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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 "debian".</h3>
  22
  23     <div class="entry">
  24       <div class="title">
  25         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlimited_randomness_with_the_ChaosKey_.html">Unlimited randomness with the ChaosKey?</a>
  26       </div>
  27       <div class="date">
  28          1st March 2017
  29       </div>
  30       <div class="body">
  31         <p>A few days ago I ordered a small batch of
  32 <a href="http://altusmetrum.org/ChaosKey/">the ChaosKey</a>, a small
  33 USB dongle for generating entropy created by Bdale Garbee and Keith
  34 Packard.  Yesterday it arrived, and I am very happy to report that it
  35 work great!  According to its designers, to get it to work out of the
  36 box, you need the Linux kernel version 4.1 or later.  I tested on a
  37 Debian Stretch machine (kernel version 4.9), and there it worked just
  38 fine, increasing the available entropy very quickly.  I wrote a small
  39 test oneliner to test.  It first print the current entropy level,
  40 drain /dev/random, and then print the entropy level for five seconds.
  41 Here is the situation without the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
  42
  43 <blockquote><pre>
  44 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
  45   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
  46   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
  47      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
  48      sleep 1; \
  49   done
  50 300
  51 0+1 oppføringer inn
  52 0+1 oppføringer ut
  53 28 byte kopiert, 0,000264565 s, 106 kB/s
  54 4
  55 8
  56 12
  57 17
  58 21
  59 %
  60 </pre></blockquote>
  61
  62 <p>The entropy level increases by 3-4 every second.  In such case any
  63 application requiring random bits (like a HTTPS enabled web server)
  64 will halt and wait for more entrpy.  And here is the situation with
  65 the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
  66
  67 <blockquote><pre>
  68 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
  69   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
  70   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
  71      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
  72      sleep 1; \
  73   done
  74 1079
  75 0+1 oppføringer inn
  76 0+1 oppføringer ut
  77 104 byte kopiert, 0,000487647 s, 213 kB/s
  78 433
  79 1028
  80 1031
  81 1035
  82 1038
  83 %
  84 </pre></blockquote>
  85
  86 <p>Quite the difference. :) I bought a few more than I need, in case
  87 someone want to buy one here in Norway. :)</p>
  88
  89 <p>Update: The dongle was presented at Debconf last year.  You might
  90 find <a href="https://debconf16.debconf.org/talks/94/">the talk
  91 recording illuminating</a>.  It explains exactly what the source of
  92 randomness is, if you are unable to spot it from the schema drawing
  93 available from the ChaosKey web site linked at the start of this blog
  94 post.</p>
  95
  96       </div>
  97       <div class="tags">
  98
  99
 100         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>.
 101
 102
 103       </div>
 104     </div>
 105     <div class="padding"></div>
 106
 107     <div class="entry">
 108       <div class="title">
 109         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Where_did_that_package_go___mdash__geolocated_IP_traceroute.html">Where did that package go? &mdash; geolocated IP traceroute</a>
 110       </div>
 111       <div class="date">
 112          9th January 2017
 113       </div>
 114       <div class="body">
 115         <p>Did you ever wonder where the web trafic really flow to reach the
 116 web servers, and who own the network equipment it is flowing through?
 117 It is possible to get a glimpse of this from using traceroute, but it
 118 is hard to find all the details.  Many years ago, I wrote a system to
 119 map the Norwegian Internet (trying to figure out if our plans for a
 120 network game service would get low enough latency, and who we needed
 121 to talk to about setting up game servers close to the users.  Back
 122 then I used traceroute output from many locations (I asked my friends
 123 to run a script and send me their traceroute output) to create the
 124 graph and the map.  The output from traceroute typically look like
 125 this:
 126
 127 <p><pre>
 128 traceroute to www.stortinget.no (85.88.67.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
 129  1  uio-gw10.uio.no (129.240.202.1)  0.447 ms  0.486 ms  0.621 ms
 130  2  uio-gw8.uio.no (129.240.24.229)  0.467 ms  0.578 ms  0.675 ms
 131  3  oslo-gw1.uninett.no (128.39.65.17)  0.385 ms  0.373 ms  0.358 ms
 132  4  te3-1-2.br1.fn3.as2116.net (193.156.90.3)  1.174 ms  1.172 ms  1.153 ms
 133  5  he16-1-1.cr1.san110.as2116.net (195.0.244.234)  2.627 ms he16-1-1.cr2.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.244.48)  3.172 ms he16-1-1.cr1.san110.as2116.net (195.0.244.234)  2.857 ms
 134  6  ae1.ar8.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.242.39)  0.662 ms  0.637 ms ae0.ar8.oslosda310.as2116.net (195.0.242.23)  0.622 ms
 135  7  89.191.10.146 (89.191.10.146)  0.931 ms  0.917 ms  0.955 ms
 136  8  * * *
 137  9  * * *
 138 [...]
 139 </pre></p>
 140
 141 <p>This show the DNS names and IP addresses of (at least some of the)
 142 network equipment involved in getting the data traffic from me to the
 143 www.stortinget.no server, and how long it took in milliseconds for a
 144 package to reach the equipment and return to me.  Three packages are
 145 sent, and some times the packages do not follow the same path.  This
 146 is shown for hop 5, where three different IP addresses replied to the
 147 traceroute request.</p>
 148
 149 <p>There are many ways to measure trace routes.  Other good traceroute
 150 implementations I use are traceroute (using ICMP packages) mtr (can do
 151 both ICMP, UDP and TCP) and scapy (python library with ICMP, UDP, TCP
 152 traceroute and a lot of other capabilities).  All of them are easily
 153 available in <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>.</p>
 154
 155 <p>This time around, I wanted to know the geographic location of
 156 different route points, to visualize how visiting a web page spread
 157 information about the visit to a lot of servers around the globe.  The
 158 background is that a web site today often will ask the browser to get
 159 from many servers the parts (for example HTML, JSON, fonts,
 160 JavaScript, CSS, video) required to display the content.  This will
 161 leak information about the visit to those controlling these servers
 162 and anyone able to peek at the data traffic passing by (like your ISP,
 163 the ISPs backbone provider, FRA, GCHQ, NSA and others).</p>
 164
 165 <p>Lets pick an example, the Norwegian parliament web site
 166 www.stortinget.no.  It is read daily by all members of parliament and
 167 their staff, as well as political journalists, activits and many other
 168 citizens of Norway.  A visit to the www.stortinget.no web site will
 169 ask your browser to contact 8 other servers: ajax.googleapis.com,
 170 insights.hotjar.com, script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com,
 171 stats.g.doubleclick.net, www.google-analytics.com,
 172 www.googletagmanager.com and www.netigate.se.  I extracted this by
 173 asking <a href="http://phantomjs.org/">PhantomJS</a> to visit the
 174 Stortinget web page and tell me all the URLs PhantomJS downloaded to
 175 render the page (in HAR format using
 176 <a href="https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/blob/master/examples/netsniff.js">their
 177 netsniff example</a>.  I am very grateful to Gorm for showing me how
 178 to do this).  My goal is to visualize network traces to all IP
 179 addresses behind these DNS names, do show where visitors personal
 180 information is spread when visiting the page.</p>
 181
 182 <p align="center"><a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml"><img
 183 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geoip-small.png" alt="map of combined traces for URLs used by www.stortinget.no using GeoIP"/></a></p>
 184
 185 <p>When I had a look around for options, I could not find any good
 186 free software tools to do this, and decided I needed my own traceroute
 187 wrapper outputting KML based on locations looked up using GeoIP.  KML
 188 is easy to work with and easy to generate, and understood by several
 189 of the GIS tools I have available.  I got good help from by NUUG
 190 colleague Anders Einar with this, and the result can be seen in
 191 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/kmltraceroute">my
 192 kmltraceroute git repository</a>.  Unfortunately, the quality of the
 193 free GeoIP databases I could find (and the for-pay databases my
 194 friends had access to) is not up to the task.  The IP addresses of
 195 central Internet infrastructure would typically be placed near the
 196 controlling companies main office, and not where the router is really
 197 located, as you can see from <a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml">the
 198 KML file I created</a> using the GeoLite City dataset from MaxMind.
 199
 200 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg"><img
 201 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy-small.png" alt="scapy traceroute graph for URLs used by www.stortinget.no"/></a></p>
 202
 203 <p>I also had a look at the visual traceroute graph created by
 204 <a href="http://www.secdev.org/projects/scapy/">the scrapy project</a>,
 205 showing IP network ownership (aka AS owner) for the IP address in
 206 question.
 207 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg">The
 208 graph display a lot of useful information about the traceroute in SVG
 209 format</a>, and give a good indication on who control the network
 210 equipment involved, but it do not include geolocation.  This graph
 211 make it possible to see the information is made available at least for
 212 UNINETT, Catchcom, Stortinget, Nordunet, Google, Amazon, Telia, Level
 213 3 Communications and NetDNA.</p>
 214
 215 <p align="center"><a href="https://geotraceroute.com/index.php?node=4&host=www.stortinget.no"><img
 216 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-small.png" alt="example geotraceroute view for www.stortinget.no"/></a></p>
 217
 218 <p>In the process, I came across the
 219 <a href="https://geotraceroute.com/">web service GeoTraceroute</a> by
 220 Salim Gasmi.  Its methology of combining guesses based on DNS names,
 221 various location databases and finally use latecy times to rule out
 222 candidate locations seemed to do a very good job of guessing correct
 223 geolocation.  But it could only do one trace at the time, did not have
 224 a sensor in Norway and did not make the geolocations easily available
 225 for postprocessing.  So I contacted the developer and asked if he
 226 would be willing to share the code (he refused until he had time to
 227 clean it up), but he was interested in providing the geolocations in a
 228 machine readable format, and willing to set up a sensor in Norway.  So
 229 since yesterday, it is possible to run traces from Norway in this
 230 service thanks to a sensor node set up by
 231 <a href="https://www.nuug.no/">the NUUG assosiation</a>, and get the
 232 trace in KML format for further processing.</p>
 233
 234 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.kml"><img
 235 src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.png" alt="map of combined traces for URLs used by www.stortinget.no using geotraceroute"/></a></p>
 236
 237 <p>Here we can see a lot of trafic passes Sweden on its way to
 238 Denmark, Germany, Holland and Ireland.  Plenty of places where the
 239 Snowden confirmations verified the traffic is read by various actors
 240 without your best interest as their top priority.</p>
 241
 242 <p>Combining KML files is trivial using a text editor, so I could loop
 243 over all the hosts behind the urls imported by www.stortinget.no and
 244 ask for the KML file from GeoTraceroute, and create a combined KML
 245 file with all the traces (unfortunately only one of the IP addresses
 246 behind the DNS name is traced this time.  To get them all, one would
 247 have to request traces using IP number instead of DNS names from
 248 GeoTraceroute).  That might be the next step in this project.</p>
 249
 250 <p>Armed with these tools, I find it a lot easier to figure out where
 251 the IP traffic moves and who control the boxes involved in moving it.
 252 And every time the link crosses for example the Swedish border, we can
 253 be sure Swedish Signal Intelligence (FRA) is listening, as GCHQ do in
 254 Britain and NSA in USA and cables around the globe.  (Hm, what should
 255 we tell them? :) Keep that in mind if you ever send anything
 256 unencrypted over the Internet.</p>
 257
 258 <p>PS: KML files are drawn using
 259 <a href="http://ivanrublev.me/kml/">the KML viewer from Ivan
 260 Rublev<a/>, as it was less cluttered than the local Linux application
 261 Marble.  There are heaps of other options too.</p>
 262
 263 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 264 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 265 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 266
 267       </div>
 268       <div class="tags">
 269
 270
 271         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/kart">kart</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/stortinget">stortinget</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>.
 272
 273
 274       </div>
 275     </div>
 276     <div class="padding"></div>
 277
 278     <div class="entry">
 279       <div class="title">
 280         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Appstream_just_learned_how_to_map_hardware_to_packages_too_.html">Appstream just learned how to map hardware to packages too!</a>
 281       </div>
 282       <div class="date">
 283         23rd December 2016
 284       </div>
 285       <div class="body">
 286         <p>I received a very nice Christmas present today.  As my regular
 287 readers probably know, I have been working on the
 288 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the Isenkram
 289 system</a> for many years.  The goal of the Isenkram system is to make
 290 it easier for users to figure out what to install to get a given piece
 291 of hardware to work in Debian, and a key part of this system is a way
 292 to map hardware to packages.  Isenkram have its own mapping database,
 293 and also uses data provided by each package using the AppStream
 294 metadata format.  And today,
 295 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/appstream">AppStream</a> in
 296 Debian learned to look up hardware the same way Isenkram is doing it,
 297 ie using fnmatch():</p>
 298
 299 <p><pre>
 300 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias \
 301   usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
 302 Identifier: pymissile [generic]
 303 Name: pymissile
 304 Summary: Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher
 305 Package: pymissile
 306 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias usb:v0694p0002d0000
 307 Identifier: libnxt [generic]
 308 Name: libnxt
 309 Summary: utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NXT brick
 310 Package: libnxt
 311 ---
 312 Identifier: t2n [generic]
 313 Name: t2n
 314 Summary: Simple command-line tool for Lego NXT
 315 Package: t2n
 316 ---
 317 Identifier: python-nxt [generic]
 318 Name: python-nxt
 319 Summary: Python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot
 320 Package: python-nxt
 321 ---
 322 Identifier: nbc [generic]
 323 Name: nbc
 324 Summary: C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks
 325 Package: nbc
 326 %
 327 </pre></p>
 328
 329 <p>A similar query can be done using the combined AppStream and
 330 Isenkram databases using the isenkram-lookup tool:</p>
 331
 332 <p><pre>
 333 % isenkram-lookup usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
 334 pymissile
 335 % isenkram-lookup usb:v0694p0002d0000
 336 libnxt
 337 nbc
 338 python-nxt
 339 t2n
 340 %
 341 </pre></p>
 342
 343 <p>You can find modalias values relevant for your machine using
 344 <tt>cat $(find /sys/devices/ -name modalias)</tt>.
 345
 346 <p>If you want to make this system a success and help Debian users
 347 make the most of the hardware they have, please
 348 help<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add
 349 AppStream metadata for your package following the guidelines</a>
 350 documented in the wiki.  So far only 11 packages provide such
 351 information, among the several hundred hardware specific packages in
 352 Debian. The Isenkram database on the other hand contain 101 packages,
 353 mostly related to USB dongles.  Most of the packages with hardware
 354 mapping in AppStream are LEGO Mindstorms related, because I have, as
 355 part of my involvement in
 356 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the Debian LEGO
 357 team</a> given priority to making sure LEGO users get proposed the
 358 complete set of packages in Debian for that particular hardware.  The
 359 team also got a nice Christmas present today.  The
 360 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/nxt-firmware">nxt-firmware
 361 package</a> made it into Debian.  With this package in place, it is
 362 now possible to use the LEGO Mindstorms NXT unit with only free
 363 software, as the nxt-firmware package contain the source and firmware
 364 binaries for the NXT brick.</p>
 365
 366 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 367 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 368 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 369
 370       </div>
 371       <div class="tags">
 372
 373
 374         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>.
 375
 376
 377       </div>
 378     </div>
 379     <div class="padding"></div>
 380
 381     <div class="entry">
 382       <div class="title">
 383         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram_updated_with_a_lot_more_hardware_package_mappings.html">Isenkram updated with a lot more hardware-package mappings</a>
 384       </div>
 385       <div class="date">
 386         20th December 2016
 387       </div>
 388       <div class="body">
 389         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
 390 system</a> I wrote two years ago to make it easier in Debian to find
 391 and install packages to get your hardware dongles to work, is still
 392 going strong.  It is a system to look up the hardware present on or
 393 connected to the current system, and map the hardware to Debian
 394 packages.  It can either be done using the tools in isenkram-cli or
 395 using the user space daemon in the isenkram package.  The latter will
 396 notify you, when inserting new hardware, about what packages to
 397 install to get the dongle working.  It will even provide a button to
 398 click on to ask packagekit to install the packages.</p>
 399
 400 <p>Here is an command line example from my Thinkpad laptop:</p>
 401
 402 <p><pre>
 403 % isenkram-lookup
 404 bluez
 405 cheese
 406 ethtool
 407 fprintd
 408 fprintd-demo
 409 gkrellm-thinkbat
 410 hdapsd
 411 libpam-fprintd
 412 pidgin-blinklight
 413 thinkfan
 414 tlp
 415 tp-smapi-dkms
 416 tp-smapi-source
 417 tpb
 418 %
 419 </pre></p>
 420
 421 <p>It can also list the firware package providing firmware requested
 422 by the load kernel modules, which in my case is an empty list because
 423 I have all the firmware my machine need:
 424
 425 <p><pre>
 426 % /usr/sbin/isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
 427 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
 428 %
 429 </pre></p>
 430
 431 <p>The last few days I had a look at several of the around 250
 432 packages in Debian with udev rules.  These seem like good candidates
 433 to install when a given hardware dongle is inserted, and I found
 434 several that should be proposed by isenkram.  I have not had time to
 435 check all of them, but am happy to report that now there are 97
 436 packages packages mapped to hardware by Isenkram.  11 of these
 437 packages provide hardware mapping using AppStream, while the rest are
 438 listed in the modaliases file provided in isenkram.</p>
 439
 440 <p>These are the packages with hardware mappings at the moment.  The
 441 <strong>marked packages</strong> are also announcing their hardware
 442 support using AppStream, for everyone to use:</p>
 443
 444 <p>air-quality-sensor, alsa-firmware-loaders, argyll,
 445 <strong>array-info</strong>, avarice, avrdude, b43-fwcutter,
 446 bit-babbler, bluez, bluez-firmware, <strong>brltty</strong>,
 447 <strong>broadcom-sta-dkms</strong>, calibre, cgminer, cheese, colord,
 448 <strong>colorhug-client</strong>, dahdi-firmware-nonfree, dahdi-linux,
 449 dfu-util, dolphin-emu, ekeyd, ethtool, firmware-ipw2x00, fprintd,
 450 fprintd-demo, <strong>galileo</strong>, gkrellm-thinkbat, gphoto2,
 451 gpsbabel, gpsbabel-gui, gpsman, gpstrans, gqrx-sdr, gr-fcdproplus,
 452 gr-osmosdr, gtkpod, hackrf, hdapsd, hdmi2usb-udev, hpijs-ppds, hplip,
 453 ipw3945-source, ipw3945d, kde-config-tablet, kinect-audio-setup,
 454 <strong>libnxt</strong>, libpam-fprintd, <strong>lomoco</strong>,
 455 madwimax, minidisc-utils, mkgmap, msi-keyboard, mtkbabel,
 456 <strong>nbc</strong>, <strong>nqc</strong>, nut-hal-drivers, ola,
 457 open-vm-toolbox, open-vm-tools, openambit, pcgminer, pcmciautils,
 458 pcscd, pidgin-blinklight, printer-driver-splix,
 459 <strong>pymissile</strong>, python-nxt, qlandkartegt,
 460 qlandkartegt-garmin, rosegarden, rt2x00-source, sispmctl,
 461 soapysdr-module-hackrf, solaar, squeak-plugins-scratch, sunxi-tools,
 462 <strong>t2n</strong>, thinkfan, thinkfinger-tools, tlp, tp-smapi-dkms,
 463 tp-smapi-source, tpb, tucnak, uhd-host, usbmuxd, viking,
 464 virtualbox-ose-guest-x11, w1retap, xawtv, xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse,
 465 xserver-xorg-input-wacom, xserver-xorg-video-qxl,
 466 xserver-xorg-video-vmware, yubikey-personalization and
 467 zd1211-firmware</p>
 468
 469 <p>If you know of other packages, please let me know with a wishlist
 470 bug report against the isenkram-cli package, and ask the package
 471 maintainer to
 472 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add AppStream
 473 metadata according to the guidelines</a> to provide the information
 474 for everyone.  In time, I hope to get rid of the isenkram specific
 475 hardware mapping and depend exclusively on AppStream.</p>
 476
 477 <p>Note, the AppStream metadata for broadcom-sta-dkms is matching too
 478 much hardware, and suggest that the package with with any ethernet
 479 card.  See <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/838735">bug #838735</a> for
 480 the details.  I hope the maintainer find time to address it soon.  In
 481 the mean time I provide an override in isenkram.</p>
 482
 483       </div>
 484       <div class="tags">
 485
 486
 487         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>.
 488
 489
 490       </div>
 491     </div>
 492     <div class="padding"></div>
 493
 494     <div class="entry">
 495       <div class="title">
 496         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Oolite__a_life_in_space_as_vagabond_and_mercenary___nice_free_software.html">Oolite, a life in space as vagabond and mercenary - nice free software</a>
 497       </div>
 498       <div class="date">
 499         11th December 2016
 500       </div>
 501       <div class="body">
 502         <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-12-11-nice-oolite.png"/></p>
 503
 504 <p>In my early years, I played
 505 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Classic_Elite">the epic game
 506 Elite</a> on my PC.  I spent many months trading and fighting in
 507 space, and reached the 'elite' fighting status before I moved on.  The
 508 original Elite game was available on Commodore 64 and the IBM PC
 509 edition I played had a 64 KB executable.  I am still impressed today
 510 that the authors managed to squeeze both a 3D engine and details about
 511 more than 2000 planet systems across 7 galaxies into a binary so
 512 small.</p>
 513
 514 <p>I have known about <a href="http://www.oolite.org/">the free
 515 software game Oolite inspired by Elite</a> for a while, but did not
 516 really have time to test it properly until a few days ago.  It was
 517 great to discover that my old knowledge about trading routes were
 518 still valid.  But my fighting and flying abilities were gone, so I had
 519 to retrain to be able to dock on a space station.  And I am still not
 520 able to make much resistance when I am attacked by pirates, so I
 521 bougth and mounted the most powerful laser in the rear to be able to
 522 put up at least some resistance while fleeing for my life. :)</p>
 523
 524 <p>When playing Elite in the late eighties, I had to discover
 525 everything on my own, and I had long lists of prices seen on different
 526 planets to be able to decide where to trade what.  This time I had the
 527 advantages of the
 528 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Main_Page">Elite wiki</a>,
 529 where information about each planet is easily available with common
 530 price ranges and suggested trading routes.  This improved my ability
 531 to earn money and I have been able to earn enough to buy a lot of
 532 useful equipent in a few days.  I believe I originally played for
 533 months before I could get a docking computer, while now I could get it
 534 after less then a week.</p>
 535
 536 <p>If you like science fiction and dreamed of a life as a vagabond in
 537 space, you should try out Oolite.  It is available for Linux, MacOSX
 538 and Windows, and is included in Debian and derivatives since 2011.</p>
 539
 540 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 541 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 542 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 543
 544       </div>
 545       <div class="tags">
 546
 547
 548         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>.
 549
 550
 551       </div>
 552     </div>
 553     <div class="padding"></div>
 554
 555     <div class="entry">
 556       <div class="title">
 557         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Quicker_Debian_installations_using_eatmydata.html">Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</a>
 558       </div>
 559       <div class="date">
 560         25th November 2016
 561       </div>
 562       <div class="body">
 563         <p>Two years ago, I did some experiments with eatmydata and the Debian
 564 installation system, observing how using
 565 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">eatmydata
 566 could speed up the installation</a> quite a bit.  My testing measured
 567 speedup around 20-40 percent for Debian Edu, where we install around
 568 1000 packages from within the installer.  The eatmydata package
 569 provide a way to disable/delay file system flushing.  This is a bit
 570 risky in the general case, as files that should be stored on disk will
 571 stay only in memory a bit longer than expected, causing problems if a
 572 machine crashes at an inconvenient time.  But for an installation, if
 573 the machine crashes during installation the process is normally
 574 restarted, and avoiding disk operations as much as possible to speed
 575 up the process make perfect sense.
 576
 577 <p>I added code in the Debian Edu specific installation code to enable
 578 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libeatmydata">eatmydata</a>,
 579 but did not have time to push it any further.  But a few months ago I
 580 picked it up again and worked with the libeatmydata package maintainer
 581 Mattia Rizzolo to make it easier for everyone to get this installation
 582 speedup in Debian.  Thanks to our cooperation There is now an
 583 eatmydata-udeb package in Debian testing and unstable, and simply
 584 enabling/installing it in debian-installer (d-i) is enough to get the
 585 quicker installations.  It can be enabled using preseeding.  The
 586 following untested kernel argument should do the trick:</p>
 587
 588 <blockquote><pre>
 589 preseed/early_command="anna-install eatmydata-udeb"
 590 </pre></blockquote>
 591
 592 <p>This should ask d-i to install the package inside the d-i
 593 environment early in the installation sequence.  Having it installed
 594 in d-i in turn will make sure the relevant scripts are called just
 595 after debootstrap filled /target/ with the freshly installed Debian
 596 system to configure apt to run dpkg with eatmydata.  This is enough to
 597 speed up the installation process.  There is a proposal to
 598 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/841153">extend the idea a bit further
 599 by using /etc/ld.so.preload instead of apt.conf</a>, but I have not
 600 tested its impact.</p>
 601
 602
 603       </div>
 604       <div class="tags">
 605
 606
 607         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>.
 608
 609
 610       </div>
 611     </div>
 612     <div class="padding"></div>
 613
 614     <div class="entry">
 615       <div class="title">
 616         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Oversette_bokm_l_til_nynorsk__enklere_enn_du_tror_takket_v_re_Apertium.html">Oversette bokmål til nynorsk, enklere enn du tror takket være Apertium</a>
 617       </div>
 618       <div class="date">
 619         24th November 2016
 620       </div>
 621       <div class="body">
 622         <p>I Norge er det mange som trenger å skrive både bokmål og nynorsk.
 623 Eksamensoppgaver, offentlige brev og nyheter er eksempler på tekster
 624 der det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skoleoppgavene som
 625 elever over det ganske land skal levere inn hvert år.  Det mange ikke
 626 vet er at selv om de kommersielle alternativene
 627 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google Translate</a> og
 628 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing Translator</a> ikke kan
 629 bidra med å oversette mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finnes det et
 630 utmerket fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Oversetterverktøyet
 631 Apertium har støtte for en rekke språkkombinasjoner, og takket være
 632 den utrettelige innsatsen til blant annet Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
 633 en bruke webtjenesten til å fylle inn en tekst på bokmål eller
 634 nynorsk, og få den automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
 635 Resultatet er ikke perfekt, men et svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og til
 636 er resultatet så bra at det kan benyttes uten endringer.  Jeg vet
 637 f.eks. at store deler av Joomla ble oversatt til nynorsk ved hjelp
 638 Apertium.  Høres det ut som noe du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så fall
 639 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
 640 teksten din i webskjemaet der.
 641
 642 <p>Hvis du trenger maskinell tilgang til den bakenforliggende
 643 teknologien kan du enten installere pakken
 644 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">apertium-nno-nob</a>
 645 på en Debian-maskin eller bruke web-API-et tilgjengelig fra
 646 api.apertium.org.  Se
 647 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">API-dokumentasjonen</a>
 648 for detaljer om web-API-et.  Her kan du se hvordan resultatet blir for
 649 denne teksten som ble skrevet på bokmål over maskinoversatt til
 650 nynorsk.</p>
 651
 652 <hr/>
 653
 654 <p>I Noreg er det mange som treng å skriva både bokmål og nynorsk.
 655 Eksamensoppgåver, offentlege brev og nyhende er døme på tekster der
 656 det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skuleoppgåvene som
 657 elevar over det ganske land skal levera inn kvart år.  Det mange ikkje
 658 veit er at sjølv om dei kommersielle alternativa
 659 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google *Translate</a> og
 660 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing *Translator</a> ikkje
 661 kan bidra med å omsetja mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finst det eit
 662 utmerka fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Omsetjarverktøyet
 663 *Apertium har støtte for ei rekkje språkkombinasjonar, og takka vera
 664 den utrøyttelege innsatsen til blant anna Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
 665 ein bruka *webtjenesten til å fylla inn ei tekst på bokmål eller
 666 nynorsk, og få den *automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
 667 Resultatet er ikkje perfekt, men eit svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og
 668 til er resultatet så bra at det kan nyttast utan endringar.  Eg veit
 669 t.d. at store delar av *Joomla vart omsett til nynorsk ved hjelp
 670 *Apertium.  Høyrast det ut som noko du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så
 671 fall <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">*Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
 672 teksta di i *webskjemaet der.
 673
 674 <p>Viss du treng *maskinell tilgjenge til den *bakenforliggende
 675 teknologien kan du anten installera pakken
 676 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">*apertium-*nno-*nob</a>
 677 på ein *Debian-maskin eller bruka *web-*API-eit tilgjengeleg frå
 678 *api.*apertium.org.  Sjå
 679 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">*API-dokumentasjonen</a>
 680 for detaljar om *web-*API-eit.  Her kan du sjå korleis resultatet vert
 681 for denne teksta som vart skreva på bokmål over *maskinoversatt til
 682 nynorsk.</p>
 683
 684       </div>
 685       <div class="tags">
 686
 687
 688         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll</a>.
 689
 690
 691       </div>
 692     </div>
 693     <div class="padding"></div>
 694
 695     <div class="entry">
 696       <div class="title">
 697         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_profiler_for_multi_threaded_software_is_now_in_Debian.html">Coz profiler for multi-threaded software is now in Debian</a>
 698       </div>
 699       <div class="date">
 700         13th November 2016
 701       </div>
 702       <div class="body">
 703         <p><a href="http://coz-profiler.org/">The Coz profiler</a>, a nice
 704 profiler able to run benchmarking experiments on the instrumented
 705 multi-threaded program, finally
 706 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/coz-profiler">made it into
 707 Debian unstable yesterday</A>.  Lluís Vilanova and I have spent many
 708 months since
 709 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">I
 710 blogged about the coz tool</a> in August working with upstream to make
 711 it suitable for Debian.  There are still issues with clang
 712 compatibility, inline assembly only working x86 and minimized
 713 JavaScript libraries.</p>
 714
 715 <p>To test it, install 'coz-profiler' using apt and run it like this:</p>
 716
 717 <p><blockquote>
 718 <tt>coz run --- /path/to/binary-with-debug-info</tt>
 719 </blockquote></p>
 720
 721 <p>This will produce a profile.coz file in the current working
 722 directory with the profiling information.  This is then given to a
 723 JavaScript application provided in the package and available from
 724 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">a project web page</a>.
 725 To start the local copy, invoke it in a browser like this:</p>
 726
 727 <p><blockquote>
 728 <tt>sensible-browser /usr/share/coz-profiler/viewer/index.htm</tt>
 729 </blockquote></p>
 730
 731 <p>See the project home page and the
 732 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">USENIX
 733 ;login: article on Coz</a> for more information on how it is
 734 working.</p>
 735
 736       </div>
 737       <div class="tags">
 738
 739
 740         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>.
 741
 742
 743       </div>
 744     </div>
 745     <div class="padding"></div>
 746
 747     <div class="entry">
 748       <div class="title">
 749         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_own_self_balancing_Lego_Segway.html">My own self balancing Lego Segway</a>
 750       </div>
 751       <div class="date">
 752          4th November 2016
 753       </div>
 754       <div class="body">
 755         <p>A while back I received a Gyro sensor for the NXT
 756 <a href="mindstorms.lego.com">Mindstorms</a> controller as a birthday
 757 present.  It had been on my wishlist for a while, because I wanted to
 758 build a Segway like balancing lego robot.  I had already built
 759 <a href="http://www.nxtprograms.com/NXT2/segway/">a simple balancing
 760 robot</a> with the kids, using the light/color sensor included in the
 761 NXT kit as the balance sensor, but it was not working very well.  It
 762 could balance for a while, but was very sensitive to the light
 763 condition in the room and the reflective properties of the surface and
 764 would fall over after a short while.  I wanted something more robust,
 765 and had
 766 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=NGY1044">the
 767 gyro sensor from HiTechnic</a> I believed would solve it on my
 768 wishlist for some years before it suddenly showed up as a gift from my
 769 loved ones. :)</p>
 770
 771 <p>Unfortunately I have not had time to sit down and play with it
 772 since then.  But that changed some days ago, when I was searching for
 773 lego segway information and came across a recipe from HiTechnic for
 774 building
 775 <a href="http://www.hitechnic.com/blog/gyro-sensor/htway/">the
 776 HTWay</a>, a segway like balancing robot.  Build instructions and
 777 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/upload/786-HTWayC.nxc">source
 778 code</a> was included, so it was just a question of putting it all
 779 together.  And thanks to the great work of many Debian developers, the
 780 compiler needed to build the source for the NXT is already included in
 781 Debian, so I was read to go in less than an hour.  The resulting robot
 782 do not look very impressive in its simplicity:</p>
 783
 784 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-robot.jpeg"></p>
 785
 786 <p>Because I lack the infrared sensor used to control the robot in the
 787 design from HiTechnic, I had to comment out the last task
 788 (taskControl).  I simply placed /* and */ around it get the program
 789 working without that sensor present.  Now it balances just fine until
 790 the battery status run low:</p>
 791
 792 <p align="center"><video width="70%" controls="true">
 793    <source src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-balancing.ogv" type="video/ogg">
 794 </video></p>
 795
 796 <p>Now we would like to teach it how to follow a line and take remote
 797 control instructions using the included Bluetooth receiver in the NXT.</p>
 798
 799 <p>If you, like me, love LEGO and want to make sure we find the tools
 800 they need to work with LEGO in Debian and all our derivative
 801 distributions like Ubuntu, check out
 802 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the LEGO designers
 803 project page</a> and join the Debian LEGO team.  Personally I own a
 804 RCX and NXT controller (no EV3), and would like to make sure the
 805 Debian tools needed to program the systems I own work as they
 806 should.</p>
 807
 808       </div>
 809       <div class="tags">
 810
 811
 812         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>.
 813
 814
 815       </div>
 816     </div>
 817     <div class="padding"></div>
 818
 819     <div class="entry">
 820       <div class="title">
 821         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile phone</a>
 822       </div>
 823       <div class="date">
 824         10th October 2016
 825       </div>
 826       <div class="body">
 827         <p>In July
 828 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_use_the_Signal_app_if_you_only_have_a_land_line__ie_no_mobile_phone_.html">I
 829 wrote how to get the Signal Chrome/Chromium app working</a> without
 830 the ability to receive SMS messages (aka without a cell phone).  It is
 831 time to share some experiences and provide an updated setup.</p>
 832
 833 <p>The Signal app have worked fine for several months now, and I use
 834 it regularly to chat with my loved ones.  I had a major snag at the
 835 end of my summer vacation, when the the app completely forgot my
 836 setup, identity and keys.  The reason behind this major mess was
 837 running out of disk space.  To avoid that ever happening again I have
 838 started storing everything in <tt>userdata/</tt> in git, to be able to
 839 roll back to an earlier version if the files are wiped by mistake.  I
 840 had to use it once after introducing the git backup.  When rolling
 841 back to an earlier version, one need to use the 'reset session' option
 842 in Signal to get going, and notify the people you talk with about the
 843 problem.  I assume there is some sequence number tracking in the
 844 protocol to detect rollback attacks.  The git repository is rather big
 845 (674 MiB so far), but I have not tried to figure out if some of the
 846 content can be added to a .gitignore file due to lack of spare
 847 time.</p>
 848
 849 <p>I've also hit the 90 days timeout blocking, and noticed that this
 850 make it impossible to send messages using Signal.  I could still
 851 receive them, but had to patch the code with a new timestamp to send.
 852 I believe the timeout is added by the developers to force people to
 853 upgrade to the latest version of the app, even when there is no
 854 protocol changes, to reduce the version skew among the user base and
 855 thus try to keep the number of support requests down.</p>
 856
 857 <p>Since my original recipe, the Signal source code changed slightly,
 858 making the old patch fail to apply cleanly.  Below is an updated
 859 patch, including the shell wrapper I use to start Signal.  The
 860 original version required a new user to locate the JavaScript console
 861 and call a function from there.  I got help from a friend with more
 862 JavaScript knowledge than me to modify the code to provide a GUI
 863 button instead.  This mean that to get started you just need to run
 864 the wrapper and click the 'Register without mobile phone' to get going
 865 now.  I've also modified the timeout code to always set it to 90 days
 866 in the future, to avoid having to patch the code regularly.</p>
 867
 868 <p>So, the updated recipe for Debian Jessie:</p>
 869
 870 <ol>
 871
 872 <li>First, install required packages to get the source code and the
 873 browser you need.  Signal only work with Chrome/Chromium, as far as I
 874 know, so you need to install it.
 875
 876 <pre>
 877 apt install git tor chromium
 878 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
 879 </pre></li>
 880
 881 <li>Modify the source code using command listed in the the patch
 882 block below.</li>
 883
 884 <li>Start Signal using the run-signal-app wrapper (for example using
 885 <tt>`pwd`/run-signal-app</tt>).
 886
 887 <li>Click on the 'Register without mobile phone', will in a phone
 888 number you can receive calls to the next minute, receive the
 889 verification code and enter it into the form field and press
 890 'Register'.  Note, the phone number you use will be user Signal
 891 username, ie the way others can find you on Signal.</li>
 892
 893 <li>You can now use Signal to contact others.  Note, new contacts do
 894 not show up in the contact list until you restart Signal, and there is
 895 no way to assign names to Contacts.  There is also no way to create or
 896 update chat groups.  I suspect this is because the web app do not have
 897 a associated contact database.</li>
 898
 899 </ol>
 900
 901 <p>I am still a bit uneasy about using Signal, because of the way its
 902 main author moxie0 reject federation and accept dependencies to major
 903 corporations like Google (part of the code is fetched from Google) and
 904 Amazon (the central coordination point is owned by Amazon).  See for
 905 example
 906 <a href="https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37">the
 907 LibreSignal issue tracker</a> for a thread documenting the authors
 908 view on these issues.  But the network effect is strong in this case,
 909 and several of the people I want to communicate with already use
 910 Signal.  Perhaps we can all move to <a href="https://ring.cx/">Ring</a>
 911 once it <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/830265">work on my
 912 laptop</a>?  It already work on Windows and Android, and is included
 913 in <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/ring">Debian</a> and
 914 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ring">Ubuntu</a>, but not
 915 working on Debian Stable.</p>
 916
 917 <p>Anyway, this is the patch I apply to the Signal code to get it
 918 working.  It switch to the production servers, disable to timeout,
 919 make registration easier and add the shell wrapper:</p>
 920
 921 <pre>
 922 cd Signal-Desktop; cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p1
 923 diff --git a/js/background.js b/js/background.js
 924 index 24b4c1d..579345f 100644
 925 --- a/js/background.js
 926 +++ b/js/background.js
 927 @@ -33,9 +33,9 @@
 928          });
 929      });
 930
 931 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
 932 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org';
 933      var SERVER_PORTS = [80, 4433, 8443];
 934 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
 935 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
 936      var messageReceiver;
 937      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
 938          if (messageReceiver) {
 939 diff --git a/js/expire.js b/js/expire.js
 940 index 639aeae..beb91c3 100644
 941 --- a/js/expire.js
 942 +++ b/js/expire.js
 943 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 944  ;(function() {
 945      'use strict';
 946 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
 947 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = Date.now() + (90 * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
 948
 949      window.extension = window.extension || {};
 950
 951 diff --git a/js/views/install_view.js b/js/views/install_view.js
 952 index 7816f4f..1d6233b 100644
 953 --- a/js/views/install_view.js
 954 +++ b/js/views/install_view.js
 955 @@ -38,7 +38,8 @@
 956              return {
 957                  'click .step1': this.selectStep.bind(this, 1),
 958                  'click .step2': this.selectStep.bind(this, 2),
 959 -                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3)
 960 +                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3),
 961 +                'click .callreg': function() { extension.install('standalone') },
 962              };
 963          },
 964          clearQR: function() {
 965 diff --git a/options.html b/options.html
 966 index dc0f28e..8d709f6 100644
 967 --- a/options.html
 968 +++ b/options.html
 969 @@ -14,7 +14,10 @@
 970          &lt;div class='nav'>
 971            &lt;h1>{{ installWelcome }}&lt;/h1>
 972            &lt;p>{{ installTagline }}&lt;/p>
 973 -          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a> &lt;/div>
 974 +          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a>
 975 +           &lt;br> &lt;a class="button callreg">Register without mobile phone&lt;/a>
 976 +
 977 +         &lt;/div>
 978            &lt;span class='dot step1 selected'>&lt;/span>
 979            &lt;span class='dot step2'>&lt;/span>
 980            &lt;span class='dot step3'>&lt;/span>
 981 --- /dev/null   2016-10-07 09:55:13.730181472 +0200
 982 +++ b/run-signal-app   2016-10-10 08:54:09.434172391 +0200
 983 @@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
 984 +#!/bin/sh
 985 +set -e
 986 +cd $(dirname $0)
 987 +mkdir -p userdata
 988 +userdata="`pwd`/userdata"
 989 +if [ -d "$userdata" ] && [ ! -d "$userdata/.git" ] ; then
 990 +    (cd $userdata && git init)
 991 +fi
 992 +(cd $userdata && git add . && git commit -m "Current status." || true)
 993 +exec chromium \
 994 +  --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
 995 +  --user-data-dir=$userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
 996 EOF
 997 chmod a+rx run-signal-app
 998 </pre>
 999
1000 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1001 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1002 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1003
1004       </div>
1005       <div class="tags">
1006
1007
1008         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>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
1009
1010
1011       </div>
1012     </div>
1013     <div class="padding"></div>
1014
1015     <div class="entry">
1016       <div class="title">
1017         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Isenkram__Appstream_and_udev_make_life_as_a_LEGO_builder_easier.html">Isenkram, Appstream and udev make life as a LEGO builder easier</a>
1018       </div>
1019       <div class="date">
1020          7th October 2016
1021       </div>
1022       <div class="body">
1023         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
1024 system</a> provide a practical and easy way to figure out which
1025 packages support the hardware in a given machine.  The command line
1026 tool <tt>isenkram-lookup</tt> and the tasksel options provide a
1027 convenient way to list and install packages relevant for the current
1028 hardware during system installation, both user space packages and
1029 firmware packages. The GUI background daemon on the other hand provide
1030 a pop-up proposing to install packages when a new dongle is inserted
1031 while using the computer.  For example, if you plug in a smart card
1032 reader, the system will ask if you want to install <tt>pcscd</tt> if
1033 that package isn't already installed, and if you plug in a USB video
1034 camera the system will ask if you want to install <tt>cheese</tt> if
1035 cheese is currently missing.  This already work just fine.</p>
1036
1037 <p>But Isenkram depend on a database mapping from hardware IDs to
1038 package names.  When I started no such database existed in Debian, so
1039 I made my own data set and included it with the isenkram package and
1040 made isenkram fetch the latest version of this database from git using
1041 http.  This way the isenkram users would get updated package proposals
1042 as soon as I learned more about hardware related packages.</p>
1043
1044 <p>The hardware is identified using modalias strings.  The modalias
1045 design is from the Linux kernel where most hardware descriptors are
1046 made available as a strings that can be matched using filename style
1047 globbing.  It handle USB, PCI, DMI and a lot of other hardware related
1048 identifiers.</p>
1049
1050 <p>The downside to the Isenkram specific database is that there is no
1051 information about relevant distribution / Debian version, making
1052 isenkram propose obsolete packages too.  But along came AppStream, a
1053 cross distribution mechanism to store and collect metadata about
1054 software packages.  When I heard about the proposal, I contacted the
1055 people involved and suggested to add a hardware matching rule using
1056 modalias strings in the specification, to be able to use AppStream for
1057 mapping hardware to packages.  This idea was accepted and AppStream is
1058 now a great way for a package to announce the hardware it support in a
1059 distribution neutral way.  I wrote
1060 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">a
1061 recipe on how to add such meta-information</a> in a blog post last
1062 December.  If you have a hardware related package in Debian, please
1063 announce the relevant hardware IDs using AppStream.</p>
1064
1065 <p>In Debian, almost all packages that can talk to a LEGO Mindestorms
1066 RCX or NXT unit, announce this support using AppStream.  The effect is
1067 that when you insert such LEGO robot controller into your Debian
1068 machine, Isenkram will propose to install the packages needed to get
1069 it working.  The intention is that this should allow the local user to
1070 start programming his robot controller right away without having to
1071 guess what packages to use or which permissions to fix.</p>
1072
1073 <p>But when I sat down with my son the other day to program our NXT
1074 unit using his Debian Stretch computer, I discovered something
1075 annoying.  The local console user (ie my son) did not get access to
1076 the USB device for programming the unit.  This used to work, but no
1077 longer in Jessie and Stretch.  After some investigation and asking
1078 around on #debian-devel, I discovered that this was because udev had
1079 changed the mechanism used to grant access to local devices.  The
1080 ConsoleKit mechanism from <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>
1081 no longer applied, because LDAP users no longer was added to the
1082 plugdev group during login.  Michael Biebl told me that this method
1083 was obsolete and the new method used ACLs instead.  This was good
1084 news, as the plugdev mechanism is a mess when using a remote user
1085 directory like LDAP.  Using ACLs would make sure a user lost device
1086 access when she logged out, even if the user left behind a background
1087 process which would retain the plugdev membership with the ConsoleKit
1088 setup.  Armed with this knowledge I moved on to fix the access problem
1089 for the LEGO Mindstorms related packages.</p>
1090
1091 <p>The new system uses a udev tag, 'uaccess'.  It can either be
1092 applied directly for a device, or is applied in
1093 /lib/udev/rules.d/70-uaccess.rules for classes of devices.  As the
1094 LEGO Mindstorms udev rules did not have a class, I decided to add the
1095 tag directly in the udev rules files included in the packages.  Here
1096 is one example.  For the nqc C compiler for the RCX, the
1097 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/60-nqc.rules</tt> file now look like this:
1098
1099 <p><pre>
1100 SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ACTION=="add", ATTR{idVendor}=="0694", ATTR{idProduct}=="0001", \
1101     SYMLINK+="rcx-%k", TAG+="uaccess"
1102 </pre></p>
1103
1104 <p>The key part is the 'TAG+="uaccess"' at the end.  I suspect all
1105 packages using plugdev in their /lib/udev/rules.d/ files should be
1106 changed to use this tag (either directly or indirectly via
1107 <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>).  Perhaps a lintian check should be created
1108 to detect this?</p>
1109
1110 <p>I've been unable to find good documentation on the uaccess feature.
