658 objectClass: dhcpService
22659 objectClass: dhcpOptions
22660 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22661 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
22662 dhcpStatements: authoritative
22663 dhcpOption: smtp-server code 69 = array of ip-address
22664 dhcpOption: www-server code 72 = array of ip-address
22665 dhcpOption: wpad-url code 252 = text
22666 </pre></blockquote>
22667
22668 <p>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time.  When
22669 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
22670 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
22671 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
22672 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost.  These provide options
22673 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc.  Leaving out the
22674 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
22675 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
22676 related computer objects.</p>
22677
22678 <p>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
22679 of the client (00:00:00:00:00:00 in this example), using a subtree
22680 scoped search with "cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" as
22681 the base and "(&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
22682 00:00:00:00:00:00))" as the filter.  This is what a host object look
22683 like:</p>
22684
22685 <blockquote><pre>
22686 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22687 cn: hostname
22688 objectClass: top
22689 objectClass: dhcpHost
22690 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
22691 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
22692 </pre></blockquote>
22693
22694 <p>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
22695 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
22696 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure.  On the
22697 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
22698 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries.  The latter should make
22699 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
22700 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
22701 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
22702 structural object class.
22703
22704 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
22705
22706 <p>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
22707 to which LDAP schemas to use.  While its "tree" mode is rigid when it
22708 come to the the LDAP structure, the "strict" mode is very flexible,
22709 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
22710 in the configuration.</p>
22711
22712 <p>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
22713 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
22714 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
22715 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
22716 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
22717 structure.</p>
22718
22719 <p>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
22720 this might work for Debian Edu:</p>
22721
22722 <blockquote><pre>
22723 ou=services
22724   cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
22725     cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
22726     cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
22727       cn=10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
22728         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
22729     cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
22730       cn=192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
22731         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
22732     ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
22733       cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
22734 </pre></blockquote>
22735
22736 <P>This is not tested yet.  If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
22737 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
22738 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
22739 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.</p>
22740
22741 <p>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
22742 like this:</p>
22743
22744 <blockquote><pre>
22745 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22746 dc: hostname
22747 objectClass: top
22748 objectClass: dhcpHost
22749 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
22750 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
22751 associateddomain: hostname.intern
22752 arecord: 10.11.12.13
22753 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
22754 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
22755 </pre></blockquote>
22756
22757 </p>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
22758 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
22759 auxiliary object class.</p>
22760
22761       </div>
22762       <div class="tags">
22763
22764
22765         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22766
22767
22768       </div>
22769     </div>
22770     <div class="padding"></div>
22771
22772     <div class="entry">
22773       <div class="title">
22774         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects</a>
22775       </div>
22776       <div class="date">
22777         14th July 2010
22778       </div>
22779       <div class="body">
22780         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
22781 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
22782 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
22783 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
22784 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.</p>
22785
22786 <p>I've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
22787 information finally found a solution that seem to work.</p>
22788
22789 <p>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
22790 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry.  If
22791 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
22792 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
22793 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
22794 to a slave DNS server.</p>
22795
22796 <p>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
22797 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
22798 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
22799 I've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
22800 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup.  It
22801 seem to work.</p>
22802
22803 <p>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
22804 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
22805 an earlier email.  The combined LDAP object will look something like
22806 this:</p>
22807
22808 <blockquote><pre>
22809   dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
22810   cn: hostname
22811   objectClass: dhcphost
22812   objectclass: domainrelatedobject
22813   objectclass: dnsdomainaux
22814   associateddomain: hostname.intern
22815   arecord: 10.11.12.13
22816   dhcphwaddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
22817   dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
22818   ldapconfigsound: Y
22819 </pre></blockquote>
22820
22821 <p>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
22822 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
22823 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress.  LTSP will use
22824 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.</p>
22825
22826 <p>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
22827 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
22828 outside the "DHCP Config" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
22829 that.  If I can't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
22830 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
22831 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
22832 content.  I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
22833 might be a good place to put it.</p>
22834
22835 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
22836 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
22837
22838       </div>
22839       <div class="tags">
22840
22841
22842         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22843
22844
22845       </div>
22846     </div>
22847     <div class="padding"></div>
22848
22849     <div class="entry">
22850       <div class="title">
22851         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html">Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP</a>
22852       </div>
22853       <div class="date">
22854         11th July 2010
22855       </div>
22856       <div class="body">
22857         <p>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
22858 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
22859 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
22860 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.</p>
22861
22862 <p>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
22863 to get configuration from LDAP.  The idea is to look up the MAC
22864 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
22865 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
22866 LTSP clients.</p>
22867
22868 <p>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
22869 in a "computer" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
22870 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.</p>
22871
22872 <p>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
22873 this approach.  A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
22874 need to be written.  Comments, suggestions, etc?</p>
22875
22876 <blockquote><pre>
22877 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
22878 #
22879 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
22880 #
22881 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
22882 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
22883 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
22884 #
22885 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
22886 # existence of attribute names.
22887 #
22888 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
22889 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
22890 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
22891 #
22892 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
22893 # configuration settings.  Something like this should work:
22894 #
22895 # objectclass ( 1.1.2.2 NAME 'ltspClientAux'
22896 #     SUP top
22897 #     AUXILIARY
22898 #     MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
22899
22900 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
22901 if [ "$LDAPSERVER" ] ; then
22902     LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
22903     for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk '{print $5}'|sort -u) ; do
22904         filter="(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))"
22905         ldapsearch -h "$LDAPSERVER" -b "$LDAPBASE" -v -x "$filter" | \
22906             grep '^ltspConfig' | while read attr value ; do
22907             # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
22908             attr=$(echo $attr | sed 's/^ltspConfig//i' | tr a-z A-Z)
22909             # bass value on to clients
22910             eval "$attr=$value; export $attr"
22911         done
22912     done
22913 fi
22914 </pre></blockquote>
22915
22916 <p>I'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
22917 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
22918 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
22919 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
22920 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)</p>
22921
22922 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
22923 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
22924
22925 <p>Update 2010-07-17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
22926 configuration in LDAP that was created around year 2000 by
22927 <a href="http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html">PC
22928 Xperience, Inc., 2000</a>.  I found its
22929 <a href="http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/">files</a> on a
22930 personal home page over at redhat.com.</p>
22931
22932       </div>
22933       <div class="tags">
22934
22935
22936         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22937
22938
22939       </div>
22940     </div>
22941     <div class="padding"></div>
22942
22943     <div class="entry">
22944       <div class="title">
22945         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
22946       </div>
22947       <div class="date">
22948          9th July 2010
22949       </div>
22950       <div class="body">
22951         <p>Since
22952 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">my
22953 last post</a> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
22954 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma.  The java application
22955 <a href="http://jxplorer.org/">jXplorer</a> is claimed to be capable of
22956 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
22957 authenticate using Kerberos.  I have only tested the Kerberos
22958 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
22959 LDAP with my test user yet.  It is
22960 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html">available in
22961 Debian</a> testing and unstable at the moment.  The only problem I
22962 have with it is how it handle errors.  If something go wrong, its
22963 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
22964 and remove the failing query.  Nothing big, but very annoying.</p>
22965
22966       </div>
22967       <div class="tags">
22968
22969
22970         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
22971
22972
22973       </div>
22974     </div>
22975     <div class="padding"></div>
22976
22977     <div class="entry">
22978       <div class="title">
22979         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__apt_vs_aptitude_with_the_Gnome_desktop.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades, apt vs aptitude with the Gnome desktop</a>
22980       </div>
22981       <div class="date">
22982          3rd July 2010
22983       </div>
22984       <div class="body">
22985         <p>Here is a short update on my <a
22986 href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">my
22987 Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing</a>.  Here is a summary of the
22988 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude.  I'm
22989 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
22990 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
22991 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> and
22992 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585716">#585716</a>).</p>
22993
22994 <p>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
22995 complete list of the installed packages.  Based on this I see these
22996 differences when I did a test run today.  As usual, I do not really
22997 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
22998 publish the difference.</p>
22999
23000 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
23001
23002 <blockquote><p>
23003   at-spi cpp-4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
23004   libatspi1.0-0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-1-common
23005   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
23006   libgtksourceview-common libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
23007   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
23008   libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
23009   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
23010   python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
23011 </p></blockquote>
23012
23013 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
23014
23015 <blockquote><p>
23016   bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
23017   gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
23018   libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-50
23019   libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
23020   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9
23021   libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3
23022   libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
23023   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
23024   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
23025   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
23026   libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
23027   libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++10
23028   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
23029   libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5
23030   libparted1.8-10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
23031   libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
23032   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1
23033   libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
23034   libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
23035   mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
23036 </p></blockquote>
23037
23038 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
23039
23040 <blockquote><p>
23041   gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
23042   python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
23043   xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
23044   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
23045   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
23046   xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
23047   xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
23048   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
23049   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
23050   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
23051   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
23052   xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
23053   xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
23054   xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
23055   xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
23056   xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
23057   xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
23058   xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
23059   xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
23060   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
23061   xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
23062 </p></blockquote>
23063
23064 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
23065
23066 <blockquote><p>
23067   deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
23068   xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
23069   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
23070 </p></blockquote>
23071
23072 <p>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
23073 <a href="http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120">changed
23074 in git</a> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
23075 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
23076 the difference somewhat.
23077
23078       </div>
23079       <div class="tags">
23080
23081
23082         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
23083
23084
23085       </div>
23086     </div>
23087     <div class="padding"></div>
23088
23089     <div class="entry">
23090       <div class="title">
23091         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Caching_password__user_and_group_on_a_roaming_Debian_laptop.html">Caching password, user and group on a roaming Debian laptop</a>
23092       </div>
23093       <div class="date">
23094          1st July 2010
23095       </div>
23096       <div class="body">
23097         <p>For a laptop, centralized user directories and password checking is
23098 a bit troubling.  Laptops are typically used also when not connected
23099 to the network, and it is vital for a user to be able to log in or
23100 unlock the screen saver also when a central server is unavailable.
23101 This is possible by caching passwords and directory information (user
23102 and group attributes) locally, and the packages to do so are available
23103 in Debian.  Here follow two recipes to set this up in Debian/Squeeze.
