<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Hva_stemte_hver_stortingsrepresentant_i_voteringene_om_datalagringsdirektivet_.html">Hva stemte hver stortingsrepresentant i voteringene om datalagringsdirektivet?</a></div>
- <div class="date"> 9th February 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>Nytt stortingsvalg er på trappene, og folket får igjen mulighet til
-å påvirke sammensetningen i vår lovgivende forsamling. Da er det
-relevant å vite hvilke representanter og partier som har støttet
-innføringen av brev- og besøkskontroll av hele den norske
-befolkningen, det vil si datalagringsdirektivet.</p>
-
-<p>Hvis du vil vite hva hver enkelt stortingsrepresentant har stemt i
-stortingsvoteringene om datalagringsdirektivet, så har nettstedet til
-<a href="http://www.holderdeord.no/">Holder De Ord</a> den (så vidt jeg
-vet) eneste komplette oversikten på sin temaside om
-<a href="http://beta.holderdeord.no/issues/innfore-datalagringsdirektivet">innføringen
-av datalagringsdirektivet</a>. Den har detaljene fra de 11 relevante
-forslagene som har vært fremmet så lagt. De har vært votert over
-2011-04-04, 2011-04-11, 2012-06-11, 2012-10-05 og 2012-12-06.</p>
-
-<p>Hvis du lurer på hva som er problemet med datalagringsdirektivet,
-anbefaler jeg å lese <a href="http://www.uhuru.biz/?cat=84">artiklene
-fra Jon Wessel-Aas</a> om temaet, samt informasjon fra foreningen
-<a href="http://www.digitaltpersonvern.no/">Digitalt
-Personvern</a>.</p>
+ <div class="title"><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></div>
+ <div class="date">17th July 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>Today I switched to
+<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">my
+new laptop</a>. I've previously written about the problems I had with
+my new Thinkpad X230, which was delivered with an
+<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
+GB Intel SSD disk with Lenovo firmware</a> that did not handle
+sustained writes. My hardware supplier have been very forthcoming in
+trying to find a solution, and after first trying with another
+identical 180 GB disks they decided to send me a 256 GB Samsung SSD
+disk instead to fix it once and for all. The Samsung disk survived
+the installation of Debian with encrypted disks (filling the disk with
+random data during installation killed the first two), and I thus
+decided to trust it with my data. I have installed it as a Debian Edu
+Wheezy roaming workstation hooked up with my Debian Edu Squeeze main
+server at home using Kerberos and LDAP, and will use it as my work
+station from now on.</p>
+
+<p>As this is a solid state disk with no moving parts, I believe the
+Debian Wheezy default installation need to be tuned a bit to increase
+performance and increase life time of the disk. The Linux kernel and
+user space applications do not yet adjust automatically to such
+environment. To make it easier for my self, I created a draft Debian
+package <tt>ssd-setup</tt> to handle this tuning. The
+<a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/ssd-setup.git">source
+for the ssd-setup package</a> is available from collab-maint, and it
+is set up to adjust the setup of the machine by just installing the
+package. If there is any non-SSD disk in the machine, the package
+will refuse to install, as I did not try to write any logic to sort
+file systems in SSD and non-SSD file systems.</p>
+
+<p>I consider the package a draft, as I am a bit unsure how to best
+set up Debian Wheezy with an SSD. It is adjusted to my use case,
+where I set up the machine with one large encrypted partition (in
+addition to /boot), put LVM on top of this and set up partitions on
+top of this again. See the README file in the package source for the
+references I used to pick the settings. At the moment these
+parameters are tuned:</p>
+
+<ul>
+
+<li>Set up cryptsetup to pass TRIM commands to the physical disk
+ (adding discard to /etc/crypttab)</li>
+
+<li>Set up LVM to pass on TRIM commands to the underlying device (in
+ this case a cryptsetup partition) by changing issue_discards from
+ 0 to 1 in /etc/lvm/lvm.conf.</li>
+
+<li>Set relatime as a file system option for ext3 and ext4 file
+ systems.</li>
+
+<li>Tell swap to use TRIM commands by adding 'discard' to
+ /etc/fstab.</li>
+
+<li>Change I/O scheduler from cfq to deadline using a udev rule.</li>
+
+<li>Run fstrim on every ext3 and ext4 file system every night (from
+ cron.daily).</li>
+
+<li>Adjust sysctl values vm.swappiness to 1 and vm.vfs_cache_pressure
+ to 50 to reduce the kernel eagerness to swap out processes.</li>
+
+</ul>
+
+<p>During installation, I cancelled the part where the installer fill
+the disk with random data, as this would kill the SSD performance for
+little gain. My goal with the encrypted file system is to ensure
+those stealing my laptop end up with a brick and not a working
+computer. I have no hope in keeping the really resourceful people
+from getting the data on the disk (see
+<a href="http://xkcd.com/538/">XKCD #538</a> for an explanation why).