1111 It is unclear to me if the uaccess tag is an internal implementation
1112 detail like the udev-acl tag used by
1113 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>.  If it is, I guess the
1114 indirect method is the preferred way.  Michael
1115 <a href="https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/4288">asked for more
1116 documentation from the systemd project</a> and I hope it will make
1117 this clearer.  For now I use the generic classes when they exist and
1118 is already handled by <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>, and add the tag
1119 directly if no such class exist.</p>
1120
1121 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
1122 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
1123 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
1124
1125 <p>To help out making life for LEGO constructors in Debian easier,
1126 please join us on our IRC channel
1127 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> and join
1128 the <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/debian-lego/">Debian
1129 LEGO team</a> in the Alioth project we created yesterday.  A mailing
1130 list is not yet created, but we are working on it. :)</p>
1131
1132 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1133 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1134 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1135
1136       </div>
1137       <div class="tags">
1138
1139
1140         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>.
1141
1142
1143       </div>
1144     </div>
1145     <div class="padding"></div>
1146
1147     <div class="entry">
1148       <div class="title">
1149         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_draft_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook_now_public.html">First draft Norwegian Bokmål edition of The Debian Administrator's Handbook now public</a>
1150       </div>
1151       <div class="date">
1152         30th August 2016
1153       </div>
1154       <div class="body">
1155         <p>In April we
1156 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">started
1157 to work</a> on a Norwegian Bokmål edition of the "open access" book on
1158 how to set up and administrate a Debian system.  Today I am happy to
1159 report that the first draft is now publicly available.  You can find
1160 it on <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/">get the Debian
1161 Administrator's Handbook page</a> (under Other languages).  The first
1162 eight chapters have a first draft translation, and we are working on
1163 proofreading the content.  If you want to help out, please start
1164 contributing using
1165 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
1166 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
1167 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
1168 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
1169 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
1170 contributors</a>.  A good way to contribute is to proofread the text
1171 and update weblate if you find errors.</p>
1172
1173 <p>Our goal is still to make the Norwegian book available on paper as well as
1174 electronic form.</p>
1175
1176       </div>
1177       <div class="tags">
1178
1179
1180         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>.
1181
1182
1183       </div>
1184     </div>
1185     <div class="padding"></div>
1186
1187     <div class="entry">
1188       <div class="title">
1189         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">Coz can help you find bottlenecks in multi-threaded software - nice free software</a>
1190       </div>
1191       <div class="date">
1192         11th August 2016
1193       </div>
1194       <div class="body">
1195         <p>This summer, I read a great article
1196 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">coz:
1197 This Is the Profiler You're Looking For</a>" in USENIX ;login: about
1198 how to profile multi-threaded programs.  It presented a system for
1199 profiling software by running experiences in the running program,
1200 testing how run time performance is affected by "speeding up" parts of
1201 the code to various degrees compared to a normal run.  It does this by
1202 slowing down parallel threads while the "faster up" code is running
1203 and measure how this affect processing time.  The processing time is
1204 measured using probes inserted into the code, either using progress
1205 counters (COZ_PROGRESS) or as latency meters (COZ_BEGIN/COZ_END).  It
1206 can also measure unmodified code by measuring complete the program
1207 runtime and running the program several times instead.</p>
1208
1209 <p>The project and presentation was so inspiring that I would like to
1210 get the system into Debian.  I
1211 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=830708">created
1212 a WNPP request for it</a> and contacted upstream to try to make the
1213 system ready for Debian by sending patches.  The build process need to
1214 be changed a bit to avoid running 'git clone' to get dependencies, and
1215 to include the JavaScript web page used to visualize the collected
1216 profiling information included in the source package.
1217 But I expect that should work out fairly soon.</p>
1218
1219 <p>The way the system work is fairly simple.  To run an coz experiment
1220 on a binary with debug symbols available, start the program like this:
1221
1222 <p><blockquote><pre>
1223 coz run --- program-to-run
1224 </pre></blockquote></p>
1225
1226 <p>This will create a text file profile.coz with the instrumentation
1227 information.  To show what part of the code affect the performance
1228 most, use a web browser and either point it to
1229 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/</a>
1230 or use the copy from git (in the gh-pages branch).  Check out this web
1231 site to have a look at several example profiling runs and get an idea what the end result from the profile runs look like.  To make the
1232 profiling more useful you include &lt;coz.h&gt; and insert the
1233 COZ_PROGRESS or COZ_BEGIN and COZ_END at appropriate places in the
1234 code, rebuild and run the profiler.  This allow coz to do more
1235 targeted experiments.</p>
1236
1237 <p>A video published by ACM
1238 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE0V-p1odPg">presenting the
1239 Coz profiler</a> is available from Youtube.  There is also a paper
1240 from the 25th Symposium on Operating Systems Principles available
1241 titled
1242 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/conference/atc16/technical-sessions/presentation/curtsinger">Coz:
1243 finding code that counts with causal profiling</a>.</p>
1244
1245 <p><a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz">The source code</a>
1246 for Coz is available from github.  It will only build with clang
1247 because it uses a
1248 <a href="https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=55606">C++
1249 feature missing in GCC</a>, but I've submitted
1250 <a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz/pull/67">a patch to solve
1251 it</a> and hope it will be included in the upstream source soon.</p>
1252
1253 <p>Please get in touch if you, like me, would like to see this piece
1254 of software in Debian.  I would very much like some help with the
1255 packaging effort, as I lack the in depth knowledge on how to package
1256 C++ libraries.</p>
1257
1258       </div>
1259       <div class="tags">
1260
1261
1262         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>.
1263
1264
1265       </div>
1266     </div>
1267     <div class="padding"></div>
1268
1269     <div class="entry">
1270       <div class="title">
1271         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlocking_HTC_Desire_HD_on_Linux_using_unruu_and_fastboot.html">Unlocking HTC Desire HD on Linux using unruu and fastboot</a>
1272       </div>
1273       <div class="date">
1274          7th July 2016
1275       </div>
1276       <div class="body">
1277         <p>Yesterday, I tried to unlock a HTC Desire HD phone, and it proved
1278 to be a slight challenge.  Here is the recipe if I ever need to do it
1279 again.  It all started by me wanting to try the recipe to set up
1280 <a href="https://blog.torproject.org/blog/mission-impossible-hardening-android-security-and-privacy">an
1281 hardened Android installation</a> from the Tor project blog on a
1282 device I had access to.  It is a old mobile phone with a broken
1283 microphone The initial idea had been to just
1284 <a href="http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Install_CM_for_ace">install
1285 CyanogenMod on it</a>, but did not quite find time to start on it
1286 until a few days ago.</p>
1287
1288 <p>The unlock process is supposed to be simple: (1) Boot into the boot
1289 loader (press volume down and power at the same time), (2) select
1290 'fastboot' before (3) connecting the device via USB to a Linux
1291 machine, (4) request the device identifier token by running 'fastboot
1292 oem get_identifier_token', (5) request the device unlocking key using
1293 the <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader/">HTC developer web
1294 site</a> and unlock the phone using the key file emailed to you.</p>
1295
1296 <p>Unfortunately, this only work fi you have hboot version 2.00.0029
1297 or newer, and the device I was working on had 2.00.0027.  This
1298 apparently can be easily fixed by downloading a Windows program and
1299 running it on your Windows machine, if you accept the terms Microsoft
1300 require you to accept to use Windows - which I do not.  So I had to
1301 come up with a different approach.  I got a lot of help from AndyCap
1302 on #nuug, and would not have been able to get this working without
1303 him.</p>
1304
1305 <p>First I needed to extract the hboot firmware from
1306 <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/ruu/PD9810000_Ace_Sense30_S_hboot_2.00.0029.exe">the
1307 windows binary for HTC Desire HD</a> downloaded as 'the RUU' from HTC.
1308 For this there is is <a href="https://github.com/kmdm/unruu/">a github
1309 project named unruu</a> using libunshield.  The unshield tool did not
1310 recognise the file format, but unruu worked and extracted rom.zip,
1311 containing the new hboot firmware and a text file describing which
1312 devices it would work for.</p>
1313
1314 <p>Next, I needed to get the new firmware into the device.  For this I
1315 followed some instructions
1316 <a href="http://www.htc1guru.com/2013/09/new-ruu-zips-posted/">available
1317 from HTC1Guru.com</a>, and ran these commands as root on a Linux
1318 machine with Debian testing:</p>
1319
1320 <p><pre>
1321 adb reboot-bootloader
1322 fastboot oem rebootRUU
1323 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
1324 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
1325 fastboot reboot
1326 </pre></p>
1327
1328 <p>The flash command apparently need to be done twice to take effect,
1329 as the first is just preparations and the second one do the flashing.
1330 The adb command is just to get to the boot loader menu, so turning the
1331 device on while holding volume down and the power button should work
1332 too.</p>
1333
1334 <p>With the new hboot version in place I could start following the
1335 instructions on the HTC developer web site.  I got the device token
1336 like this:</p>
1337
1338 <p><pre>
1339 fastboot oem get_identifier_token 2>&1 | sed 's/(bootloader) //'
1340 </pre>
1341
1342 <p>And once I got the unlock code via email, I could use it like
1343 this:</p>
1344
1345 <p><pre>
1346 fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin
1347 </pre></p>
1348
1349 <p>And with that final step in place, the phone was unlocked and I
1350 could start stuffing the software of my own choosing into the device.
1351 So far I only inserted a replacement recovery image to wipe the phone
1352 before I start.  We will see what happen next.  Perhaps I should
1353 install <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> on it. :)</p>
1354
1355       </div>
1356       <div class="tags">
1357
1358
1359         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/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet</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/How_to_use_the_Signal_app_if_you_only_have_a_land_line__ie_no_mobile_phone_.html">How to use the Signal app if you only have a land line (ie no mobile phone)</a>
1369       </div>
1370       <div class="date">
1371          3rd July 2016
1372       </div>
1373       <div class="body">
1374         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to test
1375 <a href="https://whispersystems.org/">the Signal app</a>, as it is
1376 said to provide end to end encrypted communication and several of my
1377 friends and family are already using it.  As I by choice do not own a
1378 mobile phone, this proved to be harder than expected.  And I wanted to
1379 have the source of the client and know that it was the code used on my
1380 machine.  But yesterday I managed to get it working.  I used the
1381 Github source, compared it to the source in
1382 <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/signal-private-messenger/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk?hl=en-US">the
1383 Signal Chrome app</a> available from the Chrome web store, applied
1384 patches to use the production Signal servers, started the app and
1385 asked for the hidden "register without a smart phone" form.  Here is
1386 the recipe how I did it.</p>
1387
1388 <p>First, I fetched the Signal desktop source from Github, using
1389
1390 <pre>
1391 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
1392 </pre>
1393
1394 <p>Next, I patched the source to use the production servers, to be
1395 able to talk to other Signal users:</p>
1396
1397 <pre>
1398 cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p0
1399 diff -ur ./js/background.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js
1400 --- ./js/background.js  2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
1401 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js    2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
1402 @@ -47,8 +47,8 @@
1403          });
1404      });
1405
1406 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
1407 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
1408 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org:4433';
1409 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
1410      var messageReceiver;
1411      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
1412          if (messageReceiver) {
1413 diff -ur ./js/expire.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js
1414 --- ./js/expire.js      2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
1415 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
1416 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
1417  ;(function() {
1418      'use strict';
1419 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
1420 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 1474492690000;
1421
1422      window.extension = window.extension || {};
1423
1424 EOF
1425 </pre>
1426
1427 <p>The first part is changing the servers, and the second is updating
1428 an expiration timestamp.  This timestamp need to be updated regularly.
1429 It is set 90 days in the future by the build process (Gruntfile.js).
1430 The value is seconds since 1970 times 1000, as far as I can tell.</p>
1431
1432 <p>Based on a tip and good help from the #nuug IRC channel, I wrote a
1433 script to launch Signal in Chromium.</p>
1434
1435 <pre>
1436 #!/bin/sh
1437 cd $(dirname $0)
1438 mkdir -p userdata
1439 exec chromium \
1440   --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
1441   --user-data-dir=`pwd`/userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
1442 </pre>
1443
1444 <p> The script start the app and configure Chromium to use the Tor
1445 SOCKS5 proxy to make sure those controlling the Signal servers (today
1446 Amazon and Whisper Systems) as well as those listening on the lines
1447 will have a harder time location my laptop based on the Signal
1448 connections if they use source IP address.</p>
1449
1450 <p>When the script starts, one need to follow the instructions under
1451 "Standalone Registration" in the CONTRIBUTING.md file in the git
1452 repository.  I right clicked on the Signal window to get up the
1453 Chromium debugging tool, visited the 'Console' tab and wrote
1454 'extension.install("standalone")' on the console prompt to get the
1455 registration form.  Then I entered by land line phone number and
1456 pressed 'Call'.  5 seconds later the phone rang and a robot voice
1457 repeated the verification code three times.  After entering the number
1458 into the verification code field in the form, I could start using
1459 Signal from my laptop.
1460
1461 <p>As far as I can tell, The Signal app will leak who is talking to
1462 whom and thus who know who to those controlling the central server,
1463 but such leakage is hard to avoid with a centrally controlled server
1464 setup.  It is something to keep in mind when using Signal - the
1465 content of your chats are harder to intercept, but the meta data
1466 exposing your contact network is available to people you do not know.
1467 So better than many options, but not great.  And sadly the usage is
1468 connected to my land line, thus allowing those controlling the server
1469 to associate it to my home and person.  I would prefer it if only
1470 those I knew could tell who I was on Signal.  There are options
1471 avoiding such information leakage, but most of my friends are not
1472 using them, so I am stuck with Signal for now.</p>
1473
1474 <p><strong>Update 2017-01-10</strong>: There is an updated blog post
1475 on this topic in
1476 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience
1477 and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile
1478 phone</a>.</p>
1479
1480       </div>
1481       <div class="tags">
1482
1483
1484         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>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
1485
1486
1487       </div>
1488     </div>
1489     <div class="padding"></div>
1490
1491     <div class="entry">
1492       <div class="title">
1493         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_new__best__multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?</a>
1494       </div>
1495       <div class="date">
1496          6th June 2016
1497       </div>
1498       <div class="body">
1499         <p>When I set out a few weeks ago to figure out
1500 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">which
1501 multimedia player in Debian claimed to support most file formats /
1502 MIME types</a>, I was a bit surprised how varied the sets of MIME types
1503 the various players claimed support for.  The range was from 55 to 130
1504 MIME types.  I suspect most media formats are supported by all
1505 players, but this is not really reflected in the MimeTypes values in
1506 their desktop files.  There are probably also some bogus MIME types
1507 listed, but it is hard to identify which one this is.</p>
1508
1509 <p>Anyway, in the mean time I got in touch with upstream for some of
1510 the players suggesting to add more MIME types to their desktop files,
1511 and decided to spend some time myself improving the situation for my
1512 favorite media player VLC.  The fixes for VLC entered Debian unstable
1513 yesterday. The complete list of MIME types can be seen on the
1514 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">Multimedia
1515 player MIME type support status</a> Debian wiki page.</p>
1516
1517 <p>The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?  It is VLC, followed by
1518 totem, parole, kplayer, gnome-mpv, mpv, smplayer, mplayer-gui and
1519 kmplayer.  I am sure some of the other players desktop files support
1520 several of the formats currently listed as working only with vlc,
1521 toten and parole.</p>
1522
1523 <p>A sad observation is that only 14 MIME types are listed as
1524 supported by all the tested multimedia players in Debian in their
1525 desktop files: audio/mpeg, audio/vnd.rn-realaudio, audio/x-mpegurl,
1526 audio/x-ms-wma, audio/x-scpls, audio/x-wav, video/mp4, video/mpeg,
1527 video/quicktime, video/vnd.rn-realvideo, video/x-matroska,
1528 video/x-ms-asf, video/x-ms-wmv and video/x-msvideo.  Personally I find
1529 it sad that video/ogg and video/webm is not supported by all the media
1530 players in Debian.  As far as I can tell, all of them can handle both
1531 formats.</p>
1532
1533       </div>
1534       <div class="tags">
1535
1536
1537         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>.
1538
1539
1540       </div>
1541     </div>
1542     <div class="padding"></div>
1543
1544     <div class="entry">
1545       <div class="title">
1546         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_program_should_be_able_to_open_its_own_files_on_Linux.html">A program should be able to open its own files on Linux</a>
1547       </div>
1548       <div class="date">
1549          5th June 2016
1550       </div>
1551       <div class="body">
1552         <p>Many years ago, when koffice was fresh and with few users, I
1553 decided to test its presentation tool when making the slides for a
1554 talk I was giving for NUUG on Japhar, a free Java virtual machine.  I
1555 wrote the first draft of the slides, saved the result and went to bed
1556 the day before I would give the talk.  The next day I took a plane to
1557 the location where the meeting should take place, and on the plane I
1558 started up koffice again to polish the talk a bit, only to discover
1559 that kpresenter refused to load its own data file.  I cursed a bit and
1560 started making the slides again from memory, to have something to
1561 present when I arrived.  I tested that the saved files could be
1562 loaded, and the day seemed to be rescued.  I continued to polish the
1563 slides until I suddenly discovered that the saved file could no longer
1564 be loaded into kpresenter.  In the end I had to rewrite the slides
1565 three times, condensing the content until the talk became shorter and
1566 shorter.  After the talk I was able to pinpoint the problem &ndash;
1567 kpresenter wrote inline images in a way itself could not understand.
1568 Eventually that bug was fixed and kpresenter ended up being a great
1569 program to make slides.  The point I'm trying to make is that we
1570 expect a program to be able to load its own data files, and it is
1571 embarrassing to its developers if it can't.</p>
1572
1573 <p>Did you ever experience a program failing to load its own data
1574 files from the desktop file browser?  It is not a uncommon problem.  A
1575 while back I discovered that the screencast recorder
1576 gtk-recordmydesktop would save an Ogg Theora video file the KDE file
1577 browser would refuse to open.  No video player claimed to understand
1578 such file.  I tracked down the cause being <tt>file --mime-type</tt>
1579 returning the application/ogg MIME type, which no video player I had
1580 installed listed as a MIME type they would understand.  I asked for
1581 <a href="http://bugs.gw.com/view.php?id=382">file to change its
1582 behavour</a> and use the MIME type video/ogg instead.  I also asked
1583 several video players to add video/ogg to their desktop files, to give
1584 the file browser an idea what to do about Ogg Theora files.  After a
1585 while, the desktop file browsers in Debian started to handle the
1586 output from gtk-recordmydesktop properly.</p>
1587
1588 <p>But history repeats itself.  A few days ago I tested the music
1589 system Rosegarden again, and I discovered that the KDE and xfce file
1590 browsers did not know what to do with the Rosegarden project files
1591 (*.rg).  I've reported <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/825993">the
1592 rosegarden problem to BTS</a> and a fix is commited to git and will be
1593 included in the next upload.  To increase the chance of me remembering
1594 how to fix the problem next time some program fail to load its files
1595 from the file browser, here are some notes on how to fix it.</p>
1596
1597 <p>The file browsers in Debian in general operates on MIME types.
1598 There are two sources for the MIME type of a given file.  The output from
1599 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> mentioned above, and the content of the
1600 shared MIME type registry (under /usr/share/mime/).  The file MIME
1601 type is mapped to programs supporting the MIME type, and this
1602 information is collected from
1603 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/desktop-entry-spec/">the
1604 desktop files</a> available in /usr/share/applications/.  If there is
1605 one desktop file claiming support for the MIME type of the file, it is
1606 activated when asking to open a given file.  If there are more, one
1607 can normally select which one to use by right-clicking on the file and
1608 selecting the wanted one using 'Open with' or similar.  In general
1609 this work well.  But it depend on each program picking a good MIME
1610 type (preferably
1611 <a href="http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">a
1612 MIME type registered with IANA</a>), file and/or the shared MIME
1613 registry recognizing the file and the desktop file to list the MIME
1614 type in its list of supported MIME types.</p>
1615
1616 <p>The <tt>/usr/share/mime/packages/rosegarden.xml</tt> entry for
1617 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/shared-mime-info-spec">the
1618 Shared MIME database</a> look like this:</p>
1619
1620 <p><blockquote><pre>
1621 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
1622 &lt;mime-info xmlns="http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info"&gt;
1623   &lt;mime-type type="audio/x-rosegarden"&gt;
1624     &lt;sub-class-of type="application/x-gzip"/&gt;
1625     &lt;comment&gt;Rosegarden project file&lt;/comment&gt;
1626     &lt;glob pattern="*.rg"/&gt;
1627   &lt;/mime-type&gt;
1628 &lt;/mime-info&gt;
1629 </pre></blockquote></p>
1630
1631 <p>This states that audio/x-rosegarden is a kind of application/x-gzip
1632 (it is a gzipped XML file).  Note, it is much better to use an
1633 official MIME type registered with IANA than it is to make up ones own
1634 unofficial ones like the x-rosegarden type used by rosegarden.</p>
1635
1636 <p>The desktop file of the rosegarden program failed to list
1637 audio/x-rosegarden in its list of supported MIME types, causing the
1638 file browsers to have no idea what to do with *.rg files:</p>
1639
1640 <p><blockquote><pre>
1641 % grep Mime /usr/share/applications/rosegarden.desktop
1642 MimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition;audio/x-rosegarden-device;audio/x-rosegarden-project;audio/x-rosegarden-template;audio/midi;
1643 X-KDE-NativeMimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition
1644 %
1645 </pre></blockquote></p>
1646
1647 <p>The fix was to add "audio/x-rosegarden;" at the end of the
1648 MimeType= line.</p>
1649
1650 <p>If you run into a file which fail to open the correct program when
1651 selected from the file browser, please check out the output from
1652 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> for the file, ensure the file ending and
1653 MIME type is registered somewhere under /usr/share/mime/ and check
1654 that some desktop file under /usr/share/applications/ is claiming
1655 support for this MIME type.  If not, please report a bug to have it
1656 fixed. :)</p>
1657
1658       </div>
1659       <div class="tags">
1660
1661
1662         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>.
1663
1664
1665       </div>
1666     </div>
1667     <div class="padding"></div>
1668
1669     <div class="entry">
1670       <div class="title">
1671         <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>
1672       </div>
1673       <div class="date">
1674         25th May 2016
1675       </div>
1676       <div class="body">
1677         <p><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">The isenkram
1678 system</a> is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware
1679 related packages.  The idea is to have a database of mappings between
1680 hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to
1681 install the packages to use a given hardware dongle.  Some use cases
1682 are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software
1683 needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it
1684 proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader;
1685 and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to
1686 install the driver for it.  The system work well, and even have a few
1687 command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the
1688 hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).</p>
1689
1690 <p>The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found
1691 good documentation and example code on how to use it.  But aptdaemon
1692 is going away and is generally being replaced by
1693 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/">PackageKit</a>,
1694 so Isenkram needed a rewrite.  And today, thanks to the great patch
1695 from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the
1696 rewrite finally took place.  I've just uploaded a new version of
1697 Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default
1698 for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit.  To check it out,
1699 install the <tt>isenkram</tt> package and insert some hardware dongle
1700 and see if it is recognised.</p>
1701
1702 <p>If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for
1703 the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup
1704 program.  This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:</p>
1705
1706 <p><blockquote><pre>
1707 % isenkram-lookup
1708 bluez
1709 cheese
1710 fprintd
1711 fprintd-demo
1712 gkrellm-thinkbat
1713 hdapsd
1714 libpam-fprintd
1715 pidgin-blinklight
1716 thinkfan
1717 tleds
1718 tp-smapi-dkms
1719 tp-smapi-source
1720 tpb
1721 %p
1722 </pre></blockquote></p>
1723
1724 <p>The hardware mappings come from several places.  The preferred way
1725 is for packages to announce their hardware support using
1726 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
1727 cross distribution appstream system</a>.
1728 See
1729 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">previous
1730 blog posts about isenkram</a> to learn how to do that.</p>
1731
1732       </div>
1733       <div class="tags">
1734
1735
1736         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>.
1737
1738
1739       </div>
1740     </div>
1741     <div class="padding"></div>
1742
1743     <div class="entry">
1744       <div class="title">
1745         <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>
1746       </div>
1747       <div class="date">
1748         23rd May 2016
1749       </div>
1750       <div class="body">
1751         <p>Yesterday I updated the
1752 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats
1753 package in Debian</a> with a few patches sent to me by skilled and
1754 enterprising users.  There were some nice user and visible changes.
1755 First of all, both desktop menu entries now work.  A design flaw in
1756 one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was
1757 dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available.
1758 The script worked when called from the command line, but not when
1759 called from the desktop menu.  I changed this to look for a DISPLAY
1760 variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the
1761 graph window pop up as expected.</p>
1762
1763 <p>The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the
1764 graphs (the one showing the last few hours).  New is also the user of
1765 colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red.  The percentages
1766 of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design
1767 capacity.</p>
1768
1769 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-rate.png"/></p>
1770
1771 <p>The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery
1772 statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to
1773 visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time.  The red
1774 line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent:
1775
1776 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-history.png"/></p>
1777
1778 <p>In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80
1779 percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is
1780 shrinking. :(</p>
1781
1782 <p>The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle
1783 more hardware models.  On some hardware, Linux power supply
1784 information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the
1785 collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/.  Now
1786 both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the
1787 machine.</p>
1788
1789 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
1790 check out the
1791 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
1792 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
1793 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from <a
1794 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
1795 Patches are very welcome.</p>
1796
1797 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1798 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1799 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1800
1801       </div>
1802       <div class="tags">
1803
1804
1805         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>.
1806
1807
1808       </div>
1809     </div>
1810     <div class="padding"></div>
1811
1812     <div class="entry">
1813       <div class="title">
1814         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_with_ZFS_on_Linux_included.html">Debian now with ZFS on Linux included</a>
1815       </div>
1816       <div class="date">
1817         12th May 2016
1818       </div>
1819       <div class="body">
1820         <p>Today, after many years of hard work from many people,
1821 <a href="http://zfsonlinux.org/">ZFS for Linux</a> finally entered
1822 Debian.  The package status can be seen on
1823 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/zfs-linux">the package tracker
1824 for zfs-linux</a>.  and
1825 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
1826 team status page</a>. If you want to help out, please join us.
1827 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">The
1828 source code</a> is available via git on Alioth.  It would also be
1829 great if you could help out with
1830 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/dkms">the dkms package</a>, as
1831 it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.</p>
1832
1833       </div>
1834       <div class="tags">
1835
1836
1837         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>.
1838
1839
1840       </div>
1841     </div>
1842     <div class="padding"></div>
1843
1844     <div class="entry">
1845       <div class="title">
1846         <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>
1847       </div>
1848       <div class="date">
1849          8th May 2016
1850       </div>
1851       <div class="body">
1852         <p><strong>Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in
1853 Debian claim support for most file formats.</strong></p>
1854
1855 <p>A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser
1856 plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian
1857 Edu.  I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types
1858 for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser
1859 plugin supported most file formats / media types.
1860 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">The
1861 result</a> can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have
1862 not been updated for a while.  But browser plugins are less relevant
1863 these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone
1864 players.</p>
1865
1866 <p>A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable
1867 player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National
1868 Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why.  The cause is a
1869 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/822245">missing MIME type in the VLC
1870 desktop file</a>.  In the process I wrote a script to compare the set
1871 of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin,
1872 only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the
1873 two for VLC.  This discovery made me dig up the script I used to
1874 compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files
1875 instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian
1876 support most file formats.</p>
1877
1878 <p>The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as
1879 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">a
1880 table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included
1881 in the table</a>, with the package supporting most MIME types being
1882 listed first in the table.</p>
1883
1884 </p>The best multimedia player in Debian?  It is totem, followed by
1885 parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and
1886 kmplayer.  Time for the other players to update their announced MIME
1887 support?</p>
1888
1889       </div>
1890       <div class="tags">
1891
1892
1893         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>.
1894
1895
1896       </div>
1897     </div>
1898     <div class="padding"></div>
1899
1900     <div class="entry">
1901       <div class="title">
1902         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Pyra___handheld_computer_with_Debian_preinstalled.html">The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled</a>
1903       </div>
1904       <div class="date">
1905          4th May 2016
1906       </div>
1907       <div class="body">
1908         A friend of mine made me aware of
1909 <a href="https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/">The Pyra</a>, a
1910 handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled.  I
1911 would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)</p>
1912
1913 <p>The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB
1914 plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5"
1915 LCD touch screen.  The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole
1916 day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests
1917 confirming this.  The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the
1918 last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before
1919 production started.</p>
1920
1921 <p>As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with
1922 Debian.  Please let me know if you know of any others.  Is it the
1923 first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?</p>
1924
1925       </div>
1926       <div class="tags">
1927
1928
1929         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>.
1930
1931
1932       </div>
1933     </div>
1934     <div class="padding"></div>
1935
1936     <div class="entry">
1937       <div class="title">
1938         <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>
1939       </div>
1940       <div class="date">
1941         10th April 2016
1942       </div>
1943       <div class="body">
1944         <p>During this weekends
1945 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Oslo__Takk_for_feilfiksingsfesten.shtml">bug
1946 squashing party and developer gathering</a>, we decided to do our part
1947 to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian
1948 Bokmål, and got in touch with the people behind the
1949 <a href="http://debian-handbook.info/">Debian Administrator's Handbook
1950 project</a> to get started.  If you want to help out, please start
1951 contributing using
1952 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
1953 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
1954 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
1955 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
1956 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
1957 contributors</a>.</p>
1958
1959 <p>The book is already available on paper in English, French and
1960 Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian
1961 Bokmål too.  In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and
1962 Mobi versions available.  And there are incomplete translations
1963 available for many more languages.</p>
1964
1965       </div>
1966       <div class="tags">
1967
1968
1969         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>.
1970
1971
1972       </div>
1973     </div>
1974     <div class="padding"></div>
1975
1976     <div class="entry">
1977       <div class="title">
1978         <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>
1979       </div>
1980       <div class="date">
1981          7th April 2016
1982       </div>
1983       <div class="body">
1984         <p>Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related
1985 packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found.  I use
1986 ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so.
1987 But I might be wrong.</p>
1988
1989 <p>According to
1990 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=spl-linux">the popcon
1991 results for spl-linux</a>, there are 1019 Debian installations, or
1992 0.53% of the population, with the package installed.  As far as I know
1993 the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS
1994 on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS
1995 installation on Linux in Debian.  In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian
1996 the ZFS feature is already available, and there
1997 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=zfsutils">the popcon
1998 results for zfsutils</a> show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of
1999 the population.  So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.</p>
2000
2001 <p>But even though the Debian project leader Lucas Nussbaum
2002 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2015/04/msg00006.html">announced
2003 in April 2015</a> that the legal obstacles blocking ZFS on Debian were
2004 cleared, the package is still not in Debian.  The package is again in
2005 the NEW queue.  Several uploads have been rejected so far because the
2006 debian/copyright file was incomplete or wrong, but there is no reason
2007 to give up.  The current status can be seen on
2008 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
2009 team status page</a>, and
2010 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">the
2011 source code</a> is available on Alioth.</p>
2012
2013 <p>As I want ZFS to be included in next version of Debian to make sure
2014 my home server can function in the future using only official Debian
2015 packages, and the current blocker is to get the debian/copyright file
2016 accepted by the FTP masters in Debian, I decided a while back to try
2017 to help out the team.  This was the background for my blog post about
2018 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">creating,
2019 updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>, and I
2020 used the techniques I explored there to try to find any errors in the
2021 copyright file.  It is not very easy to check every one of the around
2022 2000 files in the source package, but I hope we this time got it
2023 right.  If you want to help out, check out the git source and try to
2024 find missing entries in the debian/copyright file.</p>
2025
2026       </div>
2027       <div class="tags">
2028
2029
2030         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>.
2031
2032
2033       </div>
2034     </div>
2035     <div class="padding"></div>
2036
2037     <div class="entry">
2038       <div class="title">
2039         <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>
2040       </div>
2041       <div class="date">
2042         23rd March 2016
2043       </div>
2044       <div class="body">
2045         <p>Since this morning, the battery-stats package in Debian include an
2046 extended collector that will collect the complete battery history for
2047 later processing and graphing.  The original collector store the
2048 battery level as percentage of last full level, while the new
2049 collector also record battery vendor, model, serial number, design
2050 full level, last full level and current battery level.  This make it
2051 possible to predict the lifetime of the battery as well as visualise
2052 the energy flow when the battery is charging or discharging.</p>
2053
2054 <p>The new tools are available in <tt>/usr/share/battery-stats/</tt>
2055 in the version 0.5.1 package in unstable.  Get the new battery level graph
2056 and lifetime prediction by running:
2057
2058 <p><pre>
2059 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph /var/log/battery-stats.csv
2060 </pre></p>
2061
2062 <p>Or select the 'Battery Level Graph' from your application menu.</p>
2063
2064 <p>The flow in/out of the battery can be seen by running (no menu
2065 entry yet):</p>
2066
2067 <p><pre>
2068 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph-flow
2069 </pre></p>
2070
2071 <p>I'm not quite happy with the way the data is visualised, at least
2072 when there are few data points.  The graphs look a bit better with a
2073 few years of data.</p>
2074
2075 <p>A while back one important feature I use in the battery stats
2076 collector broke in Debian.  The scripts in
2077 <tt>/usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/</tt> were no longer executed.  I
2078 suspect it happened when Jessie started using systemd, but I do not
2079 know.  The issue is reported as
2080 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/818649">bug #818649</a> against
2081 pm-utils.  I managed to work around it by adding an udev rule to call
2082 the collector script every time the power connector is connected and
2083 disconnected.  With this fix in place it was finally time to make a
2084 new release of the package, and get it into Debian.</p>
2085
2086 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
2087 check out the
2088 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
2089 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
2090 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from
2091 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2092 As always, patches are very welcome.</p>
2093
2094       </div>
2095       <div class="tags">
2096
2097
2098         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>.
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/Making_battery_measurements_a_little_easier_in_Debian.html">Making battery measurements a little easier in Debian</a>
2108       </div>
2109       <div class="date">
2110         15th March 2016
2111       </div>
2112       <div class="body">
2113         <p>Back in September, I blogged about
2114 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">the
2115 system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery</a>, and
2116 how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced).  I
2117 created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing,
2118 but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already
2119 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">a battery-stats
2120 package in Debian</a> that should do the same thing, and I did not see
2121 a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be
2122 fixed instead.  I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and
2123 hoped someone would step in and fix it.  But no-one did.</p>
2124
2125 <p>I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own
2126 hands.  The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of
2127 battery stats (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">available from github</a>) and part of the team maintaining
2128 battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally
2129 able to collect battery status using the <tt>/sys/class/power_supply/</tt>
2130 information provided by the Linux kernel.  If you install the
2131 battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a
2132 graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the
2133 status of the battery.  The source package build and work just fine in
2134 Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not
2135 tested).  The default graph you get for that system look like this:</p>
2136
2137 <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>
2138
2139 <p>My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the
2140 battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details
2141 about the battery.  The scripts are merged into the upstream
2142 battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work
2143 yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way.  Will have to test a
2144 bit more before I make a new release.</p>
2145
2146 <p>I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I
2147 suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it
2148 impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing
2149 and graphing.</p>
2150
2151 <p>If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop
2152 battery, check out the battery-stats package in
2153 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">Debian</a> and
2154 on
2155 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
2156 I would love some help to improve the system further.</p>
2157
2158       </div>
2159       <div class="tags">
2160
2161
2162         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>.
2163
2164
2165       </div>
2166     </div>
2167     <div class="padding"></div>
2168
2169     <div class="entry">
2170       <div class="title">
2171         <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>
2172       </div>
2173       <div class="date">
2174         19th February 2016
2175       </div>
2176       <div class="body">
2177         <p>Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to
2178 details.  And one of the details is the content of the
2179 debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by
2180 the code in the package in question, preferably in
2181 <a href="https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/">machine
2182 readable DEP5 format</a>.</p>
2183
2184 <p>For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write
2185 and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the
2186 package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters.  So getting it right
2187 the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save
2188 both you and the ftpmasters some work..  Today, while trying to figure
2189 out what was wrong with
2190 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=686447">the
2191 zfsonlinux copyright file</a>, I decided to spend some time on
2192 figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least
2193 semi-automatically.</p>
2194
2195 <p>Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the
2196 file based on the code in the source package,
2197 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/debmake">debmake</a></tt>
2198 and <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cme">cme</a></tt>.  I'm
2199 not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to
2200 create a sensible draft file.  As far as I can tell, none of them can
2201 be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be
2202 polished a bit before the file is OK to upload.  I found the debmake
2203 option in
2204 <a href="http://goofying-with-debian.blogspot.com/2014/07/debmake-checking-source-against-dep-5.html">a
2205 blog posts from 2014</a>.
2206
2207 <p>To generate using debmake, use the -cc option:
2208
2209 <p><pre>
2210 debmake -cc > debian/copyright
2211 </pre></p>
2212
2213 <p>Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so
2214 this might not be the best option.</p>
2215
2216 <p>The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found
2217 this approach in
2218 <a href="https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2015/04/05/improving-creation-of-debian-copyright-file/">a
2219 blog post from 2015</a>.  To generate using cme, use the 'update
2220 dpkg-copyright' option:
2221
2222 <p><pre>
2223 cme update dpkg-copyright
2224 </pre></p>
2225
2226 <p>This will create or update debian/copyright.  The cme tool seem to
2227 handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.</p>
2228
2229 <p>When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to
2230 check if the file is correct.  For this I found two good options,
2231 <tt>debmake -k</tt> and <tt>license-reconcile</tt>.  The former seem
2232 to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect
2233 ineffective blocks in the copyright file.  The latter reports missing
2234 copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license
2235 names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0).  I suspect it is good to use both and
2236 fix all issues reported by them before uploading.  But I do not know
2237 if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a
2238 copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.</p>
2239
2240 <p>The devscripts tool <tt>licensecheck</tt> deserve mentioning.  It
2241 will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements.
2242 It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but
2243 can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.</p>
2244
2245 <p>Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update
2246 debian/copyright file.  Please let me know, or blog about it on
2247 planet.debian.org.</p>
2248
2249 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2250 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2251 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2252
2253 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-20</strong>: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel
2254 on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file
2255
2256 <p><pre>
2257 licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
2258   /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
2259 </pre></p>
2260
2261 <p>He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the
2262 version control system to make it easier to discover license and
2263 copyright changes in the upstream source.  I will try to do the same
2264 with my packages in the future.</p>
2265
2266 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-21</strong>: The cme author recommended
2267 against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed
2268 command line.</p>
2269
2270       </div>
2271       <div class="tags">
2272
2273
2274         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>.
2275
2276
2277       </div>
2278     </div>
2279     <div class="padding"></div>
2280
2281     <div class="entry">
2282       <div class="title">
2283         <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>
2284       </div>
2285       <div class="date">
2286          4th February 2016
2287       </div>
2288       <div class="body">
2289         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">appstream system</a>
2290 is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very
2291 convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given
2292 firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it.  This can
2293 be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog
2294 about. :)</p>
2295
2296 <p>Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware
2297 file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly
2298 picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian
2299 unstable.  In general you would be looking for the firmware requested
2300 by the kernel during kernel module loading.  To find the package
2301 providing the example file, do like this:</p>
2302
2303 <blockquote><pre>
2304 % apt install appstream
2305 [...]
2306 % apt update
2307 [...]
2308 % appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
2309   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
2310 firmware-qlogic
2311 %
2312 </pre></blockquote>
2313
2314 <p>See <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">the
2315 appstream wiki</a> page to learn how to embed the package metadata in
2316 a way appstream can use.</p>
2317
2318 <p>This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a
2319 given MIME type.  This is very useful when you get a file you do not
2320 know how to handle.  First find the mime type using <tt>file
2321 --mime-type</tt>, and next look up the package providing support for
2322 it.  Lets say you got an SVG file.  Its MIME type is image/svg+xml,
2323 and you can find all packages handling this type like this:</p>
2324
2325 <blockquote><pre>
2326 % apt install appstream
2327 [...]
