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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/GnuCOBOL__a_free_platform_to_learn_and_use_COBOL___nice_free_software.html">GnuCOBOL, a free platform to learn and use COBOL - nice free software</a>
  26       </div>
  27       <div class="date">
  28         29th April 2020
  29       </div>
  30       <div class="body">
  31         <p>The curiosity got the better of me when
  32 <a href="https://developers.slashdot.org/story/20/04/06/1424246/new-jersey-desperately-needs-cobol-programmers">Slashdot
  33 reported</a> that New Jersey was desperately looking for
  34 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COBOL">COBOL</a> programmers,
  35 and a few days later it was reported that
  36 <a href="https://onezero.medium.com/ibm-rallies-cobol-engineers-to-save-overloaded-unemployment-systems-eeadf13eddce">IBM
  37 tried to locate COBOL programmers</a>.</p>
  38
  39 <p>I thus decided to have a look at free software alternatives to
  40 learn COBOL, and had the pleasure to find
  41 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/open-cobol/">GnuCOBOL</a> was
  42 already <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gnucobol">in
  43 Debian</a>.  It used to be called Open Cobol, and is a "compiler"
  44 transforming COBOL code to C or C++ before giving it to GCC or Visual
  45 Studio to build binaries.</p>
  46
  47 <p>I managed to get in touch with upstream, and was impressed with the
  48 quick response, and also was happy to see a new Debian maintainer
  49 taking over when the original one recently asked to be replaced.  A
  50 new Debian upload was done as recently as yesterday.</p>
  51
  52 <p>Using the Debian package, I was able to follow a simple COBOL
  53 introduction and make and run simple COBOL programs.  It was fun to
  54 learn a new programming language.  If you want to test for yourself,
  55 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GnuCOBOL">the GnuCOBOL Wikipedia
  56 page</a> have a few simple examples to get you startet.</p>
  57
  58 <p>As I do not have much experience with COBOL, I do not know how
  59 standard compliant it is, but it claim to pass most tests from COBOL
  60 test suite, which sound good to me.  It is nice to know it is possible
  61 to learn COBOL using software without any usage restrictions, and I am
  62 very happy such nice free software project as this is available.  If
  63 you as me is curious about COBOL, check it out.</p>
  64
  65 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
  66 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
  67 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
  68
  69       </div>
  70       <div class="tags">
  71
  72
  73         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>.
  74
  75
  76       </div>
  77     </div>
  78     <div class="padding"></div>
  79
  80     <div class="entry">
  81       <div class="title">
  82         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Jami_Ring__finally_functioning_peer_to_peer_communication_client.html">Jami/Ring, finally functioning peer to peer communication client</a>
  83       </div>
  84       <div class="date">
  85         19th June 2019
  86       </div>
  87       <div class="body">
  88         <p>Some years ago, in 2016, I
  89 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">wrote
  90 for the first time about</a> the Ring peer to peer messaging system.
  91 It would provide messaging without any central server coordinating the
  92 system and without requiring all users to register a phone number or
  93 own a mobile phone.  Back then, I could not get it to work, and put it
  94 aside until it had seen more development.  A few days ago I decided to
  95 give it another try, and am happy to report that this time I am able
  96 to not only send and receive messages, but also place audio and video
  97 calls.  But only if UDP is not blocked into your network.</p>
  98
  99 <p>The Ring system changed name earlier this year to
 100 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jami_(software)">Jami</a>.  I
 101 tried doing web search for 'ring' when I discovered it for the first
 102 time, and can only applaud this change as it is impossible to find
 103 something called Ring among the noise of other uses of that word.  Now
 104 you can search for 'jami' and this client and
 105 <a href="https://jami.net/">the Jami system</a> is the first hit at
 106 least on duckduckgo.</p>
 107
 108 <p>Jami will by default encrypt messages as well as audio and video
 109 calls, and try to send them directly between the communicating parties
 110 if possible.  If this proves impossible (for example if both ends are
 111 behind NAT), it will use a central SIP TURN server maintained by the
 112 Jami project.  Jami can also be a normal SIP client.  If the SIP
 113 server is unencrypted, the audio and video calls will also be
 114 unencrypted.  This is as far as I know the only case where Jami will
 115 do anything without encryption.</p>
 116
 117 <p>Jami is available for several platforms: Linux, Windows, MacOSX,
 118 Android, iOS, and Android TV.  It is included in Debian already.  Jami
 119 also work for those using F-Droid without any Google connections,
 120 while Signal do not.
 121 <a href="https://git.jami.net/savoirfairelinux/ring-project/wikis/technical/Protocol">The
 122 protocol</a> is described in the Ring project wiki.  The system uses a
 123 distributed hash table (DHT) system (similar to BitTorrent) running
 124 over UDP.  On one of the networks I use, I discovered Jami failed to
 125 work.  I tracked this down to the fact that incoming UDP packages
 126 going to ports 1-49999 were blocked, and the DHT would pick a random
 127 port and end up in the low range most of the time.  After talking to
 128 the developers, I solved this by enabling the dhtproxy in the
 129 settings, thus using TCP to talk to a central DHT proxy instead of
 130
 131 peering directly with others.  I've been told the developers are
 132 working on allowing DHT to use TCP to avoid this problem.  I also ran
 133 into a problem when trying to talk to the version of Ring included in
 134 Debian Stable (Stretch).  Apparently the protocol changed between
 135 beta2 and the current version, making these clients incompatible.
 136 Hopefully the protocol will not be made incompatible in the
 137 future.</p>
 138
 139 <p>It is worth noting that while looking at Jami and its features, I
 140 came across another communication platform I have not tested yet.  The
 141 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tox_(protocol)">Tox protocol</a>
 142 and <a href="https://tox.chat/">family of Tox clients</a>.  It might
 143 become the topic of a future blog post.</p>
 144
 145 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 146 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 147 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 148
 149       </div>
 150       <div class="tags">
 151
 152
 153         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>.
 154
 155
 156       </div>
 157     </div>
 158     <div class="padding"></div>
 159
 160     <div class="entry">
 161       <div class="title">
 162         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Strategispillet_Unknown_Horizons_n__tilgjengelig_p__bokm_l.html">Strategispillet Unknown Horizons nå tilgjengelig på bokmål</a>
 163       </div>
 164       <div class="date">
 165         23rd January 2019
 166       </div>
 167       <div class="body">
 168         <p>I høst ble jeg inspirert til å bidra til oversettelsen av
 169 <a href="http://unknown-horizons.org/">strategispillet Unknown
 170 Horizons</a>, og oversatte de nesten 200 strengene i prosjektet til
 171 bokmål.  Deretter har jeg gått å ventet på at det kom en ny utgave som
 172 inneholdt disse oversettelsene.  Nå er endelig ventetiden over.  Den
 173 nye versjonen kom på nyåret, og ble
 174 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/unknown-horizons">lastet opp i
 175 Debian</a> for noen få dager siden.  I går kveld fikk jeg testet det ut, og
 176 må innrømme at oversettelsene fungerer fint.  Fant noen få tekster som
 177 måtte justeres, men ikke noe alvorlig.  Har oppdatert
 178 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/uh/">oversettelsen på
 179 Weblate</a>, slik at neste utgave vil være enda bedre. :)</p>
 180
 181 <p>Spillet er et ressursstyringsspill ala Civilization, og er morsomt
 182 å spille for oss som liker slikt. :)</p>
 183
 184 <p>Som vanlig, hvis du bruker Bitcoin og ønsker å vise din støtte til
 185 det jeg driver med, setter jeg pris på om du sender Bitcoin-donasjoner
 186 til min adresse
 187 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.
 188 Merk, betaling med bitcoin er ikke anonymt. :)</p>
 189
 190       </div>
 191       <div class="tags">
 192
 193
 194         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>.
 195
 196
 197       </div>
 198     </div>
 199     <div class="padding"></div>
 200
 201     <div class="entry">
 202       <div class="title">
 203         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_got_everything_you_need_to_program_Micro_bit.html">Debian now got everything you need to program Micro:bit</a>
 204       </div>
 205       <div class="date">
 206         22nd January 2019
 207       </div>
 208       <div class="body">
 209         <p>I am amazed and very pleased to discover that since a few days ago,
 210 everything you need to program the <a href="https://microbit.org/">BBC
 211 micro:bit</a> is available from the Debian archive.  All this is
 212 thanks to the hard work of Nick Morrott and the Debian python
 213 packaging team.  The micro:bit project recommend the mu-editor to
 214 program the microcomputer, as this editor will take care of all the
 215 machinery required to injekt/flash micropython alongside the program
 216 into the micro:bit, as long as the pieces are available.</p>
 217
 218 <p>There are three main pieces involved.  The first to enter Debian
 219 was
 220 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/python-uflash">python-uflash</a>,
 221 which was accepted into the archive 2019-01-12.  The next one was
 222 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/mu-editor">mu-editor</a>, which
 223 showed up 2019-01-13.  The final and hardest part to to into the
 224 archive was
 225 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/firmware-microbit-micropython">firmware-microbit-micropython</a>,
 226 which needed to get its build system and dependencies into Debian
 227 before it was accepted 2019-01-20.  The last one is already in Debian
 228 Unstable and should enter Debian Testing / Buster in three days.  This
 229 all allow any user of the micro:bit to get going by simply running
 230 'apt install mu-editor' when using Testing or Unstable, and once
 231 Buster is released as stable, all the users of Debian stable will be
 232 catered for.</p>
 233
 234 <p>As a minor final touch, I added rules to
 235 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">the isenkram
 236 package</a> for recognizing micro:bit and recommend the mu-editor
 237 package.  This make sure any user of the isenkram desktop daemon will
 238 get a popup suggesting to install mu-editor then the USB cable from
 239 the micro:bit is inserted for the first time.</p>
 240
 241 <p>This should make it easier to have fun.</p>
 242
 243 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 244 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 245 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 246
 247       </div>
 248       <div class="tags">
 249
 250
 251         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>.
 252
 253
 254       </div>
 255     </div>
 256     <div class="padding"></div>
 257
 258     <div class="entry">
 259       <div class="title">
 260         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Learn_to_program_with_Minetest_on_Debian.html">Learn to program with Minetest on Debian</a>
 261       </div>
 262       <div class="date">
 263         15th December 2018
 264       </div>
 265       <div class="body">
 266         <p>A fun way to learn how to program
 267 <a href="https://www.python.org/">Python</a> is to follow the
 268 instructions in the book
 269 "<a href="https://nostarch.com/programwithminecraft">Learn to program
 270 with Minecraft</a>", which introduces programming in Python to people
 271 who like to play with Minecraft.  The book uses a Python library to
 272 talk to a TCP/IP socket with an API accepting build instructions and
 273 providing information about the current players in a Minecraft world.
 274 The TCP/IP API was first created for the Minecraft implementation for
 275 Raspberry Pi, and has since been ported to some server versions of
 276 Minecraft.  The book contain recipes for those using Windows, MacOSX
 277 and Raspian.  But a little known fact is that you can follow the same
 278 recipes using the free software construction game
 279 <a href="https://minetest.net/">Minetest</a>.</p>
 280
 281 <p>There is <a href="https://github.com/sprintingkiwi/pycraft_mod">a
 282 Minetest module implementing the same API</a>, making it possible to
 283 use the Python programs coded to talk to Minecraft with Minetest too.
 284 I
 285 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org/new/minetest-mod-pycraft_0.20%2Bgit20180331.0376a0a%2Bdfsg-1.html">uploaded
 286 this module</a> to Debian two weeks ago, and as soon as it clears the
 287 FTP masters NEW queue, learning to program Python with Minetest on
 288 Debian will be a simple 'apt install' away.  The Debian package is
 289 maintained as part of the Debian Games team, and
 290 <a href="https://salsa.debian.org/games-team/unfinished/minetest-mod-pycraft">the
 291 packaging rules</a> are currently located under 'unfinished' on
 292 Salsa.</p>
 293
 294 <p>You will most likely need to install several of the Minetest
 295 modules in Debian for the examples included with the library to work
 296 well, as there are several blocks used by the example scripts that are
 297 provided via modules in Minetest.  Without the required blocks, a
 298 simple stone block is used instead.  My initial testing with a analog
 299 clock did not get gold arms as instructed in the python library, but
 300 instead used stone arms.</p>
 301
 302 <p>I tried to find a way to add the API to the desktop version of
 303 Minecraft, but were unable to find any working recipes.  The
 304 <a href="https://www.epiphanydigest.com/tag/minecraft-python-api/">recipes</a>
 305 I <a href="https://github.com/kbsriram/mcpiapi">found</a> are only
 306 working with a standalone Minecraft server setup.  Are there any
 307 options to use with the normal desktop version?</p>
 308
 309 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 310 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 311 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 312
 313       </div>
 314       <div class="tags">
 315
 316
 317         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>.
 318
 319
 320       </div>
 321     </div>
 322     <div class="padding"></div>
 323
 324     <div class="entry">
 325       <div class="title">
 326         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_an_official_MIME_type_for_patches_.html">Time for an official MIME type for patches?</a>
 327       </div>
 328       <div class="date">
 329          1st November 2018
 330       </div>
 331       <div class="body">
 332         <p>As part of my involvement in
 333 <a href="https://gitlab.com/OsloMet-ABI/nikita-noark5-core">the Nikita
 334 archive API project</a>, I've been importing a fairly large lump of
 335 emails into a test instance of the archive to see how well this would
 336 go.  I picked a subset of <a href="https://notmuchmail.org/">my
 337 notmuch email database</a>, all public emails sent to me via
 338 @lists.debian.org, giving me a set of around 216 000 emails to import.
 339 In the process, I had a look at the various attachments included in
 340 these emails, to figure out what to do with attachments, and noticed
 341 that one of the most common attachment formats do not have
 342 <a href="https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">an
 343 official MIME type</a> registered with IANA/IETF.  The output from
 344 diff, ie the input for patch, is on the top 10 list of formats
 345 included in these emails.  At the moment people seem to use either
 346 text/x-patch or text/x-diff, but neither is officially registered.  It
 347 would be better if one official MIME type were registered and used
 348 everywhere.</p>
 349
 350 <p>To try to get one official MIME type for these files, I've brought
 351 up the topic on
 352 <a href="https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/media-types">the
 353 media-types mailing list</a>.  If you are interested in discussion
 354 which MIME type to use as the official for patch files, or involved in
 355 making software using a MIME type for patches, perhaps you would like
 356 to join the discussion?</p>
 357
 358 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 359 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 360 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 361
 362       </div>
 363       <div class="tags">
 364
 365
 366         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/noark5">noark5</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard</a>.
 367
 368
 369       </div>
 370     </div>
 371     <div class="padding"></div>
 372
 373     <div class="entry">
 374       <div class="title">
 375         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_Google_Drive_sync_using_grive_in_Debian.html">Automatic Google Drive sync using grive in Debian</a>
 376       </div>
 377       <div class="date">
 378          4th October 2018
 379       </div>
 380       <div class="body">
 381         <p>A few days, I rescued a Windows victim over to Debian.  To try to
 382 rescue the remains, I helped set up automatic sync with Google Drive.
 383 I did not find any sensible Debian package handling this
 384 automatically, so I rebuild the grive2 source from
 385 <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/">the Ubuntu UPD8 PPA</a> to do the
 386 task and added a autostart desktop entry and a small shell script to
 387 run in the background while the user is logged in to do the sync.
 388 Here is a sketch of the setup for future reference.</p>
 389
 390 <p>I first created <tt>~/googledrive</tt>, entered the directory and
 391 ran '<tt>grive -a</tt>' to authenticate the machine/user.  Next, I
 392 created a autostart hook in <tt>~/.config/autostart/grive.desktop</tt>
 393 to start the sync when the user log in:</p>
 394
 395 <p><blockquote><pre>
 396 [Desktop Entry]
 397 Name=Google drive autosync
 398 Type=Application
 399 Exec=/home/user/bin/grive-sync
 400 </pre></blockquote></p>
 401
 402 <p>Finally, I wrote the <tt>~/bin/grive-sync</tt> script to sync
 403 ~/googledrive/ with the files in Google Drive.</p>
 404
 405 <p><blockquote><pre>
 406 #!/bin/sh
 407 set -e
 408 cd ~/
 409 cleanup() {
 410     if [ "$syncpid" ] ; then
 411         kill $syncpid
 412     fi
 413 }
 414 trap cleanup EXIT INT QUIT
 415 /usr/lib/grive/grive-sync.sh listen googledrive 2>&1 | sed "s%^%$0:%" &
 416 syncpdi=$!
 417 while true; do
 418     if ! xhost >/dev/null 2>&1 ; then
 419         echo "no DISPLAY, exiting as the user probably logged out"
 420         exit 1
 421     fi
 422     if [ ! -e /run/user/1000/grive-sync.sh_googledrive ] ; then
 423         /usr/lib/grive/grive-sync.sh sync googledrive
 424     fi
 425     sleep 300
 426 done 2>&1 | sed "s%^%$0:%"
 427 </pre></blockquote></p>
 428
 429 <p>Feel free to use the setup if you want.  It can be assumed to be
 430 GNU GPL v2 licensed (or any later version, at your leisure), but I
 431 doubt this code is possible to claim copyright on.</p>
 432
 433 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 434 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 435 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 436
 437       </div>
 438       <div class="tags">
 439
 440
 441         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>.
 442
 443
 444       </div>
 445     </div>
 446     <div class="padding"></div>
 447
 448     <div class="entry">
 449       <div class="title">
 450         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_the_Kodi_API_to_play_Youtube_videos.html">Using the Kodi API to play Youtube videos</a>
 451       </div>
 452       <div class="date">
 453          2nd September 2018
 454       </div>
 455       <div class="body">
 456         <p>I continue to explore my Kodi installation, and today I wanted to
 457 tell it to play a youtube URL I received in a chat, without having to
 458 insert search terms using the on-screen keyboard.  After searching the
 459 web for API access to the Youtube plugin and testing a bit, I managed
 460 to find a recipe that worked.  If you got a kodi instance with its API
 461 available from http://kodihost/jsonrpc, you can try the following to
 462 have check out a nice cover band.</p>
 463
 464 <p><blockquote><pre>curl --silent --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
 465   --data-binary '{ "id": 1, "jsonrpc": "2.0", "method": "Player.Open",
 466   "params": {"item": { "file":
 467   "plugin://plugin.video.youtube/play/?video_id=LuRGVM9O0qg" } } }' \
 468   http://projector.local/jsonrpc</pre></blockquote></p>
 469
 470 <p>I've extended kodi-stream program to take a video source as its
 471 first argument.  It can now handle direct video links, youtube links
 472 and 'desktop' to stream my desktop to Kodi.  It is almost like a
 473 Chromecast. :)</p>
 474
 475 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 476 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 477 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 478
 479       </div>
 480       <div class="tags">
 481
 482
 483         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/kodi">kodi</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
 484
 485
 486       </div>
 487     </div>
 488     <div class="padding"></div>
 489
 490     <div class="entry">
 491       <div class="title">
 492         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Sharing_images_with_friends_and_family_using_RSS_and_EXIF_XMP_metadata.html">Sharing images with friends and family using RSS and EXIF/XMP metadata</a>
 493       </div>
 494       <div class="date">
 495         31st July 2018
 496       </div>
 497       <div class="body">
 498         <p>For a while now, I have looked for a sensible way to share images
 499 with my family using a self hosted solution, as it is unacceptable to
 500 place images from my personal life under the control of strangers
 501 working for data hoarders like Google or Dropbox.  The last few days I
 502 have drafted an approach that might work out, and I would like to
 503 share it with you.  I would like to publish images on a server under
 504 my control, and point some Internet connected display units using some
 505 free and open standard to the images I published.  As my primary
 506 language is not limited to ASCII, I need to store metadata using
 507 UTF-8.  Many years ago, I hoped to find a digital photo frame capable
 508 of reading a RSS feed with image references (aka using the
 509 &lt;enclosure&gt; RSS tag), but was unable to find a current supplier
 510 of such frames.  In the end I gave up that approach.</p>
 511
 512 <p>Some months ago, I discovered that
 513 <a href="https://www.jwz.org/xscreensaver/">XScreensaver</a> is able to
 514 read images from a RSS feed, and used it to set up a screen saver on
 515 my home info screen, showing images from the Daily images feed from
 516 NASA.  This proved to work well.  More recently I discovered that
 517 <a href="https://kodi.tv">Kodi</a> (both using
 518 <a href="https://www.openelec.tv/">OpenELEC</a> and
 519 <a href="https://libreelec.tv">LibreELEC</a>) provide the
 520 <a href="https://github.com/grinsted/script.screensaver.feedreader">Feedreader</a>
 521 screen saver capable of reading a RSS feed with images and news.  For
 522 fun, I used it this summer to test Kodi on my parents TV by hooking up
 523 a Raspberry PI unit with LibreELEC, and wanted to provide them with a
 524 screen saver showing selected pictures from my selection.</p>
 525
 526 <p>Armed with motivation and a test photo frame, I set out to generate
 527 a RSS feed for the Kodi instance.  I adjusted my <a
 528 href="https://freedombox.org/">Freedombox</a> instance, created
 529 /var/www/html/privatepictures/, wrote a small Perl script to extract
 530 title and description metadata from the photo files and generate the
 531 RSS file.  I ended up using Perl instead of python, as the
 532 libimage-exiftool-perl Debian package seemed to handle the EXIF/XMP
 533 tags I ended up using, while python3-exif did not.  The relevant EXIF
 534 tags only support ASCII, so I had to find better alternatives.  XMP
 535 seem to have the support I need.</p>
 536
 537 <p>I am a bit unsure which EXIF/XMP tags to use, as I would like to
 538 use tags that can be easily added/updated using normal free software
 539 photo managing software.  I ended up using the tags set using this
 540 exiftool command, as these tags can also be set using digiKam:</p>
 541
 542 <blockquote><pre>
 543 exiftool -headline='The RSS image title' \
 544   -description='The RSS image description.' \
 545   -subject+=for-family photo.jpeg
 546 </pre></blockquote>
 547
 548 <p>I initially tried the "-title" and "keyword" tags, but they were
 549 invisible in digiKam, so I changed to "-headline" and "-subject".  I
 550 use the keyword/subject 'for-family' to flag that the photo should be
 551 shared with my family.  Images with this keyword set are located and
 552 copied into my Freedombox for the RSS generating script to find.</p>
 553
 554 <p>Are there better ways to do this?  Get in touch if you have better
 555 suggestions.</p>
 556
 557 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 558 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 559 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 560
 561       </div>
 562       <div class="tags">
 563
 564
 565         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>.
 566
 567
 568       </div>
 569     </div>
 570     <div class="padding"></div>
 571
 572     <div class="entry">
 573       <div class="title">
 574         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simple_streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_GStreamer_and_RTP.html">Simple streaming the Linux desktop to Kodi using GStreamer and RTP</a>
 575       </div>
 576       <div class="date">
 577         12th July 2018
 578       </div>
 579       <div class="body">
 580         <p>Last night, I wrote
 581 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html">a
 582 recipe to stream a Linux desktop using VLC to a instance of Kodi</a>.
 583 During the day I received valuable feedback, and thanks to the
 584 suggestions I have been able to rewrite the recipe into a much simpler
 585 approach requiring no setup at all.  It is a single script that take
 586 care of it all.</p>
 587
 588 <p>This new script uses GStreamer instead of VLC to capture the
 589 desktop and stream it to Kodi.  This fixed the video quality issue I
 590 saw initially.  It further removes the need to add a m3u file on the
 591 Kodi machine, as it instead connects to
 592 <a href="https://kodi.wiki/view/JSON-RPC_API/v8">the JSON-RPC API in
 593 Kodi</a> and simply ask Kodi to play from the stream created using
 594 GStreamer.  Streaming the desktop to Kodi now become trivial.  Copy
 595 the script below, run it with the DNS name or IP address of the kodi
 596 server to stream to as the only argument, and watch your screen show
 597 up on the Kodi screen.  Note, it depend on multicast on the local
 598 network, so if you need to stream outside the local network, the
 599 script must be modified.  Also note, I have no idea if audio work, as
 600 I only care about the picture part.</p>
 601
 602 <blockquote><pre>
 603 #!/bin/sh
 604 #
 605 # Stream the Linux desktop view to Kodi.  See
 606 # http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html
 607 # for backgorund information.
 608
 609 # Make sure the stream is stopped in Kodi and the gstreamer process is
 610 # killed if something go wrong (for example if curl is unable to find the
 611 # kodi server).  Do the same when interrupting this script.
 612 kodicmd() {
 613     host="$1"
 614     cmd="$2"
 615     params="$3"
 616     curl --silent --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
 617          --data-binary "{ \"id\": 1, \"jsonrpc\": \"2.0\", \"method\": \"$cmd\", \"params\": $params }" \
 618          "http://$host/jsonrpc"
 619 }
 620 cleanup() {
 621     if [ -n "$kodihost" ] ; then
 622         # Stop the playing when we end
 623         playerid=$(kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.GetActivePlayers "{}" |
 624                             jq .result[].playerid)
 625         kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.Stop "{ \"playerid\" : $playerid }" > /dev/null
 626     fi
 627     if [ "$gstpid" ] && kill -0 "$gstpid" >/dev/null 2>&1; then
 628         kill "$gstpid"
 629     fi
 630 }
 631 trap cleanup EXIT INT
 632
 633 if [ -n "$1" ]; then
 634     kodihost=$1
 635     shift
 636 else
 637     kodihost=kodi.local
 638 fi
 639
 640 mcast=239.255.0.1
 641 mcastport=1234
 642 mcastttl=1
 643
 644 pasrc=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' | \
 645   cut -d" " -f2|head -1)
 646 gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
 647   videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
 648   x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
 649   key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
 650   mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
 651   udpsink host=$mcast port=$mcastport ttl-mc=$mcastttl auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
 652   pulsesrc device=$pasrc ! audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux. \
 653   > /dev/null 2>&1 &
 654 gstpid=$!
 655
 656 # Give stream a second to get going
 657 sleep 1
 658
 659 # Ask kodi to start streaming using its JSON-RPC API
 660 kodicmd "$kodihost" Player.Open \
 661         "{\"item\": { \"file\": \"udp://@$mcast:$mcastport\" } }" > /dev/null
 662
 663 # wait for gst to end
 664 wait "$gstpid"
 665 </pre></blockquote>
 666
 667 <p>I hope you find the approach useful.  I know I do.</p>
 668
 669 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 670 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 671 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 672
 673       </div>
 674       <div class="tags">
 675
 676
 677         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/kodi">kodi</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
 678
 679
 680       </div>
 681     </div>
 682     <div class="padding"></div>
 683
 684     <div class="entry">
 685       <div class="title">
 686         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_VLC_and_RTSP.html">Streaming the Linux desktop to Kodi using VLC and RTSP</a>
 687       </div>
 688       <div class="date">
 689         12th July 2018
 690       </div>
 691       <div class="body">
 692         <p>PS: See
 693 <ahref="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simple_streaming_the_Linux_desktop_to_Kodi_using_GStreamer_and_RTP.html">the
 694 followup post</a> for a even better approach.</p>
 695
 696 <p>A while back, I was asked by a friend how to stream the desktop to
 697 my projector connected to Kodi.  I sadly had to admit that I had no
 698 idea, as it was a task I never had tried.  Since then, I have been
 699 looking for a way to do so, preferable without much extra software to
 700 install on either side.  Today I found a way that seem to kind of
 701 work.  Not great, but it is a start.</p>
 702
 703 <p>I had a look at several approaches, for example
 704 <a href="https://github.com/mfoetsch/dlna_live_streaming">using uPnP
 705 DLNA as described in 2011</a>, but it required a uPnP server, fuse and
 706 local storage enough to store the stream locally.  This is not going
 707 to work well for me, lacking enough free space, and it would
 708 impossible for my friend to get working.</p>
 709
 710 <p>Next, it occurred to me that perhaps I could use VLC to create a
 711 video stream that Kodi could play.  Preferably using
 712 broadcast/multicast, to avoid having to change any setup on the Kodi
 713 side when starting such stream.  Unfortunately, the only recipe I
 714 could find using multicast used the rtp protocol, and this protocol
 715 seem to not be supported by Kodi.</p>
 716
 717 <p>On the other hand, the rtsp protocol is working!  Unfortunately I
 718 have to specify the IP address of the streaming machine in both the
 719 sending command and the file on the Kodi server.  But it is showing my
 720 desktop, and thus allow us to have a shared look on the big screen at
 721 the programs I work on.</p>
 722
 723 <p>I did not spend much time investigating codeces.  I combined the
 724 rtp and rtsp recipes from
 725 <a href="https://wiki.videolan.org/Documentation:Streaming_HowTo/Command_Line_Examples/">the
 726 VLC Streaming HowTo/Command Line Examples</a>, and was able to get
 727 this working on the desktop/streaming end.</p>
 728
 729 <blockquote><pre>
 730 vlc screen:// --sout \
 731   '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{dst=projector.local,port=1234,sdp=rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp}'
 732 </pre></blockquote>
 733
 734 <p>I ssh-ed into my Kodi box and created a file like this with the
 735 same IP address:</p>
 736
 737 <blockquote><pre>
 738 echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/test.sdp \
 739   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 740 </pre></blockquote>
 741
 742 <p>Note the 192.168.11.4 IP address is my desktops IP address.  As far
 743 as I can tell the IP must be hardcoded for this to work.  In other
 744 words, if someone elses machine is going to do the steaming, you have
 745 to update screenstream.m3u on the Kodi machine and adjust the vlc
 746 recipe.  To get started, locate the file in Kodi and select the m3u
 747 file while the VLC stream is running.  The desktop then show up in my
 748 big screen. :)</p>
 749
 750 <p>When using the same technique to stream a video file with audio,
 751 the audio quality is really bad.  No idea if the problem is package
 752 loss or bad parameters for the transcode.  I do not know VLC nor Kodi
 753 enough to tell.</p>
 754
 755 <p><strong>Update 2018-07-12</strong>: Johannes Schauer send me a few
 756 succestions and reminded me about an important step.  The "screen:"
 757 input source is only available once the vlc-plugin-access-extra
 758 package is installed on Debian.  Without it, you will see this error
 759 message: "VLC is unable to open the MRL 'screen://'.  Check the log
 760 for details."  He further found that it is possible to drop some parts
 761 of the VLC command line to reduce the amount of hardcoded information.
 762 It is also useful to consider using cvlc to avoid having the VLC
 763 window in the desktop view.  In sum, this give us this command line on
 764 the source end
 765
 766 <blockquote><pre>
 767 cvlc screen:// --sout \
 768   '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{sdp=rtsp://:8080/}'
 769 </pre></blockquote>
 770
 771 <p>and this on the Kodi end<p>
 772
 773 <blockquote><pre>
 774 echo rtsp://192.168.11.4:8080/ \
 775   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 776 </pre></blockquote>
 777
 778 <p>Still bad image quality, though.  But I did discover that streaming
 779 a DVD using dvdsimple:///dev/dvd as the source had excellent video and
 780 audio quality, so I guess the issue is in the input or transcoding
 781 parts, not the rtsp part.  I've tried to change the vb and ab
 782 parameters to use more bandwidth, but it did not make a
 783 difference.</p>
 784
 785 <p>I further received a suggestion from Einar Haraldseid to try using
 786 gstreamer instead of VLC, and this proved to work great!  He also
 787 provided me with the trick to get Kodi to use a multicast stream as
 788 its source.  By using this monstrous oneliner, I can stream my desktop
 789 with good video quality in reasonable framerate to the 239.255.0.1
 790 multicast address on port 1234:
 791
 792 <blockquote><pre>
 793 gst-launch-1.0 ximagesrc use-damage=0 ! video/x-raw,framerate=30/1 ! \
 794   videoconvert ! queue2 ! \
 795   x264enc bitrate=8000 speed-preset=superfast tune=zerolatency qp-min=30 \
 796   key-int-max=15 bframes=2 ! video/x-h264,profile=high ! queue2 ! \
 797   mpegtsmux alignment=7 name=mux ! rndbuffersize max=1316 min=1316 ! \
 798   udpsink host=239.255.0.1 port=1234 ttl-mc=1 auto-multicast=1 sync=0 \
 799   pulsesrc device=$(pactl list | grep -A2 'Source #' | \
 800     grep 'Name: .*\.monitor$' |  cut -d" " -f2|head -1) ! \
 801   audioconvert ! queue2 ! avenc_aac ! queue2 ! mux.
 802 </pre></blockquote>
 803
 804 <p>and this on the Kodi end<p>
 805
 806 <blockquote><pre>
 807 echo udp://@239.255.0.1:1234 \
 808   > /storage/videos/screenstream.m3u
 809 </pre></blockquote>
 810
 811 <p>Note the trick to pick a valid pulseaudio source.  It might not
 812 pick the one you need.  This approach will of course lead to trouble
 813 if more than one source uses the same multicast port and address.
 814 Note the ttl-mc=1 setting, which limit the multicast packages to the
 815 local network.  If the value is increased, your screen will be
 816 broadcasted further, one network "hop" for each increase (read up on
 817 multicast to learn more. :)!</p>
 818
 819 <p>Having cracked how to get Kodi to receive multicast streams, I
 820 could use this VLC command to stream to the same multicast address.
 821 The image quality is way better than the rtsp approach, but gstreamer
 822 seem to be doing a better job.</p>
 823
 824 <blockquote><pre>
 825 cvlc screen:// --sout '#transcode{vcodec=mp4v,acodec=mpga,vb=800,ab=128}:rtp{mux=ts,dst=239.255.0.1,port=1234,sdp=sap}'
 826 </pre></blockquote>
 827
 828 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 829 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 830 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 831
 832       </div>
 833       <div class="tags">
 834
 835
 836         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/kodi">kodi</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video</a>.
 837
 838
 839       </div>
 840     </div>
 841     <div class="padding"></div>
 842
 843     <div class="entry">
 844       <div class="title">
 845         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_in_2018_.html">What is the most supported MIME type in Debian in 2018?</a>
 846       </div>
 847       <div class="date">
 848          9th July 2018
 849       </div>
 850       <div class="body">
 851         <p>Five years ago,
 852 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_most_supported_MIME_type_in_Debian_.html">I
 853 measured what the most supported MIME type in Debian was</a>, by
 854 analysing the desktop files in all packages in the archive.  Since
 855 then, the DEP-11 AppStream system has been put into production, making
 856 the task a lot easier.  This made me want to repeat the measurement,
 857 to see how much things changed.  Here are the new numbers, for
 858 unstable only this time:
 859
 860 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
 861
 862 <pre>
 863   count MIME type
 864   ----- -----------------------
 865      56 image/jpeg
 866      55 image/png
 867      49 image/tiff
 868      48 image/gif
 869      39 image/bmp
 870      38 text/plain
 871      37 audio/mpeg
 872      34 application/ogg
 873      33 audio/x-flac
 874      32 audio/x-mp3
 875      30 audio/x-wav
 876      30 audio/x-vorbis+ogg
 877      29 image/x-portable-pixmap
 878      27 inode/directory
 879      27 image/x-portable-bitmap
 880      27 audio/x-mpeg
 881      26 application/x-ogg
 882      25 audio/x-mpegurl
 883      25 audio/ogg
 884      24 text/html
 885 </pre>
 886
 887 <p>The list was created like this using a sid chroot: "cat
 888 /var/lib/apt/lists/*sid*_dep11_Components-amd64.yml.gz| zcat | awk '/^
 889 - \S+\/\S+$/ {print $2 }' | sort | uniq -c | sort -nr | head -20"</p>
 890
 891 <p>It is interesting to see how image formats have passed text/plain
 892 as the most announced supported MIME type.  These days, thanks to the
 893 AppStream system, if you run into a file format you do not know, and
 894 want to figure out which packages support the format, you can find the
 895 MIME type of the file using "file --mime &lt;filename&gt;", and then
 896 look up all packages announcing support for this format in their
 897 AppStream metadata (XML or .desktop file) using "appstreamcli
 898 what-provides mimetype &lt;mime-type&gt;.  For example if you, like
 899 me, want to know which packages support inode/directory, you can get a
 900 list like this:</p>
 901
 902 <p><blockquote><pre>
 903 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype inode/directory | grep Package: | sort
 904 Package: anjuta
 905 Package: audacious
 906 Package: baobab
 907 Package: cervisia
 908 Package: chirp
 909 Package: dolphin
 910 Package: doublecmd-common
 911 Package: easytag
 912 Package: enlightenment
 913 Package: ephoto
 914 Package: filelight
 915 Package: gwenview
 916 Package: k4dirstat
 917 Package: kaffeine
 918 Package: kdesvn
 919 Package: kid3
 920 Package: kid3-qt
 921 Package: nautilus
 922 Package: nemo
 923 Package: pcmanfm
 924 Package: pcmanfm-qt
 925 Package: qweborf
 926 Package: ranger
 927 Package: sirikali
 928 Package: spacefm
 929 Package: spacefm
 930 Package: vifm
 931 %
 932 </pre></blockquote></p>
 933
 934 <p>Using the same method, I can quickly discover that the Sketchup file
 935 format is not yet supported by any package in Debian:</p>
 936
 937 <p><blockquote><pre>
 938 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/vnd.sketchup.skp
 939 Could not find component providing 'mimetype::application/vnd.sketchup.skp'.
 940 %
 941 </pre></blockquote></p>
 942
 943 <p>Yesterday I used it to figure out which packages support the STL 3D
 944 format:</p>
 945
 946 <p><blockquote><pre>
 947 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype  application/sla|grep Package
 948 Package: cura
 949 Package: meshlab
 950 Package: printrun
 951 %
 952 </pre></blockquote></p>
 953
 954 <p>PS: A new version of Cura was uploaded to Debian yesterday.</p>
 955
 956 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
 957 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
 958 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
 959
 960       </div>
 961       <div class="tags">
 962
 963
 964         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>.
 965
 966
 967       </div>
 968     </div>
 969     <div class="padding"></div>
 970
 971     <div class="entry">
 972       <div class="title">
 973         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_APT_upgrade_without_enough_free_space_on_the_disk___.html">Debian APT upgrade without enough free space on the disk...</a>
 974       </div>
 975       <div class="date">
 976          8th July 2018
 977       </div>
 978       <div class="body">
 979         <p>Quite regularly, I let my Debian Sid/Unstable chroot stay untouch
 980 for a while, and when I need to update it there is not enough free
 981 space on the disk for apt to do a normal 'apt upgrade'.  I normally
 982 would resolve the issue by doing 'apt install &lt;somepackages&gt;' to
 983 upgrade only some of the packages in one batch, until the amount of
 984 packages to download fall below the amount of free space available.
 985 Today, I had about 500 packages to upgrade, and after a while I got
 986 tired of trying to install chunks of packages manually.  I concluded
 987 that I did not have the spare hours required to complete the task, and
 988 decided to see if I could automate it.  I came up with this small
 989 script which I call 'apt-in-chunks':</p>
 990
 991 <p><blockquote><pre>
 992 #!/bin/sh
 993 #
 994 # Upgrade packages when the disk is too full to upgrade every
 995 # upgradable package in one lump.  Fetching packages to upgrade using
 996 # apt, and then installing using dpkg, to avoid changing the package
 997 # flag for manual/automatic.
 998
 999 set -e
1000
1001 ignore() {
1002     if [ "$1" ]; then
1003         grep -v "$1"
1004     else
1005         cat
1006     fi
1007 }
1008
1009 for p in $(apt list --upgradable | ignore "$@" |cut -d/ -f1 | grep -v '^Listing...'); do
1010     echo "Upgrading $p"
1011     apt clean
1012     apt install --download-only -y $p
1013     for f in /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb; do
1014         if [ -e "$f" ]; then
1015             dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/archives/*.deb
1016             break
1017         fi
1018     done
1019 done
1020 </pre></blockquote></p>
1021
1022 <p>The script will extract the list of packages to upgrade, try to
1023 download the packages needed to upgrade one package, install the
1024 downloaded packages using dpkg.  The idea is to upgrade packages
1025 without changing the APT mark for the package (ie the one recording of
1026 the package was manually requested or pulled in as a dependency).  To
1027 use it, simply run it as root from the command line.  If it fail, try
1028 'apt install -f' to clean up the mess and run the script again.  This
1029 might happen if the new packages conflict with one of the old
1030 packages.  dpkg is unable to remove, while apt can do this.</p>
1031
1032 <p>It take one option, a package to ignore in the list of packages to
1033 upgrade.  The option to ignore a package is there to be able to skip
1034 the packages that are simply too large to unpack.  Today this was
1035 'ghc', but I have run into other large packages causing similar
1036 problems earlier (like TeX).</p>
1037
1038 <p>Update 2018-07-08: Thanks to Paul Wise, I am aware of two
1039 alternative ways to handle this.  The "unattended-upgrades
1040 --minimal-upgrade-steps" option will try to calculate upgrade sets for
1041 each package to upgrade, and then upgrade them in order, smallest set
1042 first.  It might be a better option than my above mentioned script.
1043 Also, "aptutude upgrade" can upgrade single packages, thus avoiding
1044 the need for using "dpkg -i" in the script above.</p>
1045
1046 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1047 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1048 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1049
1050       </div>
1051       <div class="tags">
1052
1053
1054         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>.
1055
1056
1057       </div>
1058     </div>
1059     <div class="padding"></div>
1060
1061     <div class="entry">
1062       <div class="title">
1063         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Version_3_1_of_Cura__the_3D_print_slicer__is_now_in_Debian.html">Version 3.1 of Cura, the 3D print slicer, is now in Debian</a>
1064       </div>
1065       <div class="date">
1066         13th February 2018
1067       </div>
1068       <div class="body">
1069         <p>A new version of the
1070 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura">3D printer slicer
1071 software Cura</a>, version 3.1.0, is now available in Debian Testing
1072 (aka Buster) and Debian Unstable (aka Sid).  I hope you find it
1073 useful.  It was uploaded the last few days, and the last update will
1074 enter testing tomorrow.  See the
1075 <a href="https://ultimaker.com/en/products/cura-software/release-notes">release
1076 notes</a> for the list of bug fixes and new features.  Version 3.2
1077 was announced 6 days ago.  We will try to get it into Debian as
1078 well.</p>
1079
1080 <p>More information related to 3D printing is available on the
1081 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/3DPrinting">3D printing</a> and
1082 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/3D-printer">3D printer</a> wiki pages
1083 in Debian.</p>
1084
1085 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1086 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1087 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1088
1089       </div>
1090       <div class="tags">
1091
1092
1093         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>.
1094
1095
1096       </div>
1097     </div>
1098     <div class="padding"></div>
1099
1100     <div class="entry">
1101       <div class="title">
1102         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Cura__the_nice_3D_print_slicer__is_now_in_Debian_Unstable.html">Cura, the nice 3D print slicer, is now in Debian Unstable</a>
1103       </div>
1104       <div class="date">
1105         17th December 2017
1106       </div>
1107       <div class="body">
1108         <p>After several months of working and waiting, I am happy to report
1109 that the nice and user friendly 3D printer slicer software Cura just
1110 entered Debian Unstable.  It consist of five packages,
1111 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura">cura</a>,
1112 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cura-engine">cura-engine</a>,
1113 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libarcus">libarcus</a>,
1114 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/fdm-materials">fdm-materials</a>,
1115 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libsavitar">libsavitar</a> and
1116 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/uranium">uranium</a>.  The last
1117 two, uranium and cura, entered Unstable yesterday.  This should make
1118 it easier for Debian users to print on at least the Ultimaker class of
1119 3D printers.  My nearest 3D printer is an Ultimaker 2+, so it will
1120 make life easier for at least me. :)</p>
1121
1122 <p>The work to make this happen was done by Gregor Riepl, and I was
1123 happy to assist him in sponsoring the packages.  With the introduction
1124 of Cura, Debian is up to three 3D printer slicers at your service,
1125 Cura, Slic3r and Slic3r Prusa.  If you own or have access to a 3D
1126 printer, give it a go. :)</p>
1127
1128 <p>The 3D printer software is maintained by the 3D printer Debian
1129 team, flocking together on the
1130 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/3dprinter-general">3dprinter-general</a>
1131 mailing list and the
1132 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/#debian-3dprinting">#debian-3dprinting</a>
1133 IRC channel.</p>
1134
1135 <p>The next step for Cura in Debian is to update the cura package to
1136 version 3.0.3 and then update the entire set of packages to version
1137 3.1.0 which showed up the last few days.</p>
1138
1139       </div>
1140       <div class="tags">
1141
1142
1143         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>.
1144
1145
1146       </div>
1147     </div>
1148     <div class="padding"></div>
1149
1150     <div class="entry">
1151       <div class="title">
1152         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Generating_3D_prints_in_Debian_using_Cura_and_Slic3r__prusa_.html">Generating 3D prints in Debian using Cura and Slic3r(-prusa)</a>
1153       </div>
1154       <div class="date">
1155          9th October 2017
1156       </div>
1157       <div class="body">
1158         <p>At my nearby maker space,
1159 <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Sonen</a>, I heard the story that it
1160 was easier to generate gcode files for theyr 3D printers (Ultimake 2+)
1161 on Windows and MacOS X than Linux, because the software involved had
1162 to be manually compiled and set up on Linux while premade packages
1163 worked out of the box on Windows and MacOS X.  I found this annoying,
1164 as the software involved,
1165 <a href="https://github.com/Ultimaker/Cura">Cura</a>, is free software
1166 and should be trivial to get up and running on Linux if someone took
1167 the time to package it for the relevant distributions.  I even found
1168 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/706656">a request for adding into
1169 Debian</a> from 2013, which had seem some activity over the years but
1170 never resulted in the software showing up in Debian.  So a few days
1171 ago I offered my help to try to improve the situation.</p>
1172
1173 <p>Now I am very happy to see that all the packages required by a
1174 working Cura in Debian are uploaded into Debian and waiting in the NEW
1175 queue for the ftpmasters to have a look.  You can track the progress
1176 on
1177 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?email=3dprinter-general%40lists.alioth.debian.org">the
1178 status page for the 3D printer team</a>.</p>
1179
1180 <p>The uploaded packages are a bit behind upstream, and was uploaded
1181 now to get slots in <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW
1182 queue</a> while we work up updating the packages to the latest
1183 upstream version.</p>
1184
1185 <p>On a related note, two competitors for Cura, which I found harder
1186 to use and was unable to configure correctly for Ultimaker 2+ in the
1187 short time I spent on it, are already in Debian.  If you are looking
1188 for 3D printer "slicers" and want something already available in
1189 Debian, check out
1190 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r">slic3r</a> and
1191 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/slic3r-prusa">slic3r-prusa</a>.
1192 The latter is a fork of the former.</p>
1193
1194 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1195 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1196 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1197
1198       </div>
1199       <div class="tags">
1200
1201
1202         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>.
1203
1204
1205       </div>
1206     </div>
1207     <div class="padding"></div>
1208
1209     <div class="entry">
1210       <div class="title">
1211         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Visualizing_GSM_radio_chatter_using_gr_gsm_and_Hopglass.html">Visualizing GSM radio chatter using gr-gsm and Hopglass</a>
1212       </div>
1213       <div class="date">
1214         29th September 2017
1215       </div>
1216       <div class="body">
1217         <p>Every mobile phone announce its existence over radio to the nearby
1218 mobile cell towers.  And this radio chatter is available for anyone
1219 with a radio receiver capable of receiving them.  Details about the
1220 mobile phones with very good accuracy is of course collected by the
1221 phone companies, but this is not the topic of this blog post.  The
1222 mobile phone radio chatter make it possible to figure out when a cell
1223 phone is nearby, as it include the SIM card ID (IMSI).  By paying
1224 attention over time, one can see when a phone arrive and when it leave
1225 an area.  I believe it would be nice to make this information more
1226 available to the general public, to make more people aware of how
1227 their phones are announcing their whereabouts to anyone that care to
1228 listen.</p>
1229
1230 <p>I am very happy to report that we managed to get something
1231 visualizing this information up and running for
1232 <a href="http://norwaymakers.org/osf17">Oslo Skaperfestival 2017</a>
1233 (Oslo Makers Festival) taking place today and tomorrow at Deichmanske
1234 library.  The solution is based on the
1235 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Easier_recipe_to_observe_the_cell_phones_around_you.html">simple
1236 recipe for listening to GSM chatter</a> I posted a few days ago, and
1237 will show up at the stand of <a href="http://sonen.ifi.uio.no/">Åpen
1238 Sone from the Computer Science department of the University of
1239 Oslo</a>.  The presentation will show the nearby mobile phones (aka
1240 IMSIs) as dots in a web browser graph, with lines to the dot
1241 representing mobile base station it is talking to. It was working in
1242 the lab yesterday, and was moved into place this morning.</p>
1243
1244 <p>We set up a fairly powerful desktop machine using Debian
1245 Buster/Testing with several (five, I believe) RTL2838 DVB-T receivers
1246 connected and visualize the visible cell phone towers using an
1247 <a href="https://github.com/marlow925/hopglass">English version of
1248 Hopglass</a>.  A fairly powerfull machine is needed as the
1249 grgsm_livemon_headless processes from
1250 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a> converting
1251 the radio signal to data packages is quite CPU intensive.</p>
1252
1253 <p>The frequencies to listen to, are identified using a slightly
1254 patched scan-and-livemon (to set the --args values for each receiver),
1255 and the Hopglass data is generated using the
1256 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/IMSI-catcher/tree/meshviewer-output">patches
1257 in my meshviewer-output branch</a>.  For some reason we could not get
1258 more than four SDRs working.  There is also a geographical map trying
1259 to show the location of the base stations, but I believe their
1260 coordinates are hardcoded to some random location in Germany, I
1261 believe.  The code should be replaced with code to look up location in
1262 a text file, a sqlite database or one of the online databases
1263 mentioned in
1264 <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher/issues/14">the github
1265 issue for the topic</a>.
1266
1267 <p>If this sound interesting, visit the stand at the festival!</p>
1268
1269       </div>
1270       <div class="tags">
1271
1272
1273         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/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
1274
1275
1276       </div>
1277     </div>
1278     <div class="padding"></div>
1279
1280     <div class="entry">
1281       <div class="title">
1282         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Easier_recipe_to_observe_the_cell_phones_around_you.html">Easier recipe to observe the cell phones around you</a>
1283       </div>
1284       <div class="date">
1285         24th September 2017
1286       </div>
1287       <div class="body">
1288         <p>A little more than a month ago I wrote
1289 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simpler_recipe_on_how_to_make_a_simple__7_IMSI_Catcher_using_Debian.html">how
1290 to observe the SIM card ID (aka IMSI number) of mobile phones talking
1291 to nearby mobile phone base stations using Debian GNU/Linux and a
1292 cheap USB software defined radio</a>, and thus being able to pinpoint
1293 the location of people and equipment (like cars and trains) with an
1294 accuracy of a few kilometer.  Since then we have worked to make the
1295 procedure even simpler, and it is now possible to do this without any
1296 manual frequency tuning and without building your own packages.</p>
1297
1298 <p>The <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/gr-gsm">gr-gsm</a>
1299 package is now included in Debian testing and unstable, and the
1300 IMSI-catcher code no longer require root access to fetch and decode
1301 the GSM data collected using gr-gsm.</p>
1302
1303 <p>Here is an updated recipe, using packages built by Debian and a git
1304 clone of two python scripts:</p>
1305
1306 <ol>
1307
1308 <li>Start with a Debian machine running the Buster version (aka
1309   testing).</li>
1310
1311 <li>Run '<tt>apt install gr-gsm python-numpy python-scipy
1312   python-scapy</tt>' as root to install required packages.</li>
1313
1314 <li>Fetch the code decoding GSM packages using '<tt>git clone
1315   github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher.git</tt>'.</li>
1316
1317 <li>Insert USB software defined radio supported by GNU Radio.</li>
1318
1319 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
1320   scan-and-livemon</tt>' to locate the frequency of nearby base
1321   stations and start listening for GSM packages on one of them.</li>
1322
1323 <li>Enter the IMSI-catcher directory and run '<tt>python
1324   simple_IMSI-catcher.py</tt>' to display the collected information.</li>
1325
1326 </ol>
1327
1328 <p>Note, due to a bug somewhere the scan-and-livemon program (actually
1329 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/issues/336">its underlying
1330 program grgsm_scanner</a>) do not work with the HackRF radio.  It does
1331 work with RTL 8232 and other similar USB radio receivers you can get
1332 very cheaply
1333 (<a href="https://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=rtl+2832">for example
1334 from ebay</a>), so for now the solution is to scan using the RTL radio
1335 and only use HackRF for fetching GSM data.</p>
1336
1337 <p>As far as I can tell, a cell phone only show up on one of the
1338 frequencies at the time, so if you are going to track and count every
1339 cell phone around you, you need to listen to all the frequencies used.
1340 To listen to several frequencies, use the --numrecv argument to
1341 scan-and-livemon to use several receivers.  Further, I am not sure if
1342 phones using 3G or 4G will show as talking GSM to base stations, so
1343 this approach might not see all phones around you.  I typically see
1344 0-400 IMSI numbers an hour when looking around where I live.</p>
1345
1346 <p>I've tried to run the scanner on a
1347 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi 2 and 3
1348 running Debian Buster</a>, but the grgsm_livemon_headless process seem
1349 to be too CPU intensive to keep up.  When GNU Radio print 'O' to
1350 stdout, I am told there it is caused by a buffer overflow between the
1351 radio and GNU Radio, caused by the program being unable to read the
1352 GSM data fast enough.  If you see a stream of 'O's from the terminal
1353 where you started scan-and-livemon, you need a give the process more
1354 CPU power.  Perhaps someone are able to optimize the code to a point
1355 where it become possible to set up RPi3 based GSM sniffers?  I tried
1356 using Raspbian instead of Debian, but there seem to be something wrong
1357 with GNU Radio on raspbian, causing glibc to abort().</p>
1358
1359       </div>
1360       <div class="tags">
1361
1362
1363         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/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
1364
1365
1366       </div>
1367     </div>
1368     <div class="padding"></div>
1369
1370     <div class="entry">
1371       <div class="title">
1372         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Simpler_recipe_on_how_to_make_a_simple__7_IMSI_Catcher_using_Debian.html">Simpler recipe on how to make a simple $7 IMSI Catcher using Debian</a>
1373       </div>
1374       <div class="date">
1375          9th August 2017
1376       </div>
1377       <div class="body">
1378         <p>On friday, I came across an interesting article in the Norwegian
1379 web based ICT news magazine digi.no on
1380 <a href="https://www.digi.no/artikler/sikkerhetsforsker-lagde-enkel-imsi-catcher-for-60-kroner-na-kan-mobiler-kartlegges-av-alle/398588">how
1381 to collect the IMSI numbers of nearby cell phones</a> using the cheap
1382 DVB-T software defined radios.  The article refered to instructions
1383 and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjwgNd_as30">a recipe by
1384 Keld Norman on Youtube on how to make a simple $7 IMSI Catcher</a>, and I decided to test them out.</p>
1385
1386 <p>The instructions said to use Ubuntu, install pip using apt (to
1387 bypass apt), use pip to install pybombs (to bypass both apt and pip),
1388 and the ask pybombs to fetch and build everything you need from
1389 scratch.  I wanted to see if I could do the same on the most recent
1390 Debian packages, but this did not work because pybombs tried to build
1391 stuff that no longer build with the most recent openssl library or
1392 some other version skew problem.  While trying to get this recipe
1393 working, I learned that the apt->pip->pybombs route was a long detour,
1394 and the only piece of software dependency missing in Debian was the
1395 gr-gsm package.  I also found out that the lead upstream developer of
1396 gr-gsm (the name stand for GNU Radio GSM) project already had a set of
1397 Debian packages provided in an Ubuntu PPA repository.  All I needed to
1398 do was to dget the Debian source package and built it.</p>
1399
1400 <p>The IMSI collector is a python script listening for packages on the
1401 loopback network device and printing to the terminal some specific GSM
1402 packages with IMSI numbers in them.  The code is fairly short and easy
1403 to understand.  The reason this work is because gr-gsm include a tool
1404 to read GSM data from a software defined radio like a DVB-T USB stick
1405 and other software defined radios, decode them and inject them into a
1406 network device on your Linux machine (using the loopback device by
1407 default).  This proved to work just fine, and I've been testing the
1408 collector for a few days now.</p>
1409
1410 <p>The updated and simpler recipe is thus to</p>
1411
1412 <ol>
1413
1414 <li>start with a Debian machine running Stretch or newer,</li>
1415
1416 <li>build and install the gr-gsm package available from
1417 <a href="http://ppa.launchpad.net/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/ubuntu/pool/main/g/gr-gsm/">http://ppa.launchpad.net/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/ubuntu/pool/main/g/gr-gsm/</a>,</li>
1418
1419 <li>clone the git repostory from <a href="https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher">https://github.com/Oros42/IMSI-catcher</a>,</li>
1420
1421 <li>run grgsm_livemon and adjust the frequency until the terminal
1422 where it was started is filled with a stream of text (meaning you
1423 found a GSM station).</li>
1424
1425 <li>go into the IMSI-catcher directory and run 'sudo python simple_IMSI-catcher.py' to extract the IMSI numbers.</li>
1426
1427 </ol>
1428
1429 <p>To make it even easier in the future to get this sniffer up and
1430 running, I decided to package
1431 <a href="https://github.com/ptrkrysik/gr-gsm/">the gr-gsm project</a>
1432 for Debian (<a href="https://bugs.debian.org/871055">WNPP
1433 #871055</a>), and the package was uploaded into the NEW queue today.
1434 Luckily the gnuradio maintainer has promised to help me, as I do not
1435 know much about gnuradio stuff yet.</p>
1436
1437 <p>I doubt this "IMSI cacher" is anywhere near as powerfull as
1438 commercial tools like
1439 <a href="https://www.thespyphone.com/portable-imsi-imei-catcher/">The
1440 Spy Phone Portable IMSI / IMEI Catcher</a> or the
1441 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_phone_tracker">Harris
1442 Stingray</a>, but I hope the existance of cheap alternatives can make
1443 more people realise how their whereabouts when carrying a cell phone
1444 is easily tracked.  Seeing the data flow on the screen, realizing that
1445 I live close to a police station and knowing that the police is also
1446 wearing cell phones, I wonder how hard it would be for criminals to
1447 track the position of the police officers to discover when there are
1448 police near by, or for foreign military forces to track the location
1449 of the Norwegian military forces, or for anyone to track the location
1450 of government officials...</p>
1451
1452 <p>It is worth noting that the data reported by the IMSI-catcher
1453 script mentioned above is only a fraction of the data broadcasted on
1454 the GSM network.  It will only collect one frequency at the time,
1455 while a typical phone will be using several frequencies, and not all
1456 phones will be using the frequencies tracked by the grgsm_livemod
1457 program.  Also, there is a lot of radio chatter being ignored by the
1458 simple_IMSI-catcher script, which would be collected by extending the
1459 parser code.  I wonder if gr-gsm can be set up to listen to more than
1460 one frequency?</p>
1461
1462       </div>
1463       <div class="tags">
1464
1465
1466         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/surveillance">surveillance</a>.
1467
1468
1469       </div>
1470     </div>
1471     <div class="padding"></div>
1472
1473     <div class="entry">
1474       <div class="title">
1475         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook_is_now_available.html">Norwegian Bokmål edition of Debian Administrator's Handbook is now available</a>
1476       </div>
1477       <div class="date">
1478         25th July 2017
1479       </div>
1480       <div class="body">
1481         <p align="center"><img align="center" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-07-25-debian-handbook-nb-testprint.png"/></p>
1482
1483 <p>I finally received a copy of the Norwegian Bokmål edition of
1484 "<a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian Administrator's
1485 Handbook</a>".  This test copy arrived in the mail a few days ago, and
1486 I am very happy to hold the result in my hand.   We spent around one and a half year translating it. This paperbook edition
1487 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/#norwegian">is available
1488 from lulu.com</a>.  If you buy it quickly, you save 25% on the list
1489 price.  The book is also available for download in electronic form as
1490 PDF, EPUB and Mobipocket, as can be
1491 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/browse/nb-NO/stable/">read online
1492 as a web page</a>.</p>
1493
1494 <p>This is the second book I publish (the first was the book
1495 "<a href="http://free-culture.cc/">Free Culture</a>" by Lawrence Lessig
1496 in
1497 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/free-culture/paperback/product-22440520.html">English</a>,
1498 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/culture-libre/paperback/product-22645082.html">French</a>
1499 and
1500 <a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/lawrence-lessig/fri-kultur/paperback/product-22441576.html">Norwegian
1501 Bokmål</a>), and I am very excited to finally wrap up this
1502 project.  I hope
1503 "<a href="http://www.lulu.com/shop/rapha%C3%ABl-hertzog-and-roland-mas/h%C3%A5ndbok-for-debian-administratoren/paperback/product-23262290.html">Håndbok
1504 for Debian-administratoren</a>" will be well received.</p>
1505
1506       </div>
1507       <div class="tags">
1508
1509
1510         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1511
1512
1513       </div>
1514     </div>
1515     <div class="padding"></div>
1516
1517     <div class="entry">
1518       <div class="title">
1519         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/N_r_nynorskoversettelsen_svikter_til_eksamen___.html">Når nynorskoversettelsen svikter til eksamen...</a>
1520       </div>
1521       <div class="date">
1522          3rd June 2017
1523       </div>
1524       <div class="body">
1525         <p><a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/norge/Krever-at-elever-ma-fa-annullert-eksamen-etter-rot-med-oppgavetekster-622459b.html">Aftenposten
1526 melder i dag</a> om feil i eksamensoppgavene for eksamen i politikk og
1527 menneskerettigheter, der teksten i bokmåls og nynorskutgaven ikke var
1528 like.  Oppgaveteksten er gjengitt i artikkelen, og jeg ble nysgjerring
1529 på om den fri oversetterløsningen
1530 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium</a> ville gjort en bedre
1531 jobb enn Utdanningsdirektoratet.  Det kan se slik ut.</p>
1532
1533 <p>Her er bokmålsoppgaven fra eksamenen:</p>
1534
1535 <blockquote>
1536 <p>Drøft utfordringene knyttet til nasjonalstatenes og andre aktørers
1537 rolle og muligheter til å håndtere internasjonale utfordringer, som
1538 for eksempel flykningekrisen.</p>
1539
1540 <p>Vedlegge er eksempler på tekster som kan gi relevante perspektiver
1541 på temaet:</p>
1542 <ol>
1543 <li>Flykningeregnskapet 2016, UNHCR og IDMC
1544 <li>«Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015
1545 </ol>
1546
1547 </blockquote>
1548
1549 <p>Dette oversetter Apertium slik:</p>
1550
1551 <blockquote>
1552 <p>Drøft utfordringane knytte til nasjonalstatane sine og rolla til
1553 andre aktørar og høve til å handtera internasjonale utfordringar, som
1554 til dømes *flykningekrisen.</p>
1555
1556 <p>Vedleggja er døme på tekster som kan gje relevante perspektiv på
1557 temaet:</p>
1558
1559 <ol>
1560 <li>*Flykningeregnskapet 2016, *UNHCR og *IDMC</li>
1561 <li>«*Grenseløst Europa for fall» A-Magasinet, 26. november 2015</li>
1562 </ol>
1563
1564 </blockquote>
1565
1566 <p>Ord som ikke ble forstått er markert med stjerne (*), og trenger
1567 ekstra språksjekk.  Men ingen ord er forsvunnet, slik det var i
1568 oppgaven elevene fikk presentert på eksamen.  Jeg mistenker dog at
1569 "andre aktørers rolle og muligheter til ..." burde vært oversatt til
1570 "rolla til andre aktørar og deira høve til ..." eller noe slikt, men
1571 det er kanskje flisespikking.  Det understreker vel bare at det alltid
1572 trengs korrekturlesning etter automatisk oversettelse.</p>
1573
1574       </div>
1575       <div class="tags">
1576
1577
1578         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>.
1579
1580
1581       </div>
1582     </div>
1583     <div class="padding"></div>
1584
1585     <div class="entry">
1586       <div class="title">
1587         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Detecting_NFS_hangs_on_Linux_without_hanging_yourself___.html">Detecting NFS hangs on Linux without hanging yourself...</a>
1588       </div>
1589       <div class="date">
1590          9th March 2017
1591       </div>
1592       <div class="body">
1593         <p>Over the years, administrating thousand of NFS mounting linux
1594 computers at the time, I often needed a way to detect if the machine
1595 was experiencing NFS hang.  If you try to use <tt>df</tt> or look at a
1596 file or directory affected by the hang, the process (and possibly the
1597 shell) will hang too.  So you want to be able to detect this without
1598 risking the detection process getting stuck too.  It has not been
1599 obvious how to do this.  When the hang has lasted a while, it is
1600 possible to find messages like these in dmesg:</p>
1601
1602 <p><blockquote>
1603 nfs: server nfsserver not responding, still trying
1604 <br>nfs: server nfsserver OK
1605 </blockquote></p>
1606
1607 <p>It is hard to know if the hang is still going on, and it is hard to
1608 be sure looking in dmesg is going to work.  If there are lots of other
1609 messages in dmesg the lines might have rotated out of site before they
1610 are noticed.</p>
1611
1612 <p>While reading through the nfs client implementation in linux kernel
1613 code, I came across some statistics that seem to give a way to detect
1614 it.  The om_timeouts sunrpc value in the kernel will increase every
1615 time the above log entry is inserted into dmesg.  And after digging a
1616 bit further, I discovered that this value show up in
1617 /proc/self/mountstats on Linux.</p>
1618
1619 <p>The mountstats content seem to be shared between files using the
1620 same file system context, so it is enough to check one of the
1621 mountstats files to get the state of the mount point for the machine.
1622 I assume this will not show lazy umounted NFS points, nor NFS mount
1623 points in a different process context (ie with a different filesystem
1624 view), but that does not worry me.</p>
1625
1626 <p>The content for a NFS mount point look similar to this:</p>
1627
1628 <p><blockquote><pre>
1629 [...]