23104 It is also possible to set up in Debian/Lenny, but require more manual
23105 setup there because pam-auth-update is missing in Lenny.</p>
23106
23107 <h2>LDAP/Kerberos + nscd + libpam-ccreds + libpam-mklocaluser/pam_mkhomedir</h2>
23108
23109 This is the traditional method with a twist.  The password caching is
23110 provided by libpam-ccreds (version 10-4 or later is needed on
23111 Squeeze), and the directory caching is done by nscd.  The directory
23112 lookup and password checking is done using LDAP.  If one want to use
23113 Kerberos for password checking the libpam-ldapd package can be
23114 replaced with libpam-krb5 or libpam-heimdal.  If one is happy having a
23115 local home directory with the path listed in LDAP, one can use the
23116 pam_mkhomedir module from pam-modules to make this happen instead of
23117 using libpam-mklocaluser.  A setup for pam-auth-update to enable
23118 pam_mkhomedir will have to be written until a fix for
23119 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/568577">bug #568577</a> is in the
23120 archive.  Because I believe it is a bad idea to have local home
23121 directories using misleading paths like /site/server/partition/, I
23122 prefer to create a local user with the home directory in /home/.  This
23123 is done using the libpam-mklocaluser package.</p>
23124
23125 <p>These packages need to be installed and configured</p>
23126
23127 <blockquote><pre>
23128 libnss-ldapd libpam-ldapd nscd libpam-ccreds libpam-mklocaluser
23129 </pre></blockquote>
23130
23131 <p>The ldapd packages will ask for LDAP connection information, and
23132 one have to fill in the values that fits ones own site.  Make sure the
23133 PAM part uses encrypted connections, to make sure the password is not
23134 sent in clear text to the LDAP server.  I've been unable to get TLS
23135 certificate checking for a self signed certificate working, which make
23136 LDAP authentication unsafe for Debian Edu (nslcd is not checking if it
23137 is talking to the correct LDAP server), and very much welcome feedback
23138 on how to get this working.</p>
23139
23140 <p>Because nscd do not have a default configuration fit for offline
23141 caching until <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/485282">bug #485282</a>
23142 is fixed, this configuration should be used instead of the one
23143 currently in /etc/nscd.conf.  The changes are in the fields
23144 reload-count and positive-time-to-live, and is based on the
23145 instructions I found in the
23146 <a href="http://www.flyn.org/laptopldap/">LDAP for Mobile Laptops</a>
23147 instructions by Flyn Computing.</p>
23148
23149 <blockquote><pre>
23150         debug-level             0
23151         reload-count            unlimited
23152         paranoia                no
23153
23154         enable-cache            passwd          yes
23155         positive-time-to-live   passwd          2592000
23156         negative-time-to-live   passwd          20
23157         suggested-size          passwd          211
23158         check-files             passwd          yes
23159         persistent              passwd          yes
23160         shared                  passwd          yes
23161         max-db-size             passwd          33554432
23162         auto-propagate          passwd          yes
23163
23164         enable-cache            group           yes
23165         positive-time-to-live   group           2592000
23166         negative-time-to-live   group           20
23167         suggested-size          group           211
23168         check-files             group           yes
23169         persistent              group           yes
23170         shared                  group           yes
23171         max-db-size             group           33554432
23172         auto-propagate          group           yes
23173
23174         enable-cache            hosts           no
23175         positive-time-to-live   hosts           2592000
23176         negative-time-to-live   hosts           20
23177         suggested-size          hosts           211
23178         check-files             hosts           yes
23179         persistent              hosts           yes
23180         shared                  hosts           yes
23181         max-db-size             hosts           33554432
23182
23183         enable-cache            services        yes
23184         positive-time-to-live   services        2592000
23185         negative-time-to-live   services        20
23186         suggested-size          services        211
23187         check-files             services        yes
23188         persistent              services        yes
23189         shared                  services        yes
23190         max-db-size             services        33554432
23191 </pre></blockquote>
23192
23193 <p>While we wait for a mechanism to update /etc/nsswitch.conf
23194 automatically like the one provided in
23195 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/496915">bug #496915</a>, the file
23196 content need to be manually replaced to ensure LDAP is used as the
23197 directory service on the machine.  /etc/nsswitch.conf should normally
23198 look like this:</p>
23199
23200 <blockquote><pre>
23201 passwd:         files ldap
23202 group:          files ldap
23203 shadow:         files ldap
23204 hosts:          files mdns4_minimal [NOTFOUND=return] dns mdns4
23205 networks:       files
23206 protocols:      files
23207 services:       files
23208 ethers:         files
23209 rpc:            files
23210 netgroup:       files ldap
23211 </pre></blockquote>
23212
23213 <p>The important parts are that ldap is listed last for passwd, group,
23214 shadow and netgroup.</p>
23215
23216 <p>With these changes in place, any user in LDAP will be able to log
23217 in locally on the machine using for example kdm, get a local home
23218 directory created and have the password as well as user and group
23219 attributes cached.
23220
23221 <h2>LDAP/Kerberos + nss-updatedb + libpam-ccreds +
23222   libpam-mklocaluser/pam_mkhomedir</h2>
23223
23224 <p>Because nscd have had its share of problems, and seem to have
23225 problems doing proper caching, I've seen suggestions and recipes to
23226 use nss-updatedb to copy parts of the LDAP database locally when the
23227 LDAP database is available.  I have not tested such setup, because I
23228 discovered sssd.</p>
23229
23230 <h2>LDAP/Kerberos + sssd + libpam-mklocaluser</h2>
23231
23232 <p>A more flexible and robust setup than the nscd combination
23233 mentioned earlier that has shown up recently, is the
23234 <a href="https://fedorahosted.org/sssd/">sssd</a> package from Redhat.
23235 It is part of the <a href="http://www.freeipa.org/">FreeIPA</A> project
23236 to provide a Active Directory like directory service for Linux
23237 machines.  The sssd system combines the caching of passwords and user
23238 information into one package, and remove the need for nscd and
23239 libpam-ccreds.  It support LDAP and Kerberos, but not NIS.  Version
23240 1.2 do not support netgroups, but it is said that it will support this
23241 in version 1.5 expected to show up later in 2010.  Because the
23242 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/s/sssd.html">sssd package</a>
23243 was missing in Debian, I ended up co-maintaining it with Werner, and
23244 version 1.2 is now in testing.
23245
23246 <p>These packages need to be installed and configured to get the
23247 roaming setup I want</p>
23248
23249 <blockquote><pre>
23250 libpam-sss libnss-sss libpam-mklocaluser
23251 </pre></blockquote>
23252
23253 The complete setup of sssd is done by editing/creating
23254 <tt>/etc/sssd/sssd.conf</tt>.
23255
23256 <blockquote><pre>
23257 [sssd]
23258 config_file_version = 2
23259 reconnection_retries = 3
23260 sbus_timeout = 30
23261 services = nss, pam
23262 domains = INTERN
23263
23264 [nss]
23265 filter_groups = root
23266 filter_users = root
23267 reconnection_retries = 3
23268
23269 [pam]
23270 reconnection_retries = 3
23271
23272 [domain/INTERN]
23273 enumerate = false
23274 cache_credentials = true
23275
23276 id_provider = ldap
23277 auth_provider = ldap
23278 chpass_provider = ldap
23279
23280 ldap_uri = ldap://ldap
23281 ldap_search_base = dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
23282 ldap_tls_reqcert = never
23283 ldap_tls_cacert = /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
23284 </pre></blockquote>
23285
23286 <p>I got the same problem here with certificate checking.  Had to set
23287 "ldap_tls_reqcert = never" to get it working.</p>
23288
23289 <p>With the libnss-sss package in testing at the moment, the
23290 nsswitch.conf file is update automatically, so there is no need to
23291 modify it manually.</p>
23292
23293 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
23294 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
23295
23296       </div>
23297       <div class="tags">
23298
23299
23300         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
23301
23302
23303       </div>
23304     </div>
23305     <div class="padding"></div>
23306
23307     <div class="entry">
23308       <div class="title">
23309         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
23310       </div>
23311       <div class="date">
23312         28th June 2010
23313       </div>
23314       <div class="body">
23315         <p>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
23316 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
23317 tool to browse the LDAP tree.  The only one I was able to find in
23318 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
23319 <a href="http://luma.sourceforge.net/">LUMA</a>, which has proved to
23320 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
23321 populated by default in Skolelinux.  Thanks to it, I have been able to
23322 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
23323 objects.  It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze.  If you
23324 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)</p>
23325
23326 <p>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
23327 the BTS yet.  There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
23328 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
23329 Debian submenu in KDE.  I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
23330 released.</p>
23331
23332 <p>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet.  I would
23333 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
23334 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet.  So in the mean time, I use
23335 <a href="http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/">ldapvi</a> for that.</p>
23336
23337 <p>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
23338 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
23339
23340 <p>Update 2010-06-29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
23341 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html">gq</a> package as a
23342 useful GUI alternative.  It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
23343 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze.  Unless that
23344 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.</p>
23345
23346       </div>
23347       <div class="tags">
23348
23349
23350         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
23351
23352
23353       </div>
23354     </div>
23355     <div class="padding"></div>
23356
23357     <div class="entry">
23358       <div class="title">
23359         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_a_change_to_LDAP_schemas_allowing_DNS_and_DHCP_info_to_be_combined_into_one_object.html">Idea for a change to LDAP schemas allowing DNS and DHCP info to be combined into one object</a>
23360       </div>
23361       <div class="date">
23362         24th June 2010
23363       </div>
23364       <div class="body">
23365         <p>A while back, I
23366 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
23367 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
23368 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
23369 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
23370
23371 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
23372 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
23373 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
23374 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
23375
23376 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
23377 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
23378 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
23379 Debian Edu.</p>
23380
23381 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
23382 the
23383 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
23384 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
23385 available today from IETF.</p>
23386
23387 <pre>
23388 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
23389 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
23390 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
23391  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
23392         NAME 'dhcpHost'
23393         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
23394 -       SUP top
23395 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
23396         MUST cn
23397         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
23398         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
23399 </pre>
23400
23401 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
23402 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
23403 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
23404
23405 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
23406 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
23407
23408       </div>
23409       <div class="tags">
23410
23411
23412         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
23413
23414
23415       </div>
23416     </div>
23417     <div class="padding"></div>
23418
23419     <div class="entry">
23420       <div class="title">
23421         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Calling_tasksel_like_the_installer__while_still_getting_useful_output.html">Calling tasksel like the installer, while still getting useful output</a>
23422       </div>
23423       <div class="date">
23424         16th June 2010
23425       </div>
23426       <div class="body">
23427         <p>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
23428 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run.  Until now,
23429 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
23430 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
23431 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
23432 this:
23433
23434 <blockquote><pre>
23435 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
23436 tasksel --new-install
23437 </pre></blockquote>
23438
23439 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
23440 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
23441 any output what so ever.
23442
23443 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
23444 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
23445 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
23446 happen.  Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
23447 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
23448 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run.  I ended up using
23449 code like this:
23450
23451 <blockquote><pre>
23452 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
23453 cmd="$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed 's/debconf-apt-progress -- //')"
23454 $cmd
23455 </pre></blockquote>
23456
23457 <p>The content of $cmd is typically something like "<tt>aptitude -q
23458 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
23459 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
23460 ~pimportant</tt>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
23461 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
23462 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
23463 installation.</p>
23464
23465 <p>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
23466 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
23467 like this.</p>
23468
23469       </div>
23470       <div class="tags">
23471
23472
23473         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
23474
23475
23476       </div>
23477     </div>
23478     <div class="padding"></div>
23479
23480     <div class="entry">
23481       <div class="title">
23482         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Officeshots_taking_shape.html">Officeshots taking shape</a>
23483       </div>
23484       <div class="date">
23485         13th June 2010
23486       </div>
23487       <div class="body">
23488         <p>For those of us caring about document exchange and
23489 interoperability, <a href="http://www.officeshots.org/">OfficeShots</a>
23490 is a great service.  It is to ODF documents what
23491 <a href="http://browsershots.org/">BrowserShots</a> is for web
23492 pages.</p>
23493
23494 <p>A while back, I was contacted by Knut Yrvin at the part of Nokia
23495 that used to be Trolltech, who wanted to help the OfficeShots project
23496 and wondered if the University of Oslo where I work would be
23497 interested in supporting the project.  I helped him to navigate his
23498 request to the right people at work, and his request was answered with
23499 a spot in the machine room with power and network connected, and Knut
23500 arranged funding for a machine to fill the spot.  The machine is
23501 administrated by the OfficeShots people, so I do not have daily
23502 contact with its progress, and thus from time to time check back to
23503 see how the project is doing.</p>
23504
23505 <p>Today I had a look, and was happy to see that the Dell box in our
23506 machine room now is the host for several virtual machines running as
23507 OfficeShots factories, and the project is able to render ODF documents
23508 in 17 different document processing implementation on Linux and
23509 Windows.  This is great.</p>
23510
23511       </div>
23512       <div class="tags">
23513
23514
23515         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
23516
23517
23518       </div>
23519     </div>
23520     <div class="padding"></div>
23521
23522     <div class="entry">
23523       <div class="title">
23524         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lenny__Squeeze_upgrades__removals_by_apt_and_aptitude.html">Lenny->Squeeze upgrades, removals by apt and aptitude</a>
23525       </div>
23526       <div class="date">
23527         13th June 2010
23528       </div>
23529       <div class="body">
23530         <p>My
23531 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">testing
23532 of Debian upgrades</a> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've
23533 finally made the upgrade logs available from
23534 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/</a>.