2328 % apt update
2329 [...]
2330 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
2331   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
2332 bkchem
2333 phototonic
2334 inkscape
2335 shutter
2336 tetzle
2337 geeqie
2338 xia
2339 pinta
2340 gthumb
2341 karbon
2342 comix
2343 mirage
2344 viewnior
2345 postr
2346 ristretto
2347 kolourpaint4
2348 eog
2349 eom
2350 gimagereader
2351 midori
2352 %
2353 </pre></blockquote>
2354
2355 <p>I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for
2356 packages providing appstream metadata.</p>
2357
2358       </div>
2359       <div class="tags">
2360
2361
2362         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>.
2363
2364
2365       </div>
2366     </div>
2367     <div class="padding"></div>
2368
2369     <div class="entry">
2370       <div class="title">
2371         <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>
2372       </div>
2373       <div class="date">
2374         24th January 2016
2375       </div>
2376       <div class="body">
2377         <p>Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around
2378 with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their
2379 position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long
2380 time (like every time a SMS is received or sent).  And if their
2381 computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called
2382 mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often
2383 also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access
2384 during installation).  And when these programs send out information to
2385 central collection points, the location is often included, unless
2386 extra care is taken to not send the location.  The provided
2387 information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is
2388 good and bad, depend on your point of view).  What is certain, is that
2389 the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and
2390 perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way,
2391 when they share their whereabouts with private and public
2392 entities.</p>
2393
2394 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-01-24-nice-creepy-desktop-window.png"></p>
2395
2396 <p>The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out
2397 when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing.  It is
2398 unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government
2399 officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from
2400 unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information.  But the
2401 public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software
2402 tool to do so is called
2403 <a href="http://www.geocreepy.com/">Creepy or Cree.py</a>.  I
2404 discovered it when I read
2405 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Slik-kan-du-bli-overvaket-pa-Twitter-og-Instagram-uten-a-ane-det-7787884.html">an
2406 article about Creepy</a> in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i
2407 November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian.
2408 The python program was in Debian, but
2409 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/creepy">the version in
2410 Debian</a> was completely broken and practically unmaintained.  I
2411 uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not
2412 have time to fix it then.  This Christmas I decided to finally try to
2413 get Creepy operational in Debian.  Now a fixed version is available in
2414 Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches
2415 are now included
2416 <a href="https://github.com/jkakavas/creepy">upstream</a>.</p>
2417
2418 <p>The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from
2419 Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a
2420 complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a
2421 given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all
2422 these services.  Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at
2423 least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these
2424 days it is impossible.  This mean that to use Creepy, you need to
2425 configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide
2426 information to them about your search interests.  This should be taken
2427 into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information
2428 about yourself with the services.</p>
2429
2430 <p>The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least
2431 geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital
2432 of Norway.  One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at
2433 information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the
2434 information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area.
2435 I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in
2436 twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a
2437 Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time,
2438 making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other
2439 things.  A similar technique have been
2440 <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl">used
2441 to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine</a>, and it is both a powerful
2442 tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people
2443 understand the value of the private information they provide to the
2444 public.</p>
2445
2446 <p>The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as
2447 it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at
2448 least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and
2449 python-requests-toolbelt).</p>
2450
2451 <p>(I have uploaded
2452 <a href="https://screenshots.debian.net/package/creepy">the image to
2453 screenshots.debian.net</a> and licensed it under the same terms as the
2454 Creepy program in Debian.)</p>
2455
2456       </div>
2457       <div class="tags">
2458
2459
2460         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>.
2461
2462
2463       </div>
2464     </div>
2465     <div class="padding"></div>
2466
2467     <div class="entry">
2468       <div class="title">
2469         <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>
2470       </div>
2471       <div class="date">
2472         15th January 2016
2473       </div>
2474       <div class="body">
2475         <p>During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum
2476 <a href="https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/meeting/331/what-is-to-be-done/">observed
2477 that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to
2478 believe a computer have a given security hole</a> if it download a
2479 security fix from a Debian mirror.  This is a good reason to always
2480 use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those
2481 listening do not know which IP address to attack.  In August, Richard
2482 Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible
2483 to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that
2484 download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and
2485 <a href="http://richardhartmann.de/blog/posts/2015/08/24-Tor-enabled_Debian_mirror/">proposed
2486 to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror</a>.  He
2487 was not the first to propose this, as the
2488 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/apt-transport-tor">apt-transport-tor</a></tt>
2489 package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt
2490 to use <a href="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</a>, but I was not
2491 aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.</p>
2492
2493 <p>Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian
2494 sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central
2495 Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making
2496 it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes,
2497 making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.</p>
2498
2499 <p>Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by
2500 installing <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> and replacing http and https
2501 urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead
2502 of the official Debian mirror site.  I recommend installing
2503 <tt>etckeeper</tt> before you start to have a history of the changes
2504 done in /etc/.</p>
2505
2506 <blockquote><pre>
2507 apt install apt-transport-tor
2508 sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
2509 sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
2510 </pre></blockquote>
2511
2512 <p>If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run
2513 the sed commands for these too.  The sed command is assuming your are
2514 using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror.  Adjust the command (or just
2515 edit the file manually) to match your mirror.</p>
2516
2517 <p>This work in Debian Jessie and later.  Note that tools like
2518 <tt>apt-file</tt> only recently started using the apt transport
2519 system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs.  For
2520 <tt>apt-file</tt> you need the version currently in experimental,
2521 which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable.  So if you
2522 need a working <tt>apt-file</tt>, this is not for you.</p>
2523
2524 <p>Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start
2525 using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you
2526 update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus
2527 masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine.  Using Tor will
2528 become normal for the machine in question.</p>
2529
2530 <p>On <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox</a>, APT
2531 is set up by default to use <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> when Tor is
2532 enabled.  It would be great if it was the default on any Debian
2533 system.</p>
2534
2535       </div>
2536       <div class="tags">
2537
2538
2539         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>.
2540
2541
2542       </div>
2543     </div>
2544     <div class="padding"></div>
2545
2546     <div class="entry">
2547       <div class="title">
2548         <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>
2549       </div>
2550       <div class="date">
2551         23rd December 2015
2552       </div>
2553       <div class="body">
2554         <p>When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to
2555 call the car license plate numbers in those days.  I would write the
2556 numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids
2557 to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some
2558 exotic or special region codes and numbers.  It was a fun game to pass
2559 time, as we kids have plenty of it.</p>
2560
2561 <p>A few days I came across
2562 <a href="https://github.com/openalpr/openalpr">the OpenALPR
2563 project</a>, a free software project to automatically discover and
2564 report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the
2565 "car numbers" in a machine readable format.  I've been looking for
2566 such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the
2567 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition">automatic
2568 number plate recognition</a> tool only is available in the hands of
2569 the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to
2570 even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance.  I
2571 discovered the developer
2572 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/747509">wanted to get the tool into
2573 Debian</a>, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to
2574 help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian
2575 archive.</p>
2576
2577 <p>Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded
2578 it into Debian, where it currently
2579 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org//new/openalpr_2.2.1-1.html">waits
2580 in the NEW queue</a> for review by the Debian ftpmasters.</p>
2581
2582 <p>I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful
2583 for the common folks, ie those not running a large government
2584 surveillance system?  Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike
2585 and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified
2586 when number plates on my watch list are discovered.  Another use case
2587 was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home
2588 to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his
2589 car.  When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone
2590 capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to
2591 open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway.  I
2592 guess for such use case it make sense.  I am sure there are other use
2593 cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.</p>
2594
2595 <p>If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check
2596 out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/
2597 before running "debuild" to build the source.  Or wait a bit until the
2598 package show up in unstable.</p>
2599
2600       </div>
2601       <div class="tags">
2602
2603
2604         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>.
2605
2606
2607       </div>
2608     </div>
2609     <div class="padding"></div>
2610
2611     <div class="entry">
2612       <div class="title">
2613         <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>
2614       </div>
2615       <div class="date">
2616         20th December 2015
2617       </div>
2618       <div class="body">
2619         <p>Around three years ago, I created
2620 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the isenkram
2621 system</a> to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing
2622 hardware related packages.  A GUI system in the isenkram package will
2623 present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by
2624 relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine.  The same
2625 lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line
2626 tools in the isenkram-cli package.  In addition to mapping hardware,
2627 it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to
2628 install needed firmware packages automatically.  The key for this
2629 system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other
2630 words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work
2631 with.</p>
2632
2633 <p>I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and
2634 adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run
2635 time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available.
2636 I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in
2637 the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I
2638 was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings,
2639 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
2640 appstream system</a> was announced.  I got in touch and suggested to
2641 add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use
2642 appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the
2643 Debian version of appstream.</p>
2644
2645 <p>A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible,
2646 and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for
2647 appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages.  The only
2648 package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my
2649 pymissile package.  I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out
2650 how do add the required
2651 <a href="https://appstream.debian.org/html/sid/main/metainfo/pymissile.html">metadata
2652 in pymissile</a>.  I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with
2653 this content:</p>
2654
2655 <blockquote><pre>
2656 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
2657 &lt;component&gt;
2658   &lt;id&gt;pymissile&lt;/id&gt;
2659   &lt;metadata_license&gt;MIT&lt;/metadata_license&gt;
2660   &lt;name&gt;pymissile&lt;/name&gt;
2661   &lt;summary&gt;Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher&lt;/summary&gt;
2662   &lt;description&gt;
2663     &lt;p&gt;
2664       Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
2665       Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
2666       motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
2667       launcher.
2668     &lt;/p&gt;
2669   &lt;/description&gt;
2670   &lt;provides&gt;
2671     &lt;modalias&gt;usb:v1130p0202d*&lt;/modalias&gt;
2672   &lt;/provides&gt;
2673 &lt;/component&gt;
2674 </pre></blockquote>
2675
2676 <p>The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value,
2677 which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings
2678 (modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel.  In this case, it
2679 will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code
2680 0202.</p>
2681
2682 <p>Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files
2683 are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide
2684 appstream files.  Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for
2685 these files.  A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as
2686 it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions
2687 (in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use).  But
2688 it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as
2689 upstream for this project is dormant.</p>
2690
2691 <p>To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the
2692 mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the
2693 appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary
2694 package under /usr/share/appdata/.  I did this by adding the following
2695 line to debian/pymissile.install:</p>
2696
2697 <blockquote><pre>
2698 debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
2699 </pre></blockquote>
2700
2701 <p>With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list
2702 all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI
2703 pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already
2704 installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in
2705 question.</p>
2706
2707 <p>Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the
2708 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a> proposal.</p>
2709
2710 <p>To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine,
2711 try running this command on the command line:</p>
2712
2713 <blockquote><pre>
2714 cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
2715 </pre></blockquote>
2716
2717 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
2718 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
2719 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
2720
2721       </div>
2722       <div class="tags">
2723
2724
2725         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>.
2726
2727
2728       </div>
2729     </div>
2730     <div class="padding"></div>
2731
2732     <div class="entry">
2733       <div class="title">
2734         <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>
2735       </div>
2736       <div class="date">
2737         30th November 2015
2738       </div>
2739       <div class="body">
2740         <p>A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled
2741 "<a href="http://bonedaddy.net/pabs3/log/2015/11/27/sfc-supporter/">The
2742 GPL is not magic pixie dust</a>" explain the importance of making sure
2743 the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GPL</a> is enforced.
2744 I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:<p>
2745
2746 <blockquote>
2747
2748 <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>
2749
2750 <blockquote>
2751 The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.<br/>
2752
2753 The first step is to choose a
2754 <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft</a> license for your
2755 code.<br/>
2756
2757 The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license,
2758 <b>it must be enforced</b><br/>
2759
2760 and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of
2761 work<br/>
2762
2763 is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do.
2764 </blockquote>
2765
2766 <p><small>-- <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/">Bradley Kuhn</a>, in
2767 <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in Freedom">FaiF</a>
2768 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode
2769 0x57</a></small></p>
2770
2771 <p>As the Debian Website
2772 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/794116">used</a>
2773 <a href="https://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/webwml/webwml/english/intro/free.wml?r1=1.24&amp;r2=1.25">to</a>
2774 imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to
2775 the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful
2776 software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or
2777 software products.  Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created
2778 to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but
2779 such licenses are not enough.  With the ongoing adoption of Free
2780 Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's
2781 expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of
2782 ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always.  As Karen
2783 and Bradley explained in <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in
2784 Freedom">FaiF</a>
2785 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode 0x57</a>,
2786 copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court
2787 to protect it.  The reality of today's world is that legal
2788 representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming.  With
2789 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/">gpl-violations.org</a> in hiatus
2790 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/news/20151027-homepage-recovers/">until</a>
2791 some time in 2016, the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software
2792 Freedom Conservancy</a> (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender
2793 of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations.
2794 In March the SFC supported a
2795 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">lawsuit
2796 by Christoph Hellwig</a> against VMware for refusing to
2797 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/vmware-lawsuit-faq.html">comply
2798 with the GPL</a> in relation to their use of parts of the Linux
2799 kernel.  Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and
2800 conferences
2801 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">blocked
2802 or cancelled their talks</a>.  As a result they have decided to rely
2803 less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of
2804 individuals who support Free Software and copyleft.  So the SFC has
2805 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/23/2015fundraiser/">launched</a>
2806 a <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">campaign</a> to create
2807 a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by
2808 supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free
2809 Software.</p>
2810
2811 <p>If you support Free Software,
2812 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/26/like-what-I-do/">like</a>
2813 what the SFC do, agree with their
2814 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">compliance
2815 principles</a>, are happy about their
2816 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">successes</a> in 2015,
2817 work on a project that is an SFC
2818 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/members/current/">member</a> and or
2819 just want to stand up for copyleft, please join
2820 <a href="https://identi.ca/cwebber/image/JQGPA4qbTyyp3-MY8QpvuA">Christopher
2821 Allan Webber</a>,
2822 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">Carol
2823 Smith</a>,
2824 <a href="http://www.jonobacon.org/2015/11/25/supporting-software-freedom-conservancy/">Jono
2825 Bacon</a>, myself and
2826 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/sponsors/#supporters">others</a> in
2827 becoming a
2828 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">supporter</a>.  For the
2829 next week your donation will be
2830 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/27/black-friday/">matched</a>
2831 by an anonymous donor.  Please also consider asking your employer to
2832 match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC.  Don't forget to
2833 spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or
2834 social media accounts.</p>
2835
2836 </blockquote>
2837
2838 <p>I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter
2839 of Software Freedom Conservancy myself.  Perhaps you should be a
2840 supporter too?</p>
2841
2842       </div>
2843       <div class="tags">
2844
2845
2846         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>.
2847
2848
2849       </div>
2850     </div>
2851     <div class="padding"></div>
2852
2853     <div class="entry">
2854       <div class="title">
2855         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/PGP_key_transition_statement_for_key_EE4E02F9.html">PGP key transition statement for key EE4E02F9</a>
2856       </div>
2857       <div class="date">
2858         17th November 2015
2859       </div>
2860       <div class="body">
2861         <p>I've needed a new OpenPGP key for a while, but have not had time to
2862 set it up properly.  I wanted to generate it offline and have it
2863 available on <a href="http://shop.kernelconcepts.de/#openpgp">a OpenPGP
2864 smart card</a> for daily use, and learning how to do it and finding
2865 time to sit down with an offline machine almost took forever.  But
2866 finally I've been able to complete the process, and have now moved
2867 from my old GPG key to a new GPG key.  See
2868 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-11-17-new-gpg-key-transition.txt">the
2869 full transition statement, signed with both my old and new key</a> for
2870 the details.  This is my new key:</p>
2871
2872 <pre>
2873 pub   3936R/<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/111D6B29EE4E02F9.html">111D6B29EE4E02F9</a> 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-14]
2874       Key fingerprint = 3AC7 B2E3 ACA5 DF87 78F1  D827 111D 6B29 EE4E 02F9
2875 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
2876 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@debian.org&gt;
2877 sub   4096R/87BAFB0E 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
2878 sub   4096R/F91E6DE9 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
2879 sub   4096R/A0439BAB 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
2880 </pre>
2881
2882 <p>The key can be downloaded from the OpenPGP key servers, signed by
2883 my old key.</p>
2884
2885 <p>If you signed my old key
2886 (<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/DB4CCC4B2A30D729.html">DB4CCC4B2A30D729</a>),
2887 I'd very much appreciate a signature on my new key, details and
2888 instructions in the transition statement. I m happy to reciprocate if
2889 you have a similarly signed transition statement to present.</p>
2890
2891       </div>
2892       <div class="tags">
2893
2894
2895         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>.
2896
2897
2898       </div>
2899     </div>
2900     <div class="padding"></div>
2901
2902     <div class="entry">
2903       <div class="title">
2904         <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>
2905       </div>
2906       <div class="date">
2907         24th September 2015
2908       </div>
2909       <div class="body">
2910         <p>When I get a new laptop, the battery life time at the start is OK.
2911 But this do not last.  The last few laptops gave me a feeling that
2912 within a year, the life time is just a fraction of what it used to be,
2913 and it slowly become painful to use the laptop without power connected
2914 all the time.  Because of this, when I got a new Thinkpad X230 laptop
2915 about two years ago, I decided to monitor its battery state to have
2916 more hard facts when the battery started to fail.</p>
2917
2918 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-24-laptop-battery-graph.png"/>
2919
2920 <p>First I tried to find a sensible Debian package to record the
2921 battery status, assuming that this must be a problem already handled
2922 by someone else.  I found
2923 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>,
2924 which collects statistics from the battery, but it was completely
2925 broken.  I sent a few suggestions to the maintainer, but decided to
2926 write my own collector as a shell script while I waited for feedback
2927 from him.  Via
2928 <a href="http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html">a
2929 blog post about the battery development on a MacBook Air</a> I also
2930 discovered
2931 <a href="https://github.com/jradavenport/batlog.git">batlog</a>, not
2932 available in Debian.</p>
2933
2934 <p>I started my collector 2013-07-15, and it has been collecting
2935 battery stats ever since. Now my
2936 /var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log file contain around 115,000
2937 measurements, from the time the battery was working great until now,
2938 when it is unable to charge above 7% of original capacity.  My
2939 collector shell script is quite simple and look like this:</p>
2940
2941 <pre>
2942 #!/bin/sh
2943 # Inspired by
2944 # http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html
2945 # See also
2946 # http://blog.sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/01/02/debian-how-to-monitor-battery-capacity/
2947 logfile=/var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log
2948
2949 files="manufacturer model_name technology serial_number \
2950     energy_full energy_full_design energy_now cycle_count status"
2951
2952 if [ ! -e "$logfile" ] ; then
2953     (
2954         printf "timestamp,"
2955         for f in $files; do
2956             printf "%s," $f
2957         done
2958         echo
2959     ) > "$logfile"
2960 fi
2961
2962 log_battery() {
2963     # Print complete message in one echo call, to avoid race condition
2964     # when several log processes run in parallel.
2965     msg=$(printf "%s," $(date +%s); \
2966         for f in $files; do \
2967             printf "%s," $(cat $f); \
2968         done)
2969     echo "$msg"
2970 }
2971
2972 cd /sys/class/power_supply
2973
2974 for bat in BAT*; do
2975     (cd $bat && log_battery >> "$logfile")
2976 done
2977 </pre>
2978
2979 <p>The script is called when the power management system detect a
2980 change in the power status (power plug in or out), and when going into
2981 and out of hibernation and suspend.  In addition, it collect a value
2982 every 10 minutes.  This make it possible for me know when the battery
2983 is discharging, charging and how the maximum charge change over time.
2984 The code for the Debian package
2985 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-status">is now
2986 available on github</a>.</p>
2987
2988 <p>The collected log file look like this:</p>
2989
2990 <pre>
2991 timestamp,manufacturer,model_name,technology,serial_number,energy_full,energy_full_design,energy_now,cycle_count,status,
2992 1376591133,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,62800000,62160000,39050000,0,Discharging,
2993 [...]
2994 1443090528,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
2995 1443090601,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
2996 </pre>
2997
2998 <p>I wrote a small script to create a graph of the charge development
2999 over time.  This graph depicted above show the slow death of my laptop
3000 battery.</p>
3001
3002 <p>But why is this happening?  Why are my laptop batteries always
3003 dying in a year or two, while the batteries of space probes and
3004 satellites keep working year after year.  If we are to believe
3005 <a href="http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries">Battery
3006 University</a>, the cause is me charging the battery whenever I have a
3007 chance, and the fix is to not charge the Lithium-ion batteries to 100%
3008 all the time, but to stay below 90% of full charge most of the time.
3009 I've been told that the Tesla electric cars
3010 <a href="http://my.teslamotors.com/de_CH/forum/forums/battery-charge-limit">limit
3011 the charge of their batteries to 80%</a>, with the option to charge to
3012 100% when preparing for a longer trip (not that I would want a car
3013 like Tesla where rights to privacy is abandoned, but that is another
3014 story), which I guess is the option we should have for laptops on
3015 Linux too.</p>
3016
3017 <p>Is there a good and generic way with Linux to tell the battery to
3018 stop charging at 80%, unless requested to charge to 100% once in
3019 preparation for a longer trip?  I found
3020 <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/34452/how-can-i-limit-battery-charging-to-80-capacity">one
3021 recipe on askubuntu for Ubuntu to limit charging on Thinkpad to
3022 80%</a>, but could not get it to work (kernel module refused to
3023 load).</p>
3024
3025 <p>I wonder why the battery capacity was reported to be more than 100%
3026 at the start.  I also wonder why the "full capacity" increases some
3027 times, and if it is possible to repeat the process to get the battery
3028 back to design capacity.  And I wonder if the discharge and charge
3029 speed change over time, or if this stay the same.  I did not yet try
3030 to write a tool to calculate the derivative values of the battery
3031 level, but suspect some interesting insights might be learned from
3032 those.</p>
3033
3034 <p>Update 2015-09-24: I got a tip to install the packages
3035 acpi-call-dkms and tlp (unfortunately missing in Debian stable)
3036 packages instead of the tp-smapi-dkms package I had tried to use
3037 initially, and use 'tlp setcharge 40 80' to change when charging start
3038 and stop.  I've done so now, but expect my existing battery is toast
3039 and need to be replaced.  The proposal is unfortunately Thinkpad
3040 specific.</p>
3041
3042       </div>
3043       <div class="tags">
3044
3045
3046         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>.
3047
3048
3049       </div>
3050     </div>
3051     <div class="padding"></div>
3052
3053     <div class="entry">
3054       <div class="title">
3055         <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>
3056       </div>
3057       <div class="date">
3058          5th July 2015
3059       </div>
3060       <div class="body">
3061         <p>Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my
3062 need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback.  I wish to
3063 thank every one of these.  Several pointed me to the possibility of
3064 fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to
3065 do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the
3066 machine.  But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it
3067 with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live
3068 for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement.  If I did
3069 not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts
3070 using <a href="http://www.francecrans.com/">FrancEcrans</a>, but it
3071 might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.</p>
3072
3073 <p>One tip I got was to use the
3074 <a href="https://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=nb">Skinflint</a> web service to
3075 compare laptop models.  It seem to have more models available than
3076 prisjakt.no.  Another tip I got from someone I know have similar
3077 keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not
3078 very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook
3079 keyboards I tested.  Because of this, I will not consider it any further.
3080
3081 <p>When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the
3082 newest Thinkpad X model.  The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons
3083 (which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with
3084 Debian Sid/Unstable according to
3085 <a href="http://www.corsac.net/X250/">Corsac.net</a>.  The reports I
3086 got on the keyboard quality are not consistent.  Some say the keyboard
3087 is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good.
3088 Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250
3089 keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I
3090 keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to
3091 replace it.  I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk
3092 activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230.  I'm
3093 also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit
3094 noisy.  In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian
3095 Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.</p>
3096
3097 <p>I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was
3098 <a href="http://pro-star.com">Pro-Star</a>, another was
3099 <a href="http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/product/libreboot-x200/">Libreboot</a>.
3100 The latter look very attractive to me.</p>
3101
3102 <p>Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback.  It help a lot
3103 as I keep looking for a replacement.</p>
3104
3105 <p>Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the
3106 <a href="">lapstore.de</a> web shop for used laptops.  They got several
3107 different
3108 <a href="http://www.lapstore.de/f.php/shop/lapstore/f/411/lang/x/kw/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X_Serie/">old
3109 thinkpad X models</a>, and provide one year warranty.</p>
3110
3111       </div>
3112       <div class="tags">
3113
3114
3115         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>.
3116
3117
3118       </div>
3119     </div>
3120     <div class="padding"></div>
3121
3122     <div class="entry">
3123       <div class="title">
3124         <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>
3125       </div>
3126       <div class="date">
3127          3rd July 2015
3128       </div>
3129       <div class="body">
3130         <p>My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a
3131 replacement soon.  The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230
3132 started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken
3133 cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the
3134 flickering.</p>
3135
3136 <p>My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is
3137 still as
3138 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">I
3139 described them in 2013</a>.  The last time I bought a laptop, I had
3140 good help from
3141 <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/category.php?k=353">prisjakt.no</a>
3142 where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin,
3143 wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually.  Three button mouse
3144 and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three
3145 laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and
3146 G2) lack three mouse buttons).  It is also unclear to me how good the
3147 keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are.  I hope Lenovo have not messed up
3148 the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have
3149 deteriorated since X41.</p>
3150
3151 <p>I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options
3152 seem sensible to me?  Are there better services around to search the
3153 set of available laptops for features?  Please send me an email if you
3154 have suggestions.</p>
3155
3156 <p>Update 2015-07-23: I got a suggestion to check out the FSF
3157 <a href="http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom">list
3158 of endorsed hardware</a>, which is useful background information.</p>
3159
3160       </div>
3161       <div class="tags">
3162
3163
3164         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>.
3165
3166
3167       </div>
3168     </div>
3169     <div class="padding"></div>
3170
3171     <div class="entry">
3172       <div class="title">
3173         <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>
3174       </div>
3175       <div class="date">
3176         22nd November 2014
3177       </div>
3178       <div class="body">
3179         <p>By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
3180 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
3181 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
3182 courtesy of
3183 <a href="http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html">Erich
3184 Schubert</a> and
3185 <a href="http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/">Simon
3186 McVittie</a>.
3187
3188 <p>If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
3189 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
3190 <tt>/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit</tt> with this content before
3191 you upgrade:</p>
3192
3193 <p><blockquote><pre>
3194 Package: systemd-sysv
3195 Pin: release o=Debian
3196 Pin-Priority: -1
3197 </pre></blockquote><p>
3198
3199 <p>This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
3200 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
3201 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
3202 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
3203 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.</p>
3204
3205 <p>If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
3206 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
3207 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
3208 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
3209 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
3210 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
3211
3212 <p><blockquote><pre>
3213 preseed/late_command="in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core"
3214 </pre></blockquote><p>
3215
3216 <p>Next, the line to use in a preseed file:</p>
3217
3218 <p><blockquote><pre>
3219 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
3220 </pre></blockquote><p>
3221
3222 <p>One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
3223 the sysvinit-core package.</p>
3224
3225 <p>I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
3226 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
3227 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
3228 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
3229 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
3230 Jessie is released.</p>
3231
3232 <p>Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
3233 <ahref="https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg">a
3234 blog post by Torsten Glaser</a>, added --purge to the preseed
3235 line.</p>
3236
3237       </div>
3238       <div class="tags">
3239
3240
3241         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>.
3242
3243
3244       </div>
3245     </div>
3246     <div class="padding"></div>
3247
3248     <div class="entry">
3249       <div class="title">
3250         <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>
3251       </div>
3252       <div class="date">
3253         10th November 2014
3254       </div>
3255       <div class="body">
3256         <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
3257 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
3258 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.</p>
3259
3260 <p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
3261 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
3262 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
3263 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
3264 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
3265 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
3266 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
3267 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed
3268 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a
3269 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
3270 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
3271 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
3272 <a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the
3273 Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems
3274 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p>
3275
3276 <p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
3277 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
3278 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
3279 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
3280 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
3281 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
3282 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
3283 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
3284 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
3285 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
3286 were fairly easy, and
3287 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the
3288 source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github.  I
3289 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
3290 useful approach.</p>
3291
3292 <p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
3293 mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to
3294 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
3295 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
3296 <tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow
3297 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
3298 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
3299 this:</p>
3300
3301 <p><blockquote><pre>
3302 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
3303   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
3304 </pre></blockquote></p>
3305
3306 <p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
3307 address with your own address to test your server. :)</p>
3308
3309 <p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
3310 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
3311 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
3312 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
3313 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
3314 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
3315 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
3316 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
3317 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
3318 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
3319 system.</p>
3320
3321 <p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
3322 <tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over
3323 SMTorP. :)</p>
3324
3325       </div>
3326       <div class="tags">
3327
3328
3329         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>.
3330
3331
3332       </div>
3333     </div>
3334     <div class="padding"></div>
3335
3336     <div class="entry">
3337       <div class="title">
3338         <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>
3339       </div>
3340       <div class="date">
3341         22nd October 2014
3342       </div>
3343       <div class="body">
3344         <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
3345 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
3346 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
3347 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
3348 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
3349 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
3350 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
3351 <a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the
3352 listadmin program</a>.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
3353 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
3354 lists I recently took over:</p>
3355
3356 <p><blockquote><pre>
3357 % time listadmin xiph
3358 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
3359 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
3360
3361 real    0m1.709s
3362 user    0m0.232s
3363 sys     0m0.012s
3364 %
3365 </pre></blockquote></p>
3366
3367 <p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
3368 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
3369 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
3370 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
3371 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
3372 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
3373 program.</p>
3374
3375 <p>If you install
3376 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin
3377 package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt>
3378 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p>
3379
3380 <p><blockquote><pre>
3381 username username@example.org
3382 spamlevel 23
3383 default discard
3384 discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
3385
3386 password secret
3387 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
3388 mailman-list@lists.example.com
3389
3390 password hidden
3391 other-list@otherserver.example.org
3392 </pre></blockquote></p>
3393
3394 <p>There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
3395 learn the details.</p>
3396
3397 <p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
3398 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
3399 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
3400 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p>
3401
3402 <p><blockquote><pre>
3403 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
3404 </pre></blockquote></p>
3405
3406 <p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
3407 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
3408 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
3409 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
3410 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
3411 email.</p>
3412
3413 <p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
3414 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
3415 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
3416 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
3417 software.</p>
3418
3419 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
3420 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
3421 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
3422
3423 <p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in
3424 configuration example.  Also, I've been told that the
3425 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
3426 sure why.</p>
3427
3428       </div>
3429       <div class="tags">
3430
3431
3432         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>.
3433
3434
3435       </div>
3436     </div>
3437     <div class="padding"></div>
3438
3439     <div class="entry">
3440       <div class="title">
3441         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html">Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</a>
3442       </div>
3443       <div class="date">
3444         17th October 2014
3445       </div>
3446       <div class="body">
3447         <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
3448 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
3449 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
3450 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
3451 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram
3452 package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
3453 to do this using simple preseeding.</p>
3454
3455 <p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
3456 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
3457 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
3458 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
3459 of this story.)</p>
3460
3461 <p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
3462 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
3463 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
3464 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
3465 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
3466 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
3467 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
3468 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
3469 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
3470 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p>
3471
3472 <p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
3473 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
3474 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
3475 hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p>
3476
3477 <p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
3478 firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p>
3479
3480 <p><blockquote><pre>
3481 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
3482 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
3483 </pre></blockquote></p>
3484
3485 <p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
3486 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
3487 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
3488 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
3489 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
3490 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
3491 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
3492 implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p>
3493
3494 <p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
3495 this recipe work for you. :)</p>
3496
3497 <p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
3498 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
3499 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
3500 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
3501 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p>
3502
3503 <p><blockquote><pre>
3504 Task: isenkram-packages
3505 Section: hardware
3506 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
3507  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
3508  proposed.
3509 Test-new-install: show show
3510 Relevance: 8
3511 Packages: for-current-hardware
3512
3513 Task: isenkram-firmware
3514 Section: hardware
3515 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
3516  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
3517  packages are proposed.
3518 Test-new-install: mark show
3519 Relevance: 8
3520 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
3521 </pre></blockquote></p>
3522
3523 <p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
3524 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
3525 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
3526 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
3527 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
3528
3529 <p><blockquote><pre>
3530 #!/bin/sh
3531 #
3532 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
3533 export PATH
3534 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
3535 </pre></blockquote></p>
3536
3537 <p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
3538 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p>
3539
3540 <p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
3541 installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
3542 --new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would
3543 install.</p>
3544
3545 <p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be
3546 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
3547 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p>
3548
3549       </div>
3550       <div class="tags">
3551
3552
3553         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>.
3554
3555
3556       </div>
3557     </div>
3558     <div class="padding"></div>
3559
3560     <div class="entry">
3561       <div class="title">
3562         <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>
3563       </div>
3564       <div class="date">
3565          4th October 2014
3566       </div>
3567       <div class="body">
3568         <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
3569 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
3570 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
3571 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p>
3572
3573 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p>
3574
3575 <p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
3576 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
3577 <a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p>
3578
3579       </div>
3580       <div class="tags">
3581
3582
3583         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>.
3584
3585
3586       </div>
3587     </div>
3588     <div class="padding"></div>
3589
3590     <div class="entry">
3591       <div class="title">
3592         <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>
3593       </div>
3594       <div class="date">
3595          4th October 2014
3596       </div>
3597       <div class="body">
3598         <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a>
3599 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
3600 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
3601 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
3602 Dibb.</p>
3603
3604 <p>I just wrapped up
3605 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a
3606 new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from
3607 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the
3608 download page</a>.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
3609 0.17.</p>
3610
3611 <ul>
3612
3613  <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li>
3614  <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
3615    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li>
3616  <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li>
3617  <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li>
3618  <li>Fix include orders</li>
3619  <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li>
3620  <li>Fix the chapter count</li>
3621  <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
3622    the palette size is the same.</li>
3623  <li>Fix array printing.</li>
3624  <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li>
3625  <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li>
3626  <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
3627    with more GCC compiler warnings.</li>
3628
3629 </ul>
3630
3631 <p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
3632 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
3633 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)</p>
3634
3635       </div>
3636       <div class="tags">
3637
3638
3639         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>.
3640
3641
3642       </div>
3643     </div>
3644     <div class="padding"></div>
3645
3646     <div class="entry">
3647       <div class="title">
3648         <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>
3649       </div>
3650       <div class="date">
3651         26th September 2014
3652       </div>
3653       <div class="body">
3654         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
3655 project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
3656 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
3657 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
3658 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
3659 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
3660 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
3661 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
3662 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
3663 future.  The
3664 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current
3665 status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
3666 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
3667 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
3668 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p>
3669
3670 <p>First, download the test ISO via
3671 <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>,
3672 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a>
3673 or rsync (use
3674 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
3675 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
3676 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
3677 install with some tweaking.</p>
3678
3679 <p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
3680 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p>
3681
3682 <p><blockquote><pre>
3683 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
3684 </pre></blockquote></p>
3685
3686 <p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
3687 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
3688 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
3689 due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p>
3690
3691 <p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
3692 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
3693 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
3694 your need.</p>
3695
3696 <p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
3697 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
3698 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
3699 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
3700 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
3701 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
3702 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
3703 days.</p>
3704
3705 <p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
3706 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
3707 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
3708 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
3709 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
3710 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
3711 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
3712 provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>.
3713 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p>
3714
3715 <p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
3716 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
3717 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p>
3718
3719       </div>
3720       <div class="tags">
3721
3722
3723         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>.
3724
3725
3726       </div>
3727     </div>
3728     <div class="padding"></div>
3729
3730     <div class="entry">
3731       <div class="title">
3732         <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>
3733       </div>
3734       <div class="date">
3735         25th September 2014
3736       </div>
3737       <div class="body">
3738         <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a>
3739 to handle my fairly large DVD collection.  It is a nice command line
3740 tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length,
3741 etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format.  But lsdvd have not seen
3742 any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting
3743 its use with some DVDs.  Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I
3744 sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the
3745 project, without any reply.  But I use it regularly and would like to
3746 get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version
3747 into Debian</a>.  So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with
3748 the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that
3749 he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take
3750 over.  And yesterday, I became project admin.</p>
3751
3752 <p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian
3753 maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream
3754 project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly,
3755 collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place.
3756 I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git
3757 repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too.  If you got
3758 a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out
3759 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join
3760 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing
3761 list</a>. :)</p>
3762
3763       </div>
3764       <div class="tags">
3765
3766
3767         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>.
3768
3769
3770       </div>
3771     </div>
3772     <div class="padding"></div>
3773
3774     <div class="entry">
3775       <div class="title">
3776         <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>
3777       </div>
3778       <div class="date">
3779         16th September 2014
3780       </div>
3781       <div class="body">
3782         <p>The <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> installer could be
3783 a lot quicker.  When we install more than 2000 packages in
3784 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> using
3785 tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever.
3786 A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in
3787 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/613428">bug #613428</a> about too
3788 much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package
3789 responsible for unpacking the binary packages.  Other parts (like code
3790 executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during
3791 installation.  All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to
3792 me.  If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try
3793 to salvage the half installed system.  So the failure sync-ing is
3794 supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really
3795 relevant while the installer is running.</p>
3796
3797 <p>A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file
3798 system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to
3799 change the code in several packages.  The idea is not new, but I have
3800 not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before.  It
3801 depend on the small and clever package
3802 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/eatmydata">eatmydata</a>, which
3803 uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to
3804 disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live
3805 dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly.  Instead of
3806 modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the
3807 packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages),
3808 it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace
3809 them with a simple shell wrapper calling
3810 "eatmydata&nbsp;$program&nbsp;$@", to get the same effect.
3811 Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple
3812 implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.</p>
3813
3814 <p>The effect was stunning.  In my first test it reduced the running
3815 time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44
3816 minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell
3817 Latitude D505 machine.  I am not quite sure what the optimised time
3818 would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf
3819 priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during
3820 installation.  As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation
3821 along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the
3822 installation.  I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie,
3823 and got these results.  The time measured is the time stamp in
3824 /var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the
3825 "pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement
3826 yourself.  In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the
3827 timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel
3828 dialog.</p>
3829
3830 <p><table>
3831
3832 <tr>
3833 <th>Machine/setup</th>
3834 <th>Original tasksel</th>
3835 <th>Optimised tasksel</th>
3836 <th>Reduction</th>
3837 </tr>
3838
3839 <tr>
3840 <td>Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE</td>
3841 <td>64 min (07:46-08:50)</td>
3842 <td><44 min (11:27-12:11)</td>
3843 <td>>20 min 18%</td>
3844 </tr>
3845
3846 <tr>
3847 <td>Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE</td>
3848 <td>57 min (08:48-09:45)</td>
3849 <td>34 min (07:43-08:17)</td>
3850 <td>23 min 40%</td>
3851 </tr>
3852
3853 <tr>
3854 <td>Latitude D505 Minimal</td>
3855 <td>22 min (10:37-10:59)</td>
3856 <td>11 min (11:16-11:27)</td>
3857 <td>11 min 50%</td>
3858 </tr>
3859
3860 <tr>
3861 <td>Thinkpad X200 Minimal</td>
3862 <td>6 min (08:19-08:25)</td>
3863 <td>4 min (08:04-08:08)</td>
3864 <td>2 min 33%</td>
3865 </tr>
3866
3867 <tr>
3868 <td>Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE</td>
3869 <td>19 min (09:21-09:40)</td>
3870 <td>15 min (10:25-10:40)</td>
3871 <td>4 min 21%</td>
3872 </tr>
3873
3874 </table></p>
3875
3876 <p>The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the
3877 time is spent downloading packages.  The connection to the Internet
3878 was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a
3879 significant factor in the measurement.  Download typically took a few
3880 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being
3881 installed.</p>
3882
3883 <p>The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in
3884 <a href="https://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/">Debian
3885 Installer</a>, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the
3886 finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the
3887 installation.  I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the
3888 post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the
3889 eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in
3890 Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO.  The
3891 negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this
3892 optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i.  If the code is
3893 moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger
3894 for the entire installation.</p>
3895
3896 <p>I've implemented this in the
3897 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-install">debian-edu-install</a>
3898 git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the
3899 Debian Edu installation.  If you want to test this yourself, you can
3900 create two files in the installer (or in an udeb).  One shell script
3901 need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:</p>
3902
3903 <p><blockquote><pre>
3904 #!/bin/sh
3905 set -e
3906 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
3907 info() {
3908     logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
3909 }
3910 error() {
3911     logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
3912 }
3913 override_install() {
3914     apt-install eatmydata || true
3915     if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
3916         for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
3917             file=/usr/bin/$bin
3918             # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
3919             if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
3920                 info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
3921                 printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
3922                     > /target$file.edu
3923                 chmod 755 /target$file.edu
3924                 in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
3925                     --rename --quiet --add $file
3926                 ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
3927             else
3928                 error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
3929             fi
3930         done
3931     else
3932         error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
3933     fi
3934 }
3935
3936 override_install
3937 </pre></blockquote></p>
3938
3939 <p>To clean up, another shell script should go into
3940 /usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this:
3941
3942 <p><blockquote><pre>
3943 #! /bin/sh -e
3944 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
3945 error() {
3946     logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
3947 }
3948 remove_install_override() {
3949     for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
3950         file=/usr/bin/$bin
3951         if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
3952             rm /target$file
3953             in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
3954                 --rename --quiet --remove $file
3955             rm /target$file.edu
3956         else
3957             error "Missing divert for $file."
3958         fi
3959     done
3960     sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
3961 }
3962
3963 remove_install_override
3964 </pre></blockquote></p>
3965
3966 <p>In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script
3967 edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and
3968 finish-install.d scripts.</p>
3969
3970 <p>By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal
3971 Debian installer too?  I suspect it should, but am not sure the
3972 current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough.  It also
3973 depend on the side effects of the change.  I'm not aware of any, but I
3974 guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing.
3975 Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and
3976 fsync() having effect?  Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to
3977 allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting
3978 everyone.</p>
3979
3980 <p>Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization
3981 will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of
3982 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">bug #702711</a>.  An updated
3983 eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.</p>
3984
3985 <p>Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and
3986 the optimization work again.  And I have discovered that the
3987 dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly
3988 simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package.  See
3989 tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.</p>
3990
3991 <p>Update 2014-11-11: Unfortunately, a new
3992 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/765738">bug #765738</a> in eatmydata only
3993 triggering on i386 made it into testing, and broke this installation
3994 optimization again.  If <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/768893">unblock
3995 request 768893</a> is accepted, it should be working again.</p>
3996
3997       </div>
3998       <div class="tags">
3999
4000
4001         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>.