+Thus I concluded that adding the discard option to crypttab is the
+right thing to do.</p>
+
+<p>I considered using the noop I/O scheduler, as several recommended
+it for SSD, but others recommended deadline and a benchmark I found
+indicated that deadline might be better for interactive use.</p>
+
+<p>I also considered using the 'discard' file system option for ext3
+and ext4, but read that it would give a performance hit ever time a
+file is removed, and thought it best to that that slowdown once a day
+instead of during my work.</p>
+
+<p>My package do not set up tmpfs on /var/run, /var/lock and /tmp, as
+this is already done by Debian Edu.</p>
+
+<p>I have not yet started on the user space tuning. I expect
+iceweasel need some tuning, and perhaps other applications too, but
+have not yet had time to investigate those parts.</p>
+
+<p>The package should work on Ubuntu too, but I have not yet tested it
+there.</p>
+
+<p>As for the answer to the question in the title of this blog post,
+as far as I know, the only solution I know about is to replace the
+disk. It might be possible to flash it with Intel firmware instead of
+the Lenovo firmware. But I have not tried and did not want to do so
+without approval from Lenovo as I wanted to keep the warranty on the
+disk until a solution was found and they wanted the broken disks
+back.</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</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>.
+ 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>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/_kt_overv_kning_applauderes_igjen_av_Arbeiderpartiet__H_yre_og_Fremskrittspartiet.html">Økt overvåkning applauderes igjen av Arbeiderpartiet, Høyre og Fremskrittspartiet</a></div>
- <div class="date"> 4th February 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>Jeg ser med gru at Arbeiderpartiet, Høyre og Fremskrittspartiet
-<a href="http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/Positive-til-mer-smuglerovervaking-7110348.html">applauderer
-tollvesenets forslag</a> om å øke overvåkningen i Norge nok et hakk.
-Det er ikke så rart, da de som uttaler seg jo også har støttet
-innføringen av datalagringsdirektivet eller i hvert fall ikke veldig
-aktivt har motarbeidet det. Innføringen av datalagringsdirektivet er
-en lovendring som innebærer brev og besøkskontroll for hele
-befolkningen.</p>
-
-<p><a href="http://www.stortinget.no/no/Saker-og-publikasjoner/Saker/Sak/?p=48717">Datalagringsdirektivet</a>
-har vært oppe til votering i stortinget tre ganger så langt. Det ble
-<a href="http://svartelisten.org/">vedtatt første gang 2011-04-04</a>
-og
-<a href="https://github.com/holderdeord/hdo-folketingparser/blob/master/data/votering-2011-04-11.xml">andre
-gang 2011-04-11</a> (lovendringer voteres to ganger), og forslag om å
-stoppe loven ble
-<a href="http://www.stortinget.no/no/Saker-og-publikasjoner/Saker/Sak/Voteringsoversikt/?p=53844&dnid=1">nedstemt
-2012-12-06</a> (se også
-<a href="http://beta.holderdeord.no/issues/innfore-datalagringsdirektivet">oversikt fra Holder De
-Ord</a>).</p>
-
-<p>Jan Bøhler i Arbeiderpartiet stemte for å innføre
-datalagringsdirektivet i lovverket i første votering, var ikke
-tilstede i andre votering og støttet loven i tredje votering. André
-Oktay Dahl i Høyre var ikke til stede i første og andre votering men
-støttet loven i tredje votering. Ulf Leirstein i Fremskrittspartiet
-stemte mot loven i første votering men var ikke til stede i andre og
-tredje votering.</p>
-
-<p>Hvis du lurer på hva som er problemet med datalagringsdirektivet,
-anbefaler jeg å lese <a href="http://www.uhuru.biz/?cat=84">artiklene
-fra Jon Wessel-Aas</a> om temaet, samt informasjon fra foreningen
-<a href="http://www.digitaltpersonvern.no/">Digitalt
-Personvern</a>.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Oppdatering 2013-03-09</strong>: Endret lenke til Holder De
-Ord, som har byttet mange lenker i forbindelse med import av
-voteringsdata for 2010-2011.</p>
+ <div class="title"><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></div>
+ <div class="date">10th July 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>A few days ago, I wrote about
+<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_Thinkpad_is_dead__long_live_the_Thinkpad_X230_.html">the
+problems I experienced with my new X230 and its SSD disk</a>, which
+was dying during installation because it is unable to cope with
+sustained write. My supplier is in contact with
+<a href="http://www.lenovo.com/">Lenovo</a>, and they wanted to send a
+replacement disk to try to fix the problem. They decided to send an
+identical model, so my hopes for a permanent fix was slim.</p>
+
+<p>Anyway, today I got the replacement disk and tried to install
+Debian Edu Wheezy with encrypted disk on it. The new disk have the
+same firmware version as the original. This time my hope raised
+slightly as the installation progressed, as the original disk used to
+die after 4-7% of the disk was written to, while this time it kept
+going past 10%, 20%, 40% and even past 50%. But around 60%, the disk
+died again and I was back on square one. I still do not have a new
+laptop with a disk I can trust. I can not live with a disk that might
+lock up when I download a new
+<a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux</a> ISO or