1630 device /dev/mapper/Debian-var mounted on /var with fstype ext3
1631 device nfsserver:/mnt/nfsserver/home0 mounted on /mnt/nfsserver/home0 with fstype nfs statvers=1.1
1632         opts:   rw,vers=3,rsize=65536,wsize=65536,namlen=255,acregmin=3,acregmax=60,acdirmin=30,acdirmax=60,soft,nolock,proto=tcp,timeo=600,retrans=2,sec=sys,mountaddr=129.240.3.145,mountvers=3,mountport=4048,mountproto=udp,local_lock=all
1633         age:    7863311
1634         caps:   caps=0x3fe7,wtmult=4096,dtsize=8192,bsize=0,namlen=255
1635         sec:    flavor=1,pseudoflavor=1
1636         events: 61063112 732346265 1028140 35486205 16220064 8162542 761447191 71714012 37189 3891185 45561809 110486139 4850138 420353 15449177 296502 52736725 13523379 0 52182 9016896 1231 0 0 0 0 0
1637         bytes:  166253035039 219519120027 0 0 40783504807 185466229638 11677877 45561809
1638         RPC iostats version: 1.0  p/v: 100003/3 (nfs)
1639         xprt:   tcp 925 1 6810 0 0 111505412 111480497 109 2672418560317 0 248 53869103 22481820
1640         per-op statistics
1641                 NULL: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1642              GETATTR: 61063106 61063108 0 9621383060 6839064400 453650 77291321 78926132
1643              SETATTR: 463469 463470 0 92005440 66739536 63787 603235 687943
1644               LOOKUP: 17021657 17021657 0 3354097764 4013442928 57216 35125459 35566511
1645               ACCESS: 14281703 14290009 5 2318400592 1713803640 1709282 4865144 7130140
1646             READLINK: 125 125 0 20472 18620 0 1112 1118
1647                 READ: 4214236 4214237 0 715608524 41328653212 89884 22622768 22806693
1648                WRITE: 8479010 8494376 22 187695798568 1356087148 178264904 51506907 231671771
1649               CREATE: 171708 171708 0 38084748 46702272 873 1041833 1050398
1650                MKDIR: 3680 3680 0 773980 993920 26 23990 24245
1651              SYMLINK: 903 903 0 233428 245488 6 5865 5917
1652                MKNOD: 80 80 0 20148 21760 0 299 304
1653               REMOVE: 429921 429921 0 79796004 61908192 3313 2710416 2741636
1654                RMDIR: 3367 3367 0 645112 484848 22 5782 6002
1655               RENAME: 466201 466201 0 130026184 121212260 7075 5935207 5961288
1656                 LINK: 289155 289155 0 72775556 67083960 2199 2565060 2585579
1657              READDIR: 2933237 2933237 0 516506204 13973833412 10385 3190199 3297917
1658          READDIRPLUS: 1652839 1652839 0 298640972 6895997744 84735 14307895 14448937
1659               FSSTAT: 6144 6144 0 1010516 1032192 51 9654 10022
1660               FSINFO: 2 2 0 232 328 0 1 1
1661             PATHCONF: 1 1 0 116 140 0 0 0
1662               COMMIT: 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
1663
1664 device binfmt_misc mounted on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc with fstype binfmt_misc
1665 [...]
1666 </pre></blockquote></p>
1667
1668 <p>The key number to look at is the third number in the per-op list.
1669 It is the number of NFS timeouts experiences per file system
1670 operation.  Here 22 write timeouts and 5 access timeouts.  If these
1671 numbers are increasing, I believe the machine is experiencing NFS
1672 hang.  Unfortunately the timeout value do not start to increase right
1673 away.  The NFS operations need to time out first, and this can take a
1674 while.  The exact timeout value depend on the setup.  For example the
1675 defaults for TCP and UDP mount points are quite different, and the
1676 timeout value is affected by the soft, hard, timeo and retrans NFS
1677 mount options.</p>
1678
1679 <p>The only way I have been able to get working on Debian and RedHat
1680 Enterprise Linux for getting the timeout count is to peek in /proc/.
1681 But according to
1682 <ahref="http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19253-01/816-4555/netmonitor-12/index.html">Solaris
1683 10 System Administration Guide: Network Services</a>, the 'nfsstat -c'
1684 command can be used to get these timeout values.  But this do not work
1685 on Linux, as far as I can tell.  I
1686 <ahref="http://bugs.debian.org/857043">asked Debian about this</a>,
1687 but have not seen any replies yet.</p>
1688
1689 <p>Is there a better way to figure out if a Linux NFS client is
1690 experiencing NFS hangs?  Is there a way to detect which processes are
1691 affected?  Is there a way to get the NFS mount going quickly once the
1692 network problem causing the NFS hang has been cleared?  I would very
1693 much welcome some clues, as we regularly run into NFS hangs.</p>
1694
1695       </div>
1696       <div class="tags">
1697
1698
1699         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/sysadmin">sysadmin</a>.
1700
1701
1702       </div>
1703     </div>
1704     <div class="padding"></div>
1705
1706     <div class="entry">
1707       <div class="title">
1708         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Norwegian_Bokm_l_translation_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook_complete__proofreading_in_progress.html">Norwegian Bokmål translation of The Debian Administrator's Handbook complete, proofreading in progress</a>
1709       </div>
1710       <div class="date">
1711          3rd March 2017
1712       </div>
1713       <div class="body">
1714         <p>For almost a year now, we have been working on making a Norwegian
1715 Bokmål edition of <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/">The Debian
1716 Administrator's Handbook</a>.  Now, thanks to the tireless effort of
1717 Ole-Erik, Ingrid and Andreas, the initial translation is complete, and
1718 we are working on the proof reading to ensure consistent language and
1719 use of correct computer science terms.  The plan is to make the book
1720 available on paper, as well as in electronic form.  For that to
1721 happen, the proof reading must be completed and all the figures need
1722 to be translated.  If you want to help out, get in touch.</p>
1723
1724 <p><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-handbook/debian-handbook-nb-NO.pdf">A
1725
1726 fresh PDF edition</a> in A4 format (the final book will have smaller
1727 pages) of the book created every morning is available for
1728 proofreading.  If you find any errors, please
1729 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">visit
1730 Weblate and correct the error</a>.  The
1731 <a href="http://l.github.io/debian-handbook/stat/nb-NO/index.html">state
1732 of the translation including figures</a> is a useful source for those
1733 provide Norwegian bokmål screen shots and figures.</p>
1734
1735       </div>
1736       <div class="tags">
1737
1738
1739         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
1740
1741
1742       </div>
1743     </div>
1744     <div class="padding"></div>
1745
1746     <div class="entry">
1747       <div class="title">
1748         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Unlimited_randomness_with_the_ChaosKey_.html">Unlimited randomness with the ChaosKey?</a>
1749       </div>
1750       <div class="date">
1751          1st March 2017
1752       </div>
1753       <div class="body">
1754         <p>A few days ago I ordered a small batch of
1755 <a href="http://altusmetrum.org/ChaosKey/">the ChaosKey</a>, a small
1756 USB dongle for generating entropy created by Bdale Garbee and Keith
1757 Packard.  Yesterday it arrived, and I am very happy to report that it
1758 work great!  According to its designers, to get it to work out of the
1759 box, you need the Linux kernel version 4.1 or later.  I tested on a
1760 Debian Stretch machine (kernel version 4.9), and there it worked just
1761 fine, increasing the available entropy very quickly.  I wrote a small
1762 test oneliner to test.  It first print the current entropy level,
1763 drain /dev/random, and then print the entropy level for five seconds.
1764 Here is the situation without the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
1765
1766 <blockquote><pre>
1767 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1768   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
1769   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
1770      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1771      sleep 1; \
1772   done
1773 300
1774 0+1 oppføringer inn
1775 0+1 oppføringer ut
1776 28 byte kopiert, 0,000264565 s, 106 kB/s
1777 4
1778 8
1779 12
1780 17
1781 21
1782 %
1783 </pre></blockquote>
1784
1785 <p>The entropy level increases by 3-4 every second.  In such case any
1786 application requiring random bits (like a HTTPS enabled web server)
1787 will halt and wait for more entrpy.  And here is the situation with
1788 the ChaosKey inserted:</p>
1789
1790 <blockquote><pre>
1791 % cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1792   dd bs=1M if=/dev/random of=/dev/null count=1; \
1793   for n in $(seq 1 5); do \
1794      cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail; \
1795      sleep 1; \
1796   done
1797 1079
1798 0+1 oppføringer inn
1799 0+1 oppføringer ut
1800 104 byte kopiert, 0,000487647 s, 213 kB/s
1801 433
1802 1028
1803 1031
1804 1035
1805 1038
1806 %
1807 </pre></blockquote>
1808
1809 <p>Quite the difference. :) I bought a few more than I need, in case
1810 someone want to buy one here in Norway. :)</p>
1811
1812 <p>Update: The dongle was presented at Debconf last year.  You might
1813 find <a href="https://debconf16.debconf.org/talks/94/">the talk
1814 recording illuminating</a>.  It explains exactly what the source of
1815 randomness is, if you are unable to spot it from the schema drawing
1816 available from the ChaosKey web site linked at the start of this blog
1817 post.</p>
1818
1819       </div>
1820       <div class="tags">
1821
1822
1823         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>.
1824
1825
1826       </div>
1827     </div>
1828     <div class="padding"></div>
1829
1830     <div class="entry">
1831       <div class="title">
1832         <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>
1833       </div>
1834       <div class="date">
1835          9th January 2017
1836       </div>
1837       <div class="body">
1838         <p>Did you ever wonder where the web trafic really flow to reach the
1839 web servers, and who own the network equipment it is flowing through?
1840 It is possible to get a glimpse of this from using traceroute, but it
1841 is hard to find all the details.  Many years ago, I wrote a system to
1842 map the Norwegian Internet (trying to figure out if our plans for a
1843 network game service would get low enough latency, and who we needed
1844 to talk to about setting up game servers close to the users.  Back
1845 then I used traceroute output from many locations (I asked my friends
1846 to run a script and send me their traceroute output) to create the
1847 graph and the map.  The output from traceroute typically look like
1848 this:
1849
1850 <p><pre>
1851 traceroute to www.stortinget.no (85.88.67.10), 30 hops max, 60 byte packets
1852  1  uio-gw10.uio.no (129.240.202.1)  0.447 ms  0.486 ms  0.621 ms
1853  2  uio-gw8.uio.no (129.240.24.229)  0.467 ms  0.578 ms  0.675 ms
1854  3  oslo-gw1.uninett.no (128.39.65.17)  0.385 ms  0.373 ms  0.358 ms
1855  4  te3-1-2.br1.fn3.as2116.net (193.156.90.3)  1.174 ms  1.172 ms  1.153 ms
1856  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
1857  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
1858  7  89.191.10.146 (89.191.10.146)  0.931 ms  0.917 ms  0.955 ms
1859  8  * * *
1860  9  * * *
1861 [...]
1862 </pre></p>
1863
1864 <p>This show the DNS names and IP addresses of (at least some of the)
1865 network equipment involved in getting the data traffic from me to the
1866 www.stortinget.no server, and how long it took in milliseconds for a
1867 package to reach the equipment and return to me.  Three packages are
1868 sent, and some times the packages do not follow the same path.  This
1869 is shown for hop 5, where three different IP addresses replied to the
1870 traceroute request.</p>
1871
1872 <p>There are many ways to measure trace routes.  Other good traceroute
1873 implementations I use are traceroute (using ICMP packages) mtr (can do
1874 both ICMP, UDP and TCP) and scapy (python library with ICMP, UDP, TCP
1875 traceroute and a lot of other capabilities).  All of them are easily
1876 available in <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>.</p>
1877
1878 <p>This time around, I wanted to know the geographic location of
1879 different route points, to visualize how visiting a web page spread
1880 information about the visit to a lot of servers around the globe.  The
1881 background is that a web site today often will ask the browser to get
1882 from many servers the parts (for example HTML, JSON, fonts,
1883 JavaScript, CSS, video) required to display the content.  This will
1884 leak information about the visit to those controlling these servers
1885 and anyone able to peek at the data traffic passing by (like your ISP,
1886 the ISPs backbone provider, FRA, GCHQ, NSA and others).</p>
1887
1888 <p>Lets pick an example, the Norwegian parliament web site
1889 www.stortinget.no.  It is read daily by all members of parliament and
1890 their staff, as well as political journalists, activits and many other
1891 citizens of Norway.  A visit to the www.stortinget.no web site will
1892 ask your browser to contact 8 other servers: ajax.googleapis.com,
1893 insights.hotjar.com, script.hotjar.com, static.hotjar.com,
1894 stats.g.doubleclick.net, www.google-analytics.com,
1895 www.googletagmanager.com and www.netigate.se.  I extracted this by
1896 asking <a href="http://phantomjs.org/">PhantomJS</a> to visit the
1897 Stortinget web page and tell me all the URLs PhantomJS downloaded to
1898 render the page (in HAR format using
1899 <a href="https://github.com/ariya/phantomjs/blob/master/examples/netsniff.js">their
1900 netsniff example</a>.  I am very grateful to Gorm for showing me how
1901 to do this).  My goal is to visualize network traces to all IP
1902 addresses behind these DNS names, do show where visitors personal
1903 information is spread when visiting the page.</p>
1904
1905 <p align="center"><a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml"><img
1906 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>
1907
1908 <p>When I had a look around for options, I could not find any good
1909 free software tools to do this, and decided I needed my own traceroute
1910 wrapper outputting KML based on locations looked up using GeoIP.  KML
1911 is easy to work with and easy to generate, and understood by several
1912 of the GIS tools I have available.  I got good help from by NUUG
1913 colleague Anders Einar with this, and the result can be seen in
1914 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/kmltraceroute">my
1915 kmltraceroute git repository</a>.  Unfortunately, the quality of the
1916 free GeoIP databases I could find (and the for-pay databases my
1917 friends had access to) is not up to the task.  The IP addresses of
1918 central Internet infrastructure would typically be placed near the
1919 controlling companies main office, and not where the router is really
1920 located, as you can see from <a href="www.stortinget.no-geoip.kml">the
1921 KML file I created</a> using the GeoLite City dataset from MaxMind.
1922
1923 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg"><img
1924 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>
1925
1926 <p>I also had a look at the visual traceroute graph created by
1927 <a href="http://www.secdev.org/projects/scapy/">the scrapy project</a>,
1928 showing IP network ownership (aka AS owner) for the IP address in
1929 question.
1930 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-scapy.svg">The
1931 graph display a lot of useful information about the traceroute in SVG
1932 format</a>, and give a good indication on who control the network
1933 equipment involved, but it do not include geolocation.  This graph
1934 make it possible to see the information is made available at least for
1935 UNINETT, Catchcom, Stortinget, Nordunet, Google, Amazon, Telia, Level
1936 3 Communications and NetDNA.</p>
1937
1938 <p align="center"><a href="https://geotraceroute.com/index.php?node=4&host=www.stortinget.no"><img
1939 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>
1940
1941 <p>In the process, I came across the
1942 <a href="https://geotraceroute.com/">web service GeoTraceroute</a> by
1943 Salim Gasmi.  Its methology of combining guesses based on DNS names,
1944 various location databases and finally use latecy times to rule out
1945 candidate locations seemed to do a very good job of guessing correct
1946 geolocation.  But it could only do one trace at the time, did not have
1947 a sensor in Norway and did not make the geolocations easily available
1948 for postprocessing.  So I contacted the developer and asked if he
1949 would be willing to share the code (he refused until he had time to
1950 clean it up), but he was interested in providing the geolocations in a
1951 machine readable format, and willing to set up a sensor in Norway.  So
1952 since yesterday, it is possible to run traces from Norway in this
1953 service thanks to a sensor node set up by
1954 <a href="https://www.nuug.no/">the NUUG assosiation</a>, and get the
1955 trace in KML format for further processing.</p>
1956
1957 <p align="center"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2017-01-09-www.stortinget.no-geotraceroute-kml-join.kml"><img
1958 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>
1959
1960 <p>Here we can see a lot of trafic passes Sweden on its way to
1961 Denmark, Germany, Holland and Ireland.  Plenty of places where the
1962 Snowden confirmations verified the traffic is read by various actors
1963 without your best interest as their top priority.</p>
1964
1965 <p>Combining KML files is trivial using a text editor, so I could loop
1966 over all the hosts behind the urls imported by www.stortinget.no and
1967 ask for the KML file from GeoTraceroute, and create a combined KML
1968 file with all the traces (unfortunately only one of the IP addresses
1969 behind the DNS name is traced this time.  To get them all, one would
1970 have to request traces using IP number instead of DNS names from
1971 GeoTraceroute).  That might be the next step in this project.</p>
1972
1973 <p>Armed with these tools, I find it a lot easier to figure out where
1974 the IP traffic moves and who control the boxes involved in moving it.
1975 And every time the link crosses for example the Swedish border, we can
1976 be sure Swedish Signal Intelligence (FRA) is listening, as GCHQ do in
1977 Britain and NSA in USA and cables around the globe.  (Hm, what should
1978 we tell them? :) Keep that in mind if you ever send anything
1979 unencrypted over the Internet.</p>
1980
1981 <p>PS: KML files are drawn using
1982 <a href="http://ivanrublev.me/kml/">the KML viewer from Ivan
1983 Rublev<a/>, as it was less cluttered than the local Linux application
1984 Marble.  There are heaps of other options too.</p>
1985
1986 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
1987 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
1988 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
1989
1990       </div>
1991       <div class="tags">
1992
1993
1994         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>.
1995
1996
1997       </div>
1998     </div>
1999     <div class="padding"></div>
2000
2001     <div class="entry">
2002       <div class="title">
2003         <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>
2004       </div>
2005       <div class="date">
2006         23rd December 2016
2007       </div>
2008       <div class="body">
2009         <p>I received a very nice Christmas present today.  As my regular
2010 readers probably know, I have been working on the
2011 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the Isenkram
2012 system</a> for many years.  The goal of the Isenkram system is to make
2013 it easier for users to figure out what to install to get a given piece
2014 of hardware to work in Debian, and a key part of this system is a way
2015 to map hardware to packages.  Isenkram have its own mapping database,
2016 and also uses data provided by each package using the AppStream
2017 metadata format.  And today,
2018 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/appstream">AppStream</a> in
2019 Debian learned to look up hardware the same way Isenkram is doing it,
2020 ie using fnmatch():</p>
2021
2022 <p><pre>
2023 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias \
2024   usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
2025 Identifier: pymissile [generic]
2026 Name: pymissile
2027 Summary: Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher
2028 Package: pymissile
2029 % appstreamcli what-provides modalias usb:v0694p0002d0000
2030 Identifier: libnxt [generic]
2031 Name: libnxt
2032 Summary: utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NXT brick
2033 Package: libnxt
2034 ---
2035 Identifier: t2n [generic]
2036 Name: t2n
2037 Summary: Simple command-line tool for Lego NXT
2038 Package: t2n
2039 ---
2040 Identifier: python-nxt [generic]
2041 Name: python-nxt
2042 Summary: Python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot
2043 Package: python-nxt
2044 ---
2045 Identifier: nbc [generic]
2046 Name: nbc
2047 Summary: C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks
2048 Package: nbc
2049 %
2050 </pre></p>
2051
2052 <p>A similar query can be done using the combined AppStream and
2053 Isenkram databases using the isenkram-lookup tool:</p>
2054
2055 <p><pre>
2056 % isenkram-lookup usb:v1130p0202d0100dc00dsc00dp00ic03isc00ip00in00
2057 pymissile
2058 % isenkram-lookup usb:v0694p0002d0000
2059 libnxt
2060 nbc
2061 python-nxt
2062 t2n
2063 %
2064 </pre></p>
2065
2066 <p>You can find modalias values relevant for your machine using
2067 <tt>cat $(find /sys/devices/ -name modalias)</tt>.
2068
2069 <p>If you want to make this system a success and help Debian users
2070 make the most of the hardware they have, please
2071 help<a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add
2072 AppStream metadata for your package following the guidelines</a>
2073 documented in the wiki.  So far only 11 packages provide such
2074 information, among the several hundred hardware specific packages in
2075 Debian. The Isenkram database on the other hand contain 101 packages,
2076 mostly related to USB dongles.  Most of the packages with hardware
2077 mapping in AppStream are LEGO Mindstorms related, because I have, as
2078 part of my involvement in
2079 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the Debian LEGO
2080 team</a> given priority to making sure LEGO users get proposed the
2081 complete set of packages in Debian for that particular hardware.  The
2082 team also got a nice Christmas present today.  The
2083 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/nxt-firmware">nxt-firmware
2084 package</a> made it into Debian.  With this package in place, it is
2085 now possible to use the LEGO Mindstorms NXT unit with only free
2086 software, as the nxt-firmware package contain the source and firmware
2087 binaries for the NXT brick.</p>
2088
2089 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2090 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2091 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2092
2093       </div>
2094       <div class="tags">
2095
2096
2097         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>.
2098
2099
2100       </div>
2101     </div>
2102     <div class="padding"></div>
2103
2104     <div class="entry">
2105       <div class="title">
2106         <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>
2107       </div>
2108       <div class="date">
2109         20th December 2016
2110       </div>
2111       <div class="body">
2112         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
2113 system</a> I wrote two years ago to make it easier in Debian to find
2114 and install packages to get your hardware dongles to work, is still
2115 going strong.  It is a system to look up the hardware present on or
2116 connected to the current system, and map the hardware to Debian
2117 packages.  It can either be done using the tools in isenkram-cli or
2118 using the user space daemon in the isenkram package.  The latter will
2119 notify you, when inserting new hardware, about what packages to
2120 install to get the dongle working.  It will even provide a button to
2121 click on to ask packagekit to install the packages.</p>
2122
2123 <p>Here is an command line example from my Thinkpad laptop:</p>
2124
2125 <p><pre>
2126 % isenkram-lookup
2127 bluez
2128 cheese
2129 ethtool
2130 fprintd
2131 fprintd-demo
2132 gkrellm-thinkbat
2133 hdapsd
2134 libpam-fprintd
2135 pidgin-blinklight
2136 thinkfan
2137 tlp
2138 tp-smapi-dkms
2139 tp-smapi-source
2140 tpb
2141 %
2142 </pre></p>
2143
2144 <p>It can also list the firware package providing firmware requested
2145 by the load kernel modules, which in my case is an empty list because
2146 I have all the firmware my machine need:
2147
2148 <p><pre>
2149 % /usr/sbin/isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
2150 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
2151 %
2152 </pre></p>
2153
2154 <p>The last few days I had a look at several of the around 250
2155 packages in Debian with udev rules.  These seem like good candidates
2156 to install when a given hardware dongle is inserted, and I found
2157 several that should be proposed by isenkram.  I have not had time to
2158 check all of them, but am happy to report that now there are 97
2159 packages packages mapped to hardware by Isenkram.  11 of these
2160 packages provide hardware mapping using AppStream, while the rest are
2161 listed in the modaliases file provided in isenkram.</p>
2162
2163 <p>These are the packages with hardware mappings at the moment.  The
2164 <strong>marked packages</strong> are also announcing their hardware
2165 support using AppStream, for everyone to use:</p>
2166
2167 <p>air-quality-sensor, alsa-firmware-loaders, argyll,
2168 <strong>array-info</strong>, avarice, avrdude, b43-fwcutter,
2169 bit-babbler, bluez, bluez-firmware, <strong>brltty</strong>,
2170 <strong>broadcom-sta-dkms</strong>, calibre, cgminer, cheese, colord,
2171 <strong>colorhug-client</strong>, dahdi-firmware-nonfree, dahdi-linux,
2172 dfu-util, dolphin-emu, ekeyd, ethtool, firmware-ipw2x00, fprintd,
2173 fprintd-demo, <strong>galileo</strong>, gkrellm-thinkbat, gphoto2,
2174 gpsbabel, gpsbabel-gui, gpsman, gpstrans, gqrx-sdr, gr-fcdproplus,
2175 gr-osmosdr, gtkpod, hackrf, hdapsd, hdmi2usb-udev, hpijs-ppds, hplip,
2176 ipw3945-source, ipw3945d, kde-config-tablet, kinect-audio-setup,
2177 <strong>libnxt</strong>, libpam-fprintd, <strong>lomoco</strong>,
2178 madwimax, minidisc-utils, mkgmap, msi-keyboard, mtkbabel,
2179 <strong>nbc</strong>, <strong>nqc</strong>, nut-hal-drivers, ola,
2180 open-vm-toolbox, open-vm-tools, openambit, pcgminer, pcmciautils,
2181 pcscd, pidgin-blinklight, printer-driver-splix,
2182 <strong>pymissile</strong>, python-nxt, qlandkartegt,
2183 qlandkartegt-garmin, rosegarden, rt2x00-source, sispmctl,
2184 soapysdr-module-hackrf, solaar, squeak-plugins-scratch, sunxi-tools,
2185 <strong>t2n</strong>, thinkfan, thinkfinger-tools, tlp, tp-smapi-dkms,
2186 tp-smapi-source, tpb, tucnak, uhd-host, usbmuxd, viking,
2187 virtualbox-ose-guest-x11, w1retap, xawtv, xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse,
2188 xserver-xorg-input-wacom, xserver-xorg-video-qxl,
2189 xserver-xorg-video-vmware, yubikey-personalization and
2190 zd1211-firmware</p>
2191
2192 <p>If you know of other packages, please let me know with a wishlist
2193 bug report against the isenkram-cli package, and ask the package
2194 maintainer to
2195 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">add AppStream
2196 metadata according to the guidelines</a> to provide the information
2197 for everyone.  In time, I hope to get rid of the isenkram specific
2198 hardware mapping and depend exclusively on AppStream.</p>
2199
2200 <p>Note, the AppStream metadata for broadcom-sta-dkms is matching too
2201 much hardware, and suggest that the package with with any ethernet
2202 card.  See <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/838735">bug #838735</a> for
2203 the details.  I hope the maintainer find time to address it soon.  In
2204 the mean time I provide an override in isenkram.</p>
2205
2206       </div>
2207       <div class="tags">
2208
2209
2210         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>.
2211
2212
2213       </div>
2214     </div>
2215     <div class="padding"></div>
2216
2217     <div class="entry">
2218       <div class="title">
2219         <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>
2220       </div>
2221       <div class="date">
2222         11th December 2016
2223       </div>
2224       <div class="body">
2225         <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-12-11-nice-oolite.png"/></p>
2226
2227 <p>In my early years, I played
2228 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Classic_Elite">the epic game
2229 Elite</a> on my PC.  I spent many months trading and fighting in
2230 space, and reached the 'elite' fighting status before I moved on.  The
2231 original Elite game was available on Commodore 64 and the IBM PC
2232 edition I played had a 64 KB executable.  I am still impressed today
2233 that the authors managed to squeeze both a 3D engine and details about
2234 more than 2000 planet systems across 7 galaxies into a binary so
2235 small.</p>
2236
2237 <p>I have known about <a href="http://www.oolite.org/">the free
2238 software game Oolite inspired by Elite</a> for a while, but did not
2239 really have time to test it properly until a few days ago.  It was
2240 great to discover that my old knowledge about trading routes were
2241 still valid.  But my fighting and flying abilities were gone, so I had
2242 to retrain to be able to dock on a space station.  And I am still not
2243 able to make much resistance when I am attacked by pirates, so I
2244 bougth and mounted the most powerful laser in the rear to be able to
2245 put up at least some resistance while fleeing for my life. :)</p>
2246
2247 <p>When playing Elite in the late eighties, I had to discover
2248 everything on my own, and I had long lists of prices seen on different
2249 planets to be able to decide where to trade what.  This time I had the
2250 advantages of the
2251 <a href="http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Main_Page">Elite wiki</a>,
2252 where information about each planet is easily available with common
2253 price ranges and suggested trading routes.  This improved my ability
2254 to earn money and I have been able to earn enough to buy a lot of
2255 useful equipent in a few days.  I believe I originally played for
2256 months before I could get a docking computer, while now I could get it
2257 after less then a week.</p>
2258
2259 <p>If you like science fiction and dreamed of a life as a vagabond in
2260 space, you should try out Oolite.  It is available for Linux, MacOSX
2261 and Windows, and is included in Debian and derivatives since 2011.</p>
2262
2263 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2264 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2265 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2266
2267       </div>
2268       <div class="tags">
2269
2270
2271         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>.
2272
2273
2274       </div>
2275     </div>
2276     <div class="padding"></div>
2277
2278     <div class="entry">
2279       <div class="title">
2280         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Quicker_Debian_installations_using_eatmydata.html">Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</a>
2281       </div>
2282       <div class="date">
2283         25th November 2016
2284       </div>
2285       <div class="body">
2286         <p>Two years ago, I did some experiments with eatmydata and the Debian
2287 installation system, observing how using
2288 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">eatmydata
2289 could speed up the installation</a> quite a bit.  My testing measured
2290 speedup around 20-40 percent for Debian Edu, where we install around
2291 1000 packages from within the installer.  The eatmydata package
2292 provide a way to disable/delay file system flushing.  This is a bit
2293 risky in the general case, as files that should be stored on disk will
2294 stay only in memory a bit longer than expected, causing problems if a
2295 machine crashes at an inconvenient time.  But for an installation, if
2296 the machine crashes during installation the process is normally
2297 restarted, and avoiding disk operations as much as possible to speed
2298 up the process make perfect sense.
2299
2300 <p>I added code in the Debian Edu specific installation code to enable
2301 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libeatmydata">eatmydata</a>,
2302 but did not have time to push it any further.  But a few months ago I
2303 picked it up again and worked with the libeatmydata package maintainer
2304 Mattia Rizzolo to make it easier for everyone to get this installation
2305 speedup in Debian.  Thanks to our cooperation There is now an
2306 eatmydata-udeb package in Debian testing and unstable, and simply
2307 enabling/installing it in debian-installer (d-i) is enough to get the
2308 quicker installations.  It can be enabled using preseeding.  The
2309 following untested kernel argument should do the trick:</p>
2310
2311 <blockquote><pre>
2312 preseed/early_command="anna-install eatmydata-udeb"
2313 </pre></blockquote>
2314
2315 <p>This should ask d-i to install the package inside the d-i
2316 environment early in the installation sequence.  Having it installed
2317 in d-i in turn will make sure the relevant scripts are called just
2318 after debootstrap filled /target/ with the freshly installed Debian
2319 system to configure apt to run dpkg with eatmydata.  This is enough to
2320 speed up the installation process.  There is a proposal to
2321 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/841153">extend the idea a bit further
2322 by using /etc/ld.so.preload instead of apt.conf</a>, but I have not
2323 tested its impact.</p>
2324
2325
2326       </div>
2327       <div class="tags">
2328
2329
2330         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>.
2331
2332
2333       </div>
2334     </div>
2335     <div class="padding"></div>
2336
2337     <div class="entry">
2338       <div class="title">
2339         <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>
2340       </div>
2341       <div class="date">
2342         24th November 2016
2343       </div>
2344       <div class="body">
2345         <p>I Norge er det mange som trenger å skrive både bokmål og nynorsk.
2346 Eksamensoppgaver, offentlige brev og nyheter er eksempler på tekster
2347 der det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skoleoppgavene som
2348 elever over det ganske land skal levere inn hvert år.  Det mange ikke
2349 vet er at selv om de kommersielle alternativene
2350 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google Translate</a> og
2351 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing Translator</a> ikke kan
2352 bidra med å oversette mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finnes det et
2353 utmerket fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Oversetterverktøyet
2354 Apertium har støtte for en rekke språkkombinasjoner, og takket være
2355 den utrettelige innsatsen til blant annet Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
2356 en bruke webtjenesten til å fylle inn en tekst på bokmål eller
2357 nynorsk, og få den automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
2358 Resultatet er ikke perfekt, men et svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og til
2359 er resultatet så bra at det kan benyttes uten endringer.  Jeg vet
2360 f.eks. at store deler av Joomla ble oversatt til nynorsk ved hjelp
2361 Apertium.  Høres det ut som noe du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så fall
2362 <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
2363 teksten din i webskjemaet der.
2364
2365 <p>Hvis du trenger maskinell tilgang til den bakenforliggende
2366 teknologien kan du enten installere pakken
2367 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">apertium-nno-nob</a>
2368 på en Debian-maskin eller bruke web-API-et tilgjengelig fra
2369 api.apertium.org.  Se
2370 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">API-dokumentasjonen</a>
2371 for detaljer om web-API-et.  Her kan du se hvordan resultatet blir for
2372 denne teksten som ble skrevet på bokmål over maskinoversatt til
2373 nynorsk.</p>
2374
2375 <hr/>
2376
2377 <p>I Noreg er det mange som treng å skriva både bokmål og nynorsk.
2378 Eksamensoppgåver, offentlege brev og nyhende er døme på tekster der
2379 det er krav om skriftspråk.  I tillegg til alle skuleoppgåvene som
2380 elevar over det ganske land skal levera inn kvart år.  Det mange ikkje
2381 veit er at sjølv om dei kommersielle alternativa
2382 <a href="https://translate.google.com/">Google *Translate</a> og
2383 <a href="https://www.bing.com/translator/">Bing *Translator</a> ikkje
2384 kan bidra med å omsetja mellom bokmål og nynorsk, så finst det eit
2385 utmerka fri programvarealternativ som kan.  Omsetjarverktøyet
2386 *Apertium har støtte for ei rekkje språkkombinasjonar, og takka vera
2387 den utrøyttelege innsatsen til blant anna Kevin Brubeck Unhammer, kan
2388 ein bruka *webtjenesten til å fylla inn ei tekst på bokmål eller
2389 nynorsk, og få den *automatoversatt til det andre skriftspråket.
2390 Resultatet er ikkje perfekt, men eit svært godt utgangspunkt.  Av og
2391 til er resultatet så bra at det kan nyttast utan endringar.  Eg veit
2392 t.d. at store delar av *Joomla vart omsett til nynorsk ved hjelp
2393 *Apertium.  Høyrast det ut som noko du kan ha bruk for?  Besøk i så
2394 fall <a href="https://www.apertium.org/">*Apertium.org</a> og fyll inn
2395 teksta di i *webskjemaet der.
2396
2397 <p>Viss du treng *maskinell tilgjenge til den *bakenforliggende
2398 teknologien kan du anten installera pakken
2399 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/apertium-nno-nob">*apertium-*nno-*nob</a>
2400 på ein *Debian-maskin eller bruka *web-*API-eit tilgjengeleg frå
2401 *api.*apertium.org.  Sjå
2402 <a href="http://wiki.apertium.org/wiki/Apertium-apy">*API-dokumentasjonen</a>
2403 for detaljar om *web-*API-eit.  Her kan du sjå korleis resultatet vert
2404 for denne teksta som vart skreva på bokmål over *maskinoversatt til
2405 nynorsk.</p>
2406
2407       </div>
2408       <div class="tags">
2409
2410
2411         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>.
2412
2413
2414       </div>
2415     </div>
2416     <div class="padding"></div>
2417
2418     <div class="entry">
2419       <div class="title">
2420         <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>
2421       </div>
2422       <div class="date">
2423         13th November 2016
2424       </div>
2425       <div class="body">
2426         <p><a href="http://coz-profiler.org/">The Coz profiler</a>, a nice
2427 profiler able to run benchmarking experiments on the instrumented
2428 multi-threaded program, finally
2429 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/coz-profiler">made it into
2430 Debian unstable yesterday</A>.  Lluís Vilanova and I have spent many
2431 months since
2432 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Coz_can_help_you_find_bottlenecks_in_multi_threaded_software___nice_free_software.html">I
2433 blogged about the coz tool</a> in August working with upstream to make
2434 it suitable for Debian.  There are still issues with clang
2435 compatibility, inline assembly only working x86 and minimized
2436 JavaScript libraries.</p>
2437
2438 <p>To test it, install 'coz-profiler' using apt and run it like this:</p>
2439
2440 <p><blockquote>
2441 <tt>coz run --- /path/to/binary-with-debug-info</tt>
2442 </blockquote></p>
2443
2444 <p>This will produce a profile.coz file in the current working
2445 directory with the profiling information.  This is then given to a
2446 JavaScript application provided in the package and available from
2447 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">a project web page</a>.
2448 To start the local copy, invoke it in a browser like this:</p>
2449
2450 <p><blockquote>
2451 <tt>sensible-browser /usr/share/coz-profiler/viewer/index.htm</tt>
2452 </blockquote></p>
2453
2454 <p>See the project home page and the
2455 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">USENIX
2456 ;login: article on Coz</a> for more information on how it is
2457 working.</p>
2458
2459       </div>
2460       <div class="tags">
2461
2462
2463         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>.
2464
2465
2466       </div>
2467     </div>
2468     <div class="padding"></div>
2469
2470     <div class="entry">
2471       <div class="title">
2472         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/My_own_self_balancing_Lego_Segway.html">My own self balancing Lego Segway</a>
2473       </div>
2474       <div class="date">
2475          4th November 2016
2476       </div>
2477       <div class="body">
2478         <p>A while back I received a Gyro sensor for the NXT
2479 <a href="mindstorms.lego.com">Mindstorms</a> controller as a birthday
2480 present.  It had been on my wishlist for a while, because I wanted to
2481 build a Segway like balancing lego robot.  I had already built
2482 <a href="http://www.nxtprograms.com/NXT2/segway/">a simple balancing
2483 robot</a> with the kids, using the light/color sensor included in the
2484 NXT kit as the balance sensor, but it was not working very well.  It
2485 could balance for a while, but was very sensitive to the light
2486 condition in the room and the reflective properties of the surface and
2487 would fall over after a short while.  I wanted something more robust,
2488 and had
2489 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/cgi-bin/commerce.cgi?preadd=action&key=NGY1044">the
2490 gyro sensor from HiTechnic</a> I believed would solve it on my
2491 wishlist for some years before it suddenly showed up as a gift from my
2492 loved ones. :)</p>
2493
2494 <p>Unfortunately I have not had time to sit down and play with it
2495 since then.  But that changed some days ago, when I was searching for
2496 lego segway information and came across a recipe from HiTechnic for
2497 building
2498 <a href="http://www.hitechnic.com/blog/gyro-sensor/htway/">the
2499 HTWay</a>, a segway like balancing robot.  Build instructions and
2500 <a href="https://www.hitechnic.com/upload/786-HTWayC.nxc">source
2501 code</a> was included, so it was just a question of putting it all
2502 together.  And thanks to the great work of many Debian developers, the
2503 compiler needed to build the source for the NXT is already included in
2504 Debian, so I was read to go in less than an hour.  The resulting robot
2505 do not look very impressive in its simplicity:</p>
2506
2507 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-robot.jpeg"></p>
2508
2509 <p>Because I lack the infrared sensor used to control the robot in the
2510 design from HiTechnic, I had to comment out the last task
2511 (taskControl).  I simply placed /* and */ around it get the program
2512 working without that sensor present.  Now it balances just fine until
2513 the battery status run low:</p>
2514
2515 <p align="center"><video width="70%" controls="true">
2516    <source src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-11-04-lego-htway-balancing.ogv" type="video/ogg">
2517 </video></p>
2518
2519 <p>Now we would like to teach it how to follow a line and take remote
2520 control instructions using the included Bluetooth receiver in the NXT.</p>
2521
2522 <p>If you, like me, love LEGO and want to make sure we find the tools
2523 they need to work with LEGO in Debian and all our derivative
2524 distributions like Ubuntu, check out
2525 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">the LEGO designers
2526 project page</a> and join the Debian LEGO team.  Personally I own a
2527 RCX and NXT controller (no EV3), and would like to make sure the
2528 Debian tools needed to program the systems I own work as they
2529 should.</p>
2530
2531       </div>
2532       <div class="tags">
2533
2534
2535         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/lego">lego</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
2536
2537
2538       </div>
2539     </div>
2540     <div class="padding"></div>
2541
2542     <div class="entry">
2543       <div class="title">
2544         <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>
2545       </div>
2546       <div class="date">
2547         10th October 2016
2548       </div>
2549       <div class="body">
2550         <p>In July
2551 <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
2552 wrote how to get the Signal Chrome/Chromium app working</a> without
2553 the ability to receive SMS messages (aka without a cell phone).  It is
2554 time to share some experiences and provide an updated setup.</p>
2555
2556 <p>The Signal app have worked fine for several months now, and I use
2557 it regularly to chat with my loved ones.  I had a major snag at the
2558 end of my summer vacation, when the the app completely forgot my
2559 setup, identity and keys.  The reason behind this major mess was
2560 running out of disk space.  To avoid that ever happening again I have
2561 started storing everything in <tt>userdata/</tt> in git, to be able to
2562 roll back to an earlier version if the files are wiped by mistake.  I
2563 had to use it once after introducing the git backup.  When rolling
2564 back to an earlier version, one need to use the 'reset session' option
2565 in Signal to get going, and notify the people you talk with about the
2566 problem.  I assume there is some sequence number tracking in the
2567 protocol to detect rollback attacks.  The git repository is rather big
2568 (674 MiB so far), but I have not tried to figure out if some of the
2569 content can be added to a .gitignore file due to lack of spare
2570 time.</p>
2571
2572 <p>I've also hit the 90 days timeout blocking, and noticed that this
2573 make it impossible to send messages using Signal.  I could still
2574 receive them, but had to patch the code with a new timestamp to send.
2575 I believe the timeout is added by the developers to force people to
2576 upgrade to the latest version of the app, even when there is no
2577 protocol changes, to reduce the version skew among the user base and
2578 thus try to keep the number of support requests down.</p>
2579
2580 <p>Since my original recipe, the Signal source code changed slightly,
2581 making the old patch fail to apply cleanly.  Below is an updated
2582 patch, including the shell wrapper I use to start Signal.  The
2583 original version required a new user to locate the JavaScript console
2584 and call a function from there.  I got help from a friend with more
2585 JavaScript knowledge than me to modify the code to provide a GUI
2586 button instead.  This mean that to get started you just need to run
2587 the wrapper and click the 'Register without mobile phone' to get going
2588 now.  I've also modified the timeout code to always set it to 90 days
2589 in the future, to avoid having to patch the code regularly.</p>
2590
2591 <p>So, the updated recipe for Debian Jessie:</p>
2592
2593 <ol>
2594
2595 <li>First, install required packages to get the source code and the
2596 browser you need.  Signal only work with Chrome/Chromium, as far as I
2597 know, so you need to install it.
2598
2599 <pre>
2600 apt install git tor chromium
2601 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
2602 </pre></li>
2603
2604 <li>Modify the source code using command listed in the the patch
2605 block below.</li>
2606
2607 <li>Start Signal using the run-signal-app wrapper (for example using
2608 <tt>`pwd`/run-signal-app</tt>).
2609
2610 <li>Click on the 'Register without mobile phone', will in a phone
2611 number you can receive calls to the next minute, receive the
2612 verification code and enter it into the form field and press
2613 'Register'.  Note, the phone number you use will be user Signal
2614 username, ie the way others can find you on Signal.</li>
2615
2616 <li>You can now use Signal to contact others.  Note, new contacts do
2617 not show up in the contact list until you restart Signal, and there is
2618 no way to assign names to Contacts.  There is also no way to create or
2619 update chat groups.  I suspect this is because the web app do not have
2620 a associated contact database.</li>
2621
2622 </ol>
2623
2624 <p>I am still a bit uneasy about using Signal, because of the way its
2625 main author moxie0 reject federation and accept dependencies to major
2626 corporations like Google (part of the code is fetched from Google) and
2627 Amazon (the central coordination point is owned by Amazon).  See for
2628 example
2629 <a href="https://github.com/LibreSignal/LibreSignal/issues/37">the
2630 LibreSignal issue tracker</a> for a thread documenting the authors
2631 view on these issues.  But the network effect is strong in this case,
2632 and several of the people I want to communicate with already use
2633 Signal.  Perhaps we can all move to <a href="https://ring.cx/">Ring</a>
2634 once it <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/830265">work on my
2635 laptop</a>?  It already work on Windows and Android, and is included
2636 in <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/ring">Debian</a> and
2637 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ring">Ubuntu</a>, but not
2638 working on Debian Stable.</p>
2639
2640 <p>Anyway, this is the patch I apply to the Signal code to get it
2641 working.  It switch to the production servers, disable to timeout,
2642 make registration easier and add the shell wrapper:</p>
2643
2644 <pre>
2645 cd Signal-Desktop; cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p1
2646 diff --git a/js/background.js b/js/background.js
2647 index 24b4c1d..579345f 100644
2648 --- a/js/background.js
2649 +++ b/js/background.js
2650 @@ -33,9 +33,9 @@
2651          });
2652      });
2653
2654 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
2655 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org';
2656      var SERVER_PORTS = [80, 4433, 8443];
2657 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
2658 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
2659      var messageReceiver;
2660      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
2661          if (messageReceiver) {
2662 diff --git a/js/expire.js b/js/expire.js
2663 index 639aeae..beb91c3 100644
2664 --- a/js/expire.js
2665 +++ b/js/expire.js
2666 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
2667  ;(function() {
2668      'use strict';
2669 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
2670 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = Date.now() + (90 * 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);
2671
2672      window.extension = window.extension || {};
2673
2674 diff --git a/js/views/install_view.js b/js/views/install_view.js
2675 index 7816f4f..1d6233b 100644
2676 --- a/js/views/install_view.js
2677 +++ b/js/views/install_view.js
2678 @@ -38,7 +38,8 @@
2679              return {
2680                  'click .step1': this.selectStep.bind(this, 1),
2681                  'click .step2': this.selectStep.bind(this, 2),
2682 -                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3)
2683 +                'click .step3': this.selectStep.bind(this, 3),
2684 +                'click .callreg': function() { extension.install('standalone') },
2685              };
2686          },
2687          clearQR: function() {
2688 diff --git a/options.html b/options.html
2689 index dc0f28e..8d709f6 100644
2690 --- a/options.html
2691 +++ b/options.html
2692 @@ -14,7 +14,10 @@
2693          &lt;div class='nav'>
2694            &lt;h1>{{ installWelcome }}&lt;/h1>
2695            &lt;p>{{ installTagline }}&lt;/p>
2696 -          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a> &lt;/div>
2697 +          &lt;div> &lt;a class='button step2'>{{ installGetStartedButton }}&lt;/a>
2698 +           &lt;br> &lt;a class="button callreg">Register without mobile phone&lt;/a>
2699 +
2700 +         &lt;/div>
2701            &lt;span class='dot step1 selected'>&lt;/span>
2702            &lt;span class='dot step2'>&lt;/span>
2703            &lt;span class='dot step3'>&lt;/span>
2704 --- /dev/null   2016-10-07 09:55:13.730181472 +0200
2705 +++ b/run-signal-app   2016-10-10 08:54:09.434172391 +0200
2706 @@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
2707 +#!/bin/sh
2708 +set -e
2709 +cd $(dirname $0)
2710 +mkdir -p userdata
2711 +userdata="`pwd`/userdata"
2712 +if [ -d "$userdata" ] && [ ! -d "$userdata/.git" ] ; then
2713 +    (cd $userdata && git init)
2714 +fi
2715 +(cd $userdata && git add . && git commit -m "Current status." || true)
2716 +exec chromium \
2717 +  --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
2718 +  --user-data-dir=$userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
2719 EOF
2720 chmod a+rx run-signal-app
2721 </pre>
2722
2723 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2724 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2725 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2726
2727       </div>
2728       <div class="tags">
2729
2730
2731         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>.
2732
2733
2734       </div>
2735     </div>
2736     <div class="padding"></div>
2737
2738     <div class="entry">
2739       <div class="title">
2740         <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>
2741       </div>
2742       <div class="date">
2743          7th October 2016
2744       </div>
2745       <div class="body">
2746         <p><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">The Isenkram
2747 system</a> provide a practical and easy way to figure out which
2748 packages support the hardware in a given machine.  The command line
2749 tool <tt>isenkram-lookup</tt> and the tasksel options provide a
2750 convenient way to list and install packages relevant for the current
2751 hardware during system installation, both user space packages and
2752 firmware packages. The GUI background daemon on the other hand provide
2753 a pop-up proposing to install packages when a new dongle is inserted
2754 while using the computer.  For example, if you plug in a smart card
2755 reader, the system will ask if you want to install <tt>pcscd</tt> if
2756 that package isn't already installed, and if you plug in a USB video
2757 camera the system will ask if you want to install <tt>cheese</tt> if
2758 cheese is currently missing.  This already work just fine.</p>
2759
2760 <p>But Isenkram depend on a database mapping from hardware IDs to
2761 package names.  When I started no such database existed in Debian, so
2762 I made my own data set and included it with the isenkram package and
2763 made isenkram fetch the latest version of this database from git using
2764 http.  This way the isenkram users would get updated package proposals
2765 as soon as I learned more about hardware related packages.</p>
2766
2767 <p>The hardware is identified using modalias strings.  The modalias
2768 design is from the Linux kernel where most hardware descriptors are
2769 made available as a strings that can be matched using filename style
2770 globbing.  It handle USB, PCI, DMI and a lot of other hardware related
2771 identifiers.</p>
2772
2773 <p>The downside to the Isenkram specific database is that there is no
2774 information about relevant distribution / Debian version, making
2775 isenkram propose obsolete packages too.  But along came AppStream, a
2776 cross distribution mechanism to store and collect metadata about
2777 software packages.  When I heard about the proposal, I contacted the
2778 people involved and suggested to add a hardware matching rule using
2779 modalias strings in the specification, to be able to use AppStream for
2780 mapping hardware to packages.  This idea was accepted and AppStream is
2781 now a great way for a package to announce the hardware it support in a
2782 distribution neutral way.  I wrote
2783 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Using_appstream_with_isenkram_to_install_hardware_related_packages_in_Debian.html">a
2784 recipe on how to add such meta-information</a> in a blog post last
2785 December.  If you have a hardware related package in Debian, please
2786 announce the relevant hardware IDs using AppStream.</p>
2787
2788 <p>In Debian, almost all packages that can talk to a LEGO Mindestorms
2789 RCX or NXT unit, announce this support using AppStream.  The effect is
2790 that when you insert such LEGO robot controller into your Debian
2791 machine, Isenkram will propose to install the packages needed to get
2792 it working.  The intention is that this should allow the local user to
2793 start programming his robot controller right away without having to
2794 guess what packages to use or which permissions to fix.</p>
2795
2796 <p>But when I sat down with my son the other day to program our NXT
2797 unit using his Debian Stretch computer, I discovered something
2798 annoying.  The local console user (ie my son) did not get access to
2799 the USB device for programming the unit.  This used to work, but no
2800 longer in Jessie and Stretch.  After some investigation and asking
2801 around on #debian-devel, I discovered that this was because udev had
2802 changed the mechanism used to grant access to local devices.  The
2803 ConsoleKit mechanism from <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>
2804 no longer applied, because LDAP users no longer was added to the
2805 plugdev group during login.  Michael Biebl told me that this method
2806 was obsolete and the new method used ACLs instead.  This was good
2807 news, as the plugdev mechanism is a mess when using a remote user
2808 directory like LDAP.  Using ACLs would make sure a user lost device
2809 access when she logged out, even if the user left behind a background
2810 process which would retain the plugdev membership with the ConsoleKit
2811 setup.  Armed with this knowledge I moved on to fix the access problem
2812 for the LEGO Mindstorms related packages.</p>
2813
2814 <p>The new system uses a udev tag, 'uaccess'.  It can either be
2815 applied directly for a device, or is applied in
2816 /lib/udev/rules.d/70-uaccess.rules for classes of devices.  As the
2817 LEGO Mindstorms udev rules did not have a class, I decided to add the
2818 tag directly in the udev rules files included in the packages.  Here
2819 is one example.  For the nqc C compiler for the RCX, the
2820 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/60-nqc.rules</tt> file now look like this:
2821
2822 <p><pre>
2823 SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ACTION=="add", ATTR{idVendor}=="0694", ATTR{idProduct}=="0001", \
2824     SYMLINK+="rcx-%k", TAG+="uaccess"
2825 </pre></p>
2826
2827 <p>The key part is the 'TAG+="uaccess"' at the end.  I suspect all
2828 packages using plugdev in their /lib/udev/rules.d/ files should be
2829 changed to use this tag (either directly or indirectly via
2830 <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>).  Perhaps a lintian check should be created
2831 to detect this?</p>
2832
2833 <p>I've been unable to find good documentation on the uaccess feature.
2834 It is unclear to me if the uaccess tag is an internal implementation
2835 detail like the udev-acl tag used by
2836 <tt>/lib/udev/rules.d/70-udev-acl.rules</tt>.  If it is, I guess the
2837 indirect method is the preferred way.  Michael
2838 <a href="https://github.com/systemd/systemd/issues/4288">asked for more
2839 documentation from the systemd project</a> and I hope it will make
2840 this clearer.  For now I use the generic classes when they exist and
2841 is already handled by <tt>70-uaccess.rules</tt>, and add the tag
2842 directly if no such class exist.</p>
2843
2844 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
2845 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
2846 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
2847
2848 <p>To help out making life for LEGO constructors in Debian easier,
2849 please join us on our IRC channel
2850 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> and join
2851 the <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/debian-lego/">Debian
2852 LEGO team</a> in the Alioth project we created yesterday.  A mailing
2853 list is not yet created, but we are working on it. :)</p>
2854
2855 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
2856 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
2857 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
2858
2859       </div>
2860       <div class="tags">
2861
2862
2863         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/lego">lego</a>.
2864
2865
2866       </div>
2867     </div>
2868     <div class="padding"></div>
2869
2870     <div class="entry">
2871       <div class="title">
2872         <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>
2873       </div>
2874       <div class="date">
2875         30th August 2016
2876       </div>
2877       <div class="body">
2878         <p>In April we
2879 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_a_Norwegian_Bokm_l_edition_of_The_Debian_Administrator_s_Handbook.html">started
2880 to work</a> on a Norwegian Bokmål edition of the "open access" book on
2881 how to set up and administrate a Debian system.  Today I am happy to
2882 report that the first draft is now publicly available.  You can find
2883 it on <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/get/">get the Debian
2884 Administrator's Handbook page</a> (under Other languages).  The first
2885 eight chapters have a first draft translation, and we are working on
2886 proofreading the content.  If you want to help out, please start
2887 contributing using
2888 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
2889 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
2890 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
2891 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
2892 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
2893 contributors</a>.  A good way to contribute is to proofread the text
2894 and update weblate if you find errors.</p>
2895
2896 <p>Our goal is still to make the Norwegian book available on paper as well as
2897 electronic form.</p>
2898
2899       </div>
2900       <div class="tags">
2901
2902
2903         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
2904
2905
2906       </div>
2907     </div>
2908     <div class="padding"></div>
2909
2910     <div class="entry">
2911       <div class="title">
2912         <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>
2913       </div>
2914       <div class="date">
2915         11th August 2016
2916       </div>
2917       <div class="body">
2918         <p>This summer, I read a great article
2919 "<a href="https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/summer2016/curtsinger">coz:
2920 This Is the Profiler You're Looking For</a>" in USENIX ;login: about
2921 how to profile multi-threaded programs.  It presented a system for
2922 profiling software by running experiences in the running program,
2923 testing how run time performance is affected by "speeding up" parts of
2924 the code to various degrees compared to a normal run.  It does this by
2925 slowing down parallel threads while the "faster up" code is running
2926 and measure how this affect processing time.  The processing time is
2927 measured using probes inserted into the code, either using progress
2928 counters (COZ_PROGRESS) or as latency meters (COZ_BEGIN/COZ_END).  It
2929 can also measure unmodified code by measuring complete the program
2930 runtime and running the program several times instead.</p>
2931
2932 <p>The project and presentation was so inspiring that I would like to
2933 get the system into Debian.  I
2934 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=830708">created
2935 a WNPP request for it</a> and contacted upstream to try to make the
2936 system ready for Debian by sending patches.  The build process need to
2937 be changed a bit to avoid running 'git clone' to get dependencies, and
2938 to include the JavaScript web page used to visualize the collected
2939 profiling information included in the source package.
2940 But I expect that should work out fairly soon.</p>
2941
2942 <p>The way the system work is fairly simple.  To run an coz experiment
2943 on a binary with debug symbols available, start the program like this:
2944
2945 <p><blockquote><pre>
2946 coz run --- program-to-run
2947 </pre></blockquote></p>
2948
2949 <p>This will create a text file profile.coz with the instrumentation
2950 information.  To show what part of the code affect the performance
2951 most, use a web browser and either point it to
2952 <a href="http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/">http://plasma-umass.github.io/coz/</a>
2953 or use the copy from git (in the gh-pages branch).  Check out this web
2954 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
2955 profiling more useful you include &lt;coz.h&gt; and insert the
2956 COZ_PROGRESS or COZ_BEGIN and COZ_END at appropriate places in the
2957 code, rebuild and run the profiler.  This allow coz to do more
2958 targeted experiments.</p>
2959
2960 <p>A video published by ACM
2961 <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE0V-p1odPg">presenting the
2962 Coz profiler</a> is available from Youtube.  There is also a paper
2963 from the 25th Symposium on Operating Systems Principles available
2964 titled
2965 <a href="https://www.usenix.org/conference/atc16/technical-sessions/presentation/curtsinger">Coz:
2966 finding code that counts with causal profiling</a>.</p>
2967
2968 <p><a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz">The source code</a>
2969 for Coz is available from github.  It will only build with clang
2970 because it uses a
2971 <a href="https://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=55606">C++
2972 feature missing in GCC</a>, but I've submitted
2973 <a href="https://github.com/plasma-umass/coz/pull/67">a patch to solve
2974 it</a> and hope it will be included in the upstream source soon.</p>
2975
2976 <p>Please get in touch if you, like me, would like to see this piece
2977 of software in Debian.  I would very much like some help with the
2978 packaging effort, as I lack the in depth knowledge on how to package
2979 C++ libraries.</p>
2980
2981       </div>
2982       <div class="tags">
2983
2984
2985         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>.
2986
2987
2988       </div>
2989     </div>
2990     <div class="padding"></div>
2991
2992     <div class="entry">
2993       <div class="title">
2994         <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>
2995       </div>
2996       <div class="date">
2997          7th July 2016
2998       </div>
2999       <div class="body">
3000         <p>Yesterday, I tried to unlock a HTC Desire HD phone, and it proved
3001 to be a slight challenge.  Here is the recipe if I ever need to do it
3002 again.  It all started by me wanting to try the recipe to set up
3003 <a href="https://blog.torproject.org/blog/mission-impossible-hardening-android-security-and-privacy">an
3004 hardened Android installation</a> from the Tor project blog on a
3005 device I had access to.  It is a old mobile phone with a broken
3006 microphone The initial idea had been to just
3007 <a href="http://wiki.cyanogenmod.org/w/Install_CM_for_ace">install
3008 CyanogenMod on it</a>, but did not quite find time to start on it
3009 until a few days ago.</p>
3010
3011 <p>The unlock process is supposed to be simple: (1) Boot into the boot
3012 loader (press volume down and power at the same time), (2) select
3013 'fastboot' before (3) connecting the device via USB to a Linux
3014 machine, (4) request the device identifier token by running 'fastboot
3015 oem get_identifier_token', (5) request the device unlocking key using
3016 the <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/bootloader/">HTC developer web
3017 site</a> and unlock the phone using the key file emailed to you.</p>
3018
3019 <p>Unfortunately, this only work fi you have hboot version 2.00.0029
3020 or newer, and the device I was working on had 2.00.0027.  This
3021 apparently can be easily fixed by downloading a Windows program and
3022 running it on your Windows machine, if you accept the terms Microsoft
3023 require you to accept to use Windows - which I do not.  So I had to
3024 come up with a different approach.  I got a lot of help from AndyCap
3025 on #nuug, and would not have been able to get this working without
3026 him.</p>
3027
3028 <p>First I needed to extract the hboot firmware from
3029 <a href="http://www.htcdev.com/ruu/PD9810000_Ace_Sense30_S_hboot_2.00.0029.exe">the
3030 windows binary for HTC Desire HD</a> downloaded as 'the RUU' from HTC.
3031 For this there is is <a href="https://github.com/kmdm/unruu/">a github
3032 project named unruu</a> using libunshield.  The unshield tool did not
3033 recognise the file format, but unruu worked and extracted rom.zip,
3034 containing the new hboot firmware and a text file describing which
3035 devices it would work for.</p>
3036
3037 <p>Next, I needed to get the new firmware into the device.  For this I
3038 followed some instructions
3039 <a href="http://www.htc1guru.com/2013/09/new-ruu-zips-posted/">available
3040 from HTC1Guru.com</a>, and ran these commands as root on a Linux
3041 machine with Debian testing:</p>
3042
3043 <p><pre>
3044 adb reboot-bootloader
3045 fastboot oem rebootRUU
3046 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
3047 fastboot flash zip rom.zip
3048 fastboot reboot
3049 </pre></p>
3050
3051 <p>The flash command apparently need to be done twice to take effect,
3052 as the first is just preparations and the second one do the flashing.
3053 The adb command is just to get to the boot loader menu, so turning the
3054 device on while holding volume down and the power button should work
3055 too.</p>
3056
3057 <p>With the new hboot version in place I could start following the
3058 instructions on the HTC developer web site.  I got the device token
3059 like this:</p>
3060
3061 <p><pre>
3062 fastboot oem get_identifier_token 2>&1 | sed 's/(bootloader) //'
3063 </pre>
3064
3065 <p>And once I got the unlock code via email, I could use it like
3066 this:</p>
3067
3068 <p><pre>
3069 fastboot flash unlocktoken Unlock_code.bin
3070 </pre></p>
3071
3072 <p>And with that final step in place, the phone was unlocked and I
3073 could start stuffing the software of my own choosing into the device.
3074 So far I only inserted a replacement recovery image to wipe the phone
3075 before I start.  We will see what happen next.  Perhaps I should
3076 install <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> on it. :)</p>
3077
3078       </div>
3079       <div class="tags">
3080
3081
3082         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>.
3083
3084
3085       </div>
3086     </div>
3087     <div class="padding"></div>
3088
3089     <div class="entry">
3090       <div class="title">
3091         <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>
3092       </div>
3093       <div class="date">
3094          3rd July 2016
3095       </div>
3096       <div class="body">
3097         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to test
3098 <a href="https://whispersystems.org/">the Signal app</a>, as it is
3099 said to provide end to end encrypted communication and several of my
3100 friends and family are already using it.  As I by choice do not own a
3101 mobile phone, this proved to be harder than expected.  And I wanted to
3102 have the source of the client and know that it was the code used on my
3103 machine.  But yesterday I managed to get it working.  I used the
3104 Github source, compared it to the source in
3105 <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/signal-private-messenger/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk?hl=en-US">the
3106 Signal Chrome app</a> available from the Chrome web store, applied
3107 patches to use the production Signal servers, started the app and
3108 asked for the hidden "register without a smart phone" form.  Here is
3109 the recipe how I did it.</p>
3110
3111 <p>First, I fetched the Signal desktop source from Github, using
3112
3113 <pre>
3114 git clone https://github.com/WhisperSystems/Signal-Desktop.git
3115 </pre>
3116
3117 <p>Next, I patched the source to use the production servers, to be
3118 able to talk to other Signal users:</p>
3119
3120 <pre>
3121 cat &lt;&lt;EOF | patch -p0
3122 diff -ur ./js/background.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js
3123 --- ./js/background.js  2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
3124 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/background.js    2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
3125 @@ -47,8 +47,8 @@
3126          });
3127      });
3128
3129 -    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-staging.whispersystems.org';
3130 -    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments-staging.s3.amazonaws.com';
3131 +    var SERVER_URL = 'https://textsecure-service-ca.whispersystems.org:4433';
3132 +    var ATTACHMENT_SERVER_URL = 'https://whispersystems-textsecure-attachments.s3.amazonaws.com';
3133      var messageReceiver;
3134      window.getSocketStatus = function() {
3135          if (messageReceiver) {
3136 diff -ur ./js/expire.js userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js
3137 --- ./js/expire.js      2016-06-29 13:43:15.630344628 +0200
3138 +++ userdata/Default/Extensions/bikioccmkafdpakkkcpdbppfkghcmihk/0.15.0_0/js/expire.js2016-06-29 14:06:29.530300934 +0200
3139 @@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
3140  ;(function() {
3141      'use strict';
3142 -    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 0;
3143 +    var BUILD_EXPIRATION = 1474492690000;
3144
3145      window.extension = window.extension || {};
3146
3147 EOF
3148 </pre>
3149
3150 <p>The first part is changing the servers, and the second is updating
3151 an expiration timestamp.  This timestamp need to be updated regularly.
3152 It is set 90 days in the future by the build process (Gruntfile.js).
3153 The value is seconds since 1970 times 1000, as far as I can tell.</p>
3154
3155 <p>Based on a tip and good help from the #nuug IRC channel, I wrote a
3156 script to launch Signal in Chromium.</p>
3157
3158 <pre>
3159 #!/bin/sh
3160 cd $(dirname $0)
3161 mkdir -p userdata
3162 exec chromium \
3163   --proxy-server="socks://localhost:9050" \
3164   --user-data-dir=`pwd`/userdata --load-and-launch-app=`pwd`
3165 </pre>
3166
3167 <p> The script start the app and configure Chromium to use the Tor
3168 SOCKS5 proxy to make sure those controlling the Signal servers (today
3169 Amazon and Whisper Systems) as well as those listening on the lines
3170 will have a harder time location my laptop based on the Signal
3171 connections if they use source IP address.</p>
3172
3173 <p>When the script starts, one need to follow the instructions under
3174 "Standalone Registration" in the CONTRIBUTING.md file in the git
3175 repository.  I right clicked on the Signal window to get up the
3176 Chromium debugging tool, visited the 'Console' tab and wrote
3177 'extension.install("standalone")' on the console prompt to get the
3178 registration form.  Then I entered by land line phone number and
3179 pressed 'Call'.  5 seconds later the phone rang and a robot voice
3180 repeated the verification code three times.  After entering the number
3181 into the verification code field in the form, I could start using
3182 Signal from my laptop.
3183
3184 <p>As far as I can tell, The Signal app will leak who is talking to
3185 whom and thus who know who to those controlling the central server,
3186 but such leakage is hard to avoid with a centrally controlled server
3187 setup.  It is something to keep in mind when using Signal - the
3188 content of your chats are harder to intercept, but the meta data
3189 exposing your contact network is available to people you do not know.