4002
4003
4004       </div>
4005     </div>
4006     <div class="padding"></div>
4007
4008     <div class="entry">
4009       <div class="title">
4010         <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>
4011       </div>
4012       <div class="date">
4013         10th September 2014
4014       </div>
4015       <div class="body">
4016         <p>Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk with the
4017 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> about
4018 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20140909-sks-keyservers/">the
4019 OpenPGP keyserver pool sks-keyservers.net</a>, and was very happy to
4020 learn that there is a large set of publicly available key servers to
4021 use when looking for peoples public key.  So far I have used
4022 subkeys.pgp.net, and some times wwwkeys.nl.pgp.net when the former
4023 were misbehaving, but those days are ended.  The servers I have used
4024 up until yesterday have been slow and some times unavailable.  I hope
4025 those problems are gone now.</p>
4026
4027 <p>Behind the round robin DNS entry of the
4028 <a href="https://sks-keyservers.net/">sks-keyservers.net</a> service
4029 there is a pool of more than 100 keyservers which are checked every
4030 day to ensure they are well connected and up to date.  It must be
4031 better than what I have used so far. :)</p>
4032
4033 <p>Yesterdays speaker told me that the service is the default
4034 keyserver provided by the default configuration in GnuPG, but this do
4035 not seem to be used in Debian.  Perhaps it should?</p>
4036
4037 <p>Anyway, I've updated my ~/.gnupg/options file to now include this
4038 line:</p>
4039
4040 <p><blockquote><pre>
4041 keyserver pool.sks-keyservers.net
4042 </pre></blockquote></p>
4043
4044 <p>With GnuPG version 2 one can also locate the keyserver using SRV
4045 entries in DNS.  Just for fun, I did just that at work, so now every
4046 user of GnuPG at the University of Oslo should find a OpenGPG
4047 keyserver automatically should their need it:</p>
4048
4049 <p><blockquote><pre>
4050 % host -t srv _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no
4051 _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no has SRV record 0 100 11371 pool.sks-keyservers.net.
4052 %
4053 </pre></blockquote></p>
4054
4055 <p>Now if only
4056 <a href="http://ietfreport.isoc.org/idref/draft-shaw-openpgp-hkp/">the
4057 HKP lookup protocol</a> supported finding signature paths, I would be
4058 very happy.  It can look up a given key or search for a user ID, but I
4059 normally do not want that, but to find a trust path from my key to
4060 another key.  Given a user ID or key ID, I would like to find (and
4061 download) the keys representing a signature path from my key to the
4062 key in question, to be able to get a trust path between the two keys.
4063 This is as far as I can tell not possible today.  Perhaps something
4064 for a future version of the protocol?</p>
4065
4066       </div>
4067       <div class="tags">
4068
4069
4070         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>.
4071
4072
4073       </div>
4074     </div>
4075     <div class="padding"></div>
4076
4077     <div class="entry">
4078       <div class="title">
4079         <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>
4080       </div>
4081       <div class="date">
4082         17th June 2014
4083       </div>
4084       <div class="body">
4085         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
4086 project</a> provide an instruction manual for teachers, system
4087 administrators and other users that contain useful tips for setting up
4088 and maintaining a Debian Edu installation.  This text is about how the
4089 text processing of this manual is handled in the project.</p>
4090
4091 <p>One goal of the project is to provide information in the native
4092 language of its users, and for this we need to handle translations.
4093 But we also want to make sure each language contain the same
4094 information, so for this we need a good way to keep the translations
4095 in sync.  And we want it to be easy for our users to improve the
4096 documentation, avoiding the need to learn special formats or tools to
4097 contribute, and the obvious way to do this is to make it possible to
4098 edit the documentation using a web browser.  We also want it to be
4099 easy for translators to keep the translation up to date, and give them
4100 help in figuring out what need to be translated. Here is the list of
4101 tools and the process we have found trying to reach all these
4102 goals.</p>
4103
4104 <p>We maintain the authoritative source of our manual in the
4105 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">Debian
4106 wiki</a>, as several wiki pages written in English.  It consist of one
4107 front page with references to the different chapters, several pages
4108 for each chapter, and finally one "collection page" gluing all the
4109 chapters together into one large web page (aka
4110 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/AllInOne">the
4111 AllInOne page</a>).  The AllInOne page is the one used for further
4112 processing and translations.  Thanks to the fact that the
4113 <a href="http://moinmo.in/">MoinMoin</a> installation on
4114 wiki.debian.org support exporting pages in
4115 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">the Docbook format</a>, we can fetch
4116 the list of pages to export using the raw version of the AllInOne
4117 page, loop over each of them to generate a Docbook XML version of the
4118 manual.  This process also download images and transform image
4119 references to use the locally downloaded images.  The generated
4120 Docbook XML files are slightly broken, so some post-processing is done
4121 using the <tt>documentation/scripts/get_manual</tt> program, and the
4122 result is a nice Docbook XML file (debian-edu-wheezy-manual.xml) and
4123 a handfull of images.  The XML file can now be used to generate PDF, HTML
4124 and epub versions of the English manual.  This is the basic step of
4125 our process, making PDF (using dblatex), HTML (using xsltproc) and
4126 epub (using dbtoepub) version from Docbook XML, and the resulting files
4127 are placed in the debian-edu-doc-en binary package.</p>
4128
4129 <p>But English documentation is not enough for us.  We want translated
4130 documentation too, and we want to make it easy for translators to
4131 track the English original.  For this we use the
4132 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/poxml.html">poxml</a> package,
4133 which allow us to transform the English Docbook XML file into a
4134 translation file (a .pot file), usable with the normal gettext based
4135 translation tools used by those translating free software.  The pot
4136 file is used to create and maintain translation files (several .po
4137 files), which the translations update with the native language
4138 translations of all titles, paragraphs and blocks of text in the
4139 original.  The next step is combining the original English Docbook XML
4140 and the translation file (say debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.po), to
4141 create a translated Docbook XML file (in this case
4142 debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.xml).  This translated (or partly
4143 translated, if the translation is not complete) Docbook XML file can
4144 then be used like the original to create a PDF, HTML and epub version
4145 of the documentation.</p>
4146
4147 <p>The translators use different tools to edit the .po files.  We
4148 recommend using
4149 <a href="http://www.kde.org/applications/development/lokalize/">lokalize</a>,
4150 while some use emacs and vi, others can use web based editors like
4151 <a href="http://pootle.translatehouse.org/">Poodle</a> or
4152 <a href="https://www.transifex.com/">Transifex</a>.  All we care about
4153 is where the .po file end up, in our git repository.  Updated
4154 translations can either be committed directly to git, or submitted as
4155 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/src:debian-edu-doc">bug reports
4156 against the debian-edu-doc package</a>.</p>
4157
4158 <p>One challenge is images, which both might need to be translated (if
4159 they show translated user applications), and are needed in different
4160 formats when creating PDF and HTML versions (epub is a HTML version in
4161 this regard).  For this we transform the original PNG images to the
4162 needed density and format during build, and have a way to provide
4163 translated images by storing translated versions in
4164 images/$LANGUAGECODE/.  I am a bit unsure about the details here.  The
4165 package maintainers know more.</p>
4166
4167 <p>If you wonder what the result look like, we provide
4168 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">the content
4169 of the documentation packages on the web</a>.  See for example the
4170 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/it/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.pdf">Italian
4171 PDF version</a> or the
4172 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/de/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.html">German
4173 HTML version</a>.  We do not yet build the epub version by default,
4174 but perhaps it will be done in the future.</p>
4175
4176 <p>To learn more, check out
4177 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-edu-doc.html">the
4178 debian-edu-doc package</a>,
4179 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">the
4180 manual on the wiki</a> and
4181 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/Translations">the
4182 translation instructions</a> in the manual.</p>
4183
4184       </div>
4185       <div class="tags">
4186
4187
4188         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>.
4189
4190
4191       </div>
4192     </div>
4193     <div class="padding"></div>
4194
4195     <div class="entry">
4196       <div class="title">
4197         <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>
4198       </div>
4199       <div class="date">
4200         23rd April 2014
4201       </div>
4202       <div class="body">
4203         <p>It would be nice if it was easier in Debian to get all the hardware
4204 related packages relevant for the computer installed automatically.
4205 So I implemented one, using
4206 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">my Isenkram
4207 package</a>.  To use it, install the tasksel and isenkram packages and
4208 run tasksel as user root.  You should be presented with a new option,
4209 "Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)".  When you
4210 select it, tasksel will install the packages isenkram claim is fit for
4211 the current hardware, hot pluggable or not.<p>
4212
4213 <p>The implementation is in two files, one is the tasksel menu entry
4214 description, and the other is the script used to extract the list of
4215 packages to install.  The first part is in
4216 <tt>/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc</tt> and look like
4217 this:</p>
4218
4219 <p><blockquote><pre>
4220 Task: isenkram
4221 Section: hardware
4222 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
4223  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
4224  proposed.
4225 Test-new-install: mark show
4226 Relevance: 8
4227 Packages: for-current-hardware
4228 </pre></blockquote></p>
4229
4230 <p>The second part is in
4231 <tt>/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/for-current-hardware</tt> and look like
4232 this:</p>
4233
4234 <p><blockquote><pre>
4235 #!/bin/sh
4236 #
4237 (
4238     isenkram-lookup
4239     isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
4240 ) | sort -u
4241 </pre></blockquote></p>
4242
4243 <p>All in all, a very short and simple implementation making it
4244 trivial to install the hardware dependent package we all may want to
4245 have installed on our machines.  I've not been able to find a way to
4246 get tasksel to tell you exactly which packages it plan to install
4247 before doing the installation.  So if you are curious or careful,
4248 check the output from the isenkram-* command line tools first.</p>
4249
4250 <p>The information about which packages are handling which hardware is
4251 fetched either from the isenkram package itself in
4252 /usr/share/isenkram/, from git.debian.org or from the APT package
4253 database (using the Modaliases header).  The APT package database
4254 parsing have caused a nasty resource leak in the isenkram daemon (bugs
4255 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/719837">#719837</a> and
4256 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/730704">#730704</a>).  The cause is in
4257 the python-apt code (bug
4258 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/745487">#745487</a>), but using a
4259 workaround I was able to get rid of the file descriptor leak and
4260 reduce the memory leak from ~30 MiB per hardware detection down to
4261 around 2 MiB per hardware detection.  It should make the desktop
4262 daemon a lot more useful.  The fix is in version 0.7 uploaded to
4263 unstable today.</p>
4264
4265 <p>I believe the current way of mapping hardware to packages in
4266 Isenkram is is a good draft, but in the future I expect isenkram to
4267 use the AppStream data source for this.  A proposal for getting proper
4268 AppStream support into Debian is floating around as
4269 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a>, and
4270 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2014/Projects#SummerOfCode2014.2FProjects.2FAppStreamDEP11Implementation.AppStream.2FDEP-11_for_the_Debian_Archive">GSoC
4271 project</a> will take place this summer to improve the situation.  I
4272 look forward to seeing the result, and welcome patches for isenkram to
4273 start using the information when it is ready.</p>
4274
4275 <p>If you want your package to map to some specific hardware, either
4276 add a "Xb-Modaliases" header to your control file like I did in
4277 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">the pymissile
4278 package</a> or submit a bug report with the details to the isenkram
4279 package.  See also
4280 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">all my
4281 blog posts tagged isenkram</a> for details on the notation.  I expect
4282 the information will be migrated to AppStream eventually, but for the
4283 moment I got no better place to store it.</p>
4284
4285       </div>
4286       <div class="tags">
4287
4288
4289         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>.
4290
4291
4292       </div>
4293     </div>
4294     <div class="padding"></div>
4295
4296     <div class="entry">
4297       <div class="title">
4298         <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>
4299       </div>
4300       <div class="date">
4301         15th April 2014
4302       </div>
4303       <div class="body">
4304         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
4305 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware to make
4306 it easy for non-technical people to host their data and communication
4307 at home, and being able to communicate with their friends and family
4308 encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It is still going strong, and
4309 today a major mile stone was reached.</p>
4310
4311 <p>Today, the last of the packages currently used by the project to
4312 created the system images were accepted into Debian Unstable.  It was
4313 the freedombox-setup package, which is used to configure the images
4314 during build and on the first boot.  Now all one need to get going is
4315 the build code from the freedom-maker git repository and packages from
4316 Debian.  And once the freedombox-setup package enter testing, we can
4317 build everything directly from Debian. :)</p>
4318
4319 <p>Some key packages used by Freedombox are
4320 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>,
4321 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/plinth">plinth</a>,
4322 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pagekite">pagekite</a>,
4323 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/tor">tor</a>,
4324 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>,
4325 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/owncloud">owncloud</a> and
4326 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/dnsmasq">dnsmasq</a>.  There
4327 are plans to integrate more packages into the setup.  User
4328 documentation is maintained on the Debian wiki.  Please
4329 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Manual/Jessie">check out
4330 the manual</a> and help us improve it.</p>
4331
4332 <p>To test for yourself and create boot images with the FreedomBox
4333 setup, run this on a Debian machine using a user with sudo rights to
4334 become root:</p>
4335
4336 <p><pre>
4337 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
4338   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
4339   u-boot-tools
4340 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
4341   freedom-maker
4342 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
4343 </pre></p>
4344
4345 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
4346 devices.  See the README in the freedom-maker git repo for more
4347 details on the build.  If you do not want all three images, trim the
4348 make line.  Note that the virtualbox-image target is not really
4349 virtualbox specific.  It create a x86 image usable in kvm, qemu,
4350 vmware and any other x86 virtual machine environment.  You might need
4351 the version of vmdebootstrap in Jessie to get the build working, as it
4352 include fixes for a race condition with kpartx.</p>
4353
4354 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
4355 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
4356 the preseed values:</p>
4357
4358 <p><pre>
4359 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
4360 </pre></p>
4361
4362 <p>I have not tested it myself the last few weeks, so I do not know if
4363 it still work.</p>
4364
4365 <p>If you wonder how to help, one task you could look at is using
4366 systemd as the boot system.  It will become the default for Linux in
4367 Jessie, so we need to make sure it is usable on the Freedombox.  I did
4368 a simple test a few weeks ago, and noticed dnsmasq failed to start
4369 during boot when using systemd.  I suspect there are other problems
4370 too. :) To detect problems, there is a test suite included, which can
4371 be run from the plinth web interface.</p>
4372
4373 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
4374 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
4375 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
4376 irc.debian.org)</a> and
4377 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
4378 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
4379
4380       </div>
4381       <div class="tags">
4382
4383
4384         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>.
4385
4386
4387       </div>
4388     </div>
4389     <div class="padding"></div>
4390
4391     <div class="entry">
4392       <div class="title">
4393         <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>
4394       </div>
4395       <div class="date">
4396          9th April 2014
4397       </div>
4398       <div class="body">
4399         <p>For a while now, I have been looking for a sensible offsite backup
4400 solution for use at home.  My requirements are simple, it must be
4401 cheap and locally encrypted (in other words, I keep the encryption
4402 keys, the storage provider do not have access to my private files).
4403 One idea me and my friends had many years ago, before the cloud
4404 storage providers showed up, was to use Google mail as storage,
4405 writing a Linux block device storing blocks as emails in the mail
4406 service provided by Google, and thus get heaps of free space.  On top
4407 of this one can add encryption, RAID and volume management to have
4408 lots of (fairly slow, I admit that) cheap and encrypted storage.  But
4409 I never found time to implement such system.  But the last few weeks I
4410 have looked at a system called
4411 <a href="https://bitbucket.org/nikratio/s3ql/">S3QL</a>, a locally
4412 mounted network backed file system with the features I need.</p>
4413
4414 <p>S3QL is a fuse file system with a local cache and cloud storage,
4415 handling several different storage providers, any with Amazon S3,
4416 Google Drive or OpenStack API.  There are heaps of such storage
4417 providers.  S3QL can also use a local directory as storage, which
4418 combined with sshfs allow for file storage on any ssh server.  S3QL
4419 include support for encryption, compression, de-duplication, snapshots
4420 and immutable file systems, allowing me to mount the remote storage as
4421 a local mount point, look at and use the files as if they were local,
4422 while the content is stored in the cloud as well.  This allow me to
4423 have a backup that should survive fire.  The file system can not be
4424 shared between several machines at the same time, as only one can
4425 mount it at the time, but any machine with the encryption key and
4426 access to the storage service can mount it if it is unmounted.</p>
4427
4428 <p>It is simple to use.  I'm using it on Debian Wheezy, where the
4429 package is included already.  So to get started, run <tt>apt-get
4430 install s3ql</tt>.  Next, pick a storage provider.  I ended up picking
4431 Greenqloud, after reading their nice recipe on
4432 <a href="https://greenqloud.zendesk.com/entries/44611757-How-To-Use-S3QL-to-mount-a-StorageQloud-bucket-on-Debian-Wheezy">how
4433 to use S3QL with their Amazon S3 service</a>, because I trust the laws
4434 in Iceland more than those in USA when it come to keeping my personal
4435 data safe and private, and thus would rather spend money on a company
4436 in Iceland.  Another nice recipe is available from the article
4437 <a href="http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/Articles/HPC-Cloud-Storage">S3QL
4438 Filesystem for HPC Storage</a> by Jeff Layton in the HPC section of
4439 Admin magazine.  When the provider is picked, figure out how to get
4440 the API key needed to connect to the storage API.  With Greencloud,
4441 the key did not show up until I had added payment details to my
4442 account.</p>
4443
4444 <p>Armed with the API access details, it is time to create the file
4445 system.  First, create a new bucket in the cloud.  This bucket is the
4446 file system storage area.  I picked a bucket name reflecting the
4447 machine that was going to store data there, but any name will do.
4448 I'll refer to it as <tt>bucket-name</tt> below.  In addition, one need
4449 the API login and password, and a locally created password.  Store it
4450 all in ~root/.s3ql/authinfo2 like this:
4451
4452 <p><blockquote><pre>
4453 [s3c]
4454 storage-url: s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
4455 backend-login: API-login
4456 backend-password: API-password
4457 fs-passphrase: local-password
4458 </pre></blockquote></p>
4459
4460 <p>I create my local passphrase using <tt>pwget 50</tt> or similar,
4461 but any sensible way to create a fairly random password should do it.
4462 Armed with these details, it is now time to run mkfs, entering the API
4463 details and password to create it:</p>
4464
4465 <p><blockquote><pre>
4466 # mkdir -m 700 /var/lib/s3ql-cache
4467 # mkfs.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
4468   --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
4469 Enter backend login:
4470 Enter backend password:
4471 Before using S3QL, make sure to read the user's guide, especially
4472 the 'Important Rules to Avoid Loosing Data' section.
4473 Enter encryption password:
4474 Confirm encryption password:
4475 Generating random encryption key...
4476 Creating metadata tables...
4477 Dumping metadata...
4478 ..objects..
4479 ..blocks..
4480 ..inodes..
4481 ..inode_blocks..
4482 ..symlink_targets..
4483 ..names..
4484 ..contents..
4485 ..ext_attributes..
4486 Compressing and uploading metadata...
4487 Wrote 0.00 MB of compressed metadata.
4488 # </pre></blockquote></p>
4489
4490 <p>The next step is mounting the file system to make the storage available.
4491
4492 <p><blockquote><pre>
4493 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
4494   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
4495 Using 4 upload threads.
4496 Downloading and decompressing metadata...
4497 Reading metadata...
4498 ..objects..
4499 ..blocks..
4500 ..inodes..
4501 ..inode_blocks..
4502 ..symlink_targets..
4503 ..names..
4504 ..contents..
4505 ..ext_attributes..
4506 Mounting filesystem...
4507 # df -h /s3ql
4508 Filesystem                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
4509 s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name  1.0T     0  1.0T   0% /s3ql
4510 #
4511 </pre></blockquote></p>
4512
4513 <p>The file system is now ready for use.  I use rsync to store my
4514 backups in it, and as the metadata used by rsync is downloaded at
4515 mount time, no network traffic (and storage cost) is triggered by
4516 running rsync.  To unmount, one should not use the normal umount
4517 command, as this will not flush the cache to the cloud storage, but
4518 instead running the umount.s3ql command like this:
4519
4520 <p><blockquote><pre>
4521 # umount.s3ql /s3ql
4522 #
4523 </pre></blockquote></p>
4524
4525 <p>There is a fsck command available to check the file system and
4526 correct any problems detected.  This can be used if the local server
4527 crashes while the file system is mounted, to reset the "already
4528 mounted" flag.  This is what it look like when processing a working
4529 file system:</p>
4530
4531 <p><blockquote><pre>
4532 # fsck.s3ql --force --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
4533 Using cached metadata.
4534 File system seems clean, checking anyway.
4535 Checking DB integrity...
4536 Creating temporary extra indices...
4537 Checking lost+found...
4538 Checking cached objects...
4539 Checking names (refcounts)...
4540 Checking contents (names)...
4541 Checking contents (inodes)...
4542 Checking contents (parent inodes)...
4543 Checking objects (reference counts)...
4544 Checking objects (backend)...
4545 ..processed 5000 objects so far..
4546 ..processed 10000 objects so far..
4547 ..processed 15000 objects so far..
4548 Checking objects (sizes)...
4549 Checking blocks (referenced objects)...
4550 Checking blocks (refcounts)...
4551 Checking inode-block mapping (blocks)...
4552 Checking inode-block mapping (inodes)...
4553 Checking inodes (refcounts)...
4554 Checking inodes (sizes)...
4555 Checking extended attributes (names)...
4556 Checking extended attributes (inodes)...
4557 Checking symlinks (inodes)...
4558 Checking directory reachability...
4559 Checking unix conventions...
4560 Checking referential integrity...
4561 Dropping temporary indices...
4562 Backing up old metadata...
4563 Dumping metadata...
4564 ..objects..
4565 ..blocks..
4566 ..inodes..
4567 ..inode_blocks..
4568 ..symlink_targets..
4569 ..names..
4570 ..contents..
4571 ..ext_attributes..
4572 Compressing and uploading metadata...
4573 Wrote 0.89 MB of compressed metadata.
4574 #
4575 </pre></blockquote></p>
4576
4577 <p>Thanks to the cache, working on files that fit in the cache is very
4578 quick, about the same speed as local file access.  Uploading large
4579 amount of data is to me limited by the bandwidth out of and into my
4580 house.  Uploading 685 MiB with a 100 MiB cache gave me 305 kiB/s,
4581 which is very close to my upload speed, and downloading the same
4582 Debian installation ISO gave me 610 kiB/s, close to my download speed.
4583 Both were measured using <tt>dd</tt>.  So for me, the bottleneck is my
4584 network, not the file system code.  I do not know what a good cache
4585 size would be, but suspect that the cache should e larger than your
4586 working set.</p>
4587
4588 <p>I mentioned that only one machine can mount the file system at the
4589 time.  If another machine try, it is told that the file system is
4590 busy:</p>
4591
4592 <p><blockquote><pre>
4593 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
4594   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
4595 Using 8 upload threads.
4596 Backend reports that fs is still mounted elsewhere, aborting.
4597 #
4598 </pre></blockquote></p>
4599
4600 <p>The file content is uploaded when the cache is full, while the
4601 metadata is uploaded once every 24 hour by default.  To ensure the
4602 file system content is flushed to the cloud, one can either umount the
4603 file system, or ask S3QL to flush the cache and metadata using
4604 s3qlctrl:
4605
4606 <p><blockquote><pre>
4607 # s3qlctrl upload-meta /s3ql
4608 # s3qlctrl flushcache /s3ql
4609 #
4610 </pre></blockquote></p>
4611
4612 <p>If you are curious about how much space your data uses in the
4613 cloud, and how much compression and deduplication cut down on the
4614 storage usage, you can use s3qlstat on the mounted file system to get
4615 a report:</p>
4616
4617 <p><blockquote><pre>
4618 # s3qlstat /s3ql
4619 Directory entries:    9141
4620 Inodes:               9143
4621 Data blocks:          8851
4622 Total data size:      22049.38 MB
4623 After de-duplication: 21955.46 MB (99.57% of total)
4624 After compression:    21877.28 MB (99.22% of total, 99.64% of de-duplicated)
4625 Database size:        2.39 MB (uncompressed)
4626 (some values do not take into account not-yet-uploaded dirty blocks in cache)
4627 #
4628 </pre></blockquote></p>
4629
4630 <p>I mentioned earlier that there are several possible suppliers of
4631 storage.  I did not try to locate them all, but am aware of at least
4632 <a href="https://www.greenqloud.com/">Greenqloud</a>,
4633 <a href="http://drive.google.com/">Google Drive</a>,
4634 <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/">Amazon S3 web serivces</a>,
4635 <a href="http://www.rackspace.com/">Rackspace</a> and
4636 <a href="http://crowncloud.net/">Crowncloud</A>.  The latter even
4637 accept payment in Bitcoin.  Pick one that suit your need.  Some of
4638 them provide several GiB of free storage, but the prize models are
4639 quite different and you will have to figure out what suits you
4640 best.</p>
4641
4642 <p>While researching this blog post, I had a look at research papers
4643 and posters discussing the S3QL file system.  There are several, which
4644 told me that the file system is getting a critical check by the
4645 science community and increased my confidence in using it.  One nice
4646 poster is titled
4647 "<a href="http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/adtsc/publications/science_highlights_2013/docs/pg68_69.pdf">An
4648 Innovative Parallel Cloud Storage System using OpenStack’s SwiftObject
4649 Store and Transformative Parallel I/O Approach</a>" by Hsing-Bung
4650 Chen, Benjamin McClelland, David Sherrill, Alfred Torrez, Parks Fields
4651 and Pamela Smith.  Please  have a look.</p>
4652
4653 <p>Given my problems with different file systems earlier, I decided to
4654 check out the mounted S3QL file system to see if it would be usable as
4655 a home directory (in other word, that it provided POSIX semantics when
4656 it come to locking and umask handling etc).  Running
4657 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">my
4658 test code to check file system semantics</a>, I was happy to discover that
4659 no error was found.  So the file system can be used for home
4660 directories, if one chooses to do so.</p>
4661
4662 <p>If you do not want a locally file system, and want something that
4663 work without the Linux fuse file system, I would like to mention the
4664 <a href="http://www.tarsnap.com/">Tarsnap service</a>, which also
4665 provide locally encrypted backup using a command line client.  It have
4666 a nicer access control system, where one can split out read and write
4667 access, allowing some systems to write to the backup and others to
4668 only read from it.</p>
4669
4670 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
4671 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
4672 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
4673
4674       </div>
4675       <div class="tags">
4676
4677
4678         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>.
4679
4680
4681       </div>
4682     </div>
4683     <div class="padding"></div>
4684
4685     <div class="entry">
4686       <div class="title">
4687         <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>
4688       </div>
4689       <div class="date">
4690         14th March 2014
4691       </div>
4692       <div class="body">
4693         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
4694 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware for
4695 making it easy for non-technical people to host their data and
4696 communication at home, and being able to communicate with their
4697 friends and family encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It has been
4698 going on for a while, and is slowly progressing towards a new test
4699 release (0.2).</p>
4700
4701 <p>And what day could be better than the Pi day to announce that the
4702 new version will provide "hard drive" / SD card / USB stick images for
4703 Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and VirtualBox (or any other virtualization
4704 system), and can also be installed using a Debian installer preseed
4705 file.  The Debian based Freedombox is now based on Debian Jessie,
4706 where most of the needed packages used are already present.  Only one,
4707 the freedombox-setup package, is missing.  To try to build your own
4708 boot image to test the current status, fetch the freedom-maker scripts
4709 and build using
4710 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/vmdebootstrap">vmdebootstrap</a>
4711 with a user with sudo access to become root:
4712
4713 <pre>
4714 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
4715   freedom-maker
4716 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
4717   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
4718   u-boot-tools
4719 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
4720 </pre>
4721
4722 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
4723 devices.  See the README for more details on the build. If you do not
4724 want all three images, trim the make line.  But note that thanks to <a
4725 href="https://bugs.debian.org/741407">a race condition in
4726 vmdebootstrap</a>, the build might fail without the patch to the
4727 kpartx call.</p>
4728
4729 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
4730 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
4731 the preseed values:</p>
4732
4733 <pre>
4734 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
4735 </pre>
4736
4737 <p>But note that due to <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/740673">a
4738 recently introduced bug in apt in Jessie</a>, the installer will
4739 currently hang while setting up APT sources.  Killing the
4740 '<tt>apt-cdrom ident</tt>' process when it hang a few times during the
4741 installation will get the installation going.  This affect all
4742 installations in Jessie, and I expect it will be fixed soon.</p>
4743
4744 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
4745 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
4746 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
4747 irc.debian.org)</a> and
4748 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
4749 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
4750
4751       </div>
4752       <div class="tags">
4753
4754
4755         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>.
4756
4757
4758       </div>
4759     </div>
4760     <div class="padding"></div>
4761
4762     <div class="entry">
4763       <div class="title">
4764         <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>
4765       </div>
4766       <div class="date">
4767         22nd February 2014
4768       </div>
4769       <div class="body">
4770         <p>Many years ago, I wrote a GPL licensed version of the netgroup and
4771 innetgr tools, because I needed them in
4772 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>.  I called the project
4773 ng-utils, and it has served me well.  I placed the project under the
4774 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/">Hungry Programmer</a> umbrella, and it was maintained in our CVS
4775 repository.  But many years ago, the CVS repository was dropped (lost,
4776 not migrated to new hardware, not sure), and the project have lacked a
4777 proper home since then.</p>
4778
4779 <p>Last summer, I had a look at the package and made a new release
4780 fixing a irritating crash bug, but was unable to store the changes in
4781 a proper source control system.  I applied for a project on
4782 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/">Alioth</a>, but did not have time
4783 to follow up on it.  Until today. :)</p>
4784
4785 <p>After many hours of cleaning and migration, the ng-utils project
4786 now have a new home, and a git repository with the highlight of the
4787 history of the project.  I published all release tarballs and imported
4788 them into the git repository.  As the project is really stable and not
4789 expected to gain new features any time soon, I decided to make a new
4790 release and call it 1.0.  Visit the new project home on
4791 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/">https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/</a>
4792 if you want to check it out.  The new version is also uploaded into
4793 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/ng-utils.html">Debian Unstable</a>.</p>
4794
4795       </div>
4796       <div class="tags">
4797
4798
4799         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>.
4800
4801
4802       </div>
4803     </div>
4804     <div class="padding"></div>
4805
4806     <div class="entry">
4807       <div class="title">
4808         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_sysvinit_from_experimental_in_Debian_Hurd.html">Testing sysvinit from experimental in Debian Hurd</a>
4809       </div>
4810       <div class="date">
4811          3rd February 2014
4812       </div>
4813       <div class="body">
4814         <p>A few days ago I decided to try to help the Hurd people to get
4815 their changes into sysvinit, to allow them to use the normal sysvinit
4816 boot system instead of their old one.  This follow up on the
4817 <a href="https://teythoon.cryptobitch.de//categories/gsoc.html">great
4818 Google Summer of Code work</a> done last summer by Justus Winter to
4819 get Debian on Hurd working more like Debian on Linux.  To get started,
4820 I downloaded a prebuilt hard disk image from
4821 <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>,
4822 and started it using virt-manager.</p>
4823
4824 <p>The first think I had to do after logging in (root without any
4825 password) was to get the network operational.  I followed
4826 <a href="https://www.debian.org/ports/hurd/hurd-install">the
4827 instructions on the Debian GNU/Hurd ports page</a> and ran these
4828 commands as root to get the machine to accept a IP address from the
4829 kvm internal DHCP server:</p>
4830
4831 <p><blockquote><pre>
4832 settrans -fgap /dev/netdde /hurd/netdde
4833 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[p]finet/ { print $2}')
4834 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[d]evnode/ { print $2}')
4835 dhclient /dev/eth0
4836 </pre></blockquote></p>
4837
4838 <p>After this, the machine had internet connectivity, and I could
4839 upgrade it and install the sysvinit packages from experimental and
4840 enable it as the default boot system in Hurd.</p>
4841
4842 <p>But before I did that, I set a password on the root user, as ssh is
4843 running on the machine it for ssh login to work a password need to be
4844 set.  Also, note that a bug somewhere in openssh on Hurd block
4845 compression from working.  Remember to turn that off on the client
4846 side.</p>
4847
4848 <p>Run these commands as root to upgrade and test the new sysvinit
4849 stuff:</p>
4850
4851 <p><blockquote><pre>
4852 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/experimental.list &lt;&lt;EOF
4853 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ experimental main
4854 EOF
4855 apt-get update
4856 apt-get dist-upgrade
4857 apt-get install -t experimental initscripts sysv-rc sysvinit \
4858     sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils
4859 update-alternatives --config runsystem
4860 </pre></blockquote></p>
4861
4862 <p>To reboot after switching boot system, you have to use
4863 <tt>reboot-hurd</tt> instead of just <tt>reboot</tt>, as there is not
4864 yet a sysvinit process able to receive the signals from the normal
4865 'reboot' command.  After switching to sysvinit as the boot system,
4866 upgrading every package and rebooting, the network come up with DHCP
4867 after boot as it should, and the settrans/pkill hack mentioned at the
4868 start is no longer needed.  But for some strange reason, there are no
4869 longer any login prompt in the virtual console, so I logged in using
4870 ssh instead.
4871
4872 <p>Note that there are some race conditions in Hurd making the boot
4873 fail some times.  No idea what the cause is, but hope the Hurd porters
4874 figure it out.  At least Justus said on IRC (#debian-hurd on
4875 irc.debian.org) that they are aware of the problem.  A way to reduce
4876 the impact is to upgrade to the Hurd packages built by Justus by
4877 adding this repository to the machine:</p>
4878
4879 <p><blockquote><pre>
4880 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/hurd-ci.list &lt;&lt;EOF
4881 deb http://darnassus.sceen.net/~teythoon/hurd-ci/ sid main
4882 EOF
4883 </pre></blockquote></p>
4884
4885 <p>At the moment the prebuilt virtual machine get some packages from
4886 http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian, because some of the packages in
4887 unstable do not yet include the required patches that are lingering in
4888 BTS.  This is the completely list of "unofficial" packages installed:</p>
4889
4890 <p><blockquote><pre>
4891 # aptitude search '?narrow(?version(CURRENT),?origin(Debian Ports))'
4892 i   emacs                   - GNU Emacs editor (metapackage)
4893 i   gdb                     - GNU Debugger
4894 i   hurd-recommended        - Miscellaneous translators
4895 i   isc-dhcp-client         - ISC DHCP client
4896 i   isc-dhcp-common         - common files used by all the isc-dhcp* packages
4897 i   libc-bin                - Embedded GNU C Library: Binaries
4898 i   libc-dev-bin            - Embedded GNU C Library: Development binaries
4899 i   libc0.3                 - Embedded GNU C Library: Shared libraries
4900 i A libc0.3-dbg             - Embedded GNU C Library: detached debugging symbols
4901 i   libc0.3-dev             - Embedded GNU C Library: Development Libraries and Hea
4902 i   multiarch-support       - Transitional package to ensure multiarch compatibilit
4903 i A x11-common              - X Window System (X.Org) infrastructure
4904 i   xorg                    - X.Org X Window System
4905 i A xserver-xorg            - X.Org X server
4906 i A xserver-xorg-input-all  - X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
4907 #
4908 </pre></blockquote></p>
4909
4910 <p>All in all, testing hurd has been an interesting experience. :)
4911 X.org did not work out of the box and I never took the time to follow
4912 the porters instructions to fix it.  This time I was interested in the
4913 command line stuff.<p>
4914
4915       </div>
4916       <div class="tags">
4917
4918
4919         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>.
4920
4921
4922       </div>
4923     </div>
4924     <div class="padding"></div>
4925
4926     <div class="entry">
4927       <div class="title">
4928         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html">New chrpath release 0.16</a>
4929       </div>
4930       <div class="date">
4931         14th January 2014
4932       </div>
4933       <div class="body">
4934         <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to
4935 find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code
4936 analysis.  It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very
4937 useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of
4938 the source.  The company behind it provide
4939 <a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as
4940 a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are
4941 already checked.  A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at
4942 the Coverity system, and discovered that the
4943 <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and
4944 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a>
4945 projects I am involved with was already registered.  But these are
4946 fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to
4947 check, and decided to <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request
4948 checking of the chrpath project</a>.  It was
4949 added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects.  Six of
4950 these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an
4951 error.  Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction
4952 of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it
4953 is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in
4954 the future end up in a library.  Having fixed all defects and added
4955 <a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a
4956 mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to
4957 publish a new release.  These are the release notes:</p>
4958
4959 <p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p>
4960
4961 <ul>
4962
4963   <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li>
4964   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li>
4965   <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li>
4966
4967 </ul>
4968
4969 <p>You can
4970 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
4971 new version 0.16 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
4972 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
4973 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
4974 include a test suite check.</p>
4975
4976       </div>
4977       <div class="tags">
4978
4979
4980         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>.
4981
4982
4983       </div>
4984     </div>
4985     <div class="padding"></div>
4986
4987     <div class="entry">
4988       <div class="title">
4989         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html">New chrpath release 0.15</a>
4990       </div>
4991       <div class="date">
4992         24th November 2013
4993       </div>
4994       <div class="body">
4995         <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that
4996 development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my
4997 acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath,
4998 the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already
4999 compiled ELF programs.  The update was triggered by the persistence of
5000 Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get
5001 support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he
5002 is working on.  I checked the
5003 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>,
5004 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and
5005 <a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a>
5006 packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from
5007 OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes.
5008 These are the release notes:</p>
5009
5010 <p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p>
5011
5012 <ul>
5013
5014   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work
5015    with newer architectures.  Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads
5016    up.</li>
5017
5018   <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li>
5019
5020   <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and
5021    Matthias Klose.</li>
5022
5023   <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by
5024    Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li>
5025
5026   <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in
5027    .dynamic is a NULL terminated string.  Based on patch found in
5028    Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li>
5029
5030 </ul>
5031
5032 <p>You can
5033 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
5034 new version 0.15 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
5035 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
5036 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
5037 include a testsuite check.</p>
5038
5039       </div>
5040       <div class="tags">
5041
5042
5043         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>.
5044
5045
5046       </div>
5047     </div>
5048     <div class="padding"></div>
5049
5050     <div class="entry">
5051       <div class="title">
5052         <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>
5053       </div>
5054       <div class="date">
5055          2nd November 2013
5056       </div>
5057       <div class="body">
5058         <p>If one of the points of switching to a new init system in Debian is
5059 <a href="http://thomas.goirand.fr/blog/?p=147">to get rid of huge
5060 init.d scripts</a>, I doubt we need to switch away from sysvinit and
5061 init.d scripts at all.  Here is an example init.d script, ie a rewrite
5062 of /etc/init.d/rsyslog:</p>
5063
5064 <p><pre>
5065 #!/lib/init/init-d-script
5066 ### BEGIN INIT INFO
5067 # Provides:          rsyslog
5068 # Required-Start:    $remote_fs $time
5069 # Required-Stop:     umountnfs $time
5070 # X-Stop-After:      sendsigs
5071 # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
5072 # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
5073 # Short-Description: enhanced syslogd
5074 # Description:       Rsyslog is an enhanced multi-threaded syslogd.
5075 #                    It is quite compatible to stock sysklogd and can be
5076 #                    used as a drop-in replacement.
5077 ### END INIT INFO
5078 DESC="enhanced syslogd"
5079 DAEMON=/usr/sbin/rsyslogd
5080 </pre></p>
5081
5082 <p>Pretty minimalistic to me... For the record, the original sysv-rc
5083 script was 137 lines, and the above is just 15 lines, most of it meta
5084 info/comments.</p>
5085
5086 <p>How to do this, you ask?  Well, one create a new script
5087 /lib/init/init-d-script looking something like this:
5088
5089 <p><pre>
5090 #!/bin/sh
5091
5092 # Define LSB log_* functions.
5093 # Depend on lsb-base (>= 3.2-14) to ensure that this file is present
5094 # and status_of_proc is working.
5095 . /lib/lsb/init-functions
5096
5097 #
5098 # Function that starts the daemon/service
5099
5100 #
5101 do_start()
5102 {
5103         # Return
5104         #   0 if daemon has been started
5105         #   1 if daemon was already running
5106         #   2 if daemon could not be started
5107         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON --test > /dev/null \
5108                 || return 1
5109         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON -- \
5110                 $DAEMON_ARGS \
5111                 || return 2
5112         # Add code here, if necessary, that waits for the process to be ready
5113         # to handle requests from services started subsequently which depend
5114         # on this one.  As a last resort, sleep for some time.
5115 }
5116
5117 #
5118 # Function that stops the daemon/service
5119 #
5120 do_stop()
5121 {
5122         # Return
5123         #   0 if daemon has been stopped
5124         #   1 if daemon was already stopped
5125         #   2 if daemon could not be stopped
5126         #   other if a failure occurred
5127         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --retry=TERM/30/KILL/5 --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
5128         RETVAL="$?"
5129         [ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2
5130         # Wait for children to finish too if this is a daemon that forks
5131         # and if the daemon is only ever run from this initscript.
5132         # If the above conditions are not satisfied then add some other code
5133         # that waits for the process to drop all resources that could be
5134         # needed by services started subsequently.  A last resort is to
5135         # sleep for some time.
5136         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --retry=0/30/KILL/5 --exec $DAEMON
5137         [ "$?" = 2 ] && return 2
5138         # Many daemons don't delete their pidfiles when they exit.
5139         rm -f $PIDFILE
5140         return "$RETVAL"
5141 }
5142
5143 #
5144 # Function that sends a SIGHUP to the daemon/service
5145 #
5146 do_reload() {
5147         #
5148         # If the daemon can reload its configuration without
5149         # restarting (for example, when it is sent a SIGHUP),
5150         # then implement that here.
5151         #
5152         start-stop-daemon --stop --signal 1 --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
5153         return 0
5154 }
5155
5156 SCRIPTNAME=$1
5157 scriptbasename="$(basename $1)"
5158 echo "SN: $scriptbasename"
5159 if [ "$scriptbasename" != "init-d-library" ] ; then
5160     script="$1"
5161     shift
5162     . $script
5163 else
5164     exit 0
5165 fi
5166
5167 NAME=$(basename $DAEMON)
5168 PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
5169
5170 # Exit if the package is not installed
5171 #[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0
5172
5173 # Read configuration variable file if it is present
5174 [ -r /etc/default/$NAME ] && . /etc/default/$NAME
5175
5176 # Load the VERBOSE setting and other rcS variables
5177 . /lib/init/vars.sh
5178
5179 case "$1" in
5180   start)
5181         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
5182         do_start
5183         case "$?" in
5184                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
5185                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
5186         esac
5187         ;;
5188   stop)
5189         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
5190         do_stop
5191         case "$?" in
5192                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
5193                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
5194         esac
5195         ;;
5196   status)
5197         status_of_proc "$DAEMON" "$NAME" && exit 0 || exit $?
5198         ;;
5199   #reload|force-reload)
5200         #
5201         # If do_reload() is not implemented then leave this commented out
5202         # and leave 'force-reload' as an alias for 'restart'.
5203         #
5204         #log_daemon_msg "Reloading $DESC" "$NAME"
5205         #do_reload
5206         #log_end_msg $?