+other large files. I look forward to hearing from my supplier with
+the next proposal from Lenovo.</p>
+
+<p>The original disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
+11S0C38722Z1ZNME35X1TR, ISN: CVCV321407HB180EGN, SA: G57560302, FW:
+LF1i, 29MAY2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
+Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40002756C4, Model:
+SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
+P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
+
+<p>The replacement disk is marked Intel SSD 520 Series 180 GB,
+11S0C38722Z1ZNDE34N0L0, ISN: CVCV315306RK180EGN, SA: G57560-302, FW:
+LF1i, 22APR2013, PBA: G39779-300, LBA 351,651,888, LI P/N: 0C38722,
+Pb-free 2LI, LC P/N: 16-200366, WWN: 55CD2E40000AB69E, Model:
+SSDSC2BW180A3L 2.5" 6Gb/s SATA SSD 180G 5V 1A, ASM P/N 0C38732, FRU
+P/N 45N8295, P0C38732.</p>
+
+<p>The only difference is in the first number (serial number?), ISN,
+SA, date and WNPP values. Mentioning all the details here in case
+someone is able to use the information to find a way to identify the
+failing disk among working ones (if any such working disk actually
+exist).</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk</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>.
+ 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>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><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></div>
- <div class="date"> 2nd February 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>My
-<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/How_to_backport_bitcoin_qt_version_0_7_2_2_to_Debian_Squeeze.html">last
-bitcoin related blog post</a> mentioned that the new
-<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/bitcoin">bitcoin package</a> for
-Debian was waiting in NEW. It was accepted by the Debian ftp-masters
-2013-01-19, and have been available in unstable since then. It was
-automatically copied to Ubuntu, and is available in their Raring
-version too.</p>
-
-<p>But there is a strange problem with the build that block this new
-version from being available on the i386 and kfreebsd-i386
-architectures. For some strange reason, the autobuilders in Debian
-for these architectures fail to run the test suite on these
-architectures (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/672524">BTS #672524</a>).
-We are so far unable to reproduce it when building it manually, and
-no-one have been able to propose a fix. If you got an idea what is
-failing, please let us know via the BTS.</p>
-
-<p>One feature that is annoying me with of the bitcoin client, because
-I often run low on disk space, is the fact that the client will exit
-if it run short on space (<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/696715">BTS
-#696715</a>). So make sure you have enough disk space when you run
-it. :)</p>
-
-<p>As usual, if you use bitcoin and want to show your support of my
-activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address
-<b><a href="bitcoin:15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b&label=PetterReinholdtsenBlog">15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b</a></b>.</p>
+ <div class="title"><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></div>
+ <div class="date"> 9th July 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>The upcoming Saturday, 2013-07-13, we are organising a combined
+Debian Edu developer gathering and Debian and Ubuntu bug squashing
+party in Oslo. It is organised by <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the
+member assosiation NUUG</a> and
+<a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">the Debian Edu / Skolelinux
+project</a> together with <a href="http://bitraf.no/">the hack space
+Bitraf</a>.</p>
+
+<p>It starts 10:00 and continue until late evening. Everyone is
+welcome, and there is no fee to participate. There is on the other
+hand limited space, and only room for 30 people. Please put your name
+on <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/BSP/2013/07/13/no/Oslo">the event
+wiki page</a> if you plan to join us.</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ 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>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">Welcome to the world, Isenkram!</a></div>
- <div class="date">22nd January 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>Yesterday, I
-<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_prototype_ready_making_hardware_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">asked
-for testers</a> for my prototype for making Debian better at handling
-pluggable hardware devices, which I
-<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">set
-out to create</a> earlier this month. Several valuable testers showed
-up, and caused me to really want to to open up the development to more
-people. But before I did this, I want to come up with a sensible name
-for this project. Today I finally decided on a new name, and I have
-renamed the project from hw-support-handler to this new name. In the
-process, I moved the source to git and made it available as a
-<a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/gitweb/?p=collab-maint/isenkram.git">collab-maint</a>
-repository in Debian. The new name? It is <strong>Isenkram</strong>.