23535 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
23536 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting.  This time
23537 I will only focus on their removal plans.</p>
23538
23539 <p>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
23540 to remove 72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze.  The
23541 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
23542 xserver-xorg-video* drivers.  Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
23543 sure why.  When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove 129
23544 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
23545 longer needed.  Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
23546 I do not know.  Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?</p>
23547
23548 <p>For KDE, apt-get want to remove 82 packages, among them kdebase
23549 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
23550 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove 192 packages, none which are
23551 too surprising.</p>
23552
23553 <p>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
23554 and avoided, and perhaps others as well.  Here are the complete list
23555 of planned removals.  The complete logs is available from the URL
23556 above.  Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
23557 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
23558 conffile questions.  No idea why.  I worked around it by using
23559 '<tt>echo >> /proc/<em>pidofdpkg</em>/fd/0</tt>' to tell dpkg to
23560 continue.</p>
23561
23562 <p><b>apt-get gnome 72</b>
23563 <br>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
23564   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
23565   iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-1-0
23566   libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
23567   nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
23568   serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
23569   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
23570   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
23571   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
23572   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
23573   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
23574   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
23575   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
23576   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
23577   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
23578   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
23579   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
23580   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
23581   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
23582   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
23583   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
23584   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
23585   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
23586   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
23587   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
23588   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
23589   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
23590   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9
23591   xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support</p>
23592
23593 <p><b>aptitude gnome 129</b>
23594
23595 <br>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
23596   djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
23597   gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
23598   gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
23599   libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
23600   libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
23601   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20
23602   libeel2-data libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libfaad0 libgail-common
23603   libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libgdl-1-0 libgdl-1-common
23604   libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0
23605   libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-0
23606   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
23607   libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
23608   libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6
23609   libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++10
23610   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
23611   libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2
23612   libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10
23613   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-8
23614   libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8 libssh2-1
23615   libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
23616   libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
23617   libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
23618   libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
23619   openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
23620   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
23621   python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
23622   python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
23623   swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
23624   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
23625   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
23626   zip</p>
23627
23628 <p><b>apt-get kde 82</b>
23629
23630 <br>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
23631   kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
23632   kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
23633   kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
23634   kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
23635   libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
23636   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
23637   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
23638   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
23639   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
23640   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
23641   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
23642   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
23643   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
23644   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
23645   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
23646   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
23647   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
23648   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
23649   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
23650   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
23651   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
23652   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
23653   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
23654   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
23655   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
23656   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
23657   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9</p>
23658
23659 <p><b>aptitude kde 192</b>
23660 <br>bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
23661   djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
23662   ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
23663   kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
23664   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
23665   kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
23666   kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
23667   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
23668   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
23669   kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
23670   kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
23671   klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
23672   kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
23673   krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
23674   ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
23675   kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
23676   kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
23677   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
23678   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
23679   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
23680   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
23681   libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0
23682   libicu38 libiec61883-0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
23683   libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
23684   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
23685   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
23686   libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
23687   libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 libsmbios2
23688   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
23689   libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
23690   libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
23691   openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
23692   superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
23693   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
23694   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
23695   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
23696   xulrunner-1.9</p>
23697
23698
23699       </div>
23700       <div class="tags">
23701
23702
23703         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
23704
23705
23706       </div>
23707     </div>
23708     <div class="padding"></div>
23709
23710     <div class="entry">
23711       <div class="title">
23712         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze</a>
23713       </div>
23714       <div class="date">
23715         11th June 2010
23716       </div>
23717       <div class="body">
23718         <p>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
23719 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly.  A few bugs
23720 have been discovered and reported in the process
23721 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585410">#585410</a> in nagios3-cgi,
23722 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584879">#584879</a> already fixed in
23723 enscript and <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> in
23724 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
23725 am working on a script to automate the test.</p>
23726
23727 <p>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
23728 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
23729 it.  To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
23730 script is inserted.  To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
23731 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
23732 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).</p>
23733
23734 <p>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
23735 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
23736 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
23737 is created.  The bug report
23738 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566000">#566000</a> make me suspect
23739 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
23740 to make sure the upgrade go well.  Testing on virtual and real
23741 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
23742 do the trick in such settings anyway.  This is a
23743 <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-804130/">known
23744 issue</a> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
23745 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
23746 working with old kernels or something like that.  I really wish the
23747 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
23748 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
23749 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
23750 Debian Squeeze.</p>
23751
23752 <p>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades.  This test
23753 script, which I call <tt>upgrade-test</tt> for now, is doing the
23754 trick:</p>
23755
23756 <blockquote><pre>
23757 #!/bin/sh
23758 set -ex
23759
23760 if [ "$1" ] ; then
23761     desktop=$1
23762 else
23763     desktop=gnome
23764 fi
23765
23766 from=lenny
23767 to=squeeze
23768
23769 exec &lt; /dev/null
23770 unset LANG
23771 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
23772 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
23773 fuser -mv .
23774 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
23775 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
23776 cat > $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d &lt;&lt;EOF
23777 #!/bin/sh
23778 exit 101
23779 EOF
23780 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
23781 exit_cleanup() {
23782     umount $tmpdir/proc
23783 }
23784 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
23785 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
23786 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
23787
23788 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
23789
23790 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger.  It need the test scripts
23791 # to return the correct answers.
23792 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
23793     chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
23794
23795 # Include the desktop and laptop task
23796 for test in desktop laptop ; do
23797     echo > $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test &lt;&lt;EOF
23798 #!/bin/sh
23799 exit 2
23800 EOF
23801     chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
23802 done
23803
23804 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
23805 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
23806 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
23807 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
23808
23809 echo deb $mirror $to main > $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
23810 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
23811 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
23812 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
23813 fuser -mv
23814 </pre></blockquote>
23815
23816 <p>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
23817 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
23818 differently so far.  I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
23819 regularly and post the result on the web.  The Gnome upgrade currently
23820 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
23821 kdebase-workspace-data</p>
23822
23823 <p>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
23824 (KDE 167 KiB, Gnome 516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
23825 post, so I will refrain from trying.  I can report that for Gnome,
23826 aptitude report 760 packages upgraded, 448 newly installed, 129 to
23827 remove and 1 not upgraded and 1024MB need to be downloaded while for
23828 KDE the same numbers are 702 packages upgraded, 507 newly installed,
23829 193 to remove and 0 not upgraded and 1117MB need to be downloaded</p>
23830
23831 <p>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
23832 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
23833 booting without a hitch.  Was unsure if there were still bugs with
23834 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
23835 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
23836 packages.</p>
23837
23838       </div>
23839       <div class="tags">
23840
23841
23842         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
23843
23844
23845       </div>
23846     </div>
23847     <div class="padding"></div>
23848
23849     <div class="entry">
23850       <div class="title">
23851         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Upstart_or_sysvinit___as_init_d_scripts_see_it.html">Upstart or sysvinit - as init.d scripts see it</a>
23852       </div>
23853       <div class="date">
23854          6th June 2010
23855       </div>
23856       <div class="body">
23857         <p>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
23858 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
23859 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd.  The packages with such
23860 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
23861 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart.  Because of
23862 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
23863 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.</p>
23864
23865 <p>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
23866 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
23867 COLUMNS):</p>
23868
23869 <blockquote><pre>
23870 DEFAULT_RUNLEVEL=2
23871 previous=N
23872 PREVLEVEL=
23873 RUNLEVEL=
23874 runlevel=S
23875 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
23876 UPSTART_INSTANCE=
23877 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
23878 </pre></blockquote>
23879
23880 <p>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
23881 script.</p>
23882
23883 <blockquote><pre>
23884 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-2.88
23885 previous=N
23886 PREVLEVEL=N
23887 RUNLEVEL=S
23888 runlevel=S
23889 </pre></blockquote>
23890
23891 <p>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
23892 sysvinit are not set by upstart.  Not sure if it is intentional or not
23893 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.</p>
23894
23895 <p>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
23896 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
23897 choice.</p>
23898
23899       </div>
23900       <div class="tags">
23901
23902
23903         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
23904
23905
23906       </div>
23907     </div>
23908     <div class="padding"></div>
23909
23910     <div class="entry">
23911       <div class="title">
23912         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html">A manual for standards wars...</a>
23913       </div>
23914       <div class="date">
23915          6th June 2010
23916       </div>
23917       <div class="body">
23918         <p>Via the
23919 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html">blog
23920 of Rob Weir</a> I came across the very interesting essay named
23921 <a href="http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf">The Art of
23922 Standards Wars</a> (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
23923 following the standards wars of today.</p>
23924
23925       </div>
23926       <div class="tags">
23927
23928
23929         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
23930
23931
23932       </div>
23933     </div>
23934     <div class="padding"></div>
23935
23936     <div class="entry">
23937       <div class="title">
23938         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_computer_hardware_models_used_at_site.html">Sitesummary tip: Listing computer hardware models used at site</a>
23939       </div>
23940       <div class="date">
23941          3rd June 2010
23942       </div>
23943       <div class="body">
23944         <p>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
23945 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
23946 information extracted from each machine.  The script to do so is
23947 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
23948 the Skolelinux build servers:</p>
23949
23950 <blockquote><pre>
23951 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
23952   vendor                    count
23953   Dell Computer Corporation     1
23954     PowerEdge 1750              1
23955   IBM                           1
23956     eserver xSeries 345 -[8670M1X]-     1
23957   Intel                         2
23958   [no-dmi-info]                 3
23959 maintainer:~#
23960 </pre></blockquote>
23961
23962 <p>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
23963 provided in each machine.  Here there are Intel machines without model
23964 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
23965 machines listed as [no-dmi-info].  One can add -l as a command line
23966 option to list the individual machines.</p>
23967
23968 <p>A larger list is
23969 <a href="http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/">available from the the
23970 city of Narvik</a>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
23971 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly.  In their report there
23972 are ~1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
23973 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
23974 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
23975 collector.</p>
23976
23977       </div>
23978       <div class="tags">
23979
23980
23981         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary</a>.
23982
23983
23984       </div>
23985     </div>
23986     <div class="padding"></div>
23987
23988     <div class="entry">
23989       <div class="title">
23990         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/KDM_fail_at_boot_with_NVidia_cards___and_no_one_try_to_fix_it_.html">KDM fail at boot with NVidia cards - and no one try to fix it?</a>
23991       </div>
23992       <div class="date">
23993          1st June 2010
23994       </div>
23995       <div class="body">
23996         <p>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
23997 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled.  The
23998 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
23999 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
24000 wait.</p>
24001
24002 <p>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
24003 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">#583312</a> initially filed
24004 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
24005 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
24006 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/524751">#524751</a> initially filed against
24007 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.</p>
24008
24009 <p>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
24010 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
24011 distribution work out of the box for these users.  The nvidia driver
24012 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
24013 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
24014 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
24015 distribution that work for them.  I have no idea what the solution is,
24016 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.</p>
24017
24018 <p>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.</p>
24019
24020       </div>
24021       <div class="tags">
24022
24023
24024         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
24025
24026
24027       </div>
24028     </div>
24029     <div class="padding"></div>
24030
24031     <div class="entry">
24032       <div class="title">
24033         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_seem_to_hold_up_well_in_Debian_testing.html">Parallellized boot seem to hold up well in Debian/testing</a>
24034       </div>
24035       <div class="date">
24036         27th May 2010
24037       </div>
24038       <div class="body">
24039         <p>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
24040 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
24041 issues are known and should be solved:
24042
24043 <p><ul>
24044
24045 <li>The wicd package seen to
24046 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/508289">break NFS mounting</a> and
24047 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/581586">network setup</a> when
24048 parallel booting is enabled.  No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
24049 seem to be on the case.</li>
24050
24051 <li>The nvidia X driver seem to
24052 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">have a race condition</a>
24053 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect.  The
24054 maintainer is on the case.</li>
24055
24056 <li>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
24057 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
24058 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/575080">try to switch back</a> to
24059 sysv-rc.  One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
24060 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
24061 sysv-rc more robust.  Will investigate some more and probably upload a
24062 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
24063 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.</li>
24064
24065 </ul></p>
24066
24067 <p>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
24068 solvable before Squeeze is released.  In addition to these there are
24069 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
24070 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.</p>
24071
24072 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
24073 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
24074 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
24075 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
24076
24077 <p>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.</p>
24078
24079       </div>
24080       <div class="tags">
24081
24082
24083         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
24084
24085
24086       </div>
24087     </div>
24088     <div class="padding"></div>
24089
24090     <div class="entry">
24091       <div class="title">
24092         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html">More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer</a>
24093       </div>
24094       <div class="date">
24095         22nd May 2010
24096       </div>
24097       <div class="body">
24098         <p>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
24099 found time today to return to the project.  Having to spend less time
24100 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
24101 definitely helped freeing some time.</p>
24102
24103 <p>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu.  We
24104 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
24105 get disk and network controllers working.  Without having these
24106 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
24107 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
24108 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
24109 an external medium is a support pain.  Initially, I expected it to be
24110 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
24111 debian-installer to find and use them.  This proved to be wrong.