5207         #;;
5208   restart|force-reload)
5209         #
5210         # If the "reload" option is implemented then remove the
5211         # 'force-reload' alias
5212         #
5213         log_daemon_msg "Restarting $DESC" "$NAME"
5214         do_stop
5215         case "$?" in
5216           0|1)
5217                 do_start
5218                 case "$?" in
5219                         0) log_end_msg 0 ;;
5220                         1) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Old process is still running
5221                         *) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Failed to start
5222                 esac
5223                 ;;
5224           *)
5225                 # Failed to stop
5226                 log_end_msg 1
5227                 ;;
5228         esac
5229         ;;
5230   *)
5231         echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|status|restart|force-reload}" >&2
5232         exit 3
5233         ;;
5234 esac
5235
5236 :
5237 </pre></p>
5238
5239 <p>It is based on /etc/init.d/skeleton, and could be improved quite a
5240 lot.  I did not really polish the approach, so it might not always
5241 work out of the box, but you get the idea.  I did not try very hard to
5242 optimize it nor make it more robust either.</p>
5243
5244 <p>A better argument for switching init system in Debian than reducing
5245 the size of init scripts (which is a good thing to do anyway), is to
5246 get boot system that is able to handle the kernel events sensibly and
5247 robustly, and do not depend on the boot to run sequentially.  The boot
5248 and the kernel have not behaved sequentially in years.</p>
5249
5250       </div>
5251       <div class="tags">
5252
5253
5254         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>.
5255
5256
5257       </div>
5258     </div>
5259     <div class="padding"></div>
5260
5261     <div class="entry">
5262       <div class="title">
5263         <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>
5264       </div>
5265       <div class="date">
5266          1st November 2013
5267       </div>
5268       <div class="body">
5269         <p><a href="http://www.spice-space.org/">The SPICE protocol</a> for
5270 remote display access is the preferred solution with oVirt and RedHat
5271 Enterprise Virtualization, and I was sad to discover the other day
5272 that the browser plugin needed to use these systems seamlessly was
5273 missing in Debian.  The <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/668284">request
5274 for a package</a> was from 2012-04-10 with no progress since
5275 2013-04-01, so I decided to wrap up a package based on the great work
5276 from Cajus Pollmeier and put it in a collab-maint maintained git
5277 repository to get a package I could use.  I would very much like
5278 others to help me maintain the package (or just take over, I do not
5279 mind), but as no-one had volunteered so far, I just uploaded it to
5280 NEW.  I hope it will be available in Debian in a few days.</p>
5281
5282 <p>The source is now available from
5283 <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>
5284
5285       </div>
5286       <div class="tags">
5287
5288
5289         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>.
5290
5291
5292       </div>
5293     </div>
5294     <div class="padding"></div>
5295
5296     <div class="entry">
5297       <div class="title">
5298         <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>
5299       </div>
5300       <div class="date">
5301         27th October 2013
5302       </div>
5303       <div class="body">
5304         <p>The
5305 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/v/vmdebootstrap.html">vmdebootstrap</a>
5306 program is a a very nice system to create virtual machine images.  It
5307 create a image file, add a partition table, mount it and run
5308 debootstrap in the mounted directory to create a Debian system on a
5309 stick.  Yesterday, I decided to try to teach it how to make images for
5310 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi</a>, as part
5311 of a plan to simplify the build system for
5312 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the FreedomBox
5313 project</a>.  The FreedomBox project already uses vmdebootstrap for
5314 the virtualbox images, but its current build system made multistrap
5315 based system for Dreamplug images, and it is lacking support for
5316 Raspberry Pi.</p>
5317
5318 <p>Armed with the knowledge on how to build "foreign" (aka non-native
5319 architecture) chroots for Raspberry Pi, I dived into the vmdebootstrap
5320 code and adjusted it to be able to build armel images on my amd64
5321 Debian laptop.  I ended up giving vmdebootstrap five new options,
5322 allowing me to replicate the image creation process I use to make
5323 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">Debian
5324 Jessie based mesh node images for the Raspberry Pi</a>.  First, the
5325 <tt>--foreign /path/to/binfm_handler</tt> option tell vmdebootstrap to
5326 call debootstrap with --foreign and to copy the handler into the
5327 generated chroot before running the second stage.  This allow
5328 vmdebootstrap to create armel images on an amd64 host.  Next I added
5329 two new options <tt>--bootsize size</tt> and <tt>--boottype
5330 fstype</tt> to teach it to create a separate /boot/ partition with the
5331 given file system type, allowing me to create an image with a vfat
5332 partition for the /boot/ stuff.  I also added a <tt>--variant
5333 variant</tt> option to allow me to create smaller images without the
5334 Debian base system packages installed.  Finally, I added an option
5335 <tt>--no-extlinux</tt> to tell vmdebootstrap to not install extlinux
5336 as a boot loader.  It is not needed on the Raspberry Pi and probably
5337 most other non-x86 architectures.  The changes were accepted by the
5338 upstream author of vmdebootstrap yesterday and today, and is now
5339 available from
5340 <a href="http://git.liw.fi/cgi-bin/cgit/cgit.cgi/vmdebootstrap/">the
5341 upstream project page</a>.</p>
5342
5343 <p>To use it to build a Raspberry Pi image using Debian Jessie, first
5344 create a small script (the customize script) to add the non-free
5345 binary blob needed to boot the Raspberry Pi and the APT source
5346 list:</p>
5347
5348 <p><pre>
5349 #!/bin/sh
5350 set -e # Exit on first error
5351 rootdir="$1"
5352 cd "$rootdir"
5353 cat &lt;&lt;EOF > etc/apt/sources.list
5354 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
5355 EOF
5356 # Install non-free binary blob needed to boot Raspberry Pi.  This
5357 # install a kernel somewhere too.
5358 wget https://raw.github.com/Hexxeh/rpi-update/master/rpi-update \
5359     -O $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
5360 chmod a+x $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
5361 mkdir -p $rootdir/lib/modules
5362 touch $rootdir/boot/start.elf
5363 chroot $rootdir rpi-update
5364 </pre></p>
5365
5366 <p>Next, fetch the latest vmdebootstrap script and call it like this
5367 to build the image:</p>
5368
5369 <pre>
5370 sudo ./vmdebootstrap \
5371     --variant minbase \
5372     --arch armel \
5373     --distribution jessie \
5374     --mirror http://http.debian.net/debian \
5375     --image test.img \
5376     --size 600M \
5377     --bootsize 64M \
5378     --boottype vfat \
5379     --log-level debug \
5380     --verbose \
5381     --no-kernel \
5382     --no-extlinux \
5383     --root-password raspberry \
5384     --hostname raspberrypi \
5385     --foreign /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static \
5386     --customize `pwd`/customize \
5387     --package netbase \
5388     --package git-core \
5389     --package binutils \
5390     --package ca-certificates \
5391     --package wget \
5392     --package kmod
5393 </pre></p>
5394
5395 <p>The list of packages being installed are the ones needed by
5396 rpi-update to make the image bootable on the Raspberry Pi, with the
5397 exception of netbase, which is needed by debootstrap to find
5398 /etc/hosts with the minbase variant.  I really wish there was a way to
5399 set up an Raspberry Pi using only packages in the Debian archive, but
5400 that is not possible as far as I know, because it boots from the GPU
5401 using a non-free binary blob.</p>
5402
5403 <p>The build host need debootstrap, kpartx and qemu-user-static and
5404 probably a few others installed.  I have not checked the complete
5405 build dependency list.</p>
5406
5407 <p>The resulting image will not use the hardware floating point unit
5408 on the Raspberry PI, because the armel architecture in Debian is not
5409 optimized for that use.  So the images created will be a bit slower
5410 than <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/">Raspbian</a> based images.</p>
5411
5412       </div>
5413       <div class="tags">
5414
5415
5416         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>.
5417
5418
5419       </div>
5420     </div>
5421     <div class="padding"></div>
5422
5423     <div class="entry">
5424       <div class="title">
5425         <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>
5426       </div>
5427       <div class="date">
5428         15th October 2013
5429       </div>
5430       <div class="body">
5431         <p>The last few days I came across a few good causes that should get
5432 wider attention.  I recommend signing and donating to each one of
5433 these. :)</p>
5434
5435 <p>Via <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2013/18/">Debian
5436 Project News for 2013-10-14</a> I came across the Outreach Program for
5437 Women program which is a Google Summer of Code like initiative to get
5438 more women involved in free software.  One debian sponsor has offered
5439 to match <a href="http://debian.ch/opw2013">any donation done to Debian
5440 earmarked</a> for this initiative.  I donated a few minutes ago, and
5441 hope you will to. :)</p>
5442
5443 <p>And the Electronic Frontier Foundation just announced plans to
5444 create <a href="https://supporters.eff.org/donate/nsa-videos">video
5445 documentaries about the excessive spying</a> on every Internet user that
5446 take place these days, and their need to fund the work.  I've already
5447 donated.  Are you next?</p>
5448
5449 <p>For my Norwegian audience, the organisation Studentenes og
5450 Akademikernes Internasjonale Hjelpefond is collecting signatures for a
5451 statement under the heading
5452 <a href="http://saih.no/Bloggers_United/">Bloggers United for Open
5453 Access</a> for those of us asking for more focus on open access in the
5454 Norwegian government.  So far 499 signatures.  I hope you will sign it
5455 too.</p>
5456
5457       </div>
5458       <div class="tags">
5459
5460
5461         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>.
5462
5463
5464       </div>
5465     </div>
5466     <div class="padding"></div>
5467
5468     <div class="entry">
5469       <div class="title">
5470         <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>
5471       </div>
5472       <div class="date">
5473         27th September 2013
5474       </div>
5475       <div class="body">
5476         <p>The <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox
5477 project</a> have been going on for a while, and have presented the
5478 vision, ideas and solution several places.  Here is a little
5479 collection of videos of talks and presentation of the project.</p>
5480
5481 <ul>
5482
5483 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukvUz5taxvA">FreedomBox -
5484 2,5 minute marketing film</a> (Youtube)</li>
5485
5486 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzW25QTVWsE">Eben Moglen
5487 discusses the Freedombox on CBS news 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
5488
5489 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae8SZbxfE0g">Eben Moglen -
5490 Freedom in the Cloud - Software Freedom, Privacy and and Security for
5491 Web 2.0 and Cloud computing at ISOC-NY Public Meeting 2010</a>
5492 (Youtube)</li>
5493
5494 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNaIji_3xBE">Fosdem 2011
5495 Keynote by Eben Moglen presenting the Freedombox</a> (Youtube)</li>
5496
5497 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bDDUyJSQ9s">Presentation of
5498 the Freedombox by James Vasile at Elevate in Gratz 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
5499
5500 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQTmnk27g9s"> Freedombox -
5501 Discovery, Identity, and Trust by Nick Daly at Freedombox Hackfest New
5502 York City in 2012</a> (Youtube)</li>
5503
5504 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbSB4Ba7Ck">Introduction
5505 to the Freedombox at Freedombox Hackfest New York City in 2012</a>
5506 (Youtube)</li>
5507
5508 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-P2Jaeg0aQ">Freedom, Out
5509 of the Box! by Bdale Garbee at linux.conf.au Ballarat, 2012</a> (Youtube) </li>
5510
5511 <li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/freedombox/">Freedombox
5512 1.0 by Eben Moglen and Bdale Garbee at Fosdem 2013</a> (FOSDEM) </li>
5513
5514 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LpYX2zVYg">What is the
5515 FreedomBox today by Bdale Garbee at Debconf13 in Vaumarcus
5516 2013</a> (Youtube)</li>
5517
5518 </ul>
5519
5520 <p>A larger list is available from
5521 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/TalksAndPresentations">the
5522 Freedombox Wiki</a>.</p>
5523
5524 <p>On other news, I am happy to report that Freedombox based on Debian
5525 Jessie is coming along quite well, and soon both Owncloud and using
5526 Tor should be available for testers of the Freedombox solution. :) In
5527 a few weeks I hope everything needed to test it is included in Debian.
5528 The withsqlite package is already in Debian, and the plinth package is
5529 pending in NEW.  The third and vital part of that puzzle is the
5530 metapackage/setup framework, which is still pending an upload.  Join
5531 us on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC
5532 (#freedombox on irc.debian.org)</a> and
5533 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
5534 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
5535
5536       </div>
5537       <div class="tags">
5538
5539
5540         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>.
5541
5542
5543       </div>
5544     </div>
5545     <div class="padding"></div>
5546
5547     <div class="entry">
5548       <div class="title">
5549         <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>
5550       </div>
5551       <div class="date">
5552         10th September 2013
5553       </div>
5554       <div class="body">
5555         <p>I was introduced to the
5556 <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox project</a>
5557 in 2010, when Eben Moglen presented his vision about serving the need
5558 of non-technical people to keep their personal information private and
5559 within the legal protection of their own homes.  The idea is to give
5560 people back the power over their network and machines, and return
5561 Internet back to its intended peer-to-peer architecture.  Instead of
5562 depending on a central service, the Freedombox will give everyone
5563 control over their own basic infrastructure.</p>
5564
5565 <p>I've intended to join the effort since then, but other tasks have
5566 taken priority.  But this summers nasty news about the misuse of trust
5567 and privilege exercised by the "western" intelligence gathering
5568 communities increased my eagerness to contribute to a point where I
5569 actually started working on the project a while back.</p>
5570
5571 <p>The <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/freedombox/">initial
5572 Debian initiative</a> based on the vision from Eben Moglen, is to
5573 create a simple and cheap Debian based appliance that anyone can hook
5574 up in their home and get access to secure and private services and
5575 communication.  The initial deployment platform have been the
5576 <a href="http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-dreamplugdetails.aspx">Dreamplug</a>,
5577 which is a piece of hardware I do not own.  So to be able to test what
5578 the current Freedombox setup look like, I had to come up with a way to install
5579 it on some hardware I do have access to.  I have rewritten the
5580 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedom-maker">freedom-maker</a>
5581 image build framework to use .deb packages instead of only copying
5582 setup into the boot images, and thanks to this rewrite I am able to
5583 set up any machine supported by Debian Wheezy as a Freedombox, using
5584 the previously mentioned deb (and a few support debs for packages
5585 missing in Debian).</p>
5586
5587 <p>The current Freedombox setup consist of a set of bootstrapping
5588 scripts
5589 (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>),
5590 and a administrative web interface
5591 (<a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/Plinth">plinth</a> + exmachina +
5592 withsqlite), as well as a privacy enhancing proxy based on
5593 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>
5594 (freedombox-privoxy).  There is also a web/javascript based XMPP
5595 client (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/jwchat">jwchat</a>)
5596 trying (unsuccessfully so far) to talk to the XMPP server
5597 (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/ejabberd">ejabberd</a>).  The
5598 web interface is pluggable, and the goal is to use it to enable OpenID
5599 services, mesh network connectivity, use of TOR, etc, etc.  Not much of
5600 this is really working yet, see
5601 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedombox-todos/blob/master/TODO">the
5602 project TODO</a> for links to GIT repositories.  Most of the code is
5603 on github at the moment.  The HTTP proxy is operational out of the
5604 box, and the admin web interface can be used to add/remove plinth
5605 users.  I've not been able to do anything else with it so far, but
5606 know there are several branches spread around github and other places
5607 with lots of half baked features.</p>
5608
5609 <p>Anyway, if you want to have a look at the current state, the
5610 following recipes should work to give you a test machine to poke
5611 at.</p>
5612
5613 <p><strong>Debian Wheezy amd64</strong></p>
5614
5615 <ol>
5616
5617 <li>Fetch normal Debian Wheezy installation ISO.</li>
5618 <li>Boot from it, either as CD or USB stick.</li>
5619 <li><p>Press [tab] on the boot prompt and add this as a boot argument
5620 to the Debian installer:<p>
5621 <pre>url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat</a></pre></li>
5622
5623 <li>Answer the few language/region/password questions and pick disk to
5624 install on.</li>
5625
5626 <li>When the installation is finished and the machine have rebooted a
5627 few times, your Freedombox is ready for testing.</li>
5628
5629 </ol>
5630
5631 <p><strong>Raspberry Pi Raspbian</strong></p>
5632
5633 <ol>
5634
5635 <li>Fetch a Raspbian SD card image, create SD card.</li>
5636 <li>Boot from SD card, extend file system to fill the card completely.</li>
5637 <li><p>Log in and add this to /etc/sources.list:</p>
5638 <pre>
5639 deb <a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox</a> wheezy main
5640 </pre></li>
5641 <li><p>Run this as root:</p>
5642 <pre>
5643 wget -O - http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/BE1A583D.asc | \
5644    apt-key add -
5645 apt-get update
5646 apt-get install freedombox-setup
5647 /usr/lib/freedombox/setup
5648 </pre></li>
5649 <li>Reboot into your freshly created Freedombox.</li>
5650
5651 </ol>
5652
5653 <p>You can test it on other architectures too, but because the
5654 freedombox-privoxy package is binary, it will only work as intended on
5655 the architectures where I have had time to build the binary and put it
5656 in my APT repository.  But do not let this stop you.  It is only a
5657 short "<tt>apt-get source -b freedombox-privoxy</tt>" away. :)</p>
5658
5659 <p>Note that by default Freedombox is a DHCP server on the
5660 192.168.1.0/24 subnet, so if this is your subnet be careful and turn
5661 off the DHCP server by running "<tt>update-rc.d isc-dhcp-server
5662 disable</tt>" as root.</p>
5663
5664 <p>Please let me know if this works for you, or if you have any
5665 problems.  We gather on the IRC channel
5666 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">#freedombox</a> on
5667 irc.debian.org and the
5668 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">project
5669 mailing list</a>.</p>
5670
5671 <p>Once you get your freedombox operational, you can visit
5672 <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/</tt> to see the state of the plint
5673 welcome screen (dead end - do not be surprised if you are unable to
5674 get past it), and next visit <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/help/</tt>
5675 to look at the rest of plinth.  The default user is 'admin' and the
5676 default password is 'secret'.</p>
5677
5678       </div>
5679       <div class="tags">
5680
5681
5682         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>.
5683
5684
5685       </div>
5686     </div>
5687     <div class="padding"></div>
5688
5689     <div class="entry">
5690       <div class="title">
5691         <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>
5692       </div>
5693       <div class="date">
5694         18th August 2013
5695       </div>
5696       <div class="body">
5697         <p>Earlier, I reported about
5698 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">my
5699 problems using an Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB disk</a>.  Friday I was
5700 told by IBM that the original disk should be thrown away.  And as
5701 there no longer was a problem if I bricked the firmware, I decided
5702 today to try to install Intel firmware to replace the Lenovo firmware
5703 currently on the disk.</p>
5704
5705 <p>I searched the Intel site for firmware, and found
5706 <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>
5707 (aka Intel SATA Solid-State Drive Firmware Update Tool) which
5708 according to the site should contain the latest firmware for SSD
5709 disks.  I inserted the broken disk in one of my spare laptops and
5710 booted the ISO from a USB stick.  The disk was recognized, but the
5711 program claimed the newest firmware already were installed and refused
5712 to insert any Intel firmware.  So no change, and the disk is still
5713 unable to handle write load. :( I guess the only way to get them
5714 working would be if Lenovo releases new firmware.  No idea how likely
5715 that is.  Anyway, just blogging about this test for completeness.  I
5716 got a working Samsung disk, and see no point in spending more time on
5717 the broken disks.</p>
5718
5719       </div>
5720       <div class="tags">
5721
5722
5723         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>.
5724
5725
5726       </div>
5727     </div>
5728     <div class="padding"></div>
5729
5730     <div class="entry">
5731       <div class="title">
5732         <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>
5733       </div>
5734       <div class="date">
5735         17th July 2013
5736       </div>
5737       <div class="body">
5738         <p>Today I switched to
5739 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
5740 new laptop</a>.  I've previously written about the problems I had with
5741 my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
5742 <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
5743 GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
5744 sustained writes.  My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
5745 trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
5746 identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
5747 disk instead to fix it once and for all.  The Samsung disk survived
5748 the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
5749 random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
5750 decided to trust it with my data.  I have installed it as a Debian Edu
5751 Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
5752 server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
5753 station from now on.</p>
5754
5755 <p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
5756 Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
5757 performance and increase life time of the disk.  The Linux kernel and
5758 user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
5759 environment.  To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
5760 package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning.  The
5761 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
5762 for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
5763 is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
5764 package.  If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
5765 will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
5766 file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
5767
5768 <p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
5769 set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD.  It is adjusted to my use case,
5770 where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
5771 addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
5772 top of this again.  See the README file in the package source for the
5773 references I used to pick the settings.  At the moment these
5774 parameters are tuned:</p>
5775
5776 <ul>
5777
5778 <li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
5779     (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
5780
5781 <li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
5782     this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
5783     0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
5784
5785 <li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
5786     systems.</li>
5787
5788 <li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
5789     /etc/fstab.</li>
5790
5791 <li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
5792
5793 <li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
5794     cron.daily).</li>
5795
5796 <li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
5797     to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
5798
5799 </ul>
5800
5801 <p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
5802 the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
5803 little gain.  My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
5804 those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
5805 computer.  I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
5806 from getting the data on the disk (see
5807 <a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
5808 Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
5809 right thing to do.</p>
5810
5811 <p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
5812 it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
5813 indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
5814
5815 <p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
5816 and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
5817 file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
5818 instead of during my work.</p>
5819
5820 <p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
5821 this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
5822
5823 <p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning.  I expect
5824 iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
5825 have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
5826
5827 <p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
5828 there.</p>
5829
5830 <p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
5831 as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
5832 disk.  It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
5833 the Lenovo firmware.  But I have not tried and did not want to do so
5834 without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
5835 disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
5836 back.</p>
5837
5838       </div>
5839       <div class="tags">
5840
5841
5842         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>.
5843
5844
5845       </div>
5846     </div>
5847     <div class="padding"></div>
5848
5849     <div class="entry">
5850       <div class="title">
5851         <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>
5852       </div>
5853       <div class="date">
5854         10th July 2013
5855       </div>
5856       <div class="body">
5857         <p>A few days ago, I wrote about
5858 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
5859 problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
5860 was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
5861 sustained write.  My supplier is in contact with
5862 <a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
5863 replacement disk to try to fix the problem.  They decided to send an
5864 identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
5865
5866 <p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
5867 Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it.  The new disk have the
5868 same firmware version as the original.  This time my hope raised
5869 slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
5870 die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
5871 going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%.  But around 60%, the disk
5872 died again and I was back on square one.  I still do not have a new
5873 laptop with a disk I can trust.  I can not live with a disk that might
5874 lock up when I download a new
5875 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
5876 other large files.  I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
5877 the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
5878
5879 <p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
5880 11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
5881 LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
5882 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
5883 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
5884 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
5885
5886 <p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
5887 11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
5888 LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
5889 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
5890 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
5891 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
5892
5893 <p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
5894 SA, date and WNPP values.  Mentioning all the details here in case
5895 someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
5896 failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
5897 exist).</p>
5898
5899       </div>
5900       <div class="tags">
5901
5902
5903         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>.
5904
5905
5906       </div>
5907     </div>
5908     <div class="padding"></div>
5909
5910     <div class="entry">
5911       <div class="title">
5912         <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>
5913       </div>
5914       <div class="date">
5915          9th July 2013
5916       </div>
5917       <div class="body">
5918         <p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
5919 Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
5920 party in Oslo.  It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
5921 member assosiation NUUG</a> and
5922 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
5923 project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
5924 Bitraf</a>.</p>
5925
5926 <p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening.  Everyone is
5927 welcome, and there is no fee to participate.  There is on the other
5928 hand limited space, and only room for 30 people.  Please put your name
5929 on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
5930 wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
5931
5932       </div>
5933       <div class="tags">
5934
5935
5936         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>.
5937
5938
5939       </div>
5940     </div>
5941     <div class="padding"></div>
5942
5943     <div class="entry">
5944       <div class="title">
5945         <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>
5946       </div>
5947       <div class="date">
5948          5th July 2013
5949       </div>
5950       <div class="body">
5951         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
5952 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
5953 for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>.  Unfortunately I did not have much
5954 time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
5955 will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived.  I
5956 ended up picking a
5957 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
5958 with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
5959 a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly.  But my
5960 second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful.  More
5961 on that below.</p>
5962
5963 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
5964 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
5965 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
5966 feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
5967 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
5968 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
5969 to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
5970 disks from my search parameters.  I also asked around among friends to
5971 get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
5972
5973 <p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
5974 X41.  I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
5975 significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
5976 hand a lot more to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly
5977 good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
5978 I will get used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
5979 needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
5980
5981 <p>Turning off the touch pad was simple.  All it took was a quick
5982 visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
5983
5984 <p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop.  The 180 GB SSD disk
5985 lock up during load.  And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
5986 with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
5987 I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
5988 reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
5989 default in Ubuntu).  And the bug with is already known.  It was
5990 reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
5991 report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
5992 Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD).  It is also reported to the Linux
5993 kernel developers as
5994 <a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
5995 report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
5996 (SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
5997 Lenovo forums, both for
5998 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
5999 2012-11-10</a> and for
6000 <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
6001 03-20-2013</a>.  The problem do not only affect installation.  The
6002 reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
6003 on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
6004 problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
6005 There is even a
6006 <a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
6007 available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
6008 minutes by writing to a file.</p>
6009
6010 <p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
6011 contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
6012 requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
6013 firmware.  Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
6014 Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i).  I
6015 hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
6016 fixed. :)</p>
6017
6018       </div>
6019       <div class="tags">
6020
6021
6022         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>.
6023
6024
6025       </div>
6026     </div>
6027     <div class="padding"></div>
6028
6029     <div class="entry">
6030       <div class="title">
6031         <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>
6032       </div>
6033       <div class="date">
6034          4th July 2013
6035       </div>
6036       <div class="body">
6037         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
6038 trusty old Thinkpad X41.  Unfortunately I did not have much time to
6039 spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived.  I ended up
6040 picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
6041 X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu
6042 Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly.  As I write
6043 this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
6044 with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
6045 with an expencive door stop.</p>
6046
6047 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
6048 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
6049 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
6050 feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
6051 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
6052 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
6053 to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
6054
6055 <p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
6056 wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
6057 to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly good and the
6058 individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
6059 used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
6060 new laptop now. :)</p>
6061
6062 <p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
6063
6064       </div>
6065       <div class="tags">
6066
6067
6068         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>.
6069
6070
6071       </div>
6072     </div>
6073     <div class="padding"></div>
6074
6075     <div class="entry">
6076       <div class="title">
6077         <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>
6078       </div>
6079       <div class="date">
6080         25th June 2013
6081       </div>
6082       <div class="body">
6083         <p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
6084 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
6085 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
6086 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
6087 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
6088 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
6089 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
6090 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
6091 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
6092 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
6093 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
6094
6095 <p><pre>
6096 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
6097 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
6098 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
6099 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
6100 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
6101 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
6102 firmware-ipw2x00
6103 firmware-ipw2x00
6104 Preconfiguring packages ...
6105 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
6106 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
6107 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
6108 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
6109 #
6110 </pre></p>
6111
6112 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
6113 printed instead:</p>
6114
6115 <p><pre>
6116 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
6117 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
6118 #
6119 </pre></p>
6120
6121 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
6122 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
6123
6124 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
6125 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
6126 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
6127 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
6128 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
6129 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
6130 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
6131 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
6132 machine.</p>
6133
6134 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
6135 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
6136 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
6137 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
6138 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
6139 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
6140
6141       </div>
6142       <div class="tags">
6143
6144
6145         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>.
6146
6147
6148       </div>
6149     </div>
6150     <div class="padding"></div>
6151
6152     <div class="entry">
6153       <div class="title">
6154         <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>
6155       </div>
6156       <div class="date">
6157         11th June 2013
6158       </div>
6159       <div class="body">
6160         <p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
6161 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
6162 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
6163 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
6164 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
6165 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
6166 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
6167 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
6168 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
6169 i915 driver used by the
6170 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
6171 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
6172
6173 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
6174 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
6175 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
6176 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
6177 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
6178
6179 <pre>
6180 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
6181 update-initramfs -u -k all
6182 </pre>
6183
6184 <p>Since March 2012 there is
6185 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
6186 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
6187 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
6188 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
6189 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
6190 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
6191 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
6192 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
6193 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
6194 number.</p>
6195
6196 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
6197 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
6198
6199 <p><pre>
6200 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
6201     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
6202     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
6203  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
6204  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
6205     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
6206  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
6207     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
6208  Latency: 0
6209  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
6210  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
6211  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
6212  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
6213  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
6214  Capabilities: <access denied>
6215  Kernel driver in use: i915
6216 </pre></p>
6217
6218 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
6219
6220 <p><pre>
6221 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
6222        ...
6223         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
6224         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
6225        ...
6226 }
6227 </pre></p>
6228
6229 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
6230 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
6231 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
6232 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
6233 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
6234 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
6235 yet shown up in
6236 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
6237 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
6238 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
6239 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
6240 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
6241 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
6242
6243 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
6244 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
6245 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
6246 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
6247 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
6248 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
6249 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
6250 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
6251 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
6252 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
6253 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
6254 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
6255
6256 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
6257 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
6258 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
6259 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
6260 backlight.</p>
6261
6262       </div>
6263       <div class="tags">
6264
6265
6266         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>.
6267
6268
6269       </div>
6270     </div>
6271     <div class="padding"></div>
6272
6273     <div class="entry">
6274       <div class="title">
6275         <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>
6276       </div>
6277       <div class="date">
6278         27th May 2013
6279       </div>
6280       <div class="body">
6281         <p>Two days ago, I asked
6282 <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
6283 I could install Linux on a Packard Bell EasyNote LV computer
6284 preinstalled with Windows 8</a>.  I found a solution, but am horrified
6285 with the obstacles put in the way of Linux users on a laptop with UEFI
6286 and Windows 8.</p>
6287
6288 <p>I never found out if the cause of my problems were the use of UEFI
6289 secure booting or fast boot.  I suspect fast boot was the problem,
6290 causing the firmware to boot directly from HD without considering any
6291 key presses and alternative devices, but do not know UEFI settings
6292 enough to tell.</p>
6293
6294 <p>There is no way to install Linux on the machine in question without
6295 opening the box and disconnecting the hard drive!  This is as far as I
6296 can tell, the only way to get access to the firmware setup menu
6297 without accepting the Windows 8 license agreement.  I am told (and
6298 found description on how to) that it is possible to configure the
6299 firmware setup once booted into Windows 8.  But as I believe the terms
6300 of that agreement are completely unacceptable, accepting the license
6301 was never an alternative.  I do not enter agreements I do not intend
6302 to follow.</p>
6303
6304 <p>I feared I had to return the laptops and ask for a refund, and
6305 waste many hours on this, but luckily there was a way to get it to
6306 work.  But I would not recommend it to anyone planning to run Linux on
6307 it, and I have become sceptical to Windows 8 certified laptops.  Is
6308 this the way Linux will be forced out of the market place, by making
6309 it close to impossible for "normal" users to install Linux without
6310 accepting the Microsoft Windows license terms?  Or at least not
6311 without risking to loose the warranty?</p>
6312
6313 <p>I've updated the
6314 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Linux Laptop
6315 wiki page for Packard Bell EasyNote LV</a>, to ensure the next person
6316 do not have to struggle as much as I did to get Linux into the
6317 machine.</p>
6318
6319 <p>Thanks to Bob Rosbag, Florian Weimer, Philipp Kern, Ben Hutching,
6320 Michael Tokarev and others for feedback and ideas.</p>
6321
6322       </div>
6323       <div class="tags">
6324
6325
6326         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>.
6327
6328
6329       </div>
6330     </div>
6331     <div class="padding"></div>
6332
6333     <div class="entry">
6334       <div class="title">
6335         <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>
6336       </div>
6337       <div class="date">
6338         25th May 2013
6339       </div>
6340       <div class="body">
6341         <p>I've run into quite a problem the last few days.  I bought three
6342 new laptops for my parents and a few others.  I bought Packard Bell
6343 Easynote LV to run Kubuntu on and use as their home computer.  But I
6344 am completely unable to figure out how to install Linux on it.  The
6345 computer is preinstalled with Windows 8, and I suspect it uses UEFI
6346 instead of a BIOS to boot.</p>
6347
6348 <p>The problem is that I am unable to get it to PXE boot, and unable
6349 to get it to boot the Linux installer from my USB stick.  I have yet
6350 to try the DVD install, and still hope it will work.  when I turn on
6351 the computer, there is no information on what buttons to press to get
6352 the normal boot menu.  I expect to get some boot menu to select PXE or
6353 USB stick booting.  When booting, it first ask for the language to
6354 use, then for some regional settings, and finally if I will accept the
6355 Windows 8 terms of use.  As these terms are completely unacceptable to
6356 me, I have no other choice but to turn off the computer and try again
6357 to get it to boot the Linux installer.</p>
6358
6359 <p>I have gathered my findings so far on a Linlap page about the
6360 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
6361 EasyNote LV</a> model.  If you have any idea how to get Linux
6362 installed on this machine, please get in touch or update that wiki
6363 page.  If I can't find a way to install Linux, I will have to return
6364 the laptop to the seller and find another machine for my parents.</p>
6365
6366 <p>I wonder, is this the way Linux will be forced out of the market
6367 using UEFI and "secure boot" by making it impossible to install Linux
6368 on new Laptops?</p>
6369
6370       </div>
6371       <div class="tags">
6372
6373
6374         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>.
6375
6376
6377       </div>
6378     </div>
6379     <div class="padding"></div>
6380
6381     <div class="entry">
6382       <div class="title">
6383         <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>
6384       </div>
6385       <div class="date">
6386         17th May 2013
6387       </div>
6388       <div class="body">
6389         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is
6390 an operating system based on Debian intended for use in schools.  It
6391 contain a turn-key solution for the computer network provided to
6392 pupils in the primary schools.  It provide both the central server,
6393 network boot servers and desktop environments with heaps of
6394 educational software.  The project was founded almost 12 years ago,
6395 2001-07-02.  If you want to support the project, which is in need for
6396 cash to fund developer gatherings and other project related activity,
6397 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">please
6398 donate some money</a>.
6399
6400 <p>A topic that come up again and again on the Debian Edu mailing
6401 lists and elsewhere, is the question on how to transform a Debian or
6402 Ubuntu installation into a Debian Edu installation.  It isn't very
6403 hard, and last week I wrote a script to replicate the steps done by
6404 the Debian Edu installer.</p>
6405
6406 <p>The script,
6407 <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/>
6408 in the debian-edu-config package, will go through these six steps and
6409 transform an existing Debian Wheezy or Ubuntu (untested) installation
6410 into a Debian Edu Workstation:</p>
6411
6412 <ol>
6413
6414 <li>Add skolelinux related APT sources.</li>
6415 <li>Create /etc/debian-edu/config with the wanted configuration.</li>
6416 <li>Install debian-edu-install to load preseeding values and pull in
6417     our configuration.</li>
6418 <li>Preseed debconf database with profile setup in
6419     /etc/debian-edu/config, and run tasksel to install packages
6420     according to the profile specified in the config above,
6421     overriding some of the Debian automation machinery.</li>
6422 <li>Run debian-edu-cfengine-D installation to configure everything
6423     that could not be done using preseeding.</li>
6424 <li>Ask for a reboot to enable all the configuration changes.</li>
6425
6426 </ol>
6427
6428 <p>There are some steps in the Debian Edu installation that can not be
6429 replicated like this.  Disk partitioning and LVM setup, for example.
6430 So this script just assume there is enough disk space to install all
6431 the needed packages.</p>
6432
6433 <p>The script was created to help a Debian Edu student working on
6434 setting up <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org">Raspberry Pi</a> as a
6435 Debian Edu client, and using it he can take the existing
6436 <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/FrontPage‎">Raspbian</a> installation and
6437 transform it into a fully functioning Debian Edu Workstation (or
6438 Roaming Workstation, or whatever :).</p>
6439
6440 <p>The default setting in the script is to create a KDE Workstation.
6441 If a LXDE based Roaming workstation is wanted instead, modify the
6442 PROFILE and DESKTOP values at the top to look like this instead:</p>
6443
6444 <p><pre>
6445 PROFILE="Roaming-Workstation"
6446 DESKTOP="lxde"
6447 </pre></p>
6448
6449 <p>The script could even become useful to set up Debian Edu servers in
6450 the cloud, by starting with a virtual Debian installation at some
6451 virtual hosting service and setting up all the services on first
6452 boot.</p>
6453
6454       </div>
6455       <div class="tags">
6456
6457
6458         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>.
6459
6460
6461       </div>
6462     </div>
6463     <div class="padding"></div>
6464
6465     <div class="entry">
6466       <div class="title">
6467         <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>
6468       </div>
6469       <div class="date">
6470         11th May 2013
6471       </div>
6472       <div class="body">
6473         <P>In January,
6474 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
6475 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
6476 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
6477 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
6478 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
6479 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
6480 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
6481 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
6482 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
6483 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
6484 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
6485 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
6486
6487 <p><table>
6488 <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>
6489 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
6490 <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>
6491 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
6492 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
6493 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
6494 <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>
6495 <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>
6496 <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>
6497 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
6498 </table></p>
6499
6500 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
6501 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
6502 available in experimental.</p>
6503
6504 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
6505 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
6506 for LEGO designers.</p>
6507
6508       </div>
6509       <div class="tags">
6510
6511
6512         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>.
6513
6514
6515       </div>
6516     </div>
6517     <div class="padding"></div>
6518
6519     <div class="entry">
6520       <div class="title">
6521         <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>
6522       </div>
6523       <div class="date">
6524          5th May 2013
6525       </div>
6526       <div class="body">
6527         <p>When I woke up this morning, I was very happy to see that the
6528 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130504">release announcement
6529 for Debian Wheezy</a> was waiting in my mail box.  This is a great
6530 Debian release, and I expect to move my machines at home over to it fairly
6531 soon.</p>
6532
6533 <p>The new debian release contain heaps of new stuff, and one program
6534 in particular make me very happy to see included.  The
6535 <a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">Scratch</a> program, made famous by
6536 the <a href="http://www.code.org/">Teach kids code</a> movement, is
6537 included for the first time.  Alongside similar programs like
6538 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/kturtle/">kturtle</a> and
6539 <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/Turtle_Art">turtleart</a>,
6540 it allow for visual programming where syntax errors can not happen,
6541 and a friendly programming environment for learning to control the
6542 computer.  Scratch will also be included in the next release of Debian
6543 Edu.</a>
6544
6545 <p>And now that Wheezy is wrapped up, we can wrap up the next Debian
6546 Edu/Skolelinux release too.  The
6547 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/04/msg00132.html">first
6548 alpha release</a> went out last week, and the next should soon
6549 follow.<p>
6550
6551       </div>
6552       <div class="tags">
6553
6554
6555         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>.
6556
6557
6558       </div>
6559     </div>
6560     <div class="padding"></div>
6561
6562     <div class="entry">
6563       <div class="title">
6564         <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>
6565       </div>
6566       <div class="date">
6567          3rd April 2013
6568       </div>
6569       <div class="body">
6570         <p>Today the <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram
6571 package</a> finally made it into the archive, after lingering in NEW
6572 for many months.  I uploaded it to the Debian experimental suite
6573 2013-01-27, and today it was accepted into the archive.</p>
6574
6575 <p>Isenkram is a system for suggesting to users what packages to
6576 install to work with a pluggable hardware device.  The suggestion pop
6577 up when the device is plugged in.  For example if a Lego Mindstorm NXT
6578 is inserted, it will suggest to install the program needed to program
6579 the NXT controller.  Give it a go, and report bugs and suggestions to
6580 BTS. :)</p>
6581
6582       </div>
6583       <div class="tags">
6584
6585
6586         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>.
6587
6588
6589       </div>
6590     </div>
6591     <div class="padding"></div>
6592
6593     <div class="entry">
6594       <div class="title">
6595         <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>
6596       </div>
6597       <div class="date">
6598          2nd February 2013
6599       </div>
6600       <div class="body">
6601         <p>My
6602 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
6603 bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
6604 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
6605 Debian was waiting in NEW.  It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
6606 2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then.  It was
6607 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
6608 version too.</p>
6609
6610 <p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
6611 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
6612 architectures.  For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
6613 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
6614 architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
6615 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
6616 no-one have been able to propose a fix.  If you got an idea what is
6617 failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
6618
6619 <p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
6620 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
6621 if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
6622 #696715</a>).  So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
6623 it. :)</p>
6624
6625 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
6626 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
6627 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
6628
6629       </div>
6630       <div class="tags">
6631
6632
6633         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>.
6634
6635
6636       </div>
6637     </div>
6638     <div class="padding"></div>
6639
6640     <div class="entry">
6641       <div class="title">
6642         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a>
6643       </div>
6644       <div class="date">
6645         22nd January 2013
6646       </div>
6647       <div class="body">
6648         <p>Yesterday, I
6649 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
6650 for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
6651 pluggable hardware devices, which I
6652 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
6653 out to create</a> earlier this month.  Several valuable testers showed
6654 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
6655 people.  But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
6656 for this project.  Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
6657 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name.  In the
6658 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
6659 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
6660 repository in Debian.  The new name?  It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
6661 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
6662
6663 <pre>
6664 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
6665 cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
6666 </pre>
6667
6668 <p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet.  If you
6669 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
6670 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
6671 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
6672
6673 <p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
6674 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc.  Typical hardware
6675 stuff, in other words.  I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
6676 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
6677 word.</p>
6678
6679 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
6680 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
6681 process.</p>
6682
6683 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
6684 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
6685
6686       </div>
6687       <div class="tags">
6688
6689
6690         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>.
6691
6692
6693       </div>
6694     </div>
6695     <div class="padding"></div>
6696
6697     <div class="entry">
6698       <div class="title">
6699         <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>
6700       </div>
6701       <div class="date">
6702         21st January 2013
6703       </div>
6704       <div class="body">
6705         <p>Early this month I set out to try to
6706 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
6707 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>.  Now my
6708 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience.  To test
6709 it, fetch the
6710 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
6711 from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
6712 package.  You might have to log out and in again activate the
6713 autostart script.</p>
6714
6715 <p>The design is simple:</p>
6716
6717 <ul>
6718
6719 <li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
6720 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
6721
6722 <li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
6723 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
6724 initially did.</li>
6725
6726 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
6727 the APT database, a database
6728 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
6729 via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
6730
6731 <li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
6732 isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
6733 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
6734 package or packages.</li>
6735
6736 <li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
6737 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
6738
6739 <li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
6740 package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
6741
6742 </ul>
6743
6744 <p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system.  Here
6745 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action.  First the
6746 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
6747 approve all the dependencies.  Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
6748
6749 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
6750 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
6751 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
6752 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
6753 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
6754
6755 <p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
6756 is already useful.  The database of hardware to package mappings also
6757 need more work.  It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
6758 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
6759 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
6760 method.  I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
6761 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
6762 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
6763
6764 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
6765 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
6766 '<tt>svn checkout
6767 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
6768 hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'.  If you lack debuild, install the
6769 devscripts package.</p>
6770
6771 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
6772 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
6773 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository.  See
6774 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
6775 instructions</a> for details.</p>
6776
6777       </div>
6778       <div class="tags">
6779
6780
6781         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>.