3190 So better than many options, but not great.  And sadly the usage is
3191 connected to my land line, thus allowing those controlling the server
3192 to associate it to my home and person.  I would prefer it if only
3193 those I knew could tell who I was on Signal.  There are options
3194 avoiding such information leakage, but most of my friends are not
3195 using them, so I am stuck with Signal for now.</p>
3196
3197 <p><strong>Update 2017-01-10</strong>: There is an updated blog post
3198 on this topic in
3199 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Experience_and_updated_recipe_for_using_the_Signal_app_without_a_mobile_phone.html">Experience
3200 and updated recipe for using the Signal app without a mobile
3201 phone</a>.</p>
3202
3203       </div>
3204       <div class="tags">
3205
3206
3207         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>.
3208
3209
3210       </div>
3211     </div>
3212     <div class="padding"></div>
3213
3214     <div class="entry">
3215       <div class="title">
3216         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_new__best__multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?</a>
3217       </div>
3218       <div class="date">
3219          6th June 2016
3220       </div>
3221       <div class="body">
3222         <p>When I set out a few weeks ago to figure out
3223 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_the_best_multimedia_player_in_Debian_.html">which
3224 multimedia player in Debian claimed to support most file formats /
3225 MIME types</a>, I was a bit surprised how varied the sets of MIME types
3226 the various players claimed support for.  The range was from 55 to 130
3227 MIME types.  I suspect most media formats are supported by all
3228 players, but this is not really reflected in the MimeTypes values in
3229 their desktop files.  There are probably also some bogus MIME types
3230 listed, but it is hard to identify which one this is.</p>
3231
3232 <p>Anyway, in the mean time I got in touch with upstream for some of
3233 the players suggesting to add more MIME types to their desktop files,
3234 and decided to spend some time myself improving the situation for my
3235 favorite media player VLC.  The fixes for VLC entered Debian unstable
3236 yesterday. The complete list of MIME types can be seen on the
3237 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">Multimedia
3238 player MIME type support status</a> Debian wiki page.</p>
3239
3240 <p>The new "best" multimedia player in Debian?  It is VLC, followed by
3241 totem, parole, kplayer, gnome-mpv, mpv, smplayer, mplayer-gui and
3242 kmplayer.  I am sure some of the other players desktop files support
3243 several of the formats currently listed as working only with vlc,
3244 toten and parole.</p>
3245
3246 <p>A sad observation is that only 14 MIME types are listed as
3247 supported by all the tested multimedia players in Debian in their
3248 desktop files: audio/mpeg, audio/vnd.rn-realaudio, audio/x-mpegurl,
3249 audio/x-ms-wma, audio/x-scpls, audio/x-wav, video/mp4, video/mpeg,
3250 video/quicktime, video/vnd.rn-realvideo, video/x-matroska,
3251 video/x-ms-asf, video/x-ms-wmv and video/x-msvideo.  Personally I find
3252 it sad that video/ogg and video/webm is not supported by all the media
3253 players in Debian.  As far as I can tell, all of them can handle both
3254 formats.</p>
3255
3256       </div>
3257       <div class="tags">
3258
3259
3260         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>.
3261
3262
3263       </div>
3264     </div>
3265     <div class="padding"></div>
3266
3267     <div class="entry">
3268       <div class="title">
3269         <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>
3270       </div>
3271       <div class="date">
3272          5th June 2016
3273       </div>
3274       <div class="body">
3275         <p>Many years ago, when koffice was fresh and with few users, I
3276 decided to test its presentation tool when making the slides for a
3277 talk I was giving for NUUG on Japhar, a free Java virtual machine.  I
3278 wrote the first draft of the slides, saved the result and went to bed
3279 the day before I would give the talk.  The next day I took a plane to
3280 the location where the meeting should take place, and on the plane I
3281 started up koffice again to polish the talk a bit, only to discover
3282 that kpresenter refused to load its own data file.  I cursed a bit and
3283 started making the slides again from memory, to have something to
3284 present when I arrived.  I tested that the saved files could be
3285 loaded, and the day seemed to be rescued.  I continued to polish the
3286 slides until I suddenly discovered that the saved file could no longer
3287 be loaded into kpresenter.  In the end I had to rewrite the slides
3288 three times, condensing the content until the talk became shorter and
3289 shorter.  After the talk I was able to pinpoint the problem &ndash;
3290 kpresenter wrote inline images in a way itself could not understand.
3291 Eventually that bug was fixed and kpresenter ended up being a great
3292 program to make slides.  The point I'm trying to make is that we
3293 expect a program to be able to load its own data files, and it is
3294 embarrassing to its developers if it can't.</p>
3295
3296 <p>Did you ever experience a program failing to load its own data
3297 files from the desktop file browser?  It is not a uncommon problem.  A
3298 while back I discovered that the screencast recorder
3299 gtk-recordmydesktop would save an Ogg Theora video file the KDE file
3300 browser would refuse to open.  No video player claimed to understand
3301 such file.  I tracked down the cause being <tt>file --mime-type</tt>
3302 returning the application/ogg MIME type, which no video player I had
3303 installed listed as a MIME type they would understand.  I asked for
3304 <a href="http://bugs.gw.com/view.php?id=382">file to change its
3305 behavour</a> and use the MIME type video/ogg instead.  I also asked
3306 several video players to add video/ogg to their desktop files, to give
3307 the file browser an idea what to do about Ogg Theora files.  After a
3308 while, the desktop file browsers in Debian started to handle the
3309 output from gtk-recordmydesktop properly.</p>
3310
3311 <p>But history repeats itself.  A few days ago I tested the music
3312 system Rosegarden again, and I discovered that the KDE and xfce file
3313 browsers did not know what to do with the Rosegarden project files
3314 (*.rg).  I've reported <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/825993">the
3315 rosegarden problem to BTS</a> and a fix is commited to git and will be
3316 included in the next upload.  To increase the chance of me remembering
3317 how to fix the problem next time some program fail to load its files
3318 from the file browser, here are some notes on how to fix it.</p>
3319
3320 <p>The file browsers in Debian in general operates on MIME types.
3321 There are two sources for the MIME type of a given file.  The output from
3322 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> mentioned above, and the content of the
3323 shared MIME type registry (under /usr/share/mime/).  The file MIME
3324 type is mapped to programs supporting the MIME type, and this
3325 information is collected from
3326 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/desktop-entry-spec/">the
3327 desktop files</a> available in /usr/share/applications/.  If there is
3328 one desktop file claiming support for the MIME type of the file, it is
3329 activated when asking to open a given file.  If there are more, one
3330 can normally select which one to use by right-clicking on the file and
3331 selecting the wanted one using 'Open with' or similar.  In general
3332 this work well.  But it depend on each program picking a good MIME
3333 type (preferably
3334 <a href="http://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/media-types.xhtml">a
3335 MIME type registered with IANA</a>), file and/or the shared MIME
3336 registry recognizing the file and the desktop file to list the MIME
3337 type in its list of supported MIME types.</p>
3338
3339 <p>The <tt>/usr/share/mime/packages/rosegarden.xml</tt> entry for
3340 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/shared-mime-info-spec">the
3341 Shared MIME database</a> look like this:</p>
3342
3343 <p><blockquote><pre>
3344 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
3345 &lt;mime-info xmlns="http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/shared-mime-info"&gt;
3346   &lt;mime-type type="audio/x-rosegarden"&gt;
3347     &lt;sub-class-of type="application/x-gzip"/&gt;
3348     &lt;comment&gt;Rosegarden project file&lt;/comment&gt;
3349     &lt;glob pattern="*.rg"/&gt;
3350   &lt;/mime-type&gt;
3351 &lt;/mime-info&gt;
3352 </pre></blockquote></p>
3353
3354 <p>This states that audio/x-rosegarden is a kind of application/x-gzip
3355 (it is a gzipped XML file).  Note, it is much better to use an
3356 official MIME type registered with IANA than it is to make up ones own
3357 unofficial ones like the x-rosegarden type used by rosegarden.</p>
3358
3359 <p>The desktop file of the rosegarden program failed to list
3360 audio/x-rosegarden in its list of supported MIME types, causing the
3361 file browsers to have no idea what to do with *.rg files:</p>
3362
3363 <p><blockquote><pre>
3364 % grep Mime /usr/share/applications/rosegarden.desktop
3365 MimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition;audio/x-rosegarden-device;audio/x-rosegarden-project;audio/x-rosegarden-template;audio/midi;
3366 X-KDE-NativeMimeType=audio/x-rosegarden-composition
3367 %
3368 </pre></blockquote></p>
3369
3370 <p>The fix was to add "audio/x-rosegarden;" at the end of the
3371 MimeType= line.</p>
3372
3373 <p>If you run into a file which fail to open the correct program when
3374 selected from the file browser, please check out the output from
3375 <tt>file --mime-type</tt> for the file, ensure the file ending and
3376 MIME type is registered somewhere under /usr/share/mime/ and check
3377 that some desktop file under /usr/share/applications/ is claiming
3378 support for this MIME type.  If not, please report a bug to have it
3379 fixed. :)</p>
3380
3381       </div>
3382       <div class="tags">
3383
3384
3385         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>.
3386
3387
3388       </div>
3389     </div>
3390     <div class="padding"></div>
3391
3392     <div class="entry">
3393       <div class="title">
3394         <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>
3395       </div>
3396       <div class="date">
3397         25th May 2016
3398       </div>
3399       <div class="body">
3400         <p><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/isenkram">The isenkram
3401 system</a> is a user-focused solution in Debian for handling hardware
3402 related packages.  The idea is to have a database of mappings between
3403 hardware and packages, and pop up a dialog suggesting for the user to
3404 install the packages to use a given hardware dongle.  Some use cases
3405 are when you insert a Yubikey, it proposes to install the software
3406 needed to control it; when you insert a braille reader list it
3407 proposes to install the packages needed to send text to the reader;
3408 and when you insert a ColorHug screen calibrator it suggests to
3409 install the driver for it.  The system work well, and even have a few
3410 command line tools to install firmware packages and packages for the
3411 hardware already in the machine (as opposed to hotpluggable hardware).</p>
3412
3413 <p>The system was initially written using aptdaemon, because I found
3414 good documentation and example code on how to use it.  But aptdaemon
3415 is going away and is generally being replaced by
3416 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/PackageKit/">PackageKit</a>,
3417 so Isenkram needed a rewrite.  And today, thanks to the great patch
3418 from my college Sunil Mohan Adapa in the FreedomBox project, the
3419 rewrite finally took place.  I've just uploaded a new version of
3420 Isenkram into Debian Unstable with the patch included, and the default
3421 for the background daemon is now to use PackageKit.  To check it out,
3422 install the <tt>isenkram</tt> package and insert some hardware dongle
3423 and see if it is recognised.</p>
3424
3425 <p>If you want to know what kind of packages isenkram would propose for
3426 the machine it is running on, you can check out the isenkram-lookup
3427 program.  This is what it look like on a Thinkpad X230:</p>
3428
3429 <p><blockquote><pre>
3430 % isenkram-lookup
3431 bluez
3432 cheese
3433 fprintd
3434 fprintd-demo
3435 gkrellm-thinkbat
3436 hdapsd
3437 libpam-fprintd
3438 pidgin-blinklight
3439 thinkfan
3440 tleds
3441 tp-smapi-dkms
3442 tp-smapi-source
3443 tpb
3444 %p
3445 </pre></blockquote></p>
3446
3447 <p>The hardware mappings come from several places.  The preferred way
3448 is for packages to announce their hardware support using
3449 <a href="https://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
3450 cross distribution appstream system</a>.
3451 See
3452 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">previous
3453 blog posts about isenkram</a> to learn how to do that.</p>
3454
3455       </div>
3456       <div class="tags">
3457
3458
3459         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>.
3460
3461
3462       </div>
3463     </div>
3464     <div class="padding"></div>
3465
3466     <div class="entry">
3467       <div class="title">
3468         <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>
3469       </div>
3470       <div class="date">
3471         23rd May 2016
3472       </div>
3473       <div class="body">
3474         <p>Yesterday I updated the
3475 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats
3476 package in Debian</a> with a few patches sent to me by skilled and
3477 enterprising users.  There were some nice user and visible changes.
3478 First of all, both desktop menu entries now work.  A design flaw in
3479 one of the script made the history graph fail to show up (its PNG was
3480 dumped in ~/.xsession-errors) if no controlling TTY was available.
3481 The script worked when called from the command line, but not when
3482 called from the desktop menu.  I changed this to look for a DISPLAY
3483 variable or a TTY before deciding where to draw the graph, and now the
3484 graph window pop up as expected.</p>
3485
3486 <p>The next new feature is a discharge rate estimator in one of the
3487 graphs (the one showing the last few hours).  New is also the user of
3488 colours showing charging in blue and discharge in red.  The percentages
3489 of this graph is relative to last full charge, not battery design
3490 capacity.</p>
3491
3492 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-rate.png"/></p>
3493
3494 <p>The other graph show the entire history of the collected battery
3495 statistics, comparing it to the design capacity of the battery to
3496 visualise how the battery life time get shorter over time.  The red
3497 line in this graph is what the previous graph considers 100 percent:
3498
3499 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-05-23-battery-stats-history.png"/></p>
3500
3501 <p>In this graph you can see that I only charge the battery to 80
3502 percent of last full capacity, and how the capacity of the battery is
3503 shrinking. :(</p>
3504
3505 <p>The last new feature is in the collector, which now will handle
3506 more hardware models.  On some hardware, Linux power supply
3507 information is stored in /sys/class/power_supply/ACAD/, while the
3508 collector previously only looked in /sys/class/power_supply/AC/.  Now
3509 both are checked to figure if there is power connected to the
3510 machine.</p>
3511
3512 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
3513 check out the
3514 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
3515 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
3516 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from <a
3517 href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3518 Patches are very welcome.</p>
3519
3520 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
3521 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
3522 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
3523
3524       </div>
3525       <div class="tags">
3526
3527
3528         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>.
3529
3530
3531       </div>
3532     </div>
3533     <div class="padding"></div>
3534
3535     <div class="entry">
3536       <div class="title">
3537         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_now_with_ZFS_on_Linux_included.html">Debian now with ZFS on Linux included</a>
3538       </div>
3539       <div class="date">
3540         12th May 2016
3541       </div>
3542       <div class="body">
3543         <p>Today, after many years of hard work from many people,
3544 <a href="http://zfsonlinux.org/">ZFS for Linux</a> finally entered
3545 Debian.  The package status can be seen on
3546 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/zfs-linux">the package tracker
3547 for zfs-linux</a>.  and
3548 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
3549 team status page</a>. If you want to help out, please join us.
3550 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">The
3551 source code</a> is available via git on Alioth.  It would also be
3552 great if you could help out with
3553 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/dkms">the dkms package</a>, as
3554 it is an important piece of the puzzle to get ZFS working.</p>
3555
3556       </div>
3557       <div class="tags">
3558
3559
3560         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>.
3561
3562
3563       </div>
3564     </div>
3565     <div class="padding"></div>
3566
3567     <div class="entry">
3568       <div class="title">
3569         <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>
3570       </div>
3571       <div class="date">
3572          8th May 2016
3573       </div>
3574       <div class="body">
3575         <p><strong>Where I set out to figure out which multimedia player in
3576 Debian claim support for most file formats.</strong></p>
3577
3578 <p>A few years ago, I had a look at the media support for Browser
3579 plugins in Debian, to get an idea which plugins to include in Debian
3580 Edu.  I created a script to extract the set of supported MIME types
3581 for each plugin, and used this to find out which multimedia browser
3582 plugin supported most file formats / media types.
3583 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">The
3584 result</a> can still be seen on the Debian wiki, even though it have
3585 not been updated for a while.  But browser plugins are less relevant
3586 these days, so I thought it was time to look at standalone
3587 players.</p>
3588
3589 <p>A few days ago I was tired of VLC not being listed as a viable
3590 player when I wanted to play videos from the Norwegian National
3591 Broadcasting Company, and decided to investigate why.  The cause is a
3592 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/822245">missing MIME type in the VLC
3593 desktop file</a>.  In the process I wrote a script to compare the set
3594 of MIME types announced in the desktop file and the browser plugin,
3595 only to discover that there is quite a large difference between the
3596 two for VLC.  This discovery made me dig up the script I used to
3597 compare browser plugins, and adjust it to compare desktop files
3598 instead, to try to figure out which multimedia player in Debian
3599 support most file formats.</p>
3600
3601 <p>The result can be seen on the Debian Wiki, as
3602 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianMultimedia/PlayerSupport">a
3603 table listing all MIME types supported by one of the packages included
3604 in the table</a>, with the package supporting most MIME types being
3605 listed first in the table.</p>
3606
3607 </p>The best multimedia player in Debian?  It is totem, followed by
3608 parole, kplayer, mpv, vlc, smplayer mplayer-gui gnome-mpv and
3609 kmplayer.  Time for the other players to update their announced MIME
3610 support?</p>
3611
3612       </div>
3613       <div class="tags">
3614
3615
3616         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>.
3617
3618
3619       </div>
3620     </div>
3621     <div class="padding"></div>
3622
3623     <div class="entry">
3624       <div class="title">
3625         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Pyra___handheld_computer_with_Debian_preinstalled.html">The Pyra - handheld computer with Debian preinstalled</a>
3626       </div>
3627       <div class="date">
3628          4th May 2016
3629       </div>
3630       <div class="body">
3631         A friend of mine made me aware of
3632 <a href="https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/">The Pyra</a>, a
3633 handheld computer which will be delivered with Debian preinstalled.  I
3634 would love to get one of those for my birthday. :)</p>
3635
3636 <p>The machine is a complete ARM-based PC with micro HDMI, SATA, USB
3637 plugs and many others connectors, and include a full keyboard and a 5"
3638 LCD touch screen.  The 6000mAh battery is claimed to provide a whole
3639 day of battery life time, but I have not seen any independent tests
3640 confirming this.  The vendor is still collecting preorders, and the
3641 last I heard last night was that 22 more orders were needed before
3642 production started.</p>
3643
3644 <p>As far as I know, this is the first handheld preinstalled with
3645 Debian.  Please let me know if you know of any others.  Is it the
3646 first computer being sold with Debian preinstalled?</p>
3647
3648       </div>
3649       <div class="tags">
3650
3651
3652         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>.
3653
3654
3655       </div>
3656     </div>
3657     <div class="padding"></div>
3658
3659     <div class="entry">
3660       <div class="title">
3661         <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>
3662       </div>
3663       <div class="date">
3664         10th April 2016
3665       </div>
3666       <div class="body">
3667         <p>During this weekends
3668 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/news/Oslo__Takk_for_feilfiksingsfesten.shtml">bug
3669 squashing party and developer gathering</a>, we decided to do our part
3670 to make sure there are good books about Debian available in Norwegian
3671 Bokmål, and got in touch with the people behind the
3672 <a href="http://debian-handbook.info/">Debian Administrator's Handbook
3673 project</a> to get started.  If you want to help out, please start
3674 contributing using
3675 <a href="https://hosted.weblate.org/projects/debian-handbook/">the
3676 hosted weblate project page</a>, and get in touch using
3677 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/debian-handbook-translators">the
3678 translators mailing list</a>.  Please also check out
3679 <a href="https://debian-handbook.info/contribute/">the instructions for
3680 contributors</a>.</p>
3681
3682 <p>The book is already available on paper in English, French and
3683 Japanese, and our goal is to get it available on paper in Norwegian
3684 Bokmål too.  In addition to the paper edition, there are also EPUB and
3685 Mobi versions available.  And there are incomplete translations
3686 available for many more languages.</p>
3687
3688       </div>
3689       <div class="tags">
3690
3691
3692         Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
3693
3694
3695       </div>
3696     </div>
3697     <div class="padding"></div>
3698
3699     <div class="entry">
3700       <div class="title">
3701         <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>
3702       </div>
3703       <div class="date">
3704          7th April 2016
3705       </div>
3706       <div class="body">
3707         <p>Just for fun I had a look at the popcon number of ZFS related
3708 packages in Debian, and was quite surprised with what I found.  I use
3709 ZFS myself at home, but did not really expect many others to do so.
3710 But I might be wrong.</p>
3711
3712 <p>According to
3713 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=spl-linux">the popcon
3714 results for spl-linux</a>, there are 1019 Debian installations, or
3715 0.53% of the population, with the package installed.  As far as I know
3716 the only use of the spl-linux package is as a support library for ZFS
3717 on Linux, so I use it here as proxy for measuring the number of ZFS
3718 installation on Linux in Debian.  In the kFreeBSD variant of Debian
3719 the ZFS feature is already available, and there
3720 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/popcon.php?package=zfsutils">the popcon
3721 results for zfsutils</a> show 1625 Debian installations or 0.84% of
3722 the population.  So I guess I am not alone in using ZFS on Debian.</p>
3723
3724 <p>But even though the Debian project leader Lucas Nussbaum
3725 <a href="https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2015/04/msg00006.html">announced
3726 in April 2015</a> that the legal obstacles blocking ZFS on Debian were
3727 cleared, the package is still not in Debian.  The package is again in
3728 the NEW queue.  Several uploads have been rejected so far because the
3729 debian/copyright file was incomplete or wrong, but there is no reason
3730 to give up.  The current status can be seen on
3731 <a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?login=pkg-zfsonlinux-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
3732 team status page</a>, and
3733 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=pkg-zfsonlinux/zfs.git">the
3734 source code</a> is available on Alioth.</p>
3735
3736 <p>As I want ZFS to be included in next version of Debian to make sure
3737 my home server can function in the future using only official Debian
3738 packages, and the current blocker is to get the debian/copyright file
3739 accepted by the FTP masters in Debian, I decided a while back to try
3740 to help out the team.  This was the background for my blog post about
3741 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Creating__updating_and_checking_debian_copyright_semi_automatically.html">creating,
3742 updating and checking debian/copyright semi-automatically</a>, and I
3743 used the techniques I explored there to try to find any errors in the
3744 copyright file.  It is not very easy to check every one of the around
3745 2000 files in the source package, but I hope we this time got it
3746 right.  If you want to help out, check out the git source and try to
3747 find missing entries in the debian/copyright file.</p>
3748
3749       </div>
3750       <div class="tags">
3751
3752
3753         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>.
3754
3755
3756       </div>
3757     </div>
3758     <div class="padding"></div>
3759
3760     <div class="entry">
3761       <div class="title">
3762         <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>
3763       </div>
3764       <div class="date">
3765         23rd March 2016
3766       </div>
3767       <div class="body">
3768         <p>Since this morning, the battery-stats package in Debian include an
3769 extended collector that will collect the complete battery history for
3770 later processing and graphing.  The original collector store the
3771 battery level as percentage of last full level, while the new
3772 collector also record battery vendor, model, serial number, design
3773 full level, last full level and current battery level.  This make it
3774 possible to predict the lifetime of the battery as well as visualise
3775 the energy flow when the battery is charging or discharging.</p>
3776
3777 <p>The new tools are available in <tt>/usr/share/battery-stats/</tt>
3778 in the version 0.5.1 package in unstable.  Get the new battery level graph
3779 and lifetime prediction by running:
3780
3781 <p><pre>
3782 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph /var/log/battery-stats.csv
3783 </pre></p>
3784
3785 <p>Or select the 'Battery Level Graph' from your application menu.</p>
3786
3787 <p>The flow in/out of the battery can be seen by running (no menu
3788 entry yet):</p>
3789
3790 <p><pre>
3791 /usr/share/battery-stats/battery-stats-graph-flow
3792 </pre></p>
3793
3794 <p>I'm not quite happy with the way the data is visualised, at least
3795 when there are few data points.  The graphs look a bit better with a
3796 few years of data.</p>
3797
3798 <p>A while back one important feature I use in the battery stats
3799 collector broke in Debian.  The scripts in
3800 <tt>/usr/lib/pm-utils/power.d/</tt> were no longer executed.  I
3801 suspect it happened when Jessie started using systemd, but I do not
3802 know.  The issue is reported as
3803 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/818649">bug #818649</a> against
3804 pm-utils.  I managed to work around it by adding an udev rule to call
3805 the collector script every time the power connector is connected and
3806 disconnected.  With this fix in place it was finally time to make a
3807 new release of the package, and get it into Debian.</p>
3808
3809 <p>If you are interested in how your laptop battery is doing, please
3810 check out the
3811 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>
3812 in Debian unstable, or rebuild it on Jessie to get it working on
3813 Debian stable. :) The upstream source is available from
3814 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3815 As always, patches are very welcome.</p>
3816
3817       </div>
3818       <div class="tags">
3819
3820
3821         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>.
3822
3823
3824       </div>
3825     </div>
3826     <div class="padding"></div>
3827
3828     <div class="entry">
3829       <div class="title">
3830         <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>
3831       </div>
3832       <div class="date">
3833         15th March 2016
3834       </div>
3835       <div class="body">
3836         <p>Back in September, I blogged about
3837 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_life_and_death_of_a_laptop_battery.html">the
3838 system I wrote to collect statistics about my laptop battery</a>, and
3839 how it showed the decay and death of this battery (now replaced).  I
3840 created a simple deb package to handle the collection and graphing,
3841 but did not want to upload it to Debian as there were already
3842 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">a battery-stats
3843 package in Debian</a> that should do the same thing, and I did not see
3844 a point of uploading a competing package when battery-stats could be
3845 fixed instead.  I reported a few bugs about its non-function, and
3846 hoped someone would step in and fix it.  But no-one did.</p>
3847
3848 <p>I got tired of waiting a few days ago, and took matters in my own
3849 hands.  The end result is that I am now the new upstream developer of
3850 battery stats (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">available from github</a>) and part of the team maintaining
3851 battery-stats in Debian, and the package in Debian unstable is finally
3852 able to collect battery status using the <tt>/sys/class/power_supply/</tt>
3853 information provided by the Linux kernel.  If you install the
3854 battery-stats package from unstable now, you will be able to get a
3855 graph of the current battery fill level, to get some idea about the
3856 status of the battery.  The source package build and work just fine in
3857 Debian testing and stable (and probably oldstable too, but I have not
3858 tested).  The default graph you get for that system look like this:</p>
3859
3860 <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>
3861
3862 <p>My plans for the future is to merge my old scripts into the
3863 battery-stats package, as my old scripts collected a lot more details
3864 about the battery.  The scripts are merged into the upstream
3865 battery-stats git repository already, but I am not convinced they work
3866 yet, as I changed a lot of paths along the way.  Will have to test a
3867 bit more before I make a new release.</p>
3868
3869 <p>I will also consider changing the file format slightly, as I
3870 suspect the way I combine several values into one field might make it
3871 impossible to know the type of the value when using it for processing
3872 and graphing.</p>
3873
3874 <p>If you would like I would like to keep an close eye on your laptop
3875 battery, check out the battery-stats package in
3876 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">Debian</a> and
3877 on
3878 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-stats">github</a>.
3879 I would love some help to improve the system further.</p>
3880
3881       </div>
3882       <div class="tags">
3883
3884
3885         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>.
3886
3887
3888       </div>
3889     </div>
3890     <div class="padding"></div>
3891
3892     <div class="entry">
3893       <div class="title">
3894         <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>
3895       </div>
3896       <div class="date">
3897         19th February 2016
3898       </div>
3899       <div class="body">
3900         <p>Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to
3901 details.  And one of the details is the content of the
3902 debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by
3903 the code in the package in question, preferably in
3904 <a href="https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/">machine
3905 readable DEP5 format</a>.</p>
3906
3907 <p>For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write
3908 and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the
3909 package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters.  So getting it right
3910 the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save
3911 both you and the ftpmasters some work..  Today, while trying to figure
3912 out what was wrong with
3913 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=686447">the
3914 zfsonlinux copyright file</a>, I decided to spend some time on
3915 figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least
3916 semi-automatically.</p>
3917
3918 <p>Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the
3919 file based on the code in the source package,
3920 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/debmake">debmake</a></tt>
3921 and <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/cme">cme</a></tt>.  I'm
3922 not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to
3923 create a sensible draft file.  As far as I can tell, none of them can
3924 be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be
3925 polished a bit before the file is OK to upload.  I found the debmake
3926 option in
3927 <a href="http://goofying-with-debian.blogspot.com/2014/07/debmake-checking-source-against-dep-5.html">a
3928 blog posts from 2014</a>.
3929
3930 <p>To generate using debmake, use the -cc option:
3931
3932 <p><pre>
3933 debmake -cc > debian/copyright
3934 </pre></p>
3935
3936 <p>Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so
3937 this might not be the best option.</p>
3938
3939 <p>The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found
3940 this approach in
3941 <a href="https://ddumont.wordpress.com/2015/04/05/improving-creation-of-debian-copyright-file/">a
3942 blog post from 2015</a>.  To generate using cme, use the 'update
3943 dpkg-copyright' option:
3944
3945 <p><pre>
3946 cme update dpkg-copyright
3947 </pre></p>
3948
3949 <p>This will create or update debian/copyright.  The cme tool seem to
3950 handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.</p>
3951
3952 <p>When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to
3953 check if the file is correct.  For this I found two good options,
3954 <tt>debmake -k</tt> and <tt>license-reconcile</tt>.  The former seem
3955 to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect
3956 ineffective blocks in the copyright file.  The latter reports missing
3957 copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license
3958 names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0).  I suspect it is good to use both and
3959 fix all issues reported by them before uploading.  But I do not know
3960 if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a
3961 copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.</p>
3962
3963 <p>The devscripts tool <tt>licensecheck</tt> deserve mentioning.  It
3964 will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements.
3965 It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but
3966 can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.</p>
3967
3968 <p>Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update
3969 debian/copyright file.  Please let me know, or blog about it on
3970 planet.debian.org.</p>
3971
3972 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
3973 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
3974 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
3975
3976 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-20</strong>: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel
3977 on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file
3978
3979 <p><pre>
3980 licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \
3981   /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto
3982 </pre></p>
3983
3984 <p>He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the
3985 version control system to make it easier to discover license and
3986 copyright changes in the upstream source.  I will try to do the same
3987 with my packages in the future.</p>
3988
3989 <p><strong>Update 2016-02-21</strong>: The cme author recommended
3990 against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed
3991 command line.</p>
3992
3993       </div>
3994       <div class="tags">
3995
3996
3997         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>.
3998
3999
4000       </div>
4001     </div>
4002     <div class="padding"></div>
4003
4004     <div class="entry">
4005       <div class="title">
4006         <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>
4007       </div>
4008       <div class="date">
4009          4th February 2016
4010       </div>
4011       <div class="body">
4012         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">appstream system</a>
4013 is taking shape in Debian, and one provided feature is a very
4014 convenient way to tell you which package to install to make a given
4015 firmware file available when the kernel is looking for it.  This can
4016 be done using apt-file too, but that is for someone else to blog
4017 about. :)</p>
4018
4019 <p>Here is a small recipe to find the package with a given firmware
4020 file, in this example I am looking for ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin, randomly
4021 picked from the set of firmware announced using appstream in Debian
4022 unstable.  In general you would be looking for the firmware requested
4023 by the kernel during kernel module loading.  To find the package
4024 providing the example file, do like this:</p>
4025
4026 <blockquote><pre>
4027 % apt install appstream
4028 [...]
4029 % apt update
4030 [...]
4031 % appstreamcli what-provides firmware:runtime ctfw-3.2.3.0.bin | \
4032   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
4033 firmware-qlogic
4034 %
4035 </pre></blockquote>
4036
4037 <p>See <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/AppStream/Guidelines">the
4038 appstream wiki</a> page to learn how to embed the package metadata in
4039 a way appstream can use.</p>
4040
4041 <p>This same approach can be used to find any package supporting a
4042 given MIME type.  This is very useful when you get a file you do not
4043 know how to handle.  First find the mime type using <tt>file
4044 --mime-type</tt>, and next look up the package providing support for
4045 it.  Lets say you got an SVG file.  Its MIME type is image/svg+xml,
4046 and you can find all packages handling this type like this:</p>
4047
4048 <blockquote><pre>
4049 % apt install appstream
4050 [...]
4051 % apt update
4052 [...]
4053 % appstreamcli what-provides mimetype image/svg+xml | \
4054   awk '/Package:/ {print $2}'
4055 bkchem
4056 phototonic
4057 inkscape
4058 shutter
4059 tetzle
4060 geeqie
4061 xia
4062 pinta
4063 gthumb
4064 karbon
4065 comix
4066 mirage
4067 viewnior
4068 postr
4069 ristretto
4070 kolourpaint4
4071 eog
4072 eom
4073 gimagereader
4074 midori
4075 %
4076 </pre></blockquote>
4077
4078 <p>I believe the MIME types are fetched from the desktop file for
4079 packages providing appstream metadata.</p>
4080
4081       </div>
4082       <div class="tags">
4083
4084
4085         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>.
4086
4087
4088       </div>
4089     </div>
4090     <div class="padding"></div>
4091
4092     <div class="entry">
4093       <div class="title">
4094         <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>
4095       </div>
4096       <div class="date">
4097         24th January 2016
4098       </div>
4099       <div class="body">
4100         <p>Most people seem not to realise that every time they walk around
4101 with the computerised radio beacon known as a mobile phone their
4102 position is tracked by the phone company and often stored for a long
4103 time (like every time a SMS is received or sent).  And if their
4104 computerised radio beacon is capable of running programs (often called
4105 mobile apps) downloaded from the Internet, these programs are often
4106 also capable of tracking their location (if the app requested access
4107 during installation).  And when these programs send out information to
4108 central collection points, the location is often included, unless
4109 extra care is taken to not send the location.  The provided
4110 information is used by several entities, for good and bad (what is
4111 good and bad, depend on your point of view).  What is certain, is that
4112 the private sphere and the right to free movement is challenged and
4113 perhaps even eradicated for those announcing their location this way,
4114 when they share their whereabouts with private and public
4115 entities.</p>
4116
4117 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2016-01-24-nice-creepy-desktop-window.png"></p>
4118
4119 <p>The phone company logs provide a register of locations to check out
4120 when one want to figure out what the tracked person was doing.  It is
4121 unavailable for most of us, but provided to selected government
4122 officials, company staff, those illegally buying information from
4123 unfaithful servants and crackers stealing the information.  But the
4124 public information can be collected and analysed, and a free software
4125 tool to do so is called
4126 <a href="http://www.geocreepy.com/">Creepy or Cree.py</a>.  I
4127 discovered it when I read
4128 <a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/kultur/Slik-kan-du-bli-overvaket-pa-Twitter-og-Instagram-uten-a-ane-det-7787884.html">an
4129 article about Creepy</a> in the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten i
4130 November 2014, and decided to check if it was available in Debian.
4131 The python program was in Debian, but
4132 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/creepy">the version in
4133 Debian</a> was completely broken and practically unmaintained.  I
4134 uploaded a new version which did not work quite right, but did not
4135 have time to fix it then.  This Christmas I decided to finally try to
4136 get Creepy operational in Debian.  Now a fixed version is available in
4137 Debian unstable and testing, and almost all Debian specific patches
4138 are now included
4139 <a href="https://github.com/jkakavas/creepy">upstream</a>.</p>
4140
4141 <p>The Creepy program visualises geolocation information fetched from
4142 Twitter, Instagram, Flickr and Google+, and allow one to get a
4143 complete picture of every social media message posted recently in a
4144 given area, or track the movement of a given individual across all
4145 these services.  Earlier it was possible to use the search API of at
4146 least some of these services without identifying oneself, but these
4147 days it is impossible.  This mean that to use Creepy, you need to
4148 configure it to log in as yourself on these services, and provide
4149 information to them about your search interests.  This should be taken
4150 into account when using Creepy, as it will also share information
4151 about yourself with the services.</p>
4152
4153 <p>The picture above show the twitter messages sent from (or at least
4154 geotagged with a position from) the city centre of Oslo, the capital
4155 of Norway.  One useful way to use Creepy is to first look at
4156 information tagged with an area of interest, and next look at all the
4157 information provided by one or more individuals who was in the area.
4158 I tested it by checking out which celebrity provide their location in
4159 twitter messages by checkout out who sent twitter messages near a
4160 Norwegian TV station, and next could track their position over time,
4161 making it possible to locate their home and work place, among other
4162 things.  A similar technique have been
4163 <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl">used
4164 to locate Russian soldiers in Ukraine</a>, and it is both a powerful
4165 tool to discover lying governments, and a useful tool to help people
4166 understand the value of the private information they provide to the
4167 public.</p>
4168
4169 <p>The package is not trivial to backport to Debian Stable/Jessie, as
4170 it depend on several python modules currently missing in Jessie (at
4171 least python-instagram, python-flickrapi and
4172 python-requests-toolbelt).</p>
4173
4174 <p>(I have uploaded
4175 <a href="https://screenshots.debian.net/package/creepy">the image to
4176 screenshots.debian.net</a> and licensed it under the same terms as the
4177 Creepy program in Debian.)</p>
4178
4179       </div>
4180       <div class="tags">
4181
4182
4183         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>.
4184
4185
4186       </div>
4187     </div>
4188     <div class="padding"></div>
4189
4190     <div class="entry">
4191       <div class="title">
4192         <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>
4193       </div>
4194       <div class="date">
4195         15th January 2016
4196       </div>
4197       <div class="body">
4198         <p>During his DebConf15 keynote, Jacob Appelbaum
4199 <a href="https://summit.debconf.org/debconf15/meeting/331/what-is-to-be-done/">observed
4200 that those listening on the Internet lines would have good reason to
4201 believe a computer have a given security hole</a> if it download a
4202 security fix from a Debian mirror.  This is a good reason to always
4203 use encrypted connections to the Debian mirror, to make sure those
4204 listening do not know which IP address to attack.  In August, Richard
4205 Hartmann observed that encryption was not enough, when it was possible
4206 to interfere download size to security patches or the fact that
4207 download took place shortly after a security fix was released, and
4208 <a href="http://richardhartmann.de/blog/posts/2015/08/24-Tor-enabled_Debian_mirror/">proposed
4209 to always use Tor to download packages from the Debian mirror</a>.  He
4210 was not the first to propose this, as the
4211 <tt><a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/apt-transport-tor">apt-transport-tor</a></tt>
4212 package by Tim Retout already existed to make it easy to convince apt
4213 to use <a href="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</a>, but I was not
4214 aware of that package when I read the blog post from Richard.</p>
4215
4216 <p>Richard discussed the idea with Peter Palfrader, one of the Debian
4217 sysadmins, and he set up a Tor hidden service on one of the central
4218 Debian mirrors using the address vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion, thus making
4219 it possible to download packages directly between two tor nodes,
4220 making sure the network traffic always were encrypted.</p>
4221
4222 <p>Here is a short recipe for enabling this on your machine, by
4223 installing <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> and replacing http and https
4224 urls with tor+http and tor+https, and using the hidden service instead
4225 of the official Debian mirror site.  I recommend installing
4226 <tt>etckeeper</tt> before you start to have a history of the changes
4227 done in /etc/.</p>
4228
4229 <blockquote><pre>
4230 apt install apt-transport-tor
4231 sed -i 's% http://ftp.debian.org/% tor+http://vwakviie2ienjx6t.onion/%' /etc/apt/sources.list
4232 sed -i 's% http% tor+http%' /etc/apt/sources.list
4233 </pre></blockquote>
4234
4235 <p>If you have more sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/, run
4236 the sed commands for these too.  The sed command is assuming your are
4237 using the ftp.debian.org Debian mirror.  Adjust the command (or just
4238 edit the file manually) to match your mirror.</p>
4239
4240 <p>This work in Debian Jessie and later.  Note that tools like
4241 <tt>apt-file</tt> only recently started using the apt transport
4242 system, and do not work with these tor+http URLs.  For
4243 <tt>apt-file</tt> you need the version currently in experimental,
4244 which need a recent apt version currently only in unstable.  So if you
4245 need a working <tt>apt-file</tt>, this is not for you.</p>
4246
4247 <p>Another advantage from this change is that your machine will start
4248 using Tor regularly and at fairly random intervals (every time you
4249 update the package lists or upgrade or install a new package), thus
4250 masking other Tor traffic done from the same machine.  Using Tor will
4251 become normal for the machine in question.</p>
4252
4253 <p>On <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox</a>, APT
4254 is set up by default to use <tt>apt-transport-tor</tt> when Tor is
4255 enabled.  It would be great if it was the default on any Debian
4256 system.</p>
4257
4258       </div>
4259       <div class="tags">
4260
4261
4262         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>.
4263
4264
4265       </div>
4266     </div>
4267     <div class="padding"></div>
4268
4269     <div class="entry">
4270       <div class="title">
4271         <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>
4272       </div>
4273       <div class="date">
4274         23rd December 2015
4275       </div>
4276       <div class="body">
4277         <p>When I was a kid, we used to collect "car numbers", as we used to
4278 call the car license plate numbers in those days.  I would write the
4279 numbers down in my little book and compare notes with the other kids
4280 to see how many region codes we had seen and if we had seen some
4281 exotic or special region codes and numbers.  It was a fun game to pass
4282 time, as we kids have plenty of it.</p>
4283
4284 <p>A few days I came across
4285 <a href="https://github.com/openalpr/openalpr">the OpenALPR
4286 project</a>, a free software project to automatically discover and
4287 report license plates in images and video streams, and provide the
4288 "car numbers" in a machine readable format.  I've been looking for
4289 such system for a while now, because I believe it is a bad idea that the
4290 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automatic_number_plate_recognition">automatic
4291 number plate recognition</a> tool only is available in the hands of
4292 the powerful, and want it to be available also for the powerless to
4293 even the score when it comes to surveillance and sousveillance.  I
4294 discovered the developer
4295 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/747509">wanted to get the tool into
4296 Debian</a>, and as I too wanted it to be in Debian, I volunteered to
4297 help him get it into shape to get the package uploaded into the Debian
4298 archive.</p>
4299
4300 <p>Today we finally managed to get the package into shape and uploaded
4301 it into Debian, where it currently
4302 <a href="https://ftp-master.debian.org//new/openalpr_2.2.1-1.html">waits
4303 in the NEW queue</a> for review by the Debian ftpmasters.</p>
4304
4305 <p>I guess you are wondering why on earth such tool would be useful
4306 for the common folks, ie those not running a large government
4307 surveillance system?  Well, I plan to put it in a computer on my bike
4308 and in my car, tracking the cars nearby and allowing me to be notified
4309 when number plates on my watch list are discovered.  Another use case
4310 was suggested by a friend of mine, who wanted to set it up at his home
4311 to open the car port automatically when it discovered the plate on his
4312 car.  When I mentioned it perhaps was a bit foolhardy to allow anyone
4313 capable of placing his license plate number of a piece of cardboard to
4314 open his car port, men replied that it was always unlocked anyway.  I
4315 guess for such use case it make sense.  I am sure there are other use
4316 cases too, for those with imagination and a vision.</p>
4317
4318 <p>If you want to build your own version of the Debian package, check
4319 out the upstream git source and symlink ./distros/debian to ./debian/
4320 before running "debuild" to build the source.  Or wait a bit until the
4321 package show up in unstable.</p>
4322
4323       </div>
4324       <div class="tags">
4325
4326
4327         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>.
4328
4329
4330       </div>
4331     </div>
4332     <div class="padding"></div>
4333
4334     <div class="entry">
4335       <div class="title">
4336         <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>
4337       </div>
4338       <div class="date">
4339         20th December 2015
4340       </div>
4341       <div class="body">
4342         <p>Around three years ago, I created
4343 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">the isenkram
4344 system</a> to get a more practical solution in Debian for handing
4345 hardware related packages.  A GUI system in the isenkram package will
4346 present a pop-up dialog when some hardware dongle supported by
4347 relevant packages in Debian is inserted into the machine.  The same
4348 lookup mechanism to detect packages is available as command line
4349 tools in the isenkram-cli package.  In addition to mapping hardware,
4350 it will also map kernel firmware files to packages and make it easy to
4351 install needed firmware packages automatically.  The key for this
4352 system to work is a good way to map hardware to packages, in other
4353 words, allow packages to announce what hardware they will work
4354 with.</p>
4355
4356 <p>I started by providing data files in the isenkram source, and
4357 adding code to download the latest version of these data files at run
4358 time, to ensure every user had the most up to date mapping available.
4359 I also added support for storing the mapping in the Packages file in
4360 the apt repositories, but did not push this approach because while I
4361 was trying to figure out how to best store hardware/package mappings,
4362 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/software/appstream/docs/">the
4363 appstream system</a> was announced.  I got in touch and suggested to
4364 add the hardware mapping into that data set to be able to use
4365 appstream as a data source, and this was accepted at least for the
4366 Debian version of appstream.</p>
4367
4368 <p>A few days ago using appstream in Debian for this became possible,
4369 and today I uploaded a new version 0.20 of isenkram adding support for
4370 appstream as a data source for mapping hardware to packages.  The only
4371 package so far using appstream to announce its hardware support is my
4372 pymissile package.  I got help from Matthias Klumpp with figuring out
4373 how do add the required
4374 <a href="https://appstream.debian.org/html/sid/main/metainfo/pymissile.html">metadata
4375 in pymissile</a>.  I added a file debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml with
4376 this content:</p>
4377
4378 <blockquote><pre>
4379 &lt;?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?&gt;
4380 &lt;component&gt;
4381   &lt;id&gt;pymissile&lt;/id&gt;
4382   &lt;metadata_license&gt;MIT&lt;/metadata_license&gt;
4383   &lt;name&gt;pymissile&lt;/name&gt;
4384   &lt;summary&gt;Control original Striker USB Missile Launcher&lt;/summary&gt;
4385   &lt;description&gt;
4386     &lt;p&gt;
4387       Pymissile provides a curses interface to control an original
4388       Marks and Spencer / Striker USB Missile Launcher, as well as a
4389       motion control script to allow a webcamera to control the
4390       launcher.
4391     &lt;/p&gt;
4392   &lt;/description&gt;
4393   &lt;provides&gt;
4394     &lt;modalias&gt;usb:v1130p0202d*&lt;/modalias&gt;
4395   &lt;/provides&gt;
4396 &lt;/component&gt;
4397 </pre></blockquote>
4398
4399 <p>The key for isenkram is the component/provides/modalias value,
4400 which is a glob style match rule for hardware specific strings
4401 (modalias strings) provided by the Linux kernel.  In this case, it
4402 will map to all USB devices with vendor code 1130 and product code
4403 0202.</p>
4404
4405 <p>Note, it is important that the license of all the metadata files
4406 are compatible to have permissions to aggregate them into archive wide
4407 appstream files.  Matthias suggested to use MIT or BSD licenses for
4408 these files.  A challenge is figuring out a good id for the data, as
4409 it is supposed to be globally unique and shared across distributions
4410 (in other words, best to coordinate with upstream what to use).  But
4411 it can be changed later or, so we went with the package name as
4412 upstream for this project is dormant.</p>
4413
4414 <p>To get the metadata file installed in the correct location for the
4415 mirror update scripts to pick it up and include its content the
4416 appstream data source, the file must be installed in the binary
4417 package under /usr/share/appdata/.  I did this by adding the following
4418 line to debian/pymissile.install:</p>
4419
4420 <blockquote><pre>
4421 debian/pymissile.metainfo.xml usr/share/appdata
4422 </pre></blockquote>
4423
4424 <p>With that in place, the command line tool isenkram-lookup will list
4425 all packages useful on the current computer automatically, and the GUI
4426 pop-up handler will propose to install the package not already
4427 installed if a hardware dongle is inserted into the machine in
4428 question.</p>
4429
4430 <p>Details of the modalias field in appstream is available from the
4431 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a> proposal.</p>
4432
4433 <p>To locate the modalias values of all hardware present in a machine,
4434 try running this command on the command line:</p>
4435
4436 <blockquote><pre>
4437 cat $(find /sys/devices/|grep modalias)
4438 </pre></blockquote>
4439
4440 <p>To learn more about the isenkram system, please check out
4441 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">my
4442 blog posts tagged isenkram</a>.</p>
4443
4444       </div>
4445       <div class="tags">
4446
4447
4448         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>.
4449
4450
4451       </div>
4452     </div>
4453     <div class="padding"></div>
4454
4455     <div class="entry">
4456       <div class="title">
4457         <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>
4458       </div>
4459       <div class="date">
4460         30th November 2015
4461       </div>
4462       <div class="body">
4463         <p>A blog post from my fellow Debian developer Paul Wise titled
4464 "<a href="http://bonedaddy.net/pabs3/log/2015/11/27/sfc-supporter/">The
4465 GPL is not magic pixie dust</a>" explain the importance of making sure
4466 the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GPL</a> is enforced.
4467 I quote the blog post from Paul in full here with his permission:<p>
4468
4469 <blockquote>
4470
4471 <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>
4472
4473 <blockquote>
4474 The GPL is not magic pixie dust. It does not work by itself.<br/>
4475
4476 The first step is to choose a
4477 <a href="https://copyleft.org/">copyleft</a> license for your
4478 code.<br/>
4479
4480 The next step is, when someone fails to follow that copyleft license,
4481 <b>it must be enforced</b><br/>
4482
4483 and its a simple fact of our modern society that such type of
4484 work<br/>
4485
4486 is incredibly expensive to do and incredibly difficult to do.
4487 </blockquote>
4488
4489 <p><small>-- <a href="http://ebb.org/bkuhn/">Bradley Kuhn</a>, in
4490 <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in Freedom">FaiF</a>
4491 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode
4492 0x57</a></small></p>
4493
4494 <p>As the Debian Website
4495 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/794116">used</a>
4496 <a href="https://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/webwml/webwml/english/intro/free.wml?r1=1.24&amp;r2=1.25">to</a>
4497 imply, public domain and permissively licensed software can lead to
4498 the production of more proprietary software as people discover useful
4499 software, extend it and or incorporate it into their hardware or
4500 software products.  Copyleft licenses such as the GNU GPL were created
4501 to close off this avenue to the production of proprietary software but
4502 such licenses are not enough.  With the ongoing adoption of Free
4503 Software by individuals and groups, inevitably the community's
4504 expectations of license compliance are violated, usually out of
4505 ignorance of the way Free Software works, but not always.  As Karen
4506 and Bradley explained in <a href="http://faif.us/" title="Free as in
4507 Freedom">FaiF</a>
4508 <a href="http://faif.us/cast/2015/nov/24/0x57/">episode 0x57</a>,
4509 copyleft is nothing if no-one is willing and able to stand up in court
4510 to protect it.  The reality of today's world is that legal
4511 representation is expensive, difficult and time consuming.  With
4512 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/">gpl-violations.org</a> in hiatus
4513 <a href="http://gpl-violations.org/news/20151027-homepage-recovers/">until</a>
4514 some time in 2016, the <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/">Software
4515 Freedom Conservancy</a> (a tax-exempt charity) is the major defender
4516 of the Linux project, Debian and other groups against GPL violations.
4517 In March the SFC supported a
4518 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/mar/05/vmware-lawsuit/">lawsuit
4519 by Christoph Hellwig</a> against VMware for refusing to
4520 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/vmware-lawsuit-faq.html">comply
4521 with the GPL</a> in relation to their use of parts of the Linux
4522 kernel.  Since then two of their sponsors pulled corporate funding and
4523 conferences
4524 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">blocked
4525 or cancelled their talks</a>.  As a result they have decided to rely
4526 less on corporate funding and more on the broad community of
4527 individuals who support Free Software and copyleft.  So the SFC has
4528 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/23/2015fundraiser/">launched</a>
4529 a <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">campaign</a> to create
4530 a community of folks who stand up for copyleft and the GPL by
4531 supporting their work on promoting and supporting copyleft and Free
4532 Software.</p>
4533
4534 <p>If you support Free Software,
4535 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/26/like-what-I-do/">like</a>
4536 what the SFC do, agree with their
4537 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/linux-compliance/principles.html">compliance
4538 principles</a>, are happy about their
4539 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">successes</a> in 2015,
4540 work on a project that is an SFC
4541 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/members/current/">member</a> and or
4542 just want to stand up for copyleft, please join
4543 <a href="https://identi.ca/cwebber/image/JQGPA4qbTyyp3-MY8QpvuA">Christopher
4544 Allan Webber</a>,
4545 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2015/nov/24/faif-carols-fundraiser/">Carol
4546 Smith</a>,
4547 <a href="http://www.jonobacon.org/2015/11/25/supporting-software-freedom-conservancy/">Jono
4548 Bacon</a>, myself and
4549 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/sponsors/#supporters">others</a> in
4550 becoming a
4551 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/supporter/">supporter</a>.  For the
4552 next week your donation will be
4553 <a href="https://sfconservancy.org/news/2015/nov/27/black-friday/">matched</a>
4554 by an anonymous donor.  Please also consider asking your employer to
4555 match your donation or become a sponsor of SFC.  Don't forget to
4556 spread the word about your support for SFC via email, your blog and or
4557 social media accounts.</p>
4558
4559 </blockquote>
4560
4561 <p>I agree with Paul on this topic and just signed up as a Supporter
4562 of Software Freedom Conservancy myself.  Perhaps you should be a
4563 supporter too?</p>
4564
4565       </div>
4566       <div class="tags">
4567
4568
4569         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>.
4570
4571
4572       </div>
4573     </div>
4574     <div class="padding"></div>
4575
4576     <div class="entry">
4577       <div class="title">
4578         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/PGP_key_transition_statement_for_key_EE4E02F9.html">PGP key transition statement for key EE4E02F9</a>
4579       </div>
4580       <div class="date">
4581         17th November 2015
4582       </div>
4583       <div class="body">
4584         <p>I've needed a new OpenPGP key for a while, but have not had time to
4585 set it up properly.  I wanted to generate it offline and have it
4586 available on <a href="http://shop.kernelconcepts.de/#openpgp">a OpenPGP
4587 smart card</a> for daily use, and learning how to do it and finding
4588 time to sit down with an offline machine almost took forever.  But
4589 finally I've been able to complete the process, and have now moved
4590 from my old GPG key to a new GPG key.  See
4591 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-11-17-new-gpg-key-transition.txt">the
4592 full transition statement, signed with both my old and new key</a> for
4593 the details.  This is my new key:</p>
4594
4595 <pre>
4596 pub   3936R/<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/111D6B29EE4E02F9.html">111D6B29EE4E02F9</a> 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-14]
4597       Key fingerprint = 3AC7 B2E3 ACA5 DF87 78F1  D827 111D 6B29 EE4E 02F9
4598 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@hungry.com&gt;
4599 uid                  Petter Reinholdtsen &lt;pere@debian.org&gt;
4600 sub   4096R/87BAFB0E 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4601 sub   4096R/F91E6DE9 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4602 sub   4096R/A0439BAB 2015-11-03 [expires: 2019-11-02]
4603 </pre>
4604
4605 <p>The key can be downloaded from the OpenPGP key servers, signed by
4606 my old key.</p>
4607
4608 <p>If you signed my old key
4609 (<a href="http://pgp.cs.uu.nl/stats/DB4CCC4B2A30D729.html">DB4CCC4B2A30D729</a>),
4610 I'd very much appreciate a signature on my new key, details and
4611 instructions in the transition statement. I m happy to reciprocate if
4612 you have a similarly signed transition statement to present.</p>
4613
4614       </div>
4615       <div class="tags">
4616
4617
4618         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>.
4619
4620
4621       </div>
4622     </div>
4623     <div class="padding"></div>
4624
4625     <div class="entry">
4626       <div class="title">
4627         <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>
4628       </div>
4629       <div class="date">
4630         24th September 2015
4631       </div>
4632       <div class="body">
4633         <p>When I get a new laptop, the battery life time at the start is OK.
4634 But this do not last.  The last few laptops gave me a feeling that
4635 within a year, the life time is just a fraction of what it used to be,
4636 and it slowly become painful to use the laptop without power connected
4637 all the time.  Because of this, when I got a new Thinkpad X230 laptop
4638 about two years ago, I decided to monitor its battery state to have
4639 more hard facts when the battery started to fail.</p>
4640
4641 <img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-24-laptop-battery-graph.png"/>
4642
4643 <p>First I tried to find a sensible Debian package to record the
4644 battery status, assuming that this must be a problem already handled
4645 by someone else.  I found
4646 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/battery-stats">battery-stats</a>,
4647 which collects statistics from the battery, but it was completely
4648 broken.  I sent a few suggestions to the maintainer, but decided to
4649 write my own collector as a shell script while I waited for feedback
4650 from him.  Via
4651 <a href="http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html">a
4652 blog post about the battery development on a MacBook Air</a> I also
4653 discovered
4654 <a href="https://github.com/jradavenport/batlog.git">batlog</a>, not
4655 available in Debian.</p>
4656
4657 <p>I started my collector 2013-07-15, and it has been collecting
4658 battery stats ever since. Now my
4659 /var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log file contain around 115,000
4660 measurements, from the time the battery was working great until now,
4661 when it is unable to charge above 7% of original capacity.  My
4662 collector shell script is quite simple and look like this:</p>
4663
4664 <pre>
4665 #!/bin/sh
4666 # Inspired by
4667 # http://www.ifweassume.com/2013/08/the-de-evolution-of-my-laptop-battery.html
4668 # See also
4669 # http://blog.sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/01/02/debian-how-to-monitor-battery-capacity/
4670 logfile=/var/log/hjemmenett-battery-status.log
4671
4672 files="manufacturer model_name technology serial_number \
4673     energy_full energy_full_design energy_now cycle_count status"
4674
4675 if [ ! -e "$logfile" ] ; then
4676     (
4677         printf "timestamp,"
4678         for f in $files; do
4679             printf "%s," $f
4680         done
4681         echo
4682     ) > "$logfile"
4683 fi
4684
4685 log_battery() {
4686     # Print complete message in one echo call, to avoid race condition
4687     # when several log processes run in parallel.
4688     msg=$(printf "%s," $(date +%s); \
4689         for f in $files; do \
4690             printf "%s," $(cat $f); \
4691         done)
4692     echo "$msg"
4693 }
4694
4695 cd /sys/class/power_supply
4696
4697 for bat in BAT*; do
4698     (cd $bat && log_battery >> "$logfile")
4699 done
4700 </pre>
4701
4702 <p>The script is called when the power management system detect a
4703 change in the power status (power plug in or out), and when going into
4704 and out of hibernation and suspend.  In addition, it collect a value
4705 every 10 minutes.  This make it possible for me know when the battery
4706 is discharging, charging and how the maximum charge change over time.
4707 The code for the Debian package
4708 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/battery-status">is now
4709 available on github</a>.</p>
4710
4711 <p>The collected log file look like this:</p>
4712
4713 <pre>
4714 timestamp,manufacturer,model_name,technology,serial_number,energy_full,energy_full_design,energy_now,cycle_count,status,
4715 1376591133,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,62800000,62160000,39050000,0,Discharging,
4716 [...]
4717 1443090528,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
4718 1443090601,LGC,45N1025,Li-ion,974,4900000,62160000,4900000,0,Full,
4719 </pre>
4720
4721 <p>I wrote a small script to create a graph of the charge development
4722 over time.  This graph depicted above show the slow death of my laptop
4723 battery.</p>
4724
4725 <p>But why is this happening?  Why are my laptop batteries always
4726 dying in a year or two, while the batteries of space probes and
4727 satellites keep working year after year.  If we are to believe
4728 <a href="http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/how_to_prolong_lithium_based_batteries">Battery
4729 University</a>, the cause is me charging the battery whenever I have a
4730 chance, and the fix is to not charge the Lithium-ion batteries to 100%
4731 all the time, but to stay below 90% of full charge most of the time.
4732 I've been told that the Tesla electric cars
4733 <a href="http://my.teslamotors.com/de_CH/forum/forums/battery-charge-limit">limit
4734 the charge of their batteries to 80%</a>, with the option to charge to
4735 100% when preparing for a longer trip (not that I would want a car
4736 like Tesla where rights to privacy is abandoned, but that is another
4737 story), which I guess is the option we should have for laptops on
4738 Linux too.</p>
4739
4740 <p>Is there a good and generic way with Linux to tell the battery to
4741 stop charging at 80%, unless requested to charge to 100% once in
4742 preparation for a longer trip?  I found
4743 <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/34452/how-can-i-limit-battery-charging-to-80-capacity">one
4744 recipe on askubuntu for Ubuntu to limit charging on Thinkpad to
4745 80%</a>, but could not get it to work (kernel module refused to
4746 load).</p>
4747
4748 <p>I wonder why the battery capacity was reported to be more than 100%
4749 at the start.  I also wonder why the "full capacity" increases some
4750 times, and if it is possible to repeat the process to get the battery
4751 back to design capacity.  And I wonder if the discharge and charge
4752 speed change over time, or if this stay the same.  I did not yet try
4753 to write a tool to calculate the derivative values of the battery
4754 level, but suspect some interesting insights might be learned from
4755 those.</p>
4756
4757 <p>Update 2015-09-24: I got a tip to install the packages
4758 acpi-call-dkms and tlp (unfortunately missing in Debian stable)
4759 packages instead of the tp-smapi-dkms package I had tried to use
4760 initially, and use 'tlp setcharge 40 80' to change when charging start
4761 and stop.  I've done so now, but expect my existing battery is toast
4762 and need to be replaced.  The proposal is unfortunately Thinkpad
4763 specific.</p>
4764
4765       </div>
4766       <div class="tags">
4767
4768
4769         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>.
4770
4771
4772       </div>
4773     </div>
4774     <div class="padding"></div>
4775
4776     <div class="entry">
4777       <div class="title">
4778         <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>
4779       </div>
4780       <div class="date">
4781          5th July 2015
4782       </div>
4783       <div class="body">
4784         <p>Several people contacted me after my previous blog post about my
4785 need for a new laptop, and provided very useful feedback.  I wish to
4786 thank every one of these.  Several pointed me to the possibility of
4787 fixing my X230, and I am already in the process of getting Lenovo to
4788 do so thanks to the on site, next day support contract covering the
4789 machine.  But the battery is almost useless (I expect to replace it
4790 with a non-official battery) and I do not expect the machine to live
4791 for many more years, so it is time to plan its replacement.  If I did
4792 not have a support contract, it was suggested to find replacement parts
4793 using <a href="http://www.francecrans.com/">FrancEcrans</a>, but it
4794 might present a language barrier as I do not understand French.</p>
4795
4796 <p>One tip I got was to use the
4797 <a href="https://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=nb">Skinflint</a> web service to
4798 compare laptop models.  It seem to have more models available than
4799 prisjakt.no.  Another tip I got from someone I know have similar
4800 keyboard preferences was that the HP EliteBook 840 keyboard is not
4801 very good, and this matches my experience with earlier EliteBook
4802 keyboards I tested.  Because of this, I will not consider it any further.
4803
4804 <p>When I wrote my blog post, I was not aware of Thinkpad X250, the
4805 newest Thinkpad X model.  The keyboard reintroduces mouse buttons
4806 (which is missing from the X240), and is working fairly well with
4807 Debian Sid/Unstable according to
4808 <a href="http://www.corsac.net/X250/">Corsac.net</a>.  The reports I
4809 got on the keyboard quality are not consistent.  Some say the keyboard
4810 is good, others say it is ok, while others say it is not very good.
4811 Those with experience from X41 and and X60 agree that the X250
4812 keyboard is not as good as those trusty old laptops, and suggest I
4813 keep and fix my X230 instead of upgrading, or get a used X230 to
4814 replace it.  I'm also told that the X250 lack leds for caps lock, disk
4815 activity and battery status, which is very convenient on my X230.  I'm
4816 also told that the CPU fan is running very often, making it a bit
4817 noisy.  In any case, the X250 do not work out of the box with Debian
4818 Stable/Jessie, one of my requirements.</p>
4819
4820 <p>I have also gotten a few vendor proposals, one was
4821 <a href="http://pro-star.com">Pro-Star</a>, another was
4822 <a href="http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/product/libreboot-x200/">Libreboot</a>.
4823 The latter look very attractive to me.</p>
4824
4825 <p>Again, thank you all for the very useful feedback.  It help a lot
4826 as I keep looking for a replacement.</p>
4827
4828 <p>Update 2015-07-06: I was recommended to check out the
4829 <a href="">lapstore.de</a> web shop for used laptops.  They got several
4830 different
4831 <a href="http://www.lapstore.de/f.php/shop/lapstore/f/411/lang/x/kw/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X_Serie/">old
4832 thinkpad X models</a>, and provide one year warranty.</p>
4833
4834       </div>
4835       <div class="tags">
4836
4837
4838         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>.
4839
4840
4841       </div>
4842     </div>
4843     <div class="padding"></div>
4844
4845     <div class="entry">
4846       <div class="title">
4847         <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>
4848       </div>
4849       <div class="date">
4850          3rd July 2015
4851       </div>
4852       <div class="body">
4853         <p>My primary work horse laptop is failing, and will need a
4854 replacement soon.  The left 5 cm of the screen on my Thinkpad X230
4855 started flickering yesterday, and I suspect the cause is a broken
4856 cable, as changing the angle of the screen some times get rid of the
4857 flickering.</p>
4858
4859 <p>My requirements have not really changed since I bought it, and is
4860 still as
4861 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">I
4862 described them in 2013</a>.  The last time I bought a laptop, I had
4863 good help from
4864 <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/category.php?k=353">prisjakt.no</a>
4865 where I could select at least a few of the requirements (mouse pin,
4866 wifi, weight) and go through the rest manually.  Three button mouse
4867 and a good keyboard is not available as an option, and all the three
4868 laptop models proposed today (Thinkpad X240, HP EliteBook 820 G1 and
4869 G2) lack three mouse buttons).  It is also unclear to me how good the
4870 keyboard on the HP EliteBooks are.  I hope Lenovo have not messed up
4871 the keyboard, even if the quality and robustness in the X series have
4872 deteriorated since X41.</p>
4873
4874 <p>I wonder how I can find a sensible laptop when none of the options
4875 seem sensible to me?  Are there better services around to search the
4876 set of available laptops for features?  Please send me an email if you
4877 have suggestions.</p>
4878
4879 <p>Update 2015-07-23: I got a suggestion to check out the FSF
4880 <a href="http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom">list
4881 of endorsed hardware</a>, which is useful background information.</p>
4882
4883       </div>
4884       <div class="tags">
4885
4886
4887         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>.