24112 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
24113 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
24114 /cdrom/firmware/).  This also proved to not work, and at this point I
24115 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
24116 going to work.</p>
24117
24118 <p>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
24119 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
24120 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
24121 packages.  It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
24122 "external" media devices.  Today I changed it to also look in the
24123 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
24124 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu.  I also changed it to
24125 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
24126 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
24127 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
24128 Edu.</p>
24129
24130 <p>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
24131 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
24132 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
24133 run these before activating the firmware during installation.  The
24134 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
24135 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.</p>
24136
24137 <p>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
24138 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.</p>
24139
24140       </div>
24141       <div class="tags">
24142
24143
24144         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
24145
24146
24147       </div>
24148     </div>
24149     <div class="padding"></div>
24150
24151     <div class="entry">
24152       <div class="title">
24153         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Pieces_of_the_roaming_laptop_puzzle_in_Debian.html">Pieces of the roaming laptop puzzle in Debian</a>
24154       </div>
24155       <div class="date">
24156         19th May 2010
24157       </div>
24158       <div class="body">
24159         <p>Today, the last piece of the puzzle for roaming laptops in Debian
24160 Edu finally entered the Debian archive.  Today, the new
24161 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/libp/libpam-mklocaluser.html">libpam-mklocaluser</a>
24162 package was accepted.  Two days ago, two other pieces was accepted
24163 into unstable.  The
24164 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/pam-python.html">pam-python</a>
24165 package needed by libpam-mklocaluser, and the
24166 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/s/sssd.html">sssd</a> package
24167 passed NEW on Monday.  In addition, the
24168 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/libp/libpam-ccreds.html">libpam-ccreds</a>
24169 package we need is in experimental (version 10-4) since Saturday, and
24170 hopefully will be moved to unstable soon.</p>
24171
24172 <p>This collection of packages allow for two different setups for
24173 roaming laptops.  The traditional setup would be using libpam-ccreds,
24174 nscd and libpam-mklocaluser with LDAP or Kerberos authentication,
24175 which should work out of the box if the configuration changes proposed
24176 for nscd in <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/485282">BTS report
24177 #485282</a> is implemented.  The alternative setup is to use sssd with
24178 libpam-mklocaluser to connect to LDAP or Kerberos and let sssd take
24179 care of the caching of passwords and group information.</p>
24180
24181 <p>I have so far been unable to get sssd to work with the LDAP server
24182 at the University, but suspect the issue is some SSL/GnuTLS related
24183 problem with the server certificate.  I plan to update the Debian
24184 package to version 1.2, which is scheduled for next week, and hope to
24185 find time to make sure the next release will include both the
24186 Debian/Ubuntu specific patches.  Upstream is friendly and responsive,
24187 and I am sure we will find a good solution.</p>
24188
24189 <p>The idea is to set up the roaming laptops to authenticate using
24190 LDAP or Kerberos and create a local user with home directory in /home/
24191 when a usre in LDAP logs in via KDM or GDM for the first time, and
24192 cache the password for offline checking, as well as caching group
24193 memberhips and other relevant LDAP information.  The
24194 libpam-mklocaluser package was created to make sure the local home
24195 directory is in /home/, instead of /site/server/directory/ which would
24196 be the home directory if pam_mkhomedir was used.  To avoid confusion
24197 with support requests and configuration, we do not want local laptops
24198 to have users in a path that is used for the same users home directory
24199 on the home directory servers.</p>
24200
24201 <p>One annoying problem with gdm is that it do not show the PAM
24202 message passed to the user from libpam-mklocaluser when the local user
24203 is created.  Instead gdm simply reject the login with some generic
24204 message.  The message is shown in kdm, ssh and login, so I guess it is
24205 a bug in gdm.  Have not investigated if there is some other message
24206 type that can be used instead to get gdm to also show the message.</p>
24207
24208 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
24209 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
24210
24211       </div>
24212       <div class="tags">
24213
24214
24215         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24216
24217
24218       </div>
24219     </div>
24220     <div class="padding"></div>
24221
24222     <div class="entry">
24223       <div class="title">
24224         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellized_boot_is_now_the_default_in_Debian_unstable.html">Parallellized boot is now the default in Debian/unstable</a>
24225       </div>
24226       <div class="date">
24227         14th May 2010
24228       </div>
24229       <div class="body">
24230         <p>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
24231 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
24232 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
24233 expected, if I am to believe the
24234 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
24235 on debian-devel@</a>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
24236 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
24237 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen.  If serious problems are
24238 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
24239 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
24240 version.</p>
24241
24242 More information about
24243 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
24244 based boot sequencing</a> is available from the Debian wiki.  It is
24245 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
24246 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:</p>
24247
24248 <blockquote><pre>
24249 CONCURRENCY=none
24250 </pre></blockquote>
24251
24252 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
24253 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
24254 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
24255 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
24256
24257       </div>
24258       <div class="tags">
24259
24260
24261         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
24262
24263
24264       </div>
24265     </div>
24266     <div class="padding"></div>
24267
24268     <div class="entry">
24269       <div class="title">
24270         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sitesummary_tip__Listing_MAC_address_of_all_clients.html">Sitesummary tip: Listing MAC address of all clients</a>
24271       </div>
24272       <div class="date">
24273         14th May 2010
24274       </div>
24275       <div class="body">
24276         <p>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
24277 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">sitesummary
24278 system</a> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
24279 network.  Each machine will automatically report its status to the
24280 central server after boot and once per night.  The network setup is
24281 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
24282 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines.  This is useful
24283 to update the DHCP configuration.</p>
24284
24285 <p>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
24286 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary.  Run
24287 this on the collector host:</p>
24288
24289 <blockquote><pre>
24290 perl -MSiteSummary -e 'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(" ", get_macaddresses(shift)), "\n"; });'
24291 </pre></blockquote>
24292
24293 <p>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
24294 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.</p>
24295
24296 <p>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
24297 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
24298 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
24299 tables in LDAP using this information.  Such tool is unfortunately not
24300 written yet.</p>
24301
24302       </div>
24303       <div class="tags">
24304
24305
24306         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary</a>.
24307
24308
24309       </div>
24310     </div>
24311     <div class="padding"></div>
24312
24313     <div class="entry">
24314       <div class="title">
24315         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html">systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart</a>
24316       </div>
24317       <div class="date">
24318         13th May 2010
24319       </div>
24320       <div class="body">
24321         <p>The last few days a new boot system called
24322 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd">systemd</a>
24323 has been
24324 <a href="http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html">introduced</a>
24325
24326 to the free software world.  I have not yet had time to play around
24327 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
24328 <a href="http://upstart.ubuntu.com/">upstart</a>, and might prove to be
24329 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
24330 based boot system.  Tollef is
24331 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/580814">in the process</a> of getting
24332 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work.  I
24333 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
24334 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
24335 at the moment do not.</p>
24336
24337 <p>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
24338 platform support.  It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
24339 some new kernel features enabled to function properly.  This means
24340 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
24341 system.  Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
24342 way forward.</p>
24343
24344 <p>In the mean time, based on the
24345 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
24346 on debian-devel@</a> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
24347 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
24348 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
24349 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies.  A
24350 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
24351 already in experimental.  If all go well, Squeeze will be released
24352 with parallel booting enabled by default.</p>
24353
24354       </div>
24355       <div class="tags">
24356
24357
24358         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24359
24360
24361       </div>
24362     </div>
24363     <div class="padding"></div>
24364
24365     <div class="entry">
24366       <div class="title">
24367         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Parallellizing_the_boot_in_Debian_Squeeze___ready_for_wider_testing.html">Parallellizing the boot in Debian Squeeze - ready for wider testing</a>
24368       </div>
24369       <div class="date">
24370          6th May 2010
24371       </div>
24372       <div class="body">
24373         <p>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
24374 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
24375 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies.  If you want
24376 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
24377 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
24378 based boot sequencing</a> is enabled, and add this line to
24379 /etc/default/rcS:</p>
24380
24381 <blockquote><pre>
24382 CONCURRENCY=makefile
24383 </pre></blockquote>
24384
24385 <p>That is it.  It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
24386 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
24387 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
24388 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts.  Startpar is configured
24389 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
24390 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
24391 make this happen.</p>
24392
24393 <p>Give it a try, and see if you like the result.  If some services
24394 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
24395 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
24396 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies).  Report bugs and get
24397 the package maintainers to fix it. :)</p>
24398
24399 <p>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
24400 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct.  I
24401 expect we will get there in Squeeze+1, if we get manage to test and
24402 fix the remaining issues.</p>
24403
24404 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
24405 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
24406 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
24407 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
24408
24409       </div>
24410       <div class="tags">
24411
24412
24413         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
24414
24415
24416       </div>
24417     </div>
24418     <div class="padding"></div>
24419
24420     <div class="entry">
24421       <div class="title">
24422         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Forcing_new_users_to_change_their_password_on_first_login.html">Forcing new users to change their password on first login</a>
24423       </div>
24424       <div class="date">
24425          2nd May 2010
24426       </div>
24427       <div class="body">
24428         <p>One interesting feature in Active Directory, is the ability to
24429 create a new user with an expired password, and thus force the user to
24430 change the password on the first login attempt.</p>
24431
24432 <p>I'm not quite sure how to do that with the LDAP setup in Debian
24433 Edu, but did some initial testing with a local account.  The account
24434 and password aging information is available in /etc/shadow, but
24435 unfortunately, it is not possible to specify an expiration time for
24436 passwords, only a maximum age for passwords.</p>
24437
24438 <p>A freshly created account (using adduser test) will have these
24439 settings in /etc/shadow:</p>
24440
24441 <blockquote><pre>
24442 root@tjener:~# chage -l test
24443 Last password change                                    : May 02, 2010
24444 Password expires                                        : never
24445 Password inactive                                       : never
24446 Account expires                                         : never
24447 Minimum number of days between password change          : 0
24448 Maximum number of days between password change          : 99999
24449 Number of days of warning before password expires       : 7
24450 root@tjener:~#
24451 </pre></blockquote>
24452
24453 <p>The only way I could come up with to create a user with an expired
24454 account, is to change the date of the last password change to the
24455 lowest value possible (January 1th 1970), and the maximum password age
24456 to the difference in days between that date and today.  To make it
24457 simple, I went for 30 years (30 * 365 = 10950) and January 2th (to
24458 avoid testing if 0 is a valid value).</p>
24459
24460 <p>After using these commands to set it up, it seem to work as
24461 intended:</p>
24462
24463 <blockquote><pre>
24464 root@tjener:~# chage -d 1 test; chage -M 10950 test
24465 root@tjener:~# chage -l test
24466 Last password change                                    : Jan 02, 1970
24467 Password expires                                        : never
24468 Password inactive                                       : never
24469 Account expires                                         : never
24470 Minimum number of days between password change          : 0
24471 Maximum number of days between password change          : 10950
24472 Number of days of warning before password expires       : 7
24473 root@tjener:~#
24474 </pre></blockquote>
24475
24476 <p>So far I have tested this with ssh and console, and kdm (in
24477 Squeeze) login, and all ask for a new password before login in the
24478 user (with ssh, I was thrown out and had to log in again).</p>
24479
24480 <p>Perhaps we should set up something similar for Debian Edu, to make
24481 sure only the user itself have the account password?</p>
24482
24483 <p>If you want to comment on or help out with implementing this for
24484 Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
24485
24486 <p>Update 2010-05-02 17:20: Paul Tötterman tells me on IRC that the
24487 shadow(8) page in Debian/testing now state that setting the date of
24488 last password change to zero (0) will force the password to be changed
24489 on the first login.  This was not mentioned in the manual in Lenny, so
24490 I did not notice this in my initial testing.  I have tested it on
24491 Squeeze, and '<tt>chage -d 0 username</tt>' do work there.  I have not
24492 tested it on Lenny yet.</p>
24493
24494 <p>Update 2010-05-02-19:05: Jim Paris tells me via email that an
24495 equivalent command to expire a password is '<tt>passwd -e
24496 username</tt>', which insert zero into the date of the last password
24497 change.</p>
24498
24499       </div>
24500       <div class="tags">
24501
24502
24503         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>.
24504
24505
24506       </div>
24507     </div>
24508     <div class="padding"></div>
24509
24510     <div class="entry">
24511       <div class="title">
24512         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thoughts_on_roaming_laptop_setup_for_Debian_Edu.html">Thoughts on roaming laptop setup for Debian Edu</a>
24513       </div>
24514       <div class="date">
24515         28th April 2010
24516       </div>
24517       <div class="body">
24518         <p>For some years now, I have wondered how we should handle laptops in
24519 Debian Edu.  The Debian Edu infrastructure is mostly designed to
24520 handle stationary computers, and less suited for computers that come
24521 and go.</p>
24522
24523 <p>Now I finally believe I have an sensible idea on how to adjust
24524 Debian Edu for laptops, by introducing a new profile for them, for
24525 example called Roaming Workstations.  Here are my thought on this.