6782
6783
6784       </div>
6785     </div>
6786     <div class="padding"></div>
6787
6788     <div class="entry">
6789       <div class="title">
6790         <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>
6791       </div>
6792       <div class="date">
6793         19th January 2013
6794       </div>
6795       <div class="body">
6796         <p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died.  It died quietly and
6797 suddenly in bed.  With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
6798 black.  The power button was no longer able to turn it on.  It was a
6799 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had.  Better than both
6800 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S.  Far better than the
6801 Compaq I had before that.  Now I need to find a replacement.  To keep
6802 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
6803 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
6804 not a durable solution.
6805
6806 <p>My laptop needs are fairly modest.  This is my wishlist from when I
6807 got a new one more than 10 years ago.  It still holds true.:)</p>
6808
6809 <ul>
6810
6811 <li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
6812   than A4).</li>
6813 <li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
6814 <li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
6815 <li>Long battery life time.  Preferable a week.</li>
6816 <li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
6817 <li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
6818 <li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
6819 <li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
6820 <li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
6821 size).</li>
6822 <li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
6823   X.org packages.</li>
6824 <li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
6825   the time).
6826
6827 </ul>
6828
6829 <p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
6830 list.  The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
6831 last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
6832 at other features to choose my laptop.  But are there still made as
6833 robust laptops as my X41?  The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
6834 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
6835 Lenovo took over.  But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
6836 still be useful.</p>
6837
6838 <p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
6839 external keyboard?  I'll have to check the
6840 <a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
6841 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
6842 of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
6843 Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
6844
6845       </div>
6846       <div class="tags">
6847
6848
6849         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>.
6850
6851
6852       </div>
6853     </div>
6854     <div class="padding"></div>
6855
6856     <div class="entry">
6857       <div class="title">
6858         <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>
6859       </div>
6860       <div class="date">
6861         18th January 2013
6862       </div>
6863       <div class="body">
6864         <p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
6865 install to get support for a given MIME type.  Thanks to
6866 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
6867 done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
6868 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
6869 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
6870 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
6871
6872 <pre>
6873 #!/usr/bin/python
6874 import sys
6875 import apt
6876 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
6877     cache = apt.Cache()
6878     cache.open(None)
6879     thepkgs = []
6880     for pkg in cache:
6881         version = pkg.candidate
6882         if version is None:
6883             version = pkg.installed
6884         if version is None:
6885             continue
6886         record = version.record
6887         if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
6888             continue
6889         mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
6890         for t in mime_types:
6891             t = t.rstrip().strip()
6892             if t == mimetype:
6893                 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
6894     return thepkgs
6895 mimetype = "audio/ogg"
6896 if 1 < len(sys.argv):
6897     mimetype = sys.argv[1]
6898 print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
6899 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
6900     print "  %s" %pkg
6901 </pre>
6902
6903 <p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
6904
6905 <pre>
6906 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
6907 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
6908   gecko-mediaplayer
6909 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
6910 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
6911   browser-plugin-gnash
6912 %
6913 </pre>
6914
6915 <p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
6916 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
6917 packages.  It would be great if Debian supported such feature too.  Is
6918 anyone working on adding it?</p>
6919
6920 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
6921 request for icweasel support for this feature is
6922 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
6923 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today).  Lack
6924 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
6925 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
6926
6927       </div>
6928       <div class="tags">
6929
6930
6931         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>.
6932
6933
6934       </div>
6935     </div>
6936     <div class="padding"></div>
6937
6938     <div class="entry">
6939       <div class="title">
6940         <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>
6941       </div>
6942       <div class="date">
6943         16th January 2013
6944       </div>
6945       <div class="body">
6946         <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
6947 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
6948 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
6949 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
6950 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing.  With such
6951 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
6952 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
6953 downloaded by the browser.</p>
6954
6955 <p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
6956 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
6957 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there.  The result
6958 can be found on the
6959 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
6960 site</a>.  Using the collected information, it become possible to
6961 answer the question in the title.  Here are the 20 most supported MIME
6962 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
6963 The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
6964
6965 <p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
6966
6967 <pre>
6968   count MIME type
6969   ----- -----------------------
6970      32 text/plain
6971      30 audio/mpeg
6972      29 image/png
6973      28 image/jpeg
6974      27 application/ogg
6975      26 audio/x-mp3
6976      25 image/tiff
6977      25 image/gif
6978      22 image/bmp
6979      22 audio/x-wav
6980      20 audio/x-flac
6981      19 audio/x-mpegurl
6982      18 video/x-ms-asf
6983      18 audio/x-musepack
6984      18 audio/x-mpeg
6985      18 application/x-ogg
6986      17 video/mpeg
6987      17 audio/x-scpls
6988      17 audio/ogg
6989      16 video/x-ms-wmv
6990 </pre>
6991
6992 <p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
6993
6994 <pre>
6995   count MIME type
6996   ----- -----------------------
6997      33 text/plain
6998      32 image/png
6999      32 image/jpeg
7000      29 audio/mpeg
7001      27 image/gif
7002      26 image/tiff
7003      26 application/ogg
7004      25 audio/x-mp3
7005      22 image/bmp
7006      21 audio/x-wav
7007      19 audio/x-mpegurl
7008      19 audio/x-mpeg
7009      18 video/mpeg
7010      18 audio/x-scpls
7011      18 audio/x-flac
7012      18 application/x-ogg
7013      17 video/x-ms-asf
7014      17 text/html
7015      17 audio/x-musepack
7016      16 image/x-xbitmap
7017 </pre>
7018
7019 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
7020
7021 <pre>
7022   count MIME type
7023   ----- -----------------------
7024      31 text/plain
7025      31 image/png
7026      31 image/jpeg
7027      29 audio/mpeg
7028      28 application/ogg
7029      27 image/gif
7030      26 image/tiff
7031      26 audio/x-mp3
7032      23 audio/x-wav
7033      22 image/bmp
7034      21 audio/x-flac
7035      20 audio/x-mpegurl
7036      19 audio/x-mpeg
7037      18 video/x-ms-asf
7038      18 video/mpeg
7039      18 audio/x-scpls
7040      18 application/x-ogg
7041      17 audio/x-musepack
7042      16 video/x-ms-wmv
7043      16 video/x-msvideo
7044 </pre>
7045
7046 <p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
7047 information mentioned in DEP-11.  I have not yet had time to look at
7048 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
7049 issues.</p>
7050
7051 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
7052 discovering a typo in my script.</p>
7053
7054       </div>
7055       <div class="tags">
7056
7057
7058         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>.
7059
7060
7061       </div>
7062     </div>
7063     <div class="padding"></div>
7064
7065     <div class="entry">
7066       <div class="title">
7067         <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>
7068       </div>
7069       <div class="date">
7070         15th January 2013
7071       </div>
7072       <div class="body">
7073         <p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
7074 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
7075 values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
7076 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
7077 dongle support in Debian</a>.  Using this knowledge, I have tested how
7078 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
7079 to hardware.  This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
7080 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
7081 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
7082 packages.</p>
7083
7084 <p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
7085 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
7086 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
7087 modalias.</p>
7088
7089 <p><blockquote>
7090 Package: package-name
7091 <br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
7092 </blockquote></p>
7093
7094 <p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
7095 for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
7096
7097 <p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
7098 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
7099
7100 <p><blockquote>
7101 Package: cheese
7102 <br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
7103 </blockquote></p>
7104
7105 <p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
7106 CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
7107
7108 <p><blockquote>
7109 Package: pcmciautils
7110 <br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
7111 </blockquote></p>
7112
7113 <p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
7114 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
7115
7116 <p><blockquote>
7117 Package: colorhug-client
7118 <br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
7119 </blockquote></p>
7120
7121 <p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
7122 file in the Debian archive.  Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
7123 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
7124
7125 <p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
7126 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
7127 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
7128 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
7129 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information.  I've
7130 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
7131 is working as it should with my prototype.  It even made it to Ubuntu
7132 Raring.</p>
7133
7134 <p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
7135 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
7136 implementation of the lookup code.  The idea is to create files for
7137 each modalias and let the shell do the matching.  Please check out and
7138 try the
7139 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
7140 shell script.  It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
7141 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
7142 repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
7143
7144 <p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
7145 install yubikey-personalization:</p>
7146
7147 <p><blockquote>
7148 % ./hw-support-lookup
7149 <br>yubikey-personalization
7150 <br>%
7151 </blockquote></p>
7152
7153 <p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
7154 propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
7155
7156 <p><blockquote>
7157 % ./hw-support-lookup
7158 <br>pcmciautils
7159 <br>%
7160 </blockquote></p>
7161
7162 <p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
7163 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
7164 database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
7165
7166 <p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
7167 packages and hardware.  One source would be to look at packages with
7168 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
7169 extract their modalias information.  Another would be to look at
7170 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
7171 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
7172 generate a modalias matching rule.  I have not tested any of these to
7173 see if it work.</p>
7174
7175 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
7176 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
7177 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
7178 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
7179
7180       </div>
7181       <div class="tags">
7182
7183
7184         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>.
7185
7186
7187       </div>
7188     </div>
7189     <div class="padding"></div>
7190
7191     <div class="entry">
7192       <div class="title">
7193         <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>
7194       </div>
7195       <div class="date">
7196         14th January 2013
7197       </div>
7198       <div class="body">
7199         <p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
7200 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
7201 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
7202 to document the details.  Here are my findings so far, also available
7203 in
7204 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
7205 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
7206
7207 <p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
7208
7209 <p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
7210 values stands for.  It is in part based on information from
7211 &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> &gt;,
7212 &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;,
7213 &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
7214 &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;.
7215
7216 <p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
7217 this shell script:</p>
7218
7219 <pre>
7220 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
7221 </pre>
7222
7223 <p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
7224 using modinfo:</p>
7225
7226 <pre>
7227 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
7228 alias:          serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
7229 alias:          serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
7230 %
7231 </pre>
7232
7233 <p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
7234
7235 <p>A typical PCI entry can look like this.  This is an Intel Host
7236 Bridge memory controller:</p>
7237
7238 <p><blockquote>
7239 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
7240 </blockquote></p>
7241
7242 <p>This represent these values:</p>
7243
7244 <pre>
7245  v   00008086  (vendor)
7246  d   00002770  (device)
7247  sv  00001028  (subvendor)
7248  sd  000001AD  (subdevice)
7249  bc  06        (bus class)
7250  sc  00        (bus subclass)
7251  i   00        (interface)
7252 </pre>
7253
7254 <p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
7255 -n' as 8086:2770.  The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
7256 0600.  The 0600 class is a host bridge.  Other useful bus values are
7257 0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
7258
7259 <p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
7260 means.</p>
7261
7262 <p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
7263
7264 <p>Some typical USB entries can look like this.  This is an internal
7265 USB hub in a laptop:</p>
7266
7267 <p><blockquote>
7268 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
7269 </blockquote></p>
7270
7271 <p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
7272
7273 <pre>
7274  v    1D6B  (device vendor)
7275  p    0001  (device product)
7276  d    0206  (bcddevice)
7277  dc     09  (device class)
7278  dsc    00  (device subclass)
7279  dp     00  (device protocol)
7280  ic     09  (interface class)
7281  isc    00  (interface subclass)
7282  ip     00  (interface protocol)
7283 </pre>
7284
7285 <p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub.  Some times the relevant
7286 class is in the interface class section.  For a simple USB web camera,
7287 these alias entries show up:</p>
7288
7289 <p><blockquote>
7290 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
7291 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
7292 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
7293 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
7294 </blockquote></p>
7295
7296 <p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
7297 camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
7298 microphone).  Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
7299
7300 <p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
7301
7302 <p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff.  This is an IR
7303 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
7304
7305 <p><blockquote>
7306 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
7307 </blockquote></p>
7308
7309 <p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
7310
7311 <p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
7312
7313 <p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
7314 and model.  This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
7315 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
7316
7317 <p><blockquote>
7318 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
7319 </blockquote></p>
7320
7321 <p>The values present are</p>
7322
7323 <pre>
7324  bvn  IBM            (BIOS vendor)
7325  bvr  1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
7326  bd   06/15/2005     (BIOS date)
7327  svn  IBM            (system vendor)
7328  pn   2371H4G        (product name)
7329  pvr  ThinkPadX40    (product version)
7330  rvn  IBM            (board vendor)
7331  rn   2371H4G        (board name)
7332  rvr  NotAvailable   (board version)
7333  cvn  IBM            (chassis vendor)
7334  ct   10             (chassis type)
7335  cvr  NotAvailable   (chassis version)
7336 </pre>
7337
7338 <p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook.  Other interesting values can be
7339 found in the dmidecode source:</p>
7340
7341 <pre>
7342   3 Desktop
7343   4 Low Profile Desktop
7344   5 Pizza Box
7345   6 Mini Tower
7346   7 Tower
7347   8 Portable
7348   9 Laptop
7349  10 Notebook
7350  11 Hand Held
7351  12 Docking Station
7352  13 All In One
7353  14 Sub Notebook
7354  15 Space-saving
7355  16 Lunch Box
7356  17 Main Server Chassis
7357  18 Expansion Chassis
7358  19 Sub Chassis
7359  20 Bus Expansion Chassis
7360  21 Peripheral Chassis
7361  22 RAID Chassis
7362  23 Rack Mount Chassis
7363  24 Sealed-case PC
7364  25 Multi-system
7365  26 CompactPCI
7366  27 AdvancedTCA
7367  28 Blade
7368  29 Blade Enclosing
7369 </pre>
7370
7371 <p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
7372 table.  For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
7373 claim it is a desktop.</p>
7374
7375 <p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
7376
7377 <p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs.  One example is from my
7378 test machine:</p>
7379
7380 <p><blockquote>
7381 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
7382 </blockquote></p>
7383
7384 <p>The values present are</p>
7385
7386 <pre>
7387   ty  01  (type)
7388   pr  00  (prototype)
7389   id  00  (id)
7390   ex  00  (extra)
7391 </pre>
7392
7393 <p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver.  I am not sure what
7394 the valid values are.</p>
7395
7396 <p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
7397
7398 <p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
7399 file2alias.c.  There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
7400 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
7401 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
7402 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro.  I did not spend time documenting all of
7403 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
7404 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
7405
7406 <p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
7407
7408 <p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
7409 one can use the following shell script:</p>
7410
7411 <pre>
7412   for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
7413     echo "$id" ; \
7414     /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/  /' ; \
7415   done
7416 </pre>
7417
7418 <p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
7419 list is very long on my test machine):</p>
7420
7421 <pre>
7422   acpi:ACPI0003:
7423     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
7424   acpi:device:
7425   FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
7426   acpi:IBM0068:
7427     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
7428     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
7429     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
7430     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
7431   acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
7432     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
7433     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
7434     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
7435   [...]
7436 </pre>
7437
7438 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
7439 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
7440 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
7441 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
7442
7443 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
7444 "find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
7445 in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
7446
7447       </div>
7448       <div class="tags">
7449
7450
7451         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>.
7452
7453
7454       </div>
7455     </div>
7456     <div class="padding"></div>
7457
7458     <div class="entry">
7459       <div class="title">
7460         <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>
7461       </div>
7462       <div class="date">
7463         10th January 2013
7464       </div>
7465       <div class="body">
7466         <p>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
7467 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
7468 Launcher and updated the Debian package
7469 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">pymissile</a> to make
7470 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in.  I
7471 also added a "Modaliases" header to test it in the Debian archive and
7472 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
7473 plug in his rocket launcher.  In the process I moved the source to a
7474 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
7475 contribute.  <a href="http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/">Upstream</a>
7476 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
7477 years of relative silence.  The new git repository is not listed in
7478 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
7479 bit more before I upload the new version.  If you want to check out
7480 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
7481 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git">gitweb
7482 view</a> or use "<tt>git clone
7483 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git</tt>".</p>
7484
7485       </div>
7486       <div class="tags">
7487
7488
7489         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>.
7490
7491
7492       </div>
7493     </div>
7494     <div class="padding"></div>
7495
7496     <div class="entry">
7497       <div class="title">
7498         <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>
7499       </div>
7500       <div class="date">
7501          9th January 2013
7502       </div>
7503       <div class="body">
7504         <p>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
7505 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
7506 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
7507 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
7508 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
7509 machine.  Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
7510 Linux distribution.  When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
7511 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
7512 I need to talk to it.  When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
7513 yubikey-personalization package.  The information required to do this
7514 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.</p>
7515
7516 <p>Some years ago, I proposed to
7517 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg01206.html">use
7518 the discover subsystem to implement this</a>.  The idea is fairly
7519 simple:
7520
7521 <ul>
7522
7523 <li>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
7524   starting when a user log in.</li>
7525
7526 <li>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
7527   hardware is inserted into the computer.</li>
7528
7529 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
7530   database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
7531   packages.</li>
7532
7533 <li>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
7534   package, and make it easy to install it.</li>
7535
7536 </ul>
7537
7538 <p>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
7539 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
7540 discover database to find packages and
7541 <a href="http://www.packagekit.org/">PackageKit</a> to install
7542 packages.</p>
7543
7544 <p>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
7545 draft package is now checked into
7546 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
7547 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>.  In the process, I updated the
7548 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html">discover-data</a>
7549 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
7550 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
7551 2.2013.01.09 to unstable.  I also discovered that the current
7552 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html">discover</a>
7553 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
7554 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present.  I ported it to use
7555 libusb as a fall back option to get it working.  The fixed package
7556 version 2.1.2-6 is now in experimental (didn't upload it to unstable
7557 because of the freeze).</p>
7558
7559 <p>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
7560 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
7561 inserted):</p>
7562
7563 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-09-hw-autoinstall.png"></p>
7564
7565 <p>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
7566 install the proposed packages by pressing the "Please install
7567 program(s)" button should to be implemented.</p>
7568
7569 <p>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
7570 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
7571 from hardware to Debian packages.  Check if 'discover-pkginstall -l'
7572 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
7573 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
7574 reportbug if it isn't.  Or, if you know of a better way to provide
7575 such mapping, please let me know.</p>
7576
7577 <p>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
7578 should be considered before it is ready for production use.  Is dbus
7579 the correct way to detect new hardware?  At the moment I look for HAL
7580 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
7581 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop.  Are there better events to use?
7582 How should the user be notified?  Is the desktop notification
7583 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
7584 popup instead?  How should packages be installed?  When should they
7585 not be installed?</p>
7586
7587 <p>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
7588 please send me an email. :)</p>
7589
7590       </div>
7591       <div class="tags">
7592
7593
7594         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>.
7595
7596
7597       </div>
7598     </div>
7599     <div class="padding"></div>
7600
7601     <div class="entry">
7602       <div class="title">
7603         <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>
7604       </div>
7605       <div class="date">
7606          2nd January 2013
7607       </div>
7608       <div class="body">
7609         <p>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
7610 <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx">LEGO Mindstorm
7611 NXT</a>.  My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
7612 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
7613 already in Debian Squeeze.  If Debian support for LEGO is something
7614 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
7615 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> (server
7616 irc.debian.org).  There is a lot that could be done to improve the
7617 Debian support for LEGO designers.  For example both CAD software
7618 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)</p>
7619
7620 <p>Update 2012-01-03: A
7621 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">project page</a>
7622 including links to Lego related packages is now available.</p>
7623
7624       </div>
7625       <div class="tags">
7626
7627
7628         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>.
7629
7630
7631       </div>
7632     </div>
7633     <div class="padding"></div>
7634
7635     <div class="entry">
7636       <div class="title">
7637         <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>
7638       </div>
7639       <div class="date">
7640         25th December 2012
7641       </div>
7642       <div class="body">
7643         <p>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
7644 year!  I hope next year will prove to be a good year.</p>
7645
7646 <p><a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">Bitcoin</a>, the digital
7647 decentralised "currency" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
7648 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
7649 experiment.  And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
7650 <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> is about to improve a bit.
7651 The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">new debian source
7652 package</a> (version 0.7.2-2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
7653 in <a href="http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW queue</A>
7654 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
7655 name.</p>
7656
7657 <p>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
7658 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
7659 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:</p>
7660
7661 <blockquote><pre>
7662 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
7663 cd bitcoin
7664 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
7665 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
7666 </pre></blockquote>
7667
7668 <p>You might have to install some build dependencies as well.  The
7669 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
7670 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment.  Note that the
7671 client will download the complete set of bitcoin "blocks", which need
7672 around 5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment.  Make sure your
7673 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
7674 all the blocks.  The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
7675 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
7676 not be able to get all the features out of the client.</p>
7677
7678 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
7679 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
7680 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
7681
7682       </div>
7683       <div class="tags">
7684
7685
7686         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>.
7687
7688
7689       </div>
7690     </div>
7691     <div class="padding"></div>
7692
7693     <div class="entry">
7694       <div class="title">
7695         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html">A word on bitcoin support in Debian</a>
7696       </div>
7697       <div class="date">
7698         21st December 2012
7699       </div>
7700       <div class="body">
7701         <p>It has been a while since I wrote about
7702 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>, the decentralised
7703 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
7704 have been busy elsewhere.  But two days ago, I started looking at the
7705 state of <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin in
7706 Debian</a> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet.  The package
7707 is now maintained by a
7708 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/">team of
7709 people</a>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team.  We
7710 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
7711 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
7712 Wheezy.  It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
7713 backports).  The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
7714 it from entering testing.  To try to help the team and improve the
7715 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
7716 reports.  I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
7717 Corallo in a
7718 <a href="https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin">PPA for
7719 Ubuntu</a>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
7720 Debian package.</p>
7721
7722 <p>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
7723 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
7724 improve the package.  It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
7725 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
7726 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
7727 setup.  As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
7728 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-20121217/000041.html">a
7729 patch to backport</a> the latest version.  Jonas is going to look at
7730 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
7731 new version to unstable.
7732
7733 <p>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
7734 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system.  I
7735 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
7736 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
7737 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
7738 transactions to Wikileaks.  But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
7739 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
7740 they sell products and services.  Improving the bitcoin support in
7741 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
7742 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
7743 pay with bitcoin is still not very good.  The bitcoin: URI is a step
7744 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
7745 use.  Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
7746 quick transaction.  I believe there are other clients available, but
7747 have not tested them.</p>
7748
7749 <p>My
7750 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">experiment
7751 with bitcoins</a> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
7752 I received 20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
7753 years ago, as can be
7754 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">seen
7755 on the blockexplorer service</a>.  Thank you everyone for your
7756 donation.  The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
7757 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
7758 number of users have gone up since then.  If you use bitcoin and want
7759 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
7760 the same address as last time,
7761 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
7762
7763       </div>
7764       <div class="tags">
7765
7766
7767         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>.
7768
7769
7770       </div>
7771     </div>
7772     <div class="padding"></div>
7773
7774     <div class="entry">
7775       <div class="title">
7776         <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>
7777       </div>
7778       <div class="date">
7779          7th September 2012
7780       </div>
7781       <div class="body">
7782         <p>As I
7783 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">mentioned
7784 this summer</a>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
7785 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
7786 <a href="https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook">Gitorious
7787 repository for the project</a>.</p>
7788
7789 <p>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
7790 to the HTML version.  To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
7791 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
7792 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.</p>
7793
7794 <p>Want to sing?  You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
7795 PostScript formats at
7796 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's Computer
7797 Science Songbook</a>.</p>
7798
7799       </div>
7800       <div class="tags">
7801
7802
7803         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>.
7804
7805
7806       </div>
7807     </div>
7808     <div class="padding"></div>
7809
7810     <div class="entry">
7811       <div class="title">
7812         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gratulerer_med_19__rsdagen__Debian_.html">Gratulerer med 19-årsdagen, Debian!</a>
7813       </div>
7814       <div class="date">
7815         16th August 2012
7816       </div>
7817       <div class="body">
7818         <p>I dag fyller
7819 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120813">Debian-prosjektet 19
7820 år</a>.  Jeg har fulgt det de siste 12 årene, og er veldig glad for å kunne
7821 si gratulerer med dagen, Debian!</p>
7822
7823       </div>
7824       <div class="tags">
7825
7826
7827         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>.
7828
7829
7830       </div>
7831     </div>
7832     <div class="padding"></div>
7833
7834     <div class="entry">
7835       <div class="title">
7836         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Song book for Computer Scientists</a>
7837       </div>
7838       <div class="date">
7839         24th June 2012
7840       </div>
7841       <div class="body">
7842         <p>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
7843 <a href="http://www.uit.no/">University of Tromsø</a>, I started
7844 collecting computer related songs for use at parties.  The original
7845 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
7846 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
7847 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format.  I have
7848 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
7849 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
7850 help me extend and update the book.  If anyone is volunteering to help
7851 me with this, send me an email.  Also let me know if there are songs
7852 missing in my book.</p>
7853
7854 <p>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
7855 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
7856 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
7857 Especially now that <a href="http://debconf12.debconf.org/">Debconf
7858 12</a> is about to start (and I am not going).  Want to sing?  Check
7859 out <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's
7860 Computer Science Songbook</a>.
7861
7862       </div>
7863       <div class="tags">
7864
7865
7866         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>.
7867
7868
7869       </div>
7870     </div>
7871     <div class="padding"></div>
7872
7873     <div class="entry">
7874       <div class="title">
7875         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html">Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge</a>
7876       </div>
7877       <div class="date">
7878         21st November 2011
7879       </div>
7880       <div class="body">
7881         <p>At work we have heaps of servers.  I believe the total count is
7882 around 1000 at the moment.  To be able to get help from the vendors
7883 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
7884 up to date.  If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the
7885 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
7886 firmware is upgraded.  So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
7887 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
7888 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
7889 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
7890 the tools to do so.</p>
7891
7892 <p>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
7893 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got.  Most of
7894 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
7895 so far.  This blog post is about the Dell part.</P>
7896
7897 <p>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
7898 <a href="ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz">an XML file</a>
7899 with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing
7900 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
7901 site I can find it.  Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
7902 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
7903 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
7904 be activated on the first reboot.</p>
7905
7906 <p>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
7907 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
7908 servers at a site?  Please get in touch and lets share resources.</p>
7909
7910 <p><pre>
7911 #!/usr/bin/perl
7912 use strict;
7913 use warnings;
7914 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
7915 BEGIN {
7916     # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
7917     my %rhelmodules = (
7918         'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
7919         );
7920     for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
7921         eval "use $module;";
7922         if ($@) {
7923             my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
7924             system("yum install -y $pkg");
7925             eval "use $module;";
7926         }
7927     }
7928 }
7929 my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
7930
7931 upgrade_dell();
7932
7933 exit 0;
7934
7935 sub run_firmware_script {
7936     my ($opts, $script) = @_;
7937     unless ($script) {
7938         print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
7939         exit 1
7940     }
7941     print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
7942
7943     if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
7944         print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
7945     } else {
7946         print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
7947     }
7948 }
7949
7950 sub run_firmware_scripts {
7951     my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
7952     # Run firmware packages
7953     for my $dir (@dirs) {
7954         print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
7955         opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
7956         while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
7957             next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
7958             run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
7959         }
7960         closedir $dh;
7961     }
7962 }
7963
7964 sub download {
7965     my $url = shift;
7966     print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
7967     system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
7968 }
7969
7970 sub upgrade_dell {
7971     my @dirs;
7972     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
7973     chomp $product;
7974
7975     if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
7976
7977         # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
7978         system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
7979
7980         my $tmpdir = tempdir(
7981             CLEANUP => 1
7982             );
7983         chdir($tmpdir);
7984         fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
7985         system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
7986         my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
7987         # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
7988         my $fwopts = "-q";
7989         if (@paths) {
7990             for my $url (@paths) {
7991                 fetch_dell_fw($url);
7992             }
7993             run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
7994         } else {
7995             print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
7996             print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
7997         }
7998         chdir('/');
7999     } else {
8000         print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
8001         print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
8002     }
8003 }
8004
8005 sub fetch_dell_fw {
8006     my $path = shift;
8007     my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
8008     download($url);
8009 }
8010
8011 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
8012 # firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
8013 # machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
8014 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
8015     my $filename = shift;
8016
8017     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
8018     chomp $product;
8019     my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
8020
8021     print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
8022
8023     my $xml = XMLin($filename);
8024     my @paths;
8025     for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
8026         my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
8027         my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
8028         my $oscode;
8029         if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
8030             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
8031         } else {
8032             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
8033         }
8034         if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
8035         {
8036             @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
8037         }
8038     }
8039     for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
8040         my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
8041
8042         # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
8043         next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
8044
8045         my $cpath = $component->{path};
8046         for my $path (@paths) {
8047             if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
8048                 push(@paths, $cpath);
8049             }
8050         }
8051     }
8052     return @paths;
8053 }
8054 </pre>
8055
8056 <p>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
8057 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking.  Anyone know a
8058 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers?  At the
8059 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
8060 outdated.</p>
8061
8062       </div>
8063       <div class="tags">
8064
8065
8066         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>.
8067
8068
8069       </div>
8070     </div>
8071     <div class="padding"></div>
8072
8073     <div class="entry">
8074       <div class="title">
8075         <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>
8076       </div>
8077       <div class="date">
8078          4th August 2011
8079       </div>
8080       <div class="body">
8081         <p>Wouter Verhelst have some
8082 <a href="http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot">interesting
8083 comments and opinions</a> on my blog post on
8084 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">the
8085 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian</a> and my blog post about
8086 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">the
8087 default KDE desktop in Debian</a>.  I only have time to address one
8088 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
8089 misunderstanding he bring forward:</p>
8090
8091 <p><blockquote>
8092 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
8093 single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line;
8094 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
8095 </blockquote></p>
8096
8097 <p>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
8098 and booting into runlevel 1 is the same.  I am not surprised he
8099 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
8100 thing to believe.  But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
8101 runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user
8102 mode.  I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
8103 hard to explain.</p>
8104
8105 <p>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
8106 "<tt>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin</tt>".  This means the only thing that is
8107 executed in single user mode is sulogin.  Single user mode is a boot
8108 state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
8109 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
8110 enters the single user state.  When switching to runlevel 1, the state
8111 is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1
8112 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
8113 runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
8114 1.  It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the
8115 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
8116 mode).</p>
8117
8118 <p>This summary might make it clearer.  When booting for the first
8119 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
8120 "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  When booting into
8121 runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc
8122 S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  A problem show up when
8123 trying to continue after visiting single user mode.  Not all services
8124 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
8125 unpredicatble state.  This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
8126 after visiting single user mode.</p>
8127
8128 <p>A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of
8129 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/.  When switching from say runlevel 2
8130 to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
8131 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
8132 started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels
8133 2-5.  I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
8134 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not <strong>required</strong> to get a
8135 functioning single user mode during boot.</p>
8136
8137 <p>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
8138 and discovered this problem a few years ago.  I suspect it originates
8139 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.</p>
8140
8141       </div>
8142       <div class="tags">
8143
8144
8145         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>.
8146
8147
8148       </div>
8149     </div>
8150     <div class="padding"></div>
8151
8152     <div class="entry">
8153       <div class="title">
8154         <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>
8155       </div>
8156       <div class="date">
8157         30th July 2011
8158       </div>
8159       <div class="body">
8160         <p>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
8161 are started from /etc/rcS.d/.  In fact, there is a bite more of them
8162 than make sense, and this causes a few problems.  What kind of
8163 problems, you might ask.  There are at least two problems.  The first
8164 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
8165 runlevel 1.  One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
8166 the expected state.  The other is that single user boot will sometimes
8167 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
8168 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
8169 machine from a problem in that subsystem.  A minor additional point is
8170 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
8171 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
8172 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.</p>
8173
8174 <p>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/.  In short, only the
8175 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
8176 presented during a single user boot should go there.  Everything else
8177 should go into the numeric runlevels.  This means things like
8178 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
8179 the numeric runlevels.  Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d
8180 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
8181 out.  Do your package have one of them?  Please help us make single
8182 user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.</p>
8183
8184 <p>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
8185 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
8186 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
8187 is presented.</p>
8188
8189 <p>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound.  To keep
8190 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
8191 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
8192 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
8193 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
8194 moved first.  This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
8195 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
8196 the system state correct.  This will require some coordination when it
8197 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
8198 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
8199 on them.  Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
8200 package, while others are still left to do.  I wish I had time to work
8201 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
8202 find time to push this forward.</p>
8203
8204       </div>
8205       <div class="tags">
8206
8207
8208         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>.
8209
8210
8211       </div>
8212     </div>
8213     <div class="padding"></div>
8214
8215     <div class="entry">
8216       <div class="title">
8217         <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>
8218       </div>
8219       <div class="date">
8220         29th July 2011
8221       </div>
8222       <div class="body">
8223         <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
8224 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
8225 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
8226 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
8227 issues.</p>
8228
8229 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
8230 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
8231 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
8232
8233 <ol>
8234
8235 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
8236 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
8237 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
8238 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
8239 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
8240 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
8241 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
8242 Debian.</li>
8243
8244 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
8245 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
8246 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
8247 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
8248 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
8249 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
8250 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
8251 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
8252 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
8253 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
8254 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
8255 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
8256 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
8257
8258 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
8259 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
8260 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
8261 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
8262 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
8263 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
8264 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
8265 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
8266 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
8267 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
8268
8269 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
8270 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
8271 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
8272 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
8273 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
8274 latter behaviour.</li>
8275
8276 </ol>
8277
8278 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
8279 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
8280 it do not matter much.</p>
8281
8282 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
8283 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
8284 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>
8285
8286       </div>
8287       <div class="tags">
8288
8289
8290         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>.
8291
8292
8293       </div>
8294     </div>
8295     <div class="padding"></div>
8296
8297     <div class="entry">
8298       <div class="title">
8299         <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>
8300       </div>
8301       <div class="date">
8302         26th July 2011
8303       </div>
8304       <div class="body">
8305         <p>The Norwegian <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</A>
8306 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
8307 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10
8308 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
8309 security support for a few years.</p>
8310
8311 <p>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
8312 that are missing in Debian at the moment.  It would be great if these
8313 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
8314 their own <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com">FixMyStreet</a> clone
8315 in their own country using only Debian packages.  The list of modules
8316 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group
8317 will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
8318 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
8319 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
8320 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
8321 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
8322 easier in the future.</p>
8323
8324 <p>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
8325 installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name'
8326 and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package.  But this leave me
8327 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
8328 do not have time for.</p>
8329
8330       </div>
8331       <div class="tags">
8332
8333
8334         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>.
8335
8336
8337       </div>
8338     </div>
8339     <div class="padding"></div>
8340
8341     <div class="entry">
8342       <div class="title">
8343         <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>
8344       </div>
8345       <div class="date">
8346          3rd April 2011
8347       </div>
8348       <div class="body">
8349         <p>Here is a small update for my English readers.  Most of my blog
8350 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
8351 update in English.</p>
8352
8353 <p>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
8354 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
8355 of the British service
8356 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> up and running,
8357 and it has been running for a month now.  The entire project has been
8358 organised by me and two others.  Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
8359 to fund the development work.  In January I drafted a contract with
8360 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> on what to develop,
8361 and in February the development took place.  Most of it involved
8362 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
8363 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
8364 running in any country by now.  The Norwegian
8365 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is using
8366 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> as the map
8367 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
8368 support for this had to be added/fixed.</p>
8369
8370 <p>The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend
8371 polishing the system before we announced it March 7th.  The system is
8372 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000
8373 problem reports in a few weeks.  Soon we hope to announce the Android
8374 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
8375 public infrastructure.</p>
8376
8377 <p>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
8378 such service?</p>
8379
8380       </div>
8381       <div class="tags">
8382
8383
8384         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>.
8385
8386
8387       </div>
8388     </div>
8389     <div class="padding"></div>
8390
8391     <div class="entry">
8392       <div class="title">
8393         <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>
8394       </div>
8395       <div class="date">
8396         28th January 2011
8397       </div>
8398       <div class="body">
8399         <p>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
8400 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo.  My idea is that
8401 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
8402 available on the Internet, and check our locally
8403 maintained/distributed software against this information.  It should
8404 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten.  The
8405 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
8406 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
8407 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
8408 out which security holes were present in our free software
8409 collection.</p>
8410
8411 <p>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
8412 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
8413 consistent way across data sources.  I considered several ways to do
8414 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
8415 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
8416 existing naming scheme.  And it seem like I am not the first one to
8417 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
8418 solution.  Enter the <a href="http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html">Common
8419 Platform Enumeration</a> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
8420 software, hardware and other platform components.  The CPE ids are
8421 mapped to CVEs in the <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/">National
8422 Vulnerability Database</a>, allowing me to look up know security
8423 issues for any CPE name.  With this in place, all I need to do is to
8424 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
8425 This is fairly trivial (I google for 'cve cpe $package' and check the
8426 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).</p>
8427
8428 <p>To give you an example.  The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
8429 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip.  If the old version 1.3.3 was the package to
8430 check out, one could look up
8431 <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
8432 in NVD</a> and get a list of 6 security holes with public CVE entries.
8433 The most recent one is
8434 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-0001">CVE-2010-0001</a>,
8435 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
8436 list of affected versions is provided.</p>
8437
8438 <p>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
8439 for offline processing of issues.  Using this dump, I've written a
8440 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
8441 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs.  One give it CPEs
8442 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
8443 security issues out.</p>
8444
8445 <p>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
8446 information need to be high.  For that to happen, I believe as many as
8447 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database.  I notice
8448 RHEL is providing
8449 <a href="https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt">a
8450 map from CVE to CPE</a>, indicating that they are using the CPE
8451 information.  I'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.</p>
8452
8453 <p>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
8454 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
8455 the CVE database in NVD.  The result look fairly good, but there are
8456 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
8457 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
8458 Debian believe are affected by a CVE).  Hope to find time to improve
8459 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
8460 someone maintaining it.  So far my three emails with questions and
8461 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
8462 established soon.</p>
8463
8464 <p>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
8465 mapping.  It would be useful to know which packages in for example
8466 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
8467 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
8468 for their packages.</p>
8469
8470       </div>
8471       <div class="tags">
8472
8473
8474         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>.
8475
8476
8477       </div>
8478     </div>
8479     <div class="padding"></div>
8480
8481     <div class="entry">
8482       <div class="title">
8483         <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>
8484       </div>
8485       <div class="date">
8486         23rd January 2011
8487       </div>
8488       <div class="body">
8489         <p>In the
8490 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data">discover-data</a>
8491 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
8492 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
8493 information.  One part of this script that I find very useful when
8494 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
8495 to the PCI device it claims.  It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
8496 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with.  To see
8497 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
8498 <tt>/usr/share/bug/discover-data 3>&1</tt>.  The relevant output on
8499 one of my machines like this:</p>
8500
8501 <pre>
8502 loaded modules:
8503 10de:03eb i2c_nforce2
8504 10de:03f1 ohci_hcd
8505 10de:03f2 ehci_hcd
8506 10de:03f0 snd_hda_intel
8507 10de:03ec pata_amd
8508 10de:03f6 sata_nv
8509 1022:1103 k8temp
8510 109e:036e bttv
8511 109e:0878 snd_bt87x
8512 11ab:4364 sky2
8513 </pre>
8514
8515 <p>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
8516 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor 3:</p>
8517
8518 <pre>
8519 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
8520     echo loaded pci modules:
8521     (
8522         cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
8523         for address in * ; do
8524             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
8525                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
8526                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
8527                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
8528                     id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $3}'`
8529                     echo "$id $module"
8530                 fi
8531             fi
8532         done
8533     )
8534     echo
8535 fi
8536 </pre>
8537
8538 <p>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
8539 mappings:</p>
8540
8541 <pre>
8542 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
8543     echo loaded usb modules:
8544     (
8545         cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
8546         for address in * ; do
8547             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
8548                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
8549                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
8550                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
8551                     id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $6}')
8552                     if [ "$id" ] ; then
8553                         echo "$id $module"
8554                     fi
8555                 fi
8556             fi
8557         done
8558     )
8559     echo
8560 fi
8561 </pre>
8562
8563 <p>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
8564 well.</p>
8565
8566       </div>
8567       <div class="tags">
8568
8569
8570         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>.
8571
8572
8573       </div>
8574     </div>
8575     <div class="padding"></div>
8576
8577     <div class="entry">
8578       <div class="title">
8579         <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>
8580       </div>
8581       <div class="date">
8582         22nd December 2010
8583       </div>
8584       <div class="body">
8585         <p>The last few days I have spent at work here at the <a
8586 href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> testing if the new
8587 batch of computers will work with Linux.  Every year for the last few
8588 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
8589 computers, and this year HP won the bid.  Two different desktops and
8590 five different laptops are on the list this year.  We in the UNIX
8591 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
8592 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
8593 university.</p>
8594
8595 <p>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
8596 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well.  To test, I PXE
8597 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
8598 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware.  When
8599 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
8600 on.  If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
8601 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
8602 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.</p>
8603
8604 <p>Anyway, to get to the point of this post.  Here is the simple tests
8605 I perform on a new model.</p>
8606
8607 <ul>
8608
8609 <li>Is PXE installation working?  I'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
8610 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment.  If I feel like it, I also test with
8611 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.</li>
8612
8613 <li>Is X.org working?  If the graphical login screen show up after
8614 installation, X.org is working.</li>
8615
8616 <li>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working?  Running glxgears (in
8617 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
8618 reported by the program.</li>
8619
8620 <li>Is sound working?  With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
8621 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful.  If there
8622 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
8623 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound.  I
8624 normally test this by playing
8625 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20101012-chef/ ">a HTML5
8626 video</a> in Firefox/Iceweasel.</li>
8627
8628 <li>Is the USB subsystem working?  I test this by plugging in a USB
8629 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
8630
8631 <li>Is the CD/DVD player working?  I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
8632 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
8633
8634 <li>Is any built in camera working?  Test using cheese, and see if a
8635 picture from the v4l device show up.</li>
8636
8637 <li>Is bluetooth working?  Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
8638 any bluetooth devices are discovered.  In my office, I normally see a
8639 few.</li>
8640
8641 <li>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working.  I have
8642 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
8643 notice this.</li>
8644
8645 <li>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working?  I'm testing if the
8646 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
8647 resume.</li>
8648
8649 <li>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
8650 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
8651 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc?  The set of buttons differ from
8652 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
8653 not.</li>
8654
8655 <li>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
8656 acceleration sensors etc.  I rarely test these, as I do not know how
8657 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
8658 existence.</li>
8659
8660 </ul>
8661
8662 <p>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
8663 for the HP machines I am testing.  I'm not done yet, so I will report
8664 the test results later.  For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work
8665 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
8666 and audio fail on RHEL6.  Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p.  As you
8667 can see, I have most machines left to test.  One interesting
8668 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
8669 RHEL6 with glxgears.  No idea why.</p>
8670
8671       </div>
8672       <div class="tags">
8673
8674
8675         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>.