4888
4889
4890       </div>
4891     </div>
4892     <div class="padding"></div>
4893
4894     <div class="entry">
4895       <div class="title">
4896         <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>
4897       </div>
4898       <div class="date">
4899         22nd November 2014
4900       </div>
4901       <div class="body">
4902         <p>By now, it is well known that Debian Jessie will not be using
4903 sysvinit as its boot system by default.  But how can one keep using
4904 sysvinit in Jessie?  It is fairly easy, and here are a few recipes,
4905 courtesy of
4906 <a href="http://www.vitavonni.de/blog/201410/2014102101-avoiding-systemd.html">Erich
4907 Schubert</a> and
4908 <a href="http://smcv.pseudorandom.co.uk/2014/still_universal/">Simon
4909 McVittie</a>.
4910
4911 <p>If you already are using Wheezy and want to upgrade to Jessie and
4912 keep sysvinit as your boot system, create a file
4913 <tt>/etc/apt/preferences.d/use-sysvinit</tt> with this content before
4914 you upgrade:</p>
4915
4916 <p><blockquote><pre>
4917 Package: systemd-sysv
4918 Pin: release o=Debian
4919 Pin-Priority: -1
4920 </pre></blockquote><p>
4921
4922 <p>This file content will tell apt and aptitude to not consider
4923 installing systemd-sysv as part of any installation and upgrade
4924 solution when resolving dependencies, and thus tell it to avoid
4925 systemd as a default boot system.  The end result should be that the
4926 upgraded system keep using sysvinit.</p>
4927
4928 <p>If you are installing Jessie for the first time, there is no way to
4929 get sysvinit installed by default (debootstrap used by
4930 debian-installer have no option for this), but one can tell the
4931 installer to switch to sysvinit before the first boot.  Either by
4932 using a kernel argument to the installer, or by adding a line to the
4933 preseed file used.  First, the kernel command line argument:
4934
4935 <p><blockquote><pre>
4936 preseed/late_command="in-target apt-get install --purge -y sysvinit-core"
4937 </pre></blockquote><p>
4938
4939 <p>Next, the line to use in a preseed file:</p>
4940
4941 <p><blockquote><pre>
4942 d-i preseed/late_command string in-target apt-get install -y sysvinit-core
4943 </pre></blockquote><p>
4944
4945 <p>One can of course also do this after the first boot by installing
4946 the sysvinit-core package.</p>
4947
4948 <p>I recommend only using sysvinit if you really need it, as the
4949 sysvinit boot sequence in Debian have several hardware specific bugs
4950 on Linux caused by the fact that it is unpredictable when hardware
4951 devices show up during boot.  But on the other hand, the new default
4952 boot system still have a few rough edges I hope will be fixed before
4953 Jessie is released.</p>
4954
4955 <p>Update 2014-11-26: Inspired by
4956 <ahref="https://www.mirbsd.org/permalinks/wlog-10-tg_e20141125-tg.htm#e20141125-tg_wlog-10-tg">a
4957 blog post by Torsten Glaser</a>, added --purge to the preseed
4958 line.</p>
4959
4960       </div>
4961       <div class="tags">
4962
4963
4964         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>.
4965
4966
4967       </div>
4968     </div>
4969     <div class="padding"></div>
4970
4971     <div class="entry">
4972       <div class="title">
4973         <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>
4974       </div>
4975       <div class="date">
4976         10th November 2014
4977       </div>
4978       <div class="body">
4979         <p>The right to communicate with your friends and family in private,
4980 without anyone snooping, is a right every citicen have in a liberal
4981 democracy.  But this right is under serious attack these days.</p>
4982
4983 <p>A while back it occurred to me that one way to make the dragnet
4984 surveillance conducted by NSA, GCHQ, FRA and others (and confirmed by
4985 the whisleblower Snowden) more expensive for Internet email,
4986 is to deliver all email using SMTP via Tor.  Such SMTP option would be
4987 a nice addition to the FreedomBox project if we could send email
4988 between FreedomBox machines without leaking metadata about the emails
4989 to the people peeking on the wire.  I
4990 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/freedombox-discuss/2014-October/006493.html">proposed
4991 this on the FreedomBox project mailing list in October</a> and got a
4992 lot of useful feedback and suggestions.  It also became obvious to me
4993 that this was not a novel idea, as the same idea was tested and
4994 documented by Johannes Berg as early as 2006, and both
4995 <a href="https://github.com/pagekite/Mailpile/wiki/SMTorP">the
4996 Mailpile</a> and <a href="http://dee.su/cables">the Cables</a> systems
4997 propose a similar method / protocol to pass emails between users.</p>
4998
4999 <p>To implement such system one need to set up a Tor hidden service
5000 providing the SMTP protocol on port 25, and use email addresses
5001 looking like username@hidden-service-name.onion.  With such addresses
5002 the connections to port 25 on hidden-service-name.onion using Tor will
5003 go to the correct SMTP server.  To do this, one need to configure the
5004 Tor daemon to provide the hidden service and the mail server to accept
5005 emails for this .onion domain.  To learn more about Exim configuration
5006 in Debian and test the design provided by Johannes Berg in his FAQ, I
5007 set out yesterday to create a Debian package for making it trivial to
5008 set up such SMTP over Tor service based on Debian.  Getting it to work
5009 were fairly easy, and
5010 <a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/exim4-smtorp">the
5011 source code for the Debian package</a> is available from github.  I
5012 plan to move it into Debian if further testing prove this to be a
5013 useful approach.</p>
5014
5015 <p>If you want to test this, set up a blank Debian machine without any
5016 mail system installed (or run <tt>apt-get purge exim4-config</tt> to
5017 get rid of exim4).  Install tor, clone the git repository mentioned
5018 above, build the deb and install it on the machine.  Next, run
5019 <tt>/usr/lib/exim4-smtorp/setup-exim-hidden-service</tt> and follow
5020 the instructions to get the service up and running.  Restart tor and
5021 exim when it is done, and test mail delivery using swaks like
5022 this:</p>
5023
5024 <p><blockquote><pre>
5025 torsocks swaks --server dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion \
5026   --to fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion
5027 </pre></blockquote></p>
5028
5029 <p>This will test the SMTP delivery using tor.  Replace the email
5030 address with your own address to test your server. :)</p>
5031
5032 <p>The setup procedure is still to complex, and I hope it can be made
5033 easier and more automatic.  Especially the tor setup need more work.
5034 Also, the package include a tor-smtp tool written in C, but its task
5035 should probably be rewritten in some script language to make the deb
5036 architecture independent.  It would probably also make the code easier
5037 to review.  The tor-smtp tool currently need to listen on a socket for
5038 exim to talk to it and is started using xinetd.  It would be better if
5039 no daemon and no socket is needed.  I suspect it is possible to get
5040 exim to run a command line tool for delivery instead of talking to a
5041 socket, and hope to figure out how in a future version of this
5042 system.</p>
5043
5044 <p>Until I wipe my test machine, I can be reached using the
5045 <tt>fbx@dutlqrrmjhtfa3vp.onion</tt> mail address, deliverable over
5046 SMTorP. :)</p>
5047
5048       </div>
5049       <div class="tags">
5050
5051
5052         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>.
5053
5054
5055       </div>
5056     </div>
5057     <div class="padding"></div>
5058
5059     <div class="entry">
5060       <div class="title">
5061         <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>
5062       </div>
5063       <div class="date">
5064         22nd October 2014
5065       </div>
5066       <div class="body">
5067         <p>If you ever had to moderate a mailman list, like the ones on
5068 alioth.debian.org, you know the web interface is fairly slow to
5069 operate.  First you visit one web page, enter the moderation password
5070 and get a new page shown with a list of all the messages to moderate
5071 and various options for each email address.  This take a while for
5072 every list you moderate, and you need to do it regularly to do a good
5073 job as a list moderator.  But there is a quick alternative,
5074 <a href="http://heim.ifi.uio.no/kjetilho/hacks/#listadmin">the
5075 listadmin program</a>.  It allow you to check lists for new messages
5076 to moderate in a fraction of a second.  Here is a test run on two
5077 lists I recently took over:</p>
5078
5079 <p><blockquote><pre>
5080 % time listadmin xiph
5081 fetching data for pkg-xiph-commits@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
5082 fetching data for pkg-xiph-maint@lists.alioth.debian.org ... nothing in queue
5083
5084 real    0m1.709s
5085 user    0m0.232s
5086 sys     0m0.012s
5087 %
5088 </pre></blockquote></p>
5089
5090 <p>In 1.7 seconds I had checked two mailing lists and confirmed that
5091 there are no message in the moderation queue.  Every morning I
5092 currently moderate 68 mailman lists, and it normally take around two
5093 minutes.  When I took over the two pkg-xiph lists above a few days
5094 ago, there were 400 emails waiting in the moderator queue.  It took me
5095 less than 15 minutes to process them all using the listadmin
5096 program.</p>
5097
5098 <p>If you install
5099 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/listadmin">the listadmin
5100 package</a> from Debian and create a file <tt>~/.listadmin.ini</tt>
5101 with content like this, the moderation task is a breeze:</p>
5102
5103 <p><blockquote><pre>
5104 username username@example.org
5105 spamlevel 23
5106 default discard
5107 discard_if_reason "Posting restricted to members only. Remove us from your mail list."
5108
5109 password secret
5110 adminurl https://{domain}/mailman/admindb/{list}
5111 mailman-list@lists.example.com
5112
5113 password hidden
5114 other-list@otherserver.example.org
5115 </pre></blockquote></p>
5116
5117 <p>There are other options to set as well.  Check the manual page to
5118 learn the details.</p>
5119
5120 <p>If you are forced to moderate lists on a mailman installation where
5121 the SSL certificate is self signed or not properly signed by a
5122 generally accepted signing authority, you can set a environment
5123 variable when calling listadmin to disable SSL verification:</p>
5124
5125 <p><blockquote><pre>
5126 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 listadmin
5127 </pre></blockquote></p>
5128
5129 <p>If you want to moderate a subset of the lists you take care of, you
5130 can provide an argument to the listadmin script like I do in the
5131 initial screen dump (the xiph argument).  Using an argument, only
5132 lists matching the argument string will be processed.  This make it
5133 quick to accept messages if you notice the moderation request in your
5134 email.</p>
5135
5136 <p>Without the listadmin program, I would never be the moderator of 68
5137 mailing lists, as I simply do not have time to spend on that if the
5138 process was any slower. The listadmin program have saved me hours of
5139 time I could spend elsewhere over the years.  It truly is nice free
5140 software.</p>
5141
5142 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
5143 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
5144 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
5145
5146 <p>Update 2014-10-27: Added missing 'username' statement in
5147 configuration example.  Also, I've been told that the
5148 PERL_LWP_SSL_VERIFY_HOSTNAME=0 setting do not work for everyone.  Not
5149 sure why.</p>
5150
5151       </div>
5152       <div class="tags">
5153
5154
5155         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>.
5156
5157
5158       </div>
5159     </div>
5160     <div class="padding"></div>
5161
5162     <div class="entry">
5163       <div class="title">
5164         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Jessie__PXE_and_automatic_firmware_installation.html">Debian Jessie, PXE and automatic firmware installation</a>
5165       </div>
5166       <div class="date">
5167         17th October 2014
5168       </div>
5169       <div class="body">
5170         <p>When PXE installing laptops with Debian, I often run into the
5171 problem that the WiFi card require some firmware to work properly.
5172 And it has been a pain to fix this using preseeding in Debian.
5173 Normally something more is needed.  But thanks to
5174 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/i/isenkram.html">my isenkram
5175 package</a> and its recent tasksel extension, it has now become easy
5176 to do this using simple preseeding.</p>
5177
5178 <p>The isenkram-cli package provide tasksel tasks which will install
5179 firmware for the hardware found in the machine (actually, requested by
5180 the kernel modules for the hardware).  (It can also install user space
5181 programs supporting the hardware detected, but that is not the focus
5182 of this story.)</p>
5183
5184 <p>To get this working in the default installation, two preeseding
5185 values are needed.  First, the isenkram-cli package must be installed
5186 into the target chroot (aka the hard drive) before tasksel is executed
5187 in the pkgsel step of the debian-installer system.  This is done by
5188 preseeding the base-installer/includes debconf value to include the
5189 isenkram-cli package.  The package name is next passed to debootstrap
5190 for installation.  With the isenkram-cli package in place, tasksel
5191 will automatically use the isenkram tasks to detect hardware specific
5192 packages for the machine being installed and install them, because
5193 isenkram-cli contain tasksel tasks.</p>
5194
5195 <p>Second, one need to enable the non-free APT repository, because
5196 most firmware unfortunately is non-free.  This is done by preseeding
5197 the apt-mirror-setup step.  This is unfortunate, but for a lot of
5198 hardware it is the only option in Debian.</p>
5199
5200 <p>The end result is two lines needed in your preseeding file to get
5201 firmware installed automatically by the installer:</p>
5202
5203 <p><blockquote><pre>
5204 base-installer base-installer/includes string isenkram-cli
5205 apt-mirror-setup apt-setup/non-free boolean true
5206 </pre></blockquote></p>
5207
5208 <p>The current version of isenkram-cli in testing/jessie will install
5209 both firmware and user space packages when using this method.  It also
5210 do not work well, so use version 0.15 or later.  Installing both
5211 firmware and user space packages might give you a bit more than you
5212 want, so I decided to split the tasksel task in two, one for firmware
5213 and one for user space programs.  The firmware task is enabled by
5214 default, while the one for user space programs is not.  This split is
5215 implemented in the package currently in unstable.</p>
5216
5217 <p>If you decide to give this a go, please let me know (via email) how
5218 this recipe work for you. :)</p>
5219
5220 <p>So, I bet you are wondering, how can this work.  First and
5221 foremost, it work because tasksel is modular, and driven by whatever
5222 files it find in /usr/lib/tasksel/ and /usr/share/tasksel/.  So the
5223 isenkram-cli package place two files for tasksel to find.  First there
5224 is the task description file (/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc):</p>
5225
5226 <p><blockquote><pre>
5227 Task: isenkram-packages
5228 Section: hardware
5229 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5230  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
5231  proposed.
5232 Test-new-install: show show
5233 Relevance: 8
5234 Packages: for-current-hardware
5235
5236 Task: isenkram-firmware
5237 Section: hardware
5238 Description: Hardware specific firmware packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5239  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific firmware
5240  packages are proposed.
5241 Test-new-install: mark show
5242 Relevance: 8
5243 Packages: for-current-hardware-firmware
5244 </pre></blockquote></p>
5245
5246 <p>The key parts are Test-new-install which indicate how the task
5247 should be handled and the Packages line referencing to a script in
5248 /usr/lib/tasksel/packages/.  The scripts use other scripts to get a
5249 list of packages to install.  The for-current-hardware-firmware script
5250 look like this to list relevant firmware for the machine:
5251
5252 <p><blockquote><pre>
5253 #!/bin/sh
5254 #
5255 PATH=/usr/sbin:$PATH
5256 export PATH
5257 isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
5258 </pre></blockquote></p>
5259
5260 <p>With those two pieces in place, the firmware is installed by
5261 tasksel during the normal d-i run. :)</p>
5262
5263 <p>If you want to test what tasksel will install when isenkram-cli is
5264 installed, run <tt>DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical tasksel --test
5265 --new-install</tt> to get the list of packages that tasksel would
5266 install.</p>
5267
5268 <p><a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> will be
5269 pilots in testing this feature, as isenkram is used there now to
5270 install firmware, replacing the earlier scripts.</p>
5271
5272       </div>
5273       <div class="tags">
5274
5275
5276         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>.
5277
5278
5279       </div>
5280     </div>
5281     <div class="padding"></div>
5282
5283     <div class="entry">
5284       <div class="title">
5285         <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>
5286       </div>
5287       <div class="date">
5288          4th October 2014
5289       </div>
5290       <div class="body">
5291         <p>Today I came across an unexpected Ubuntu boot screen.  Above the
5292 bread shelf on the ICA shop at Storo in Oslo, the grub menu of Ubuntu
5293 with Linux kernel 3.2.0-23 (ie probably version 12.04 LTS) was stuck
5294 on a screen normally showing the bread types and prizes:</p>
5295
5296 <p align="center"><img width="70%" src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2014-10-04-ubuntu-ica-storo-crop.jpeg"></p>
5297
5298 <p>If it had booted as it was supposed to, I would never had known
5299 about this hidden Linux installation.  It is interesting what
5300 <a href="http://revealingerrors.com/">errors can reveal</a>.</p>
5301
5302       </div>
5303       <div class="tags">
5304
5305
5306         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>.
5307
5308
5309       </div>
5310     </div>
5311     <div class="padding"></div>
5312
5313     <div class="entry">
5314       <div class="title">
5315         <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>
5316       </div>
5317       <div class="date">
5318          4th October 2014
5319       </div>
5320       <div class="body">
5321         <p>The <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd project</a>
5322 got a new set of developers a few weeks ago, after the original
5323 developer decided to step down and pass the project to fresh blood.
5324 This project is now maintained by Petter Reinholdtsen and Steve
5325 Dibb.</p>
5326
5327 <p>I just wrapped up
5328 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/message/32896061/">a
5329 new lsdvd release</a>, available in git or from
5330 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/projects/lsdvd/files/lsdvd/">the
5331 download page</a>.  This is the changelog dated 2014-10-03 for version
5332 0.17.</p>
5333
5334 <ul>
5335
5336  <li>Ignore 'phantom' audio, subtitle tracks</li>
5337  <li>Check for garbage in the program chains, which indicate that a track is
5338    non-existant, to work around additional copy protection</li>
5339  <li>Fix displaying content type for audio tracks, subtitles</li>
5340  <li>Fix pallete display of first entry</li>
5341  <li>Fix include orders</li>
5342  <li>Ignore read errors in titles that would not be displayed anyway</li>
5343  <li>Fix the chapter count</li>
5344  <li>Make sure the array size and the array limit used when initialising
5345    the palette size is the same.</li>
5346  <li>Fix array printing.</li>
5347  <li>Correct subsecond calculations.</li>
5348  <li>Add sector information to the output format.</li>
5349  <li>Clean up code to be closer to ANSI C and compile without warnings
5350    with more GCC compiler warnings.</li>
5351
5352 </ul>
5353
5354 <p>This change bring together patches for lsdvd in use in various
5355 Linux and Unix distributions, as well as patches submitted to the
5356 project the last nine years.  Please check it out. :)</p>
5357
5358       </div>
5359       <div class="tags">
5360
5361
5362         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>.
5363
5364
5365       </div>
5366     </div>
5367     <div class="padding"></div>
5368
5369     <div class="entry">
5370       <div class="title">
5371         <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>
5372       </div>
5373       <div class="date">
5374         26th September 2014
5375       </div>
5376       <div class="body">
5377         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
5378 project</a> provide a Linux solution for schools, including a
5379 powerful desktop with education software, a central server providing
5380 web pages, user database, user home directories, central login and PXE
5381 boot of both  clients without disk and the installation to install Debian
5382 Edu on machines with disk (and a few other services perhaps to small
5383 to mention here).  We in the Debian Edu team are currently working on
5384 the Jessie based version, trying to get everything in shape before the
5385 freeze, to avoid having to maintain our own package repository in the
5386 future.  The
5387 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Status/Jessie">current
5388 status</a> can be seen on the Debian wiki, and there is still heaps of
5389 work left.  Some fatal problems block testing, breaking the installer,
5390 but it is possible to work around these to get anyway.  Here is a
5391 recipe on how to get the installation limping along.</p>
5392
5393 <p>First, download the test ISO via
5394 <a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">ftp</a>,
5395 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.no/cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso">http</a>
5396 or rsync (use
5397 ftp.skolelinux.org::cd-edu-testing-nolocal-netinst/debian-edu-amd64-i386-NETINST-1.iso).
5398 The ISO build was broken on Tuesday, so we do not get a new ISO every
5399 12 hours or so, but thankfully the ISO we already got we are able to
5400 install with some tweaking.</p>
5401
5402 <p>When you get to the Debian Edu profile question, go to tty2
5403 (use Alt-Ctrl-F2), run</p>
5404
5405 <p><blockquote><pre>
5406 nano /usr/bin/edu-eatmydata-install
5407 </pre></blockquote></p>
5408
5409 <p>and add 'exit 0' as the second line, disabling the eatmydata
5410 optimization.  Return to the installation, select the profile you want
5411 and continue.  Without this change, exim4-config will fail to install
5412 due to a known bug in eatmydata.</p>
5413
5414 <p>When you get the grub question at the end, answer /dev/sda (or if
5415 this do not work, figure out what your correct value would be.  All my
5416 test machines need /dev/sda, so I have no advice if it do not fit
5417 your need.</p>
5418
5419 <p>If you installed a profile including a graphical desktop, log in as
5420 root after the initial boot from hard drive, and install the
5421 education-desktop-XXX metapackage.  XXX can be kde, gnome, lxde, xfce
5422 or mate.  If you want several desktop options, install more than one
5423 metapackage.  Once this is done, reboot and you should have a working
5424 graphical login screen.  This workaround should no longer be needed
5425 once the education-tasks package version 1.801 enter testing in two
5426 days.</p>
5427
5428 <p>I believe the ISO build will start working on two days when the new
5429 tasksel package enter testing and Steve McIntyre get a chance to
5430 update the debian-cd git repository.  The eatmydata, grub and desktop
5431 issues are already fixed in unstable and testing, and should show up
5432 on the ISO as soon as the ISO build start working again.  Well the
5433 eatmydata optimization is really just disabled.  The proper fix
5434 require an upload by the eatmydata maintainer applying the patch
5435 provided in bug <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">#702711</a>.
5436 The rest have proper fixes in unstable.</p>
5437
5438 <p>I hope this get you going with the installation testing, as we are
5439 quickly running out of time trying to get our Jessie based
5440 installation ready before the distribution freeze in a month.</p>
5441
5442       </div>
5443       <div class="tags">
5444
5445
5446         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>.
5447
5448
5449       </div>
5450     </div>
5451     <div class="padding"></div>
5452
5453     <div class="entry">
5454       <div class="title">
5455         <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>
5456       </div>
5457       <div class="date">
5458         25th September 2014
5459       </div>
5460       <div class="body">
5461         <p>I use the <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/">lsdvd tool</a>
5462 to handle my fairly large DVD collection.  It is a nice command line
5463 tool to get details about a DVD, like title, tracks, track length,
5464 etc, in XML, Perl or human readable format.  But lsdvd have not seen
5465 any new development since 2006 and had a few irritating bugs affecting
5466 its use with some DVDs.  Upstream seemed to be dead, and in January I
5467 sent a small probe asking for a version control repository for the
5468 project, without any reply.  But I use it regularly and would like to
5469 get <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/lsdvd">an updated version
5470 into Debian</a>.  So two weeks ago I tried harder to get in touch with
5471 the project admin, and after getting a reply from him explaining that
5472 he was no longer interested in the project, I asked if I could take
5473 over.  And yesterday, I became project admin.</p>
5474
5475 <p>I've been in touch with a Gentoo developer and the Debian
5476 maintainer interested in joining forces to maintain the upstream
5477 project, and I hope we can get a new release out fairly quickly,
5478 collecting the patches spread around on the internet into on place.
5479 I've added the relevant Debian patches to the freshly created git
5480 repository, and expect the Gentoo patches to make it too.  If you got
5481 a DVD collection and care about command line tools, check out
5482 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/git/ci/master/tree/">the git source</a> and join
5483 <a href="https://sourceforge.net/p/lsdvd/mailman/">the project mailing
5484 list</a>. :)</p>
5485
5486       </div>
5487       <div class="tags">
5488
5489
5490         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>.
5491
5492
5493       </div>
5494     </div>
5495     <div class="padding"></div>
5496
5497     <div class="entry">
5498       <div class="title">
5499         <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>
5500       </div>
5501       <div class="date">
5502         16th September 2014
5503       </div>
5504       <div class="body">
5505         <p>The <a href="https://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> installer could be
5506 a lot quicker.  When we install more than 2000 packages in
5507 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux / Debian Edu</a> using
5508 tasksel in the installer, unpacking the binary packages take forever.
5509 A part of the slow I/O issue was discussed in
5510 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/613428">bug #613428</a> about too
5511 much file system sync-ing done by dpkg, which is the package
5512 responsible for unpacking the binary packages.  Other parts (like code
5513 executed by postinst scripts) might also sync to disk during
5514 installation.  All this sync-ing to disk do not really make sense to
5515 me.  If the machine crash half-way through, I start over, I do not try
5516 to salvage the half installed system.  So the failure sync-ing is
5517 supposed to protect against, hardware or system crash, is not really
5518 relevant while the installer is running.</p>
5519
5520 <p>A few days ago, I thought of a way to get rid of all the file
5521 system sync()-ing in a fairly non-intrusive way, without the need to
5522 change the code in several packages.  The idea is not new, but I have
5523 not heard anyone propose the approach using dpkg-divert before.  It
5524 depend on the small and clever package
5525 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/eatmydata">eatmydata</a>, which
5526 uses LD_PRELOAD to replace the system functions for syncing data to
5527 disk with functions doing nothing, thus allowing programs to live
5528 dangerous while speeding up disk I/O significantly.  Instead of
5529 modifying the implementation of dpkg, apt and tasksel (which are the
5530 packages responsible for selecting, fetching and installing packages),
5531 it occurred to me that we could just divert the programs away, replace
5532 them with a simple shell wrapper calling
5533 "eatmydata&nbsp;$program&nbsp;$@", to get the same effect.
5534 Two days ago I decided to test the idea, and wrapped up a simple
5535 implementation for the Debian Edu udeb.</p>
5536
5537 <p>The effect was stunning.  In my first test it reduced the running
5538 time of the pkgsel step (installing tasks) from 64 to less than 44
5539 minutes (20 minutes shaved off the installation) on an old Dell
5540 Latitude D505 machine.  I am not quite sure what the optimised time
5541 would have been, as I messed up the testing a bit, causing the debconf
5542 priority to get low enough for two questions to pop up during
5543 installation.  As soon as I saw the questions I moved the installation
5544 along, but do not know how long the question were holding up the
5545 installation.  I did some more measurements using Debian Edu Jessie,
5546 and got these results.  The time measured is the time stamp in
5547 /var/log/syslog between the "pkgsel: starting tasksel" and the
5548 "pkgsel: finishing up" lines, if you want to do the same measurement
5549 yourself.  In Debian Edu, the tasksel dialog do not show up, and the
5550 timing thus do not depend on how quickly the user handle the tasksel
5551 dialog.</p>
5552
5553 <p><table>
5554
5555 <tr>
5556 <th>Machine/setup</th>
5557 <th>Original tasksel</th>
5558 <th>Optimised tasksel</th>
5559 <th>Reduction</th>
5560 </tr>
5561
5562 <tr>
5563 <td>Latitude D505 Main+LTSP LXDE</td>
5564 <td>64 min (07:46-08:50)</td>
5565 <td><44 min (11:27-12:11)</td>
5566 <td>>20 min 18%</td>
5567 </tr>
5568
5569 <tr>
5570 <td>Latitude D505 Roaming LXDE</td>
5571 <td>57 min (08:48-09:45)</td>
5572 <td>34 min (07:43-08:17)</td>
5573 <td>23 min 40%</td>
5574 </tr>
5575
5576 <tr>
5577 <td>Latitude D505 Minimal</td>
5578 <td>22 min (10:37-10:59)</td>
5579 <td>11 min (11:16-11:27)</td>
5580 <td>11 min 50%</td>
5581 </tr>
5582
5583 <tr>
5584 <td>Thinkpad X200 Minimal</td>
5585 <td>6 min (08:19-08:25)</td>
5586 <td>4 min (08:04-08:08)</td>
5587 <td>2 min 33%</td>
5588 </tr>
5589
5590 <tr>
5591 <td>Thinkpad X200 Roaming KDE</td>
5592 <td>19 min (09:21-09:40)</td>
5593 <td>15 min (10:25-10:40)</td>
5594 <td>4 min 21%</td>
5595 </tr>
5596
5597 </table></p>
5598
5599 <p>The test is done using a netinst ISO on a USB stick, so some of the
5600 time is spent downloading packages.  The connection to the Internet
5601 was 100Mbit/s during testing, so downloading should not be a
5602 significant factor in the measurement.  Download typically took a few
5603 seconds to a few minutes, depending on the amount of packages being
5604 installed.</p>
5605
5606 <p>The speedup is implemented by using two hooks in
5607 <a href="https://www.debian.org/devel/debian-installer/">Debian
5608 Installer</a>, the pre-pkgsel.d hook to set up the diverts, and the
5609 finish-install.d hook to remove the divert at the end of the
5610 installation.  I picked the pre-pkgsel.d hook instead of the
5611 post-base-installer.d hook because I test using an ISO without the
5612 eatmydata package included, and the post-base-installer.d hook in
5613 Debian Edu can only operate on packages included in the ISO.  The
5614 negative effect of this is that I am unable to activate this
5615 optimization for the kernel installation step in d-i.  If the code is
5616 moved to the post-base-installer.d hook, the speedup would be larger
5617 for the entire installation.</p>
5618
5619 <p>I've implemented this in the
5620 <a href="https://packages.qa.debian.org/debian-edu-install">debian-edu-install</a>
5621 git repository, and plan to provide the optimization as part of the
5622 Debian Edu installation.  If you want to test this yourself, you can
5623 create two files in the installer (or in an udeb).  One shell script
5624 need do go into /usr/lib/pre-pkgsel.d/, with content like this:</p>
5625
5626 <p><blockquote><pre>
5627 #!/bin/sh
5628 set -e
5629 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5630 info() {
5631     logger -t my-pkgsel "info: $*"
5632 }
5633 error() {
5634     logger -t my-pkgsel "error: $*"
5635 }
5636 override_install() {
5637     apt-install eatmydata || true
5638     if [ -x /target/usr/bin/eatmydata ] ; then
5639         for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5640             file=/usr/bin/$bin
5641             # Test that the file exist and have not been diverted already.
5642             if [ -f /target$file ] ; then
5643                 info "diverting $file using eatmydata"
5644                 printf "#!/bin/sh\neatmydata $bin.distrib \"\$@\"\n" \
5645                     > /target$file.edu
5646                 chmod 755 /target$file.edu
5647                 in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5648                     --rename --quiet --add $file
5649                 ln -sf ./$bin.edu /target$file
5650             else
5651                 error "unable to divert $file, as it is missing."
5652             fi
5653         done
5654     else
5655         error "unable to find /usr/bin/eatmydata after installing the eatmydata pacage"
5656     fi
5657 }
5658
5659 override_install
5660 </pre></blockquote></p>
5661
5662 <p>To clean up, another shell script should go into
5663 /usr/lib/finish-install.d/ with code like this:
5664
5665 <p><blockquote><pre>
5666 #! /bin/sh -e
5667 . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
5668 error() {
5669     logger -t my-finish-install "error: $@"
5670 }
5671 remove_install_override() {
5672     for bin in dpkg apt-get aptitude tasksel ; do
5673         file=/usr/bin/$bin
5674         if [ -x /target$file.edu ] ; then
5675             rm /target$file
5676             in-target dpkg-divert --package debian-edu-config \
5677                 --rename --quiet --remove $file
5678             rm /target$file.edu
5679         else
5680             error "Missing divert for $file."
5681         fi
5682     done
5683     sync # Flush file buffers before continuing
5684 }
5685
5686 remove_install_override
5687 </pre></blockquote></p>
5688
5689 <p>In Debian Edu, I placed both code fragments in a separate script
5690 edu-eatmydata-install and call it from the pre-pkgsel.d and
5691 finish-install.d scripts.</p>
5692
5693 <p>By now you might ask if this change should get into the normal
5694 Debian installer too?  I suspect it should, but am not sure the
5695 current debian-installer coordinators find it useful enough.  It also
5696 depend on the side effects of the change.  I'm not aware of any, but I
5697 guess we will see if the change is safe after some more testing.
5698 Perhaps there is some package in Debian depending on sync() and
5699 fsync() having effect?  Perhaps it should go into its own udeb, to
5700 allow those of us wanting to enable it to do so without affecting
5701 everyone.</p>
5702
5703 <p>Update 2014-09-24: Since a few days ago, enabling this optimization
5704 will break installation of all programs using gnutls because of
5705 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/702711">bug #702711</a>.  An updated
5706 eatmydata package in Debian will solve it.</p>
5707
5708 <p>Update 2014-10-17: The bug mentioned above is fixed in testing and
5709 the optimization work again.  And I have discovered that the
5710 dpkg-divert trick is not really needed and implemented a slightly
5711 simpler approach as part of the debian-edu-install package.  See
5712 tools/edu-eatmydata-install in the source package.</p>
5713
5714 <p>Update 2014-11-11: Unfortunately, a new
5715 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/765738">bug #765738</a> in eatmydata only
5716 triggering on i386 made it into testing, and broke this installation
5717 optimization again.  If <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/768893">unblock
5718 request 768893</a> is accepted, it should be working again.</p>
5719
5720       </div>
5721       <div class="tags">
5722
5723
5724         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>.
5725
5726
5727       </div>
5728     </div>
5729     <div class="padding"></div>
5730
5731     <div class="entry">
5732       <div class="title">
5733         <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>
5734       </div>
5735       <div class="date">
5736         10th September 2014
5737       </div>
5738       <div class="body">
5739         <p>Yesterday, I had the pleasure of attending a talk with the
5740 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">Norwegian Unix User Group</a> about
5741 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20140909-sks-keyservers/">the
5742 OpenPGP keyserver pool sks-keyservers.net</a>, and was very happy to
5743 learn that there is a large set of publicly available key servers to
5744 use when looking for peoples public key.  So far I have used
5745 subkeys.pgp.net, and some times wwwkeys.nl.pgp.net when the former
5746 were misbehaving, but those days are ended.  The servers I have used
5747 up until yesterday have been slow and some times unavailable.  I hope
5748 those problems are gone now.</p>
5749
5750 <p>Behind the round robin DNS entry of the
5751 <a href="https://sks-keyservers.net/">sks-keyservers.net</a> service
5752 there is a pool of more than 100 keyservers which are checked every
5753 day to ensure they are well connected and up to date.  It must be
5754 better than what I have used so far. :)</p>
5755
5756 <p>Yesterdays speaker told me that the service is the default
5757 keyserver provided by the default configuration in GnuPG, but this do
5758 not seem to be used in Debian.  Perhaps it should?</p>
5759
5760 <p>Anyway, I've updated my ~/.gnupg/options file to now include this
5761 line:</p>
5762
5763 <p><blockquote><pre>
5764 keyserver pool.sks-keyservers.net
5765 </pre></blockquote></p>
5766
5767 <p>With GnuPG version 2 one can also locate the keyserver using SRV
5768 entries in DNS.  Just for fun, I did just that at work, so now every
5769 user of GnuPG at the University of Oslo should find a OpenGPG
5770 keyserver automatically should their need it:</p>
5771
5772 <p><blockquote><pre>
5773 % host -t srv _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no
5774 _pgpkey-http._tcp.uio.no has SRV record 0 100 11371 pool.sks-keyservers.net.
5775 %
5776 </pre></blockquote></p>
5777
5778 <p>Now if only
5779 <a href="http://ietfreport.isoc.org/idref/draft-shaw-openpgp-hkp/">the
5780 HKP lookup protocol</a> supported finding signature paths, I would be
5781 very happy.  It can look up a given key or search for a user ID, but I
5782 normally do not want that, but to find a trust path from my key to
5783 another key.  Given a user ID or key ID, I would like to find (and
5784 download) the keys representing a signature path from my key to the
5785 key in question, to be able to get a trust path between the two keys.
5786 This is as far as I can tell not possible today.  Perhaps something
5787 for a future version of the protocol?</p>
5788
5789       </div>
5790       <div class="tags">
5791
5792
5793         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>.
5794
5795
5796       </div>
5797     </div>
5798     <div class="padding"></div>
5799
5800     <div class="entry">
5801       <div class="title">
5802         <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>
5803       </div>
5804       <div class="date">
5805         17th June 2014
5806       </div>
5807       <div class="body">
5808         <p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
5809 project</a> provide an instruction manual for teachers, system
5810 administrators and other users that contain useful tips for setting up
5811 and maintaining a Debian Edu installation.  This text is about how the
5812 text processing of this manual is handled in the project.</p>
5813
5814 <p>One goal of the project is to provide information in the native
5815 language of its users, and for this we need to handle translations.
5816 But we also want to make sure each language contain the same
5817 information, so for this we need a good way to keep the translations
5818 in sync.  And we want it to be easy for our users to improve the
5819 documentation, avoiding the need to learn special formats or tools to
5820 contribute, and the obvious way to do this is to make it possible to
5821 edit the documentation using a web browser.  We also want it to be
5822 easy for translators to keep the translation up to date, and give them
5823 help in figuring out what need to be translated. Here is the list of
5824 tools and the process we have found trying to reach all these
5825 goals.</p>
5826
5827 <p>We maintain the authoritative source of our manual in the
5828 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">Debian
5829 wiki</a>, as several wiki pages written in English.  It consist of one
5830 front page with references to the different chapters, several pages
5831 for each chapter, and finally one "collection page" gluing all the
5832 chapters together into one large web page (aka
5833 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/AllInOne">the
5834 AllInOne page</a>).  The AllInOne page is the one used for further
5835 processing and translations.  Thanks to the fact that the
5836 <a href="http://moinmo.in/">MoinMoin</a> installation on
5837 wiki.debian.org support exporting pages in
5838 <a href="http://www.docbook.org/">the Docbook format</a>, we can fetch
5839 the list of pages to export using the raw version of the AllInOne
5840 page, loop over each of them to generate a Docbook XML version of the
5841 manual.  This process also download images and transform image
5842 references to use the locally downloaded images.  The generated
5843 Docbook XML files are slightly broken, so some post-processing is done
5844 using the <tt>documentation/scripts/get_manual</tt> program, and the
5845 result is a nice Docbook XML file (debian-edu-wheezy-manual.xml) and
5846 a handfull of images.  The XML file can now be used to generate PDF, HTML
5847 and epub versions of the English manual.  This is the basic step of
5848 our process, making PDF (using dblatex), HTML (using xsltproc) and
5849 epub (using dbtoepub) version from Docbook XML, and the resulting files
5850 are placed in the debian-edu-doc-en binary package.</p>
5851
5852 <p>But English documentation is not enough for us.  We want translated
5853 documentation too, and we want to make it easy for translators to
5854 track the English original.  For this we use the
5855 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/p/poxml.html">poxml</a> package,
5856 which allow us to transform the English Docbook XML file into a
5857 translation file (a .pot file), usable with the normal gettext based
5858 translation tools used by those translating free software.  The pot
5859 file is used to create and maintain translation files (several .po
5860 files), which the translations update with the native language
5861 translations of all titles, paragraphs and blocks of text in the
5862 original.  The next step is combining the original English Docbook XML
5863 and the translation file (say debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.po), to
5864 create a translated Docbook XML file (in this case
5865 debian-edu-wheezy-manual.nb.xml).  This translated (or partly
5866 translated, if the translation is not complete) Docbook XML file can
5867 then be used like the original to create a PDF, HTML and epub version
5868 of the documentation.</p>
5869
5870 <p>The translators use different tools to edit the .po files.  We
5871 recommend using
5872 <a href="http://www.kde.org/applications/development/lokalize/">lokalize</a>,
5873 while some use emacs and vi, others can use web based editors like
5874 <a href="http://pootle.translatehouse.org/">Poodle</a> or
5875 <a href="https://www.transifex.com/">Transifex</a>.  All we care about
5876 is where the .po file end up, in our git repository.  Updated
5877 translations can either be committed directly to git, or submitted as
5878 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/src:debian-edu-doc">bug reports
5879 against the debian-edu-doc package</a>.</p>
5880
5881 <p>One challenge is images, which both might need to be translated (if
5882 they show translated user applications), and are needed in different
5883 formats when creating PDF and HTML versions (epub is a HTML version in
5884 this regard).  For this we transform the original PNG images to the
5885 needed density and format during build, and have a way to provide
5886 translated images by storing translated versions in
5887 images/$LANGUAGECODE/.  I am a bit unsure about the details here.  The
5888 package maintainers know more.</p>
5889
5890 <p>If you wonder what the result look like, we provide
5891 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/">the content
5892 of the documentation packages on the web</a>.  See for example the
5893 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/it/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.pdf">Italian
5894 PDF version</a> or the
5895 <a href="http://maintainer.skolelinux.org/debian-edu-doc/de/debian-edu-wheezy-manual.html">German
5896 HTML version</a>.  We do not yet build the epub version by default,
5897 but perhaps it will be done in the future.</p>
5898
5899 <p>To learn more, check out
5900 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/debian-edu-doc.html">the
5901 debian-edu-doc package</a>,
5902 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/">the
5903 manual on the wiki</a> and
5904 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/Wheezy/Translations">the
5905 translation instructions</a> in the manual.</p>
5906
5907       </div>
5908       <div class="tags">
5909
5910
5911         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>.
5912
5913
5914       </div>
5915     </div>
5916     <div class="padding"></div>
5917
5918     <div class="entry">
5919       <div class="title">
5920         <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>
5921       </div>
5922       <div class="date">
5923         23rd April 2014
5924       </div>
5925       <div class="body">
5926         <p>It would be nice if it was easier in Debian to get all the hardware
5927 related packages relevant for the computer installed automatically.
5928 So I implemented one, using
5929 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">my Isenkram
5930 package</a>.  To use it, install the tasksel and isenkram packages and
5931 run tasksel as user root.  You should be presented with a new option,
5932 "Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)".  When you
5933 select it, tasksel will install the packages isenkram claim is fit for
5934 the current hardware, hot pluggable or not.<p>
5935
5936 <p>The implementation is in two files, one is the tasksel menu entry
5937 description, and the other is the script used to extract the list of
5938 packages to install.  The first part is in
5939 <tt>/usr/share/tasksel/descs/isenkram.desc</tt> and look like
5940 this:</p>
5941
5942 <p><blockquote><pre>
5943 Task: isenkram
5944 Section: hardware
5945 Description: Hardware specific packages (autodetected by isenkram)
5946  Based on the detected hardware various hardware specific packages are
5947  proposed.
5948 Test-new-install: mark show
5949 Relevance: 8
5950 Packages: for-current-hardware
5951 </pre></blockquote></p>
5952
5953 <p>The second part is in
5954 <tt>/usr/lib/tasksel/packages/for-current-hardware</tt> and look like
5955 this:</p>
5956
5957 <p><blockquote><pre>
5958 #!/bin/sh
5959 #
5960 (
5961     isenkram-lookup
5962     isenkram-autoinstall-firmware -l
5963 ) | sort -u
5964 </pre></blockquote></p>
5965
5966 <p>All in all, a very short and simple implementation making it
5967 trivial to install the hardware dependent package we all may want to
5968 have installed on our machines.  I've not been able to find a way to
5969 get tasksel to tell you exactly which packages it plan to install
5970 before doing the installation.  So if you are curious or careful,
5971 check the output from the isenkram-* command line tools first.</p>
5972
5973 <p>The information about which packages are handling which hardware is
5974 fetched either from the isenkram package itself in
5975 /usr/share/isenkram/, from git.debian.org or from the APT package
5976 database (using the Modaliases header).  The APT package database
5977 parsing have caused a nasty resource leak in the isenkram daemon (bugs
5978 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/719837">#719837</a> and
5979 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/730704">#730704</a>).  The cause is in
5980 the python-apt code (bug
5981 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/745487">#745487</a>), but using a
5982 workaround I was able to get rid of the file descriptor leak and
5983 reduce the memory leak from ~30 MiB per hardware detection down to
5984 around 2 MiB per hardware detection.  It should make the desktop
5985 daemon a lot more useful.  The fix is in version 0.7 uploaded to
5986 unstable today.</p>
5987
5988 <p>I believe the current way of mapping hardware to packages in
5989 Isenkram is is a good draft, but in the future I expect isenkram to
5990 use the AppStream data source for this.  A proposal for getting proper
5991 AppStream support into Debian is floating around as
5992 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/DEP-11">DEP-11</a>, and
5993 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/SummerOfCode2014/Projects#SummerOfCode2014.2FProjects.2FAppStreamDEP11Implementation.AppStream.2FDEP-11_for_the_Debian_Archive">GSoC
5994 project</a> will take place this summer to improve the situation.  I
5995 look forward to seeing the result, and welcome patches for isenkram to
5996 start using the information when it is ready.</p>
5997
5998 <p>If you want your package to map to some specific hardware, either
5999 add a "Xb-Modaliases" header to your control file like I did in
6000 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">the pymissile
6001 package</a> or submit a bug report with the details to the isenkram
6002 package.  See also
6003 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram/">all my
6004 blog posts tagged isenkram</a> for details on the notation.  I expect
6005 the information will be migrated to AppStream eventually, but for the
6006 moment I got no better place to store it.</p>
6007
6008       </div>
6009       <div class="tags">
6010
6011
6012         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>.
6013
6014
6015       </div>
6016     </div>
6017     <div class="padding"></div>
6018
6019     <div class="entry">
6020       <div class="title">
6021         <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>
6022       </div>
6023       <div class="date">
6024         15th April 2014
6025       </div>
6026       <div class="body">
6027         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
6028 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware to make
6029 it easy for non-technical people to host their data and communication
6030 at home, and being able to communicate with their friends and family
6031 encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It is still going strong, and
6032 today a major mile stone was reached.</p>
6033
6034 <p>Today, the last of the packages currently used by the project to
6035 created the system images were accepted into Debian Unstable.  It was
6036 the freedombox-setup package, which is used to configure the images
6037 during build and on the first boot.  Now all one need to get going is
6038 the build code from the freedom-maker git repository and packages from
6039 Debian.  And once the freedombox-setup package enter testing, we can
6040 build everything directly from Debian. :)</p>
6041
6042 <p>Some key packages used by Freedombox are
6043 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>,
6044 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/plinth">plinth</a>,
6045 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pagekite">pagekite</a>,
6046 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/tor">tor</a>,
6047 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>,
6048 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/owncloud">owncloud</a> and
6049 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/dnsmasq">dnsmasq</a>.  There
6050 are plans to integrate more packages into the setup.  User
6051 documentation is maintained on the Debian wiki.  Please
6052 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/Manual/Jessie">check out
6053 the manual</a> and help us improve it.</p>
6054
6055 <p>To test for yourself and create boot images with the FreedomBox
6056 setup, run this on a Debian machine using a user with sudo rights to
6057 become root:</p>
6058
6059 <p><pre>
6060 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
6061   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
6062   u-boot-tools
6063 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
6064   freedom-maker
6065 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
6066 </pre></p>
6067
6068 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
6069 devices.  See the README in the freedom-maker git repo for more
6070 details on the build.  If you do not want all three images, trim the
6071 make line.  Note that the virtualbox-image target is not really
6072 virtualbox specific.  It create a x86 image usable in kvm, qemu,
6073 vmware and any other x86 virtual machine environment.  You might need
6074 the version of vmdebootstrap in Jessie to get the build working, as it
6075 include fixes for a race condition with kpartx.</p>
6076
6077 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
6078 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
6079 the preseed values:</p>
6080
6081 <p><pre>
6082 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
6083 </pre></p>
6084
6085 <p>I have not tested it myself the last few weeks, so I do not know if
6086 it still work.</p>
6087
6088 <p>If you wonder how to help, one task you could look at is using
6089 systemd as the boot system.  It will become the default for Linux in
6090 Jessie, so we need to make sure it is usable on the Freedombox.  I did
6091 a simple test a few weeks ago, and noticed dnsmasq failed to start
6092 during boot when using systemd.  I suspect there are other problems
6093 too. :) To detect problems, there is a test suite included, which can
6094 be run from the plinth web interface.</p>
6095
6096 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
6097 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
6098 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
6099 irc.debian.org)</a> and
6100 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6101 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6102
6103       </div>
6104       <div class="tags">
6105
6106
6107         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>.
6108
6109
6110       </div>
6111     </div>
6112     <div class="padding"></div>
6113
6114     <div class="entry">
6115       <div class="title">
6116         <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>
6117       </div>
6118       <div class="date">
6119          9th April 2014
6120       </div>
6121       <div class="body">
6122         <p>For a while now, I have been looking for a sensible offsite backup
6123 solution for use at home.  My requirements are simple, it must be
6124 cheap and locally encrypted (in other words, I keep the encryption
6125 keys, the storage provider do not have access to my private files).
6126 One idea me and my friends had many years ago, before the cloud
6127 storage providers showed up, was to use Google mail as storage,
6128 writing a Linux block device storing blocks as emails in the mail
6129 service provided by Google, and thus get heaps of free space.  On top
6130 of this one can add encryption, RAID and volume management to have
6131 lots of (fairly slow, I admit that) cheap and encrypted storage.  But
6132 I never found time to implement such system.  But the last few weeks I
6133 have looked at a system called
6134 <a href="https://bitbucket.org/nikratio/s3ql/">S3QL</a>, a locally
6135 mounted network backed file system with the features I need.</p>
6136
6137 <p>S3QL is a fuse file system with a local cache and cloud storage,
6138 handling several different storage providers, any with Amazon S3,
6139 Google Drive or OpenStack API.  There are heaps of such storage
6140 providers.  S3QL can also use a local directory as storage, which
6141 combined with sshfs allow for file storage on any ssh server.  S3QL
6142 include support for encryption, compression, de-duplication, snapshots
6143 and immutable file systems, allowing me to mount the remote storage as
6144 a local mount point, look at and use the files as if they were local,
6145 while the content is stored in the cloud as well.  This allow me to
6146 have a backup that should survive fire.  The file system can not be
6147 shared between several machines at the same time, as only one can
6148 mount it at the time, but any machine with the encryption key and
6149 access to the storage service can mount it if it is unmounted.</p>
6150
6151 <p>It is simple to use.  I'm using it on Debian Wheezy, where the
6152 package is included already.  So to get started, run <tt>apt-get
6153 install s3ql</tt>.  Next, pick a storage provider.  I ended up picking
6154 Greenqloud, after reading their nice recipe on
6155 <a href="https://greenqloud.zendesk.com/entries/44611757-How-To-Use-S3QL-to-mount-a-StorageQloud-bucket-on-Debian-Wheezy">how
6156 to use S3QL with their Amazon S3 service</a>, because I trust the laws
6157 in Iceland more than those in USA when it come to keeping my personal
6158 data safe and private, and thus would rather spend money on a company
6159 in Iceland.  Another nice recipe is available from the article
6160 <a href="http://www.admin-magazine.com/HPC/Articles/HPC-Cloud-Storage">S3QL
6161 Filesystem for HPC Storage</a> by Jeff Layton in the HPC section of
6162 Admin magazine.  When the provider is picked, figure out how to get
6163 the API key needed to connect to the storage API.  With Greencloud,
6164 the key did not show up until I had added payment details to my
6165 account.</p>
6166
6167 <p>Armed with the API access details, it is time to create the file
6168 system.  First, create a new bucket in the cloud.  This bucket is the
6169 file system storage area.  I picked a bucket name reflecting the
6170 machine that was going to store data there, but any name will do.
6171 I'll refer to it as <tt>bucket-name</tt> below.  In addition, one need
6172 the API login and password, and a locally created password.  Store it
6173 all in ~root/.s3ql/authinfo2 like this:
6174
6175 <p><blockquote><pre>
6176 [s3c]
6177 storage-url: s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6178 backend-login: API-login
6179 backend-password: API-password
6180 fs-passphrase: local-password
6181 </pre></blockquote></p>
6182
6183 <p>I create my local passphrase using <tt>pwget 50</tt> or similar,
6184 but any sensible way to create a fairly random password should do it.
6185 Armed with these details, it is now time to run mkfs, entering the API
6186 details and password to create it:</p>
6187
6188 <p><blockquote><pre>
6189 # mkdir -m 700 /var/lib/s3ql-cache
6190 # mkfs.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6191   --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6192 Enter backend login:
6193 Enter backend password:
6194 Before using S3QL, make sure to read the user's guide, especially
6195 the 'Important Rules to Avoid Loosing Data' section.
6196 Enter encryption password:
6197 Confirm encryption password:
6198 Generating random encryption key...
6199 Creating metadata tables...
6200 Dumping metadata...
6201 ..objects..
6202 ..blocks..
6203 ..inodes..
6204 ..inode_blocks..
6205 ..symlink_targets..
6206 ..names..
6207 ..contents..
6208 ..ext_attributes..
6209 Compressing and uploading metadata...
6210 Wrote 0.00 MB of compressed metadata.
6211 # </pre></blockquote></p>
6212
6213 <p>The next step is mounting the file system to make the storage available.
6214
6215 <p><blockquote><pre>
6216 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6217   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
6218 Using 4 upload threads.
6219 Downloading and decompressing metadata...
6220 Reading metadata...
6221 ..objects..
6222 ..blocks..
6223 ..inodes..
6224 ..inode_blocks..
6225 ..symlink_targets..
6226 ..names..
6227 ..contents..
6228 ..ext_attributes..
6229 Mounting filesystem...
6230 # df -h /s3ql
6231 Filesystem                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
6232 s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name  1.0T     0  1.0T   0% /s3ql
6233 #
6234 </pre></blockquote></p>
6235
6236 <p>The file system is now ready for use.  I use rsync to store my
6237 backups in it, and as the metadata used by rsync is downloaded at
6238 mount time, no network traffic (and storage cost) is triggered by
6239 running rsync.  To unmount, one should not use the normal umount
6240 command, as this will not flush the cache to the cloud storage, but
6241 instead running the umount.s3ql command like this:
6242
6243 <p><blockquote><pre>
6244 # umount.s3ql /s3ql
6245 #
6246 </pre></blockquote></p>
6247
6248 <p>There is a fsck command available to check the file system and
6249 correct any problems detected.  This can be used if the local server
6250 crashes while the file system is mounted, to reset the "already
6251 mounted" flag.  This is what it look like when processing a working
6252 file system:</p>
6253
6254 <p><blockquote><pre>
6255 # fsck.s3ql --force --ssl s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name
6256 Using cached metadata.
6257 File system seems clean, checking anyway.
6258 Checking DB integrity...
6259 Creating temporary extra indices...
6260 Checking lost+found...
6261 Checking cached objects...
6262 Checking names (refcounts)...
6263 Checking contents (names)...
6264 Checking contents (inodes)...
6265 Checking contents (parent inodes)...
6266 Checking objects (reference counts)...
6267 Checking objects (backend)...
6268 ..processed 5000 objects so far..
6269 ..processed 10000 objects so far..
6270 ..processed 15000 objects so far..
6271 Checking objects (sizes)...
6272 Checking blocks (referenced objects)...
6273 Checking blocks (refcounts)...
6274 Checking inode-block mapping (blocks)...
6275 Checking inode-block mapping (inodes)...
6276 Checking inodes (refcounts)...
6277 Checking inodes (sizes)...
6278 Checking extended attributes (names)...
6279 Checking extended attributes (inodes)...
6280 Checking symlinks (inodes)...
6281 Checking directory reachability...
6282 Checking unix conventions...
6283 Checking referential integrity...
6284 Dropping temporary indices...
6285 Backing up old metadata...
6286 Dumping metadata...
6287 ..objects..
6288 ..blocks..
6289 ..inodes..
6290 ..inode_blocks..
6291 ..symlink_targets..
6292 ..names..
6293 ..contents..
6294 ..ext_attributes..
6295 Compressing and uploading metadata...
6296 Wrote 0.89 MB of compressed metadata.
6297 #
6298 </pre></blockquote></p>
6299
6300 <p>Thanks to the cache, working on files that fit in the cache is very
6301 quick, about the same speed as local file access.  Uploading large
6302 amount of data is to me limited by the bandwidth out of and into my
6303 house.  Uploading 685 MiB with a 100 MiB cache gave me 305 kiB/s,
6304 which is very close to my upload speed, and downloading the same
6305 Debian installation ISO gave me 610 kiB/s, close to my download speed.
6306 Both were measured using <tt>dd</tt>.  So for me, the bottleneck is my
6307 network, not the file system code.  I do not know what a good cache
6308 size would be, but suspect that the cache should e larger than your
6309 working set.</p>
6310
6311 <p>I mentioned that only one machine can mount the file system at the
6312 time.  If another machine try, it is told that the file system is
6313 busy:</p>
6314
6315 <p><blockquote><pre>
6316 # mount.s3ql --cachedir /var/lib/s3ql-cache --authfile /root/.s3ql/authinfo2 \
6317   --ssl --allow-root s3c://s.greenqloud.com:443/bucket-name /s3ql
6318 Using 8 upload threads.
6319 Backend reports that fs is still mounted elsewhere, aborting.
6320 #
6321 </pre></blockquote></p>
6322
6323 <p>The file content is uploaded when the cache is full, while the
6324 metadata is uploaded once every 24 hour by default.  To ensure the
6325 file system content is flushed to the cloud, one can either umount the
6326 file system, or ask S3QL to flush the cache and metadata using
6327 s3qlctrl:
6328
6329 <p><blockquote><pre>
6330 # s3qlctrl upload-meta /s3ql
6331 # s3qlctrl flushcache /s3ql
6332 #
6333 </pre></blockquote></p>
6334
6335 <p>If you are curious about how much space your data uses in the
6336 cloud, and how much compression and deduplication cut down on the
6337 storage usage, you can use s3qlstat on the mounted file system to get
6338 a report:</p>
6339
6340 <p><blockquote><pre>
6341 # s3qlstat /s3ql
6342 Directory entries:    9141
6343 Inodes:               9143
6344 Data blocks:          8851
6345 Total data size:      22049.38 MB
6346 After de-duplication: 21955.46 MB (99.57% of total)
6347 After compression:    21877.28 MB (99.22% of total, 99.64% of de-duplicated)
6348 Database size:        2.39 MB (uncompressed)
6349 (some values do not take into account not-yet-uploaded dirty blocks in cache)
6350 #
6351 </pre></blockquote></p>
6352
6353 <p>I mentioned earlier that there are several possible suppliers of
6354 storage.  I did not try to locate them all, but am aware of at least
6355 <a href="https://www.greenqloud.com/">Greenqloud</a>,
6356 <a href="http://drive.google.com/">Google Drive</a>,
6357 <a href="http://aws.amazon.com/s3/">Amazon S3 web serivces</a>,
6358 <a href="http://www.rackspace.com/">Rackspace</a> and
6359 <a href="http://crowncloud.net/">Crowncloud</A>.  The latter even
6360 accept payment in Bitcoin.  Pick one that suit your need.  Some of
6361 them provide several GiB of free storage, but the prize models are
6362 quite different and you will have to figure out what suits you
6363 best.</p>
6364
6365 <p>While researching this blog post, I had a look at research papers
6366 and posters discussing the S3QL file system.  There are several, which
6367 told me that the file system is getting a critical check by the
6368 science community and increased my confidence in using it.  One nice
6369 poster is titled
6370 "<a href="http://www.lanl.gov/orgs/adtsc/publications/science_highlights_2013/docs/pg68_69.pdf">An
6371 Innovative Parallel Cloud Storage System using OpenStack’s SwiftObject
6372 Store and Transformative Parallel I/O Approach</a>" by Hsing-Bung
6373 Chen, Benjamin McClelland, David Sherrill, Alfred Torrez, Parks Fields
6374 and Pamela Smith.  Please  have a look.</p>
6375
6376 <p>Given my problems with different file systems earlier, I decided to
6377 check out the mounted S3QL file system to see if it would be usable as
6378 a home directory (in other word, that it provided POSIX semantics when
6379 it come to locking and umask handling etc).  Running
6380 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_if_a_file_system_can_be_used_for_home_directories___.html">my
6381 test code to check file system semantics</a>, I was happy to discover that
6382 no error was found.  So the file system can be used for home
6383 directories, if one chooses to do so.</p>
6384
6385 <p>If you do not want a locally file system, and want something that
6386 work without the Linux fuse file system, I would like to mention the
6387 <a href="http://www.tarsnap.com/">Tarsnap service</a>, which also
6388 provide locally encrypted backup using a command line client.  It have
6389 a nicer access control system, where one can split out read and write
6390 access, allowing some systems to write to the backup and others to
6391 only read from it.</p>
6392
6393 <p>As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my
6394 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
6395 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
6396
6397       </div>
6398       <div class="tags">
6399
6400
6401         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>.
6402
6403
6404       </div>
6405     </div>
6406     <div class="padding"></div>
6407
6408     <div class="entry">
6409       <div class="title">
6410         <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>
6411       </div>
6412       <div class="date">
6413         14th March 2014
6414       </div>
6415       <div class="body">
6416         <p>The <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">Freedombox
6417 project</a> is working on providing the software and hardware for
6418 making it easy for non-technical people to host their data and
6419 communication at home, and being able to communicate with their
6420 friends and family encrypted and away from prying eyes.  It has been
6421 going on for a while, and is slowly progressing towards a new test
6422 release (0.2).</p>
6423
6424 <p>And what day could be better than the Pi day to announce that the
6425 new version will provide "hard drive" / SD card / USB stick images for
6426 Dreamplug, Raspberry Pi and VirtualBox (or any other virtualization
6427 system), and can also be installed using a Debian installer preseed
6428 file.  The Debian based Freedombox is now based on Debian Jessie,
6429 where most of the needed packages used are already present.  Only one,
6430 the freedombox-setup package, is missing.  To try to build your own
6431 boot image to test the current status, fetch the freedom-maker scripts
6432 and build using
6433 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/vmdebootstrap">vmdebootstrap</a>
6434 with a user with sudo access to become root:
6435
6436 <pre>
6437 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/freedombox/freedom-maker.git \
6438   freedom-maker
6439 sudo apt-get install git vmdebootstrap mercurial python-docutils \
6440   mktorrent extlinux virtualbox qemu-user-static binfmt-support \
6441   u-boot-tools
6442 make -C freedom-maker dreamplug-image raspberry-image virtualbox-image
6443 </pre>
6444
6445 <p>Root access is needed to run debootstrap and mount loopback
6446 devices.  See the README for more details on the build. If you do not
6447 want all three images, trim the make line.  But note that thanks to <a
6448 href="https://bugs.debian.org/741407">a race condition in
6449 vmdebootstrap</a>, the build might fail without the patch to the
6450 kpartx call.</p>
6451
6452 <p>If you instead want to install using a Debian CD and the preseed
6453 method, boot a Debian Wheezy ISO and use this boot argument to load
6454 the preseed values:</p>
6455
6456 <pre>
6457 url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-jessie.dat</a>
6458 </pre>
6459
6460 <p>But note that due to <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/740673">a
6461 recently introduced bug in apt in Jessie</a>, the installer will
6462 currently hang while setting up APT sources.  Killing the
6463 '<tt>apt-cdrom ident</tt>' process when it hang a few times during the
6464 installation will get the installation going.  This affect all
6465 installations in Jessie, and I expect it will be fixed soon.</p>
6466
6467 <p>Give it a go and let us know how it goes on the mailing list, and help
6468 us get the new release published. :) Please join us on
6469 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC (#freedombox on
6470 irc.debian.org)</a> and
6471 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
6472 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
6473
6474       </div>
6475       <div class="tags">
6476
6477
6478         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>.
6479
6480
6481       </div>
6482     </div>
6483     <div class="padding"></div>
6484
6485     <div class="entry">
6486       <div class="title">
6487         <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>
6488       </div>
6489       <div class="date">
6490         22nd February 2014
6491       </div>
6492       <div class="body">
6493         <p>Many years ago, I wrote a GPL licensed version of the netgroup and
6494 innetgr tools, because I needed them in
6495 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>.  I called the project
6496 ng-utils, and it has served me well.  I placed the project under the
6497 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/">Hungry Programmer</a> umbrella, and it was maintained in our CVS
6498 repository.  But many years ago, the CVS repository was dropped (lost,
6499 not migrated to new hardware, not sure), and the project have lacked a
6500 proper home since then.</p>
6501
6502 <p>Last summer, I had a look at the package and made a new release
6503 fixing a irritating crash bug, but was unable to store the changes in
6504 a proper source control system.  I applied for a project on
6505 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/">Alioth</a>, but did not have time
6506 to follow up on it.  Until today. :)</p>
6507
6508 <p>After many hours of cleaning and migration, the ng-utils project
6509 now have a new home, and a git repository with the highlight of the
6510 history of the project.  I published all release tarballs and imported
6511 them into the git repository.  As the project is really stable and not
6512 expected to gain new features any time soon, I decided to make a new
6513 release and call it 1.0.  Visit the new project home on
6514 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/">https://alioth.debian.org/projects/ng-utils/</a>
6515 if you want to check it out.  The new version is also uploaded into
6516 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/n/ng-utils.html">Debian Unstable</a>.</p>
6517
6518       </div>
6519       <div class="tags">
6520
6521
6522         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>.
6523
6524
6525       </div>
6526     </div>
6527     <div class="padding"></div>
6528
6529     <div class="entry">
6530       <div class="title">
6531         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Testing_sysvinit_from_experimental_in_Debian_Hurd.html">Testing sysvinit from experimental in Debian Hurd</a>
6532       </div>
6533       <div class="date">
6534          3rd February 2014
6535       </div>
6536       <div class="body">
6537         <p>A few days ago I decided to try to help the Hurd people to get
6538 their changes into sysvinit, to allow them to use the normal sysvinit
6539 boot system instead of their old one.  This follow up on the
6540 <a href="https://teythoon.cryptobitch.de//categories/gsoc.html">great
6541 Google Summer of Code work</a> done last summer by Justus Winter to
6542 get Debian on Hurd working more like Debian on Linux.  To get started,
6543 I downloaded a prebuilt hard disk image from
6544 <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>,
6545 and started it using virt-manager.</p>
6546
6547 <p>The first think I had to do after logging in (root without any
6548 password) was to get the network operational.  I followed
6549 <a href="https://www.debian.org/ports/hurd/hurd-install">the
6550 instructions on the Debian GNU/Hurd ports page</a> and ran these
6551 commands as root to get the machine to accept a IP address from the
6552 kvm internal DHCP server:</p>
6553
6554 <p><blockquote><pre>
6555 settrans -fgap /dev/netdde /hurd/netdde
6556 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[p]finet/ { print $2}')
6557 kill $(ps -ef|awk '/[d]evnode/ { print $2}')
6558 dhclient /dev/eth0
6559 </pre></blockquote></p>
6560
6561 <p>After this, the machine had internet connectivity, and I could
6562 upgrade it and install the sysvinit packages from experimental and
6563 enable it as the default boot system in Hurd.</p>
6564
6565 <p>But before I did that, I set a password on the root user, as ssh is
6566 running on the machine it for ssh login to work a password need to be
6567 set.  Also, note that a bug somewhere in openssh on Hurd block
6568 compression from working.  Remember to turn that off on the client
6569 side.</p>
6570
6571 <p>Run these commands as root to upgrade and test the new sysvinit
6572 stuff:</p>
6573
6574 <p><blockquote><pre>
6575 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/experimental.list &lt;&lt;EOF
6576 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ experimental main
6577 EOF
6578 apt-get update
6579 apt-get dist-upgrade
6580 apt-get install -t experimental initscripts sysv-rc sysvinit \
6581     sysvinit-core sysvinit-utils
6582 update-alternatives --config runsystem
6583 </pre></blockquote></p>
6584
6585 <p>To reboot after switching boot system, you have to use
6586 <tt>reboot-hurd</tt> instead of just <tt>reboot</tt>, as there is not
6587 yet a sysvinit process able to receive the signals from the normal
6588 'reboot' command.  After switching to sysvinit as the boot system,
6589 upgrading every package and rebooting, the network come up with DHCP
6590 after boot as it should, and the settrans/pkill hack mentioned at the
6591 start is no longer needed.  But for some strange reason, there are no
6592 longer any login prompt in the virtual console, so I logged in using
6593 ssh instead.