24526 The setup would consist of the following:</p>
24527
24528 <ul>
24529
24530  <li>During installation, the user name of the owner / primary user of
24531    the laptop is requested and a local home directory is set up for
24532    the user, with uid and gid information fetched from the LDAP
24533    server.  This allow the user to work also when offline.  The
24534    central home directory can be available in a subdirectory on
24535    request, for example mounted via CIFS.  It could be mounted
24536    automatically when a user log in while on the Debian Edu network,
24537    and unmounted when the machine is taken away (network down,
24538    hibernate, etc), it can be set up to do automatic mounting on
24539    request (using autofs), or perhaps some GUI button on the desktop
24540    can be used to access it when needed.  Perhaps it is enough to use
24541    the fish protocol in KDE?</li>
24542
24543  <li>Password checking is set up to use LDAP or Kerberos
24544    authentication when the machine is on the Debian Edu network, and
24545    to cache the password for offline checking when the machine unable
24546    to reach the LDAP or Kerberos server.  This can be done using
24547    <a href="http://www.padl.com/OSS/pam_ccreds.html">libpam-ccreds</a>
24548    or the Fedora developed
24549    <a href="https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/SSSD">System
24550    Security Services Daemon</a> packages.</li>
24551
24552  <li>File synchronisation with the central home directory is set up
24553    using a shared directory in both the local and the central home
24554    directory, using unison.</li>
24555
24556  <li>Printing should be set up to print to all printers broadcasting
24557    their existence on the local network, and should then work out of
24558    the box with CUPS.  For sites needing accurate printer quotas, some
24559    system with Kerberos authentication or printing via ssh could be
24560    implemented.</li>
24561
24562  <li>For users that should have local root access to their laptop,
24563    sudo should be used to allow this to the local user.</li>
24564
24565  <li>It would be nice if user and group information from LDAP is
24566    cached on the client, but given that there are entries for the
24567    local user and primary group in /etc/, it should not be needed.</li>
24568
24569 </ul>
24570
24571 <p>I believe all the pieces to implement this are in Debian/testing at
24572 the moment.  If we work quickly, we should be able to get this ready
24573 in time for the Squeeze release to freeze.  Some of the pieces need
24574 tweaking, like libpam-ccreds should get support for pam-auth-update
24575 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566718">#566718</a>) and nslcd (or
24576 perhaps debian-edu-config) should get some integration code to stop
24577 its daemon when the LDAP server is unavailable to avoid long timeouts
24578 when disconnected from the net.  If we get Kerberos enabled, we need
24579 to make sure we avoid long timeouts there too.</p>
24580
24581 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
24582 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
24583
24584       </div>
24585       <div class="tags">
24586
24587
24588         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24589
24590
24591       </div>
24592     </div>
24593     <div class="padding"></div>
24594
24595     <div class="entry">
24596       <div class="title">
24597         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Great_book___Content__Selected_Essays_on_Technology__Creativity__Copyright__and_the_Future_of_the_Future_.html">Great book: "Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity, Copyright, and the Future of the Future"</a>
24598       </div>
24599       <div class="date">
24600         19th April 2010
24601       </div>
24602       <div class="body">
24603         <p>The last few weeks i have had the pleasure of reading a
24604 thought-provoking collection of essays by Cory Doctorow, on topics
24605 touching copyright, virtual worlds, the future of man when the
24606 conscience mind can be duplicated into a computer and many more. The
24607 book titled "Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity,
24608 Copyright, and the Future of the Future" is available with few
24609 restrictions on the web, for example from
24610 <a href="http://craphound.com/content/">his own site</a>. I read the
24611 epub-version from
24612 <a href="http://www.feedbooks.com/book/2883">feedbooks</a> using
24613 <a href="http://www.fbreader.org/">fbreader</a> and my N810. I
24614 strongly recommend this book.</p>
24615
24616       </div>
24617       <div class="tags">
24618
24619
24620         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
24621
24622
24623       </div>
24624     </div>
24625     <div class="padding"></div>
24626
24627     <div class="entry">
24628       <div class="title">
24629         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kerberos_for_Debian_Edu_Squeeze_.html">Kerberos for Debian Edu/Squeeze?</a>
24630       </div>
24631       <div class="date">
24632         14th April 2010
24633       </div>
24634       <div class="body">
24635         <p><a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20100413-kerberos/">Yesterdays
24636 NUUG presentation</a> about Kerberos was inspiring, and reminded me
24637 about the need to start using Kerberos in Skolelinux.  Setting up a
24638 Kerberos server seem to be straight forward, and if we get this in
24639 place a long time before the Squeeze version of Debian freezes, we
24640 have a chance to migrate Skolelinux away from NFSv3 for the home
24641 directories, and over to an architecture where the infrastructure do
24642 not have to trust IP addresses and machines, and instead can trust
24643 users and cryptographic keys instead.</p>
24644
24645 <p>A challenge will be integration and administration.  Is there a
24646 Kerberos implementation for Debian where one can control the
24647 administration access in Kerberos using LDAP groups?  With it, the
24648 school administration will have to maintain access control using flat
24649 files on the main server, which give a huge potential for errors.</p>
24650
24651 <p>A related question I would like to know is how well Kerberos and
24652 pam-ccreds (offline password check) work together.  Anyone know?</p>
24653
24654 <p>Next step will be to use Kerberos for access control in Lwat and
24655 Nagios.  I have no idea how much work that will be to implement.  We
24656 would also need to document how to integrate with Windows AD, as such
24657 shared network will require two Kerberos realms that need to cooperate
24658 to work properly.</p>
24659
24660 <p>I believe a good start would be to start using Kerberos on the
24661 skolelinux.no machines, and this way get ourselves experience with
24662 configuration and integration.  A natural starting point would be
24663 setting up ldap.skolelinux.no as the Kerberos server, and migrate the
24664 rest of the machines from PAM via LDAP to PAM via Kerberos one at the
24665 time.</p>
24666
24667 <p>If you would like to contribute to get this working in Skolelinux,
24668 I recommend you to see the video recording from yesterdays NUUG
24669 presentation, and start using Kerberos at home.  The video show show
24670 up in a few days.</p>
24671
24672       </div>
24673       <div class="tags">
24674
24675
24676         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24677
24678
24679       </div>
24680     </div>
24681     <div class="padding"></div>
24682
24683     <div class="entry">
24684       <div class="title">
24685         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/After_6_years_of_waiting__the_Xreset_d_feature_is_implemented.html">After 6 years of waiting, the Xreset.d feature is implemented</a>
24686       </div>
24687       <div class="date">
24688          6th March 2010
24689       </div>
24690       <div class="body">
24691         <p>6 years ago, as part of the Debian Edu development I am involved
24692 in, I asked for a hook in the kdm and gdm setup to run scripts as root
24693 when the user log out.  A bug was submitted against the xfree86-common
24694 package in 2004 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/230422">#230422</a>),
24695 and revisited every time Debian Edu was working on a new release.
24696 Today, this finally paid off.</p>
24697
24698 <p>The framework for this feature was today commited to the git
24699 repositry for the xorg package, and the git repository for xdm has
24700 been updated to use this framework.  Next on my agenda is to make sure
24701 kdm and gdm also add code to use this framework.</p>
24702
24703 <p>In Debian Edu, we want to ability to run commands as root when the
24704 user log out, to get rid of runaway processes and do general cleanup
24705 after a user.  With this framework in place, we finally can do that in
24706 a generic way that work with all display managers using this
24707 framework.  My goal is to get all display managers in Debian use it,
24708 similar to how they use the Xsession.d framework today.<p>
24709
24710       </div>
24711       <div class="tags">
24712
24713
24714         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24715
24716
24717       </div>
24718     </div>
24719     <div class="padding"></div>
24720
24721     <div class="entry">
24722       <div class="title">
24723         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu___Skolelinux_based_on_Lenny_released__work_continues.html">Debian Edu / Skolelinux based on Lenny released, work continues</a>
24724       </div>
24725       <div class="date">
24726         11th February 2010
24727       </div>
24728       <div class="body">
24729         <p>On Tuesday, the Debian/Lenny based version of
24730 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> was finally
24731 shipped.  This was a major leap forward for the project, and I am very
24732 pleased that we finally got the release wrapped up.  Work on the first
24733 point release starts imediately, as we plan to get that one out a
24734 month after the major release, to include all fixes for bugs we found
24735 and fixed too late in the release process to include last Tuesday.</p>
24736
24737 <p>Perhaps it even is time for some partying?</p>
24738
24739 <p>After this first point release, my plan is to focus again on the
24740 next major release, based on Squeeze.  We will try to get as many of
24741 the fixes we need into the official Debian packages before the freeze,
24742 and have just a few weeks or months to make it happen.</p>
24743
24744       </div>
24745       <div class="tags">
24746
24747
24748         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24749
24750
24751       </div>
24752     </div>
24753     <div class="padding"></div>
24754
24755     <div class="entry">
24756       <div class="title">
24757         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_Munin_and_Nagios_configuration.html">Automatic Munin and Nagios configuration</a>
24758       </div>
24759       <div class="date">
24760         27th January 2010
24761       </div>
24762       <div class="body">
24763         <p>One of the new features in the next Debian/Lenny based release of
24764 Debian Edu/Skolelinux, which is scheduled for release in the next few
24765 days, is automatic configuration of the service monitoring system
24766 Nagios.  The previous release had automatic configuration of trend
24767 analysis using Munin, and this Lenny based release take that a step
24768 further.</p>
24769
24770 <p>When installing a Debian Edu Main-server, it is automatically
24771 configured as a Munin and Nagios server.  In addition, it is
24772 configured to be a server for the
24773 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">SiteSummary
24774 system</a> I have written for use in Debian Edu.  The SiteSummary
24775 system is inspired by a system used by the University of Oslo where I
24776 work.  In short, the system provide a centralised collector of
24777 information about the computers on the network, and a client on each
24778 computer submitting information to this collector.  This allow for
24779 automatic information on which packages are installed on each machine,
24780 which kernel the machines are using, what kind of configuration the
24781 packages got etc.  This also allow us to automatically generate Munin
24782 and Nagios configuration.</p>
24783
24784 <p>All computers reporting to the sitesummary collector with the
24785 munin-node package installed is automatically enabled as a Munin
24786 client and graphs from the statistics collected from that machine show
24787 up automatically on http://www/munin/ on the Main-server.</p>
24788
24789 <p>All non-laptop computers reporting to the sitesummary collector are
24790 automatically monitored for network presence (ping and any network
24791 services detected).  In addition, all computers (also laptops) with
24792 the nagios-nrpe-server package installed and configured the way
24793 sitesummary would configure it, are monitored for full disks, software
24794 raid status, swap free and other checks that need to run locally on
24795 the machine.</p>
24796
24797 <p>The result is that the administrator on a school using Debian Edu
24798 based on Lenny will be able to check the health of his installation
24799 with one look at the Nagios settings, without having to spend any time
24800 keeping the Nagios configuration up-to-date.</p>
24801
24802 <p>The only configuration one need to do to get Nagios up and running
24803 is to set the password used to get access via HTTP.  The system
24804 administrator need to run "<tt>htpasswd /etc/nagios3/htpasswd.users
24805 nagiosadmin</tt>" to create a nagiosadmin user and set a password for
24806 it to be able to log into the Nagios web pages.  After that,
24807 everything is taken care of.</p>
24808
24809       </div>
24810       <div class="tags">
24811
24812
24813         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary</a>.
