- <title>Automatic proxy configuration with Debian Edu / Skolelinux</title>
- <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_proxy_configuration_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux.html</link>
- <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Automatic_proxy_configuration_with_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux.html</guid>
- <pubDate>Mon, 13 Feb 2012 23:40:00 +0100</pubDate>
- <description><p>New in the Squeeze version of
-<a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> is the
-ability for clients to automatically configure their proxy settings
-based on their environment. We want all systems on the client to use
-the WPAD based proxy definition fetched from <tt>http://wpad/wpad.dat</tt>, to
-allow sites to control the proxy setting from a central place and make
-sure clients do not have hard coded proxy settings. The schools can
-change the global proxy setting by editing
-<tt>tjener:/etc/debian-edu/www/wpad.dat</tt> and the change propagate
-to all Debian Edu clients in the network.</p>
-
-<p>The problem is that some systems do not understand the WPAD system.
-In other words, how do one get from a WPAD file like this (this is a
-simple one, they can run arbitrary code):</p>
-
-<blockquote><pre>
-function FindProxyForURL(url, host)
-{
- if (!isResolvable(host) ||
- isPlainHostName(host) ||
- dnsDomainIs(host, ".intern"))
- return "DIRECT";
- else
- return "PROXY webcache:3128; DIRECT";
-}
-</pre></blockquote>
-
-<p>to a proxy setting in the process environment looking like this:</p>
-
-<blockquote><pre>
-http_proxy=http://webcache:3128/
-ftp_proxy=http://webcache:3128/
-</pre></blockquote>
-
-<p>To do this conversion I developed a perl script that will execute
-the javascript fragment in the WPAD file and return the proxy that
-would be used for
-<tt><a href="http://www.debian.org/">http://www.debian.org/</a></tt>,
-and insert this extracted proxy URL in <tt>/etc/environment</tt> and
-<tt>/etc/apt/apt.conf</tt>. The perl script wpad-extract work just
-fine in Squeeze, but in Wheezy the library it need to run the
-javascript code is <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/631045">no longer
-able to build</a> because the C library it depended on is now a C++
-library. I hope someone find a solution to that problem before Wheezy
-is frozen. An alternative would be for us to rewrite wpad-extract to
-use some other javascript library currently working in Wheezy, but no
-known alternative is known at the moment.</p>
-
-<p>This automatic proxy system allow the roaming workstation (aka
-laptop) setup in Debian Edu/Squeeze to use the proxy when the laptop
-is connected to the backbone network in a Debian Edu setup, and to
-automatically use any proxy present and announced using the WPAD
-feature when it is connected to other networks. And if no proxy is
-announced, direct connections will be used instead.</p>
-
-<p>Silently using a proxy announced on the network might be a privacy
-or security problem. But those controlling DHCP and DNS on a network
-could just as easily set up a transparent proxy, and force all HTTP
-and FTP connections to use a proxy anyway, so I consider that
-distinction to be academic. If you are afraid of using the wrong
-proxy, you should avoid connecting to the network in question in the
-first place. In Debian Edu, the proxy setup is updated using dhcp and
-ifupdown hooks, to make sure the configuration is updated every time
-the network setup changes.</p>
-
-<p>The WPAD system is documented in a
-<a href="http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-wrec-wpad-01">IETF
-draft</a> and a
-<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Proxy_Autodiscovery_Protocol">Wikipedia
-page</a> for those that want to learn more.</p>
+ <title>Debian Edu interview: Mike Gabriel</title>
+ <link>http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Mike_Gabriel.html</link>
+ <guid isPermaLink="true">http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Mike_Gabriel.html</guid>
+ <pubDate>Sat, 2 Jun 2012 15:00:00 +0200</pubDate>
+ <description><p>Back in 2010, Mike Gabriel showed up on the
+<a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and Skolelinux</a>
+mailing list. He quickly proved to be a valuable developer, and
+thanks to his tireless effort we now have Kerberos integrated into the
+<a href="http://www.debian.org/News/2012/20120311.html">Debian Edu
+Squeeze</a> version.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
+
+<p>My name is Mike Gabriel, I am 38 years old and live near Kiel,
+Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. I live together with a wonderful partner
+(Angela Fuß) and two own children and two bonus children (contributed
+by Angela).</p>
+
+<p>During the day I am part-time employed as a system administrator
+and part-time working as an IT consultant. The consultancy work
+touches free software topics wherever and whenever possible. During
+the nights I am a free software developer. In the gaps I also train in
+becoming an osteopath.</p>
+
+<p>Starting in 2010 we (Andreas Buchholz, Angela Fuß, Mike Gabriel)
+have set up a free software project in the area of Kiel that aims at
+introducing free software into schools. The project's name is
+"IT-Zukunft Schule" (IT future for schools). The project links IT
+skills with communication skills.</p>
+
+<p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux/Debian Edu
+project?</strong></p>
+
+<p>While preparing our own customised Linux distribution for
+"IT-Zukunft Schule" we were repeatedly asked if we really wanted to
+reinvent the wheel. What schools really need is already available,
+people said. From this impulse we started evaluating other Linux
+distributions that target being used for school networks.</p>
+
+<p>At the end we short-listed two approaches and compared them: a