8676
8677
8678       </div>
8679     </div>
8680     <div class="padding"></div>
8681
8682     <div class="entry">
8683       <div class="title">
8684         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html">Some thoughts on BitCoins</a>
8685       </div>
8686       <div class="date">
8687         11th December 2010
8688       </div>
8689       <div class="body">
8690         <p>As I continue to explore
8691 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>, I've starting to wonder
8692 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
8693 and regulations here in Norway.  Here are some random notes.</p>
8694
8695 <p>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
8696 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
8697 is known to everyone.  This means that if a BitCoin address has been
8698 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
8699 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
8700 that address.  There is even a web service to look at the details for
8701 all transactions.  There I can see that my address
8702 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a>
8703 have received 16.06 Bitcoin, the
8704 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3</a>
8705 address of Simon Phipps have received 181.97 BitCoin and the address
8706 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt</A>
8707 of EFF have received 2447.38 BitCoins so far.  Thank you to each and
8708 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
8709 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
8710 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
8711 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction.  I'm told
8712 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
8713 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
8714 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.</p>
8715
8716 <p>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
8717 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
8718 without declaring it.  There are money laundering, tax and accounting
8719 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
8720 If the Skolelinux foundation
8721 (<a href="http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">SLX
8722 Debian Labs</a>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
8723 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
8724 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
8725 not, should everything or nothing be declared?  What exchange rate
8726 should be used when calculating taxes?  Would receivers have to pay
8727 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
8728 BitCoin?  I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.</p>
8729
8730 <p>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
8731 accepted by a lot of users.  It must be possible to get easy access to
8732 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
8733 easy to spend it.  At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
8734 access to, but there are very few places to spend it.  I am not really
8735 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
8736 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins.  I
8737 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
8738 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
8739 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
8740 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular.  I'm sure they
8741 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
8742 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
8743 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
8744 currencies.</p>
8745
8746 <p>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
8747 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
8748 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
8749 to see which one get the next lump of cash).  The "winner" get 50
8750 BitCoin when this happen.  Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
8751 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
8752 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
8753 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the 50
8754 BitCoins.  Check out
8755 <a href="http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/">BitCoin Pool</a>
8756 if this sounds interesting.  I have not had time to try to set up a
8757 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
8758 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
8759 yet.</p>
8760
8761 <p>Update 2010-12-15: Found an <a
8762 href="http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi">interesting
8763 criticism</a> of bitcoin.  Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
8764 it was interesting to read.  The arguments presented seem to be
8765 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.</p>
8766
8767       </div>
8768       <div class="tags">
8769
8770
8771         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>.
8772
8773
8774       </div>
8775     </div>
8776     <div class="padding"></div>
8777
8778     <div class="entry">
8779       <div class="title">
8780         <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>
8781       </div>
8782       <div class="date">
8783         10th December 2010
8784       </div>
8785       <div class="body">
8786         <p>With this weeks lawless
8787 <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/06/wikileaks/index.html">governmental
8788 attacks</a> on Wikileak and
8789 <a href="http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/2010/12/06/war_on_speech">free
8790 speech</a>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
8791 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
8792 A blog post from
8793 <a href="http://webmink.com/2010/12/06/now-accepting-bitcoin/">Simon
8794 Phipps on bitcoin</a> reminded me about a project that a friend of
8795 mine mentioned earlier.  I decided to follow Simon's example, and get
8796 involved with <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>.  I got
8797 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
8798 some bitcoins to get started.  I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
8799 for helping me remember BitCoin.</p>
8800
8801 <p>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder?  It is a digital
8802 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
8803 networks.  It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
8804 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
8805 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions.  The
8806 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets 2.9
8807 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
8808 line client builds just fine.  Hopefully Jonas
8809 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/578157">will get the package into
8810 Debian</a> soon.</p>
8811
8812 <p>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
8813 There are <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/trade">companies accepting
8814 bitcoins</a> when selling services and goods, and there are even
8815 currency "stock" markets where the exchange rate is decided.  There
8816 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising.  If you
8817 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
8818 you can even get
8819 <a href="https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/">some for free</a> (0.05
8820 bitcoin at the time of writing).  Use
8821 <a href="http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/">BitcoinWatch</a> to keep an eye
8822 on the current exchange rates.</p>
8823
8824 <p>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
8825 machines.  If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
8826 donations to the address
8827 <b>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</b>.  Thank you!</p>
8828
8829       </div>
8830       <div class="tags">
8831
8832
8833         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>.
8834
8835
8836       </div>
8837     </div>
8838     <div class="padding"></div>
8839
8840     <div class="entry">
8841       <div class="title">
8842         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html">Why isn't Debian Edu using VLC?</a>
8843       </div>
8844       <div class="date">
8845         27th November 2010
8846       </div>
8847       <div class="body">
8848         <p>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
8849 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
8850 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
8851 to play a video file or stream.  Only if VLC fail will I drag out
8852 gmplayer to see if it can do better.  The reason is mostly the failure
8853 model and trust.  When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
8854 reporting the problem.  When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
8855 just hangs.  The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.<p>
8856
8857 <p>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
8858 mplayer in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
8859 Edu/Skolelinux</a>.  The reason is simple.  We need a good browser
8860 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
8861 not very good.  For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
8862 is no way for the user to pause the video.  Also, when I
8863 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">last
8864 tested the browser plugins</a> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
8865 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked.  If
8866 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
8867 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.</P>
8868
8869 <p>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
8870 annoying.  The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
8871 keyboard shortcuts.  When the player is in full screen mode, its
8872 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
8873 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode.  I
8874 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
8875 window mode.  Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
8876 the current video.  It is very nice when playing short videos from the
8877 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
8878 what is going on.</p>
8879
8880       </div>
8881       <div class="tags">
8882
8883
8884         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>.
8885
8886
8887       </div>
8888     </div>
8889     <div class="padding"></div>
8890
8891     <div class="entry">
8892       <div class="title">
8893         <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>
8894       </div>
8895       <div class="date">
8896         22nd November 2010
8897       </div>
8898       <div class="body">
8899         <p>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
8900 upgrade testing of the
8901 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
8902 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a> to do <tt>apt-get autoremove</tt> when using apt-get.
8903 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
8904 can now present the updated result from today:</p>
8905
8906 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
8907
8908 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
8909
8910 <blockquote><p>
8911   apache2.2-bin
8912   aptdaemon
8913   baobab
8914   binfmt-support
8915   browser-plugin-gnash
8916   cheese-common
8917   cli-common
8918   cups-pk-helper
8919   dmz-cursor-theme
8920   empathy
8921   empathy-common
8922   freedesktop-sound-theme
8923   freeglut3
8924   gconf-defaults-service
8925   gdm-themes
8926   gedit-plugins
8927   geoclue
8928   geoclue-hostip
8929   geoclue-localnet
8930   geoclue-manual
8931   geoclue-yahoo
8932   gnash
8933   gnash-common
8934   gnome
8935   gnome-backgrounds
8936   gnome-cards-data
8937   gnome-codec-install
8938   gnome-core
8939   gnome-desktop-environment
8940   gnome-disk-utility
8941   gnome-screenshot
8942   gnome-search-tool
8943   gnome-session-canberra
8944   gnome-system-log
8945   gnome-themes-extras
8946   gnome-themes-more
8947   gnome-user-share
8948   gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
8949   gstreamer0.10-tools
8950   gtk2-engines
8951   gtk2-engines-pixbuf
8952   gtk2-engines-smooth
8953   hamster-applet
8954   libapache2-mod-dnssd
8955   libapr1
8956   libaprutil1
8957   libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
8958   libaprutil1-ldap
8959   libart2.0-cil
8960   libboost-date-time1.42.0
8961   libboost-python1.42.0
8962   libboost-thread1.42.0
8963   libchamplain-0.4-0
8964   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0
8965   libcheese-gtk18
8966   libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
8967   libcryptui0
8968   libdiscid0
8969   libelf1
8970   libepc-1.0-2
8971   libepc-common
8972   libepc-ui-1.0-2
8973   libfreerdp-plugins-standard
8974   libfreerdp0
8975   libgconf2.0-cil
8976   libgdata-common
8977   libgdata7
8978   libgdu-gtk0
8979   libgee2
8980   libgeoclue0
8981   libgexiv2-0
8982   libgif4
8983   libglade2.0-cil
8984   libglib2.0-cil
8985   libgmime2.4-cil
8986   libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
8987   libgnome2.24-cil
8988   libgnomepanel2.24-cil
8989   libgpod-common
8990   libgpod4
8991   libgtk2.0-cil
8992   libgtkglext1
8993   libgtksourceview2.0-common
8994   libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
8995   libmono-addins0.2-cil
8996   libmono-cairo2.0-cil
8997   libmono-corlib2.0-cil
8998   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
8999   libmono-posix2.0-cil
9000   libmono-security2.0-cil
9001   libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
9002   libmono-system2.0-cil
9003   libmtp8
9004   libmusicbrainz3-6
9005   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
9006   libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
9007   libopal3.6.8
9008   libpolkit-gtk-1-0
9009   libpt2.6.7
9010   libpython2.6
9011   librpm1
9012   librpmio1
9013   libsdl1.2debian
9014   libsrtp0
9015   libssh-4
9016   libtelepathy-farsight0
9017   libtelepathy-glib0
9018   libtidy-0.99-0
9019   media-player-info
9020   mesa-utils
9021   mono-2.0-gac
9022   mono-gac
9023   mono-runtime
9024   nautilus-sendto
9025   nautilus-sendto-empathy
9026   p7zip-full
9027   pkg-config
9028   python-aptdaemon
9029   python-aptdaemon-gtk
9030   python-axiom
9031   python-beautifulsoup
9032   python-bugbuddy
9033   python-clientform
9034   python-coherence
9035   python-configobj
9036   python-crypto
9037   python-cupshelpers
9038   python-elementtree
9039   python-epsilon
9040   python-evolution
9041   python-feedparser
9042   python-gdata
9043   python-gdbm
9044   python-gst0.10
9045   python-gtkglext1
9046   python-gtksourceview2
9047   python-httplib2
9048   python-louie
9049   python-mako
9050   python-markupsafe
9051   python-mechanize
9052   python-nevow
9053   python-notify
9054   python-opengl
9055   python-openssl
9056   python-pam
9057   python-pkg-resources
9058   python-pyasn1
9059   python-pysqlite2
9060   python-rdflib
9061   python-serial
9062   python-tagpy
9063   python-twisted-bin
9064   python-twisted-conch
9065   python-twisted-core
9066   python-twisted-web
9067   python-utidylib
9068   python-webkit
9069   python-xdg
9070   python-zope.interface
9071   remmina
9072   remmina-plugin-data
9073   remmina-plugin-rdp
9074   remmina-plugin-vnc
9075   rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
9076   rhythmbox-plugins
9077   rpm-common
9078   rpm2cpio
9079   seahorse-plugins
9080   shotwell
9081   software-center
9082   system-config-printer-udev
9083   telepathy-gabble
9084   telepathy-mission-control-5
9085   telepathy-salut
9086   tomboy
9087   totem
9088   totem-coherence
9089   totem-mozilla
9090   totem-plugins
9091   transmission-common
9092   xdg-user-dirs
9093   xdg-user-dirs-gtk
9094   xserver-xephyr
9095 </p></blockquote>
9096
9097 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
9098
9099 <blockquote><p>
9100   cheese
9101   ekiga
9102   eog
9103   epiphany-extensions
9104   evolution-exchange
9105   fast-user-switch-applet
9106   file-roller
9107   gcalctool
9108   gconf-editor
9109   gdm
9110   gedit
9111   gedit-common
9112   gnome-games
9113   gnome-games-data
9114   gnome-nettool
9115   gnome-system-tools
9116   gnome-themes
9117   gnuchess
9118   gucharmap
9119   guile-1.8-libs
9120   libavahi-ui0
9121   libdmx1
9122   libgalago3
9123   libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
9124   libgtksourceview2.0-0
9125   liblircclient0
9126   libsdl1.2debian-alsa
9127   libspeexdsp1
9128   libsvga1
9129   rhythmbox
9130   seahorse
9131   sound-juicer
9132   system-config-printer
9133   totem-common
9134   transmission-gtk
9135   vinagre
9136   vino
9137 </p></blockquote>
9138
9139 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9140
9141 <blockquote><p>
9142   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
9143 </p></blockquote>
9144
9145 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9146
9147 <blockquote><p>
9148 [nothing]
9149 </p></blockquote>
9150
9151 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
9152
9153 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
9154
9155 <blockquote><p>
9156   ksmserver
9157 </p></blockquote>
9158
9159 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
9160
9161 <blockquote><p>
9162   kwin
9163   network-manager-kde
9164 </p></blockquote>
9165
9166 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9167
9168 <blockquote><p>
9169   arts
9170   dolphin
9171   freespacenotifier
9172   google-gadgets-gst
9173   google-gadgets-xul
9174   kappfinder
9175   kcalc
9176   kcharselect
9177   kde-core
9178   kde-plasma-desktop
9179   kde-standard
9180   kde-window-manager
9181   kdeartwork
9182   kdeartwork-emoticons
9183   kdeartwork-style
9184   kdeartwork-theme-icon
9185   kdebase
9186   kdebase-apps
9187   kdebase-workspace
9188   kdebase-workspace-bin
9189   kdebase-workspace-data
9190   kdeeject
9191   kdelibs
9192   kdeplasma-addons
9193   kdeutils
9194   kdewallpapers
9195   kdf
9196   kfloppy
9197   kgpg
9198   khelpcenter4
9199   kinfocenter
9200   konq-plugins-l10n
9201   konqueror-nsplugins
9202   kscreensaver
9203   kscreensaver-xsavers
9204   ktimer
9205   kwrite
9206   libgle3
9207   libkde4-ruby1.8
9208   libkonq5
9209   libkonq5-templates
9210   libnetpbm10
9211   libplasma-ruby
9212   libplasma-ruby1.8
9213   libqt4-ruby1.8
9214   marble-data
9215   marble-plugins
9216   netpbm
9217   nuvola-icon-theme
9218   plasma-dataengines-workspace
9219   plasma-desktop
9220   plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
9221   plasma-runners-addons
9222   plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
9223   plasma-scriptengine-python
9224   plasma-scriptengine-qedje
9225   plasma-scriptengine-ruby
9226   plasma-scriptengine-webkit
9227   plasma-scriptengines
9228   plasma-wallpapers-addons
9229   plasma-widget-folderview
9230   plasma-widget-networkmanagement
9231   ruby
9232   sweeper
9233   update-notifier-kde
9234   xscreensaver-data-extra
9235   xscreensaver-gl
9236   xscreensaver-gl-extra
9237   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
9238 </p></blockquote>
9239
9240 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9241
9242 <blockquote><p>
9243   ark
9244   google-gadgets-common
9245   google-gadgets-qt
9246   htdig
9247   kate
9248   kdebase-bin
9249   kdebase-data
9250   kdepasswd
9251   kfind
9252   klipper
9253   konq-plugins
9254   konqueror
9255   ksysguard
9256   ksysguardd
9257   libarchive1
9258   libcln6
9259   libeet1
9260   libeina-svn-06
9261   libggadget-1.0-0b
9262   libggadget-qt-1.0-0b
9263   libgps19
9264   libkdecorations4
9265   libkephal4
9266   libkonq4
9267   libkonqsidebarplugin4a
9268   libkscreensaver5
9269   libksgrd4
9270   libksignalplotter4
9271   libkunitconversion4
9272   libkwineffects1a
9273   libmarblewidget4
9274   libntrack-qt4-1
9275   libntrack0
9276   libplasma-geolocation-interface4
9277   libplasmaclock4a
9278   libplasmagenericshell4
9279   libprocesscore4a
9280   libprocessui4a
9281   libqalculate5
9282   libqedje0a
9283   libqtruby4shared2
9284   libqzion0a
9285   libruby1.8
9286   libscim8c2a
9287   libsmokekdecore4-3
9288   libsmokekdeui4-3
9289   libsmokekfile3
9290   libsmokekhtml3
9291   libsmokekio3
9292   libsmokeknewstuff2-3
9293   libsmokeknewstuff3-3
9294   libsmokekparts3
9295   libsmokektexteditor3
9296   libsmokekutils3
9297   libsmokenepomuk3
9298   libsmokephonon3
9299   libsmokeplasma3
9300   libsmokeqtcore4-3
9301   libsmokeqtdbus4-3
9302   libsmokeqtgui4-3
9303   libsmokeqtnetwork4-3
9304   libsmokeqtopengl4-3
9305   libsmokeqtscript4-3
9306   libsmokeqtsql4-3
9307   libsmokeqtsvg4-3
9308   libsmokeqttest4-3
9309   libsmokeqtuitools4-3
9310   libsmokeqtwebkit4-3
9311   libsmokeqtxml4-3
9312   libsmokesolid3
9313   libsmokesoprano3
9314   libtaskmanager4a
9315   libtidy-0.99-0
9316   libweather-ion4a
9317   libxklavier16
9318   libxxf86misc1
9319   okteta
9320   oxygencursors
9321   plasma-dataengines-addons
9322   plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
9323   plasma-widget-lancelot
9324   plasma-widgets-addons
9325   plasma-widgets-workspace
9326   polkit-kde-1
9327   ruby1.8
9328   systemsettings
9329   update-notifier-common
9330 </p></blockquote>
9331
9332 <p>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
9333 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
9334 differences.  I have no idea what packages should be installed after
9335 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.</p>
9336
9337       </div>
9338       <div class="tags">
9339
9340
9341         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>.
9342
9343
9344       </div>
9345     </div>
9346     <div class="padding"></div>
9347
9348     <div class="entry">
9349       <div class="title">
9350         <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>
9351       </div>
9352       <div class="date">
9353         22nd November 2010
9354       </div>
9355       <div class="body">
9356         <p>Most of the computers in use by the
9357 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project</a>
9358 are virtual machines.  And they have been Xen machines running on a
9359 fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
9360 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge 2950 host machine.  This was a
9361 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
9362 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
9363 know is not supported by KVM.  So to migrate, we had to convert
9364 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.</p>
9365
9366 <p>I found
9367 <a href="http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM">a
9368 nice recipe</a> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
9369 migration.  It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
9370 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
9371 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data.  I NFS mounted the
9372 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.</p>
9373
9374 <pre>
9375 #!/bin/sh
9376
9377 # Based on
9378 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
9379
9380 set -e
9381 set -x
9382
9383 if [ -z "$1" ] ; then
9384     echo "Usage: $0 &lt;hostname&gt;"
9385     exit 1
9386 else
9387     host="$1"
9388 fi
9389
9390 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
9391     echo "error: unable to find LVM volume for $host"
9392     exit 1
9393 fi
9394
9395 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs.  not sure why.
9396 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
9397 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
9398 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
9399
9400 img=$host.img
9401 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
9402 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
9403
9404 parted $img mklabel msdos
9405 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap 0 $disksize
9406 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
9407 parted $img set 1 boot on
9408
9409 modprobe dm-mod
9410 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
9411 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
9412
9413 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=1M
9414 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
9415 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
9416
9417 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
9418 losetup -d /dev/loop0
9419 </pre>
9420
9421 <p>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
9422 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.</p>
9423
9424 <p>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
9425 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and
9426 set up grub to boot from the disk image.  After this, the KVM machines
9427 seem to work just fine.</p>
9428
9429       </div>
9430       <div class="tags">
9431
9432
9433         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>.
9434
9435
9436       </div>
9437     </div>
9438     <div class="padding"></div>
9439
9440     <div class="entry">
9441       <div class="title">
9442         <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>
9443       </div>
9444       <div class="date">
9445         20th November 2010
9446       </div>
9447       <div class="body">
9448         <p>I'm still running upgrade testing of the
9449 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
9450 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
9451 status.  Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.</p>
9452
9453 <p>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
9454 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
9455 can see if anything should be changed.</p>
9456
9457 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
9458
9459 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
9460
9461 <blockquote><p>
9462   apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
9463   browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-4.3 cups-pk-helper
9464   dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
9465   freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
9466   gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
9467   geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
9468   gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
9469   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
9470   gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
9471   gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
9472   gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
9473   gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
9474   gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
9475   libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
9476   libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-0 libboost-date-time1.42.0
9477   libboost-python1.42.0 libboost-thread1.42.0 libchamplain-0.4-0
9478   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
9479   libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-1.0-2
9480   libepc-common libepc-ui-1.0-2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
9481   libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
9482   libgdl-1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-0 libgif4
9483   libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
9484   libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
9485   libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
9486   libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
9487   libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
9488   libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
9489   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
9490   libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
9491   libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-6
9492   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6.8
9493   libpolkit-gtk-1-0 libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
9494   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
9495   libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-4
9496   libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-0.99-0
9497   libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
9498   mono-2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
9499   nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
9500   openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-4suite-xml
9501   python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
9502   python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
9503   python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
9504   python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
9505   python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
9506   python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
9507   python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
9508   python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
9509   python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
9510   python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
9511   python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
9512   python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
9513   python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
9514   remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
9515   rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
9516   software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
9517   telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-5 telepathy-salut tomboy
9518   totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
9519   transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
9520   zip
9521 </p></blockquote>
9522
9523 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
9524
9525 <blockquote><p>
9526   arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
9527   epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
9528   fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
9529   gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
9530   gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
9531   gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
9532   guile-1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
9533   libavahi-ui0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7
9534   libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
9535   libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1
9536   libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3 libfaad0 libgadu3
9537   libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
9538   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
9539   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
9540   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
9541   libgtkhtml2-0 libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgtksourceview2.0-0
9542   libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
9543   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
9544   libmagick++10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
9545   libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
9546   libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpisock9
9547   libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8
9548   libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
9549   libspeexdsp1 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libsvga1
9550   libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
9551   libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
9552   libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
9553   sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
9554   totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
9555 </p></blockquote>
9556
9557 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9558
9559 <blockquote><p>
9560   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
9561 </p></blockquote>
9562
9563 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9564
9565 <blockquote><p>
9566 [nothing]
9567 </p></blockquote>
9568
9569 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
9570
9571 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
9572
9573 <blockquote><p>
9574   autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-4.3 dcoprss
9575   edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
9576   ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
9577   gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
9578   kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
9579   kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
9580   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
9581   kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
9582   kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
9583   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
9584   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
9585   kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
9586   killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
9587   kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
9588   ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42.0
9589   libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
9590   libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
9591   libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
9592   libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
9593   libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
9594   libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
9595   libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
9596   libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
9597   libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
9598   lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
9599   openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
9600   parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
9601   pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
9602   speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
9603   ttf-sazanami-gothic
9604 </p></blockquote>
9605
9606 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
9607
9608 <blockquote><p>
9609   amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
9610   dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
9611   kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
9612   kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
9613   keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
9614   kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
9615   kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
9616   klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
9617   kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
9618   kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
9619   kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
9620   ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
9621   ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
9622   kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
9623   kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
9624   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
9625   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2
9626   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
9627   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
9628   libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0 libicu38
9629   libiec61883-0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
9630   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
9631   libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
9632   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
9633   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
9634   libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
9635   libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
9636   libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 librss1 libsensors3
9637   libsmbios2 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90
9638   libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
9639   mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
9640   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
9641   ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
9642 </p></blockquote>
9643
9644 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
9645
9646 <blockquote><p>
9647   dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
9648   kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
9649   kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
9650   kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
9651   netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
9652   xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra
9653   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
9654 </p></blockquote>
9655
9656 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
9657
9658 <blockquote><p>
9659   kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
9660 </p></blockquote>
9661
9662       </div>
9663       <div class="tags">
9664
9665
9666         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>.
9667
9668
9669       </div>
9670     </div>
9671     <div class="padding"></div>
9672
9673     <div class="entry">
9674       <div class="title">
9675         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html">Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd</a>
9676       </div>
9677       <div class="date">
9678         20th November 2010
9679       </div>
9680       <div class="body">
9681         <p>Answering
9682 <a href="http://www.listware.net/201011/gnash-dev/67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html">the
9683 call from the Gnash project</a> for
9684 <a href="http://www.gnashdev.org:8010">buildbot</a> slaves to test the
9685 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
9686 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
9687 Debian/Squeeze.  I hope this can help the developers in getting new
9688 releases out more often.</p>
9689
9690 <p>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
9691 I have considered setting up a <a
9692 href="http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/">Debian/kfreebsd</a>
9693 machine as well.  I have also considered using the kfreebsd
9694 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the 5
9695 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video.  Because of this, I
9696 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
9697 kfreebsd.  Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
9698 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
9699 screen at random locations).  Have not gotten very far with the
9700 testing.  Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
9701 fatal problem.  Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
9702 useful as a file server for NUUG.  Will try to find time to set up a
9703 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.</p>
9704
9705       </div>
9706       <div class="tags">
9707
9708
9709         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>.
9710
9711
9712       </div>
9713     </div>
9714     <div class="padding"></div>
9715
9716     <div class="entry">
9717       <div class="title">
9718         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html">Debian in 3D</a>
9719       </div>
9720       <div class="date">
9721          9th November 2010
9722       </div>
9723       <div class="body">
9724         <p><img src="http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/23/e0/c4/f9/2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg"></p>
9725
9726 <p>3D printing is just great.  I just came across this Debian logo in
9727 3D linked in from
9728 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2010/11/09/participatory-branding/">the
9729 thingiverse blog</a>.</p>
9730
9731       </div>
9732       <div class="tags">
9733
9734
9735         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>.
9736
9737
9738       </div>
9739     </div>
9740     <div class="padding"></div>
9741
9742     <div class="entry">
9743       <div class="title">
9744         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html">Software updates 2010-10-24</a>
9745       </div>
9746       <div class="date">
9747         24th October 2010
9748       </div>
9749       <div class="body">
9750         <p>Some updates.</p>
9751
9752 <p>My <a href="http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">gnash pledge</a> to
9753 raise money for the project is going well.  The lower limit of 10
9754 signers was reached in 24 hours, and so far 13 people have signed it.
9755 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
9756 how far we can get before the time limit of December 24 is reached.
9757 :)</p>
9758
9759 <p>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
9760 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
9761 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
9762 It is called
9763 <a href="http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html">kcov</a>,
9764 and can be used using <tt>kcov &lt;directory&gt; &lt;binary&gt;</tt>.
9765 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
9766 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
9767 libglib2.0-dev.  Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
9768 solvable.  I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.</p>
9769
9770 <p>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for <a
9771 href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2010/10/msg00002.html">a
9772 new alpha release of Debian Edu</a>, and just published the second
9773 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
9774 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>
9775 release.  Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
9776 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
9777 client servers and diskless workstations.  A nice touch added
9778 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
9779 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.</p>
9780
9781       </div>
9782       <div class="tags">
9783
9784
9785         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>.
9786
9787
9788       </div>
9789     </div>
9790     <div class="padding"></div>
9791
9792     <div class="entry">
9793       <div class="title">
9794         <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>
9795       </div>
9796       <div class="date">
9797          4th September 2010
9798       </div>
9799       <div class="body">
9800         <p>In the <a href="http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote">Debian
9801 popularity-contest numbers</a>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
9802 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian.  The sixth
9803 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla.  This is a clear indication that
9804 working flash is important for Debian users.  Around 10 percent of the
9805 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
9806 installed.</p>
9807
9808 <p>In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008
9809 («<a href="http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile&do=view&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf">Skolelinux
9810 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
9811 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs</a>»), one of the most important problems
9812 schools experienced with <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
9813 Edu/Skolelinux</a> was the lack of working Flash.  A lot of educational
9814 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
9815 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
9816 good reason to stay with Windows.</p>
9817
9818 <p>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
9819 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
9820 everything you told him but could work fairly well.  This was a
9821 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
9822 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
9823 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
9824 example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
9825 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
9826 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
9827 pages they want to visit.</p>
9828
9829 <p>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
9830 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
9831 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
9832 Video to working out of the box.  For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
9833 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
9834 the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
9835 unstable.  The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7.
9836 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
9837 release team have not had time to reply to it yet.  I hope they agree
9838 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
9839 accept the new package into Squeeze.</p>
9840
9841       </div>
9842       <div class="tags">
9843
9844
9845         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>.
9846
9847
9848       </div>
9849     </div>
9850     <div class="padding"></div>
9851
9852     <div class="entry">
9853       <div class="title">
9854         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html">Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery</a>
9855       </div>
9856       <div class="date">
9857         27th July 2010
9858       </div>
9859       <div class="body">
9860         <p>I discovered this while doing
9861 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">automated
9862 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze</a>.  A few packages
9863 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
9864 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
9865 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.</p>
9866
9867 <p>An example is from todays
9868 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt">upgrade
9869 of KDE using aptitude</a>.  In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
9870 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade.  The cause is simple.  If a
9871 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
9872 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
9873 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
9874 because its dependencies are unavailable.</p>
9875
9876 <p>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:</p>
9877
9878 <blockquote><pre>
9879 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
9880  perl-modules depends on perl (>= 5.10.1-1); however:
9881   Version of perl on system is 5.10.0-19lenny2.
9882 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
9883  dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
9884 </pre></blockquote>
9885
9886 <p>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
9887 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/527917">reported as a bug</a>, and will
9888 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
9889 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
9890 failures.  Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
9891 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
9892 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
9893 of dependency loops.</p>
9894
9895 <p>Thanks to
9896 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/06/msg00116.html">the
9897 tireless effort by Bill Allombert</a>, the number of circular
9898 dependencies
9899 <a href="http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html">left in Debian
9900 is dropping</a>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)</p>
9901
9902 <p>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
9903 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590605">update-notifier</a> and
9904 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590604">different behaviour</a> between
9905 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
9906 dependency.  Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
9907 it.</p>
9908
9909       </div>
9910       <div class="tags">
9911
9912
9913         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>.
9914
9915
9916       </div>
9917     </div>
9918     <div class="padding"></div>
9919
9920     <div class="entry">
9921       <div class="title">
9922         <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>
9923       </div>
9924       <div class="date">
9925         17th July 2010
9926       </div>
9927       <div class="body">
9928         <p>This is a
9929 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">followup</a>
9930 on my
9931 <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
9932 work</a> on
9933 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">merging
9934 all</a> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.</p>
9935
9936 <p>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
9937 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
9938 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server.  The two
9939 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.</p>
9940
9941 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
9942 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
9943 on a Debian Edu main-server.  Here is a summary.
9944
9945 <p><strong>powerdns</strong></p>
9946
9947 <a href="http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend">Clues
9948 on how to</a> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
9949 the web.
9950
9951 <p>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
9952 One "strict" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
9953 using the same LDAP objects, and a "tree" mode where the forward and
9954 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
9955 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
9956 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.</p>
9957
9958 <p>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
9959 base, and uses a "base" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
9960 "dc=tjener,dc=intern," to the base with a filter for
9961 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" for the forward entry and
9962 "dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa," with a filter for
9963 "(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)" for the reverse entry.  For
9964 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
9965 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
9966 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
9967 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
9968 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
9969 spfrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entries it is looking for
9970 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
9971 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
9972 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  The equivalent
9973 ldapsearch commands could look like this:</p>
9974
9975 <blockquote><pre>
9976 ldapsearch -h ldap \
9977   -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
9978   -s base -x '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
9979   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
9980   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
9981   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
9982   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
9983
9984 ldapsearch -h ldap \
9985   -b dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
9986   -s base -x '(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)'
9987   dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
9988   hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
9989   srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
9990 </pre></blockquote>
9991
9992 <p>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
9993 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
9994 example LDAP objects used there.  In addition to these objects, the
9995 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
9996 also exist.</p>
9997
9998 <blockquote><pre>
9999 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10000 objectclass: top
10001 objectclass: dnsdomain
10002 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10003 dc: tjener
10004 arecord: 10.0.2.2
10005 associateddomain: tjener.intern
10006
10007 dn: dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10008 objectclass: top
10009 objectclass: dnsdomain2
10010 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10011 dc: 2
10012 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
10013 associateddomain: 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
10014 </pre></blockquote>
10015
10016 <p>In strict mode, the server behaves differently.  When looking for
10017 forward DNS entries, it is doing a "subtree" scoped search with the
10018 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
10019 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
10020 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
10021 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
10022 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entires it also do a
10023 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is "(arecord=10.0.2.2)"
10024 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
10025 modifytimestamp.  In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
10026 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
10027 instead.</p>
10028
10029 <p>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
10030 like this:</p>
10031
10032 <blockquote><pre>
10033 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
10034   '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
10035   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
10036   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
10037   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
10038   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
10039
10040 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
10041   '(arecord=10.0.2.2)' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
10042 </pre></blockquote>
10043
10044 <p>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
10045 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
10046 reverse lookups.</p>
10047
10048 <p>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
10049 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
10050 need to generate a DNS reply.  This make it able to work with any
10051 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.</p>
10052
10053 <p>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC 1274) and
10054 dnsdomain2 schemas.  The latter is used for reverse entries like
10055 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.</p>
10056
10057 <p>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
10058 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
10059 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain).  The use
10060 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
10061 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.</p>
10062
10063 <p>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
10064 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
10065 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
10066 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
10067 (zonename and relativedomainname).</p>
10068
10069 <p>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
10070 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
10071 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
10072 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
10073 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
10074 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):</p>
10075
10076 <blockquote><pre>
10077 objectclass ( some-oid NAME 'dnsDomainAux'
10078     SUP top
10079     AUXILIARY
10080     MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
10081           DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
10082           TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
10083           NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
10084           A6Record $ DNAMERecord
10085     ))
10086 </pre></blockquote>
10087
10088 <p>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
10089 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
10090 all the attributes PowerDNS wants.  I've sent an email to the PowerDNS
10091 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
10092 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
10093 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.</p>
10094
10095 <p><strong>ISC dhcp</strong></p>
10096
10097 <p>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
10098 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want.  This
10099 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
10100 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
10101 what is needed without having to read the source code.</p>
10102
10103 <p>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
10104 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
10105 stored.  These are the relevant entries from
10106 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:</p>
10107
10108 <blockquote><pre>
10109 ldap-base-dn "dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no";
10110 ldap-dhcp-server-cn "dhcp";
10111 </pre></blockquote>
10112
10113 <p>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
10114 configuration it need.  The cn "dhcp" is located using the given LDAP
10115 base and the filter "(&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))".  The
10116 search result is this entry:</p>
10117
10118 <blockquote><pre>
10119 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10120 cn: dhcp
10121 objectClass: top
10122 objectClass: dhcpServer
10123 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10124 </pre></blockquote>
10125
10126 <p>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
10127 subtree with DHCP configuration.  The DHCP configuration subtree base
10128 is located using a base scope search with base "cn=DHCP
10129 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" and filter
10130 "(&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))".
10131 The search result is this entry:</p>
10132
10133 <blockquote><pre>
10134 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10135 cn: DHCP Config
10136 objectClass: top
10137 objectClass: dhcpService
10138 objectClass: dhcpOptions
10139 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10140 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
10141 dhcpStatements: authoritative
10142 dhcpOption: smtp-server code 69 = array of ip-address
10143 dhcpOption: www-server code 72 = array of ip-address
10144 dhcpOption: wpad-url code 252 = text
10145 </pre></blockquote>
10146
10147 <p>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time.  When
10148 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
10149 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
10150 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
10151 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost.  These provide options
10152 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc.  Leaving out the
10153 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
10154 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
10155 related computer objects.</p>
10156
10157 <p>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
10158 of the client (00:00:00:00:00:00 in this example), using a subtree
10159 scoped search with "cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" as
10160 the base and "(&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
10161 00:00:00:00:00:00))" as the filter.  This is what a host object look
10162 like:</p>
10163
10164 <blockquote><pre>
10165 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10166 cn: hostname
10167 objectClass: top
10168 objectClass: dhcpHost
10169 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10170 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
10171 </pre></blockquote>
10172
10173 <p>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
10174 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
10175 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure.  On the
10176 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
10177 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries.  The latter should make
10178 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
10179 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
10180 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
10181 structural object class.
10182
10183 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
10184
10185 <p>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
10186 to which LDAP schemas to use.  While its "tree" mode is rigid when it
10187 come to the the LDAP structure, the "strict" mode is very flexible,
10188 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
10189 in the configuration.</p>
10190
10191 <p>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
10192 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
10193 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
10194 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
10195 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
10196 structure.</p>
10197
10198 <p>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
10199 this might work for Debian Edu:</p>
10200
10201 <blockquote><pre>
10202 ou=services
10203   cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
10204     cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
10205     cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
10206       cn=10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
10207         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
10208     cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
10209       cn=192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
10210         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
10211     ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
10212       cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
10213 </pre></blockquote>
10214
10215 <P>This is not tested yet.  If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
10216 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
10217 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
10218 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.</p>
10219
10220 <p>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
10221 like this:</p>
10222
10223 <blockquote><pre>
10224 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10225 dc: hostname
10226 objectClass: top
10227 objectClass: dhcpHost
10228 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10229 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
10230 associateddomain: hostname.intern
10231 arecord: 10.11.12.13
10232 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10233 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
10234 </pre></blockquote>
10235
10236 </p>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
10237 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
10238 auxiliary object class.</p>
10239
10240       </div>
10241       <div class="tags">
10242
10243
10244         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>.
10245
10246
10247       </div>
10248     </div>
10249     <div class="padding"></div>
10250
10251     <div class="entry">
10252       <div class="title">
10253         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects</a>
10254       </div>
10255       <div class="date">
10256         14th July 2010
10257       </div>
10258       <div class="body">
10259         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
10260 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
10261 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
10262 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
10263 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.</p>
10264
10265 <p>I've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
10266 information finally found a solution that seem to work.</p>
10267
10268 <p>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
10269 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry.  If
10270 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
10271 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
10272 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
10273 to a slave DNS server.</p>
10274
10275 <p>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
10276 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
10277 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
10278 I've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
10279 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup.  It
10280 seem to work.</p>
10281
10282 <p>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
10283 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
10284 an earlier email.  The combined LDAP object will look something like
10285 this:</p>
10286
10287 <blockquote><pre>
10288   dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
10289   cn: hostname
10290   objectClass: dhcphost
10291   objectclass: domainrelatedobject
10292   objectclass: dnsdomainaux
10293   associateddomain: hostname.intern
10294   arecord: 10.11.12.13
10295   dhcphwaddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
10296   dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
10297   ldapconfigsound: Y
10298 </pre></blockquote>
10299
10300 <p>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
10301 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
10302 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress.  LTSP will use
10303 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.</p>
10304
10305 <p>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
10306 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
10307 outside the "DHCP Config" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
10308 that.  If I can't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
10309 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
10310 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
10311 content.  I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
10312 might be a good place to put it.</p>
10313
10314 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10315 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
10316
10317       </div>
10318       <div class="tags">
10319
10320
10321         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>.
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/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html">Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP</a>
10331       </div>
10332       <div class="date">
10333         11th July 2010
10334       </div>
10335       <div class="body">
10336         <p>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
10337 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
10338 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
10339 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.</p>
10340
10341 <p>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
10342 to get configuration from LDAP.  The idea is to look up the MAC
10343 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
10344 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
10345 LTSP clients.</p>
10346
10347 <p>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
10348 in a "computer" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
10349 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.</p>
10350
10351 <p>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
10352 this approach.  A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
10353 need to be written.  Comments, suggestions, etc?</p>
10354
10355 <blockquote><pre>
10356 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
10357 #
10358 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
10359 #
10360 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
10361 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
10362 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
10363 #
10364 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
10365 # existence of attribute names.
10366 #
10367 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
10368 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
10369 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
10370 #
10371 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
10372 # configuration settings.  Something like this should work:
10373 #
10374 # objectclass ( 1.1.2.2 NAME 'ltspClientAux'
10375 #     SUP top
10376 #     AUXILIARY
10377 #     MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
10378
10379 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
10380 if [ "$LDAPSERVER" ] ; then
10381     LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
10382     for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk '{print $5}'|sort -u) ; do
10383         filter="(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))"
10384         ldapsearch -h "$LDAPSERVER" -b "$LDAPBASE" -v -x "$filter" | \
10385             grep '^ltspConfig' | while read attr value ; do
10386             # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
10387             attr=$(echo $attr | sed 's/^ltspConfig//i' | tr a-z A-Z)
10388             # bass value on to clients
10389             eval "$attr=$value; export $attr"
10390         done
10391     done
10392 fi
10393 </pre></blockquote>
10394
10395 <p>I'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
10396 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
10397 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
10398 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
10399 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)</p>
10400
10401 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10402 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
10403
10404 <p>Update 2010-07-17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
10405 configuration in LDAP that was created around year 2000 by
10406 <a href="http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html">PC
10407 Xperience, Inc., 2000</a>.  I found its
10408 <a href="http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/">files</a> on a
10409 personal home page over at redhat.com.</p>
10410
10411       </div>
10412       <div class="tags">
10413
10414
10415         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>.
10416
10417
10418       </div>
10419     </div>
10420     <div class="padding"></div>
10421
10422     <div class="entry">
10423       <div class="title">
10424         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
10425       </div>
10426       <div class="date">
10427          9th July 2010
10428       </div>
10429       <div class="body">
10430         <p>Since
10431 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">my
10432 last post</a> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
10433 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma.  The java application
10434 <a href="http://jxplorer.org/">jXplorer</a> is claimed to be capable of
10435 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
10436 authenticate using Kerberos.  I have only tested the Kerberos
10437 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
10438 LDAP with my test user yet.  It is
10439 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html">available in
10440 Debian</a> testing and unstable at the moment.  The only problem I
10441 have with it is how it handle errors.  If something go wrong, its
10442 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
10443 and remove the failing query.  Nothing big, but very annoying.</p>
10444
10445       </div>
10446       <div class="tags">
10447
10448
10449         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>.
10450
10451
10452       </div>
10453     </div>
10454     <div class="padding"></div>
10455
10456     <div class="entry">
10457       <div class="title">
10458         <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>
10459       </div>
10460       <div class="date">
10461          3rd July 2010
10462       </div>
10463       <div class="body">
10464         <p>Here is a short update on my <a
10465 href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">my
10466 Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing</a>.  Here is a summary of the
10467 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude.  I'm
10468 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
10469 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
10470 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> and
10471 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585716">#585716</a>).</p>
10472
10473 <p>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
10474 complete list of the installed packages.  Based on this I see these
10475 differences when I did a test run today.  As usual, I do not really
10476 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
10477 publish the difference.</p>
10478
10479 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10480
10481 <blockquote><p>
10482   at-spi cpp-4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
10483   libatspi1.0-0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-1-common
10484   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
10485   libgtksourceview-common libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
10486   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
10487   libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
10488   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
10489   python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
10490 </p></blockquote>
10491
10492 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10493
10494 <blockquote><p>
10495   bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
10496   gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
10497   libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-50
10498   libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
10499   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9
10500   libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3
10501   libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
10502   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
10503   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
10504   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
10505   libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
10506   libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++10
10507   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
10508   libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5
10509   libparted1.8-10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
10510   libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
10511   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1
10512   libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
10513   libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
10514   mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
10515 </p></blockquote>
10516
10517 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10518
10519 <blockquote><p>
10520   gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
10521   python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
10522   xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
10523   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
10524   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
10525   xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
10526   xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
10527   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
10528   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
10529   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
10530   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
10531   xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
10532   xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
10533   xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
10534   xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
10535   xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
10536   xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
10537   xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
10538   xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
10539   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
10540   xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
10541 </p></blockquote>
10542
10543 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10544
10545 <blockquote><p>
10546   deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
10547   xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
10548   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
10549 </p></blockquote>
10550
10551 <p>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
10552 <a href="http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120">changed
10553 in git</a> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
10554 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
10555 the difference somewhat.
10556
10557       </div>
10558       <div class="tags">
10559
10560
10561         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>.