24814
24815
24816       </div>
24817     </div>
24818     <div class="padding"></div>
24819
24820     <div class="entry">
24821       <div class="title">
24822         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Relative_popularity_of_document_formats__MS_Office_vs__ODF_.html">Relative popularity of document formats (MS Office vs. ODF)</a>
24823       </div>
24824       <div class="date">
24825         12th August 2009
24826       </div>
24827       <div class="body">
24828         <p>Just for fun, I did a search right now on Google for a few file ODF
24829 and MS Office based formats (not to be mistaken for ISO or ECMA
24830 OOXML), to get an idea of their relative usage.  I searched using
24831 'filetype:odt' and equvalent terms, and got these results:</P>
24832
24833 <table>
24834 <tr><th>Type</th><th>ODF</th><th>MS Office</th></tr>
24835 <tr><td>Tekst</td> <td>odt:282000</td> <td>docx:308000</td></tr>
24836 <tr><td>Presentasjon</td> <td>odp:75600</td> <td>pptx:183000</td></tr>
24837 <tr><td>Regneark</td> <td>ods:26500     </td> <td>xlsx:145000</td></tr>
24838 </table>
24839
24840 <p>Next, I added a 'site:no' limit to get the numbers for Norway, and
24841 got these numbers:</p>
24842
24843 <table>
24844 <tr><th>Type</th><th>ODF</th><th>MS Office</th></tr>
24845 <tr><td>Tekst</td> <td>odt:2480 </td> <td>docx:4460</td></tr>
24846 <tr><td>Presentasjon</td> <td>odp:299   </td> <td>pptx:741</td></tr>
24847 <tr><td>Regneark</td> <td>ods:187       </td> <td>xlsx:372</td></tr>
24848 </table>
24849
24850 <p>I wonder how these numbers change over time.</p>
24851
24852 <p>I am aware of Google returning different results and numbers based
24853 on where the search is done, so I guess these numbers will differ if
24854 they are conduced in another country.  Because of this, I did the same
24855 search from a machine in California, USA, a few minutes after the
24856 search done from a machine here in Norway.</p>
24857
24858
24859 <table>
24860 <tr><th>Type</th><th>ODF</th><th>MS Office</th></tr>
24861 <tr><td>Tekst</td> <td>odt:129000</td> <td>docx:308000</td></tr>
24862 <tr><td>Presentasjon</td> <td>odp:44200</td> <td>pptx:93900</td></tr>
24863 <tr><td>Regneark</td> <td>ods:26500     </td> <td>xlsx:82400</td></tr>
24864 </table>
24865
24866 <p>And with 'site:no':
24867
24868 <table>
24869 <tr><th>Type</th><th>ODF</th><th>MS Office</th></tr>
24870 <tr><td>Tekst</td> <td>odt:2480</td> <td>docx:3410</td></tr>
24871 <tr><td>Presentasjon</td> <td>odp:175</td> <td>pptx:604</td></tr>
24872 <tr><td>Regneark</td> <td>ods:186       </td> <td>xlsx:296</td></tr>
24873 </table>
24874
24875 <p>Interesting difference, not sure what to conclude from these
24876 numbers.</p>
24877
24878       </div>
24879       <div class="tags">
24880
24881
24882         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
24883
24884
24885       </div>
24886     </div>
24887     <div class="padding"></div>
24888
24889     <div class="entry">
24890       <div class="title">
24891         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ISO_still_hope_to_fix_OOXML.html">ISO still hope to fix OOXML</a>
24892       </div>
24893       <div class="date">
24894          8th August 2009
24895       </div>
24896       <div class="body">
24897         <p>According to <a
24898 href="http://twerner.blogspot.com/2009/08/defects-of-office-open-xml.html">a
24899 blog post from Torsten Werner</a>, the current defect report for ISO
24900 29500 (ISO OOXML) is 809 pages.  His interesting point is that the
24901 defect report is 71 pages more than the full ODF 1.1 specification.
24902 Personally I find it more interesting that ISO still believe ISO OOXML
24903 can be fixed in ISO.  Personally, I believe it is broken beyon repair,
24904 and I completely lack any trust in ISO for being able to get anywhere
24905 close to solving the problems.  I was part of the Norwegian committee
24906 involved in the OOXML fast track process, and was not impressed with
24907 Standard Norway and ISO in how they handled it.</p>
24908
24909 <p>These days I focus on ODF instead, which seem like a specification
24910 with the future ahead of it.  We are working in NUUG to organise a ODF
24911 seminar this autumn.</p>
24912
24913       </div>
24914       <div class="tags">
24915
24916
24917         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
24918
24919
24920       </div>
24921     </div>
24922     <div class="padding"></div>
24923
24924     <div class="entry">
24925       <div class="title">
24926         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_has_switched_to_dependency_based_boot_sequencing.html">Debian has switched to dependency based boot sequencing</a>
24927       </div>
24928       <div class="date">
24929         27th July 2009
24930       </div>
24931       <div class="body">
24932         <p>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2,
24933 and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable
24934 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing.  This
24935 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
24936 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
24937 installation.  Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
24938 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.</p>
24939
24940 <p>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
24941 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
24942 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.</p>
24943
24944       </div>
24945       <div class="tags">
24946
24947
24948         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24949
24950
24951       </div>
24952     </div>
24953     <div class="padding"></div>
24954
24955     <div class="entry">
24956       <div class="title">
24957         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html">Taking over sysvinit development</a>
24958       </div>
24959       <div class="date">
24960         22nd July 2009
24961       </div>
24962       <div class="body">
24963         <p>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
24964 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
24965 take over the package and become the new upstream.  The number of
24966 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
24967 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
24968 the package up to date.</p>
24969
24970 <p>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
24971 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman.  About 10 days ago, I made
24972 a new upstream tarball with version number 2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
24973 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
24974 distributions.  We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
24975 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge.  Since the
24976 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
24977 upstream project at <a href="http://savannah.nongnu.org/">Savannah</a>, and continue
24978 development there.  The project is registered and currently waiting
24979 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
24980 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
24981 working on the future release.</p>
24982
24983 <p>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
24984 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.</p>
24985
24986       </div>
24987       <div class="tags">
24988
24989
24990         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
24991
24992
24993       </div>
24994     </div>
24995     <div class="padding"></div>
24996
24997     <div class="entry">
24998       <div class="title">
24999         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html">Debian boots quicker and quicker</a>
25000       </div>
25001       <div class="date">
25002         24th June 2009
25003       </div>
25004       <div class="body">
25005         <p>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
25006 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
25007 could find more ways to speed up the boot system.  This was an Ubuntu
25008 funded
25009 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint">developer
25010 gathering</a>. It was quite productive.  We also discussed the future
25011 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
25012 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
25013 asynchronous and event base.  The Ubuntu approach using udev and
25014 upstart might be a good way forward.  Time will show.</p>
25015
25016 <p>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
25017 process in Debian.  All of these should be applied to get a quick
25018 boot:</p>
25019
25020 <ul>
25021
25022 <li>Use dash as /bin/sh.</li>
25023
25024 <li>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
25025    clock is in UTC.</li>
25026
25027 <li>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
25028    <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
25029    based boot sequencing</a>, and enable concurrent booting.</li>
25030
25031 </ul>
25032
25033 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
25034 <a href="http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/">Carlos
25035 Villegas</a>.
25036
25037 <p>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
25038 unstable yesterday.  When we tested it, we were able to cut 6 seconds
25039 from the boot sequence.  It depend on very correct dependency
25040 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
25041 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
25042 using this.</p>
25043
25044 <p>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
25045 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
25046 startup speed as well.  Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
25047 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
25048 possible to run a of them in the same process.  A quick way to test
25049 this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
25050 insserv'.  Will need to test if that work. :)</p>
25051
25052       </div>
25053       <div class="tags">
25054
25055
25056         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
25057
25058
25059       </div>
25060     </div>
25061     <div class="padding"></div>
25062
25063     <div class="entry">
25064       <div class="title">
25065         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Two_projects_that_have_improved_the_quality_of_free_software_a_lot.html">Two projects that have improved the quality of free software a lot</a>
25066       </div>
25067       <div class="date">
25068          2nd May 2009
25069       </div>
25070       <div class="body">
25071         <p>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
25072 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
25073 do not yet know them.</p>
25074
25075 <p>The first one is <a href="http://valgrind.org/">valgrind</a>, a
25076 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
25077 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run 'valgrind program',
25078 and it will report any problems on stdout.  It is even better if the
25079 program include debug information.  With debug information, it is able
25080 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
25081 occurs.  It can report things like 'reading past memory block in file
25082 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M', and
25083 'using uninitialised value in control logic'.  This tool has made it
25084 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
25085 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
25086
25087 <p>The second one is
25088 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity">Coverity</a> which is
25089 a source code checker.  It is able to process the source of a program
25090 and find problems in the logic without running the program.  It
25091 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
25092 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel.  It is now a commercial tool
25093 and the company behind it is running
25094 <a href="http://www.scan.coverity.com/">a community service</a> for the
25095 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
25096 their source checked for free.  Several thousand defects have been
25097 found and fixed so far.  It can find errors like 'lock L taken in file
25098 X line N is never released if exiting in line M', or 'the code in file
25099 Y lines O to P can never be executed'.  The projects included in the
25100 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
25101 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.</p>
25102
25103 <p>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
25104 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
25105 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
25106 surrounded by today.</p>
25107
25108       </div>
25109       <div class="tags">
25110
25111
25112         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
25113
25114
25115       </div>
25116     </div>
25117     <div class="padding"></div>
25118
25119     <div class="entry">
25120       <div class="title">
25121         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/No_patch_is_not_better_than_a_useless_patch.html">No patch is not better than a useless patch</a>
25122       </div>
25123       <div class="date">
25124         28th April 2009
25125       </div>
25126       <div class="body">
25127         <p>Julien Blache
25128 <a href="http://blog.technologeek.org/2009/04/12/214">claim that no
25129 patch is better than a useless patch</a>.  I completely disagree, as a
25130 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
25131 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
25132 time on fixing it.  No patch do not provide any of these positive
25133 properties.</p>
25134
25135       </div>
25136       <div class="tags">
25137
25138
25139         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
25140
25141
25142       </div>
25143     </div>
25144     <div class="padding"></div>
25145
25146     <div class="entry">
25147       <div class="title">
25148         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Recording_video_from_cron_using_VLC.html">Recording video from cron using VLC</a>
25149       </div>
25150       <div class="date">
25151          5th April 2009
25152       </div>
25153       <div class="body">
25154         <p>One think I have wanted to figure out for a along time is how to
25155 run vlc from cron to do recording of video streams on the net.  The
25156 task is trivial with mplayer, but I do not really trust the security
25157 of mplayer (it crashes too often on strange input), and thus prefer
25158 vlc.  I finally found a way to do it today.  I spent an hour or so
25159 searching the web for recipes and reading the documentation.  The
25160 hardest part was to get rid of the GUI window, but after finding the
25161 dummy interface, the command line finally presented itself:</p>
25162
25163 <blockquote><pre>URL=http://www.ping.uio.no/video/rms-oslo_2009.ogg
25164 SAVEFILE=rms.ogg
25165 DISPLAY= vlc -q $URL \
25166   --sout="#duplicate{dst=std{access=file,url='$SAVEFILE'},dst=nodisplay}" \
25167   --intf=dummy</pre></blockquote>
25168
25169 <p>The command stream the URL and store it in the SAVEFILE by
25170 duplicating the output stream to "nodisplay" and the file, using the
25171 dummy interface.  The dummy interface and the nodisplay output make
25172 sure no X interface is needed.</p>
25173
25174 <p>The cron job then need to start this job with the appropriate URL
25175 and file name to save, sleep for the duration wanted, and then kill
25176 the vlc process with SIGTERM.  Here is a complete script
25177 <tt>vlc-record</tt> to use from <tt>at</tt> or <tt>cron</tt>:</p>
25178
25179 <blockquote><pre>#!/bin/sh
25180 set -e
25181 URL="$1"
25182 SAVEFILE="$2"
25183 DURATION="$3"
25184 DISPLAY= vlc -q "$URL" \
25185   --sout="#duplicate{dst=std{access=file,url='$SAVEFILE'},dst=nodisplay}" \
25186   --intf=dummy < /dev/null > /dev/null 2>&1 &
25187 pid=$!