6594
6595 <p>Note that there are some race conditions in Hurd making the boot
6596 fail some times.  No idea what the cause is, but hope the Hurd porters
6597 figure it out.  At least Justus said on IRC (#debian-hurd on
6598 irc.debian.org) that they are aware of the problem.  A way to reduce
6599 the impact is to upgrade to the Hurd packages built by Justus by
6600 adding this repository to the machine:</p>
6601
6602 <p><blockquote><pre>
6603 cat > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/hurd-ci.list &lt;&lt;EOF
6604 deb http://darnassus.sceen.net/~teythoon/hurd-ci/ sid main
6605 EOF
6606 </pre></blockquote></p>
6607
6608 <p>At the moment the prebuilt virtual machine get some packages from
6609 http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian, because some of the packages in
6610 unstable do not yet include the required patches that are lingering in
6611 BTS.  This is the completely list of "unofficial" packages installed:</p>
6612
6613 <p><blockquote><pre>
6614 # aptitude search '?narrow(?version(CURRENT),?origin(Debian Ports))'
6615 i   emacs                   - GNU Emacs editor (metapackage)
6616 i   gdb                     - GNU Debugger
6617 i   hurd-recommended        - Miscellaneous translators
6618 i   isc-dhcp-client         - ISC DHCP client
6619 i   isc-dhcp-common         - common files used by all the isc-dhcp* packages
6620 i   libc-bin                - Embedded GNU C Library: Binaries
6621 i   libc-dev-bin            - Embedded GNU C Library: Development binaries
6622 i   libc0.3                 - Embedded GNU C Library: Shared libraries
6623 i A libc0.3-dbg             - Embedded GNU C Library: detached debugging symbols
6624 i   libc0.3-dev             - Embedded GNU C Library: Development Libraries and Hea
6625 i   multiarch-support       - Transitional package to ensure multiarch compatibilit
6626 i A x11-common              - X Window System (X.Org) infrastructure
6627 i   xorg                    - X.Org X Window System
6628 i A xserver-xorg            - X.Org X server
6629 i A xserver-xorg-input-all  - X.Org X server -- input driver metapackage
6630 #
6631 </pre></blockquote></p>
6632
6633 <p>All in all, testing hurd has been an interesting experience. :)
6634 X.org did not work out of the box and I never took the time to follow
6635 the porters instructions to fix it.  This time I was interested in the
6636 command line stuff.<p>
6637
6638       </div>
6639       <div class="tags">
6640
6641
6642         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>.
6643
6644
6645       </div>
6646     </div>
6647     <div class="padding"></div>
6648
6649     <div class="entry">
6650       <div class="title">
6651         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_16.html">New chrpath release 0.16</a>
6652       </div>
6653       <div class="date">
6654         14th January 2014
6655       </div>
6656       <div class="body">
6657         <p><a href="http://www.coverity.com/">Coverity</a> is a nice tool to
6658 find problems in C, C++ and Java code using static source code
6659 analysis.  It can detect a lot of different problems, and is very
6660 useful to find memory and locking bugs in the error handling part of
6661 the source.  The company behind it provide
6662 <a href="https://scan.coverity.com/">check of free software projects as
6663 a community service</a>, and many hundred free software projects are
6664 already checked.  A few days ago I decided to have a closer look at
6665 the Coverity system, and discovered that the
6666 <a href="http://www.gnu.org/software/gnash/">gnash</a> and
6667 <a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/">ipmitool</a>
6668 projects I am involved with was already registered.  But these are
6669 fairly big, and I would also like to have a small and easy project to
6670 check, and decided to <a href="http://scan.coverity.com/projects/1179">request
6671 checking of the chrpath project</a>.  It was
6672 added to the checker and discovered seven potential defects.  Six of
6673 these were real, mostly resource "leak" when the program detected an
6674 error.  Nothing serious, as the resources would be released a fraction
6675 of a second later when the program exited because of the error, but it
6676 is nice to do it right in case the source of the program some time in
6677 the future end up in a library.  Having fixed all defects and added
6678 <a href="https://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/chrpath-devel">a
6679 mailing list for the chrpath developers</a>, I decided it was time to
6680 publish a new release.  These are the release notes:</p>
6681
6682 <p>New in 0.16 released 2014-01-14:</p>
6683
6684 <ul>
6685
6686   <li>Fixed all minor bugs discovered by Coverity.</li>
6687   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project.</li>
6688   <li>Mention new project mailing list in the documentation.</li>
6689
6690 </ul>
6691
6692 <p>You can
6693 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
6694 new version 0.16 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
6695 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
6696 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
6697 include a test suite check.</p>
6698
6699       </div>
6700       <div class="tags">
6701
6702
6703         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>.
6704
6705
6706       </div>
6707     </div>
6708     <div class="padding"></div>
6709
6710     <div class="entry">
6711       <div class="title">
6712         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_chrpath_release_0_15.html">New chrpath release 0.15</a>
6713       </div>
6714       <div class="date">
6715         24th November 2013
6716       </div>
6717       <div class="body">
6718         <p>After many years break from the package and a vain hope that
6719 development would be continued by someone else, I finally pulled my
6720 acts together this morning and wrapped up a new release of chrpath,
6721 the command line tool to modify the rpath and runpath of already
6722 compiled ELF programs.  The update was triggered by the persistence of
6723 Isha Vishnoi at IBM, which needed a new config.guess file to get
6724 support for the ppc64le architecture (powerpc 64-bit Little Endian) he
6725 is working on.  I checked the
6726 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/chrpath">Debian</a>,
6727 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chrpath">Ubuntu</a> and
6728 <a href="https://admin.fedoraproject.org/pkgdb/acls/name/chrpath">Fedora</a>
6729 packages for interesting patches (failed to find the source from
6730 OpenSUSE and Mandriva packages), and found quite a few nice fixes.
6731 These are the release notes:</p>
6732
6733 <p>New in 0.15 released 2013-11-24:</p>
6734
6735 <ul>
6736
6737   <li>Updated config.sub and config.guess from the GNU project to work
6738    with newer architectures.  Thanks to isha vishnoi for the heads
6739    up.</li>
6740
6741   <li>Updated README with current URLs.</li>
6742
6743   <li>Added byteswap fix found in Ubuntu, credited Jeremy Kerr and
6744    Matthias Klose.</li>
6745
6746   <li>Added missing help for -k|--keepgoing option, using patch by
6747    Petr Machata found in Fedora.</li>
6748
6749   <li>Rewrite removal of RPATH/RUNPATH to make sure the entry in
6750    .dynamic is a NULL terminated string.  Based on patch found in
6751    Fedora credited Axel Thimm and Christian Krause.</li>
6752
6753 </ul>
6754
6755 <p>You can
6756 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/frs/?group_id=31052">download the
6757 new version 0.15 from alioth</a>.  Please let us know via the Alioth
6758 project if something is wrong with the new release.  The test suite
6759 did not discover any old errors, so if you find a new one, please also
6760 include a testsuite check.</p>
6761
6762       </div>
6763       <div class="tags">
6764
6765
6766         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>.
6767
6768
6769       </div>
6770     </div>
6771     <div class="padding"></div>
6772
6773     <div class="entry">
6774       <div class="title">
6775         <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>
6776       </div>
6777       <div class="date">
6778          2nd November 2013
6779       </div>
6780       <div class="body">
6781         <p>If one of the points of switching to a new init system in Debian is
6782 <a href="http://thomas.goirand.fr/blog/?p=147">to get rid of huge
6783 init.d scripts</a>, I doubt we need to switch away from sysvinit and
6784 init.d scripts at all.  Here is an example init.d script, ie a rewrite
6785 of /etc/init.d/rsyslog:</p>
6786
6787 <p><pre>
6788 #!/lib/init/init-d-script
6789 ### BEGIN INIT INFO
6790 # Provides:          rsyslog
6791 # Required-Start:    $remote_fs $time
6792 # Required-Stop:     umountnfs $time
6793 # X-Stop-After:      sendsigs
6794 # Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
6795 # Default-Stop:      0 1 6
6796 # Short-Description: enhanced syslogd
6797 # Description:       Rsyslog is an enhanced multi-threaded syslogd.
6798 #                    It is quite compatible to stock sysklogd and can be
6799 #                    used as a drop-in replacement.
6800 ### END INIT INFO
6801 DESC="enhanced syslogd"
6802 DAEMON=/usr/sbin/rsyslogd
6803 </pre></p>
6804
6805 <p>Pretty minimalistic to me... For the record, the original sysv-rc
6806 script was 137 lines, and the above is just 15 lines, most of it meta
6807 info/comments.</p>
6808
6809 <p>How to do this, you ask?  Well, one create a new script
6810 /lib/init/init-d-script looking something like this:
6811
6812 <p><pre>
6813 #!/bin/sh
6814
6815 # Define LSB log_* functions.
6816 # Depend on lsb-base (>= 3.2-14) to ensure that this file is present
6817 # and status_of_proc is working.
6818 . /lib/lsb/init-functions
6819
6820 #
6821 # Function that starts the daemon/service
6822
6823 #
6824 do_start()
6825 {
6826         # Return
6827         #   0 if daemon has been started
6828         #   1 if daemon was already running
6829         #   2 if daemon could not be started
6830         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON --test > /dev/null \
6831                 || return 1
6832         start-stop-daemon --start --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --exec $DAEMON -- \
6833                 $DAEMON_ARGS \
6834                 || return 2
6835         # Add code here, if necessary, that waits for the process to be ready
6836         # to handle requests from services started subsequently which depend
6837         # on this one.  As a last resort, sleep for some time.
6838 }
6839
6840 #
6841 # Function that stops the daemon/service
6842 #
6843 do_stop()
6844 {
6845         # Return
6846         #   0 if daemon has been stopped
6847         #   1 if daemon was already stopped
6848         #   2 if daemon could not be stopped
6849         #   other if a failure occurred
6850         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --retry=TERM/30/KILL/5 --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
6851         RETVAL="$?"
6852         [ "$RETVAL" = 2 ] && return 2
6853         # Wait for children to finish too if this is a daemon that forks
6854         # and if the daemon is only ever run from this initscript.
6855         # If the above conditions are not satisfied then add some other code
6856         # that waits for the process to drop all resources that could be
6857         # needed by services started subsequently.  A last resort is to
6858         # sleep for some time.
6859         start-stop-daemon --stop --quiet --oknodo --retry=0/30/KILL/5 --exec $DAEMON
6860         [ "$?" = 2 ] && return 2
6861         # Many daemons don't delete their pidfiles when they exit.
6862         rm -f $PIDFILE
6863         return "$RETVAL"
6864 }
6865
6866 #
6867 # Function that sends a SIGHUP to the daemon/service
6868 #
6869 do_reload() {
6870         #
6871         # If the daemon can reload its configuration without
6872         # restarting (for example, when it is sent a SIGHUP),
6873         # then implement that here.
6874         #
6875         start-stop-daemon --stop --signal 1 --quiet --pidfile $PIDFILE --name $NAME
6876         return 0
6877 }
6878
6879 SCRIPTNAME=$1
6880 scriptbasename="$(basename $1)"
6881 echo "SN: $scriptbasename"
6882 if [ "$scriptbasename" != "init-d-library" ] ; then
6883     script="$1"
6884     shift
6885     . $script
6886 else
6887     exit 0
6888 fi
6889
6890 NAME=$(basename $DAEMON)
6891 PIDFILE=/var/run/$NAME.pid
6892
6893 # Exit if the package is not installed
6894 #[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0
6895
6896 # Read configuration variable file if it is present
6897 [ -r /etc/default/$NAME ] && . /etc/default/$NAME
6898
6899 # Load the VERBOSE setting and other rcS variables
6900 . /lib/init/vars.sh
6901
6902 case "$1" in
6903   start)
6904         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Starting $DESC" "$NAME"
6905         do_start
6906         case "$?" in
6907                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
6908                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
6909         esac
6910         ;;
6911   stop)
6912         [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_daemon_msg "Stopping $DESC" "$NAME"
6913         do_stop
6914         case "$?" in
6915                 0|1) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 0 ;;
6916                 2) [ "$VERBOSE" != no ] && log_end_msg 1 ;;
6917         esac
6918         ;;
6919   status)
6920         status_of_proc "$DAEMON" "$NAME" && exit 0 || exit $?
6921         ;;
6922   #reload|force-reload)
6923         #
6924         # If do_reload() is not implemented then leave this commented out
6925         # and leave 'force-reload' as an alias for 'restart'.
6926         #
6927         #log_daemon_msg "Reloading $DESC" "$NAME"
6928         #do_reload
6929         #log_end_msg $?
6930         #;;
6931   restart|force-reload)
6932         #
6933         # If the "reload" option is implemented then remove the
6934         # 'force-reload' alias
6935         #
6936         log_daemon_msg "Restarting $DESC" "$NAME"
6937         do_stop
6938         case "$?" in
6939           0|1)
6940                 do_start
6941                 case "$?" in
6942                         0) log_end_msg 0 ;;
6943                         1) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Old process is still running
6944                         *) log_end_msg 1 ;; # Failed to start
6945                 esac
6946                 ;;
6947           *)
6948                 # Failed to stop
6949                 log_end_msg 1
6950                 ;;
6951         esac
6952         ;;
6953   *)
6954         echo "Usage: $SCRIPTNAME {start|stop|status|restart|force-reload}" >&2
6955         exit 3
6956         ;;
6957 esac
6958
6959 :
6960 </pre></p>
6961
6962 <p>It is based on /etc/init.d/skeleton, and could be improved quite a
6963 lot.  I did not really polish the approach, so it might not always
6964 work out of the box, but you get the idea.  I did not try very hard to
6965 optimize it nor make it more robust either.</p>
6966
6967 <p>A better argument for switching init system in Debian than reducing
6968 the size of init scripts (which is a good thing to do anyway), is to
6969 get boot system that is able to handle the kernel events sensibly and
6970 robustly, and do not depend on the boot to run sequentially.  The boot
6971 and the kernel have not behaved sequentially in years.</p>
6972
6973       </div>
6974       <div class="tags">
6975
6976
6977         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>.
6978
6979
6980       </div>
6981     </div>
6982     <div class="padding"></div>
6983
6984     <div class="entry">
6985       <div class="title">
6986         <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>
6987       </div>
6988       <div class="date">
6989          1st November 2013
6990       </div>
6991       <div class="body">
6992         <p><a href="http://www.spice-space.org/">The SPICE protocol</a> for
6993 remote display access is the preferred solution with oVirt and RedHat
6994 Enterprise Virtualization, and I was sad to discover the other day
6995 that the browser plugin needed to use these systems seamlessly was
6996 missing in Debian.  The <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/668284">request
6997 for a package</a> was from 2012-04-10 with no progress since
6998 2013-04-01, so I decided to wrap up a package based on the great work
6999 from Cajus Pollmeier and put it in a collab-maint maintained git
7000 repository to get a package I could use.  I would very much like
7001 others to help me maintain the package (or just take over, I do not
7002 mind), but as no-one had volunteered so far, I just uploaded it to
7003 NEW.  I hope it will be available in Debian in a few days.</p>
7004
7005 <p>The source is now available from
7006 <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>
7007
7008       </div>
7009       <div class="tags">
7010
7011
7012         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>.
7013
7014
7015       </div>
7016     </div>
7017     <div class="padding"></div>
7018
7019     <div class="entry">
7020       <div class="title">
7021         <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>
7022       </div>
7023       <div class="date">
7024         27th October 2013
7025       </div>
7026       <div class="body">
7027         <p>The
7028 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/v/vmdebootstrap.html">vmdebootstrap</a>
7029 program is a a very nice system to create virtual machine images.  It
7030 create a image file, add a partition table, mount it and run
7031 debootstrap in the mounted directory to create a Debian system on a
7032 stick.  Yesterday, I decided to try to teach it how to make images for
7033 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi">Raspberry Pi</a>, as part
7034 of a plan to simplify the build system for
7035 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox">the FreedomBox
7036 project</a>.  The FreedomBox project already uses vmdebootstrap for
7037 the virtualbox images, but its current build system made multistrap
7038 based system for Dreamplug images, and it is lacking support for
7039 Raspberry Pi.</p>
7040
7041 <p>Armed with the knowledge on how to build "foreign" (aka non-native
7042 architecture) chroots for Raspberry Pi, I dived into the vmdebootstrap
7043 code and adjusted it to be able to build armel images on my amd64
7044 Debian laptop.  I ended up giving vmdebootstrap five new options,
7045 allowing me to replicate the image creation process I use to make
7046 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_Raspberry_Pi_based_batman_adv_Mesh_network_node.html">Debian
7047 Jessie based mesh node images for the Raspberry Pi</a>.  First, the
7048 <tt>--foreign /path/to/binfm_handler</tt> option tell vmdebootstrap to
7049 call debootstrap with --foreign and to copy the handler into the
7050 generated chroot before running the second stage.  This allow
7051 vmdebootstrap to create armel images on an amd64 host.  Next I added
7052 two new options <tt>--bootsize size</tt> and <tt>--boottype
7053 fstype</tt> to teach it to create a separate /boot/ partition with the
7054 given file system type, allowing me to create an image with a vfat
7055 partition for the /boot/ stuff.  I also added a <tt>--variant
7056 variant</tt> option to allow me to create smaller images without the
7057 Debian base system packages installed.  Finally, I added an option
7058 <tt>--no-extlinux</tt> to tell vmdebootstrap to not install extlinux
7059 as a boot loader.  It is not needed on the Raspberry Pi and probably
7060 most other non-x86 architectures.  The changes were accepted by the
7061 upstream author of vmdebootstrap yesterday and today, and is now
7062 available from
7063 <a href="http://git.liw.fi/cgi-bin/cgit/cgit.cgi/vmdebootstrap/">the
7064 upstream project page</a>.</p>
7065
7066 <p>To use it to build a Raspberry Pi image using Debian Jessie, first
7067 create a small script (the customize script) to add the non-free
7068 binary blob needed to boot the Raspberry Pi and the APT source
7069 list:</p>
7070
7071 <p><pre>
7072 #!/bin/sh
7073 set -e # Exit on first error
7074 rootdir="$1"
7075 cd "$rootdir"
7076 cat &lt;&lt;EOF > etc/apt/sources.list
7077 deb http://http.debian.net/debian/ jessie main contrib non-free
7078 EOF
7079 # Install non-free binary blob needed to boot Raspberry Pi.  This
7080 # install a kernel somewhere too.
7081 wget https://raw.github.com/Hexxeh/rpi-update/master/rpi-update \
7082     -O $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
7083 chmod a+x $rootdir/usr/bin/rpi-update
7084 mkdir -p $rootdir/lib/modules
7085 touch $rootdir/boot/start.elf
7086 chroot $rootdir rpi-update
7087 </pre></p>
7088
7089 <p>Next, fetch the latest vmdebootstrap script and call it like this
7090 to build the image:</p>
7091
7092 <pre>
7093 sudo ./vmdebootstrap \
7094     --variant minbase \
7095     --arch armel \
7096     --distribution jessie \
7097     --mirror http://http.debian.net/debian \
7098     --image test.img \
7099     --size 600M \
7100     --bootsize 64M \
7101     --boottype vfat \
7102     --log-level debug \
7103     --verbose \
7104     --no-kernel \
7105     --no-extlinux \
7106     --root-password raspberry \
7107     --hostname raspberrypi \
7108     --foreign /usr/bin/qemu-arm-static \
7109     --customize `pwd`/customize \
7110     --package netbase \
7111     --package git-core \
7112     --package binutils \
7113     --package ca-certificates \
7114     --package wget \
7115     --package kmod
7116 </pre></p>
7117
7118 <p>The list of packages being installed are the ones needed by
7119 rpi-update to make the image bootable on the Raspberry Pi, with the
7120 exception of netbase, which is needed by debootstrap to find
7121 /etc/hosts with the minbase variant.  I really wish there was a way to
7122 set up an Raspberry Pi using only packages in the Debian archive, but
7123 that is not possible as far as I know, because it boots from the GPU
7124 using a non-free binary blob.</p>
7125
7126 <p>The build host need debootstrap, kpartx and qemu-user-static and
7127 probably a few others installed.  I have not checked the complete
7128 build dependency list.</p>
7129
7130 <p>The resulting image will not use the hardware floating point unit
7131 on the Raspberry PI, because the armel architecture in Debian is not
7132 optimized for that use.  So the images created will be a bit slower
7133 than <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/">Raspbian</a> based images.</p>
7134
7135       </div>
7136       <div class="tags">
7137
7138
7139         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>.
7140
7141
7142       </div>
7143     </div>
7144     <div class="padding"></div>
7145
7146     <div class="entry">
7147       <div class="title">
7148         <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>
7149       </div>
7150       <div class="date">
7151         15th October 2013
7152       </div>
7153       <div class="body">
7154         <p>The last few days I came across a few good causes that should get
7155 wider attention.  I recommend signing and donating to each one of
7156 these. :)</p>
7157
7158 <p>Via <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/weekly/2013/18/">Debian
7159 Project News for 2013-10-14</a> I came across the Outreach Program for
7160 Women program which is a Google Summer of Code like initiative to get
7161 more women involved in free software.  One debian sponsor has offered
7162 to match <a href="http://debian.ch/opw2013">any donation done to Debian
7163 earmarked</a> for this initiative.  I donated a few minutes ago, and
7164 hope you will to. :)</p>
7165
7166 <p>And the Electronic Frontier Foundation just announced plans to
7167 create <a href="https://supporters.eff.org/donate/nsa-videos">video
7168 documentaries about the excessive spying</a> on every Internet user that
7169 take place these days, and their need to fund the work.  I've already
7170 donated.  Are you next?</p>
7171
7172 <p>For my Norwegian audience, the organisation Studentenes og
7173 Akademikernes Internasjonale Hjelpefond is collecting signatures for a
7174 statement under the heading
7175 <a href="http://saih.no/Bloggers_United/">Bloggers United for Open
7176 Access</a> for those of us asking for more focus on open access in the
7177 Norwegian government.  So far 499 signatures.  I hope you will sign it
7178 too.</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/opphavsrett">opphavsrett</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance</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/Videos_about_the_Freedombox_project___for_inspiration_and_learning.html">Videos about the Freedombox project - for inspiration and learning</a>
7194       </div>
7195       <div class="date">
7196         27th September 2013
7197       </div>
7198       <div class="body">
7199         <p>The <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox
7200 project</a> have been going on for a while, and have presented the
7201 vision, ideas and solution several places.  Here is a little
7202 collection of videos of talks and presentation of the project.</p>
7203
7204 <ul>
7205
7206 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukvUz5taxvA">FreedomBox -
7207 2,5 minute marketing film</a> (Youtube)</li>
7208
7209 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzW25QTVWsE">Eben Moglen
7210 discusses the Freedombox on CBS news 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
7211
7212 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ae8SZbxfE0g">Eben Moglen -
7213 Freedom in the Cloud - Software Freedom, Privacy and and Security for
7214 Web 2.0 and Cloud computing at ISOC-NY Public Meeting 2010</a>
7215 (Youtube)</li>
7216
7217 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNaIji_3xBE">Fosdem 2011
7218 Keynote by Eben Moglen presenting the Freedombox</a> (Youtube)</li>
7219
7220 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bDDUyJSQ9s">Presentation of
7221 the Freedombox by James Vasile at Elevate in Gratz 2011</a> (Youtube)</li>
7222
7223 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQTmnk27g9s"> Freedombox -
7224 Discovery, Identity, and Trust by Nick Daly at Freedombox Hackfest New
7225 York City in 2012</a> (Youtube)</li>
7226
7227 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkbSB4Ba7Ck">Introduction
7228 to the Freedombox at Freedombox Hackfest New York City in 2012</a>
7229 (Youtube)</li>
7230
7231 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-P2Jaeg0aQ">Freedom, Out
7232 of the Box! by Bdale Garbee at linux.conf.au Ballarat, 2012</a> (Youtube) </li>
7233
7234 <li><a href="https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/freedombox/">Freedombox
7235 1.0 by Eben Moglen and Bdale Garbee at Fosdem 2013</a> (FOSDEM) </li>
7236
7237 <li><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1LpYX2zVYg">What is the
7238 FreedomBox today by Bdale Garbee at Debconf13 in Vaumarcus
7239 2013</a> (Youtube)</li>
7240
7241 </ul>
7242
7243 <p>A larger list is available from
7244 <a href="https://wiki.debian.org/FreedomBox/TalksAndPresentations">the
7245 Freedombox Wiki</a>.</p>
7246
7247 <p>On other news, I am happy to report that Freedombox based on Debian
7248 Jessie is coming along quite well, and soon both Owncloud and using
7249 Tor should be available for testers of the Freedombox solution. :) In
7250 a few weeks I hope everything needed to test it is included in Debian.
7251 The withsqlite package is already in Debian, and the plinth package is
7252 pending in NEW.  The third and vital part of that puzzle is the
7253 metapackage/setup framework, which is still pending an upload.  Join
7254 us on <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">IRC
7255 (#freedombox on irc.debian.org)</a> and
7256 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">the
7257 mailing list</a> if you want to help make this vision come true.</p>
7258
7259       </div>
7260       <div class="tags">
7261
7262
7263         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>.
7264
7265
7266       </div>
7267     </div>
7268     <div class="padding"></div>
7269
7270     <div class="entry">
7271       <div class="title">
7272         <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>
7273       </div>
7274       <div class="date">
7275         10th September 2013
7276       </div>
7277       <div class="body">
7278         <p>I was introduced to the
7279 <a href="http://www.freedomboxfoundation.org/">Freedombox project</a>
7280 in 2010, when Eben Moglen presented his vision about serving the need
7281 of non-technical people to keep their personal information private and
7282 within the legal protection of their own homes.  The idea is to give
7283 people back the power over their network and machines, and return
7284 Internet back to its intended peer-to-peer architecture.  Instead of
7285 depending on a central service, the Freedombox will give everyone
7286 control over their own basic infrastructure.</p>
7287
7288 <p>I've intended to join the effort since then, but other tasks have
7289 taken priority.  But this summers nasty news about the misuse of trust
7290 and privilege exercised by the "western" intelligence gathering
7291 communities increased my eagerness to contribute to a point where I
7292 actually started working on the project a while back.</p>
7293
7294 <p>The <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/freedombox/">initial
7295 Debian initiative</a> based on the vision from Eben Moglen, is to
7296 create a simple and cheap Debian based appliance that anyone can hook
7297 up in their home and get access to secure and private services and
7298 communication.  The initial deployment platform have been the
7299 <a href="http://www.globalscaletechnologies.com/t-dreamplugdetails.aspx">Dreamplug</a>,
7300 which is a piece of hardware I do not own.  So to be able to test what
7301 the current Freedombox setup look like, I had to come up with a way to install
7302 it on some hardware I do have access to.  I have rewritten the
7303 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedom-maker">freedom-maker</a>
7304 image build framework to use .deb packages instead of only copying
7305 setup into the boot images, and thanks to this rewrite I am able to
7306 set up any machine supported by Debian Wheezy as a Freedombox, using
7307 the previously mentioned deb (and a few support debs for packages
7308 missing in Debian).</p>
7309
7310 <p>The current Freedombox setup consist of a set of bootstrapping
7311 scripts
7312 (<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/freedombox-setup">freedombox-setup</a>),
7313 and a administrative web interface
7314 (<a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/Plinth">plinth</a> + exmachina +
7315 withsqlite), as well as a privacy enhancing proxy based on
7316 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/privoxy">privoxy</a>
7317 (freedombox-privoxy).  There is also a web/javascript based XMPP
7318 client (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/jwchat">jwchat</a>)
7319 trying (unsuccessfully so far) to talk to the XMPP server
7320 (<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/ejabberd">ejabberd</a>).  The
7321 web interface is pluggable, and the goal is to use it to enable OpenID
7322 services, mesh network connectivity, use of TOR, etc, etc.  Not much of
7323 this is really working yet, see
7324 <a href="https://github.com/NickDaly/freedombox-todos/blob/master/TODO">the
7325 project TODO</a> for links to GIT repositories.  Most of the code is
7326 on github at the moment.  The HTTP proxy is operational out of the
7327 box, and the admin web interface can be used to add/remove plinth
7328 users.  I've not been able to do anything else with it so far, but
7329 know there are several branches spread around github and other places
7330 with lots of half baked features.</p>
7331
7332 <p>Anyway, if you want to have a look at the current state, the
7333 following recipes should work to give you a test machine to poke
7334 at.</p>
7335
7336 <p><strong>Debian Wheezy amd64</strong></p>
7337
7338 <ol>
7339
7340 <li>Fetch normal Debian Wheezy installation ISO.</li>
7341 <li>Boot from it, either as CD or USB stick.</li>
7342 <li><p>Press [tab] on the boot prompt and add this as a boot argument
7343 to the Debian installer:<p>
7344 <pre>url=<a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/preseed-wheezy.dat</a></pre></li>
7345
7346 <li>Answer the few language/region/password questions and pick disk to
7347 install on.</li>
7348
7349 <li>When the installation is finished and the machine have rebooted a
7350 few times, your Freedombox is ready for testing.</li>
7351
7352 </ol>
7353
7354 <p><strong>Raspberry Pi Raspbian</strong></p>
7355
7356 <ol>
7357
7358 <li>Fetch a Raspbian SD card image, create SD card.</li>
7359 <li>Boot from SD card, extend file system to fill the card completely.</li>
7360 <li><p>Log in and add this to /etc/sources.list:</p>
7361 <pre>
7362 deb <a href="http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/">http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox</a> wheezy main
7363 </pre></li>
7364 <li><p>Run this as root:</p>
7365 <pre>
7366 wget -O - http://www.reinholdtsen.name/freedombox/BE1A583D.asc | \
7367    apt-key add -
7368 apt-get update
7369 apt-get install freedombox-setup
7370 /usr/lib/freedombox/setup
7371 </pre></li>
7372 <li>Reboot into your freshly created Freedombox.</li>
7373
7374 </ol>
7375
7376 <p>You can test it on other architectures too, but because the
7377 freedombox-privoxy package is binary, it will only work as intended on
7378 the architectures where I have had time to build the binary and put it
7379 in my APT repository.  But do not let this stop you.  It is only a
7380 short "<tt>apt-get source -b freedombox-privoxy</tt>" away. :)</p>
7381
7382 <p>Note that by default Freedombox is a DHCP server on the
7383 192.168.1.0/24 subnet, so if this is your subnet be careful and turn
7384 off the DHCP server by running "<tt>update-rc.d isc-dhcp-server
7385 disable</tt>" as root.</p>
7386
7387 <p>Please let me know if this works for you, or if you have any
7388 problems.  We gather on the IRC channel
7389 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org:6667/%23freedombox">#freedombox</a> on
7390 irc.debian.org and the
7391 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/freedombox-discuss">project
7392 mailing list</a>.</p>
7393
7394 <p>Once you get your freedombox operational, you can visit
7395 <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/</tt> to see the state of the plint
7396 welcome screen (dead end - do not be surprised if you are unable to
7397 get past it), and next visit <tt>http://your-host-name:8001/help/</tt>
7398 to look at the rest of plinth.  The default user is 'admin' and the
7399 default password is 'secret'.</p>
7400
7401       </div>
7402       <div class="tags">
7403
7404
7405         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>.
7406
7407
7408       </div>
7409     </div>
7410     <div class="padding"></div>
7411
7412     <div class="entry">
7413       <div class="title">
7414         <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>
7415       </div>
7416       <div class="date">
7417         18th August 2013
7418       </div>
7419       <div class="body">
7420         <p>Earlier, I reported about
7421 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_fix_a_Thinkpad_X230_with_a_broken_180_GB_SSD_disk.html">my
7422 problems using an Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB disk</a>.  Friday I was
7423 told by IBM that the original disk should be thrown away.  And as
7424 there no longer was a problem if I bricked the firmware, I decided
7425 today to try to install Intel firmware to replace the Lenovo firmware
7426 currently on the disk.</p>
7427
7428 <p>I searched the Intel site for firmware, and found
7429 <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>
7430 (aka Intel SATA Solid-State Drive Firmware Update Tool) which
7431 according to the site should contain the latest firmware for SSD
7432 disks.  I inserted the broken disk in one of my spare laptops and
7433 booted the ISO from a USB stick.  The disk was recognized, but the
7434 program claimed the newest firmware already were installed and refused
7435 to insert any Intel firmware.  So no change, and the disk is still
7436 unable to handle write load. :( I guess the only way to get them
7437 working would be if Lenovo releases new firmware.  No idea how likely
7438 that is.  Anyway, just blogging about this test for completeness.  I
7439 got a working Samsung disk, and see no point in spending more time on
7440 the broken disks.</p>
7441
7442       </div>
7443       <div class="tags">
7444
7445
7446         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>.
7447
7448
7449       </div>
7450     </div>
7451     <div class="padding"></div>
7452
7453     <div class="entry">
7454       <div class="title">
7455         <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>
7456       </div>
7457       <div class="date">
7458         17th July 2013
7459       </div>
7460       <div class="body">
7461         <p>Today I switched to
7462 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
7463 new laptop</a>.  I've previously written about the problems I had with
7464 my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
7465 <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
7466 GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
7467 sustained writes.  My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
7468 trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
7469 identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
7470 disk instead to fix it once and for all.  The Samsung disk survived
7471 the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
7472 random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
7473 decided to trust it with my data.  I have installed it as a Debian Edu
7474 Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
7475 server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
7476 station from now on.</p>
7477
7478 <p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
7479 Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
7480 performance and increase life time of the disk.  The Linux kernel and
7481 user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
7482 environment.  To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
7483 package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning.  The
7484 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
7485 for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
7486 is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
7487 package.  If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
7488 will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
7489 file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
7490
7491 <p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
7492 set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD.  It is adjusted to my use case,
7493 where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
7494 addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
7495 top of this again.  See the README file in the package source for the
7496 references I used to pick the settings.  At the moment these
7497 parameters are tuned:</p>
7498
7499 <ul>
7500
7501 <li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
7502     (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
7503
7504 <li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
7505     this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
7506     0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
7507
7508 <li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
7509     systems.</li>
7510
7511 <li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
7512     /etc/fstab.</li>
7513
7514 <li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
7515
7516 <li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
7517     cron.daily).</li>
7518
7519 <li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
7520     to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
7521
7522 </ul>
7523
7524 <p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
7525 the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
7526 little gain.  My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
7527 those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
7528 computer.  I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
7529 from getting the data on the disk (see
7530 <a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
7531 Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
7532 right thing to do.</p>
7533
7534 <p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
7535 it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
7536 indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
7537
7538 <p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
7539 and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
7540 file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
7541 instead of during my work.</p>
7542
7543 <p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
7544 this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
7545
7546 <p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning.  I expect
7547 iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
7548 have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
7549
7550 <p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
7551 there.</p>
7552
7553 <p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
7554 as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
7555 disk.  It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
7556 the Lenovo firmware.  But I have not tried and did not want to do so
7557 without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
7558 disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
7559 back.</p>
7560
7561       </div>
7562       <div class="tags">
7563
7564
7565         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>.
7566
7567
7568       </div>
7569     </div>
7570     <div class="padding"></div>
7571
7572     <div class="entry">
7573       <div class="title">
7574         <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>
7575       </div>
7576       <div class="date">
7577         10th July 2013
7578       </div>
7579       <div class="body">
7580         <p>A few days ago, I wrote about
7581 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
7582 problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
7583 was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
7584 sustained write.  My supplier is in contact with
7585 <a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
7586 replacement disk to try to fix the problem.  They decided to send an
7587 identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
7588
7589 <p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
7590 Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it.  The new disk have the
7591 same firmware version as the original.  This time my hope raised
7592 slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
7593 die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
7594 going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%.  But around 60%, the disk
7595 died again and I was back on square one.  I still do not have a new
7596 laptop with a disk I can trust.  I can not live with a disk that might
7597 lock up when I download a new
7598 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
7599 other large files.  I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
7600 the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
7601
7602 <p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
7603 11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
7604 LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
7605 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
7606 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
7607 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
7608
7609 <p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
7610 11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
7611 LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
7612 Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
7613 SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
7614 P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
7615
7616 <p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
7617 SA, date and WNPP values.  Mentioning all the details here in case
7618 someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
7619 failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
7620 exist).</p>
7621
7622       </div>
7623       <div class="tags">
7624
7625
7626         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>.
7627
7628
7629       </div>
7630     </div>
7631     <div class="padding"></div>
7632
7633     <div class="entry">
7634       <div class="title">
7635         <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>
7636       </div>
7637       <div class="date">
7638          9th July 2013
7639       </div>
7640       <div class="body">
7641         <p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
7642 Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
7643 party in Oslo.  It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
7644 member assosiation NUUG</a> and
7645 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
7646 project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
7647 Bitraf</a>.</p>
7648
7649 <p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening.  Everyone is
7650 welcome, and there is no fee to participate.  There is on the other
7651 hand limited space, and only room for 30 people.  Please put your name
7652 on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
7653 wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
7654
7655       </div>
7656       <div class="tags">
7657
7658
7659         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>.
7660
7661
7662       </div>
7663     </div>
7664     <div class="padding"></div>
7665
7666     <div class="entry">
7667       <div class="title">
7668         <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>
7669       </div>
7670       <div class="date">
7671          5th July 2013
7672       </div>
7673       <div class="body">
7674         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
7675 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
7676 for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>.  Unfortunately I did not have much
7677 time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
7678 will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived.  I
7679 ended up picking a
7680 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
7681 with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
7682 a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly.  But my
7683 second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful.  More
7684 on that below.</p>
7685
7686 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
7687 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
7688 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
7689 feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
7690 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
7691 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
7692 to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
7693 disks from my search parameters.  I also asked around among friends to
7694 get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
7695
7696 <p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
7697 X41.  I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
7698 significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
7699 hand a lot more to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly
7700 good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
7701 I will get used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
7702 needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
7703
7704 <p>Turning off the touch pad was simple.  All it took was a quick
7705 visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
7706
7707 <p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop.  The 180 GB SSD disk
7708 lock up during load.  And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
7709 with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
7710 I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
7711 reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
7712 default in Ubuntu).  And the bug with is already known.  It was
7713 reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
7714 report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
7715 Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD).  It is also reported to the Linux
7716 kernel developers as
7717 <a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
7718 report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
7719 (SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
7720 Lenovo forums, both for
7721 <a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
7722 2012-11-10</a> and for
7723 <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
7724 03-20-2013</a>.  The problem do not only affect installation.  The
7725 reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
7726 on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
7727 problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
7728 There is even a
7729 <a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
7730 available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
7731 minutes by writing to a file.</p>
7732
7733 <p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
7734 contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
7735 requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
7736 firmware.  Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
7737 Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i).  I
7738 hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
7739 fixed. :)</p>
7740
7741       </div>
7742       <div class="tags">
7743
7744
7745         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>.
7746
7747
7748       </div>
7749     </div>
7750     <div class="padding"></div>
7751
7752     <div class="entry">
7753       <div class="title">
7754         <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>
7755       </div>
7756       <div class="date">
7757          4th July 2013
7758       </div>
7759       <div class="body">
7760         <p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
7761 trusty old Thinkpad X41.  Unfortunately I did not have much time to
7762 spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived.  I ended up
7763 picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
7764 X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN).  I first test installed Debian Edu
7765 Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly.  As I write
7766 this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
7767 with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
7768 with an expencive door stop.</p>
7769
7770 <p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
7771 important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
7772 listed in the feature list.  But I did get good help from the search
7773 feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
7774 allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
7775 requirements.  A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
7776 to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
7777
7778 <p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
7779 wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
7780 to reach the edges.  But the key response is fairly good and the
7781 individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
7782 used to it.  My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
7783 new laptop now. :)</p>
7784
7785 <p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
7786
7787       </div>
7788       <div class="tags">
7789
7790
7791         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>.
7792
7793
7794       </div>
7795     </div>
7796     <div class="padding"></div>
7797
7798     <div class="entry">
7799       <div class="title">
7800         <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>
7801       </div>
7802       <div class="date">
7803         25th June 2013
7804       </div>
7805       <div class="body">
7806         <p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
7807 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
7808 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
7809 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
7810 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
7811 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
7812 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
7813 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
7814 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
7815 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
7816 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
7817
7818 <p><pre>
7819 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
7820 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
7821 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
7822 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
7823 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
7824 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
7825 firmware-ipw2x00
7826 firmware-ipw2x00
7827 Preconfiguring packages ...
7828 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
7829 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
7830 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
7831 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
7832 #
7833 </pre></p>
7834
7835 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
7836 printed instead:</p>
7837
7838 <p><pre>
7839 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
7840 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
7841 #
7842 </pre></p>
7843
7844 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
7845 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
7846
7847 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
7848 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
7849 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
7850 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
7851 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
7852 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
7853 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
7854 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
7855 machine.</p>
7856
7857 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
7858 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
7859 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
7860 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
7861 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
7862 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
7863
7864       </div>
7865       <div class="tags">
7866
7867
7868         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>.
7869
7870
7871       </div>
7872     </div>
7873     <div class="padding"></div>
7874
7875     <div class="entry">
7876       <div class="title">
7877         <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>
7878       </div>
7879       <div class="date">
7880         11th June 2013
7881       </div>
7882       <div class="body">
7883         <p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
7884 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
7885 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
7886 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
7887 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
7888 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
7889 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
7890 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
7891 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
7892 i915 driver used by the
7893 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
7894 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
7895
7896 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
7897 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
7898 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
7899 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
7900 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
7901
7902 <pre>
7903 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
7904 update-initramfs -u -k all
7905 </pre>
7906
7907 <p>Since March 2012 there is
7908 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
7909 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
7910 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
7911 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
7912 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
7913 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
7914 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
7915 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
7916 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
7917 number.</p>
7918
7919 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
7920 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
7921
7922 <p><pre>
7923 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
7924     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
7925     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
7926  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
7927  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
7928     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
7929  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
7930     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
7931  Latency: 0
7932  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
7933  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
7934  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
7935  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
7936  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
7937  Capabilities: <access denied>
7938  Kernel driver in use: i915
7939 </pre></p>
7940
7941 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
7942
7943 <p><pre>
7944 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
7945        ...
7946         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
7947         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
7948        ...
7949 }
7950 </pre></p>
7951
7952 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
7953 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
7954 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
7955 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
7956 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
7957 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
7958 yet shown up in
7959 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
7960 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
7961 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
7962 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
7963 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
7964 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
7965
7966 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
7967 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
7968 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
7969 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
7970 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
7971 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
7972 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
7973 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
7974 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
7975 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
7976 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
7977 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
7978
7979 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
7980 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
7981 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
7982 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
7983 backlight.</p>
7984
7985       </div>
7986       <div class="tags">
7987
7988
7989         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>.
7990
7991
7992       </div>
7993     </div>
7994     <div class="padding"></div>
7995
7996     <div class="entry">
7997       <div class="title">
7998         <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>
7999       </div>
8000       <div class="date">
8001         27th May 2013
8002       </div>
8003       <div class="body">
8004         <p>Two days ago, I asked
8005 <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
8006 I could install Linux on a Packard Bell EasyNote LV computer
8007 preinstalled with Windows 8</a>.  I found a solution, but am horrified
8008 with the obstacles put in the way of Linux users on a laptop with UEFI
8009 and Windows 8.</p>
8010
8011 <p>I never found out if the cause of my problems were the use of UEFI
8012 secure booting or fast boot.  I suspect fast boot was the problem,
8013 causing the firmware to boot directly from HD without considering any
8014 key presses and alternative devices, but do not know UEFI settings
8015 enough to tell.</p>
8016
8017 <p>There is no way to install Linux on the machine in question without
8018 opening the box and disconnecting the hard drive!  This is as far as I
8019 can tell, the only way to get access to the firmware setup menu
8020 without accepting the Windows 8 license agreement.  I am told (and
8021 found description on how to) that it is possible to configure the
8022 firmware setup once booted into Windows 8.  But as I believe the terms
8023 of that agreement are completely unacceptable, accepting the license
8024 was never an alternative.  I do not enter agreements I do not intend
8025 to follow.</p>
8026
8027 <p>I feared I had to return the laptops and ask for a refund, and
8028 waste many hours on this, but luckily there was a way to get it to
8029 work.  But I would not recommend it to anyone planning to run Linux on
8030 it, and I have become sceptical to Windows 8 certified laptops.  Is
8031 this the way Linux will be forced out of the market place, by making
8032 it close to impossible for "normal" users to install Linux without
8033 accepting the Microsoft Windows license terms?  Or at least not
8034 without risking to loose the warranty?</p>
8035
8036 <p>I've updated the
8037 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Linux Laptop
8038 wiki page for Packard Bell EasyNote LV</a>, to ensure the next person
8039 do not have to struggle as much as I did to get Linux into the
8040 machine.</p>
8041
8042 <p>Thanks to Bob Rosbag, Florian Weimer, Philipp Kern, Ben Hutching,
8043 Michael Tokarev and others for feedback and ideas.</p>
8044
8045       </div>
8046       <div class="tags">
8047
8048
8049         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>.
8050
8051
8052       </div>
8053     </div>
8054     <div class="padding"></div>
8055
8056     <div class="entry">
8057       <div class="title">
8058         <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>
8059       </div>
8060       <div class="date">
8061         25th May 2013
8062       </div>
8063       <div class="body">
8064         <p>I've run into quite a problem the last few days.  I bought three
8065 new laptops for my parents and a few others.  I bought Packard Bell
8066 Easynote LV to run Kubuntu on and use as their home computer.  But I
8067 am completely unable to figure out how to install Linux on it.  The
8068 computer is preinstalled with Windows 8, and I suspect it uses UEFI
8069 instead of a BIOS to boot.</p>
8070
8071 <p>The problem is that I am unable to get it to PXE boot, and unable
8072 to get it to boot the Linux installer from my USB stick.  I have yet
8073 to try the DVD install, and still hope it will work.  when I turn on
8074 the computer, there is no information on what buttons to press to get
8075 the normal boot menu.  I expect to get some boot menu to select PXE or
8076 USB stick booting.  When booting, it first ask for the language to
8077 use, then for some regional settings, and finally if I will accept the
8078 Windows 8 terms of use.  As these terms are completely unacceptable to
8079 me, I have no other choice but to turn off the computer and try again
8080 to get it to boot the Linux installer.</p>
8081
8082 <p>I have gathered my findings so far on a Linlap page about the
8083 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
8084 EasyNote LV</a> model.  If you have any idea how to get Linux
8085 installed on this machine, please get in touch or update that wiki
8086 page.  If I can't find a way to install Linux, I will have to return
8087 the laptop to the seller and find another machine for my parents.</p>
8088
8089 <p>I wonder, is this the way Linux will be forced out of the market
8090 using UEFI and "secure boot" by making it impossible to install Linux
8091 on new Laptops?</p>
8092
8093       </div>
8094       <div class="tags">
8095
8096
8097         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>.
8098
8099
8100       </div>
8101     </div>
8102     <div class="padding"></div>
8103
8104     <div class="entry">
8105       <div class="title">
8106         <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>
8107       </div>
8108       <div class="date">
8109         17th May 2013
8110       </div>
8111       <div class="body">
8112         <p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is
8113 an operating system based on Debian intended for use in schools.  It
8114 contain a turn-key solution for the computer network provided to
8115 pupils in the primary schools.  It provide both the central server,
8116 network boot servers and desktop environments with heaps of
8117 educational software.  The project was founded almost 12 years ago,
8118 2001-07-02.  If you want to support the project, which is in need for
8119 cash to fund developer gatherings and other project related activity,
8120 <a href="http://www.linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">please
8121 donate some money</a>.
8122
8123 <p>A topic that come up again and again on the Debian Edu mailing
8124 lists and elsewhere, is the question on how to transform a Debian or
8125 Ubuntu installation into a Debian Edu installation.  It isn't very
8126 hard, and last week I wrote a script to replicate the steps done by
8127 the Debian Edu installer.</p>
8128
8129 <p>The script,
8130 <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/>
8131 in the debian-edu-config package, will go through these six steps and
8132 transform an existing Debian Wheezy or Ubuntu (untested) installation
8133 into a Debian Edu Workstation:</p>
8134
8135 <ol>
8136
8137 <li>Add skolelinux related APT sources.</li>
8138 <li>Create /etc/debian-edu/config with the wanted configuration.</li>
8139 <li>Install debian-edu-install to load preseeding values and pull in
8140     our configuration.</li>
8141 <li>Preseed debconf database with profile setup in
8142     /etc/debian-edu/config, and run tasksel to install packages
8143     according to the profile specified in the config above,
8144     overriding some of the Debian automation machinery.</li>
8145 <li>Run debian-edu-cfengine-D installation to configure everything
8146     that could not be done using preseeding.</li>
8147 <li>Ask for a reboot to enable all the configuration changes.</li>
8148
8149 </ol>
8150
8151 <p>There are some steps in the Debian Edu installation that can not be
8152 replicated like this.  Disk partitioning and LVM setup, for example.
8153 So this script just assume there is enough disk space to install all
8154 the needed packages.</p>
8155
8156 <p>The script was created to help a Debian Edu student working on
8157 setting up <a href="http://www.raspberrypi.org">Raspberry Pi</a> as a
8158 Debian Edu client, and using it he can take the existing
8159 <a href="http://www.raspbian.org/FrontPage‎">Raspbian</a> installation and
8160 transform it into a fully functioning Debian Edu Workstation (or
8161 Roaming Workstation, or whatever :).</p>
8162
8163 <p>The default setting in the script is to create a KDE Workstation.
8164 If a LXDE based Roaming workstation is wanted instead, modify the
8165 PROFILE and DESKTOP values at the top to look like this instead:</p>
8166
8167 <p><pre>
8168 PROFILE="Roaming-Workstation"
8169 DESKTOP="lxde"
8170 </pre></p>
8171
8172 <p>The script could even become useful to set up Debian Edu servers in
8173 the cloud, by starting with a virtual Debian installation at some
8174 virtual hosting service and setting up all the services on first
8175 boot.</p>
8176
8177       </div>
8178       <div class="tags">
8179
8180
8181         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>.
8182
8183
8184       </div>
8185     </div>
8186     <div class="padding"></div>
8187
8188     <div class="entry">
8189       <div class="title">
8190         <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>
8191       </div>
8192       <div class="date">
8193         11th May 2013
8194       </div>
8195       <div class="body">
8196         <P>In January,
8197 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
8198 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
8199 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
8200 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
8201 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
8202 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
8203 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
8204 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
8205 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
8206 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
8207 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
8208 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
8209
8210 <p><table>
8211 <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>
8212 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
8213 <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>
8214 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
8215 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
8216 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
8217 <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>
8218 <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>
8219 <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>
8220 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
8221 </table></p>
8222
8223 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
8224 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
8225 available in experimental.</p>
8226
8227 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
8228 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
8229 for LEGO designers.</p>
8230
8231       </div>
8232       <div class="tags">
8233
8234
8235         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/lego">lego</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
8236
8237
8238       </div>
8239     </div>
8240     <div class="padding"></div>
8241
8242     <div class="entry">
8243       <div class="title">
8244         <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>
8245       </div>
8246       <div class="date">
8247          5th May 2013
8248       </div>
8249       <div class="body">
8250         <p>When I woke up this morning, I was very happy to see that the
8251 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2013/20130504">release announcement
8252 for Debian Wheezy</a> was waiting in my mail box.  This is a great
8253 Debian release, and I expect to move my machines at home over to it fairly
8254 soon.</p>
8255
8256 <p>The new debian release contain heaps of new stuff, and one program
8257 in particular make me very happy to see included.  The
8258 <a href="http://scratch.mit.edu/">Scratch</a> program, made famous by
8259 the <a href="http://www.code.org/">Teach kids code</a> movement, is
8260 included for the first time.  Alongside similar programs like
8261 <a href="http://edu.kde.org/kturtle/">kturtle</a> and
8262 <a href="http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Activities/Turtle_Art">turtleart</a>,
8263 it allow for visual programming where syntax errors can not happen,
8264 and a friendly programming environment for learning to control the
8265 computer.  Scratch will also be included in the next release of Debian
8266 Edu.</a>
8267
8268 <p>And now that Wheezy is wrapped up, we can wrap up the next Debian
8269 Edu/Skolelinux release too.  The
8270 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/2013/04/msg00132.html">first
8271 alpha release</a> went out last week, and the next should soon
8272 follow.<p>
8273
8274       </div>
8275       <div class="tags">
8276
8277
8278         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>.
8279
8280
8281       </div>
8282     </div>
8283     <div class="padding"></div>
8284
8285     <div class="entry">
8286       <div class="title">
8287         <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>
8288       </div>
8289       <div class="date">
8290          3rd April 2013
8291       </div>
8292       <div class="body">
8293         <p>Today the <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram
8294 package</a> finally made it into the archive, after lingering in NEW
8295 for many months.  I uploaded it to the Debian experimental suite
8296 2013-01-27, and today it was accepted into the archive.</p>
8297
8298 <p>Isenkram is a system for suggesting to users what packages to
8299 install to work with a pluggable hardware device.  The suggestion pop
8300 up when the device is plugged in.  For example if a Lego Mindstorm NXT
8301 is inserted, it will suggest to install the program needed to program
8302 the NXT controller.  Give it a go, and report bugs and suggestions to
8303 BTS. :)</p>
8304
8305       </div>
8306       <div class="tags">
8307
8308
8309         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>.
8310
8311
8312       </div>
8313     </div>
8314     <div class="padding"></div>
8315
8316     <div class="entry">
8317       <div class="title">
8318         <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>
8319       </div>
8320       <div class="date">
8321          2nd February 2013
8322       </div>
8323       <div class="body">
8324         <p>My
8325 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
8326 bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
8327 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
8328 Debian was waiting in NEW.  It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
8329 2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then.  It was
8330 automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
8331 version too.</p>
8332
8333 <p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
8334 version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
8335 architectures.  For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
8336 for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
8337 architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
8338 We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
8339 no-one have been able to propose a fix.  If you got an idea what is
8340 failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
8341
8342 <p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
8343 I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
8344 if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
8345 #696715</a>).  So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
8346 it. :)</p>
8347
8348 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
8349 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
8350 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
8351
8352       </div>
8353       <div class="tags">
8354
8355
8356         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>.
8357
8358
8359       </div>
8360     </div>
8361     <div class="padding"></div>
8362
8363     <div class="entry">
8364       <div class="title">
8365         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a>
8366       </div>
8367       <div class="date">
8368         22nd January 2013
8369       </div>
8370       <div class="body">
8371         <p>Yesterday, I
8372 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
8373 for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
8374 pluggable hardware devices, which I
8375 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
8376 out to create</a> earlier this month.  Several valuable testers showed
8377 up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
8378 people.  But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
8379 for this project.  Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
8380 renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name.  In the
8381 process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
8382 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
8383 repository in Debian.  The new name?  It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
8384 To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
8385
8386 <pre>
8387 git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
8388 cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
8389 </pre>
8390
8391 <p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet.  If you
8392 want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
8393 But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
8394 changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
8395
8396 <p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
8397 stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc.  Typical hardware
8398 stuff, in other words.  I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
8399 the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
8400 word.</p>
8401
8402 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
8403 instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
8404 process.</p>
8405
8406 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
8407 clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
8408
8409       </div>
8410       <div class="tags">
8411
8412
8413         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>.
8414
8415
8416       </div>
8417     </div>
8418     <div class="padding"></div>
8419
8420     <div class="entry">
8421       <div class="title">
8422         <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>
8423       </div>
8424       <div class="date">
8425         21st January 2013
8426       </div>
8427       <div class="body">
8428         <p>Early this month I set out to try to
8429 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
8430 the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>.  Now my
8431 prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience.  To test
8432 it, fetch the
8433 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
8434 from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
8435 package.  You might have to log out and in again activate the
8436 autostart script.</p>
8437
8438 <p>The design is simple:</p>
8439
8440 <ul>
8441
8442 <li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
8443 hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
8444
8445 <li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
8446 from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
8447 initially did.</li>
8448
8449 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
8450 the APT database, a database
8451 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
8452 via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
8453
8454 <li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
8455 isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
8456 plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
8457 package or packages.</li>
8458
8459 <li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
8460 aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
8461
8462 <li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
8463 package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
8464
8465 </ul>
8466
8467 <p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system.  Here
8468 are some screen shots showing the prototype in action.  First the
8469 notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
8470 approve all the dependencies.  Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
8471
8472 <p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
8473 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
8474 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
8475 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
8476 <br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
8477
8478 <p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
8479 is already useful.  The database of hardware to package mappings also
8480 need more work.  It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
8481 storing such information in the package control file, but could be
8482 changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
8483 method.  I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
8484 modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
8485 as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
8486
8487 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
8488 here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
8489 '<tt>svn checkout
8490 svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
8491 hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'.  If you lack debuild, install the
8492 devscripts package.</p>
8493
8494 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
8495 renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
8496 subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository.  See
8497 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
8498 instructions</a> for details.</p>
8499
8500       </div>
8501       <div class="tags">
8502
8503
8504         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>.
8505
8506
8507       </div>
8508     </div>
8509     <div class="padding"></div>
8510
8511     <div class="entry">
8512       <div class="title">
8513         <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>
8514       </div>
8515       <div class="date">
8516         19th January 2013
8517       </div>
8518       <div class="body">
8519         <p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died.  It died quietly and
8520 suddenly in bed.  With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
8521 black.  The power button was no longer able to turn it on.  It was a
8522 IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had.  Better than both
8523 Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S.  Far better than the
8524 Compaq I had before that.  Now I need to find a replacement.  To keep
8525 going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
8526 X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
8527 not a durable solution.
8528
8529 <p>My laptop needs are fairly modest.  This is my wishlist from when I
8530 got a new one more than 10 years ago.  It still holds true.:)</p>
8531
8532 <ul>
8533
8534 <li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
8535   than A4).</li>
8536 <li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
8537 <li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
8538 <li>Long battery life time.  Preferable a week.</li>
8539 <li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
8540 <li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
8541 <li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
8542 <li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
8543 <li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
8544 size).</li>
8545 <li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
8546   X.org packages.</li>
8547 <li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
8548   the time).
8549
8550 </ul>
8551
8552 <p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
8553 list.  The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
8554 last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
8555 at other features to choose my laptop.  But are there still made as
8556 robust laptops as my X41?  The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
8557 robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
8558 Lenovo took over.  But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
8559 still be useful.</p>
8560
8561 <p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
8562 external keyboard?  I'll have to check the
8563 <a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
8564 well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
8565 of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
8566 Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
8567
8568       </div>
8569       <div class="tags">
8570
8571
8572         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>.
8573
8574
8575       </div>
8576     </div>
8577     <div class="padding"></div>
8578
8579     <div class="entry">
8580       <div class="title">
8581         <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>
8582       </div>
8583       <div class="date">
8584         18th January 2013
8585       </div>
8586       <div class="body">
8587         <p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
8588 install to get support for a given MIME type.  Thanks to
8589 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
8590 done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
8591 Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
8592 information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
8593 plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
8594
8595 <pre>
8596 #!/usr/bin/python
8597 import sys
8598 import apt
8599 def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
8600     cache = apt.Cache()
8601     cache.open(None)
8602     thepkgs = []
8603     for pkg in cache:
8604         version = pkg.candidate
8605         if version is None:
8606             version = pkg.installed
8607         if version is None:
8608             continue
8609         record = version.record
8610         if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
8611             continue
8612         mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
8613         for t in mime_types:
8614             t = t.rstrip().strip()
8615             if t == mimetype:
8616                 thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
8617     return thepkgs
8618 mimetype = "audio/ogg"
8619 if 1 < len(sys.argv):
8620     mimetype = sys.argv[1]
8621 print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
8622 for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
8623     print "  %s" %pkg
8624 </pre>
8625
8626 <p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
8627
8628 <pre>
8629 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
8630 Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
8631   gecko-mediaplayer
8632 % ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
8633 Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
8634   browser-plugin-gnash
8635 %
8636 </pre>
8637
8638 <p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
8639 itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
8640 packages.  It would be great if Debian supported such feature too.  Is
8641 anyone working on adding it?</p>
8642
8643 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
8644 request for icweasel support for this feature is
8645 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
8646 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today).  Lack
8647 of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
8648 is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
8649
8650       </div>
8651       <div class="tags">
8652
8653
8654         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>.
8655
8656
8657       </div>
8658     </div>
8659     <div class="padding"></div>
8660
8661     <div class="entry">
8662       <div class="title">
8663         <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>
8664       </div>
8665       <div class="date">
8666         16th January 2013
8667       </div>
8668       <div class="body">
8669         <p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
8670 proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
8671 proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
8672 the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
8673 type, font, library etc. that is currently missing.  With such
8674 mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
8675 automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
8676 downloaded by the browser.</p>
8677
8678 <p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
8679 to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
8680 Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there.  The result
8681 can be found on the
8682 <a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
8683 site</a>.  Using the collected information, it become possible to
8684 answer the question in the title.  Here are the 20 most supported MIME
8685 types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
8686 The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
8687
8688 <p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
8689
8690 <pre>
8691   count MIME type
8692   ----- -----------------------
8693      32 text/plain
8694      30 audio/mpeg
8695      29 image/png
8696      28 image/jpeg
8697      27 application/ogg
8698      26 audio/x-mp3
8699      25 image/tiff
8700      25 image/gif
8701      22 image/bmp
8702      22 audio/x-wav
8703      20 audio/x-flac
8704      19 audio/x-mpegurl
8705      18 video/x-ms-asf
8706      18 audio/x-musepack
8707      18 audio/x-mpeg
8708      18 application/x-ogg
8709      17 video/mpeg
8710      17 audio/x-scpls
8711      17 audio/ogg
8712      16 video/x-ms-wmv
8713 </pre>
8714
8715 <p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
8716
8717 <pre>
8718   count MIME type
8719   ----- -----------------------
8720      33 text/plain
8721      32 image/png
8722      32 image/jpeg
8723      29 audio/mpeg
8724      27 image/gif
8725      26 image/tiff
8726      26 application/ogg
8727      25 audio/x-mp3
8728      22 image/bmp
8729      21 audio/x-wav
8730      19 audio/x-mpegurl
8731      19 audio/x-mpeg
8732      18 video/mpeg
8733      18 audio/x-scpls
8734      18 audio/x-flac
8735      18 application/x-ogg
8736      17 video/x-ms-asf
8737      17 text/html
8738      17 audio/x-musepack
8739      16 image/x-xbitmap
8740 </pre>
8741
8742 <p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
8743
8744 <pre>
8745   count MIME type
8746   ----- -----------------------
8747      31 text/plain
8748      31 image/png
8749      31 image/jpeg
8750      29 audio/mpeg
8751      28 application/ogg
8752      27 image/gif
8753      26 image/tiff
8754      26 audio/x-mp3
8755      23 audio/x-wav
8756      22 image/bmp
8757      21 audio/x-flac
8758      20 audio/x-mpegurl
8759      19 audio/x-mpeg
8760      18 video/x-ms-asf
8761      18 video/mpeg
8762      18 audio/x-scpls
8763      18 application/x-ogg
8764      17 audio/x-musepack
8765      16 video/x-ms-wmv
8766      16 video/x-msvideo
8767 </pre>
8768
8769 <p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
8770 information mentioned in DEP-11.  I have not yet had time to look at
8771 it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
8772 issues.</p>
8773
8774 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
8775 discovering a typo in my script.</p>
8776
8777       </div>
8778       <div class="tags">
8779
8780
8781         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>.
8782
8783
8784       </div>
8785     </div>
8786     <div class="padding"></div>
8787
8788     <div class="entry">
8789       <div class="title">
8790         <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>
8791       </div>
8792       <div class="date">
8793         15th January 2013
8794       </div>
8795       <div class="body">
8796         <p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
8797 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
8798 values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
8799 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
8800 dongle support in Debian</a>.  Using this knowledge, I have tested how
8801 modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
8802 to hardware.  This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
8803 packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
8804 discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
8805 packages.</p>
8806
8807 <p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
8808 containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
8809 the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
8810 modalias.</p>
8811
8812 <p><blockquote>
8813 Package: package-name
8814 <br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
8815 </blockquote></p>
8816
8817 <p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
8818 for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
8819
8820 <p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
8821 cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
8822
8823 <p><blockquote>
8824 Package: cheese
8825 <br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
8826 </blockquote></p>
8827
8828 <p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
8829 CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
8830
8831 <p><blockquote>
8832 Package: pcmciautils
8833 <br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
8834 </blockquote></p>
8835
8836 <p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
8837 plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
8838
8839 <p><blockquote>
8840 Package: colorhug-client
8841 <br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
8842 </blockquote></p>
8843
8844 <p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
8845 file in the Debian archive.  Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
8846 to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
8847
8848 <p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
8849 announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
8850 This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
8851 Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
8852 hardware mapping are included in the package meta information.  I've
8853 tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
8854 is working as it should with my prototype.  It even made it to Ubuntu
8855 Raring.</p>
8856
8857 <p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
8858 the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
8859 implementation of the lookup code.  The idea is to create files for
8860 each modalias and let the shell do the matching.  Please check out and
8861 try the
8862 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
8863 shell script.  It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
8864 hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
8865 repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
8866
8867 <p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
8868 install yubikey-personalization:</p>
8869
8870 <p><blockquote>
8871 % ./hw-support-lookup
8872 <br>yubikey-personalization
8873 <br>%
8874 </blockquote></p>
8875
8876 <p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
8877 propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
8878
8879 <p><blockquote>
8880 % ./hw-support-lookup
8881 <br>pcmciautils
8882 <br>%
8883 </blockquote></p>
8884
8885 <p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
8886 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
8887 database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
8888
8889 <p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
8890 packages and hardware.  One source would be to look at packages with
8891 kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
8892 extract their modalias information.  Another would be to look at
8893 packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
8894 /lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
8895 generate a modalias matching rule.  I have not tested any of these to
8896 see if it work.</p>
8897
8898 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
8899 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
8900 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
8901 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
8902
8903       </div>
8904       <div class="tags">
8905
8906
8907         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>.