10562
10563
10564       </div>
10565     </div>
10566     <div class="padding"></div>
10567
10568     <div class="entry">
10569       <div class="title">
10570         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
10571       </div>
10572       <div class="date">
10573         28th June 2010
10574       </div>
10575       <div class="body">
10576         <p>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
10577 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
10578 tool to browse the LDAP tree.  The only one I was able to find in
10579 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
10580 <a href="http://luma.sourceforge.net/">LUMA</a>, which has proved to
10581 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
10582 populated by default in Skolelinux.  Thanks to it, I have been able to
10583 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
10584 objects.  It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze.  If you
10585 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)</p>
10586
10587 <p>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
10588 the BTS yet.  There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
10589 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
10590 Debian submenu in KDE.  I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
10591 released.</p>
10592
10593 <p>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet.  I would
10594 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
10595 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet.  So in the mean time, I use
10596 <a href="http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/">ldapvi</a> for that.</p>
10597
10598 <p>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
10599 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
10600
10601 <p>Update 2010-06-29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
10602 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html">gq</a> package as a
10603 useful GUI alternative.  It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
10604 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze.  Unless that
10605 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.</p>
10606
10607       </div>
10608       <div class="tags">
10609
10610
10611         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>.
10612
10613
10614       </div>
10615     </div>
10616     <div class="padding"></div>
10617
10618     <div class="entry">
10619       <div class="title">
10620         <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>
10621       </div>
10622       <div class="date">
10623         24th June 2010
10624       </div>
10625       <div class="body">
10626         <p>A while back, I
10627 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
10628 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
10629 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
10630 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
10631
10632 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
10633 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
10634 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
10635 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
10636
10637 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
10638 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
10639 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
10640 Debian Edu.</p>
10641
10642 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
10643 the
10644 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
10645 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
10646 available today from IETF.</p>
10647
10648 <pre>
10649 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
10650 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
10651 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
10652  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
10653         NAME 'dhcpHost'
10654         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
10655 -       SUP top
10656 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
10657         MUST cn
10658         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
10659         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
10660 </pre>
10661
10662 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
10663 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
10664 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
10665
10666 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
10667 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
10668
10669       </div>
10670       <div class="tags">
10671
10672
10673         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>.
10674
10675
10676       </div>
10677     </div>
10678     <div class="padding"></div>
10679
10680     <div class="entry">
10681       <div class="title">
10682         <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>
10683       </div>
10684       <div class="date">
10685         16th June 2010
10686       </div>
10687       <div class="body">
10688         <p>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
10689 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run.  Until now,
10690 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
10691 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
10692 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
10693 this:
10694
10695 <blockquote><pre>
10696 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
10697 tasksel --new-install
10698 </pre></blockquote>
10699
10700 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
10701 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
10702 any output what so ever.
10703
10704 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
10705 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
10706 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
10707 happen.  Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
10708 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
10709 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run.  I ended up using
10710 code like this:
10711
10712 <blockquote><pre>
10713 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
10714 cmd="$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed 's/debconf-apt-progress -- //')"
10715 $cmd
10716 </pre></blockquote>
10717
10718 <p>The content of $cmd is typically something like "<tt>aptitude -q
10719 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
10720 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
10721 ~pimportant</tt>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
10722 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
10723 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
10724 installation.</p>
10725
10726 <p>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
10727 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
10728 like this.</p>
10729
10730       </div>
10731       <div class="tags">
10732
10733
10734         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>.
10735
10736
10737       </div>
10738     </div>
10739     <div class="padding"></div>
10740
10741     <div class="entry">
10742       <div class="title">
10743         <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>
10744       </div>
10745       <div class="date">
10746         13th June 2010
10747       </div>
10748       <div class="body">
10749         <p>My
10750 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">testing
10751 of Debian upgrades</a> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've
10752 finally made the upgrade logs available from
10753 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/</a>.
10754 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
10755 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting.  This time
10756 I will only focus on their removal plans.</p>
10757
10758 <p>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
10759 to remove 72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze.  The
10760 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
10761 xserver-xorg-video* drivers.  Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
10762 sure why.  When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove 129
10763 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
10764 longer needed.  Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
10765 I do not know.  Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?</p>
10766
10767 <p>For KDE, apt-get want to remove 82 packages, among them kdebase
10768 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
10769 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove 192 packages, none which are
10770 too surprising.</p>
10771
10772 <p>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
10773 and avoided, and perhaps others as well.  Here are the complete list
10774 of planned removals.  The complete logs is available from the URL
10775 above.  Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
10776 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
10777 conffile questions.  No idea why.  I worked around it by using
10778 '<tt>echo >> /proc/<em>pidofdpkg</em>/fd/0</tt>' to tell dpkg to
10779 continue.</p>
10780
10781 <p><b>apt-get gnome 72</b>
10782 <br>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
10783   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
10784   iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-1-0
10785   libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
10786   nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
10787   serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
10788   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
10789   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
10790   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
10791   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
10792   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
10793   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
10794   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
10795   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
10796   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10797   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
10798   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
10799   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
10800   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
10801   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
10802   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
10803   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
10804   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
10805   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
10806   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
10807   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
10808   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
10809   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9
10810   xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support</p>
10811
10812 <p><b>aptitude gnome 129</b>
10813
10814 <br>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
10815   djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
10816   gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
10817   gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
10818   libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
10819   libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
10820   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20
10821   libeel2-data libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libfaad0 libgail-common
10822   libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libgdl-1-0 libgdl-1-common
10823   libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0
10824   libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-0
10825   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
10826   libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
10827   libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6
10828   libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++10
10829   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
10830   libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2
10831   libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10
10832   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-8
10833   libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8 libssh2-1
10834   libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
10835   libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
10836   libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
10837   libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
10838   openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
10839   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
10840   python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
10841   python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
10842   swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
10843   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10844   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
10845   zip</p>
10846
10847 <p><b>apt-get kde 82</b>
10848
10849 <br>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
10850   kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
10851   kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
10852   kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
10853   kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
10854   libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
10855   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
10856   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
10857   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
10858   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
10859   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
10860   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
10861   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
10862   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
10863   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10864   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
10865   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
10866   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
10867   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
10868   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
10869   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
10870   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
10871   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
10872   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
10873   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
10874   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
10875   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
10876   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9</p>
10877
10878 <p><b>aptitude kde 192</b>
10879 <br>bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
10880   djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
10881   ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
10882   kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
10883   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
10884   kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
10885   kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
10886   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
10887   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
10888   kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
10889   kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
10890   klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
10891   kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
10892   krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
10893   ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
10894   kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
10895   kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
10896   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
10897   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
10898   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
10899   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
10900   libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0
10901   libicu38 libiec61883-0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
10902   libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
10903   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
10904   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
10905   libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
10906   libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 libsmbios2
10907   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
10908   libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
10909   libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
10910   openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
10911   superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
10912   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
10913   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
10914   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
10915   xulrunner-1.9</p>
10916
10917
10918       </div>
10919       <div class="tags">
10920
10921
10922         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>.
10923
10924
10925       </div>
10926     </div>
10927     <div class="padding"></div>
10928
10929     <div class="entry">
10930       <div class="title">
10931         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze</a>
10932       </div>
10933       <div class="date">
10934         11th June 2010
10935       </div>
10936       <div class="body">
10937         <p>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
10938 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly.  A few bugs
10939 have been discovered and reported in the process
10940 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585410">#585410</a> in nagios3-cgi,
10941 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584879">#584879</a> already fixed in
10942 enscript and <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> in
10943 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
10944 am working on a script to automate the test.</p>
10945
10946 <p>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
10947 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
10948 it.  To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
10949 script is inserted.  To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
10950 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
10951 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).</p>
10952
10953 <p>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
10954 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
10955 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
10956 is created.  The bug report
10957 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566000">#566000</a> make me suspect
10958 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
10959 to make sure the upgrade go well.  Testing on virtual and real
10960 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
10961 do the trick in such settings anyway.  This is a
10962 <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-804130/">known
10963 issue</a> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
10964 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
10965 working with old kernels or something like that.  I really wish the
10966 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
10967 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
10968 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
10969 Debian Squeeze.</p>
10970
10971 <p>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades.  This test
10972 script, which I call <tt>upgrade-test</tt> for now, is doing the
10973 trick:</p>
10974
10975 <blockquote><pre>
10976 #!/bin/sh
10977 set -ex
10978
10979 if [ "$1" ] ; then
10980     desktop=$1
10981 else
10982     desktop=gnome
10983 fi
10984
10985 from=lenny
10986 to=squeeze
10987
10988 exec &lt; /dev/null
10989 unset LANG
10990 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
10991 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
10992 fuser -mv .
10993 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
10994 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
10995 cat > $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d &lt;&lt;EOF
10996 #!/bin/sh
10997 exit 101
10998 EOF
10999 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
11000 exit_cleanup() {
11001     umount $tmpdir/proc
11002 }
11003 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
11004 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
11005 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
11006
11007 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
11008
11009 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger.  It need the test scripts
11010 # to return the correct answers.
11011 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
11012     chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
11013
11014 # Include the desktop and laptop task
11015 for test in desktop laptop ; do
11016     echo > $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test &lt;&lt;EOF
11017 #!/bin/sh
11018 exit 2
11019 EOF
11020     chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
11021 done
11022
11023 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
11024 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
11025 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
11026 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
11027
11028 echo deb $mirror $to main > $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
11029 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
11030 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
11031 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
11032 fuser -mv
11033 </pre></blockquote>
11034
11035 <p>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
11036 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
11037 differently so far.  I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
11038 regularly and post the result on the web.  The Gnome upgrade currently
11039 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
11040 kdebase-workspace-data</p>
11041
11042 <p>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
11043 (KDE 167 KiB, Gnome 516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
11044 post, so I will refrain from trying.  I can report that for Gnome,
11045 aptitude report 760 packages upgraded, 448 newly installed, 129 to
11046 remove and 1 not upgraded and 1024MB need to be downloaded while for
11047 KDE the same numbers are 702 packages upgraded, 507 newly installed,
11048 193 to remove and 0 not upgraded and 1117MB need to be downloaded</p>
11049
11050 <p>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
11051 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
11052 booting without a hitch.  Was unsure if there were still bugs with
11053 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
11054 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
11055 packages.</p>
11056
11057       </div>
11058       <div class="tags">
11059
11060
11061         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>.
11062
11063
11064       </div>
11065     </div>
11066     <div class="padding"></div>
11067
11068     <div class="entry">
11069       <div class="title">
11070         <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>
11071       </div>
11072       <div class="date">
11073          6th June 2010
11074       </div>
11075       <div class="body">
11076         <p>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
11077 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
11078 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd.  The packages with such
11079 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
11080 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart.  Because of
11081 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
11082 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.</p>
11083
11084 <p>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
11085 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
11086 COLUMNS):</p>
11087
11088 <blockquote><pre>
11089 DEFAULT_RUNLEVEL=2
11090 previous=N
11091 PREVLEVEL=
11092 RUNLEVEL=
11093 runlevel=S
11094 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
11095 UPSTART_INSTANCE=
11096 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
11097 </pre></blockquote>
11098
11099 <p>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
11100 script.</p>
11101
11102 <blockquote><pre>
11103 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-2.88
11104 previous=N
11105 PREVLEVEL=N
11106 RUNLEVEL=S
11107 runlevel=S
11108 </pre></blockquote>
11109
11110 <p>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
11111 sysvinit are not set by upstart.  Not sure if it is intentional or not
11112 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.</p>
11113
11114 <p>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
11115 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
11116 choice.</p>
11117
11118       </div>
11119       <div class="tags">
11120
11121
11122         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>.
11123
11124
11125       </div>
11126     </div>
11127     <div class="padding"></div>
11128
11129     <div class="entry">
11130       <div class="title">
11131         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html">A manual for standards wars...</a>
11132       </div>
11133       <div class="date">
11134          6th June 2010
11135       </div>
11136       <div class="body">
11137         <p>Via the
11138 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html">blog
11139 of Rob Weir</a> I came across the very interesting essay named
11140 <a href="http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf">The Art of
11141 Standards Wars</a> (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
11142 following the standards wars of today.</p>
11143
11144       </div>
11145       <div class="tags">
11146
11147
11148         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>.
11149
11150
11151       </div>
11152     </div>
11153     <div class="padding"></div>
11154
11155     <div class="entry">
11156       <div class="title">
11157         <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>
11158       </div>
11159       <div class="date">
11160          3rd June 2010
11161       </div>
11162       <div class="body">
11163         <p>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
11164 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
11165 information extracted from each machine.  The script to do so is
11166 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
11167 the Skolelinux build servers:</p>
11168
11169 <blockquote><pre>
11170 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
11171   vendor                    count
11172   Dell Computer Corporation     1
11173     PowerEdge 1750              1
11174   IBM                           1
11175     eserver xSeries 345 -[8670M1X]-     1
11176   Intel                         2
11177   [no-dmi-info]                 3
11178 maintainer:~#
11179 </pre></blockquote>
11180
11181 <p>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
11182 provided in each machine.  Here there are Intel machines without model
11183 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
11184 machines listed as [no-dmi-info].  One can add -l as a command line
11185 option to list the individual machines.</p>
11186
11187 <p>A larger list is
11188 <a href="http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/">available from the the
11189 city of Narvik</a>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
11190 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly.  In their report there
11191 are ~1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
11192 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
11193 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
11194 collector.</p>
11195
11196       </div>
11197       <div class="tags">
11198
11199
11200         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>.
11201
11202
11203       </div>
11204     </div>
11205     <div class="padding"></div>
11206
11207     <div class="entry">
11208       <div class="title">
11209         <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>
11210       </div>
11211       <div class="date">
11212          1st June 2010
11213       </div>
11214       <div class="body">
11215         <p>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
11216 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled.  The
11217 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
11218 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
11219 wait.</p>
11220
11221 <p>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
11222 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">#583312</a> initially filed
11223 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
11224 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
11225 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/524751">#524751</a> initially filed against
11226 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.</p>
11227
11228 <p>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
11229 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
11230 distribution work out of the box for these users.  The nvidia driver
11231 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
11232 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
11233 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
11234 distribution that work for them.  I have no idea what the solution is,
11235 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.</p>
11236
11237 <p>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.</p>
11238
11239       </div>
11240       <div class="tags">
11241
11242
11243         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>.
11244
11245
11246       </div>
11247     </div>
11248     <div class="padding"></div>
11249
11250     <div class="entry">
11251       <div class="title">
11252         <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>
11253       </div>
11254       <div class="date">
11255         27th May 2010
11256       </div>
11257       <div class="body">
11258         <p>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
11259 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
11260 issues are known and should be solved:
11261
11262 <p><ul>
11263
11264 <li>The wicd package seen to
11265 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/508289">break NFS mounting</a> and
11266 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/581586">network setup</a> when
11267 parallel booting is enabled.  No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
11268 seem to be on the case.</li>
11269
11270 <li>The nvidia X driver seem to
11271 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">have a race condition</a>
11272 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect.  The
11273 maintainer is on the case.</li>
11274
11275 <li>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
11276 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
11277 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/575080">try to switch back</a> to
11278 sysv-rc.  One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
11279 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
11280 sysv-rc more robust.  Will investigate some more and probably upload a
11281 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
11282 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.</li>
11283
11284 </ul></p>
11285
11286 <p>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
11287 solvable before Squeeze is released.  In addition to these there are
11288 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
11289 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.</p>
11290
11291 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
11292 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
11293 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
11294 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
11295
11296 <p>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.</p>
11297
11298       </div>
11299       <div class="tags">
11300
11301
11302         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>.
11303
11304
11305       </div>
11306     </div>
11307     <div class="padding"></div>
11308
11309     <div class="entry">
11310       <div class="title">
11311         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html">More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer</a>
11312       </div>
11313       <div class="date">
11314         22nd May 2010
11315       </div>
11316       <div class="body">
11317         <p>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
11318 found time today to return to the project.  Having to spend less time
11319 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
11320 definitely helped freeing some time.</p>
11321
11322 <p>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu.  We
11323 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
11324 get disk and network controllers working.  Without having these
11325 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
11326 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
11327 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
11328 an external medium is a support pain.  Initially, I expected it to be
11329 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
11330 debian-installer to find and use them.  This proved to be wrong.
11331 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
11332 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
11333 /cdrom/firmware/).  This also proved to not work, and at this point I
11334 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
11335 going to work.</p>
11336
11337 <p>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
11338 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
11339 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
11340 packages.  It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
11341 "external" media devices.  Today I changed it to also look in the
11342 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
11343 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu.  I also changed it to
11344 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
11345 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
11346 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
11347 Edu.</p>
11348
11349 <p>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
11350 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
11351 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
11352 run these before activating the firmware during installation.  The
11353 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
11354 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.</p>
11355
11356 <p>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
11357 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.</p>
11358
11359       </div>
11360       <div class="tags">
11361
11362
11363         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>.
11364
11365
11366       </div>
11367     </div>
11368     <div class="padding"></div>
11369
11370     <div class="entry">
11371       <div class="title">
11372         <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>
11373       </div>
11374       <div class="date">
11375         14th May 2010
11376       </div>
11377       <div class="body">
11378         <p>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
11379 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
11380 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
11381 expected, if I am to believe the
11382 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
11383 on debian-devel@</a>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
11384 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
11385 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen.  If serious problems are
11386 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
11387 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
11388 version.</p>
11389
11390 More information about
11391 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
11392 based boot sequencing</a> is available from the Debian wiki.  It is
11393 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
11394 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:</p>
11395
11396 <blockquote><pre>
11397 CONCURRENCY=none
11398 </pre></blockquote>
11399
11400 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
11401 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
11402 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
11403 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
11404
11405       </div>
11406       <div class="tags">
11407
11408
11409         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>.
11410
11411
11412       </div>
11413     </div>
11414     <div class="padding"></div>
11415
11416     <div class="entry">
11417       <div class="title">
11418         <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>
11419       </div>
11420       <div class="date">
11421         14th May 2010
11422       </div>
11423       <div class="body">
11424         <p>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
11425 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">sitesummary
11426 system</a> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
11427 network.  Each machine will automatically report its status to the
11428 central server after boot and once per night.  The network setup is
11429 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
11430 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines.  This is useful
11431 to update the DHCP configuration.</p>
11432
11433 <p>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
11434 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary.  Run
11435 this on the collector host:</p>
11436
11437 <blockquote><pre>
11438 perl -MSiteSummary -e 'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(" ", get_macaddresses(shift)), "\n"; });'
11439 </pre></blockquote>
11440
11441 <p>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
11442 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.</p>
11443
11444 <p>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
11445 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
11446 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
11447 tables in LDAP using this information.  Such tool is unfortunately not
11448 written yet.</p>
11449
11450       </div>
11451       <div class="tags">
11452
11453
11454         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>.
11455
11456
11457       </div>
11458     </div>
11459     <div class="padding"></div>
11460
11461     <div class="entry">
11462       <div class="title">
11463         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html">systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart</a>
11464       </div>
11465       <div class="date">
11466         13th May 2010
11467       </div>
11468       <div class="body">
11469         <p>The last few days a new boot system called
11470 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd">systemd</a>
11471 has been
11472 <a href="http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html">introduced</a>
11473
11474 to the free software world.  I have not yet had time to play around
11475 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
11476 <a href="http://upstart.ubuntu.com/">upstart</a>, and might prove to be
11477 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
11478 based boot system.  Tollef is
11479 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/580814">in the process</a> of getting
11480 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work.  I
11481 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
11482 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
11483 at the moment do not.</p>
11484
11485 <p>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
11486 platform support.  It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
11487 some new kernel features enabled to function properly.  This means
11488 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
11489 system.  Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
11490 way forward.</p>
11491
11492 <p>In the mean time, based on the
11493 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
11494 on debian-devel@</a> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
11495 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
11496 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
11497 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies.  A
11498 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
11499 already in experimental.  If all go well, Squeeze will be released
11500 with parallel booting enabled by default.</p>
11501
11502       </div>
11503       <div class="tags">
11504
11505
11506         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>.
11507
11508
11509       </div>
11510     </div>
11511     <div class="padding"></div>
11512
11513     <div class="entry">
11514       <div class="title">
11515         <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>
11516       </div>
11517       <div class="date">
11518          6th May 2010
11519       </div>
11520       <div class="body">
11521         <p>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
11522 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
11523 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies.  If you want
11524 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
11525 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
11526 based boot sequencing</a> is enabled, and add this line to
11527 /etc/default/rcS:</p>
11528
11529 <blockquote><pre>
11530 CONCURRENCY=makefile
11531 </pre></blockquote>
11532
11533 <p>That is it.  It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
11534 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
11535 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
11536 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts.  Startpar is configured
11537 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
11538 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
11539 make this happen.</p>
11540
11541 <p>Give it a try, and see if you like the result.  If some services
11542 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
11543 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
11544 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies).  Report bugs and get
11545 the package maintainers to fix it. :)</p>
11546
11547 <p>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
11548 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct.  I
11549 expect we will get there in Squeeze+1, if we get manage to test and
11550 fix the remaining issues.</p>
11551
11552 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
11553 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
11554 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
11555 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
11556
11557       </div>
11558       <div class="tags">
11559
11560
11561         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>.
11562
11563
11564       </div>
11565     </div>
11566     <div class="padding"></div>
11567
11568     <div class="entry">
11569       <div class="title">
11570         <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>
11571       </div>
11572       <div class="date">
11573         27th July 2009
11574       </div>
11575       <div class="body">
11576         <p>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2,
11577 and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable
11578 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing.  This
11579 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
11580 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
11581 installation.  Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
11582 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.</p>
11583
11584 <p>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
11585 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
11586 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.</p>
11587
11588       </div>
11589       <div class="tags">
11590
11591
11592         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>.
11593
11594
11595       </div>
11596     </div>
11597     <div class="padding"></div>
11598
11599     <div class="entry">
11600       <div class="title">
11601         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html">Taking over sysvinit development</a>
11602       </div>
11603       <div class="date">
11604         22nd July 2009
11605       </div>
11606       <div class="body">
11607         <p>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
11608 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
11609 take over the package and become the new upstream.  The number of
11610 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
11611 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
11612 the package up to date.</p>
11613
11614 <p>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
11615 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman.  About 10 days ago, I made
11616 a new upstream tarball with version number 2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
11617 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
11618 distributions.  We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
11619 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge.  Since the
11620 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
11621 upstream project at <a href="http://savannah.nongnu.org/">Savannah</a>, and continue
11622 development there.  The project is registered and currently waiting
11623 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
11624 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
11625 working on the future release.</p>
11626
11627 <p>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
11628 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.</p>
11629
11630       </div>
11631       <div class="tags">
11632
11633
11634         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>.
11635
11636
11637       </div>
11638     </div>
11639     <div class="padding"></div>
11640
11641     <div class="entry">
11642       <div class="title">
11643         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html">Debian boots quicker and quicker</a>
11644       </div>
11645       <div class="date">
11646         24th June 2009
11647       </div>
11648       <div class="body">
11649         <p>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
11650 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
11651 could find more ways to speed up the boot system.  This was an Ubuntu
11652 funded
11653 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint">developer
11654 gathering</a>. It was quite productive.  We also discussed the future
11655 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
11656 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
11657 asynchronous and event base.  The Ubuntu approach using udev and
11658 upstart might be a good way forward.  Time will show.</p>
11659
11660 <p>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
11661 process in Debian.  All of these should be applied to get a quick
11662 boot:</p>
11663
11664 <ul>
11665
11666 <li>Use dash as /bin/sh.</li>
11667
11668 <li>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
11669    clock is in UTC.</li>
11670
11671 <li>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
11672    <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
11673    based boot sequencing</a>, and enable concurrent booting.</li>
11674
11675 </ul>
11676
11677 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
11678 <a href="http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/">Carlos
11679 Villegas</a>.
11680
11681 <p>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
11682 unstable yesterday.  When we tested it, we were able to cut 6 seconds
11683 from the boot sequence.  It depend on very correct dependency
11684 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
11685 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
11686 using this.</p>
11687
11688 <p>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
11689 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
11690 startup speed as well.  Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
11691 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
11692 possible to run a of them in the same process.  A quick way to test
11693 this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
11694 insserv'.  Will need to test if that work. :)</p>
11695
11696       </div>
11697       <div class="tags">
11698
11699
11700         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>.
11701
11702
11703       </div>
11704     </div>
11705     <div class="padding"></div>
11706
11707     <div class="entry">
11708       <div class="title">
11709         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/BSAs_p_stander_om_piratkopiering_m_ter_motstand.html">BSAs påstander om piratkopiering møter motstand</a>
11710       </div>
11711       <div class="date">
11712         17th May 2009
11713       </div>
11714       <div class="body">
11715         <p>Hvert år de siste årene har BSA, lobbyfronten til de store
11716 programvareselskapene som Microsoft og Apple, publisert en rapport der
11717 de gjetter på hvor mye piratkopiering påfører i tapte inntekter i
11718 ulike land rundt om i verden.  Resultatene er tendensiøse.  For noen
11719 dager siden kom
11720 <a href="http://global.bsa.org/globalpiracy2008/studies/globalpiracy2008.pdf">siste
11721 rapport</a>, og det er flere kritiske kommentarer publisert de siste
11722 dagene.  Et spesielt interessant kommentar fra Sverige,
11723 <a href="http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.229795/bsa-hoftade-sverigesiffror">BSA
11724 höftade Sverigesiffror</a>, oppsummeres slik:</p>
11725
11726 <blockquote>
11727 I sin senaste rapport slår BSA fast att 25 procent av all mjukvara i
11728 Sverige är piratkopierad. Det utan att ha pratat med ett enda svenskt
11729 företag. "Man bör nog kanske inte se de här siffrorna som helt
11730 exakta", säger BSAs Sverigechef John Hugosson.
11731 </blockquote>
11732
11733 <p>Mon tro om de er like metodiske når de gjetter på andelen piratkopiering i Norge?  To andre kommentarer er <a
11734 href="http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/comment/2242134/bsa-piracy-figures-shot-reality">BSA
11735 piracy figures need a shot of reality</a> og <a
11736 href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3958/125/">Does The WIPO
11737 Copyright Treaty Work?</a></p>
11738
11739 <p>Fant lenkene via <a
11740 href="http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/17/1632242">oppslag
11741 på Slashdot</a>.</p>
11742
11743       </div>
11744       <div class="tags">
11745
11746
11747         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</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>.
11748
11749
11750       </div>
11751     </div>
11752     <div class="padding"></div>
11753
11754     <div class="entry">
11755       <div class="title">
11756         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/IDG_mener_linux_i_servermarkedet_vil_vokse_med_21__i_2009.html">IDG mener linux i servermarkedet vil vokse med 21% i 2009</a>
11757       </div>
11758       <div class="date">
11759          7th May 2009
11760       </div>
11761       <div class="body">
11762         <p>Kom over
11763 <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10216873-16.html">interessante
11764 tall</a> fra IDG om utviklingen av linuxservermarkedet.  Fikk meg til
11765 å tenke på antall tjenermaskiner ved Universitetet i Oslo der jeg
11766 jobber til daglig.  En rask opptelling forteller meg at vi har 490
11767 (61%) fysiske unix-tjener (mest linux men også noen solaris) og 196
11768 (25%) windowstjenere, samt 112 (14%) virtuelle unix-tjenere.  Med den
11769 bakgrunnskunnskapen kan jeg godt tro at IDG er inne på noe.</p>
11770
11771       </div>
11772       <div class="tags">
11773
11774
11775         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug</a>.
11776
11777
11778       </div>
11779     </div>
11780     <div class="padding"></div>
11781
11782     <div class="entry">
11783       <div class="title">
11784         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kryptert_harddisk___naturligvis.html">Kryptert harddisk - naturligvis</a>
11785       </div>
11786       <div class="date">
11787          2nd May 2009
11788       </div>
11789       <div class="body">
11790         <p><a href="http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1658676.ece">Dagens
11791 IT melder</a> at Intel hevder at det er dyrt å miste en datamaskin,
11792 når en tar tap av arbeidstid, fortrolige dokumenter,
11793 personopplysninger og alt annet det innebærer.  Det er ingen tvil om
11794 at det er en kostbar affære å miste sin datamaskin, og det er årsaken
11795 til at jeg har kryptert harddisken på både kontormaskinen og min
11796 bærbare.  Begge inneholder personopplysninger jeg ikke ønsker skal
11797 komme på avveie, den første informasjon relatert til jobben min ved
11798 Universitetet i Oslo, og den andre relatert til blant annet
11799 foreningsarbeide.  Kryptering av diskene gjør at det er lite
11800 sannsynlig at dophoder som kan finne på å rappe maskinene får noe ut
11801 av dem.  Maskinene låses automatisk etter noen minutter uten bruk,
11802 og en reboot vil gjøre at de ber om passord før de vil starte opp.
11803 Jeg bruker Debian på begge maskinene, og installasjonssystemet der
11804 gjør det trivielt å sette opp krypterte disker.  Jeg har LVM på toppen
11805 av krypterte partisjoner, slik at alt av datapartisjoner er kryptert.
11806 Jeg anbefaler alle å kryptere diskene på sine bærbare.  Kostnaden når
11807 det er gjort slik jeg gjør det er minimale, og gevinstene er
11808 betydelige.  En bør dog passe på passordet.  Hvis det går tapt, må
11809 maskinen reinstalleres og alt er tapt.</p>
11810
11811 <p>Krypteringen vil ikke stoppe kompetente angripere som f.eks. kjøler
11812 ned minnebrikkene før maskinen rebootes med programvare for å hente ut
11813 krypteringsnøklene.  Kostnaden med å forsvare seg mot slike angripere
11814 er for min del høyere enn gevinsten.  Jeg tror oddsene for at
11815 f.eks. etteretningsorganisasjoner har glede av å titte på mine
11816 maskiner er minimale, og ulempene jeg ville oppnå ved å forsøke å
11817 gjøre det vanskeligere for angripere med kompetanse og ressurser er
11818 betydelige.</p>
11819
11820       </div>
11821       <div class="tags">
11822
11823
11824         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</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>.
11825
11826
11827       </div>
11828     </div>
11829     <div class="padding"></div>
11830
11831     <div class="entry">
11832       <div class="title">
11833         <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>
11834       </div>
11835       <div class="date">
11836          2nd May 2009
11837       </div>
11838       <div class="body">
11839         <p>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
11840 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
11841 do not yet know them.</p>
11842
11843 <p>The first one is <a href="http://valgrind.org/">valgrind</a>, a
11844 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
11845 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run 'valgrind program',
11846 and it will report any problems on stdout.  It is even better if the
11847 program include debug information.  With debug information, it is able
11848 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
11849 occurs.  It can report things like 'reading past memory block in file
11850 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M', and
11851 'using uninitialised value in control logic'.  This tool has made it
11852 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
11853 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
11854
11855 <p>The second one is
11856 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity">Coverity</a> which is
11857 a source code checker.  It is able to process the source of a program
11858 and find problems in the logic without running the program.  It
11859 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
11860 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel.  It is now a commercial tool
11861 and the company behind it is running
11862 <a href="http://www.scan.coverity.com/">a community service</a> for the
11863 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
11864 their source checked for free.  Several thousand defects have been
11865 found and fixed so far.  It can find errors like 'lock L taken in file
11866 X line N is never released if exiting in line M', or 'the code in file
11867 Y lines O to P can never be executed'.  The projects included in the
11868 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
11869 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.</p>
11870
11871 <p>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
11872 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
11873 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
11874 surrounded by today.</p>
11875
11876       </div>
11877       <div class="tags">
11878
11879
11880         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>.
11881
11882
11883       </div>
11884     </div>
11885     <div class="padding"></div>
11886
11887     <div class="entry">
11888       <div class="title">
11889         <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>
11890       </div>
11891       <div class="date">
11892         28th April 2009
11893       </div>
11894       <div class="body">
11895         <p>Julien Blache
11896 <a href="http://blog.technologeek.org/2009/04/12/214">claim that no
11897 patch is better than a useless patch</a>.  I completely disagree, as a
11898 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
11899 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
11900 time on fixing it.  No patch do not provide any of these positive
11901 properties.</p>
11902
11903       </div>
11904       <div class="tags">
11905
11906
11907         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>.
11908
11909
11910       </div>
11911     </div>
11912     <div class="padding"></div>
11913
11914     <div class="entry">
11915       <div class="title">
11916         <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>
11917       </div>
11918       <div class="date">
11919         30th March 2009
11920       </div>
11921       <div class="body">
11922         <p>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
11923 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
11924 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
11925 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
11926 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
11927 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
11928 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
11929 application.</p>
11930
11931 <p>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
11932 independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
11933 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
11934 protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
11935 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
11936 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
11937 blocked from doing so.</p>
11938
11939 <p>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
11940 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
11941 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
11942 requirements change.</p>
11943
11944 <p>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
11945 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
11946 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.</p>
11947
11948       </div>
11949       <div class="tags">
11950
11951
11952         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>.
11953
11954
11955       </div>
11956     </div>
11957     <div class="padding"></div>
11958
11959     <div class="entry">
11960       <div class="title">
11961         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html">Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering</a>
11962       </div>
11963       <div class="date">
11964         29th March 2009
11965       </div>
11966       <div class="body">
11967         <p>I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
11968 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering.  I got a bit done tuning the
11969 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
11970 implementation avahi.  It look like it could be useful for us.  Almost
11971 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
11972 get to know the Skolelinux system.  Walter Bender, involved in the
11973 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
11974 also helped me improve my OLPC installation.  He also showed me that
11975 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
11976 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian.  As a
11977 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu.  We also
11978 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
11979 proved to be too hard for us.  The application seem to need more work
11980 before it is ready for me.  I look forward to getting home and relax
11981 now. :)</p>
11982
11983       </div>
11984       <div class="tags">
11985
11986
11987         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>.
11988
11989
11990       </div>
11991     </div>
11992     <div class="padding"></div>
11993
11994     <div class="entry">
11995       <div class="title">
11996         <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>
11997       </div>
11998       <div class="date">
11999         29th March 2009
12000       </div>
12001       <div class="body">
12002         <p>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
12003 optimal.  There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
12004 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with
12005 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory.  The RFC
12006 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
12007 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.</p>
12008
12009 <p>In <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux</a>,
12010 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
12011 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
12012 and LTSP configuration in LDAP.  These objects have a lot in common,
12013 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
12014 object per entity.  For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
12015 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
12016 DNS information and another with DHCP information.  The schemas
12017 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
12018 object.  In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
12019 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
12020 It just do not scale.  I believe it is time for a few RFC
12021 specifications to cleam up this mess.</p>
12022
12023 <p>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
12024 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
12025 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
12026 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.</p>
12027
12028 <p>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
12029 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.</p>
12030
12031 <p>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
12032 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up.  Time to start a
12033 new IETF work group?</p>
12034
12035       </div>
12036       <div class="tags">
12037
12038
12039         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>.
12040
12041
12042       </div>
12043     </div>
12044     <div class="padding"></div>
12045
12046     <div class="entry">
12047       <div class="title">
12048         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Endelig_er_Debian_Lenny_gitt_ut.html">Endelig er Debian Lenny gitt ut</a>
12049       </div>
12050       <div class="date">
12051         15th February 2009
12052       </div>
12053       <div class="body">
12054         <p>Endelig er <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>
12055 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090214">Lenny</a> gitt ut.
12056 Et langt steg videre for Debian-prosjektet, og en rekke nye
12057 programpakker blir nå tilgjengelig for de av oss som bruker den
12058 stabile utgaven av Debian.  Neste steg er nå å få
12059 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> /
12060 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> ferdig
12061 oppdatert for den nye utgaven, slik at en oppdatert versjon kan
12062 slippes løs på skolene.  Takk til alle debian-utviklerne som har
12063 gjort dette mulig.  Endelig er f.eks. fungerende avhengighetsstyrt
12064 bootsekvens tilgjengelig i stabil utgave, vha pakken
12065 <tt>insserv</tt>.</p>
12066
12067       </div>
12068       <div class="tags">
12069
12070
12071         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/norsk">norsk</a>.
12072
12073
12074       </div>
12075     </div>
12076     <div class="padding"></div>
12077
12078     <div class="entry">
12079       <div class="title">
12080         <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>
12081       </div>
12082       <div class="date">
12083          7th December 2008
12084       </div>
12085       <div class="body">
12086         <p>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
12087 Oslo.  Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
12088 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
12089 LTSP installation.  LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network.
12090 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
12091 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box.  Was working on getting the
12092 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
12093 finish it before the weekend was up.</p>
12094
12095 <p>Did not find time to look at the 4 VGA cards in one box we got from
12096 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
12097 development gathering.  Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
12098 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
12099 of these cards.</p>
12100
12101       </div>
12102       <div class="tags">
12103
12104
12105         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>.
12106
12107
12108       </div>
12109     </div>
12110     <div class="padding"></div>
12111
12112     <div class="entry">
12113       <div class="title">
12114         <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>
12115       </div>
12116       <div class="date">
12117         25th November 2008
12118       </div>
12119       <div class="body">
12120         <p>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
12121 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
12122 default in Debian Edu.  We need an embedded video playing plugin with
12123 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
12124 all the multimedia content available on the web.  The test results and
12125 notes are available on
12126 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">the
12127 Debian wiki</a>.  I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
12128 fill this need.  My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
12129 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages.  A lot of the MIME
12130 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
12131 video/ogg), just do not work.  And simple formats like the
12132 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn't supported by the
12133 totem and vlc plugins.  I hope the situation will improve soon.  No
12134 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.</p>
12135
12136 <p>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin.  It seem to
12137 be the only one fitting our needs. :/</p>
12138
12139       </div>
12140       <div class="tags">
12141
12142
12143         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>.
12144
12145
12146       </div>
12147     </div>
12148     <div class="padding"></div>
12149
12150     <p style="text-align: right;"><a href="debian.rss"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/xml.gif" alt="RSS Feed" width="36" height="14" /></a></p>
12151     <div id="sidebar">
12152
12153
12154
12155 <h2>Archive</h2>
12156 <ul>
12157
12158 <li>2017
12159 <ul>
12160
12161 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/01/">January (4)</a></li>
12162
12163 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/02/">February (3)</a></li>
12164
12165 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/03/">March (1)</a></li>
12166
12167 </ul></li>
12168
12169 <li>2016
12170 <ul>
12171
12172 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
12173
12174 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
12175
12176 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
12177
12178 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
12179
12180 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
12181
12182 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12183
12184 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/07/">July (2)</a></li>
12185
12186 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/08/">August (5)</a></li>
12187
12188 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/09/">September (2)</a></li>
12189
12190 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/10/">October (3)</a></li>
12191
12192 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/11/">November (8)</a></li>
12193
12194 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/12/">December (5)</a></li>
12195
12196 </ul></li>
12197
12198 <li>2015
12199 <ul>
12200
12201 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
12202
12203 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
12204
12205 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
12206
12207 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
12208
12209 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
12210
12211 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
12212
12213 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
12214
12215 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
12216
12217 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
12218
12219 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
12220
12221 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
12222
12223 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
12224
12225 </ul></li>
12226
12227 <li>2014
12228 <ul>
12229
12230 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
12231
12232 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
12233
12234 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
12235
12236 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
12237
12238 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
12239
12240 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12241
12242 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
12243
12244 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
12245
12246 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
12247
12248 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
12249
12250 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
12251
12252 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
12253
12254 </ul></li>
12255
12256 <li>2013
12257 <ul>
12258
12259 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
12260
12261 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
12262
12263 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
12264
12265 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
12266
12267 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
12268
12269 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
12270
12271 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
12272
12273 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
12274
12275 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
12276
12277 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
12278
12279 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
12280
12281 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
12282
12283 </ul></li>
12284
12285 <li>2012
12286 <ul>
12287
12288 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
12289
12290 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
12291
12292 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
12293
12294 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
12295
12296 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
12297
12298 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
12299
12300 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
12301
12302 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
12303
12304 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
12305
12306 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
12307
12308 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
12309
12310 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
12311
12312 </ul></li>
12313
12314 <li>2011
12315 <ul>
12316
12317 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
12318
12319 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
12320
12321 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
12322
12323 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
12324
12325 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
12326
12327 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
12328
12329 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
12330
12331 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
12332
12333 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
12334
12335 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
12336
12337 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
12338
12339 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
12340
12341 </ul></li>
12342
12343 <li>2010
12344 <ul>
12345
12346 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
12347
12348 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
12349
12350 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
12351
12352 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
12353
12354 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
12355
12356 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
12357
12358 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
12359
12360 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
12361
12362 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
12363
12364 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
12365
12366 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
12367
12368 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
12369
12370 </ul></li>
12371
12372 <li>2009
12373 <ul>
12374
12375 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
12376
12377 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
12378
12379 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
12380
12381 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
12382
12383 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
12384
12385 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
12386
12387 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
12388
12389 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
12390
12391 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
12392
12393 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
12394
12395 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
12396
12397 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
12398
12399 </ul></li>
12400
12401 <li>2008
12402 <ul>
12403
12404 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
12405
12406 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
12407
12408 </ul></li>
12409
12410 </ul>
12411
12412
12413
12414 <h2>Tags</h2>
12415 <ul>
12416
12417  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (13)</a></li>
12418
12419  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
12420
12421  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
12422
12423  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
12424
12425  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (9)</a></li>
12426
12427  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (16)</a></li>
12428
12429  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
12430
12431  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
12432
12433  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (146)</a></li>
12434
12435  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (158)</a></li>
12436
12437  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
12438
12439  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (16)</a></li>
12440
12441  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (23)</a></li>
12442
12443  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
12444
12445  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (342)</a></li>
12446
12447  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
12448
12449  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (12)</a></li>
12450
12451  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (29)</a></li>
12452
12453  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
12454
12455  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (18)</a></li>
12456
12457  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
12458
12459  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
12460
12461  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (15)</a></li>
12462
12463  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (20)</a></li>
12464
12465  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
12466
12467  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
12468
12469  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
12470
12471  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
12472
12473  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
12474
12475  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (39)</a></li>
12476
12477  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (9)</a></li>
12478
12479  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (287)</a></li>
12480
12481  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (187)</a></li>
12482
12483  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (28)</a></li>
12484
12485  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
12486
12487  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (64)</a></li>
12488
12489  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (99)</a></li>
12490
12491  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (1)</a></li>
12492
12493  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
12494
12495  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
12496
12497  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
12498
12499  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (10)</a></li>
12500
12501  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
12502
12503  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (5)</a></li>
12504
12505  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
12506
12507  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (52)</a></li>
12508
12509  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
12510
12511  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (5)</a></li>
12512
12513  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (51)</a></li>
12514
12515  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (5)</a></li>
12516
12517  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (11)</a></li>
12518
12519  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (47)</a></li>
12520
12521  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (2)</a></li>
12522
12523  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
12524
12525  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (8)</a></li>
12526
12527  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (59)</a></li>
12528
12529  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
12530
12531  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (40)</a></li>
12532
12533 </ul>
12534
12535
12536     </div>
12537     <p style="text-align: right">
12538  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
12539 </p>
12540
12541   </body>
12542 </html>