25188 sleep $DURATION
25189 kill $pid
25190 wait $pid</pre></blockquote>
25191
25192       </div>
25193       <div class="tags">
25194
25195
25196         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
25197
25198
25199       </div>
25200     </div>
25201     <div class="padding"></div>
25202
25203     <div class="entry">
25204       <div class="title">
25205         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Standardize_on_protocols_and_formats__not_vendors_and_applications.html">Standardize on protocols and formats, not vendors and applications</a>
25206       </div>
25207       <div class="date">
25208         30th March 2009
25209       </div>
25210       <div class="body">
25211         <p>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
25212 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
25213 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
25214 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
25215 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
25216 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
25217 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
25218 application.</p>
25219
25220 <p>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
25221 independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
25222 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
25223 protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
25224 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
25225 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
25226 blocked from doing so.</p>
25227
25228 <p>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
25229 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
25230 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
25231 requirements change.</p>
25232
25233 <p>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
25234 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
25235 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.</p>
25236
25237       </div>
25238       <div class="tags">
25239
25240
25241         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
25242
25243
25244       </div>
25245     </div>
25246     <div class="padding"></div>
25247
25248     <div class="entry">
25249       <div class="title">
25250         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html">Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering</a>
25251       </div>
25252       <div class="date">
25253         29th March 2009
25254       </div>
25255       <div class="body">
25256         <p>I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
25257 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering.  I got a bit done tuning the
25258 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
25259 implementation avahi.  It look like it could be useful for us.  Almost
25260 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
25261 get to know the Skolelinux system.  Walter Bender, involved in the
25262 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
25263 also helped me improve my OLPC installation.  He also showed me that
25264 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
25265 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian.  As a
25266 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu.  We also
25267 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
25268 proved to be too hard for us.  The application seem to need more work
25269 before it is ready for me.  I look forward to getting home and relax
25270 now. :)</p>
25271
25272       </div>
25273       <div class="tags">
25274
25275
25276         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
25277
25278
25279       </div>
25280     </div>
25281     <div class="padding"></div>
25282
25283     <div class="entry">
25284       <div class="title">
25285         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">Time for new  LDAP schemas replacing RFC 2307?</a>
25286       </div>
25287       <div class="date">
25288         29th March 2009
25289       </div>
25290       <div class="body">
25291         <p>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
25292 optimal.  There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
25293 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with
25294 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory.  The RFC
25295 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
25296 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.</p>
25297
25298 <p>In <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux</a>,
25299 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
25300 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
25301 and LTSP configuration in LDAP.  These objects have a lot in common,
25302 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
25303 object per entity.  For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
25304 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
25305 DNS information and another with DHCP information.  The schemas
25306 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
25307 object.  In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
25308 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
25309 It just do not scale.  I believe it is time for a few RFC
25310 specifications to cleam up this mess.</p>
25311
25312 <p>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
25313 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
25314 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
25315 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.</p>
25316
25317 <p>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
25318 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.</p>
25319
25320 <p>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
25321 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up.  Time to start a
25322 new IETF work group?</p>
25323
25324       </div>
25325       <div class="tags">
25326
25327
25328         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
25329
25330
25331       </div>
25332     </div>
25333     <div class="padding"></div>
25334
25335     <div class="entry">
25336       <div class="title">
25337         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Checking_server_hardware_support_status_for_Dell__HP_and_IBM_servers.html">Checking server hardware support status for Dell, HP and IBM servers</a>
25338       </div>
25339       <div class="date">
25340         28th February 2009
25341       </div>
25342       <div class="body">
25343         <p>At work, we have a few hundred Linux servers, and with that amount
25344 of hardware it is important to keep track of when the hardware support
25345 contract expire for each server.  We have a machine (and service)
25346 register, which until recently did not contain much useful besides the
25347 machine room location and contact information for the system owner for
25348 each machine.  To make it easier for us to track support contract
25349 status, I've recently spent time on extending the machine register to
25350 include information about when the support contract expire, and to tag
25351 machines with expired contracts to make it easy to get a list of such
25352 machines.  I extended a perl script already being used to import
25353 information about machines into the register, to also do some screen
25354 scraping off the sites of Dell, HP and IBM (our majority of machines
25355 are from these vendors), and automatically check the support status
25356 for the relevant machines.  This make the support status information
25357 easily available and I hope it will make it easier for the computer
25358 owner to know when to get new hardware or renew the support contract.
25359 The result of this work documented that 27% of the machines in the
25360 registry is without a support contract, and made it very easy to find
25361 them.  27% might seem like a lot, but I see it more as the case of us
25362 using machines a bit longer than the 3 years a normal support contract
25363 last, to have test machines and a platform for less important
25364 services.  After all, the machines without a contract are working fine
25365 at the moment and the lack of contract is only a problem if any of
25366 them break down.  When that happen, we can either fix it using spare
25367 parts from other machines or move the service to another old
25368 machine.</p>
25369
25370 <p>I believe the code for screen scraping the Dell site was originally
25371 written by Trond Hasle Amundsen, and later adjusted by me and Morten
25372 Werner Forsbring.  The HP scraping was written by me after reading a
25373 nice article in ;login: about how to use WWW::Mechanize, and the IBM
25374 scraping was written by me based on the Dell code.  I know the HTML
25375 parsing could be done using nice libraries, but did not want to
25376 introduce more dependencies.  This is the current incarnation:</p>
25377
25378 <pre>
25379 use LWP::Simple;
25380 use POSIX;
25381 use WWW::Mechanize;
25382 use Date::Parse;
25383 [...]
25384 sub get_support_info {
25385     my ($machine, $model, $serial, $productnumber) = @_;
25386     my $str;
25387
25388     if ( $model =~ m/^Dell / ) {
25389         # fetch website from Dell support
25390         my $url = "http://support.euro.dell.com/support/topics/topic.aspx/emea/shared/support/my_systems_info/no/details?c=no&amp;cs=nodhs1&amp;l=no&amp;s=dhs&amp;ServiceTag=$serial";
25391         my $webpage = get($url);
25392         return undef unless ($webpage);
25393
25394         my $daysleft = -1;
25395         my @lines = split(/\n/, $webpage);
25396         foreach my $line (@lines) {
25397             next unless ($line =~ m/Beskrivelse/);
25398             $line =~ s/&lt;[^>]+?>/;/gm;
25399             $line =~ s/^.+?;(Beskrivelse;)/$1/;
25400
25401             my @f = split(/\;/, $line);
25402             @f = @f[13 .. $#f];
25403             my $lastend = "";
25404             while ($f[3] eq "DELL") {
25405                 my ($type, $startstr, $endstr, $days) = @f[0, 5, 7, 10];
25406
25407                 my $start = POSIX::strftime("%Y-%m-%d",
25408                                             localtime(str2time($startstr)));
25409                 my $end = POSIX::strftime("%Y-%m-%d",
25410                                           localtime(str2time($endstr)));
25411                 $str .= "$type $start -> $end ";
25412                 @f = @f[14 .. $#f];
25413                 $lastend = $end if ($end gt $lastend);
25414             }
25415             my $today = POSIX::strftime("%Y-%m-%d", localtime(time));
25416             tag_machine_unsupported($machine)
25417                 if ($lastend lt $today);
25418         }
25419     } elsif ( $model =~ m/^HP / ) {
25420         my $mech = WWW::Mechanize->new();
25421         my $url =
25422             'http://www1.itrc.hp.com/service/ewarranty/warrantyInput.do';
25423         $mech->get($url);
25424         my $fields = {
25425             'BODServiceID' => 'NA',
25426             'RegisteredPurchaseDate' => '',
25427             'country' => 'NO',
25428             'productNumber' => $productnumber,
25429             'serialNumber1' => $serial,
25430         };
25431         $mech->submit_form( form_number => 2,
25432                             fields      => $fields );
25433         # Next step is screen scraping
25434         my $content = $mech->content();
25435
25436         $content =~ s/&lt;[^>]+?>/;/gm;
25437         $content =~ s/\s+/ /gm;
25438         $content =~ s/;\s*;/;;/gm;
25439         $content =~ s/;[\s;]+/;/gm;
25440
25441         my $today = POSIX::strftime("%Y-%m-%d", localtime(time));
25442
25443         while ($content =~ m/;Warranty Type;/) {
25444             my ($type, $status, $startstr, $stopstr) = $content =~
25445                 m/;Warranty Type;([^;]+);.+?;Status;(\w+);Start Date;([^;]+);End Date;([^;]+);/;
25446             $content =~ s/^.+?;Warranty Type;//;
25447             my $start = POSIX::strftime("%Y-%m-%d",
25448                                         localtime(str2time($startstr)));
25449             my $end = POSIX::strftime("%Y-%m-%d",
25450                                       localtime(str2time($stopstr)));
25451
25452             $str .= "$type ($status) $start -> $end ";
25453
25454             tag_machine_unsupported($machine)
25455                 if ($end lt $today);
25456         }
25457     } elsif ( $model =~ m/^IBM / ) {
25458         # This code ignore extended support contracts.
25459         my ($producttype) = $model =~ m/.*-\[(.{4}).+\]-/;
25460         if ($producttype &amp;&amp; $serial) {
25461             my $content =
25462                 get("http://www-947.ibm.com/systems/support/supportsite.wss/warranty?action=warranty&amp;brandind=5000008&amp;Submit=Submit&amp;type=$producttype&amp;serial=$serial");
25463             if ($content) {
25464                 $content =~ s/&lt;[^>]+?>/;/gm;
25465                 $content =~ s/\s+/ /gm;
25466                 $content =~ s/;\s*;/;;/gm;
25467                 $content =~ s/;[\s;]+/;/gm;
25468
25469                 $content =~ s/^.+?;Warranty status;//;
25470                 my ($status, $end) = $content =~ m/;Warranty status;([^;]+)\s*;Expiration date;(\S+) ;/;
25471
25472                 $str .= "($status) -> $end ";
25473
25474                 my $today = POSIX::strftime("%Y-%m-%d", localtime(time));
25475                 tag_machine_unsupported($machine)
25476                     if ($end lt $today);
25477             }
25478         }
25479     }
25480     return $str;
25481 }
25482 </pre>
25483
25484 <p>Here are some examples on how to use the function, using fake
25485 serial numbers.  The information passed in as arguments are fetched
25486 from dmidecode.</p>
25487
25488 <pre>
25489 print get_support_info("hp.host", "HP ProLiant BL460c G1", "1234567890"
25490                        "447707-B21");
25491 print get_support_info("dell.host", "Dell Inc. PowerEdge 2950", "1234567");
25492 print get_support_info("ibm.host", "IBM eserver xSeries 345 -[867061X]-",
25493                        "1234567");
25494 </pre>
25495
25496 <p>I would recommend this approach for tracking support contracts for
25497 everyone with more than a few computers to administer. :)</p>
25498
25499 <p>Update 2009-03-06: The IBM page do not include extended support
25500 contracts, so it is useless in that case.  The original Dell code do
25501 not handle extended support contracts either, but has been updated to
25502 do so.</p>
25503
25504       </div>
25505       <div class="tags">
25506
25507
25508         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
25509
25510
25511       </div>
25512     </div>
25513     <div class="padding"></div>
25514
25515     <div class="entry">
25516       <div class="title">
25517         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_bar_codes_at_a_computing_center.html">Using bar codes at a computing center</a>
25518       </div>
25519       <div class="date">
25520         20th February 2009
25521       </div>
25522       <div class="body">
25523         <p>At work with the University of Oslo, we have several hundred computers
25524 in our computing center.  This give us a challenge in tracking the
25525 location and cabling of the computers, when they are added, moved and
25526 removed.  Some times the location register is not updated when a
25527 computer is inserted or moved and we then have to search the room for
25528 the "missing" computer.</p>
25529
25530 <p>In the last issue of Linux Journal, I came across a project
25531 <a href="http://www.libdmtx.org/">libdmtx</a> to write and read bar
25532 code blocks as defined in the
25533 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_Matrix">The Data Matrix
25534 Standard</a>.  This is bar codes that can be read with a normal
25535 digital camera, for example that on a cell phone, and several such bar
25536 codes can be read by libdmtx from one picture.  The bar code standard
25537 allow up to 2 KiB to be written in the tag.  There is another project
25538 with <a href="http://www.terryburton.co.uk/barcodewriter/">a bar code
25539 writer written in postscript</a> capable of creating such bar codes,
25540 but this was the first time I found a tool to read these bar
25541 codes.</p>
25542
25543 <p>It occurred to me that this could be used to tag and track the
25544 machines in our computing center.  If both racks and computers are
25545 tagged this way, we can use a picture of the rack and all its
25546 computers to detect the rack location of any computer in that rack.