8908
8909
8910       </div>
8911     </div>
8912     <div class="padding"></div>
8913
8914     <div class="entry">
8915       <div class="title">
8916         <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>
8917       </div>
8918       <div class="date">
8919         14th January 2013
8920       </div>
8921       <div class="body">
8922         <p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
8923 information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
8924 hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
8925 to document the details.  Here are my findings so far, also available
8926 in
8927 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
8928 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
8929
8930 <p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
8931
8932 <p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
8933 values stands for.  It is in part based on information from
8934 &lt;URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> &gt;,
8935 &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;,
8936 &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
8937 &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;.
8938
8939 <p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
8940 this shell script:</p>
8941
8942 <pre>
8943 find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
8944 </pre>
8945
8946 <p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
8947 using modinfo:</p>
8948
8949 <pre>
8950 % /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
8951 alias:          serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
8952 alias:          serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
8953 %
8954 </pre>
8955
8956 <p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
8957
8958 <p>A typical PCI entry can look like this.  This is an Intel Host
8959 Bridge memory controller:</p>
8960
8961 <p><blockquote>
8962 pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
8963 </blockquote></p>
8964
8965 <p>This represent these values:</p>
8966
8967 <pre>
8968  v   00008086  (vendor)
8969  d   00002770  (device)
8970  sv  00001028  (subvendor)
8971  sd  000001AD  (subdevice)
8972  bc  06        (bus class)
8973  sc  00        (bus subclass)
8974  i   00        (interface)
8975 </pre>
8976
8977 <p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
8978 -n' as 8086:2770.  The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
8979 0600.  The 0600 class is a host bridge.  Other useful bus values are
8980 0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
8981
8982 <p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
8983 means.</p>
8984
8985 <p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
8986
8987 <p>Some typical USB entries can look like this.  This is an internal
8988 USB hub in a laptop:</p>
8989
8990 <p><blockquote>
8991 usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
8992 </blockquote></p>
8993
8994 <p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
8995
8996 <pre>
8997  v    1D6B  (device vendor)
8998  p    0001  (device product)
8999  d    0206  (bcddevice)
9000  dc     09  (device class)
9001  dsc    00  (device subclass)
9002  dp     00  (device protocol)
9003  ic     09  (interface class)
9004  isc    00  (interface subclass)
9005  ip     00  (interface protocol)
9006 </pre>
9007
9008 <p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub.  Some times the relevant
9009 class is in the interface class section.  For a simple USB web camera,
9010 these alias entries show up:</p>
9011
9012 <p><blockquote>
9013 usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
9014 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
9015 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
9016 <br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
9017 </blockquote></p>
9018
9019 <p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
9020 camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
9021 microphone).  Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
9022
9023 <p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
9024
9025 <p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff.  This is an IR
9026 receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
9027
9028 <p><blockquote>
9029 acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
9030 </blockquote></p>
9031
9032 <p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
9033
9034 <p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
9035
9036 <p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
9037 and model.  This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
9038 /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
9039
9040 <p><blockquote>
9041 dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
9042 </blockquote></p>
9043
9044 <p>The values present are</p>
9045
9046 <pre>
9047  bvn  IBM            (BIOS vendor)
9048  bvr  1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
9049  bd   06/15/2005     (BIOS date)
9050  svn  IBM            (system vendor)
9051  pn   2371H4G        (product name)
9052  pvr  ThinkPadX40    (product version)
9053  rvn  IBM            (board vendor)
9054  rn   2371H4G        (board name)
9055  rvr  NotAvailable   (board version)
9056  cvn  IBM            (chassis vendor)
9057  ct   10             (chassis type)
9058  cvr  NotAvailable   (chassis version)
9059 </pre>
9060
9061 <p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook.  Other interesting values can be
9062 found in the dmidecode source:</p>
9063
9064 <pre>
9065   3 Desktop
9066   4 Low Profile Desktop
9067   5 Pizza Box
9068   6 Mini Tower
9069   7 Tower
9070   8 Portable
9071   9 Laptop
9072  10 Notebook
9073  11 Hand Held
9074  12 Docking Station
9075  13 All In One
9076  14 Sub Notebook
9077  15 Space-saving
9078  16 Lunch Box
9079  17 Main Server Chassis
9080  18 Expansion Chassis
9081  19 Sub Chassis
9082  20 Bus Expansion Chassis
9083  21 Peripheral Chassis
9084  22 RAID Chassis
9085  23 Rack Mount Chassis
9086  24 Sealed-case PC
9087  25 Multi-system
9088  26 CompactPCI
9089  27 AdvancedTCA
9090  28 Blade
9091  29 Blade Enclosing
9092 </pre>
9093
9094 <p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
9095 table.  For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
9096 claim it is a desktop.</p>
9097
9098 <p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
9099
9100 <p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs.  One example is from my
9101 test machine:</p>
9102
9103 <p><blockquote>
9104 serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
9105 </blockquote></p>
9106
9107 <p>The values present are</p>
9108
9109 <pre>
9110   ty  01  (type)
9111   pr  00  (prototype)
9112   id  00  (id)
9113   ex  00  (extra)
9114 </pre>
9115
9116 <p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver.  I am not sure what
9117 the valid values are.</p>
9118
9119 <p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
9120
9121 <p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
9122 file2alias.c.  There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
9123 ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
9124 mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
9125 vmbus, x86cpu and zorro.  I did not spend time documenting all of
9126 these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
9127 hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
9128
9129 <p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
9130
9131 <p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
9132 one can use the following shell script:</p>
9133
9134 <pre>
9135   for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
9136     echo "$id" ; \
9137     /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/  /' ; \
9138   done
9139 </pre>
9140
9141 <p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
9142 list is very long on my test machine):</p>
9143
9144 <pre>
9145   acpi:ACPI0003:
9146     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
9147   acpi:device:
9148   FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
9149   acpi:IBM0068:
9150     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
9151     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
9152     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
9153     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
9154   acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
9155     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
9156     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
9157     insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
9158   [...]
9159 </pre>
9160
9161 <p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
9162 packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
9163 machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
9164 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
9165
9166 <p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
9167 "find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
9168 in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
9169
9170       </div>
9171       <div class="tags">
9172
9173
9174         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>.
9175
9176
9177       </div>
9178     </div>
9179     <div class="padding"></div>
9180
9181     <div class="entry">
9182       <div class="title">
9183         <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>
9184       </div>
9185       <div class="date">
9186         10th January 2013
9187       </div>
9188       <div class="body">
9189         <p>As part of my investigation on how to improve the support in Debian
9190 for hardware dongles, I dug up my old Mark and Spencer USB Rocket
9191 Launcher and updated the Debian package
9192 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/pymissile">pymissile</a> to make
9193 sure udev will fix the device permissions when it is plugged in.  I
9194 also added a "Modaliases" header to test it in the Debian archive and
9195 hopefully make the package be proposed by jockey in Ubuntu when a user
9196 plug in his rocket launcher.  In the process I moved the source to a
9197 git repository under collab-maint, to make it easier for any DD to
9198 contribute.  <a href="http://code.google.com/p/pymissile/">Upstream</a>
9199 is not very active, but the software still work for me even after five
9200 years of relative silence.  The new git repository is not listed in
9201 the uploaded package yet, because I want to test the other changes a
9202 bit more before I upload the new version.  If you want to check out
9203 the new version with a .desktop file included, visit the
9204 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/pymissile.git">gitweb
9205 view</a> or use "<tt>git clone
9206 git://anonscm.debian.org/collab-maint/pymissile.git</tt>".</p>
9207
9208       </div>
9209       <div class="tags">
9210
9211
9212         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>.
9213
9214
9215       </div>
9216     </div>
9217     <div class="padding"></div>
9218
9219     <div class="entry">
9220       <div class="title">
9221         <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>
9222       </div>
9223       <div class="date">
9224          9th January 2013
9225       </div>
9226       <div class="body">
9227         <p>One thing that annoys me with Debian and Linux distributions in
9228 general, is that there is a great package management system with the
9229 ability to automatically install software packages by downloading them
9230 from the distribution mirrors, but no way to get it to automatically
9231 install the packages I need to use the hardware I plug into my
9232 machine.  Even if the package to use it is easily available from the
9233 Linux distribution.  When I plug in a LEGO Mindstorms NXT, it could
9234 suggest to automatically install the python-nxt, nbc and t2n packages
9235 I need to talk to it.  When I plug in a Yubikey, it could propose the
9236 yubikey-personalization package.  The information required to do this
9237 is available, but no-one have pulled all the pieces together.</p>
9238
9239 <p>Some years ago, I proposed to
9240 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg01206.html">use
9241 the discover subsystem to implement this</a>.  The idea is fairly
9242 simple:
9243
9244 <ul>
9245
9246 <li>Add a desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ pointing to a program
9247   starting when a user log in.</li>
9248
9249 <li>Set this program up to listen for kernel events emitted when new
9250   hardware is inserted into the computer.</li>
9251
9252 <li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware ID in a
9253   database mapping to packages, and take note of any non-installed
9254   packages.</li>
9255
9256 <li>Show a message to the user proposing to install the discovered
9257   package, and make it easy to install it.</li>
9258
9259 </ul>
9260
9261 <p>I am not sure what the best way to implement this is, but my
9262 initial idea was to use dbus events to discover new hardware, the
9263 discover database to find packages and
9264 <a href="http://www.packagekit.org/">PackageKit</a> to install
9265 packages.</p>
9266
9267 <p>Yesterday, I found time to try to implement this idea, and the
9268 draft package is now checked into
9269 <a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
9270 Debian Edu subversion repository</a>.  In the process, I updated the
9271 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover-data.html">discover-data</a>
9272 package to map the USB ids of LEGO Mindstorms and Yubikey devices to
9273 the relevant packages in Debian, and uploaded a new version
9274 2.2013.01.09 to unstable.  I also discovered that the current
9275 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/d/discover.html">discover</a>
9276 package in Debian no longer discovered any USB devices, because
9277 /proc/bus/usb/devices is no longer present.  I ported it to use
9278 libusb as a fall back option to get it working.  The fixed package
9279 version 2.1.2-6 is now in experimental (didn't upload it to unstable
9280 because of the freeze).</p>
9281
9282 <p>With this prototype in place, I can insert my Yubikey, and get this
9283 desktop notification to show up (only once, the first time it is
9284 inserted):</p>
9285
9286 <p align="center"><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-09-hw-autoinstall.png"></p>
9287
9288 <p>For this prototype to be really useful, some way to automatically
9289 install the proposed packages by pressing the "Please install
9290 program(s)" button should to be implemented.</p>
9291
9292 <p>If this idea seem useful to you, and you want to help make it
9293 happen, please help me update the discover-data database with mappings
9294 from hardware to Debian packages.  Check if 'discover-pkginstall -l'
9295 list the package you would like to have installed when a given
9296 hardware device is inserted into your computer, and report bugs using
9297 reportbug if it isn't.  Or, if you know of a better way to provide
9298 such mapping, please let me know.</p>
9299
9300 <p>This prototype need more work, and there are several questions that
9301 should be considered before it is ready for production use.  Is dbus
9302 the correct way to detect new hardware?  At the moment I look for HAL
9303 dbus events on the system bus, because that is the events I could see
9304 on my Debian Squeeze KDE desktop.  Are there better events to use?
9305 How should the user be notified?  Is the desktop notification
9306 mechanism the best option, or should the background daemon raise a
9307 popup instead?  How should packages be installed?  When should they
9308 not be installed?</p>
9309
9310 <p>If you want to help getting such feature implemented in Debian,
9311 please send me an email. :)</p>
9312
9313       </div>
9314       <div class="tags">
9315
9316
9317         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>.
9318
9319
9320       </div>
9321     </div>
9322     <div class="padding"></div>
9323
9324     <div class="entry">
9325       <div class="title">
9326         <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>
9327       </div>
9328       <div class="date">
9329          2nd January 2013
9330       </div>
9331       <div class="body">
9332         <p>During Christmas, I have worked a bit on the Debian support for
9333 <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx">LEGO Mindstorm
9334 NXT</a>.  My son and I have played a bit with my NXT set, and I
9335 discovered I had to build all the tools myself because none were
9336 already in Debian Squeeze.  If Debian support for LEGO is something
9337 you care about, please join me on the IRC channel
9338 <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">#debian-lego</a> (server
9339 irc.debian.org).  There is a lot that could be done to improve the
9340 Debian support for LEGO designers.  For example both CAD software
9341 and Mindstorm compilers are missing. :)</p>
9342
9343 <p>Update 2012-01-03: A
9344 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">project page</a>
9345 including links to Lego related packages is now available.</p>
9346
9347       </div>
9348       <div class="tags">
9349
9350
9351         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/lego">lego</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot</a>.
9352
9353
9354       </div>
9355     </div>
9356     <div class="padding"></div>
9357
9358     <div class="entry">
9359       <div class="title">
9360         <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>
9361       </div>
9362       <div class="date">
9363         25th December 2012
9364       </div>
9365       <div class="body">
9366         <p>Let me start by wishing you all marry Christmas and a happy new
9367 year!  I hope next year will prove to be a good year.</p>
9368
9369 <p><a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">Bitcoin</a>, the digital
9370 decentralised "currency" that allow people to transfer bitcoins
9371 between each other with minimal overhead, is a very interesting
9372 experiment.  And as I wrote a few days ago, the bitcoin situation in
9373 <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a> is about to improve a bit.
9374 The <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">new debian source
9375 package</a> (version 0.7.2-2) was uploaded yesterday, and is waiting
9376 in <a href="http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html">the NEW queue</A>
9377 for one of the ftpmasters to approve the new bitcoin-qt package
9378 name.</p>
9379
9380 <p>And thanks to the great work of Jonas and the rest of the bitcoin
9381 team in Debian, you can easily test the package in Debian Squeeze
9382 using the following steps to get a set of working packages:</p>
9383
9384 <blockquote><pre>
9385 git clone git://git.debian.org/git/collab-maint/bitcoin
9386 cd bitcoin
9387 DEB_MAINTAINER_MODE=1 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp fakeroot debian/rules clean
9388 DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=noupnp git-buildpackage --git-ignore-new
9389 </pre></blockquote>
9390
9391 <p>You might have to install some build dependencies as well.  The
9392 list of commands should give you two packages, bitcoind and
9393 bitcoin-qt, ready for use in a Squeeze environment.  Note that the
9394 client will download the complete set of bitcoin "blocks", which need
9395 around 5.6 GiB of data on my machine at the moment.  Make sure your
9396 ~/.bitcoin/ directory have lots of spare room if you want to download
9397 all the blocks.  The client will warn if the disk is getting full, so
9398 there is not really a problem if you got too little room, but you will
9399 not be able to get all the features out of the client.</p>
9400
9401 <p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
9402 activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
9403 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
9404
9405       </div>
9406       <div class="tags">
9407
9408
9409         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>.
9410
9411
9412       </div>
9413     </div>
9414     <div class="padding"></div>
9415
9416     <div class="entry">
9417       <div class="title">
9418         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_word_on_bitcoin_support_in_Debian.html">A word on bitcoin support in Debian</a>
9419       </div>
9420       <div class="date">
9421         21st December 2012
9422       </div>
9423       <div class="body">
9424         <p>It has been a while since I wrote about
9425 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">bitcoin</a>, the decentralised
9426 peer-to-peer based crypto-currency, and the reason is simply that I
9427 have been busy elsewhere.  But two days ago, I started looking at the
9428 state of <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin in
9429 Debian</a> again to try to recover my old bitcoin wallet.  The package
9430 is now maintained by a
9431 <a href="https://alioth.debian.org/projects/pkg-bitcoin/">team of
9432 people</a>, and the grunt work had already been done by this team.  We
9433 owe a huge thank you to all these team members. :)
9434 But I was sad to discover that the bitcoin client is missing in
9435 Wheezy.  It is only available in Sid (and an outdated client from
9436 backports).  The client had several RC bugs registered in BTS blocking
9437 it from entering testing.  To try to help the team and improve the
9438 situation, I spent some time providing patches and triaging the bug
9439 reports.  I also had a look at the bitcoin package available from Matt
9440 Corallo in a
9441 <a href="https://launchpad.net/~bitcoin/+archive/bitcoin">PPA for
9442 Ubuntu</a>, and moved the useful pieces from that version into the
9443 Debian package.</p>
9444
9445 <p>After checking with the main package maintainer Jonas Smedegaard on
9446 IRC, I pushed several patches into the collab-maint git repository to
9447 improve the package.  It now contains fixes for the RC issues (not from
9448 me, but fixed by Scott Howard), build rules for a Qt GUI client
9449 package, konqueror support for the bitcoin: URI and bash completion
9450 setup.  As I work on Debian Squeeze, I also created
9451 <a href="http://lists.alioth.debian.org/pipermail/pkg-bitcoin-devel/Week-of-Mon-20121217/000041.html">a
9452 patch to backport</a> the latest version.  Jonas is going to look at
9453 it and try to integrate it into the git repository before uploading a
9454 new version to unstable.
9455
9456 <p>I would very much like bitcoin to succeed, to get rid of the
9457 centralized control currently exercised in the monetary system.  I
9458 find it completely unacceptable that the USA government is collecting
9459 transaction data for almost all international money transfers (most are done in USD and transaction logs shipped to the spooks), and
9460 that the major credit card companies can block legal money
9461 transactions to Wikileaks.  But for bitcoin to succeed, more people
9462 need to use bitcoins, and more people need to accept bitcoins when
9463 they sell products and services.  Improving the bitcoin support in
9464 Debian is a small step in the right direction, but not enough.
9465 Unfortunately the user experience when browsing the web and wanting to
9466 pay with bitcoin is still not very good.  The bitcoin: URI is a step
9467 in the right direction, but need to work in most or every browser in
9468 use.  Also the bitcoin-qt client is too heavy to fire up to do a
9469 quick transaction.  I believe there are other clients available, but
9470 have not tested them.</p>
9471
9472 <p>My
9473 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Now_accepting_bitcoins___anonymous_and_distributed_p2p_crypto_money.html">experiment
9474 with bitcoins</a> showed that at least some of my readers use bitcoin.
9475 I received 20.15 BTC so far on the address I provided in my blog two
9476 years ago, as can be
9477 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">seen
9478 on the blockexplorer service</a>.  Thank you everyone for your
9479 donation.  The blockexplorer service demonstrates quite well that
9480 bitcoin is not quite anonymous and untracked. :) I wonder if the
9481 number of users have gone up since then.  If you use bitcoin and want
9482 to show your support of my activity, please send Bitcoin donations to
9483 the same address as last time,
9484 <b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
9485
9486       </div>
9487       <div class="tags">
9488
9489
9490         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>.
9491
9492
9493       </div>
9494     </div>
9495     <div class="padding"></div>
9496
9497     <div class="entry">
9498       <div class="title">
9499         <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>
9500       </div>
9501       <div class="date">
9502          7th September 2012
9503       </div>
9504       <div class="body">
9505         <p>As I
9506 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">mentioned
9507 this summer</a>, I have created a Computer Science song book a few
9508 years ago, and today I finally found time to create a public
9509 <a href="https://gitorious.org/pere-cs-songbook/pere-cs-songbook">Gitorious
9510 repository for the project</a>.</p>
9511
9512 <p>If you want to help out, please clone the source and submit patches
9513 to the HTML version.  To generate the PDF and PostScript version,
9514 please use prince XML, or let me know about a useful free software
9515 processor capable of creating a good looking PDF from the HTML.</p>
9516
9517 <p>Want to sing?  You can still find the song book in HTML, PDF and
9518 PostScript formats at
9519 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's Computer
9520 Science Songbook</a>.</p>
9521
9522       </div>
9523       <div class="tags">
9524
9525
9526         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>.
9527
9528
9529       </div>
9530     </div>
9531     <div class="padding"></div>
9532
9533     <div class="entry">
9534       <div class="title">
9535         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gratulerer_med_19__rsdagen__Debian_.html">Gratulerer med 19-årsdagen, Debian!</a>
9536       </div>
9537       <div class="date">
9538         16th August 2012
9539       </div>
9540       <div class="body">
9541         <p>I dag fyller
9542 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120813">Debian-prosjektet 19
9543 år</a>.  Jeg har fulgt det de siste 12 årene, og er veldig glad for å kunne
9544 si gratulerer med dagen, Debian!</p>
9545
9546       </div>
9547       <div class="tags">
9548
9549
9550         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>.
9551
9552
9553       </div>
9554     </div>
9555     <div class="padding"></div>
9556
9557     <div class="entry">
9558       <div class="title">
9559         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Song_book_for_Computer_Scientists.html">Song book for Computer Scientists</a>
9560       </div>
9561       <div class="date">
9562         24th June 2012
9563       </div>
9564       <div class="body">
9565         <p>Many years ago, while studying Computer Science at the
9566 <a href="http://www.uit.no/">University of Tromsø</a>, I started
9567 collecting computer related songs for use at parties.  The original
9568 version was written in LaTeX, but a few years ago I got help from
9569 Håkon W. Lie, one of the inventors of W3C CSS, to convert it to HTML
9570 while keeping the ability to create a nice book in PDF format.  I have
9571 not had time to maintain the book for a while now, and guess I should
9572 put it up on some public version control repository where others can
9573 help me extend and update the book.  If anyone is volunteering to help
9574 me with this, send me an email.  Also let me know if there are songs
9575 missing in my book.</p>
9576
9577 <p>I have not mentioned the book on my blog so far, and it occured to
9578 me today that I really should let all my readers share the joys of
9579 singing out load about programming, computers and computer networks.
9580 Especially now that <a href="http://debconf12.debconf.org/">Debconf
9581 12</a> is about to start (and I am not going).  Want to sing?  Check
9582 out <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/cs-songbook/">Petter's
9583 Computer Science Songbook</a>.
9584
9585       </div>
9586       <div class="tags">
9587
9588
9589         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>.
9590
9591
9592       </div>
9593     </div>
9594     <div class="padding"></div>
9595
9596     <div class="entry">
9597       <div class="title">
9598         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatically_upgrading_server_firmware_on_Dell_PowerEdge.html">Automatically upgrading server firmware on Dell PowerEdge</a>
9599       </div>
9600       <div class="date">
9601         21st November 2011
9602       </div>
9603       <div class="body">
9604         <p>At work we have heaps of servers.  I believe the total count is
9605 around 1000 at the moment.  To be able to get help from the vendors
9606 when something go wrong, we want to keep the firmware on the servers
9607 up to date.  If the firmware isn't the latest and greatest, the
9608 vendors typically refuse to start debugging any problems until the
9609 firmware is upgraded.  So before every reboot, we want to upgrade the
9610 firmware, and we would really like everyone handling servers at the
9611 university to do this themselves when they plan to reboot a machine.
9612 For that to happen we at the unix server admin group need to provide
9613 the tools to do so.</p>
9614
9615 <p>To make firmware upgrading easier, I am working on a script to
9616 fetch and install the latest firmware for the servers we got.  Most of
9617 our hardware are from Dell and HP, so I have focused on these servers
9618 so far.  This blog post is about the Dell part.</P>
9619
9620 <p>On the Dell FTP site I was lucky enough to find
9621 <a href="ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz">an XML file</a>
9622 with firmware information for all 11th generation servers, listing
9623 which firmware should be used on a given model and where on the FTP
9624 site I can find it.  Using a simple perl XML parser I can then
9625 download the shell scripts Dell provides to do firmware upgrades from
9626 within Linux and reboot when all the firmware is primed and ready to
9627 be activated on the first reboot.</p>
9628
9629 <p>This is the Dell related fragment of the perl code I am working on.
9630 Are there anyone working on similar tools for firmware upgrading all
9631 servers at a site?  Please get in touch and lets share resources.</p>
9632
9633 <p><pre>
9634 #!/usr/bin/perl
9635 use strict;
9636 use warnings;
9637 use File::Temp qw(tempdir);
9638 BEGIN {
9639     # Install needed RHEL packages if missing
9640     my %rhelmodules = (
9641         'XML::Simple' => 'perl-XML-Simple',
9642         );
9643     for my $module (keys %rhelmodules) {
9644         eval "use $module;";
9645         if ($@) {
9646             my $pkg = $rhelmodules{$module};
9647             system("yum install -y $pkg");
9648             eval "use $module;";
9649         }
9650     }
9651 }
9652 my $errorsto = 'pere@hungry.com';
9653
9654 upgrade_dell();
9655
9656 exit 0;
9657
9658 sub run_firmware_script {
9659     my ($opts, $script) = @_;
9660     unless ($script) {
9661         print STDERR "fail: missing script name\n";
9662         exit 1
9663     }
9664     print STDERR "Running $script\n\n";
9665
9666     if (0 == system("sh $script $opts")) { # FIXME correct exit code handling
9667         print STDERR "success: firmware script ran succcessfully\n";
9668     } else {
9669         print STDERR "fail: firmware script returned error\n";
9670     }
9671 }
9672
9673 sub run_firmware_scripts {
9674     my ($opts, @dirs) = @_;
9675     # Run firmware packages
9676     for my $dir (@dirs) {
9677         print STDERR "info: Running scripts in $dir\n";
9678         opendir(my $dh, $dir) or die "Unable to open directory $dir: $!";
9679         while (my $s = readdir $dh) {
9680             next if $s =~ m/^\.\.?/;
9681             run_firmware_script($opts, "$dir/$s");
9682         }
9683         closedir $dh;
9684     }
9685 }
9686
9687 sub download {
9688     my $url = shift;
9689     print STDERR "info: Downloading $url\n";
9690     system("wget --quiet \"$url\"");
9691 }
9692
9693 sub upgrade_dell {
9694     my @dirs;
9695     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
9696     chomp $product;
9697
9698     if ($product =~ m/PowerEdge/) {
9699
9700         # on RHEL, these pacakges are needed by the firwmare upgrade scripts
9701         system('yum install -y compat-libstdc++-33.i686 libstdc++.i686 libxml2.i686 procmail');
9702
9703         my $tmpdir = tempdir(
9704             CLEANUP => 1
9705             );
9706         chdir($tmpdir);
9707         fetch_dell_fw('catalog/Catalog.xml.gz');
9708         system('gunzip Catalog.xml.gz');
9709         my @paths = fetch_dell_fw_list('Catalog.xml');
9710         # -q is quiet, disabling interactivity and reducing console output
9711         my $fwopts = "-q";
9712         if (@paths) {
9713             for my $url (@paths) {
9714                 fetch_dell_fw($url);
9715             }
9716             run_firmware_scripts($fwopts, $tmpdir);
9717         } else {
9718             print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
9719             print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
9720         }
9721         chdir('/');
9722     } else {
9723         print STDERR "error: Unsupported Dell model '$product'.\n";
9724         print STDERR "error: Please report to $errorsto.\n";
9725     }
9726 }
9727
9728 sub fetch_dell_fw {
9729     my $path = shift;
9730     my $url = "ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/$path";
9731     download($url);
9732 }
9733
9734 # Using ftp://ftp.us.dell.com/catalog/Catalog.xml.gz, figure out which
9735 # firmware packages to download from Dell.  Only work for Linux
9736 # machines and 11th generation Dell servers.
9737 sub fetch_dell_fw_list {
9738     my $filename = shift;
9739
9740     my $product = `dmidecode -s system-product-name`;
9741     chomp $product;
9742     my ($mybrand, $mymodel) = split(/\s+/, $product);
9743
9744     print STDERR "Finding firmware bundles for $mybrand $mymodel\n";
9745
9746     my $xml = XMLin($filename);
9747     my @paths;
9748     for my $bundle (@{$xml->{SoftwareBundle}}) {
9749         my $brand = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Display}->{content};
9750         my $model = $bundle->{TargetSystems}->{Brand}->{Model}->{Display}->{content};
9751         my $oscode;
9752         if ("ARRAY" eq ref $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}) {
9753             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}[0]->{osCode};
9754         } else {
9755             $oscode = $bundle->{TargetOSes}->{OperatingSystem}->{osCode};
9756         }
9757         if ($mybrand eq $brand && $mymodel eq $model && "LIN" eq $oscode)
9758         {
9759             @paths = map { $_->{path} } @{$bundle->{Contents}->{Package}};
9760         }
9761     }
9762     for my $component (@{$xml->{SoftwareComponent}}) {
9763         my $componenttype = $component->{ComponentType}->{value};
9764
9765         # Drop application packages, only firmware and BIOS
9766         next if 'APAC' eq $componenttype;
9767
9768         my $cpath = $component->{path};
9769         for my $path (@paths) {
9770             if ($cpath =~ m%/$path$%) {
9771                 push(@paths, $cpath);
9772             }
9773         }
9774     }
9775     return @paths;
9776 }
9777 </pre>
9778
9779 <p>The code is only tested on RedHat Enterprise Linux, but I suspect
9780 it could work on other platforms with some tweaking.  Anyone know a
9781 index like Catalog.xml is available from HP for HP servers?  At the
9782 moment I maintain a similar list manually and it is quickly getting
9783 outdated.</p>
9784
9785       </div>
9786       <div class="tags">
9787
9788
9789         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>.
9790
9791
9792       </div>
9793     </div>
9794     <div class="padding"></div>
9795
9796     <div class="entry">
9797       <div class="title">
9798         <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>
9799       </div>
9800       <div class="date">
9801          4th August 2011
9802       </div>
9803       <div class="body">
9804         <p>Wouter Verhelst have some
9805 <a href="http://grep.be/blog/en/retorts/pere_kubuntu_boot">interesting
9806 comments and opinions</a> on my blog post on
9807 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_should_start_from__etc_rcS_d__in_Debian____almost_nothing.html">the
9808 need to clean up /etc/rcS.d/ in Debian</a> and my blog post about
9809 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/What_is_missing_in_the_Debian_desktop__or_why_my_parents_use_Kubuntu.html">the
9810 default KDE desktop in Debian</a>.  I only have time to address one
9811 small piece of his comment now, and though it best to address the
9812 misunderstanding he bring forward:</p>
9813
9814 <p><blockquote>
9815 Currently, a system admin has four options: [...] boot to a
9816 single-user system (by adding 'single' to the kernel command line;
9817 this runs rcS and rc1 scripts)
9818 </blockquote></p>
9819
9820 <p>This make me believe Wouter believe booting into single user mode
9821 and booting into runlevel 1 is the same.  I am not surprised he
9822 believe this, because it would make sense and is a quite sensible
9823 thing to believe.  But because the boot in Debian is slightly broken,
9824 runlevel 1 do not work properly and it isn't the same as single user
9825 mode.  I'll try to explain what is actually happing, but it is a bit
9826 hard to explain.</p>
9827
9828 <p>Single user mode is defined like this in /etc/inittab:
9829 "<tt>~~:S:wait:/sbin/sulogin</tt>".  This means the only thing that is
9830 executed in single user mode is sulogin.  Single user mode is a boot
9831 state "between" the runlevels, and when booting into single user mode,
9832 only the scripts in /etc/rcS.d/ are executed before the init process
9833 enters the single user state.  When switching to runlevel 1, the state
9834 is in fact not ending in runlevel 1, but it passes through runlevel 1
9835 and end up in the single user mode (see /etc/rc1.d/S03single, which
9836 runs "init -t1 S" to switch to single user mode at the end of runlevel
9837 1.  It is confusing that the 'S' (single user) init mode is not the
9838 mode enabled by /etc/rcS.d/ (which is more like the initial boot
9839 mode).</p>
9840
9841 <p>This summary might make it clearer.  When booting for the first
9842 time into single user mode, the following commands are executed:
9843 "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc S; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  When booting into
9844 runlevel 1, the following commands are executed: "<tt>/etc/init.d/rc
9845 S; /etc/init.d/rc 1; /sbin/sulogin</tt>".  A problem show up when
9846 trying to continue after visiting single user mode.  Not all services
9847 are started again as they should, causing the machine to end up in an
9848 unpredicatble state.  This is why Debian admins recommend rebooting
9849 after visiting single user mode.</p>
9850
9851 <p>A similar problem with runlevel 1 is caused by the amount of
9852 scripts executed from /etc/rcS.d/.  When switching from say runlevel 2
9853 to runlevel 1, the services started from /etc/rcS.d/ are not properly
9854 stopped when passing through the scripts in /etc/rc1.d/, and not
9855 started again when switching away from runlevel 1 to the runlevels
9856 2-5.  I believe the problem is best fixed by moving all the scripts
9857 out of /etc/rcS.d/ that are not <strong>required</strong> to get a
9858 functioning single user mode during boot.</p>
9859
9860 <p>I have spent several years investigating the Debian boot system,
9861 and discovered this problem a few years ago.  I suspect it originates
9862 from when sysvinit was introduced into Debian, a long time ago.</p>
9863
9864       </div>
9865       <div class="tags">
9866
9867
9868         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>.
9869
9870
9871       </div>
9872     </div>
9873     <div class="padding"></div>
9874
9875     <div class="entry">
9876       <div class="title">
9877         <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>
9878       </div>
9879       <div class="date">
9880         30th July 2011
9881       </div>
9882       <div class="body">
9883         <p>In the Debian boot system, several packages include scripts that
9884 are started from /etc/rcS.d/.  In fact, there is a bite more of them
9885 than make sense, and this causes a few problems.  What kind of
9886 problems, you might ask.  There are at least two problems.  The first
9887 is that it is not possible to recover a machine after switching to
9888 runlevel 1.  One need to actually reboot to get the machine back to
9889 the expected state.  The other is that single user boot will sometimes
9890 run into problems because some of the subsystems are activated before
9891 the root login is presented, causing problems when trying to recover a
9892 machine from a problem in that subsystem.  A minor additional point is
9893 that moving more scripts out of rcS.d/ and into the other rc#.d/
9894 directories will increase the amount of scripts that can run in
9895 parallel during boot, and thus decrease the boot time.</p>
9896
9897 <p>So, which scripts should start from rcS.d/.  In short, only the
9898 scripts that _have_ to execute before the root login prompt is
9899 presented during a single user boot should go there.  Everything else
9900 should go into the numeric runlevels.  This means things like
9901 lm-sensors, fuse and x11-common should not run from rcS.d, but from
9902 the numeric runlevels.  Today in Debian, there are around 115 init.d
9903 scripts that are started from rcS.d/, and most of them should be moved
9904 out.  Do your package have one of them?  Please help us make single
9905 user and runlevel 1 better by moving it.</p>
9906
9907 <p>Scripts setting up the screen, keyboard, system partitions
9908 etc. should still be started from rcS.d/, but there is for example no
9909 need to have the network enabled before the single user login prompt
9910 is presented.</p>
9911
9912 <p>As always, things are not so easy to fix as they sound.  To keep
9913 Debian systems working while scripts migrate and during upgrades, the
9914 scripts need to be moved from rcS.d/ to rc2.d/ in reverse dependency
9915 order, ie the scripts that nothing in rcS.d/ depend on can be moved,
9916 and the next ones can only be moved when their dependencies have been
9917 moved first.  This migration must be done sequentially while we ensure
9918 that the package system upgrade packages in the right order to keep
9919 the system state correct.  This will require some coordination when it
9920 comes to network related packages, but most of the packages with
9921 scripts that should migrate do not have anything in rcS.d/ depending
9922 on them.  Some packages have already been updated, like the sudo
9923 package, while others are still left to do.  I wish I had time to work
9924 on this myself, but real live constrains make it unlikely that I will
9925 find time to push this forward.</p>
9926
9927       </div>
9928       <div class="tags">
9929
9930
9931         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>.
9932
9933
9934       </div>
9935     </div>
9936     <div class="padding"></div>
9937
9938     <div class="entry">
9939       <div class="title">
9940         <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>
9941       </div>
9942       <div class="date">
9943         29th July 2011
9944       </div>
9945       <div class="body">
9946         <p>While at Debconf11, I have several times during discussions
9947 mentioned the issues I believe should be improved in Debian for its
9948 desktop to be useful for more people.  The use case for this is my
9949 parents, which are currently running Kubuntu which solve the
9950 issues.</p>
9951
9952 <p>I suspect these four missing features are not very hard to
9953 implement.  After all, they are present in Ubuntu, so if we wanted to
9954 do this in Debian we would have a source.</p>
9955
9956 <ol>
9957
9958 <li><strong>Simple GUI based upgrade of packages.</strong> When there
9959 are new packages available for upgrades, a icon in the KDE status bar
9960 indicate this, and clicking on it will activate the simple upgrade
9961 tool to handle it.  I have no problem guiding both of my parents
9962 through the process over the phone.  If a kernel reboot is required,
9963 this too is indicated by the status bars and the upgrade tool.  Last
9964 time I checked, nothing with the same features was working in KDE in
9965 Debian.</li>
9966
9967 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing Firefox browser
9968 plugins.</strong> When the browser encounter a MIME type it do not
9969 currently have a handler for, it will ask the user if the system
9970 should search for a package that would add support for this MIME type,
9971 and if the user say yes, the APT sources will be searched for packages
9972 advertising the MIME type in their control file (visible in the
9973 Packages file in the APT archive).  If one or more packages are found,
9974 it is a simple click of the mouse to add support for the missing mime
9975 type.  If the package require the user to accept some non-free
9976 license, this is explained to the user.  The entire process make it
9977 more clear to the user why something do not work in the browser, and
9978 make the chances higher for the user to blame the web page authors and
9979 not the browser for any missing features.</li>
9980
9981 <li><strong>Simple handling of missing multimedia codec/format
9982 handlers.</strong> When the media players encounter a format or codec
9983 it is not supporting, a dialog pop up asking the user if the system
9984 should search for a package that would add support for it.  This
9985 happen with things like MP3, Windows Media or H.264.  The selection
9986 and installation procedure is very similar to the Firefox browser
9987 plugin handling.  This is as far as I know implemented using a
9988 gstreamer hook.  The end result is that the user easily get access to
9989 the codecs that are present from the APT archives available, while
9990 explaining more on why a given format is unsupported by Ubuntu.</li>
9991
9992 <li><strong>Better browser handling of some MIME types.</strong> When
9993 displaying a text/plain file in my Debian browser, it will propose to
9994 start emacs to show it.  If I remember correctly, when doing the same
9995 in Kunbutu it show the file as a text file in the browser.  At least I
9996 know Opera will show text files within the browser.  I much prefer the
9997 latter behaviour.</li>
9998
9999 </ol>
10000
10001 <p>There are other nice features as well, like the simplified suite
10002 upgrader, but given that I am the one mostly doing the dist-upgrade,
10003 it do not matter much.</p>
10004
10005 <p>I really hope we could get these features in place for the next
10006 Debian release.  It would require the coordinated effort of several
10007 maintainers, but would make the end user experience a lot better.</p>
10008
10009       </div>
10010       <div class="tags">
10011
10012
10013         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>.
10014
10015
10016       </div>
10017     </div>
10018     <div class="padding"></div>
10019
10020     <div class="entry">
10021       <div class="title">
10022         <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>
10023       </div>
10024       <div class="date">
10025         26th July 2011
10026       </div>
10027       <div class="body">
10028         <p>The Norwegian <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</A>
10029 site is build on Debian/Squeeze, and this platform was chosen because
10030 I am most familiar with Debian (being a Debian Developer for around 10
10031 years) because it is the latest stable Debian release which should get
10032 security support for a few years.</p>
10033
10034 <p>The web service is written in Perl, and depend on some perl modules
10035 that are missing in Debian at the moment.  It would be great if these
10036 modules were added to the Debian archive, allowing anyone to set up
10037 their own <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com">FixMyStreet</a> clone
10038 in their own country using only Debian packages.  The list of modules
10039 missing in Debian/Squeeze isn't very long, and I hope the perl group
10040 will find time to package the 12 modules Catalyst::Plugin::SmartURI,
10041 Catalyst::Plugin::Unicode::Encoding, Catalyst::View::TT, Devel::Hide,
10042 Sort::Key, Statistics::Distributions, Template::Plugin::Comma,
10043 Template::Plugin::DateTime::Format, Term::Size::Any, Term::Size::Perl,
10044 URI::SmartURI and Web::Scraper to make the maintenance of FixMyStreet
10045 easier in the future.</p>
10046
10047 <p>Thanks to the great tools in Debian, getting the missing modules
10048 installed on my server was a simple call to 'cpan2deb Module::Name'
10049 and 'dpkg -i' to install the resulting package.  But this leave me
10050 with the responsibility of tracking security problems, which I really
10051 do not have time for.</p>
10052
10053       </div>
10054       <div class="tags">
10055
10056
10057         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>.
10058
10059
10060       </div>
10061     </div>
10062     <div class="padding"></div>
10063
10064     <div class="entry">
10065       <div class="title">
10066         <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>
10067       </div>
10068       <div class="date">
10069          3rd April 2011
10070       </div>
10071       <div class="body">
10072         <p>Here is a small update for my English readers.  Most of my blog
10073 posts have been in Norwegian the last few weeks, so here is a short
10074 update in English.</p>
10075
10076 <p>The kids still keep me too busy to get much free software work
10077 done, but I did manage to organise a project to get a Norwegian port
10078 of the British service
10079 <a href="http://www.fixmystreet.com/">FixMyStreet</a> up and running,
10080 and it has been running for a month now.  The entire project has been
10081 organised by me and two others.  Around Christmas we gathered sponsors
10082 to fund the development work.  In January I drafted a contract with
10083 <a href="http://www.mysociety.org/">mySociety</a> on what to develop,
10084 and in February the development took place.  Most of it involved
10085 converting the source to use GPS coordinates instead of British
10086 easting/northing, and the resulting code should be a lot easier to get
10087 running in any country by now.  The Norwegian
10088 <a href="http://www.fiksgatami.no/">FiksGataMi</a> is using
10089 <a href="http://www.openstreetmap.org/">OpenStreetmap</a> as the map
10090 source and the source for administrative borders in Norway, and
10091 support for this had to be added/fixed.</p>
10092
10093 <p>The Norwegian version went live March 3th, and we spent the weekend
10094 polishing the system before we announced it March 7th.  The system is
10095 running on a KVM instance of Debian/Squeeze, and has seen almost 3000
10096 problem reports in a few weeks.  Soon we hope to announce the Android
10097 and iPhone versions making it even easier to report problems with the
10098 public infrastructure.</p>
10099
10100 <p>Perhaps something to consider for those of you in countries without
10101 such service?</p>
10102
10103       </div>
10104       <div class="tags">
10105
10106
10107         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>.
10108
10109
10110       </div>
10111     </div>
10112     <div class="padding"></div>
10113
10114     <div class="entry">
10115       <div class="title">
10116         <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>
10117       </div>
10118       <div class="date">
10119         28th January 2011
10120       </div>
10121       <div class="body">
10122         <p>The last few days I have looked at ways to track open security
10123 issues here at my work with the University of Oslo.  My idea is that
10124 it should be possible to use the information about security issues
10125 available on the Internet, and check our locally
10126 maintained/distributed software against this information.  It should
10127 allow us to verify that no known security issues are forgotten.  The
10128 CVE database listing vulnerabilities seem like a great central point,
10129 and by using the package lists from Debian mapped to CVEs provided by
10130 the testing security team, I believed it should be possible to figure
10131 out which security holes were present in our free software
10132 collection.</p>
10133
10134 <p>After reading up on the topic, it became obvious that the first
10135 building block is to be able to name software packages in a unique and
10136 consistent way across data sources.  I considered several ways to do
10137 this, for example coming up with my own naming scheme like using URLs
10138 to project home pages or URLs to the Freshmeat entries, or using some
10139 existing naming scheme.  And it seem like I am not the first one to
10140 come across this problem, as MITRE already proposed and implemented a
10141 solution.  Enter the <a href="http://cpe.mitre.org/index.html">Common
10142 Platform Enumeration</a> dictionary, a vocabulary for referring to
10143 software, hardware and other platform components.  The CPE ids are
10144 mapped to CVEs in the <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/">National
10145 Vulnerability Database</a>, allowing me to look up know security
10146 issues for any CPE name.  With this in place, all I need to do is to
10147 locate the CPE id for the software packages we use at the university.
10148 This is fairly trivial (I google for 'cve cpe $package' and check the
10149 NVD entry if a CVE for the package exist).</p>
10150
10151 <p>To give you an example.  The GNU gzip source package have the CPE
10152 name cpe:/a:gnu:gzip.  If the old version 1.3.3 was the package to
10153 check out, one could look up
10154 <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
10155 in NVD</a> and get a list of 6 security holes with public CVE entries.
10156 The most recent one is
10157 <a href="http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-0001">CVE-2010-0001</a>,
10158 and at the bottom of the NVD page for this vulnerability the complete
10159 list of affected versions is provided.</p>
10160
10161 <p>The NVD database of CVEs is also available as a XML dump, allowing
10162 for offline processing of issues.  Using this dump, I've written a
10163 small script taking a list of CPEs as input and list all CVEs
10164 affecting the packages represented by these CPEs.  One give it CPEs
10165 with version numbers as specified above and get a list of open
10166 security issues out.</p>
10167
10168 <p>Of course for this approach to be useful, the quality of the NVD
10169 information need to be high.  For that to happen, I believe as many as
10170 possible need to use and contribute to the NVD database.  I notice
10171 RHEL is providing
10172 <a href="https://www.redhat.com/security/data/metrics/rhsamapcpe.txt">a
10173 map from CVE to CPE</a>, indicating that they are using the CPE
10174 information.  I'm not aware of Debian and Ubuntu doing the same.</p>
10175
10176 <p>To get an idea about the quality for free software, I spent some
10177 time making it possible to compare the CVE database from Debian with
10178 the CVE database in NVD.  The result look fairly good, but there are
10179 some inconsistencies in NVD (same software package having several
10180 CPEs), and some inaccuracies (NVD not mentioning buggy packages that
10181 Debian believe are affected by a CVE).  Hope to find time to improve
10182 the quality of NVD, but that require being able to get in touch with
10183 someone maintaining it.  So far my three emails with questions and
10184 corrections have not seen any reply, but I hope contact can be
10185 established soon.</p>
10186
10187 <p>An interesting application for CPEs is cross platform package
10188 mapping.  It would be useful to know which packages in for example
10189 RHEL, OpenSuSe and Mandriva are missing from Debian and Ubuntu, and
10190 this would be trivial if all linux distributions provided CPE entries
10191 for their packages.</p>
10192
10193       </div>
10194       <div class="tags">
10195
10196
10197         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>.
10198
10199
10200       </div>
10201     </div>
10202     <div class="padding"></div>
10203
10204     <div class="entry">
10205       <div class="title">
10206         <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>
10207       </div>
10208       <div class="date">
10209         23rd January 2011
10210       </div>
10211       <div class="body">
10212         <p>In the
10213 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/discover-data">discover-data</a>
10214 package in Debian, there is a script to report useful information
10215 about the running hardware for use when people report missing
10216 information.  One part of this script that I find very useful when
10217 debugging hardware problems, is the part mapping loaded kernel module
10218 to the PCI device it claims.  It allow me to quickly see if the kernel
10219 module I expect is driving the hardware I am struggling with.  To see
10220 the output, make sure discover-data is installed and run
10221 <tt>/usr/share/bug/discover-data 3>&1</tt>.  The relevant output on
10222 one of my machines like this:</p>
10223
10224 <pre>
10225 loaded modules:
10226 10de:03eb i2c_nforce2
10227 10de:03f1 ohci_hcd
10228 10de:03f2 ehci_hcd
10229 10de:03f0 snd_hda_intel
10230 10de:03ec pata_amd
10231 10de:03f6 sata_nv
10232 1022:1103 k8temp
10233 109e:036e bttv
10234 109e:0878 snd_bt87x
10235 11ab:4364 sky2
10236 </pre>
10237
10238 <p>The code in question look like this, slightly modified for
10239 readability and to drop the output to file descriptor 3:</p>
10240
10241 <pre>
10242 if [ -d /sys/bus/pci/devices/ ] ; then
10243     echo loaded pci modules:
10244     (
10245         cd /sys/bus/pci/devices/
10246         for address in * ; do
10247             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
10248                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
10249                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
10250                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
10251                     id=`lspci -n -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $3}'`
10252                     echo "$id $module"
10253                 fi
10254             fi
10255         done
10256     )
10257     echo
10258 fi
10259 </pre>
10260
10261 <p>Similar code could be used to extract USB device module
10262 mappings:</p>
10263
10264 <pre>
10265 if [ -d /sys/bus/usb/devices/ ] ; then
10266     echo loaded usb modules:
10267     (
10268         cd /sys/bus/usb/devices/
10269         for address in * ; do
10270             if [ -d "$address/driver/module" ] ; then
10271                 module=`cd $address/driver/module ; pwd -P | xargs basename`
10272                 if grep -q "^$module " /proc/modules ; then
10273                     address=$(echo $address |sed s/0000://)
10274                     id=$(lsusb -s $address | tail -n 1 | awk '{print $6}')
10275                     if [ "$id" ] ; then
10276                         echo "$id $module"
10277                     fi
10278                 fi
10279             fi
10280         done
10281     )
10282     echo
10283 fi
10284 </pre>
10285
10286 <p>This might perhaps be something to include in other tools as
10287 well.</p>
10288
10289       </div>
10290       <div class="tags">
10291
10292
10293         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>.
10294
10295
10296       </div>
10297     </div>
10298     <div class="padding"></div>
10299
10300     <div class="entry">
10301       <div class="title">
10302         <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>
10303       </div>
10304       <div class="date">
10305         22nd December 2010
10306       </div>
10307       <div class="body">
10308         <p>The last few days I have spent at work here at the <a
10309 href="http://www.uio.no/">University of Oslo</a> testing if the new
10310 batch of computers will work with Linux.  Every year for the last few
10311 years the university have organised shared bid of a few thousand
10312 computers, and this year HP won the bid.  Two different desktops and
10313 five different laptops are on the list this year.  We in the UNIX
10314 group want to know which one of these computers work well with RHEL
10315 and Ubuntu, the two Linux distributions we currently handle at the
10316 university.</p>
10317
10318 <p>My test method is simple, and I share it here to get feedback and
10319 perhaps inspire others to test hardware as well.  To test, I PXE
10320 install the OS version of choice, and log in as my normal user and run
10321 a few applications and plug in selected pieces of hardware.  When
10322 something fail, I make a note about this in the test matrix and move
10323 on.  If I have some spare time I try to report the bug to the OS
10324 vendor, but as I only have the machines for a short time, I rarely
10325 have the time to do this for all the problems I find.</p>
10326
10327 <p>Anyway, to get to the point of this post.  Here is the simple tests
10328 I perform on a new model.</p>
10329
10330 <ul>
10331
10332 <li>Is PXE installation working?  I'm testing with RHEL6, Ubuntu Lucid
10333 and Ubuntu Maverik at the moment.  If I feel like it, I also test with
10334 RHEL5 and Debian Edu/Squeeze.</li>
10335
10336 <li>Is X.org working?  If the graphical login screen show up after
10337 installation, X.org is working.</li>
10338
10339 <li>Is hardware accelerated OpenGL working?  Running glxgears (in
10340 package mesa-utils on Ubuntu) and writing down the frames per second
10341 reported by the program.</li>
10342
10343 <li>Is sound working?  With Gnome and KDE, a sound is played when
10344 logging in, and if I can hear this the test is successful.  If there
10345 are several audio exits on the machine, I try them all and check if
10346 the Gnome/KDE audio mixer can control where to send the sound.  I
10347 normally test this by playing
10348 <a href="http://www.nuug.no/aktiviteter/20101012-chef/ ">a HTML5
10349 video</a> in Firefox/Iceweasel.</li>
10350
10351 <li>Is the USB subsystem working?  I test this by plugging in a USB
10352 memory stick and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
10353
10354 <li>Is the CD/DVD player working?  I test this by inserting any CD/DVD
10355 I have lying around, and see if Gnome/KDE notices this.</li>
10356
10357 <li>Is any built in camera working?  Test using cheese, and see if a
10358 picture from the v4l device show up.</li>
10359
10360 <li>Is bluetooth working?  Use the Gnome/KDE browsing tool to see if
10361 any bluetooth devices are discovered.  In my office, I normally see a
10362 few.</li>
10363
10364 <li>For laptops, is the SD or Compaq Flash reader working.  I have
10365 memory modules lying around, and stick them in and see if Gnome/KDE
10366 notice this.</li>
10367
10368 <li>For laptops, is suspend/hibernate working?  I'm testing if the
10369 special button work, and if the laptop continue to work after
10370 resume.</li>
10371
10372 <li>For laptops, is the extra buttons working, like audio level,
10373 adjusting background light, switching on/off external video output,
10374 switching on/off wifi, bluetooth, etc?  The set of buttons differ from
10375 laptop to laptop, so I just write down which are working and which are
10376 not.</li>
10377
10378 <li>Some laptops have smart card readers, finger print readers,
10379 acceleration sensors etc.  I rarely test these, as I do not know how
10380 to quickly test if they are working or not, so I only document their
10381 existence.</li>
10382
10383 </ul>
10384
10385 <p>By now I suspect you are really curious what the test results are
10386 for the HP machines I am testing.  I'm not done yet, so I will report
10387 the test results later.  For now I can report that HP 8100 Elite work
10388 fine, and hibernation fail with HP EliteBook 8440p on Ubuntu Lucid,
10389 and audio fail on RHEL6.  Ubuntu Maverik worked with 8440p.  As you
10390 can see, I have most machines left to test.  One interesting
10391 observation is that Ubuntu Lucid has almost twice the frame rate than
10392 RHEL6 with glxgears.  No idea why.</p>
10393
10394       </div>
10395       <div class="tags">
10396
10397
10398         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>.
10399
10400
10401       </div>
10402     </div>
10403     <div class="padding"></div>
10404
10405     <div class="entry">
10406       <div class="title">
10407         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Some_thoughts_on_BitCoins.html">Some thoughts on BitCoins</a>
10408       </div>
10409       <div class="date">
10410         11th December 2010
10411       </div>
10412       <div class="body">
10413         <p>As I continue to explore
10414 <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>, I've starting to wonder
10415 what properties the system have, and how it will be affected by laws
10416 and regulations here in Norway.  Here are some random notes.</p>
10417
10418 <p>One interesting thing to note is that since the transactions are
10419 verified using a peer to peer network, all details about a transaction
10420 is known to everyone.  This means that if a BitCoin address has been
10421 published like I did with mine in my initial post about BitCoin, it is
10422 possible for everyone to see how many BitCoins have been transfered to
10423 that address.  There is even a web service to look at the details for
10424 all transactions.  There I can see that my address
10425 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a>
10426 have received 16.06 Bitcoin, the
10427 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3">1LfdGnGuWkpSJgbQySxxCWhv8MHqvwst3</a>
10428 address of Simon Phipps have received 181.97 BitCoin and the address
10429 <a href="http://blockexplorer.com/address/1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt">1MCwBbhNGp5hRm5rC1Aims2YFRe2SXPYKt</A>
10430 of EFF have received 2447.38 BitCoins so far.  Thank you to each and
10431 every one of you that donated bitcoins to support my activity. The
10432 fact that anyone can see how much money was transfered to a given
10433 address make it more obvious why the BitCoin community recommend to
10434 generate and hand out a new address for each transaction.  I'm told
10435 there is no way to track which addresses belong to a given person or
10436 organisation without the person or organisation revealing it
10437 themselves, as Simon, EFF and I have done.</p>
10438
10439 <p>In Norway, and in most other countries, there are laws and
10440 regulations limiting how much money one can transfer across the border
10441 without declaring it.  There are money laundering, tax and accounting
10442 laws and regulations I would expect to apply to the use of BitCoin.
10443 If the Skolelinux foundation
10444 (<a href="http://linuxiskolen.no/slxdebianlabs/donations.html">SLX
10445 Debian Labs</a>) were to accept donations in BitCoin in addition to
10446 normal bank transfers like EFF is doing, how should this be accounted?
10447 Given that it is impossible to know if money can cross the border or
10448 not, should everything or nothing be declared?  What exchange rate
10449 should be used when calculating taxes?  Would receivers have to pay
10450 income tax if the foundation were to pay Skolelinux contributors in
10451 BitCoin?  I have no idea, but it would be interesting to know.</p>
10452
10453 <p>For a currency to be useful and successful, it must be trusted and
10454 accepted by a lot of users.  It must be possible to get easy access to
10455 the currency (as a wage or using currency exchanges), and it must be
10456 easy to spend it.  At the moment BitCoin seem fairly easy to get
10457 access to, but there are very few places to spend it.  I am not really
10458 a regular user of any of the vendor types currently accepting BitCoin,
10459 so I wonder when my kind of shop would start accepting BitCoins.  I
10460 would like to buy electronics, travels and subway tickets, not herbs
10461 and books. :) The currency is young, and this will improve over time
10462 if it become popular, but I suspect regular banks will start to lobby
10463 to get BitCoin declared illegal if it become popular.  I'm sure they
10464 will claim it is helping fund terrorism and money laundering (which
10465 probably would be true, as is any currency in existence), but I
10466 believe the problems should be solved elsewhere and not by blaming
10467 currencies.</p>
10468
10469 <p>The process of creating new BitCoins is called mining, and it is
10470 CPU intensive process that depend on a bit of luck as well (as one is
10471 competing against all the other miners currently spending CPU cycles
10472 to see which one get the next lump of cash).  The "winner" get 50
10473 BitCoin when this happen.  Yesterday I came across the obvious way to
10474 join forces to increase ones changes of getting at least some coins,
10475 by coordinating the work on mining BitCoins across several machines
10476 and people, and sharing the result if one is lucky and get the 50
10477 BitCoins.  Check out
10478 <a href="http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/bitcoin-pool/">BitCoin Pool</a>
10479 if this sounds interesting.  I have not had time to try to set up a
10480 machine to participate there yet, but have seen that running on ones
10481 own for a few days have not yield any BitCoins througth mining
10482 yet.</p>
10483
10484 <p>Update 2010-12-15: Found an <a
10485 href="http://inertia.posterous.com/reply-to-the-underground-economist-why-bitcoi">interesting
10486 criticism</a> of bitcoin.  Not quite sure how valid it is, but thought
10487 it was interesting to read.  The arguments presented seem to be
10488 equally valid for gold, which was used as a currency for many years.</p>
10489
10490       </div>
10491       <div class="tags">
10492
10493
10494         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>.
10495
10496
10497       </div>
10498     </div>
10499     <div class="padding"></div>
10500
10501     <div class="entry">
10502       <div class="title">
10503         <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>
10504       </div>
10505       <div class="date">
10506         10th December 2010
10507       </div>
10508       <div class="body">
10509         <p>With this weeks lawless
10510 <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/06/wikileaks/index.html">governmental
10511 attacks</a> on Wikileak and
10512 <a href="http://www.salon.com/technology/dan_gillmor/2010/12/06/war_on_speech">free
10513 speech</a>, it has become obvious that PayPal, visa and mastercard can
10514 not be trusted to handle money transactions.
10515 A blog post from
10516 <a href="http://webmink.com/2010/12/06/now-accepting-bitcoin/">Simon
10517 Phipps on bitcoin</a> reminded me about a project that a friend of
10518 mine mentioned earlier.  I decided to follow Simon's example, and get
10519 involved with <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/">BitCoin</a>.  I got
10520 some help from my friend to get it all running, and he even handed me
10521 some bitcoins to get started.  I even donated a few bitcoins to Simon
10522 for helping me remember BitCoin.</p>
10523
10524 <p>So, what is bitcoins, you probably wonder?  It is a digital
10525 crypto-currency, decentralised and handled using peer-to-peer
10526 networks.  It allows anonymous transactions and prohibits central
10527 control over the transactions, making it impossible for governments
10528 and companies alike to block donations and other transactions.  The
10529 source is free software, and while the key dependency wxWidgets 2.9
10530 for the graphical user interface is missing in Debian, the command
10531 line client builds just fine.  Hopefully Jonas
10532 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/578157">will get the package into
10533 Debian</a> soon.</p>
10534
10535 <p>Bitcoins can be converted to other currencies, like USD and EUR.
10536 There are <a href="http://www.bitcoin.org/trade">companies accepting
10537 bitcoins</a> when selling services and goods, and there are even
10538 currency "stock" markets where the exchange rate is decided.  There
10539 are not many users so far, but the concept seems promising.  If you
10540 want to get started and lack a friend with any bitcoins to spare,
10541 you can even get
10542 <a href="https://freebitcoins.appspot.com/">some for free</a> (0.05
10543 bitcoin at the time of writing).  Use
10544 <a href="http://www.bitcoinwatch.com/">BitcoinWatch</a> to keep an eye
10545 on the current exchange rates.</p>
10546
10547 <p>As an experiment, I have decided to set up bitcoind on one of my
10548 machines.  If you want to support my activity, please send Bitcoin
10549 donations to the address
10550 <b>15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</b>.  Thank you!</p>
10551
10552       </div>
10553       <div class="tags">
10554
10555
10556         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>.
10557
10558
10559       </div>
10560     </div>
10561     <div class="padding"></div>
10562
10563     <div class="entry">
10564       <div class="title">
10565         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Why_isn_t_Debian_Edu_using_VLC_.html">Why isn't Debian Edu using VLC?</a>
10566       </div>
10567       <div class="date">
10568         27th November 2010
10569       </div>
10570       <div class="body">
10571         <p>In the latest issue of Linux Journal, the readers choices were
10572 presented, and the winner among the multimedia player were VLC.
10573 Personally, I like VLC, and it is my player of choice when I first try
10574 to play a video file or stream.  Only if VLC fail will I drag out
10575 gmplayer to see if it can do better.  The reason is mostly the failure
10576 model and trust.  When VLC fail, it normally pop up a error message
10577 reporting the problem.  When mplayer fail, it normally segfault or
10578 just hangs.  The latter failure mode drain my trust in the program.<p>
10579
10580 <p>But even if VLC is my player of choice, we have choosen to use
10581 mplayer in <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
10582 Edu/Skolelinux</a>.  The reason is simple.  We need a good browser
10583 plugin to play web videos seamlessly, and the VLC browser plugin is
10584 not very good.  For example, it lack in-line control buttons, so there
10585 is no way for the user to pause the video.  Also, when I
10586 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">last
10587 tested the browser plugins</a> available in Debian, the VLC plugin
10588 failed on several video pages where mplayer based plugins worked.  If
10589 the browser plugin for VLC was as good as the gecko-mediaplayer
10590 package (which uses mplayer), we would switch.</P>
10591
10592 <p>While VLC is a good player, its user interface is slightly
10593 annoying.  The most annoying feature is its inconsistent use of
10594 keyboard shortcuts.  When the player is in full screen mode, its
10595 shortcuts are different from when it is playing the video in a window.
10596 For example, space only work as pause when in full screen mode.  I
10597 wish it had consisten shortcuts and that space also would work when in
10598 window mode.  Another nice shortcut in gmplayer is [enter] to restart
10599 the current video.  It is very nice when playing short videos from the
10600 web and want to restart it when new people arrive to have a look at
10601 what is going on.</p>
10602
10603       </div>
10604       <div class="tags">
10605
10606
10607         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>.
10608
10609
10610       </div>
10611     </div>
10612     <div class="padding"></div>
10613
10614     <div class="entry">
10615       <div class="title">
10616         <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>
10617       </div>
10618       <div class="date">
10619         22nd November 2010
10620       </div>
10621       <div class="body">
10622         <p>Michael Biebl suggested to me on IRC, that I changed my automated
10623 upgrade testing of the
10624 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
10625 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a> to do <tt>apt-get autoremove</tt> when using apt-get.