+commercial Linux distribution developed by a company in Bremen,
+Germany, and Skolelinux / Debian Edu. Between 12/2010 and 03/2011 we
+went to several events and met people being responsible for marketing
+and development of either of the distributions. Skolelinux / Debian
+Edu was by far much more convincing compared to the other product that
+got short-listed beforehand--across the full spectrum. What was most
+attractive for me personally: the perspective of collaboration within
+the developmental branch of the Debian Edu project itself.</p>
+
+<p>In parallel with this, we talked to many local and not-so-local
+people. People teaching at schools, headmasters, politicians, data
+protection experts, other IT professionals.</p>
+
+<p>We came to two conclusions:</p>
+
+<p>First, a technical conclusion: What schools need is available in
+bits and pieces here and there, and none of the solutions really fit
+by 100%. Any school we have seen has a very individual IT setup
+whereas most of each school's requirements could mapped by a standard
+IT solution. The requirement to this IT solution is flexibility and
+customisability, so that individual adaptations here and there are
+possible. In terms of re-distributing and rolling out such a
+standardised IT system for schools (a system that is still to some
+degree customisable) there is still a lot of work to do here
+locally. Debian Edu / Skolelinux has been our choice as the starting
+point.</p>
+
+<p>Second, a holistic conclusion: What schools need does not exist at
+all (or we missed it so far). There are several technical solutions
+for handling IT at schools that tend to make a good impression. What
+has been missing completely here in Germany, though, is the enrolment
+of people into using IT and teaching with IT. "IT-Zukunft Schule"
+tries to provide an approach for this.</p>
+
+<p>Only some schools have some sort of a media concept which explains,
+defines and gives guidance on how to use IT in class. Most schools in
+Northern Germany do not have an IT service provider, the school's IT
+equipment is managed by one or (if the school is lucky) two (admin)
+teachers, most of the workload these admin teachers get done in there
+spare time.</p>
+
+<p>We were surprised that only a very few admin teachers were
+networked with colleagues from other schools. Basically, every school
+here around has its individual approach of providing IT equipment to
+teachers and students and the exchange of ideas has been quasi
+non-existent until 2010/2011.</p>
+
+<p>Quite some (non-admin) teachers try to avoid using IT technology in
+class as a learning medium completely. Several reasons for this
+avoidance do exist.</p>
+
+<p>We discovered that no-one has ever taken a closer look at this
+social part of IT management in schools, so far. On our quest journey
+for a technical IT solution for schools, we discussed this issue with
+several teachers, headmasters, politicians, other IT professionals and
+they all confirmed: a holistic approach of considering IT management
+at schools, an approach that includes the people in place, will be new
+and probably a gain for all.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>There is a list of advantages: international context, openness to
+any kind of contributions, do-ocracy policy, the closeness to Debian,
+the different installation scenarios possible (from stand-alone
+workstation to complex multi-server sites), the transparency within
+project communication, honest communication within the group of
+developers, etc.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux/Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Every coin has two sides:</p>
+
+<p>Technically: <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/311188">BTS issue
+#311188</a>, tricky upgradability of a Debian Edu main server, network
+client installations on top of a plain vanilla Debian installation
+should become possible sometime in the near future, one could think
+about splitting the very complex package debian-edu-config into
+several portions (to make it easier for new developers to
+contribute).</p>
+
+<p>Another issue I see is that we (as Debian Edu developers) should
+find out more about the network of people who do the marketing for
+Debian Edu / Skolelinux. There is a very active group in Germany
+promoting Skolelinux on the bigger Linux Days within Germany. Are
+there other groups like that in other countries? How can we bring
+these marketing people together (marketing group A with group B and
+all of them with the group of Debian Edu developers)? During the last
+meeting of the German Skolelinux group, I got the impression of people
+there being rather disconnected from the development department of
+Debian Edu / Skolelinux.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
+
+<p>For my daily business, I do not use commercial software at all.</p>
+
+<p>For normal stuff I use Iceweasel/Firefox, Libreoffice.org. For
+serious text writing I prefer LaTeX. I use gimp, inkscape, scribus for
+more artistic tasks. I run virtual machines in KVM and Virtualbox.</p>
+
+<p>I am one of the upstream developers of X2Go. In 2010 I started the
+development of a Python based X2Go Client, called PyHoca-GUI.
+PyHoca-GUI has brought forth a Python X2Go Client API that currently
+is being integrated in Ubuntu's software center.</p>
+
+<p>For communications I have my own Kolab server running using Horde
+as web-based groupware client. For IRC I love to use irssi, for Jabber
+I have several clients that I use, mostly pidgin, though. I am also
+the Debian maintainer of Coccinella, a Jabber-based interactive
+whiteboard.</p>
+
+<p>My favourite terminal emulator is KDE's Yakuake.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
+get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Communicate, communicate, communicate. Enrol people, enrol people,
+enrol people.</p>