25547 If we do this regularly for the entire room, we will find all
25548 locations, and can detect movements and removals.</p>
25549
25550 <p>I decided to test if this would work in practice, and picked a
25551 random rack and tagged all the machines with their names.  Next, I
25552 took pictures with my digital camera, and gave the dmtxread program
25553 these JPEG pictures to see how many tags it could read.  This worked
25554 fairly well.  If the pictures was well focused and not taken from the
25555 side, all tags in the image could be read.  Because of limited space
25556 between the racks, I was unable to get a good picture of the entire
25557 rack, but could without problem read all tags from a picture covering
25558 about half the rack.  I had to limit the search time used by dmtxread
25559 to 60000 ms to make sure it terminated in a reasonable time frame.</p>
25560
25561 <p>My conclusion is that this could work, and we should probably look
25562 at adjusting our computer tagging procedures to use bar codes for
25563 easier automatic tracking of computers.</p>
25564
25565       </div>
25566       <div class="tags">
25567
25568
25569         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
25570
25571
25572       </div>
25573     </div>
25574     <div class="padding"></div>
25575
25576     <div class="entry">
25577       <div class="title">
25578         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/When_web_browser_developers_make_a_video_player___.html">When web browser developers make a video player...</a>
25579       </div>
25580       <div class="date">
25581         17th January 2009
25582       </div>
25583       <div class="body">
25584         <p>As part of the work we do in <a href="http://www.nuug.no">NUUG</a>
25585 to publish video recordings of our monthly presentations, we provide a
25586 page with embedded video for easy access to the recording.  Putting a
25587 good set of HTML tags together to get working embedded video in all
25588 browsers and across all operating systems is not easy.  I hope this
25589 will become easier when the &lt;video&gt; tag is implemented in all
25590 browsers, but I am not sure.  We provide the recordings in several
25591 formats, MPEG1, Ogg Theora, H.264 and Quicktime, and want the
25592 browser/media plugin to pick one it support and use it to play the
25593 recording, using whatever embed mechanism the browser understand.
25594 There is at least four different tags to use for this, the new HTML5
25595 &lt;video&gt; tag, the &lt;object&gt; tag, the &lt;embed&gt; tag and
25596 the &lt;applet&gt; tag.  All of these take a lot of options, and
25597 finding the best options is a major challenge.</p>
25598
25599 <p>I just tested the experimental Opera browser available from <a
25600 href="http://labs.opera.com">labs.opera.com</a>, to see how it handled
25601 a &lt;video&gt; tag with a few video sources and no extra attributes.
25602 I was not very impressed.  The browser start by fetching a picture
25603 from the video stream.  Not sure if it is the first frame, but it is
25604 definitely very early in the recording.  So far, so good. Next,
25605 instead of streaming the 76 MiB video file, it start to download all
25606 of it, but do not start to play the video.  This mean I have to wait
25607 for several minutes for the downloading to finish.  When the download
25608 is done, the playing of the video do not start!  Waiting for the
25609 download, but I do not get to see the video?  Some testing later, I
25610 discover that I have to add the controls="true" attribute to be able
25611 to get a play button to pres to start the video.  Adding
25612 autoplay="true" did not help.  I sure hope this is a misfeature of the
25613 test version of Opera, and that future implementations of the
25614 &lt;video&gt; tag will stream recordings by default, or at least start
25615 playing when the download is done.</p>
25616
25617 <p>The test page I used (since changed to add more attributes) is
25618 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20090113-foredrag-om-foredrag/">available
25619 from the nuug site</a>.  Will have to test it with the new Firefox
25620 too.</p>
25621
25622 <p>In the test process, I discovered a missing feature.  I was unable
25623 to find a way to get the URL of the playing video out of Opera, so I
25624 am not quite sure it picked the Ogg Theora version of the video.  I
25625 sure hope it was using the announced Ogg Theora support. :)</p>
25626
25627       </div>
25628       <div class="tags">
25629
25630
25631         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
25632
25633
25634       </div>
25635     </div>
25636     <div class="padding"></div>
25637
25638     <div class="entry">
25639       <div class="title">
25640         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_video_mixer_on_a_USB_stick.html">Software video mixer on a USB stick</a>
25641       </div>
25642       <div class="date">
25643         28th December 2008
25644       </div>
25645       <div class="body">
25646         <p>The <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> is
25647 recording our montly presentation on video, and recently we have
25648 worked on improving the quality of the recordings by mixing the slides
25649 directly with the video stream.  For this, we use the
25650 <a href="http://dvswitch.alioth.debian.org/">dvswitch</a> package from
25651 the Debian video team.  As this require quite one computer per video
25652 source, and NUUG do not have enough laptops available, we need to
25653 borrow laptops.  And to avoid having to install extra software on
25654 these borrwed laptops, I have wrapped up all the programs needed on a
25655 bootable USB stick.  The software required is dvswitch with assosiated
25656 source, sink and mixer applications and
25657 <a href="http://www.kinodv.org/">dvgrab</a>.  To allow this setup to
25658 work without any configuration, I've patched dvswitch to use
25659 <a href="http://www.avahi.org/">avahi</a> to connect the various parts
25660 together.  And to allow us to use laptops without firewire plugs, I
25661 upgraded dvgrab to the one from Debian/unstable to get one that work
25662 with USB sources.  We have not yet tested this setup in a production
25663 setup, but I hope it will work properly, and allow us to set up a
25664 video mixer in a very short time frame.  We will need it for
25665 <a href="http://www.goopen.no/">Go Open 2009</a>.</p>
25666
25667 <p><a href="http://www.nuug.no/pub/video/bin/usbstick-dvswitch.img.gz">The
25668 USB image</a> is for a 1 GB memory stick, but can be used on any
25669 larger stick as well.</p>
25670
25671       </div>
25672       <div class="tags">
25673
25674
25675         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
25676
25677
25678       </div>
25679     </div>
25680     <div class="padding"></div>
25681
25682     <div class="entry">
25683       <div class="title">
25684         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Devcamp_brought_us_closer_to_the_Lenny_based_Debian_Edu_release.html">Devcamp brought us closer to the Lenny based Debian Edu release</a>
25685       </div>
25686       <div class="date">
25687          7th December 2008
25688       </div>
25689       <div class="body">
25690         <p>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
25691 Oslo.  Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
25692 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
25693 LTSP installation.  LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network.
25694 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
25695 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box.  Was working on getting the
25696 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
25697 finish it before the weekend was up.</p>
25698
25699 <p>Did not find time to look at the 4 VGA cards in one box we got from
25700 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
25701 development gathering.  Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
25702 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
25703 of these cards.</p>
25704
25705       </div>
25706       <div class="tags">
25707
25708
25709         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp</a>.
25710
25711
25712       </div>
25713     </div>
25714     <div class="padding"></div>
25715
25716     <div class="entry">
25717       <div class="title">
25718         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_sorry_state_of_multimedia_browser_plugins_in_Debian.html">The sorry state of multimedia browser plugins in Debian</a>
25719       </div>
25720       <div class="date">
25721         25th November 2008
25722       </div>
25723       <div class="body">
25724         <p>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
25725 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
25726 default in Debian Edu.  We need an embedded video playing plugin with
25727 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
25728 all the multimedia content available on the web.  The test results and
25729 notes are available on
25730 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">the
25731 Debian wiki</a>.  I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
25732 fill this need.  My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
25733 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages.  A lot of the MIME
25734 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
25735 video/ogg), just do not work.  And simple formats like the
25736 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn't supported by the
25737 totem and vlc plugins.  I hope the situation will improve soon.  No
25738 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.</p>
25739
25740 <p>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin.  It seem to
25741 be the only one fitting our needs. :/</p>
25742
25743       </div>
25744       <div class="tags">
25745
25746
25747         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web</a>.
25748
25749
25750       </div>
25751     </div>
25752     <div class="padding"></div>
25753
25754     <p style="text-align: right;"><a href="english.rss"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/xml.gif" alt="RSS Feed" width="36" height="14" /></a></p>
25755     <div id="sidebar">
25756
25757
25758
25759 <h2>Archive</h2>
25760 <ul>
25761
25762 <li>2016
25763 <ul>
25764
25765 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
25766
25767 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
25768
25769 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
25770
25771 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
25772
25773 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
25774
25775 </ul></li>
25776
25777 <li>2015
25778 <ul>
25779
25780 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
25781
25782 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
25783
25784 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
25785
25786 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
25787
25788 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
25789
25790 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
25791
25792 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
25793
25794 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
25795
25796 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
25797
25798 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
25799
25800 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
25801
25802 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
25803
25804 </ul></li>
25805
25806 <li>2014
25807 <ul>
25808
25809 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
25810
25811 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
25812
25813 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
25814
25815 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
25816
25817 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
25818
25819 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
25820
25821 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
25822
25823 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
25824
25825 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
25826
25827 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
25828
25829 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
25830
25831 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
25832
25833 </ul></li>
25834
25835 <li>2013
25836 <ul>
25837
25838 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
25839
25840 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
25841
25842 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
25843
25844 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
25845
25846 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
25847
25848 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
25849
25850 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
25851
25852 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
25853
25854 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
25855
25856 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
25857
25858 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
25859
25860 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
25861
25862 </ul></li>
25863
25864 <li>2012
25865 <ul>
25866
25867 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
25868
25869 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
25870
25871 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
25872
25873 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
25874
25875 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
25876
25877 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
25878
25879 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
25880
25881 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
25882
25883 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
25884
25885 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
25886
25887 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
25888
25889 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
25890
25891 </ul></li>
25892
25893 <li>2011
25894 <ul>
25895
25896 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
25897
25898 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
25899
25900 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
25901
25902 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
25903
25904 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
25905
25906 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
25907
25908 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
25909
25910 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
25911
25912 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
25913
25914 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
25915
25916 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
25917
25918 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
25919
25920 </ul></li>
25921
25922 <li>2010
25923 <ul>
25924
25925 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
25926
25927 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
25928
25929 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
25930
25931 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
25932
25933 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
25934
25935 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
25936
25937 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
25938
25939 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
25940
25941 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
25942
25943 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
25944
25945 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
25946
25947 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
25948
25949 </ul></li>
25950
25951 <li>2009
25952 <ul>
25953
25954 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
25955
25956 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
25957
25958 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
25959
25960 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
25961
25962 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
25963
25964 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
25965
25966 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
25967
25968 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
25969
25970 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
25971
25972 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
25973
25974 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
25975
25976 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
25977
25978 </ul></li>
25979
25980 <li>2008
25981 <ul>
25982
25983 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
25984
25985 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
25986
25987 </ul></li>
25988
25989 </ul>
25990
25991
25992
25993 <h2>Tags</h2>
25994 <ul>
25995
25996  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (13)</a></li>
25997
25998  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
25999
26000  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
26001
26002  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
26003
26004  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (9)</a></li>
26005
26006  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (15)</a></li>
26007
26008  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
26009
26010  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
26011
26012  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (129)</a></li>
26013
26014  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (156)</a></li>
26015
26016  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
26017
26018  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (15)</a></li>
26019
26020  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (22)</a></li>
26021
26022  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
26023
26024  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (319)</a></li>
26025
26026  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
26027
26028  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (12)</a></li>
26029
26030  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (27)</a></li>
26031
26032  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
26033
26034  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (17)</a></li>
26035
26036  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
26037
26038  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
26039
26040  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (12)</a></li>
26041
26042  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (19)</a></li>
26043
26044  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
26045
26046  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
26047
26048  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
26049
26050  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
26051
26052  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
26053
26054  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (38)</a></li>
26055
26056  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (7)</a></li>
26057
26058  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (275)</a></li>
26059
26060  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (181)</a></li>
26061
26062  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (26)</a></li>
26063
26064  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
26065
26066  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (60)</a></li>
26067
26068  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (92)</a></li>
26069
26070  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (1)</a></li>
26071
26072  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
26073
26074  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
26075
26076  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
26077
26078  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (9)</a></li>
26079
26080  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
26081
26082  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (4)</a></li>
26083
26084  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
26085
26086  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (46)</a></li>
26087
26088  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
26089
26090  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (4)</a></li>
26091
26092  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (49)</a></li>
26093
26094  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (4)</a></li>
26095
26096  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (10)</a></li>
26097
26098  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (36)</a></li>
26099
26100  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (2)</a></li>
26101
26102  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
26103
26104  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (8)</a></li>
26105
26106  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (57)</a></li>
26107
26108  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
26109
26110  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (38)</a></li>
26111
26112 </ul>
26113
26114
26115     </div>
26116     <p style="text-align: right">
26117  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
26118 </p>
26119
26120   </body>
26121 </html>