10626 This seem like a very good idea, so I adjusted by test scripts and
10627 can now present the updated result from today:</p>
10628
10629 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
10630
10631 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10632
10633 <blockquote><p>
10634   apache2.2-bin
10635   aptdaemon
10636   baobab
10637   binfmt-support
10638   browser-plugin-gnash
10639   cheese-common
10640   cli-common
10641   cups-pk-helper
10642   dmz-cursor-theme
10643   empathy
10644   empathy-common
10645   freedesktop-sound-theme
10646   freeglut3
10647   gconf-defaults-service
10648   gdm-themes
10649   gedit-plugins
10650   geoclue
10651   geoclue-hostip
10652   geoclue-localnet
10653   geoclue-manual
10654   geoclue-yahoo
10655   gnash
10656   gnash-common
10657   gnome
10658   gnome-backgrounds
10659   gnome-cards-data
10660   gnome-codec-install
10661   gnome-core
10662   gnome-desktop-environment
10663   gnome-disk-utility
10664   gnome-screenshot
10665   gnome-search-tool
10666   gnome-session-canberra
10667   gnome-system-log
10668   gnome-themes-extras
10669   gnome-themes-more
10670   gnome-user-share
10671   gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
10672   gstreamer0.10-tools
10673   gtk2-engines
10674   gtk2-engines-pixbuf
10675   gtk2-engines-smooth
10676   hamster-applet
10677   libapache2-mod-dnssd
10678   libapr1
10679   libaprutil1
10680   libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3
10681   libaprutil1-ldap
10682   libart2.0-cil
10683   libboost-date-time1.42.0
10684   libboost-python1.42.0
10685   libboost-thread1.42.0
10686   libchamplain-0.4-0
10687   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0
10688   libcheese-gtk18
10689   libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
10690   libcryptui0
10691   libdiscid0
10692   libelf1
10693   libepc-1.0-2
10694   libepc-common
10695   libepc-ui-1.0-2
10696   libfreerdp-plugins-standard
10697   libfreerdp0
10698   libgconf2.0-cil
10699   libgdata-common
10700   libgdata7
10701   libgdu-gtk0
10702   libgee2
10703   libgeoclue0
10704   libgexiv2-0
10705   libgif4
10706   libglade2.0-cil
10707   libglib2.0-cil
10708   libgmime2.4-cil
10709   libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
10710   libgnome2.24-cil
10711   libgnomepanel2.24-cil
10712   libgpod-common
10713   libgpod4
10714   libgtk2.0-cil
10715   libgtkglext1
10716   libgtksourceview2.0-common
10717   libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
10718   libmono-addins0.2-cil
10719   libmono-cairo2.0-cil
10720   libmono-corlib2.0-cil
10721   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil
10722   libmono-posix2.0-cil
10723   libmono-security2.0-cil
10724   libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
10725   libmono-system2.0-cil
10726   libmtp8
10727   libmusicbrainz3-6
10728   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil
10729   libndesk-dbus1.0-cil
10730   libopal3.6.8
10731   libpolkit-gtk-1-0
10732   libpt2.6.7
10733   libpython2.6
10734   librpm1
10735   librpmio1
10736   libsdl1.2debian
10737   libsrtp0
10738   libssh-4
10739   libtelepathy-farsight0
10740   libtelepathy-glib0
10741   libtidy-0.99-0
10742   media-player-info
10743   mesa-utils
10744   mono-2.0-gac
10745   mono-gac
10746   mono-runtime
10747   nautilus-sendto
10748   nautilus-sendto-empathy
10749   p7zip-full
10750   pkg-config
10751   python-aptdaemon
10752   python-aptdaemon-gtk
10753   python-axiom
10754   python-beautifulsoup
10755   python-bugbuddy
10756   python-clientform
10757   python-coherence
10758   python-configobj
10759   python-crypto
10760   python-cupshelpers
10761   python-elementtree
10762   python-epsilon
10763   python-evolution
10764   python-feedparser
10765   python-gdata
10766   python-gdbm
10767   python-gst0.10
10768   python-gtkglext1
10769   python-gtksourceview2
10770   python-httplib2
10771   python-louie
10772   python-mako
10773   python-markupsafe
10774   python-mechanize
10775   python-nevow
10776   python-notify
10777   python-opengl
10778   python-openssl
10779   python-pam
10780   python-pkg-resources
10781   python-pyasn1
10782   python-pysqlite2
10783   python-rdflib
10784   python-serial
10785   python-tagpy
10786   python-twisted-bin
10787   python-twisted-conch
10788   python-twisted-core
10789   python-twisted-web
10790   python-utidylib
10791   python-webkit
10792   python-xdg
10793   python-zope.interface
10794   remmina
10795   remmina-plugin-data
10796   remmina-plugin-rdp
10797   remmina-plugin-vnc
10798   rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
10799   rhythmbox-plugins
10800   rpm-common
10801   rpm2cpio
10802   seahorse-plugins
10803   shotwell
10804   software-center
10805   system-config-printer-udev
10806   telepathy-gabble
10807   telepathy-mission-control-5
10808   telepathy-salut
10809   tomboy
10810   totem
10811   totem-coherence
10812   totem-mozilla
10813   totem-plugins
10814   transmission-common
10815   xdg-user-dirs
10816   xdg-user-dirs-gtk
10817   xserver-xephyr
10818 </p></blockquote>
10819
10820 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10821
10822 <blockquote><p>
10823   cheese
10824   ekiga
10825   eog
10826   epiphany-extensions
10827   evolution-exchange
10828   fast-user-switch-applet
10829   file-roller
10830   gcalctool
10831   gconf-editor
10832   gdm
10833   gedit
10834   gedit-common
10835   gnome-games
10836   gnome-games-data
10837   gnome-nettool
10838   gnome-system-tools
10839   gnome-themes
10840   gnuchess
10841   gucharmap
10842   guile-1.8-libs
10843   libavahi-ui0
10844   libdmx1
10845   libgalago3
10846   libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
10847   libgtksourceview2.0-0
10848   liblircclient0
10849   libsdl1.2debian-alsa
10850   libspeexdsp1
10851   libsvga1
10852   rhythmbox
10853   seahorse
10854   sound-juicer
10855   system-config-printer
10856   totem-common
10857   transmission-gtk
10858   vinagre
10859   vino
10860 </p></blockquote>
10861
10862 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10863
10864 <blockquote><p>
10865   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
10866 </p></blockquote>
10867
10868 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10869
10870 <blockquote><p>
10871 [nothing]
10872 </p></blockquote>
10873
10874 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
10875
10876 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
10877
10878 <blockquote><p>
10879   ksmserver
10880 </p></blockquote>
10881
10882 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
10883
10884 <blockquote><p>
10885   kwin
10886   network-manager-kde
10887 </p></blockquote>
10888
10889 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
10890
10891 <blockquote><p>
10892   arts
10893   dolphin
10894   freespacenotifier
10895   google-gadgets-gst
10896   google-gadgets-xul
10897   kappfinder
10898   kcalc
10899   kcharselect
10900   kde-core
10901   kde-plasma-desktop
10902   kde-standard
10903   kde-window-manager
10904   kdeartwork
10905   kdeartwork-emoticons
10906   kdeartwork-style
10907   kdeartwork-theme-icon
10908   kdebase
10909   kdebase-apps
10910   kdebase-workspace
10911   kdebase-workspace-bin
10912   kdebase-workspace-data
10913   kdeeject
10914   kdelibs
10915   kdeplasma-addons
10916   kdeutils
10917   kdewallpapers
10918   kdf
10919   kfloppy
10920   kgpg
10921   khelpcenter4
10922   kinfocenter
10923   konq-plugins-l10n
10924   konqueror-nsplugins
10925   kscreensaver
10926   kscreensaver-xsavers
10927   ktimer
10928   kwrite
10929   libgle3
10930   libkde4-ruby1.8
10931   libkonq5
10932   libkonq5-templates
10933   libnetpbm10
10934   libplasma-ruby
10935   libplasma-ruby1.8
10936   libqt4-ruby1.8
10937   marble-data
10938   marble-plugins
10939   netpbm
10940   nuvola-icon-theme
10941   plasma-dataengines-workspace
10942   plasma-desktop
10943   plasma-desktopthemes-artwork
10944   plasma-runners-addons
10945   plasma-scriptengine-googlegadgets
10946   plasma-scriptengine-python
10947   plasma-scriptengine-qedje
10948   plasma-scriptengine-ruby
10949   plasma-scriptengine-webkit
10950   plasma-scriptengines
10951   plasma-wallpapers-addons
10952   plasma-widget-folderview
10953   plasma-widget-networkmanagement
10954   ruby
10955   sweeper
10956   update-notifier-kde
10957   xscreensaver-data-extra
10958   xscreensaver-gl
10959   xscreensaver-gl-extra
10960   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
10961 </p></blockquote>
10962
10963 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
10964
10965 <blockquote><p>
10966   ark
10967   google-gadgets-common
10968   google-gadgets-qt
10969   htdig
10970   kate
10971   kdebase-bin
10972   kdebase-data
10973   kdepasswd
10974   kfind
10975   klipper
10976   konq-plugins
10977   konqueror
10978   ksysguard
10979   ksysguardd
10980   libarchive1
10981   libcln6
10982   libeet1
10983   libeina-svn-06
10984   libggadget-1.0-0b
10985   libggadget-qt-1.0-0b
10986   libgps19
10987   libkdecorations4
10988   libkephal4
10989   libkonq4
10990   libkonqsidebarplugin4a
10991   libkscreensaver5
10992   libksgrd4
10993   libksignalplotter4
10994   libkunitconversion4
10995   libkwineffects1a
10996   libmarblewidget4
10997   libntrack-qt4-1
10998   libntrack0
10999   libplasma-geolocation-interface4
11000   libplasmaclock4a
11001   libplasmagenericshell4
11002   libprocesscore4a
11003   libprocessui4a
11004   libqalculate5
11005   libqedje0a
11006   libqtruby4shared2
11007   libqzion0a
11008   libruby1.8
11009   libscim8c2a
11010   libsmokekdecore4-3
11011   libsmokekdeui4-3
11012   libsmokekfile3
11013   libsmokekhtml3
11014   libsmokekio3
11015   libsmokeknewstuff2-3
11016   libsmokeknewstuff3-3
11017   libsmokekparts3
11018   libsmokektexteditor3
11019   libsmokekutils3
11020   libsmokenepomuk3
11021   libsmokephonon3
11022   libsmokeplasma3
11023   libsmokeqtcore4-3
11024   libsmokeqtdbus4-3
11025   libsmokeqtgui4-3
11026   libsmokeqtnetwork4-3
11027   libsmokeqtopengl4-3
11028   libsmokeqtscript4-3
11029   libsmokeqtsql4-3
11030   libsmokeqtsvg4-3
11031   libsmokeqttest4-3
11032   libsmokeqtuitools4-3
11033   libsmokeqtwebkit4-3
11034   libsmokeqtxml4-3
11035   libsmokesolid3
11036   libsmokesoprano3
11037   libtaskmanager4a
11038   libtidy-0.99-0
11039   libweather-ion4a
11040   libxklavier16
11041   libxxf86misc1
11042   okteta
11043   oxygencursors
11044   plasma-dataengines-addons
11045   plasma-scriptengine-superkaramba
11046   plasma-widget-lancelot
11047   plasma-widgets-addons
11048   plasma-widgets-workspace
11049   polkit-kde-1
11050   ruby1.8
11051   systemsettings
11052   update-notifier-common
11053 </p></blockquote>
11054
11055 <p>Running apt-get autoremove made the results using apt-get and
11056 aptitude a bit more similar, but there are still quite a lott of
11057 differences.  I have no idea what packages should be installed after
11058 the upgrade, but hope those that do can have a look.</p>
11059
11060       </div>
11061       <div class="tags">
11062
11063
11064         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>.
11065
11066
11067       </div>
11068     </div>
11069     <div class="padding"></div>
11070
11071     <div class="entry">
11072       <div class="title">
11073         <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>
11074       </div>
11075       <div class="date">
11076         22nd November 2010
11077       </div>
11078       <div class="body">
11079         <p>Most of the computers in use by the
11080 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux project</a>
11081 are virtual machines.  And they have been Xen machines running on a
11082 fairly old IBM eserver xseries 345 machine, and we wanted to migrate
11083 them to KVM on a newer Dell PowerEdge 2950 host machine.  This was a
11084 bit harder that it could have been, because we set up the Xen virtual
11085 machines to get the virtual partitions from LVM, which as far as I
11086 know is not supported by KVM.  So to migrate, we had to convert
11087 several LVM logical volumes to partitions on a virtual disk file.</p>
11088
11089 <p>I found
11090 <a href="http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM">a
11091 nice recipe</a> to do this, and wrote the following script to do the
11092 migration.  It uses qemu-img from the qemu package to make the disk
11093 image, parted to partition it, losetup and kpartx to present the disk
11094 image partions as devices, and dd to copy the data.  I NFS mounted the
11095 new servers storage area on the old server to do the migration.</p>
11096
11097 <pre>
11098 #!/bin/sh
11099
11100 # Based on
11101 # http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com.au/articles/35011-Six-steps-for-migrating-Xen-virtual-machines-to-KVM
11102
11103 set -e
11104 set -x
11105
11106 if [ -z "$1" ] ; then
11107     echo "Usage: $0 &lt;hostname&gt;"
11108     exit 1
11109 else
11110     host="$1"
11111 fi
11112
11113 if [ ! -e /dev/vg_data/$host-disk ] ; then
11114     echo "error: unable to find LVM volume for $host"
11115     exit 1
11116 fi
11117
11118 # Partitions need to be a bit bigger than the LVM LVs.  not sure why.
11119 disksize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-disk | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
11120 swapsize=$( lvs --units m | grep $host-swap | awk '{sum = sum + $4} END { print int(sum * 1.05) }')
11121 totalsize=$(( ( $disksize + $swapsize ) ))
11122
11123 img=$host.img
11124 #dd if=/dev/zero of=$img bs=1M count=$(( $disksize + $swapsize ))
11125 qemu-img create $img ${totalsize}MMaking room on the Debian Edu/Sqeeze DVD
11126
11127 parted $img mklabel msdos
11128 parted $img mkpart primary linux-swap 0 $disksize
11129 parted $img mkpart primary ext2 $disksize $totalsize
11130 parted $img set 1 boot on
11131
11132 modprobe dm-mod
11133 losetup /dev/loop0 $img
11134 kpartx -a /dev/loop0
11135
11136 dd if=/dev/vg_data/$host-disk of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 bs=1M
11137 fsck.ext3 -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 || true
11138 mkswap /dev/mapper/loop0p2
11139
11140 kpartx -d /dev/loop0
11141 losetup -d /dev/loop0
11142 </pre>
11143
11144 <p>The script is perhaps so simple that it is not copyrightable, but
11145 if it is, it is licenced using GPL v2 or later at your discretion.</p>
11146
11147 <p>After doing this, I booted a Debian CD in rescue mode in KVM with
11148 the new disk image attached, installed grub-pc and linux-image-686 and
11149 set up grub to boot from the disk image.  After this, the KVM machines
11150 seem to work just fine.</p>
11151
11152       </div>
11153       <div class="tags">
11154
11155
11156         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>.
11157
11158
11159       </div>
11160     </div>
11161     <div class="padding"></div>
11162
11163     <div class="entry">
11164       <div class="title">
11165         <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>
11166       </div>
11167       <div class="date">
11168         20th November 2010
11169       </div>
11170       <div class="body">
11171         <p>I'm still running upgrade testing of the
11172 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">Lenny
11173 Gnome and KDE Desktop</a>, but have not had time to spend on reporting the
11174 status.  Here is a short update based on a test I ran 20101118.</p>
11175
11176 <p>I still do not know what a correct migration should look like, so I
11177 report any differences between apt and aptitude and hope someone else
11178 can see if anything should be changed.</p>
11179
11180 <p>This is for Gnome:</p>
11181
11182 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
11183
11184 <blockquote><p>
11185   apache2.2-bin aptdaemon at-spi baobab binfmt-support
11186   browser-plugin-gnash cheese-common cli-common cpp-4.3 cups-pk-helper
11187   dmz-cursor-theme empathy empathy-common finger
11188   freedesktop-sound-theme freeglut3 gconf-defaults-service gdm-themes
11189   gedit-plugins geoclue geoclue-hostip geoclue-localnet geoclue-manual
11190   geoclue-yahoo gnash gnash-common gnome gnome-backgrounds
11191   gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-core
11192   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-disk-utility gnome-screenshot
11193   gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-spell
11194   gnome-system-log gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more
11195   gnome-user-share gs-common gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3
11196   gstreamer0.10-tools gtk2-engines gtk2-engines-pixbuf
11197   gtk2-engines-smooth hal-info hamster-applet libapache2-mod-dnssd
11198   libapr1 libaprutil1 libaprutil1-dbd-sqlite3 libaprutil1-ldap
11199   libart2.0-cil libatspi1.0-0 libboost-date-time1.42.0
11200   libboost-python1.42.0 libboost-thread1.42.0 libchamplain-0.4-0
11201   libchamplain-gtk-0.4-0 libcheese-gtk18 libclutter-gtk-0.10-0
11202   libcryptui0 libcupsys2 libdiscid0 libeel2-data libelf1 libepc-1.0-2
11203   libepc-common libepc-ui-1.0-2 libfreerdp-plugins-standard
11204   libfreerdp0 libgail-common libgconf2.0-cil libgdata-common libgdata7
11205   libgdl-1-common libgdu-gtk0 libgee2 libgeoclue0 libgexiv2-0 libgif4
11206   libglade2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil
11207   libgnome2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomeprint2.2-data
11208   libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod-common libgpod4
11209   libgtk2.0-cil libgtkglext1 libgtksourceview-common
11210   libgtksourceview2.0-common libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil
11211   libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-cairo2.0-cil libmono-corlib2.0-cil
11212   libmono-i18n-west2.0-cil libmono-posix2.0-cil
11213   libmono-security2.0-cil libmono-sharpzip2.84-cil
11214   libmono-system2.0-cil libmtp8 libmusicbrainz3-6
11215   libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libopal3.6.8
11216   libpolkit-gtk-1-0 libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
11217   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libpt2.6.7 libpython2.6 librpm1 librpmio1
11218   libsdl1.2debian libservlet2.4-java libsrtp0 libssh-4
11219   libtelepathy-farsight0 libtelepathy-glib0 libtidy-0.99-0
11220   libxalan2-java libxerces2-java media-player-info mesa-utils
11221   mono-2.0-gac mono-gac mono-runtime nautilus-sendto
11222   nautilus-sendto-empathy openoffice.org-writer2latex
11223   openssl-blacklist p7zip p7zip-full pkg-config python-4suite-xml
11224   python-aptdaemon python-aptdaemon-gtk python-axiom
11225   python-beautifulsoup python-bugbuddy python-clientform
11226   python-coherence python-configobj python-crypto python-cupshelpers
11227   python-cupsutils python-eggtrayicon python-elementtree
11228   python-epsilon python-evolution python-feedparser python-gdata
11229   python-gdbm python-gst0.10 python-gtkglext1 python-gtkmozembed
11230   python-gtksourceview2 python-httplib2 python-louie python-mako
11231   python-markupsafe python-mechanize python-nevow python-notify
11232   python-opengl python-openssl python-pam python-pkg-resources
11233   python-pyasn1 python-pysqlite2 python-rdflib python-serial
11234   python-tagpy python-twisted-bin python-twisted-conch
11235   python-twisted-core python-twisted-web python-utidylib python-webkit
11236   python-xdg python-zope.interface remmina remmina-plugin-data
11237   remmina-plugin-rdp remmina-plugin-vnc rhythmbox-plugin-cdrecorder
11238   rhythmbox-plugins rpm-common rpm2cpio seahorse-plugins shotwell
11239   software-center svgalibg1 system-config-printer-udev
11240   telepathy-gabble telepathy-mission-control-5 telepathy-salut tomboy
11241   totem totem-coherence totem-mozilla totem-plugins
11242   transmission-common xdg-user-dirs xdg-user-dirs-gtk xserver-xephyr
11243   zip
11244 </p></blockquote>
11245
11246 Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude
11247
11248 <blockquote><p>
11249   arj bluez-utils cheese dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop ekiga eog
11250   epiphany-extensions epiphany-gecko evolution-exchange
11251   fast-user-switch-applet file-roller gcalctool gconf-editor gdm gedit
11252   gedit-common gnome-app-install gnome-games gnome-games-data
11253   gnome-nettool gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-utils
11254   gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager gnuchess gucharmap
11255   guile-1.8-libs hal libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5
11256   libavahi-ui0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7
11257   libcucul0 libcurl3 libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdmx1 libdvdread3
11258   libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1
11259   libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3 libfaad0 libgadu3
11260   libgalago3 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
11261   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
11262   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
11263   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtk-vnc-1.0-0
11264   libgtkhtml2-0 libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgtksourceview2.0-0
11265   libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
11266   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libkpathsea4 liblircclient0 libltdl3 liblwres50
11267   libmagick++10 libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmozjs1d libmpfr1ldbl libmtp7
11268   libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0
11269   libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpisock9
11270   libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8
11271   libsdl1.2debian-alsa libsensors3 libsexy2 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
11272   libspeexdsp1 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libsvga1
11273   libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0
11274   libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12
11275   libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common rhythmbox seahorse
11276   sound-juicer swfdec-gnome system-config-printer totem-common
11277   totem-gstreamer transmission-gtk vinagre vino w3c-dtd-xhtml wodim
11278 </p></blockquote>
11279
11280 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
11281
11282 <blockquote><p>
11283   gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
11284 </p></blockquote>
11285
11286 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
11287
11288 <blockquote><p>
11289 [nothing]
11290 </p></blockquote>
11291
11292 <p>This is for KDE:</p>
11293
11294 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
11295
11296 <blockquote><p>
11297   autopoint bomber bovo cantor cantor-backend-kalgebra cpp-4.3 dcoprss
11298   edict espeak espeak-data eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
11299   ghostscript-x git gnome-audio gnugo granatier gs-common
11300   gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio indi kaddressbook-plugins kalgebra
11301   kalzium-data kanjidic kapman kate-plugins kblocks kbreakout kbstate
11302   kde-icons-mono kdeaccessibility kdeaddons-kfile-plugins
11303   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
11304   kdeedu kdeedu-data kdeedu-kvtml-data kdegames kdegames-card-data
11305   kdegames-mahjongg-data kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc
11306   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
11307   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdessh kdetoys kdewebdev
11308   kdiamond kdnssd kfilereplace kfourinline kgeography-data kigo
11309   killbots kiriki klettres-data kmoon kmrml knewsticker-scripts
11310   kollision kpf krosspython ksirk ksmserver ksquares kstars-data
11311   ksudoku kubrick kweather libasound2-plugins libboost-python1.42.0
11312   libcfitsio3 libconvert-binhex-perl libcrypt-ssleay-perl libdb4.6++
11313   libdjvulibre-text libdotconf1.0 liberror-perl libespeak1
11314   libfinance-quote-perl libgail-common libgsl0ldbl libhtml-parser-perl
11315   libhtml-tableextract-perl libhtml-tagset-perl libhtml-tree-perl
11316   libio-stringy-perl libkdeedu4 libkdegames5 libkiten4 libkpathsea5
11317   libkrossui4 libmailtools-perl libmime-tools-perl
11318   libnews-nntpclient-perl libopenbabel3 libportaudio2 libpulse-browse0
11319   libservlet2.4-java libspeechd2 libtiff-tools libtimedate-perl
11320   libunistring0 liburi-perl libwww-perl libxalan2-java libxerces2-java
11321   lirc luatex marble networkstatus noatun-plugins
11322   openoffice.org-writer2latex palapeli palapeli-data parley
11323   parley-data poster psutils pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat
11324   pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils quanta-data rocs rsync
11325   speech-dispatcher step svgalibg1 texlive-binaries texlive-luatex
11326   ttf-sazanami-gothic
11327 </p></blockquote>
11328
11329 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
11330
11331 <blockquote><p>
11332   amor artsbuilder atlantik atlantikdesigner blinken bluez-utils cvs
11333   dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop imlib-base imlib11 kalzium kanagram kandy
11334   kasteroids katomic kbackgammon kbattleship kblackbox kbounce kbruch
11335   kcron kdat kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data kdeprint kdict kdvi kedit
11336   keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs kgeography kghostview
11337   kgoldrunner khangman khexedit kiconedit kig kimagemapeditor
11338   kitchensync kiten kjumpingcube klatin klettres klickety klines
11339   klinkstatus kmag kmahjongg kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmines
11340   kmousetool kmouth kmplot knetwalk kodo kolf kommander konquest kooka
11341   kpager kpat kpdf kpercentage kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler krec
11342   kregexpeditor kreversi ksame ksayit kshisen ksig ksim ksirc ksirtet
11343   ksmiletris ksnake ksokoban kspaceduel kstars ksvg ksysv kteatime
11344   ktip ktnef ktouch ktron kttsd ktuberling kturtle ktux kuickshow
11345   kverbos kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kwordquiz
11346   kworldclock kxsldbg libakode2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
11347   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
11348   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libbind9-50 libbluetooth2
11349   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0
11350   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
11351   libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0 libicu38
11352   libiec61883-0 libindex0 libisccc50 libisccfg50 libiw29
11353   libjaxp1.3-java-gcj libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1 libkdeedu3
11354   libkdegames1 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
11355   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
11356   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick10
11357   libmimelib1c2a libmodplug0c2 libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libmpfr1ldbl
11358   libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9 libpoppler-glib3
11359   libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 librss1 libsensors3
11360   libsmbios2 libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90
11361   libtalloc1 libxalan2-java-gcj libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 lskat
11362   mpeglib network-manager-kde noatun pmount tex-common texlive-base
11363   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended tidy
11364   ttf-dustin ttf-kochi-gothic ttf-sjfonts
11365 </p></blockquote>
11366
11367 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
11368
11369 <blockquote><p>
11370   dolphin kde-core kde-plasma-desktop kde-standard kde-window-manager
11371   kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-apps kdebase-workspace
11372   kdebase-workspace-bin kdebase-workspace-data kdeutils kscreensaver
11373   kscreensaver-xsavers libgle3 libkonq5 libkonq5-templates libnetpbm10
11374   netpbm plasma-widget-folderview plasma-widget-networkmanagement
11375   xscreensaver-data-extra xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra
11376   xscreensaver-screensaver-bsod
11377 </p></blockquote>
11378
11379 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
11380
11381 <blockquote><p>
11382   kdebase-bin konq-plugins konqueror
11383 </p></blockquote>
11384
11385       </div>
11386       <div class="tags">
11387
11388
11389         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>.
11390
11391
11392       </div>
11393     </div>
11394     <div class="padding"></div>
11395
11396     <div class="entry">
11397       <div class="title">
11398         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Gnash_buildbot_slave_and_Debian_kfreebsd.html">Gnash buildbot slave and Debian kfreebsd</a>
11399       </div>
11400       <div class="date">
11401         20th November 2010
11402       </div>
11403       <div class="body">
11404         <p>Answering
11405 <a href="http://www.listware.net/201011/gnash-dev/67431-gnash-dev-buildbot-looking-for-slaves.html">the
11406 call from the Gnash project</a> for
11407 <a href="http://www.gnashdev.org:8010">buildbot</a> slaves to test the
11408 current source, I have set up a virtual KVM machine on the Debian
11409 Edu/Skolelinux virtualization host to test the git source on
11410 Debian/Squeeze.  I hope this can help the developers in getting new
11411 releases out more often.</p>
11412
11413 <p>As the developers want less main-stream build platforms tested to,
11414 I have considered setting up a <a
11415 href="http://www.debian.org/ports/kfreebsd-gnu/">Debian/kfreebsd</a>
11416 machine as well.  I have also considered using the kfreebsd
11417 architecture in Debian as a file server in NUUG to get access to the 5
11418 TB zfs volume we currently use to store DV video.  Because of this, I
11419 finally got around to do a test installation of Debian/Squeeze with
11420 kfreebsd.  Installation went fairly smooth, thought I noticed some
11421 visual glitches in the cdebconf dialogs (black cursor left on the
11422 screen at random locations).  Have not gotten very far with the
11423 testing.  Noticed cfdisk did not work, but fdisk did so it was not a
11424 fatal problem.  Have to spend some more time on it to see if it is
11425 useful as a file server for NUUG.  Will try to find time to set up a
11426 gnash buildbot slave on the Debian Edu/Skolelinux this weekend.</p>
11427
11428       </div>
11429       <div class="tags">
11430
11431
11432         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>.
11433
11434
11435       </div>
11436     </div>
11437     <div class="padding"></div>
11438
11439     <div class="entry">
11440       <div class="title">
11441         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_in_3D.html">Debian in 3D</a>
11442       </div>
11443       <div class="date">
11444          9th November 2010
11445       </div>
11446       <div class="body">
11447         <p><img src="http://thingiverse-production.s3.amazonaws.com/renders/23/e0/c4/f9/2b/debswagtdose_preview_medium.jpg"></p>
11448
11449 <p>3D printing is just great.  I just came across this Debian logo in
11450 3D linked in from
11451 <a href="http://blog.thingiverse.com/2010/11/09/participatory-branding/">the
11452 thingiverse blog</a>.</p>
11453
11454       </div>
11455       <div class="tags">
11456
11457
11458         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>.
11459
11460
11461       </div>
11462     </div>
11463     <div class="padding"></div>
11464
11465     <div class="entry">
11466       <div class="title">
11467         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Software_updates_2010_10_24.html">Software updates 2010-10-24</a>
11468       </div>
11469       <div class="date">
11470         24th October 2010
11471       </div>
11472       <div class="body">
11473         <p>Some updates.</p>
11474
11475 <p>My <a href="http://pledgebank.com/gnash-avm2">gnash pledge</a> to
11476 raise money for the project is going well.  The lower limit of 10
11477 signers was reached in 24 hours, and so far 13 people have signed it.
11478 More signers and more funding is most welcome, and I am really curious
11479 how far we can get before the time limit of December 24 is reached.
11480 :)</p>
11481
11482 <p>On the #gnash IRC channel on irc.freenode.net, I was just tipped
11483 about what appear to be a great code coverage tool capable of
11484 generating code coverage stats without any changes to the source code.
11485 It is called
11486 <a href="http://simonkagstrom.github.com/kcov/index.html">kcov</a>,
11487 and can be used using <tt>kcov &lt;directory&gt; &lt;binary&gt;</tt>.
11488 It is missing in Debian, but the git source built just fine in Squeeze
11489 after I installed libelf-dev, libdwarf-dev, pkg-config and
11490 libglib2.0-dev.  Failed to build in Lenny, but suspect that is
11491 solvable.  I hope kcov make it into Debian soon.</p>
11492
11493 <p>Finally found time to wrap up the release notes for <a
11494 href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu-announce/2010/10/msg00002.html">a
11495 new alpha release of Debian Edu</a>, and just published the second
11496 alpha test release of the Squeeze based Debian Edu /
11497 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a>
11498 release.  Give it a try if you need a complete linux solution for your
11499 school, including central infrastructure server, workstations, thin
11500 client servers and diskless workstations.  A nice touch added
11501 yesterday is RDP support on the thin client servers, for windows
11502 clients to get a Linux desktop on request.</p>
11503
11504       </div>
11505       <div class="tags">
11506
11507
11508         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>.
11509
11510
11511       </div>
11512     </div>
11513     <div class="padding"></div>
11514
11515     <div class="entry">
11516       <div class="title">
11517         <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>
11518       </div>
11519       <div class="date">
11520          4th September 2010
11521       </div>
11522       <div class="body">
11523         <p>In the <a href="http://popcon.debian.org/unknown/by_vote">Debian
11524 popularity-contest numbers</a>, the adobe-flashplugin package the
11525 second most popular used package that is missing in Debian.  The sixth
11526 most popular is flashplayer-mozilla.  This is a clear indication that
11527 working flash is important for Debian users.  Around 10 percent of the
11528 users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package
11529 installed.</p>
11530
11531 <p>In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008
11532 («<a href="http://wiki.skolelinux.no/Dokumentasjon/Rapporter?action=AttachFile&do=view&target=Skolelinux_i_bruk_rapport_1.0.pdf">Skolelinux
11533 i bruk – Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og
11534 stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs</a>»), one of the most important problems
11535 schools experienced with <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian
11536 Edu/Skolelinux</a> was the lack of working Flash.  A lot of educational
11537 web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in
11538 the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a
11539 good reason to stay with Windows.</p>
11540
11541 <p>I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was
11542 said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand
11543 everything you told him but could work fairly well.  This was a
11544 comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and
11545 non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common
11546 understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for
11547 example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because
11548 it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux
11549 distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web
11550 pages they want to visit.</p>
11551
11552 <p>This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian
11553 and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the
11554 distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google
11555 Video to working out of the box.  For Squeeze, Debian have the chance
11556 to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as
11557 the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in
11558 unstable.  The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7.
11559 The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the
11560 release team have not had time to reply to it yet.  I hope they agree
11561 with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus
11562 accept the new package into Squeeze.</p>
11563
11564       </div>
11565       <div class="tags">
11566
11567
11568         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>.
11569
11570
11571       </div>
11572     </div>
11573     <div class="padding"></div>
11574
11575     <div class="entry">
11576       <div class="title">
11577         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Circular_package_dependencies_harms_apt_recovery.html">Circular package dependencies harms apt recovery</a>
11578       </div>
11579       <div class="date">
11580         27th July 2010
11581       </div>
11582       <div class="body">
11583         <p>I discovered this while doing
11584 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">automated
11585 testing of upgrades from Debian Lenny to Squeeze</a>.  A few packages
11586 in Debian still got circular dependencies, and it is often claimed
11587 that apt and aptitude should be able to handle this just fine, but
11588 some times these dependency loops causes apt to fail.</p>
11589
11590 <p>An example is from todays
11591 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing//test-20100727-lenny-squeeze-kde-aptitude.txt">upgrade
11592 of KDE using aptitude</a>.  In it, a bug in kdebase-workspace-data
11593 causes perl-modules to fail to upgrade.  The cause is simple.  If a
11594 package fail to unpack, then only part of packages with the circular
11595 dependency might end up being unpacked when unpacking aborts, and the
11596 ones already unpacked will fail to configure in the recovery phase
11597 because its dependencies are unavailable.</p>
11598
11599 <p>In this log, the problem manifest itself with this error:</p>
11600
11601 <blockquote><pre>
11602 dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of perl-modules:
11603  perl-modules depends on perl (>= 5.10.1-1); however:
11604   Version of perl on system is 5.10.0-19lenny2.
11605 dpkg: error processing perl-modules (--configure):
11606  dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
11607 </pre></blockquote>
11608
11609 <p>The perl/perl-modules circular dependency is already
11610 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/527917">reported as a bug</a>, and will
11611 hopefully be solved as soon as possible, but it is not the only one,
11612 and each one of these loops in the dependency tree can cause similar
11613 failures.  Of course, they only occur when there are bugs in other
11614 packages causing the unpacking to fail, but it is rather nasty when
11615 the failure of one package causes the problem to become worse because
11616 of dependency loops.</p>
11617
11618 <p>Thanks to
11619 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/06/msg00116.html">the
11620 tireless effort by Bill Allombert</a>, the number of circular
11621 dependencies
11622 <a href="http://debian.semistable.com/debgraph.out.html">left in Debian
11623 is dropping</a>, and perhaps it will reach zero one day. :)</p>
11624
11625 <p>Todays testing also exposed a bug in
11626 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590605">update-notifier</a> and
11627 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/590604">different behaviour</a> between
11628 apt-get and aptitude, the latter possibly caused by some circular
11629 dependency.  Reported both to BTS to try to get someone to look at
11630 it.</p>
11631
11632       </div>
11633       <div class="tags">
11634
11635
11636         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>.
11637
11638
11639       </div>
11640     </div>
11641     <div class="padding"></div>
11642
11643     <div class="entry">
11644       <div class="title">
11645         <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>
11646       </div>
11647       <div class="date">
11648         17th July 2010
11649       </div>
11650       <div class="body">
11651         <p>This is a
11652 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">followup</a>
11653 on my
11654 <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
11655 work</a> on
11656 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">merging
11657 all</a> the computer related LDAP objects in Debian Edu.</p>
11658
11659 <p>As a step to try to see if it possible to merge the DNS and DHCP
11660 LDAP objects, I have had a look at how the packages pdns-backend-ldap
11661 and dhcp3-server-ldap in Debian use the LDAP server.  The two
11662 implementations are quite different in how they use LDAP.</p>
11663
11664 To get this information, I started slapd with debugging enabled and
11665 dumped the debug output to a file to get the LDAP searches performed
11666 on a Debian Edu main-server.  Here is a summary.
11667
11668 <p><strong>powerdns</strong></p>
11669
11670 <a href="http://www.linuxnetworks.de/doc/index.php/PowerDNS_LDAP_Backend">Clues
11671 on how to</a> set up PowerDNS to use a LDAP backend is available on
11672 the web.
11673
11674 <p>PowerDNS have two modes of operation using LDAP as its backend.
11675 One "strict" mode where the forward and reverse DNS lookups are done
11676 using the same LDAP objects, and a "tree" mode where the forward and
11677 reverse entries are in two different subtrees in LDAP with a structure
11678 based on the DNS names, as in tjener.intern and
11679 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa.</p>
11680
11681 <p>In tree mode, the server is set up to use a LDAP subtree as its
11682 base, and uses a "base" scoped search for the DNS name by adding
11683 "dc=tjener,dc=intern," to the base with a filter for
11684 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" for the forward entry and
11685 "dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa," with a filter for
11686 "(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)" for the reverse entry.  For
11687 forward entries, it is looking for attributes named dnsttl, arecord,
11688 nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord,
11689 txtrecord, rprecord, afsdbrecord, keyrecord, aaaarecord, locrecord,
11690 srvrecord, naptrrecord, kxrecord, certrecord, dsrecord, sshfprecord,
11691 ipseckeyrecord, rrsigrecord, nsecrecord, dnskeyrecord, dhcidrecord,
11692 spfrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entries it is looking for
11693 the attributes dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord,
11694 ptrrecord, hinforecord, mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord,
11695 locrecord, srvrecord, naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  The equivalent
11696 ldapsearch commands could look like this:</p>
11697
11698 <blockquote><pre>
11699 ldapsearch -h ldap \
11700   -b dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
11701   -s base -x '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
11702   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
11703   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
11704   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
11705   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
11706
11707 ldapsearch -h ldap \
11708   -b dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no \
11709   -s base -x '(associateddomain=2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa)'
11710   dnsttl, arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord soarecord ptrrecord \
11711   hinforecord mxrecord txtrecord rprecord aaaarecord locrecord \
11712   srvrecord naptrrecord modifytimestamp
11713 </pre></blockquote>
11714
11715 <p>In Debian Edu/Lenny, the PowerDNS tree mode is used with
11716 ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no as the base, and these are two
11717 example LDAP objects used there.  In addition to these objects, the
11718 parent objects all th way up to ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11719 also exist.</p>
11720
11721 <blockquote><pre>
11722 dn: dc=tjener,dc=intern,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11723 objectclass: top
11724 objectclass: dnsdomain
11725 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11726 dc: tjener
11727 arecord: 10.0.2.2
11728 associateddomain: tjener.intern
11729
11730 dn: dc=2,dc=2,dc=0,dc=10,dc=in-addr,dc=arpa,ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11731 objectclass: top
11732 objectclass: dnsdomain2
11733 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11734 dc: 2
11735 ptrrecord: tjener.intern
11736 associateddomain: 2.2.0.10.in-addr.arpa
11737 </pre></blockquote>
11738
11739 <p>In strict mode, the server behaves differently.  When looking for
11740 forward DNS entries, it is doing a "subtree" scoped search with the
11741 same base as in the tree mode for a object with filter
11742 "(associateddomain=tjener.intern)" and requests the attributes dnsttl,
11743 arecord, nsrecord, cnamerecord, soarecord, ptrrecord, hinforecord,
11744 mxrecord, txtrecord, rprecord, aaaarecord, locrecord, srvrecord,
11745 naptrrecord and modifytimestamp.  For reverse entires it also do a
11746 subtree scoped search but this time the filter is "(arecord=10.0.2.2)"
11747 and the requested attributes are associateddomain, dnsttl and
11748 modifytimestamp.  In short, in strict mode the objects with ptrrecord
11749 go away, and the arecord attribute in the forward object is used
11750 instead.</p>
11751
11752 <p>The forward and reverse searches can be simulated using ldapsearch
11753 like this:</p>
11754
11755 <blockquote><pre>
11756 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
11757   '(associateddomain=tjener.intern)' dNSTTL aRecord nSRecord \
11758   cNAMERecord sOARecord pTRRecord hInfoRecord mXRecord tXTRecord \
11759   rPRecord aFSDBRecord KeyRecord aAAARecord lOCRecord sRVRecord \
11760   nAPTRRecord kXRecord certRecord dSRecord sSHFPRecord iPSecKeyRecord \
11761   rRSIGRecord nSECRecord dNSKeyRecord dHCIDRecord sPFRecord modifyTimestamp
11762
11763 ldapsearch -h ldap -b ou=hosts,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no -s sub -x \
11764   '(arecord=10.0.2.2)' associateddomain dnsttl modifytimestamp
11765 </pre></blockquote>
11766
11767 <p>In addition to the forward and reverse searches , there is also a
11768 search for SOA records, which behave similar to the forward and
11769 reverse lookups.</p>
11770
11771 <p>A thing to note with the PowerDNS behaviour is that it do not
11772 specify any objectclass names, and instead look for the attributes it
11773 need to generate a DNS reply.  This make it able to work with any
11774 objectclass that provide the needed attributes.</p>
11775
11776 <p>The attributes are normally provided in the cosine (RFC 1274) and
11777 dnsdomain2 schemas.  The latter is used for reverse entries like
11778 ptrrecord and recent DNS additions like aaaarecord and srvrecord.</p>
11779
11780 <p>In Debian Edu, we have created DNS objects using the object classes
11781 dcobject (for dc), dnsdomain or dnsdomain2 (structural, for the DNS
11782 attributes) and domainrelatedobject (for associatedDomain).  The use
11783 of structural object classes make it impossible to combine these
11784 classes with the object classes used by DHCP.</p>
11785
11786 <p>There are other schemas that could be used too, for example the
11787 dnszone structural object class used by Gosa and bind-sdb for the DNS
11788 attributes combined with the domainrelatedobject object class, but in
11789 this case some unused attributes would have to be included as well
11790 (zonename and relativedomainname).</p>
11791
11792 <p>My proposal for Debian Edu would be to switch PowerDNS to strict
11793 mode and not use any of the existing objectclasses (dnsdomain,
11794 dnsdomain2 and dnszone) when one want to combine the DNS information
11795 with DHCP information, and instead create a auxiliary object class
11796 defined something like this (using the attributes defined for
11797 dnsdomain and dnsdomain2 or dnszone):</p>
11798
11799 <blockquote><pre>
11800 objectclass ( some-oid NAME 'dnsDomainAux'
11801     SUP top
11802     AUXILIARY
11803     MAY ( ARecord $ MDRecord $ MXRecord $ NSRecord $ SOARecord $ CNAMERecord $
11804           DNSTTL $ DNSClass $ PTRRecord $ HINFORecord $ MINFORecord $
11805           TXTRecord $ SIGRecord $ KEYRecord $ AAAARecord $ LOCRecord $
11806           NXTRecord $ SRVRecord $ NAPTRRecord $ KXRecord $ CERTRecord $
11807           A6Record $ DNAMERecord
11808     ))
11809 </pre></blockquote>
11810
11811 <p>This will allow any object to become a DNS entry when combined with
11812 the domainrelatedobject object class, and allow any entity to include
11813 all the attributes PowerDNS wants.  I've sent an email to the PowerDNS
11814 developers asking for their view on this schema and if they are
11815 interested in providing such schema with PowerDNS, and I hope my
11816 message will be accepted into their mailing list soon.</p>
11817
11818 <p><strong>ISC dhcp</strong></p>
11819
11820 <p>The DHCP server searches for specific objectclass and requests all
11821 the object attributes, and then uses the attributes it want.  This
11822 make it harder to figure out exactly what attributes are used, but
11823 thanks to the working example in Debian Edu I can at least get an idea
11824 what is needed without having to read the source code.</p>
11825
11826 <p>In the DHCP server configuration, the LDAP base to use and the
11827 search filter to use to locate the correct dhcpServer entity is
11828 stored.  These are the relevant entries from
11829 /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf:</p>
11830
11831 <blockquote><pre>
11832 ldap-base-dn "dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no";
11833 ldap-dhcp-server-cn "dhcp";
11834 </pre></blockquote>
11835
11836 <p>The DHCP server uses this information to nest all the DHCP
11837 configuration it need.  The cn "dhcp" is located using the given LDAP
11838 base and the filter "(&(objectClass=dhcpServer)(cn=dhcp))".  The
11839 search result is this entry:</p>
11840
11841 <blockquote><pre>
11842 dn: cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11843 cn: dhcp
11844 objectClass: top
11845 objectClass: dhcpServer
11846 dhcpServiceDN: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11847 </pre></blockquote>
11848
11849 <p>The content of the dhcpServiceDN attribute is next used to locate the
11850 subtree with DHCP configuration.  The DHCP configuration subtree base
11851 is located using a base scope search with base "cn=DHCP
11852 Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" and filter
11853 "(&(objectClass=dhcpService)(|(dhcpPrimaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)(dhcpSecondaryDN=cn=dhcp,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no)))".
11854 The search result is this entry:</p>
11855
11856 <blockquote><pre>
11857 dn: cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11858 cn: DHCP Config
11859 objectClass: top
11860 objectClass: dhcpService
11861 objectClass: dhcpOptions
11862 dhcpPrimaryDN: cn=dhcp, dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11863 dhcpStatements: ddns-update-style none
11864 dhcpStatements: authoritative
11865 dhcpOption: smtp-server code 69 = array of ip-address
11866 dhcpOption: www-server code 72 = array of ip-address
11867 dhcpOption: wpad-url code 252 = text
11868 </pre></blockquote>
11869
11870 <p>Next, the entire subtree is processed, one level at the time.  When
11871 all the DHCP configuration is loaded, it is ready to receive requests.
11872 The subtree in Debian Edu contain objects with object classes
11873 top/dhcpService/dhcpOptions, top/dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions,
11874 top/dhcpSubnet, top/dhcpGroup and top/dhcpHost.  These provide options
11875 and information about netmasks, dynamic range etc.  Leaving out the
11876 details here because it is not relevant for the focus of my
11877 investigation, which is to see if it is possible to merge dns and dhcp
11878 related computer objects.</p>
11879
11880 <p>When a DHCP request come in, LDAP is searched for the MAC address
11881 of the client (00:00:00:00:00:00 in this example), using a subtree
11882 scoped search with "cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no" as
11883 the base and "(&(objectClass=dhcpHost)(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet
11884 00:00:00:00:00:00))" as the filter.  This is what a host object look
11885 like:</p>
11886
11887 <blockquote><pre>
11888 dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11889 cn: hostname
11890 objectClass: top
11891 objectClass: dhcpHost
11892 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11893 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname
11894 </pre></blockquote>
11895
11896 <p>There is less flexiblity in the way LDAP searches are done here.
11897 The object classes need to have fixed names, and the configuration
11898 need to be stored in a fairly specific LDAP structure.  On the
11899 positive side, the invidiual dhcpHost entires can be anywhere without
11900 the DN pointed to by the dhcpServer entries.  The latter should make
11901 it possible to group all host entries in a subtree next to the
11902 configuration entries, and this subtree can also be shared with the
11903 DNS server if the schema proposed above is combined with the dhcpHost
11904 structural object class.
11905
11906 <p><strong>Conclusion</strong></p>
11907
11908 <p>The PowerDNS implementation seem to be very flexible when it come
11909 to which LDAP schemas to use.  While its "tree" mode is rigid when it
11910 come to the the LDAP structure, the "strict" mode is very flexible,
11911 allowing DNS objects to be stored anywhere under the base cn specified
11912 in the configuration.</p>
11913
11914 <p>The DHCP implementation on the other hand is very inflexible, both
11915 regarding which LDAP schemas to use and which LDAP structure to use.
11916 I guess one could implement ones own schema, as long as the
11917 objectclasses and attributes have the names used, but this do not
11918 really help when the DHCP subtree need to have a fairly fixed
11919 structure.</p>
11920
11921 <p>Based on the observed behaviour, I suspect a LDAP structure like
11922 this might work for Debian Edu:</p>
11923
11924 <blockquote><pre>
11925 ou=services
11926   cn=machine-info (dhcpService) - dhcpServiceDN points here
11927     cn=dhcp (dhcpServer)
11928     cn=dhcp-internal (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
11929       cn=10.0.2.0 (dhcpSubnet)
11930         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
11931     cn=dhcp-thinclients (dhcpSharedNetwork/dhcpOptions)
11932       cn=192.168.0.0 (dhcpSubnet)
11933         cn=group1 (dhcpGroup/dhcpOptions)
11934     ou=machines - PowerDNS base points here
11935       cn=hostname (dhcpHost/domainrelatedobject/dnsDomainAux)
11936 </pre></blockquote>
11937
11938 <P>This is not tested yet.  If the DHCP server require the dhcpHost
11939 entries to be in the dhcpGroup subtrees, the entries can be stored
11940 there instead of a common machines subtree, and the PowerDNS base
11941 would have to be moved one level up to the machine-info subtree.</p>
11942
11943 <p>The combined object under the machines subtree would look something
11944 like this:</p>
11945
11946 <blockquote><pre>
11947 dn: dc=hostname,ou=machines,cn=machine-info,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
11948 dc: hostname
11949 objectClass: top
11950 objectClass: dhcpHost
11951 objectclass: domainrelatedobject
11952 objectclass: dnsDomainAux
11953 associateddomain: hostname.intern
11954 arecord: 10.11.12.13
11955 dhcpHWAddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
11956 dhcpStatements: fixed-address hostname.intern
11957 </pre></blockquote>
11958
11959 </p>One could even add the LTSP configuration associated with a given
11960 machine, as long as the required attributes are available in a
11961 auxiliary object class.</p>
11962
11963       </div>
11964       <div class="tags">
11965
11966
11967         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>.
11968
11969
11970       </div>
11971     </div>
11972     <div class="padding"></div>
11973
11974     <div class="entry">
11975       <div class="title">
11976         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Combining_PowerDNS_and_ISC_DHCP_LDAP_objects.html">Combining PowerDNS and ISC DHCP LDAP objects</a>
11977       </div>
11978       <div class="date">
11979         14th July 2010
11980       </div>
11981       <div class="body">
11982         <p>For a while now, I have wanted to find a way to change the DNS and
11983 DHCP services in Debian Edu to use the same LDAP objects for a given
11984 computer, to avoid the possibility of having a inconsistent state for
11985 a computer in LDAP (as in DHCP but no DNS entry or the other way
11986 around) and make it easier to add computers to LDAP.</p>
11987
11988 <p>I've looked at how powerdns and dhcpd is using LDAP, and using this
11989 information finally found a solution that seem to work.</p>
11990
11991 <p>The old setup required three LDAP objects for a given computer.
11992 One forward DNS entry, one reverse DNS entry and one DHCP entry.  If
11993 we switch powerdns to use its strict LDAP method (ldap-method=strict
11994 in pdns-debian-edu.conf), the forward and reverse DNS entries are
11995 merged into one while making it impossible to transfer the reverse map
11996 to a slave DNS server.</p>
11997
11998 <p>If we also replace the object class used to get the DNS related
11999 attributes to one allowing these attributes to be combined with the
12000 dhcphost object class, we can merge the DNS and DHCP entries into one.
12001 I've written such object class in the dnsdomainaux.schema file (need
12002 proper OIDs, but that is a minor issue), and tested the setup.  It
12003 seem to work.</p>
12004
12005 <p>With this test setup in place, we can get away with one LDAP object
12006 for both DNS and DHCP, and even the LTSP configuration I suggested in
12007 an earlier email.  The combined LDAP object will look something like
12008 this:</p>
12009
12010 <blockquote><pre>
12011   dn: cn=hostname,cn=group1,cn=THINCLIENTS,cn=DHCP Config,dc=skole,dc=skolelinux,dc=no
12012   cn: hostname
12013   objectClass: dhcphost
12014   objectclass: domainrelatedobject
12015   objectclass: dnsdomainaux
12016   associateddomain: hostname.intern
12017   arecord: 10.11.12.13
12018   dhcphwaddress: ethernet 00:00:00:00:00:00
12019   dhcpstatements: fixed-address hostname
12020   ldapconfigsound: Y
12021 </pre></blockquote>
12022
12023 <p>The DNS server uses the associateddomain and arecord entries, while
12024 the DHCP server uses the dhcphwaddress and dhcpstatements entries
12025 before asking DNS to resolve the fixed-adddress.  LTSP will use
12026 dhcphwaddress or associateddomain and the ldapconfig* attributes.</p>
12027
12028 <p>I am not yet sure if I can get the DHCP server to look for its
12029 dhcphost in a different location, to allow us to put the objects
12030 outside the "DHCP Config" subtree, but hope to figure out a way to do
12031 that.  If I can't figure out a way to do that, we can still get rid of
12032 the hosts subtree and move all its content into the DHCP Config tree
12033 (which probably should be renamed to be more related to the new
12034 content.  I suspect cn=dnsdhcp,ou=services or something like that
12035 might be a good place to put it.</p>
12036
12037 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
12038 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
12039
12040       </div>
12041       <div class="tags">
12042
12043
12044         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>.
12045
12046
12047       </div>
12048     </div>
12049     <div class="padding"></div>
12050
12051     <div class="entry">
12052       <div class="title">
12053         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Idea_for_storing_LTSP_configuration_in_LDAP.html">Idea for storing LTSP configuration in LDAP</a>
12054       </div>
12055       <div class="date">
12056         11th July 2010
12057       </div>
12058       <div class="body">
12059         <p>Vagrant mentioned on IRC today that ltsp_config now support
12060 sourcing files from /usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ on the thin
12061 clients, and that this can be used to fetch configuration from LDAP if
12062 Debian Edu choose to store configuration there.</p>
12063
12064 <p>Armed with this information, I got inspired and wrote a test module
12065 to get configuration from LDAP.  The idea is to look up the MAC
12066 address of the client in LDAP, and look for attributes on the form
12067 ltspconfigsetting=value, and use this to export SETTING=value to the
12068 LTSP clients.</p>
12069
12070 <p>The goal is to be able to store the LTSP configuration attributes
12071 in a "computer" LDAP object used by both DNS and DHCP, and thus
12072 allowing us to store all information about a computer in one place.</p>
12073
12074 <p>This is a untested draft implementation, and I welcome feedback on
12075 this approach.  A real LDAP schema for the ltspClientAux objectclass
12076 need to be written.  Comments, suggestions, etc?</p>
12077
12078 <blockquote><pre>
12079 # Store in /opt/ltsp/$arch/usr/share/ltsp/ltsp_config.d/ldap-config
12080 #
12081 # Fetch LTSP client settings from LDAP based on MAC address
12082 #
12083 # Uses ethernet address as stored in the dhcpHost objectclass using
12084 # the dhcpHWAddress attribute or ethernet address stored in the
12085 # ieee802Device objectclass with the macAddress attribute.
12086 #
12087 # This module is written to be schema agnostic, and only depend on the
12088 # existence of attribute names.
12089 #
12090 # The LTSP configuration variables are saved directly using a
12091 # ltspConfig prefix and uppercasing the rest of the attribute name.
12092 # To set the SERVER variable, set the ltspConfigServer attribute.
12093 #
12094 # Some LDAP schema should be created with all the relevant
12095 # configuration settings.  Something like this should work:
12096 #
12097 # objectclass ( 1.1.2.2 NAME 'ltspClientAux'
12098 #     SUP top
12099 #     AUXILIARY
12100 #     MAY ( ltspConfigServer $ ltsConfigSound $ ... )
12101
12102 LDAPSERVER=$(debian-edu-ldapserver)
12103 if [ "$LDAPSERVER" ] ; then
12104     LDAPBASE=$(debian-edu-ldapserver -b)
12105     for MAC in $(LANG=C ifconfig |grep -i hwaddr| awk '{print $5}'|sort -u) ; do
12106         filter="(|(dhcpHWAddress=ethernet $MAC)(macAddress=$MAC))"
12107         ldapsearch -h "$LDAPSERVER" -b "$LDAPBASE" -v -x "$filter" | \
12108             grep '^ltspConfig' | while read attr value ; do
12109             # Remove prefix and convert to upper case
12110             attr=$(echo $attr | sed 's/^ltspConfig//i' | tr a-z A-Z)
12111             # bass value on to clients
12112             eval "$attr=$value; export $attr"
12113         done
12114     done
12115 fi
12116 </pre></blockquote>
12117
12118 <p>I'm not sure this shell construction will work, because I suspect
12119 the while block might end up in a subshell causing the variables set
12120 there to not show up in ltsp-config, but if that is the case I am sure
12121 the code can be restructured to make sure the variables are passed on.
12122 I expect that can be solved with some testing. :)</p>
12123
12124 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
12125 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
12126
12127 <p>Update 2010-07-17: I am aware of another effort to store LTSP
12128 configuration in LDAP that was created around year 2000 by
12129 <a href="http://www.pcxperience.com/thinclient/documentation/ldap.html">PC
12130 Xperience, Inc., 2000</a>.  I found its
12131 <a href="http://people.redhat.com/alikins/ltsp/ldap/">files</a> on a
12132 personal home page over at redhat.com.</p>
12133
12134       </div>
12135       <div class="tags">
12136
12137
12138         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>.
12139
12140
12141       </div>
12142     </div>
12143     <div class="padding"></div>
12144
12145     <div class="entry">
12146       <div class="title">
12147         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/jXplorer__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">jXplorer, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
12148       </div>
12149       <div class="date">
12150          9th July 2010
12151       </div>
12152       <div class="body">
12153         <p>Since
12154 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">my
12155 last post</a> about available LDAP tools in Debian, I was told about a
12156 LDAP GUI that is even better than luma.  The java application
12157 <a href="http://jxplorer.org/">jXplorer</a> is claimed to be capable of
12158 moving LDAP objects and subtrees using drag-and-drop, and can
12159 authenticate using Kerberos.  I have only tested the Kerberos
12160 authentication, but do not have a LDAP setup allowing me to rewrite
12161 LDAP with my test user yet.  It is
12162 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/j/jxplorer.html">available in
12163 Debian</a> testing and unstable at the moment.  The only problem I
12164 have with it is how it handle errors.  If something go wrong, its
12165 non-intuitive behaviour require me to go through some query work list
12166 and remove the failing query.  Nothing big, but very annoying.</p>
12167
12168       </div>
12169       <div class="tags">
12170
12171
12172         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>.
12173
12174
12175       </div>
12176     </div>
12177     <div class="padding"></div>
12178
12179     <div class="entry">
12180       <div class="title">
12181         <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>
12182       </div>
12183       <div class="date">
12184          3rd July 2010
12185       </div>
12186       <div class="body">
12187         <p>Here is a short update on my <a
12188 href="http://people.skolelinux.org/~pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">my
12189 Debian Lenny->Squeeze upgrade testing</a>.  Here is a summary of the
12190 difference for Gnome when it is upgraded by apt-get and aptitude.  I'm
12191 not reporting the status for KDE, because the upgrade crashes when
12192 aptitude try because of missing conflicts
12193 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> and
12194 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585716">#585716</a>).</p>
12195
12196 <p>At the end of the upgrade test script, dpkg -l is executed to get a
12197 complete list of the installed packages.  Based on this I see these
12198 differences when I did a test run today.  As usual, I do not really
12199 know what the correct set of packages would be, but thought it best to
12200 publish the difference.</p>
12201
12202 <p>Installed using apt-get, missing with aptitude</p>
12203
12204 <blockquote><p>
12205   at-spi cpp-4.3 finger gnome-spell gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs
12206   libatspi1.0-0 libcupsys2 libeel2-data libgail-common libgdl-1-common
12207   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-common libgnomevfs2-bin
12208   libgtksourceview-common libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa
12209   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libservlet2.4-java libxalan2-java
12210   libxerces2-java openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
12211   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gtkhtml2
12212   python-gtkmozembed svgalibg1 xserver-xephyr zip
12213 </p></blockquote>
12214
12215 <p>Installed using apt-get, removed with aptitude</p>
12216
12217 <blockquote><p>
12218   bluez-utils dhcdbd djvulibre-desktop epiphany-gecko
12219   gnome-app-install gnome-mount gnome-vfs-obexftp gnome-volume-manager
12220   libao2 libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libbind9-50
12221   libbluetooth2 libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcurl3
12222   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedata-cal1.2-6 libedataserver1.2-9
12223   libeel2-2.20 libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libexchange-storage1.2-3
12224   libfaad0 libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libggz2 libggzcore9
12225   libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0 libgnome-desktop-2
12226   libgnome-pilot2 libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomeprint2.2-0
12227   libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
12228   libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6 libhesiod0 libicu38 libisccc50
12229   libisccfg50 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 liblwres50 libmagick++10
12230   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off libnautilus-burn4
12231   libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2 libosp5
12232   libparted1.8-10 libpisock9 libpisync1 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3
12233   libpt-1.10.10 libraw1394-8 libsensors3 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8
12234   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1
12235   libtotem-plparser10 libtrackerclient0 libvoikko1 libxalan2-java-gcj
12236   libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6 libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3
12237   mysql-common swfdec-gnome totem-gstreamer wodim
12238 </p></blockquote>
12239
12240 <p>Installed using aptitude, missing with apt-get</p>
12241
12242 <blockquote><p>
12243   gnome gnome-desktop-environment hamster-applet python-gnomeapplet
12244   python-gnomekeyring python-wnck rhythmbox-plugins xorg
12245   xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
12246   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
12247   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-video-all
12248   xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark xserver-xorg-video-ati
12249   xserver-xorg-video-chips xserver-xorg-video-cirrus
12250   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
12251   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
12252   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-mach64
12253   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
12254   xserver-xorg-video-nouveau xserver-xorg-video-nv
12255   xserver-xorg-video-r128 xserver-xorg-video-radeon
12256   xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd xserver-xorg-video-rendition
12257   xserver-xorg-video-s3 xserver-xorg-video-s3virge
12258   xserver-xorg-video-savage xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion
12259   xserver-xorg-video-sis xserver-xorg-video-sisusb
12260   xserver-xorg-video-tdfx xserver-xorg-video-tga
12261   xserver-xorg-video-trident xserver-xorg-video-tseng
12262   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vmware
12263   xserver-xorg-video-voodoo
12264 </p></blockquote>
12265
12266 <p>Installed using aptitude, removed with apt-get</p>
12267
12268 <blockquote><p>
12269   deskbar-applet xserver-xorg xserver-xorg-core
12270   xserver-xorg-input-wacom xserver-xorg-video-intel
12271   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
12272 </p></blockquote>
12273
12274 <p>I was told on IRC that the xorg-xserver package was
12275 <a href="http://git.debian.org/?p=pkg-xorg/xserver/xorg-server.git;a=commit;h=9c8080d06c457932d3bfec021c69ac000aa60120">changed
12276 in git</a> today to try to get apt-get to not remove xorg completely.
12277 No idea when it hits Squeeze, but when it does I hope it will reduce
12278 the difference somewhat.
12279
12280       </div>
12281       <div class="tags">
12282
12283
12284         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>.
12285
12286
12287       </div>
12288     </div>
12289     <div class="padding"></div>
12290
12291     <div class="entry">
12292       <div class="title">
12293         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/LUMA__a_very_nice_LDAP_GUI.html">LUMA, a very nice LDAP GUI</a>
12294       </div>
12295       <div class="date">
12296         28th June 2010
12297       </div>
12298       <div class="body">
12299         <p>The last few days I have been looking into the status of the LDAP
12300 directory in Debian Edu, and in the process I started to miss a GUI
12301 tool to browse the LDAP tree.  The only one I was able to find in
12302 Debian/Squeeze and Lenny is
12303 <a href="http://luma.sourceforge.net/">LUMA</a>, which has proved to
12304 be a great tool to get a overview of the current LDAP directory
12305 populated by default in Skolelinux.  Thanks to it, I have been able to
12306 find empty and obsolete subtrees, misplaced objects and duplicate
12307 objects.  It will be installed by default in Debian/Squeeze.  If you
12308 are working with LDAP, give it a go. :)</p>
12309
12310 <p>I did notice one problem with it I have not had time to report to
12311 the BTS yet.  There is no .desktop file in the package, so the tool do
12312 not show up in the Gnome and KDE menus, but only deep down in in the
12313 Debian submenu in KDE.  I hope that can be fixed before Squeeze is
12314 released.</p>
12315
12316 <p>I have not yet been able to get it to modify the tree yet.  I would
12317 like to move objects and remove subtrees directly in the GUI, but have
12318 not found a way to do that with LUMA yet.  So in the mean time, I use
12319 <a href="http://www.lichteblau.com/ldapvi/">ldapvi</a> for that.</p>
12320
12321 <p>If you have tips on other GUI tools for LDAP that might be useful
12322 in Debian Edu, please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
12323
12324 <p>Update 2010-06-29: Ross Reedstrom tipped us about the
12325 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/g/gq.html">gq</a> package as a
12326 useful GUI alternative.  It seem like a good tool, but is unmaintained
12327 in Debian and got a RC bug keeping it out of Squeeze.  Unless that
12328 changes, it will not be an option for Debian Edu based on Squeeze.</p>
12329
12330       </div>
12331       <div class="tags">
12332
12333
12334         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>.
12335
12336
12337       </div>
12338     </div>
12339     <div class="padding"></div>
12340
12341     <div class="entry">
12342       <div class="title">
12343         <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>
12344       </div>
12345       <div class="date">
12346         24th June 2010
12347       </div>
12348       <div class="body">
12349         <p>A while back, I
12350 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Time_for_new__LDAP_schemas_replacing_RFC_2307_.html">complained
12351 about the fact</a> that it is not possible with the provided schemas
12352 for storing DNS and DHCP information in LDAP to combine the two sets
12353 of information into one LDAP object representing a computer.</p>
12354
12355 <p>In the mean time, I discovered that a simple fix would be to make
12356 the dhcpHost object class auxiliary, to allow it to be combined with
12357 the dNSDomain object class, and thus forming one object for one
12358 computer when storing both DHCP and DNS information in LDAP.</p>
12359
12360 <p>If I understand this correctly, it is not safe to do this change
12361 without also changing the assigned number for the object class, and I
12362 do not know enough about LDAP schema design to do that properly for
12363 Debian Edu.</p>
12364
12365 <p>Anyway, for future reference, this is how I believe we could change
12366 the
12367 <a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-dhc-ldap-schema-00">DHCP
12368 schema</a> to solve at least part of the problem with the LDAP schemas
12369 available today from IETF.</p>
12370
12371 <pre>
12372 --- dhcp.schema    (revision 65192)
12373 +++ dhcp.schema    (working copy)
12374 @@ -376,7 +376,7 @@
12375  objectclass ( 2.16.840.1.113719.1.203.6.6
12376         NAME 'dhcpHost'
12377         DESC 'This represents information about a particular client'
12378 -       SUP top
12379 +       SUP top AUXILIARY
12380         MUST cn
12381         MAY  (dhcpLeaseDN $ dhcpHWAddress $ dhcpOptionsDN $ dhcpStatements $ dhcpComments $ dhcpOption)
12382         X-NDS_CONTAINMENT ('dhcpService' 'dhcpSubnet' 'dhcpGroup') )
12383 </pre>
12384
12385 <p>I very much welcome clues on how to do this properly for Debian
12386 Edu/Squeeze.  We provide the DHCP schema in our debian-edu-config
12387 package, and should thus be free to rewrite it as we see fit.</p>
12388
12389 <p>If you want to help out with implementing this for Debian Edu,
12390 please contact us on debian-edu@lists.debian.org.</p>
12391
12392       </div>
12393       <div class="tags">
12394
12395
12396         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>.
12397
12398
12399       </div>
12400     </div>
12401     <div class="padding"></div>
12402
12403     <div class="entry">
12404       <div class="title">
12405         <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>
12406       </div>
12407       <div class="date">
12408         16th June 2010
12409       </div>
12410       <div class="body">
12411         <p>A few times I have had the need to simulate the way tasksel
12412 installs packages during the normal debian-installer run.  Until now,
12413 I have ended up letting tasksel do the work, with the annoying problem
12414 of not getting any feedback at all when something fails (like a
12415 conffile question from dpkg or a download that fails), using code like
12416 this:
12417
12418 <blockquote><pre>
12419 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
12420 tasksel --new-install
12421 </pre></blockquote>
12422
12423 This would invoke tasksel, let its automatic task selection pick the
12424 tasks to install, and continue to install the requested tasks without
12425 any output what so ever.
12426
12427 Recently I revisited this problem while working on the automatic
12428 package upgrade testing, because tasksel would some times hang without
12429 any useful feedback, and I want to see what is going on when it
12430 happen.  Then it occured to me, I can parse the output from tasksel
12431 when asked to run in test mode, and use that aptitude command line
12432 printed by tasksel then to simulate the tasksel run.  I ended up using
12433 code like this:
12434
12435 <blockquote><pre>
12436 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
12437 cmd="$(in_target tasksel -t --new-install | sed 's/debconf-apt-progress -- //')"
12438 $cmd
12439 </pre></blockquote>
12440
12441 <p>The content of $cmd is typically something like "<tt>aptitude -q
12442 --without-recommends -o APT::Install-Recommends=no -y install
12443 ~t^desktop$ ~t^gnome-desktop$ ~t^laptop$ ~pstandard ~prequired
12444 ~pimportant</tt>", which will install the gnome desktop task, the
12445 laptop task and all packages with priority standard , required and
12446 important, just like tasksel would have done it during
12447 installation.</p>
12448
12449 <p>A better approach is probably to extend tasksel to be able to
12450 install packages without using debconf-apt-progress, for use cases
12451 like this.</p>
12452
12453       </div>
12454       <div class="tags">
12455
12456
12457         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>.
12458
12459
12460       </div>
12461     </div>
12462     <div class="padding"></div>
12463
12464     <div class="entry">
12465       <div class="title">
12466         <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>
12467       </div>
12468       <div class="date">
12469         13th June 2010
12470       </div>
12471       <div class="body">
12472         <p>My
12473 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">testing
12474 of Debian upgrades</a> from Lenny to Squeeze continues, and I've
12475 finally made the upgrade logs available from
12476 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/debian-upgrade-testing/</a>.
12477 I am now testing dist-upgrade of Gnome and KDE in a chroot using both
12478 apt and aptitude, and found their differences interesting.  This time
12479 I will only focus on their removal plans.</p>
12480
12481 <p>After installing a Gnome desktop and the laptop task, apt-get wants
12482 to remove 72 packages when dist-upgrading from Lenny to Squeeze.  The
12483 surprising part is that it want to remove xorg and all
12484 xserver-xorg-video* drivers.  Clearly not a good choice, but I am not
12485 sure why.  When asking aptitude to do the same, it want to remove 129
12486 packages, but most of them are library packages I suspect are no
12487 longer needed.  Both of them want to remove bluetooth packages, which
12488 I do not know.  Perhaps these bluetooth packages are obsolete?</p>
12489
12490 <p>For KDE, apt-get want to remove 82 packages, among them kdebase
12491 which seem like a bad idea and xorg the same way as with Gnome. Asking
12492 aptitude for the same, it wants to remove 192 packages, none which are
12493 too surprising.</p>
12494
12495 <p>I guess the removal of xorg during upgrades should be investigated
12496 and avoided, and perhaps others as well.  Here are the complete list
12497 of planned removals.  The complete logs is available from the URL
12498 above.  Note if you want to repeat these tests, that the upgrade test
12499 for kde+apt-get hung in the tasksel setup because of dpkg asking
12500 conffile questions.  No idea why.  I worked around it by using
12501 '<tt>echo >> /proc/<em>pidofdpkg</em>/fd/0</tt>' to tell dpkg to
12502 continue.</p>
12503
12504 <p><b>apt-get gnome 72</b>
12505 <br>bluez-gnome cupsddk-drivers deskbar-applet gnome
12506   gnome-desktop-environment gnome-network-admin gtkhtml3.14
12507   iceweasel-gnome-support libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libgdl-1-0
12508   libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libmetacity0 libslab0 libxcb-xlib0
12509   nautilus-cd-burner python-gnome2-desktop python-gnome2-extras
12510   serpentine swfdec-mozilla update-manager xorg xserver-xorg
12511   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
12512   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
12513   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
12514   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
12515   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
12516   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
12517   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
12518   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
12519   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12520   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
12521   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
12522   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
12523   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
12524   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
12525   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
12526   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
12527   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
12528   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
12529   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
12530   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
12531   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
12532   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9
12533   xulrunner-1.9-gnome-support</p>
12534
12535 <p><b>aptitude gnome 129</b>
12536
12537 <br>bluez-gnome bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers dhcdbd
12538   djvulibre-desktop finger gnome-app-install gnome-mount
12539   gnome-network-admin gnome-spell gnome-vfs-obexftp
12540   gnome-volume-manager gstreamer0.10-gnomevfs gtkhtml3.14 libao2
12541   libavahi-compat-libdnssd1 libavahi-core5 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
12542   libcamel1.2-11 libcdio7 libcucul0 libcupsys2 libcurl3 libdatrie0
12543   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdvdread3 libedataserver1.2-9 libeel2-2.20
12544   libeel2-data libepc-1.0-1 libepc-ui-1.0-1 libfaad0 libgail-common
12545   libgd2-noxpm libgda3-3 libgda3-common libgdl-1-0 libgdl-1-common
12546   libggz2 libggzcore9 libggzmod4 libgksu1.2-0 libgksuui1.0-1 libgmyth0
12547   libgnomecups1.0-1 libgnomekbd2 libgnomekbdui2 libgnomeprint2.2-0
12548   libgnomeprint2.2-data libgnomeprintui2.2-0 libgnomeprintui2.2-common
12549   libgnomevfs2-bin libgpod3 libgraphviz4 libgtkhtml2-0
12550   libgtksourceview-common libgtksourceview1.0-0 libgucharmap6
12551   libhesiod0 libicu38 libiw29 libkpathsea4 libltdl3 libmagick++10
12552   libmagick10 libmalaga7 libmetacity0 libmtp7 libmysqlclient15off
12553   libnautilus-burn4 libneon27 libnm-glib0 libnm-util0 libopal-2.2
12554   libosp5 libparted1.8-10 libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler3 libpt-1.10.10
12555   libpt-1.10.10-plugins-alsa libpt-1.10.10-plugins-v4l libraw1394-8
12556   libsensors3 libslab0 libsmbios2 libsoup2.2-8 libssh2-1
12557   libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libswfdec-0.6-90 libtalloc1 libtotem-plparser10
12558   libtrackerclient0 libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0
12559   libxerces2-java libxerces2-java-gcj libxklavier12 libxtrap6
12560   libxxf86misc1 libzephyr3 mysql-common nautilus-cd-burner
12561   openoffice.org-writer2latex openssl-blacklist p7zip
12562   python-4suite-xml python-eggtrayicon python-gnome2-desktop
12563   python-gnome2-extras python-gtkhtml2 python-gtkmozembed
12564   python-numeric python-sexy serpentine svgalibg1 swfdec-gnome
12565   swfdec-mozilla totem-gstreamer update-manager wodim
12566   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12567   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
12568   zip</p>
12569
12570 <p><b>apt-get kde 82</b>
12571
12572 <br>cupsddk-drivers karm kaudiocreator kcoloredit kcontrol kde kde-core
12573   kdeaddons kdeartwork kdebase kdebase-bin kdebase-bin-kde3
12574   kdebase-kio-plugins kdesktop kdeutils khelpcenter kicker
12575   kicker-applets knewsticker kolourpaint konq-plugins konqueror korn
12576   kpersonalizer kscreensaver ksplash libavcodec51 libdatrie0 libkiten1
12577   libxcb-xlib0 quanta superkaramba texlive-base-bin xorg xserver-xorg
12578   xserver-xorg-core xserver-xorg-input-all xserver-xorg-input-evdev
12579   xserver-xorg-input-kbd xserver-xorg-input-mouse
12580   xserver-xorg-input-synaptics xserver-xorg-input-wacom
12581   xserver-xorg-video-all xserver-xorg-video-apm xserver-xorg-video-ark
12582   xserver-xorg-video-ati xserver-xorg-video-chips
12583   xserver-xorg-video-cirrus xserver-xorg-video-cyrix
12584   xserver-xorg-video-dummy xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
12585   xserver-xorg-video-glint xserver-xorg-video-i128
12586   xserver-xorg-video-i740 xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12587   xserver-xorg-video-intel xserver-xorg-video-mach64
12588   xserver-xorg-video-mga xserver-xorg-video-neomagic
12589   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-nv
12590   xserver-xorg-video-openchrome xserver-xorg-video-r128
12591   xserver-xorg-video-radeon xserver-xorg-video-radeonhd
12592   xserver-xorg-video-rendition xserver-xorg-video-s3
12593   xserver-xorg-video-s3virge xserver-xorg-video-savage
12594   xserver-xorg-video-siliconmotion xserver-xorg-video-sis
12595   xserver-xorg-video-sisusb xserver-xorg-video-tdfx
12596   xserver-xorg-video-tga xserver-xorg-video-trident
12597   xserver-xorg-video-tseng xserver-xorg-video-v4l
12598   xserver-xorg-video-vesa xserver-xorg-video-vga
12599   xserver-xorg-video-vmware xserver-xorg-video-voodoo xulrunner-1.9</p>
12600
12601 <p><b>aptitude kde 192</b>
12602 <br>bluez-utils cpp-4.3 cupsddk-drivers cvs dcoprss dhcdbd
12603   djvulibre-desktop dosfstools eyesapplet fifteenapplet finger gettext
12604   ghostscript-x imlib-base imlib11 indi kandy karm kasteroids
12605   kaudiocreator kbackgammon kbstate kcoloredit kcontrol kcron kdat
12606   kdeadmin-kfile-plugins kdeartwork-misc kdeartwork-theme-window
12607   kdebase-bin-kde3 kdebase-kio-plugins kdeedu-data
12608   kdegraphics-kfile-plugins kdelirc kdemultimedia-kappfinder-data
12609   kdemultimedia-kfile-plugins kdenetwork-kfile-plugins
12610   kdepim-kfile-plugins kdepim-kio-plugins kdeprint kdesktop kdessh
12611   kdict kdnssd kdvi kedit keduca kenolaba kfax kfaxview kfouleggs
12612   kghostview khelpcenter khexedit kiconedit kitchensync klatin
12613   klickety kmailcvt kmenuedit kmid kmilo kmoon kmrml kodo kolourpaint
12614   kooka korn kpager kpdf kpercentage kpf kpilot kpoker kpovmodeler
12615   krec kregexpeditor ksayit ksim ksirc ksirtet ksmiletris ksmserver
12616   ksnake ksokoban ksplash ksvg ksysv ktip ktnef kuickshow kverbos
12617   kview kviewshell kvoctrain kwifimanager kwin kwin4 kworldclock
12618   kxsldbg libakode2 libao2 libarts1-akode libarts1-audiofile
12619   libarts1-mpeglib libarts1-xine libavahi-compat-libdnssd1
12620   libavahi-core5 libavc1394-0 libavcodec51 libbluetooth2
12621   libboost-python1.34.1 libcucul0 libcurl3 libcvsservice0 libdatrie0
12622   libdirectfb-1.0-0 libdjvulibre21 libdvdread3 libfaad0 libfreebob0
12623   libgail-common libgd2-noxpm libgraphviz4 libgsmme1c2a libgtkhtml2-0
12624   libicu38 libiec61883-0 libindex0 libiw29 libk3b3 libkcal2b libkcddb1
12625   libkdeedu3 libkdepim1a libkgantt0 libkiten1 libkleopatra1 libkmime2
12626   libkpathsea4 libkpimexchange1 libkpimidentities1 libkscan1
12627   libksieve0 libktnef1 liblockdev1 libltdl3 libmagick10 libmimelib1c2a
12628   libmozjs1d libmpcdec3 libneon27 libnm-util0 libopensync0 libpisock9
12629   libpoppler-glib3 libpoppler-qt2 libpoppler3 libraw1394-8 libsmbios2
12630   libssh2-1 libsuitesparse-3.1.0 libtalloc1 libtiff-tools
12631   libxalan2-java libxalan2-java-gcj libxcb-xlib0 libxerces2-java
12632   libxerces2-java-gcj libxtrap6 mpeglib networkstatus
12633   openoffice.org-writer2latex pmount poster psutils quanta quanta-data
12634   superkaramba svgalibg1 tex-common texlive-base texlive-base-bin
12635   texlive-common texlive-doc-base texlive-fonts-recommended
12636   xserver-xorg-video-cyrix xserver-xorg-video-imstt
12637   xserver-xorg-video-nsc xserver-xorg-video-v4l xserver-xorg-video-vga
12638   xulrunner-1.9</p>
12639
12640
12641       </div>
12642       <div class="tags">
12643
12644
12645         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>.
12646
12647
12648       </div>
12649     </div>
12650     <div class="padding"></div>
12651
12652     <div class="entry">
12653       <div class="title">
12654         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_upgrade_testing_from_Lenny_to_Squeeze.html">Automatic upgrade testing from Lenny to Squeeze</a>
12655       </div>
12656       <div class="date">
12657         11th June 2010
12658       </div>
12659       <div class="body">
12660         <p>The last few days I have done some upgrade testing in Debian, to
12661 see if the upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze will go smoothly.  A few bugs
12662 have been discovered and reported in the process
12663 (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/585410">#585410</a> in nagios3-cgi,
12664 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584879">#584879</a> already fixed in
12665 enscript and <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/584861">#584861</a> in
12666 kdebase-workspace-data), and to get a more regular testing going on, I
12667 am working on a script to automate the test.</p>
12668
12669 <p>The idea is to create a Lenny chroot and use tasksel to install a
12670 Gnome or KDE desktop installation inside the chroot before upgrading
12671 it.  To ensure no services are started in the chroot, a policy-rc.d
12672 script is inserted.  To make sure tasksel believe it is to install a
12673 desktop on a laptop, the tasksel tests are replaced in the chroot
12674 (only acceptable because this is a throw-away chroot).</p>
12675
12676 <p>A naive upgrade from Lenny to Squeeze using aptitude dist-upgrade
12677 currently always fail because udev refuses to upgrade with the kernel
12678 in Lenny, so to avoid that problem the file /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
12679 is created.  The bug report
12680 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/566000">#566000</a> make me suspect
12681 this problem do not trigger in a chroot, but I touch the file anyway
12682 to make sure the upgrade go well.  Testing on virtual and real
12683 hardware have failed me because of udev so far, and creating this file
12684 do the trick in such settings anyway.  This is a
12685 <a href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/debian-26/failed-dist-upgrade-due-to-udev-config_sysfs_deprecated-nonsense-804130/">known
12686 issue</a> and the current udev behaviour is intended by the udev
12687 maintainer because he lack the resources to rewrite udev to keep
12688 working with old kernels or something like that.  I really wish the
12689 udev upstream would keep udev backwards compatible, to avoid such
12690 upgrade problem, but given that they fail to do so, I guess
12691 documenting the way out of this mess is the best option we got for
12692 Debian Squeeze.</p>
12693
12694 <p>Anyway, back to the task at hand, testing upgrades.  This test
12695 script, which I call <tt>upgrade-test</tt> for now, is doing the
12696 trick:</p>
12697
12698 <blockquote><pre>
12699 #!/bin/sh
12700 set -ex
12701
12702 if [ "$1" ] ; then
12703     desktop=$1
12704 else
12705     desktop=gnome
12706 fi
12707
12708 from=lenny
12709 to=squeeze
12710
12711 exec &lt; /dev/null
12712 unset LANG
12713 mirror=http://ftp.skolelinux.org/debian
12714 tmpdir=chroot-$from-upgrade-$to-$desktop
12715 fuser -mv .
12716 debootstrap $from $tmpdir $mirror
12717 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
12718 cat > $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d &lt;&lt;EOF
12719 #!/bin/sh
12720 exit 101
12721 EOF
12722 chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/sbin/policy-rc.d
12723 exit_cleanup() {
12724     umount $tmpdir/proc
12725 }
12726 mount -t proc proc $tmpdir/proc
12727 # Make sure proc is unmounted also on failure
12728 trap exit_cleanup EXIT INT
12729
12730 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y install debconf-utils
12731
12732 # Make sure tasksel autoselection trigger.  It need the test scripts
12733 # to return the correct answers.
12734 echo tasksel tasksel/desktop multiselect $desktop | \
12735     chroot $tmpdir debconf-set-selections
12736
12737 # Include the desktop and laptop task
12738 for test in desktop laptop ; do
12739     echo > $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test &lt;&lt;EOF
12740 #!/bin/sh
12741 exit 2
12742 EOF
12743     chmod a+rx $tmpdir/usr/lib/tasksel/tests/$test
12744 done
12745
12746 DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive
12747 DEBIAN_PRIORITY=critical
12748 export DEBIAN_FRONTEND DEBIAN_PRIORITY
12749 chroot $tmpdir tasksel --new-install
12750
12751 echo deb $mirror $to main > $tmpdir/etc/apt/sources.list
12752 chroot $tmpdir aptitude update
12753 touch $tmpdir/etc/udev/kernel-upgrade
12754 chroot $tmpdir aptitude -y dist-upgrade
12755 fuser -mv
12756 </pre></blockquote>
12757
12758 <p>I suspect it would be useful to test upgrades with both apt-get and
12759 with aptitude, but I have not had time to look at how they behave
12760 differently so far.  I hope to get a cron job running to do the test
12761 regularly and post the result on the web.  The Gnome upgrade currently
12762 work, while the KDE upgrade fail because of the bug in
12763 kdebase-workspace-data</p>
12764
12765 <p>I am not quite sure what kind of extract from the huge upgrade logs
12766 (KDE 167 KiB, Gnome 516 KiB) it make sense to include in this blog
12767 post, so I will refrain from trying.  I can report that for Gnome,
12768 aptitude report 760 packages upgraded, 448 newly installed, 129 to
12769 remove and 1 not upgraded and 1024MB need to be downloaded while for
12770 KDE the same numbers are 702 packages upgraded, 507 newly installed,
12771 193 to remove and 0 not upgraded and 1117MB need to be downloaded</p>
12772
12773 <p>I am very happy to notice that the Gnome desktop + laptop upgrade
12774 is able to migrate to dependency based boot sequencing and parallel
12775 booting without a hitch.  Was unsure if there were still bugs with
12776 packages failing to clean up their obsolete init.d script during
12777 upgrades, and no such problem seem to affect the Gnome desktop+laptop
12778 packages.</p>
12779
12780       </div>
12781       <div class="tags">
12782
12783
12784         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>.
12785
12786
12787       </div>
12788     </div>
12789     <div class="padding"></div>
12790
12791     <div class="entry">
12792       <div class="title">
12793         <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>
12794       </div>
12795       <div class="date">
12796          6th June 2010
12797       </div>
12798       <div class="body">
12799         <p>If Debian is to migrate to upstart on Linux, I expect some init.d
12800 scripts to migrate (some of) their operations to upstart job while
12801 keeping the init.d for hurd and kfreebsd.  The packages with such
12802 needs will need a way to get their init.d scripts to behave
12803 differently when used with sysvinit and with upstart.  Because of
12804 this, I had a look at the environment variables set when a init.d
12805 script is running under upstart, and when it is not.</p>
12806
12807 <p>With upstart, I notice these environment variables are set when a
12808 script is started from rcS.d/ (ignoring some irrelevant ones like
12809 COLUMNS):</p>
12810
12811 <blockquote><pre>
12812 DEFAULT_RUNLEVEL=2
12813 previous=N
12814 PREVLEVEL=
12815 RUNLEVEL=
12816 runlevel=S
12817 UPSTART_EVENTS=startup
12818 UPSTART_INSTANCE=
12819 UPSTART_JOB=rc-sysinit
12820 </pre></blockquote>
12821
12822 <p>With sysvinit, these environment variables are set for the same
12823 script.</p>
12824
12825 <blockquote><pre>
12826 INIT_VERSION=sysvinit-2.88
12827 previous=N
12828 PREVLEVEL=N
12829 RUNLEVEL=S
12830 runlevel=S
12831 </pre></blockquote>
12832
12833 <p>The RUNLEVEL and PREVLEVEL environment variables passed on from
12834 sysvinit are not set by upstart.  Not sure if it is intentional or not
12835 to not be compatible with sysvinit in this regard.</p>
12836
12837 <p>For scripts needing to behave differently when upstart is used,
12838 looking for the UPSTART_JOB environment variable seem to be a good
12839 choice.</p>
12840
12841       </div>
12842       <div class="tags">
12843
12844
12845         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>.
12846
12847
12848       </div>
12849     </div>
12850     <div class="padding"></div>
12851
12852     <div class="entry">
12853       <div class="title">
12854         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/A_manual_for_standards_wars___.html">A manual for standards wars...</a>
12855       </div>
12856       <div class="date">
12857          6th June 2010
12858       </div>
12859       <div class="body">
12860         <p>Via the
12861 <a href="http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/robweir/antic-atom/~3/QzU4RgoAGMg/weekly-links-10.html">blog
12862 of Rob Weir</a> I came across the very interesting essay named
12863 <a href="http://faculty.haas.berkeley.edu/shapiro/wars.pdf">The Art of
12864 Standards Wars</a> (PDF 25 pages).  I recommend it for everyone
12865 following the standards wars of today.</p>
12866
12867       </div>
12868       <div class="tags">
12869
12870
12871         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>.
12872
12873
12874       </div>
12875     </div>
12876     <div class="padding"></div>
12877
12878     <div class="entry">
12879       <div class="title">
12880         <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>
12881       </div>
12882       <div class="date">
12883          3rd June 2010
12884       </div>
12885       <div class="body">
12886         <p>When using sitesummary at a site to track machines, it is possible
12887 to get a list of the machine types in use thanks to the DMI
12888 information extracted from each machine.  The script to do so is
12889 included in the sitesummary package, and here is example output from
12890 the Skolelinux build servers:</p>
12891
12892 <blockquote><pre>
12893 maintainer:~# /usr/lib/sitesummary/hardware-model-summary
12894   vendor                    count
12895   Dell Computer Corporation     1
12896     PowerEdge 1750              1
12897   IBM                           1
12898     eserver xSeries 345 -[8670M1X]-     1
12899   Intel                         2
12900   [no-dmi-info]                 3
12901 maintainer:~#
12902 </pre></blockquote>
12903
12904 <p>The quality of the report depend on the quality of the DMI tables
12905 provided in each machine.  Here there are Intel machines without model
12906 information listed with Intel as vendor and no model, and virtual Xen
12907 machines listed as [no-dmi-info].  One can add -l as a command line
12908 option to list the individual machines.</p>
12909
12910 <p>A larger list is
12911 <a href="http://narvikskolen.no/sitesummary/">available from the the
12912 city of Narvik</a>, which uses Skolelinux on all their shools and also
12913 provide the basic sitesummary report publicly.  In their report there
12914 are ~1400 machines. I know they use both Ubuntu and Skolelinux on
12915 their machines, and as sitesummary is available in both distributions,
12916 it is trivial to get all of them to report to the same central
12917 collector.</p>
12918
12919       </div>
12920       <div class="tags">
12921
12922
12923         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>.
12924
12925
12926       </div>
12927     </div>
12928     <div class="padding"></div>
12929
12930     <div class="entry">
12931       <div class="title">
12932         <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>
12933       </div>
12934       <div class="date">
12935          1st June 2010
12936       </div>
12937       <div class="body">
12938         <p>It is strange to watch how a bug in Debian causing KDM to fail to
12939 start at boot when an NVidia video card is used is handled.  The
12940 problem seem to be that the nvidia X.org driver uses a long time to
12941 initialize, and this duration is longer than kdm is configured to
12942 wait.</p>
12943
12944 <p>I came across two bugs related to this issue,
12945 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">#583312</a> initially filed
12946 against initscripts and passed on to nvidia-glx when it became obvious
12947 that the nvidia drivers were involved, and
12948 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/524751">#524751</a> initially filed against
12949 kdm and passed on to src:nvidia-graphics-drivers for unknown reasons.</p>
12950
12951 <p>To me, it seem that no-one is interested in actually solving the
12952 problem nvidia video card owners experience and make sure the Debian
12953 distribution work out of the box for these users.  The nvidia driver
12954 maintainers expect kdm to be set up to wait longer, while kdm expect
12955 the nvidia driver maintainers to fix the driver to start faster, and
12956 while they wait for each other I guess the users end up switching to a
12957 distribution that work for them.  I have no idea what the solution is,
12958 but I am pretty sure that waiting for each other is not it.</p>
12959
12960 <p>I wonder why we end up handling bugs this way.</p>
12961
12962       </div>
12963       <div class="tags">
12964
12965
12966         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>.
12967
12968
12969       </div>
12970     </div>
12971     <div class="padding"></div>
12972
12973     <div class="entry">
12974       <div class="title">
12975         <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>
12976       </div>
12977       <div class="date">
12978         27th May 2010
12979       </div>
12980       <div class="body">
12981         <p>A few days ago, parallel booting was enabled in Debian/testing.
12982 The feature seem to hold up pretty well, but three fairly serious
12983 issues are known and should be solved:
12984
12985 <p><ul>
12986
12987 <li>The wicd package seen to
12988 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/508289">break NFS mounting</a> and
12989 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/581586">network setup</a> when
12990 parallel booting is enabled.  No idea why, but the wicd maintainer
12991 seem to be on the case.</li>
12992
12993 <li>The nvidia X driver seem to
12994 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/583312">have a race condition</a>
12995 triggered more easily when parallel booting is in effect.  The
12996 maintainer is on the case.</li>
12997
12998 <li>The sysv-rc package fail to properly enable dependency based boot
12999 sequencing (the shutdown is broken) when old file-rc users
13000 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/575080">try to switch back</a> to
13001 sysv-rc.  One way to solve it would be for file-rc to create
13002 /etc/init.d/.legacy-bootordering, and another is to try to make
13003 sysv-rc more robust.  Will investigate some more and probably upload a
13004 workaround in sysv-rc to help those trying to move from file-rc to
13005 sysv-rc get a working shutdown.</li>
13006
13007 </ul></p>
13008
13009 <p>All in all not many surprising issues, and all of them seem
13010 solvable before Squeeze is released.  In addition to these there are
13011 some packages with bugs in their dependencies and run level settings,
13012 which I expect will be fixed in a reasonable time span.</p>
13013
13014 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
13015 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
13016 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
13017 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
13018
13019 <p>Update: Correct bug number to file-rc issue.</p>
13020
13021       </div>
13022       <div class="tags">
13023
13024
13025         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>.
13026
13027
13028       </div>
13029     </div>
13030     <div class="padding"></div>
13031
13032     <div class="entry">
13033       <div class="title">
13034         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/More_flexible_firmware_handling_in_debian_installer.html">More flexible firmware handling in debian-installer</a>
13035       </div>
13036       <div class="date">
13037         22nd May 2010
13038       </div>
13039       <div class="body">
13040         <p>After a long break from debian-installer development, I finally
13041 found time today to return to the project.  Having to spend less time
13042 working dependency based boot in debian, as it is almost complete now,
13043 definitely helped freeing some time.</p>
13044
13045 <p>A while back, I ran into a problem while working on Debian Edu.  We
13046 include some firmware packages on the Debian Edu CDs, those needed to
13047 get disk and network controllers working.  Without having these
13048 firmware packages available during installation, it is impossible to
13049 install Debian Edu on the given machine, and because our target group
13050 are non-technical people, asking them to provide firmware packages on
13051 an external medium is a support pain.  Initially, I expected it to be
13052 enough to include the firmware packages on the CD to get
13053 debian-installer to find and use them.  This proved to be wrong.
13054 Next, I hoped it was enough to symlink the relevant firmware packages
13055 to some useful location on the CD (tried /cdrom/ and
13056 /cdrom/firmware/).  This also proved to not work, and at this point I
13057 found time to look at the debian-installer code to figure out what was
13058 going to work.</p>
13059
13060 <p>The firmware loading code is in the hw-detect package, and a closer
13061 look revealed that it would only look for firmware packages outside
13062 the installation media, so the CD was never checked for firmware
13063 packages.  It would only check USB sticks, floppies and other
13064 "external" media devices.  Today I changed it to also look in the
13065 /cdrom/firmware/ directory on the mounted CD or DVD, which should
13066 solve the problem I ran into with Debian edu.  I also changed it to
13067 look in /firmware/, to make sure the installer also find firmware
13068 provided in the initrd when booting the installer via PXE, to allow us
13069 to provide the same feature in the PXE setup included in Debian
13070 Edu.</p>
13071
13072 <p>To make sure firmware deb packages with a license questions are not
13073 activated without asking if the license is accepted, I extended
13074 hw-detect to look for preinst scripts in the firmware packages, and
13075 run these before activating the firmware during installation.  The
13076 license question is asked using debconf in the preinst, so this should
13077 solve the issue for the firmware packages I have looked at so far.</p>
13078
13079 <p>If you want to discuss the details of these features, please
13080 contact us on debian-boot@lists.debian.org.</p>
13081
13082       </div>
13083       <div class="tags">
13084
13085
13086         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>.
13087
13088
13089       </div>
13090     </div>
13091     <div class="padding"></div>
13092
13093     <div class="entry">
13094       <div class="title">
13095         <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>
13096       </div>
13097       <div class="date">
13098         14th May 2010
13099       </div>
13100       <div class="body">
13101         <p>Since this evening, parallel booting is the default in
13102 Debian/unstable for machines using dependency based boot sequencing.
13103 Apparently the testing of concurrent booting has been wider than
13104 expected, if I am to believe the
13105 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
13106 on debian-devel@</a>, and I concluded a few days ago to move forward
13107 with the feature this weekend, to give us some time to detect any
13108 remaining problems before Squeeze is frozen.  If serious problems are
13109 detected, it is simple to change the default back to sequential boot.
13110 The upload of the new sysvinit package also activate a new upstream
13111 version.</p>
13112
13113 More information about
13114 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
13115 based boot sequencing</a> is available from the Debian wiki.  It is
13116 currently possible to disable parallel booting when one run into
13117 problems caused by it, by adding this line to /etc/default/rcS:</p>
13118
13119 <blockquote><pre>
13120 CONCURRENCY=none
13121 </pre></blockquote>
13122
13123 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
13124 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
13125 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
13126 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
13127
13128       </div>
13129       <div class="tags">
13130
13131
13132         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>.
13133
13134
13135       </div>
13136     </div>
13137     <div class="padding"></div>
13138
13139     <div class="entry">
13140       <div class="title">
13141         <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>
13142       </div>
13143       <div class="date">
13144         14th May 2010
13145       </div>
13146       <div class="body">
13147         <p>In the recent Debian Edu versions, the
13148 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/SiteSummary">sitesummary
13149 system</a> is used to keep track of the machines in the school
13150 network.  Each machine will automatically report its status to the
13151 central server after boot and once per night.  The network setup is
13152 also reported, and using this information it is possible to get the
13153 MAC address of all network interfaces in the machines.  This is useful
13154 to update the DHCP configuration.</p>
13155
13156 <p>To give some idea how to use sitesummary, here is a one-liner to
13157 ist all MAC addresses of all machines reporting to sitesummary.  Run
13158 this on the collector host:</p>
13159
13160 <blockquote><pre>
13161 perl -MSiteSummary -e 'for_all_hosts(sub { print join(" ", get_macaddresses(shift)), "\n"; });'
13162 </pre></blockquote>
13163
13164 <p>This will list all MAC addresses assosiated with all machine, one
13165 line per machine and with space between the MAC addresses.</p>
13166
13167 <p>To allow system administrators easier job at adding static DHCP
13168 addresses for hosts, it would be possible to extend this to fetch
13169 machine information from sitesummary and update the DHCP and DNS
13170 tables in LDAP using this information.  Such tool is unfortunately not
13171 written yet.</p>
13172
13173       </div>
13174       <div class="tags">
13175
13176
13177         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>.
13178
13179
13180       </div>
13181     </div>
13182     <div class="padding"></div>
13183
13184     <div class="entry">
13185       <div class="title">
13186         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/systemd__an_interesting_alternative_to_upstart.html">systemd, an interesting alternative to upstart</a>
13187       </div>
13188       <div class="date">
13189         13th May 2010
13190       </div>
13191       <div class="body">
13192         <p>The last few days a new boot system called
13193 <a href="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd">systemd</a>
13194 has been
13195 <a href="http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/systemd.html">introduced</a>
13196
13197 to the free software world.  I have not yet had time to play around
13198 with it, but it seem to be a very interesting alternative to
13199 <a href="http://upstart.ubuntu.com/">upstart</a>, and might prove to be
13200 a good alternative for Debian when we are able to switch to an event
13201 based boot system.  Tollef is
13202 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/580814">in the process</a> of getting
13203 systemd into Debian, and I look forward to seeing how well it work.  I
13204 like the fact that systemd handles init.d scripts with dependency
13205 information natively, allowing them to run in parallel where upstart
13206 at the moment do not.</p>
13207
13208 <p>Unfortunately do systemd have the same problem as upstart regarding
13209 platform support.  It only work on recent Linux kernels, and also need
13210 some new kernel features enabled to function properly.  This means
13211 kFreeBSD and Hurd ports of Debian will need a port or a different boot
13212 system.  Not sure how that will be handled if systemd proves to be the
13213 way forward.</p>
13214
13215 <p>In the mean time, based on the
13216 <a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2010/05/msg00122.html">input
13217 on debian-devel@</a> regarding parallel booting in Debian, I have
13218 decided to enable full parallel booting as the default in Debian as
13219 soon as possible (probably this weekend or early next week), to see if
13220 there are any remaining serious bugs in the init.d dependencies.  A
13221 new version of the sysvinit package implementing this change is
13222 already in experimental.  If all go well, Squeeze will be released
13223 with parallel booting enabled by default.</p>
13224
13225       </div>
13226       <div class="tags">
13227
13228
13229         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>.
13230
13231
13232       </div>
13233     </div>
13234     <div class="padding"></div>
13235
13236     <div class="entry">
13237       <div class="title">
13238         <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>
13239       </div>
13240       <div class="date">
13241          6th May 2010
13242       </div>
13243       <div class="body">
13244         <p>These days, the init.d script dependencies in Squeeze are quite
13245 complete, so complete that it is actually possible to run all the
13246 init.d scripts in parallell based on these dependencies.  If you want
13247 to test your Squeeze system, make sure
13248 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
13249 based boot sequencing</a> is enabled, and add this line to
13250 /etc/default/rcS:</p>
13251
13252 <blockquote><pre>
13253 CONCURRENCY=makefile
13254 </pre></blockquote>
13255
13256 <p>That is it.  It will cause sysv-rc to use the startpar tool to run
13257 scripts in parallel using the dependency information stored in
13258 /etc/init.d/.depend.boot, /etc/init.d/.depend.start and
13259 /etc/init.d/.depend.stop to order the scripts.  Startpar is configured
13260 to try to start the kdm and gdm scripts as early as possible, and will
13261 start the facilities required by kdm or gdm as early as possible to
13262 make this happen.</p>
13263
13264 <p>Give it a try, and see if you like the result.  If some services
13265 fail to start properly, it is most likely because they have incomplete
13266 init.d script dependencies in their startup script (or some of their
13267 dependent scripts have incomplete dependencies).  Report bugs and get
13268 the package maintainers to fix it. :)</p>
13269
13270 <p>Running scripts in parallel could be the default in Debian when we
13271 manage to get the init.d script dependencies complete and correct.  I
13272 expect we will get there in Squeeze+1, if we get manage to test and
13273 fix the remaining issues.</p>
13274
13275 <p>If you report any problems with dependencies in init.d scripts to
13276 the BTS, please usertag the report to get it to show up at
13277 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgreport.cgi?users=initscripts-ng-devel@lists.alioth.debian.org">the
13278 list of usertagged bugs related to this</a>.</p>
13279
13280       </div>
13281       <div class="tags">
13282
13283
13284         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>.
13285
13286
13287       </div>
13288     </div>
13289     <div class="padding"></div>
13290
13291     <div class="entry">
13292       <div class="title">
13293         <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>
13294       </div>
13295       <div class="date">
13296         27th July 2009
13297       </div>
13298       <div class="body">
13299         <p>Since this evening, with the upload of sysvinit version 2.87dsf-2,
13300 and the upload of insserv version 1.12.0-10 yesterday, Debian unstable
13301 have been migrated to using dependency based boot sequencing.  This
13302 conclude work me and others have been doing for the last three days.
13303 It feels great to see this finally part of the default Debian
13304 installation.  Now we just need to weed out the last few problems that
13305 are bound to show up, to get everything ready for Squeeze.</p>
13306
13307 <p>The next step is migrating /sbin/init from sysvinit to upstart, and
13308 fixing the more fundamental problem of handing the event based
13309 non-predictable kernel in the early boot.</p>
13310
13311       </div>
13312       <div class="tags">
13313
13314
13315         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>.
13316
13317
13318       </div>
13319     </div>
13320     <div class="padding"></div>
13321
13322     <div class="entry">
13323       <div class="title">
13324         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Taking_over_sysvinit_development.html">Taking over sysvinit development</a>
13325       </div>
13326       <div class="date">
13327         22nd July 2009
13328       </div>
13329       <div class="body">
13330         <p>After several years of frustration with the lack of activity from
13331 the existing sysvinit upstream developer, I decided a few weeks ago to
13332 take over the package and become the new upstream.  The number of
13333 patches to track for the Debian package was becoming a burden, and the
13334 lack of synchronization between the distribution made it hard to keep
13335 the package up to date.</p>
13336
13337 <p>On the new sysvinit team is the SuSe maintainer Dr. Werner Fink,
13338 and my Debian co-maintainer Kel Modderman.  About 10 days ago, I made
13339 a new upstream tarball with version number 2.87dsf (for Debian, SuSe
13340 and Fedora), based on the patches currently in use in these
13341 distributions.  We Debian maintainers plan to move to this tarball as
13342 the new upstream as soon as we find time to do the merge.  Since the
13343 new tarball was created, we agreed with Werner at SuSe to make a new
13344 upstream project at <a href="http://savannah.nongnu.org/">Savannah</a>, and continue
13345 development there.  The project is registered and currently waiting
13346 for approval by the Savannah administrators, and as soon as it is
13347 approved, we will import the old versions from svn and continue
13348 working on the future release.</p>
13349
13350 <p>It is a bit ironic that this is done now, when some of the involved
13351 distributions are moving to upstart as a syvinit replacement.</p>
13352
13353       </div>
13354       <div class="tags">
13355
13356
13357         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>.
13358
13359
13360       </div>
13361     </div>
13362     <div class="padding"></div>
13363
13364     <div class="entry">
13365       <div class="title">
13366         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_boots_quicker_and_quicker.html">Debian boots quicker and quicker</a>
13367       </div>
13368       <div class="date">
13369         24th June 2009
13370       </div>
13371       <div class="body">
13372         <p>I spent Monday and tuesday this week in London with a lot of the
13373 people involved in the boot system on Debian and Ubuntu, to see if we
13374 could find more ways to speed up the boot system.  This was an Ubuntu
13375 funded
13376 <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/FoundationsTeam/BootPerformance/DebianUbuntuSprint">developer
13377 gathering</a>. It was quite productive.  We also discussed the future
13378 of boot systems, and ways to handle the increasing number of boot
13379 issues introduced by the Linux kernel becoming more and more
13380 asynchronous and event base.  The Ubuntu approach using udev and
13381 upstart might be a good way forward.  Time will show.</p>
13382
13383 <p>Anyway, there are a few ways at the moment to speed up the boot
13384 process in Debian.  All of these should be applied to get a quick
13385 boot:</p>
13386
13387 <ul>
13388
13389 <li>Use dash as /bin/sh.</li>
13390
13391 <li>Disable the init.d/hwclock*.sh scripts and make sure the hardware
13392    clock is in UTC.</li>
13393
13394 <li>Install and activate the insserv package to enable
13395    <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LSBInitScripts/DependencyBasedBoot">dependency
13396    based boot sequencing</a>, and enable concurrent booting.</li>
13397
13398 </ul>
13399
13400 These points are based on the Google summer of code work done by
13401 <a href="http://initscripts-ng.alioth.debian.org/soc2006-bootsystem/">Carlos
13402 Villegas</a>.
13403
13404 <p>Support for makefile-style concurrency during boot was uploaded to
13405 unstable yesterday.  When we tested it, we were able to cut 6 seconds
13406 from the boot sequence.  It depend on very correct dependency
13407 declaration in all init.d scripts, so I expect us to find edge cases
13408 where the dependences in some scripts are slightly wrong when we start
13409 using this.</p>
13410
13411 <p>On our IRC channel for this effort, #pkg-sysvinit, a new idea was
13412 introduced by Raphael Geissert today, one that could affect the
13413 startup speed as well.  Instead of starting some scripts concurrently
13414 from rcS.d/ and another set of scripts from rc2.d/, it would be
13415 possible to run a of them in the same process.  A quick way to test
13416 this would be to enable insserv and run 'mv /etc/rc2.d/S* /etc/rcS.d/;
13417 insserv'.  Will need to test if that work. :)</p>
13418
13419       </div>
13420       <div class="tags">
13421
13422
13423         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>.
13424
13425
13426       </div>
13427     </div>
13428     <div class="padding"></div>
13429
13430     <div class="entry">
13431       <div class="title">
13432         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/BSAs_p_stander_om_piratkopiering_m_ter_motstand.html">BSAs påstander om piratkopiering møter motstand</a>
13433       </div>
13434       <div class="date">
13435         17th May 2009
13436       </div>
13437       <div class="body">
13438         <p>Hvert år de siste årene har BSA, lobbyfronten til de store
13439 programvareselskapene som Microsoft og Apple, publisert en rapport der
13440 de gjetter på hvor mye piratkopiering påfører i tapte inntekter i
13441 ulike land rundt om i verden.  Resultatene er tendensiøse.  For noen
13442 dager siden kom
13443 <a href="http://global.bsa.org/globalpiracy2008/studies/globalpiracy2008.pdf">siste
13444 rapport</a>, og det er flere kritiske kommentarer publisert de siste
13445 dagene.  Et spesielt interessant kommentar fra Sverige,
13446 <a href="http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.229795/bsa-hoftade-sverigesiffror">BSA
13447 höftade Sverigesiffror</a>, oppsummeres slik:</p>
13448
13449 <blockquote>
13450 I sin senaste rapport slår BSA fast att 25 procent av all mjukvara i
13451 Sverige är piratkopierad. Det utan att ha pratat med ett enda svenskt
13452 företag. "Man bör nog kanske inte se de här siffrorna som helt
13453 exakta", säger BSAs Sverigechef John Hugosson.
13454 </blockquote>
13455
13456 <p>Mon tro om de er like metodiske når de gjetter på andelen piratkopiering i Norge?  To andre kommentarer er <a
13457 href="http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/comment/2242134/bsa-piracy-figures-shot-reality">BSA
13458 piracy figures need a shot of reality</a> og <a
13459 href="http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/3958/125/">Does The WIPO
13460 Copyright Treaty Work?</a></p>
13461
13462 <p>Fant lenkene via <a
13463 href="http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/17/1632242">oppslag
13464 på Slashdot</a>.</p>
13465
13466       </div>
13467       <div class="tags">
13468
13469
13470         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>.
13471
13472
13473       </div>
13474     </div>
13475     <div class="padding"></div>
13476
13477     <div class="entry">
13478       <div class="title">
13479         <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>
13480       </div>
13481       <div class="date">
13482          7th May 2009
13483       </div>
13484       <div class="body">
13485         <p>Kom over
13486 <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10216873-16.html">interessante
13487 tall</a> fra IDG om utviklingen av linuxservermarkedet.  Fikk meg til
13488 å tenke på antall tjenermaskiner ved Universitetet i Oslo der jeg
13489 jobber til daglig.  En rask opptelling forteller meg at vi har 490
13490 (61%) fysiske unix-tjener (mest linux men også noen solaris) og 196
13491 (25%) windowstjenere, samt 112 (14%) virtuelle unix-tjenere.  Med den
13492 bakgrunnskunnskapen kan jeg godt tro at IDG er inne på noe.</p>
13493
13494       </div>
13495       <div class="tags">
13496
13497
13498         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>.
13499
13500
13501       </div>
13502     </div>
13503     <div class="padding"></div>
13504
13505     <div class="entry">
13506       <div class="title">
13507         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Kryptert_harddisk___naturligvis.html">Kryptert harddisk - naturligvis</a>
13508       </div>
13509       <div class="date">
13510          2nd May 2009
13511       </div>
13512       <div class="body">
13513         <p><a href="http://www.dagensit.no/trender/article1658676.ece">Dagens
13514 IT melder</a> at Intel hevder at det er dyrt å miste en datamaskin,
13515 når en tar tap av arbeidstid, fortrolige dokumenter,
13516 personopplysninger og alt annet det innebærer.  Det er ingen tvil om
13517 at det er en kostbar affære å miste sin datamaskin, og det er årsaken
13518 til at jeg har kryptert harddisken på både kontormaskinen og min
13519 bærbare.  Begge inneholder personopplysninger jeg ikke ønsker skal
13520 komme på avveie, den første informasjon relatert til jobben min ved
13521 Universitetet i Oslo, og den andre relatert til blant annet
13522 foreningsarbeide.  Kryptering av diskene gjør at det er lite
13523 sannsynlig at dophoder som kan finne på å rappe maskinene får noe ut
13524 av dem.  Maskinene låses automatisk etter noen minutter uten bruk,
13525 og en reboot vil gjøre at de ber om passord før de vil starte opp.
13526 Jeg bruker Debian på begge maskinene, og installasjonssystemet der
13527 gjør det trivielt å sette opp krypterte disker.  Jeg har LVM på toppen
13528 av krypterte partisjoner, slik at alt av datapartisjoner er kryptert.
13529 Jeg anbefaler alle å kryptere diskene på sine bærbare.  Kostnaden når
13530 det er gjort slik jeg gjør det er minimale, og gevinstene er
13531 betydelige.  En bør dog passe på passordet.  Hvis det går tapt, må
13532 maskinen reinstalleres og alt er tapt.</p>
13533
13534 <p>Krypteringen vil ikke stoppe kompetente angripere som f.eks. kjøler
13535 ned minnebrikkene før maskinen rebootes med programvare for å hente ut
13536 krypteringsnøklene.  Kostnaden med å forsvare seg mot slike angripere
13537 er for min del høyere enn gevinsten.  Jeg tror oddsene for at
13538 f.eks. etteretningsorganisasjoner har glede av å titte på mine
13539 maskiner er minimale, og ulempene jeg ville oppnå ved å forsøke å
13540 gjøre det vanskeligere for angripere med kompetanse og ressurser er
13541 betydelige.</p>
13542
13543       </div>
13544       <div class="tags">
13545
13546
13547         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>.
13548
13549
13550       </div>
13551     </div>
13552     <div class="padding"></div>
13553
13554     <div class="entry">
13555       <div class="title">
13556         <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>
13557       </div>
13558       <div class="date">
13559          2nd May 2009
13560       </div>
13561       <div class="body">
13562         <p>There are two software projects that have had huge influence on the
13563 quality of free software, and I wanted to mention both in case someone
13564 do not yet know them.</p>
13565
13566 <p>The first one is <a href="http://valgrind.org/">valgrind</a>, a
13567 tool to detect and expose errors in the memory handling of programs.
13568 It is easy to use, all one need to do is to run 'valgrind program',
13569 and it will report any problems on stdout.  It is even better if the
13570 program include debug information.  With debug information, it is able
13571 to report the source file name and line number where the problem
13572 occurs.  It can report things like 'reading past memory block in file
13573 X line N, the memory block was allocated in file Y, line M', and
13574 'using uninitialised value in control logic'.  This tool has made it
13575 trivial to investigate reproducible crash bugs in programs, and have
13576 reduced the number of this kind of bugs in free software a lot.
13577
13578 <p>The second one is
13579 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverity">Coverity</a> which is
13580 a source code checker.  It is able to process the source of a program
13581 and find problems in the logic without running the program.  It
13582 started out as the Stanford Checker and became well known when it was
13583 used to find bugs in the Linux kernel.  It is now a commercial tool
13584 and the company behind it is running
13585 <a href="http://www.scan.coverity.com/">a community service</a> for the
13586 free software community, where a lot of free software projects get
13587 their source checked for free.  Several thousand defects have been
13588 found and fixed so far.  It can find errors like 'lock L taken in file
13589 X line N is never released if exiting in line M', or 'the code in file
13590 Y lines O to P can never be executed'.  The projects included in the
13591 community service project have managed to get rid of a lot of
13592 reliability problems thanks to Coverity.</p>
13593
13594 <p>I believe tools like this, that are able to automatically find
13595 errors in the source, are vital to improve the quality of software and
13596 make sure we can get rid of the crashing and failing software we are
13597 surrounded by today.</p>
13598
13599       </div>
13600       <div class="tags">
13601
13602
13603         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>.
13604
13605
13606       </div>
13607     </div>
13608     <div class="padding"></div>
13609
13610     <div class="entry">
13611       <div class="title">
13612         <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>
13613       </div>
13614       <div class="date">
13615         28th April 2009
13616       </div>
13617       <div class="body">
13618         <p>Julien Blache
13619 <a href="http://blog.technologeek.org/2009/04/12/214">claim that no
13620 patch is better than a useless patch</a>.  I completely disagree, as a
13621 patch allow one to discuss a concrete and proposed solution, and also
13622 prove that the issue at hand is important enough for someone to spent
13623 time on fixing it.  No patch do not provide any of these positive
13624 properties.</p>
13625
13626       </div>
13627       <div class="tags">
13628
13629
13630         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>.
13631
13632
13633       </div>
13634     </div>
13635     <div class="padding"></div>
13636
13637     <div class="entry">
13638       <div class="title">
13639         <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>
13640       </div>
13641       <div class="date">
13642         30th March 2009
13643       </div>
13644       <div class="body">
13645         <p>Where I work at the University of Oslo, one decision stand out as a
13646 very good one to form a long lived computer infrastructure.  It is the
13647 simple one, lost by many in todays computer industry: Standardize on
13648 open network protocols and open exchange/storage formats, not applications.
13649 Applications come and go, while protocols and files tend to stay, and
13650 thus one want to make it easy to change application and vendor, while
13651 avoiding conversion costs and locking users to a specific platform or
13652 application.</p>
13653
13654 <p>This approach make it possible to replace the client applications
13655 independently of the server applications.  One can even allow users to
13656 use several different applications as long as they handle the selected
13657 protocol and format.  In the normal case, only one client application
13658 is recommended and users only get help if they choose to use this
13659 application, but those that want to deviate from the easy path are not
13660 blocked from doing so.</p>
13661
13662 <p>It also allow us to replace the server side without forcing the
13663 users to replace their applications, and thus allow us to select the
13664 best server implementation at any moment, when scale and resouce
13665 requirements change.</p>
13666
13667 <p>I strongly recommend standardizing - on open network protocols and
13668 open formats, but I would never recommend standardizing on a single
13669 application that do not use open network protocol or open formats.</p>
13670
13671       </div>
13672       <div class="tags">
13673
13674
13675         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>.
13676
13677
13678       </div>
13679     </div>
13680     <div class="padding"></div>
13681
13682     <div class="entry">
13683       <div class="title">
13684         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Returning_from_Skolelinux_developer_gathering.html">Returning from Skolelinux developer gathering</a>
13685       </div>
13686       <div class="date">
13687         29th March 2009
13688       </div>
13689       <div class="body">
13690         <p>I'm sitting on the train going home from this weekends Debian
13691 Edu/Skolelinux development gathering.  I got a bit done tuning the
13692 desktop, and looked into the dynamic service location protocol
13693 implementation avahi.  It look like it could be useful for us.  Almost
13694 30 people participated, and I believe it was a great environment to
13695 get to know the Skolelinux system.  Walter Bender, involved in the
13696 development of the Sugar educational platform, presented his stuff and
13697 also helped me improve my OLPC installation.  He also showed me that
13698 his Turtle Art application can be used in standalone mode, and we
13699 agreed that I would help getting it packaged for Debian.  As a
13700 standalone application it would be great for Debian Edu.  We also
13701 tried to get the video conferencing working with two OLPCs, but that
13702 proved to be too hard for us.  The application seem to need more work
13703 before it is ready for me.  I look forward to getting home and relax
13704 now. :)</p>
13705
13706       </div>
13707       <div class="tags">
13708
13709
13710         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>.
13711
13712
13713       </div>
13714     </div>
13715     <div class="padding"></div>
13716
13717     <div class="entry">
13718       <div class="title">
13719         <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>
13720       </div>
13721       <div class="date">
13722         29th March 2009
13723       </div>
13724       <div class="body">
13725         <p>The state of standardized LDAP schemas on Linux is far from
13726 optimal.  There is RFC 2307 documenting one way to store NIS maps in
13727 LDAP, and a modified version of this normally called RFC 2307bis, with
13728 some modifications to be compatible with Active Directory.  The RFC
13729 specification handle the content of a lot of system databases, but do
13730 not handle DNS zones and DHCP configuration.</p>
13731
13732 <p>In <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu/Skolelinux</a>,
13733 we would like to store information about users, SMB clients/hosts,
13734 filegroups, netgroups (users and hosts), DHCP and DNS configuration,
13735 and LTSP configuration in LDAP.  These objects have a lot in common,
13736 but with the current LDAP schemas it is not possible to have one
13737 object per entity.  For example, one need to have at least three LDAP
13738 objects for a given computer, one with the SMB related stuff, one with
13739 DNS information and another with DHCP information.  The schemas
13740 provided for DNS and DHCP are impossible to combine into one LDAP
13741 object.  In addition, it is impossible to implement quick queries for
13742 netgroup membership, because of the way NIS triples are implemented.
13743 It just do not scale.  I believe it is time for a few RFC
13744 specifications to cleam up this mess.</p>
13745
13746 <p>I would like to have one LDAP object representing each computer in
13747 the network, and this object can then keep the SMB (ie host key), DHCP
13748 (mac address/name) and DNS (name/IP address) settings in one place.
13749 It need to be efficently stored to make sure it scale well.</p>
13750
13751 <p>I would also like to have a quick way to map from a user or
13752 computer and to the net group this user or computer is a member.</p>
13753
13754 <p>Active Directory have done a better job than unix heads like myself
13755 in this regard, and the unix side need to catch up.  Time to start a
13756 new IETF work group?</p>
13757
13758       </div>
13759       <div class="tags">
13760
13761
13762         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>.
13763
13764
13765       </div>
13766     </div>
13767     <div class="padding"></div>
13768
13769     <div class="entry">
13770       <div class="title">
13771         <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Endelig_er_Debian_Lenny_gitt_ut.html">Endelig er Debian Lenny gitt ut</a>
13772       </div>
13773       <div class="date">
13774         15th February 2009
13775       </div>
13776       <div class="body">
13777         <p>Endelig er <a href="http://www.debian.org/">Debian</a>
13778 <a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2009/20090214">Lenny</a> gitt ut.
13779 Et langt steg videre for Debian-prosjektet, og en rekke nye
13780 programpakker blir nå tilgjengelig for de av oss som bruker den
13781 stabile utgaven av Debian.  Neste steg er nå å få
13782 <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Skolelinux</a> /
13783 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/">Debian Edu</a> ferdig
13784 oppdatert for den nye utgaven, slik at en oppdatert versjon kan
13785 slippes løs på skolene.  Takk til alle debian-utviklerne som har
13786 gjort dette mulig.  Endelig er f.eks. fungerende avhengighetsstyrt
13787 bootsekvens tilgjengelig i stabil utgave, vha pakken
13788 <tt>insserv</tt>.</p>
13789
13790       </div>
13791       <div class="tags">
13792
13793
13794         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>.
13795
13796
13797       </div>
13798     </div>
13799     <div class="padding"></div>
13800
13801     <div class="entry">
13802       <div class="title">
13803         <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>
13804       </div>
13805       <div class="date">
13806          7th December 2008
13807       </div>
13808       <div class="body">
13809         <p>This weekend we had a small developer gathering for Debian Edu in
13810 Oslo.  Most of Saturday was used for the general assemly for the
13811 member organization, but the rest of the weekend I used to tune the
13812 LTSP installation.  LTSP now work out of the box on the 10-network.
13813 Acer Aspire One proved to be a very nice thin client, with both
13814 screen, mouse and keybard in a small box.  Was working on getting the
13815 diskless workstation setup configured out of the box, but did not
13816 finish it before the weekend was up.</p>
13817
13818 <p>Did not find time to look at the 4 VGA cards in one box we got from
13819 the Brazilian group, so that will have to wait for the next
13820 development gathering.  Would love to have the Debian Edu installer
13821 automatically detect and configure a multiseat setup when it find one
13822 of these cards.</p>
13823
13824       </div>
13825       <div class="tags">
13826
13827
13828         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>.
13829
13830
13831       </div>
13832     </div>
13833     <div class="padding"></div>
13834
13835     <div class="entry">
13836       <div class="title">
13837         <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>
13838       </div>
13839       <div class="date">
13840         25th November 2008
13841       </div>
13842       <div class="body">
13843         <p>Recently I have spent some time evaluating the multimedia browser
13844 plugins available in Debian Lenny, to see which one we should use by
13845 default in Debian Edu.  We need an embedded video playing plugin with
13846 control buttons to pause or stop the video, and capable of streaming
13847 all the multimedia content available on the web.  The test results and
13848 notes are available on
13849 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/BrowserMultimedia">the
13850 Debian wiki</a>.  I was surprised how few of the plugins are able to
13851 fill this need.  My personal video player favorite, VLC, has a really
13852 bad plugin which fail on a lot of the test pages.  A lot of the MIME
13853 types I would expect to work with any free software player (like
13854 video/ogg), just do not work.  And simple formats like the
13855 audio/x-mplegurl format (m3u playlists), just isn't supported by the
13856 totem and vlc plugins.  I hope the situation will improve soon.  No
13857 wonder sites use the proprietary Adobe flash to play video.</p>
13858
13859 <p>For Lenny, we seem to end up with the mplayer plugin.  It seem to
13860 be the only one fitting our needs. :/</p>
13861
13862       </div>
13863       <div class="tags">
13864
13865
13866         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>.
13867
13868
13869       </div>
13870     </div>
13871     <div class="padding"></div>
13872
13873     <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>
13874     <div id="sidebar">
13875
13876
13877
13878 <h2>Archive</h2>
13879 <ul>
13880
13881 <li>2020
13882 <ul>
13883
13884 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2020/02/">February (2)</a></li>
13885
13886 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2020/03/">March (2)</a></li>
13887
13888 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2020/04/">April (2)</a></li>
13889
13890 </ul></li>
13891
13892 <li>2019
13893 <ul>
13894
13895 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/01/">January (4)</a></li>
13896
13897 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/02/">February (3)</a></li>
13898
13899 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13900
13901 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/05/">May (2)</a></li>
13902
13903 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/06/">June (5)</a></li>
13904
13905 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/07/">July (2)</a></li>
13906
13907 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/08/">August (1)</a></li>
13908
13909 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/09/">September (1)</a></li>
13910
13911 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/11/">November (1)</a></li>
13912
13913 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2019/12/">December (4)</a></li>
13914
13915 </ul></li>
13916
13917 <li>2018
13918 <ul>
13919
13920 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/01/">January (1)</a></li>
13921
13922 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/02/">February (5)</a></li>
13923
13924 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/03/">March (5)</a></li>
13925
13926 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/04/">April (3)</a></li>
13927
13928 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13929
13930 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/07/">July (5)</a></li>
13931
13932 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/08/">August (3)</a></li>
13933
13934 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/09/">September (3)</a></li>
13935
13936 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/10/">October (5)</a></li>
13937
13938 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/11/">November (2)</a></li>
13939
13940 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2018/12/">December (4)</a></li>
13941
13942 </ul></li>
13943
13944 <li>2017
13945 <ul>
13946
13947 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/01/">January (4)</a></li>
13948
13949 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/02/">February (3)</a></li>
13950
13951 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/03/">March (5)</a></li>
13952
13953 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/04/">April (2)</a></li>
13954
13955 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/06/">June (5)</a></li>
13956
13957 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/07/">July (1)</a></li>
13958
13959 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/08/">August (1)</a></li>
13960
13961 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/09/">September (3)</a></li>
13962
13963 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/10/">October (5)</a></li>
13964
13965 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/11/">November (3)</a></li>
13966
13967 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2017/12/">December (4)</a></li>
13968
13969 </ul></li>
13970
13971 <li>2016
13972 <ul>
13973
13974 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
13975
13976 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
13977
13978 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
13979
13980 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
13981
13982 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
13983
13984 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (2)</a></li>
13985
13986 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/07/">July (2)</a></li>
13987
13988 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/08/">August (5)</a></li>
13989
13990 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/09/">September (2)</a></li>
13991
13992 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/10/">October (3)</a></li>
13993
13994 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/11/">November (8)</a></li>
13995
13996 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/12/">December (5)</a></li>
13997
13998 </ul></li>
13999
14000 <li>2015
14001 <ul>
14002
14003 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
14004
14005 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
14006
14007 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
14008
14009 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
14010
14011 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
14012
14013 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
14014
14015 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
14016
14017 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
14018
14019 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
14020
14021 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
14022
14023 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
14024
14025 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
14026
14027 </ul></li>
14028
14029 <li>2014
14030 <ul>
14031
14032 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
14033
14034 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
14035
14036 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
14037
14038 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
14039
14040 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
14041
14042 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
14043
14044 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
14045
14046 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
14047
14048 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
14049
14050 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
14051
14052 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
14053
14054 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
14055
14056 </ul></li>
14057
14058 <li>2013
14059 <ul>
14060
14061 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
14062
14063 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
14064
14065 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
14066
14067 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
14068
14069 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
14070
14071 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
14072
14073 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
14074
14075 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
14076
14077 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
14078
14079 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
14080
14081 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
14082
14083 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
14084
14085 </ul></li>
14086
14087 <li>2012
14088 <ul>
14089
14090 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
14091
14092 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
14093
14094 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
14095
14096 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
14097
14098 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
14099
14100 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
14101
14102 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
14103
14104 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
14105
14106 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
14107
14108 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
14109
14110 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
14111
14112 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
14113
14114 </ul></li>
14115
14116 <li>2011
14117 <ul>
14118
14119 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
14120
14121 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
14122
14123 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
14124
14125 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
14126
14127 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
14128
14129 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
14130
14131 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
14132
14133 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
14134
14135 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
14136
14137 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
14138
14139 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
14140
14141 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
14142
14143 </ul></li>
14144
14145 <li>2010
14146 <ul>
14147
14148 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
14149
14150 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
14151
14152 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
14153
14154 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
14155
14156 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
14157
14158 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
14159
14160 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
14161
14162 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
14163
14164 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
14165
14166 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
14167
14168 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
14169
14170 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
14171
14172 </ul></li>
14173
14174 <li>2009
14175 <ul>
14176
14177 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
14178
14179 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
14180
14181 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
14182
14183 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
14184
14185 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
14186
14187 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
14188
14189 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
14190
14191 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
14192
14193 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
14194
14195 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
14196
14197 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
14198
14199 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
14200
14201 </ul></li>
14202
14203 <li>2008
14204 <ul>
14205
14206 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
14207
14208 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
14209
14210 </ul></li>
14211
14212 </ul>
14213
14214
14215
14216 <h2>Tags</h2>
14217 <ul>
14218
14219  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (16)</a></li>
14220
14221  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
14222
14223  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
14224
14225  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
14226
14227  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/betalkontant">betalkontant (8)</a></li>
14228
14229  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (11)</a></li>
14230
14231  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (17)</a></li>
14232
14233  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
14234
14235  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
14236
14237  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (169)</a></li>
14238
14239  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (158)</a></li>
14240
14241  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian-handbook">debian-handbook (4)</a></li>
14242
14243  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (11)</a></li>
14244
14245  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (17)</a></li>
14246
14247  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (26)</a></li>
14248
14249  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
14250
14251  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (414)</a></li>
14252
14253  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
14254
14255  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (14)</a></li>
14256
14257  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (34)</a></li>
14258
14259  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
14260
14261  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (20)</a></li>
14262
14263  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
14264
14265  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
14266
14267  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (16)</a></li>
14268
14269  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (22)</a></li>
14270
14271  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kodi">kodi (4)</a></li>
14272
14273  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
14274
14275  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lego">lego (4)</a></li>
14276
14277  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
14278
14279  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
14280
14281  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
14282
14283  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
14284
14285  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (42)</a></li>
14286
14287  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (13)</a></li>
14288
14289  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/noark5">noark5 (22)</a></li>
14290
14291  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (313)</a></li>
14292
14293  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (197)</a></li>
14294
14295  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (38)</a></li>
14296
14297  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
14298
14299  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (75)</a></li>
14300
14301  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (111)</a></li>
14302
14303  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (2)</a></li>
14304
14305  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
14306
14307  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
14308
14309  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
14310
14311  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (12)</a></li>
14312
14313  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
14314
14315  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (7)</a></li>
14316
14317  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
14318
14319  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (56)</a></li>
14320
14321  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
14322
14323  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (5)</a></li>
14324
14325  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (70)</a></li>
14326
14327  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (7)</a></li>
14328
14329  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (12)</a></li>
14330
14331  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (58)</a></li>
14332
14333  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (4)</a></li>
14334
14335  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
14336
14337  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (9)</a></li>
14338
14339  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/verkidetfri">verkidetfri (17)</a></li>
14340
14341  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (73)</a></li>
14342
14343  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
14344
14345  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (42)</a></li>
14346
14347 </ul>
14348
14349
14350     </div>
14351     <p style="text-align: right">
14352  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
14353 </p>
14354
14355   </body>
14356 </html>