-To fetch and build the latest version of the source, use</p>
-
-<pre>
-git clone http://anonscm.debian.org/git/collab-maint/isenkram.git
-cd isenkram && git-buildpackage -us -uc
-</pre>
-
-<p>I have not yet adjusted all files to use the new name yet. If you
-want to hack on the source or improve the package, please go ahead.
-But please talk to me first on IRC or via email before you do major
-changes, to make sure we do not step on each others toes. :)</p>
-
-<p>If you wonder what 'isenkram' is, it is a Norwegian word for iron
-stuff, typically meaning tools, nails, screws, etc. Typical hardware
-stuff, in other words. I've been told it is the Norwegian variant of
-the German word eisenkram, for those that are familiar with that
-word.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Update 2013-01-26</strong>: Added -us -us to build
-instructions, to avoid confusing people with an error from the signing
-process.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Update 2013-01-27</strong>: Switch to HTTP URL for the git
-clone argument to avoid the need for authentication.</p>
+ <div class="title"><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></div>
+ <div class="date"> 5th July 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a
+<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Thank_you_Thinkpad_X41__for_your_long_and_trustworthy_service.html">replacement
+for my trusty old Thinkpad X41</a>. Unfortunately I did not have much
+time to spend on it, and it took a while to find a model I believe
+will do the job, but two days ago the replacement finally arrived. I
+ended up picking a
+<a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad X230</a>
+with SSD disk (NZDAJMN). I first test installed Debian Edu Wheezy as
+a roaming workstation, and it seemed to work flawlessly. But my
+second installation with encrypted disk was not as successful. More
+on that below.</p>
+
+<p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
+important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
+listed in the feature list. But I did get good help from the search
+feature at <a href="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
+allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
+requirements. A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks according
+to that search interface, so I had to drop specifying the number of
+disks from my search parameters. I also asked around among friends to
+get their impression on keyboards and robustness.</p>
+
+<p>So the new laptop arrived, and it is quite a lot wider than the
+X41. I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is
+significantly wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my
+hand a lot more to reach the edges. But the key response is fairly
+good and the individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope
+I will get used to it. My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really
+needed a new laptop now. :)</p>
+
+<p>Turning off the touch pad was simple. All it took was a quick
+visit to the BIOS during boot it disable it.</p>
+
+<p>But there is a fatal problem with the laptop. The 180 GB SSD disk
+lock up during load. And this happen when installing Debian Wheezy
+with encrypted disk, while the disk is being filled with random data.
+I also tested to install Ubuntu Raring, and it happen there too if I
+reenable the code to fill the disk with random data (it is disabled by
+default in Ubuntu). And the bug with is already known. It was
+reported to Debian as <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/691427">BTS
+report #691427 2012-10-25</a> (journal commit I/O error on brand-new
+Thinkpad T430s ext4 on lvm on SSD). It is also reported to the Linux
+kernel developers as
+<a href="https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51861">Kernel bugzilla
+report #51861 2012-12-20</a> (Intel SSD 520 stops working under load
+(SSDSC2BW180A3L in Lenovo ThinkPad T430s)). It is also reported on the
+Lenovo forums, both for
+<a href="http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/T430s-Intel-SSD-520-180GB-issue/m-p/1070549">T430
+2012-11-10</a> and for
+<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
+03-20-2013</a>. The problem do not only affect installation. The
+reports state that the disk lock up during use if many writes are done
+on the disk, so it is much no use to work around the installation
+problem and end up with a computer that can lock up at any moment.
+There is even a
+<a href="https://git.efficios.com/?p=test-ssd.git">small C program
+available</a> that will lock up the hard drive after running a few
+minutes by writing to a file.</p>
+
+<p>I've contacted my supplier and asked how to handle this, and after
+contacting PCHELP Norway (request 01D1FDP) which handle support
+requests for Lenovo, his first suggestion was to upgrade the disk
+firmware. Unfortunately there is no newer firmware available from
+Lenovo, as my disk already have the most recent one (version LF1i). I
+hope to hear more from him today and hope the problem can be
+fixed. :)</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ 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>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><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></div>
- <div class="date">21st January 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>Early this month I set out to try to
-<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">improve
-the Debian support for pluggable hardware devices</a>. Now my
-prototype is working, and it is ready for a larger audience. To test
-it, fetch the
-<a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">source
-from the Debian Edu subversion repository</a>, build and install the
-package. You might have to log out and in again activate the
-autostart script.</p>
-
-<p>The design is simple:</p>
-
-<ul>
-
-<li>Add desktop entry in /usr/share/autostart/ causing a program
-hw-support-handlerd to start when the user log in.</li>
-
-<li>This program listen for kernel events about new hardware (directly
-from the kernel like udev does), not using HAL dbus events as I
-initially did.</li>
-
-<li>When new hardware is inserted, look up the hardware modalias in
-the APT database, a database
-<a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=markup">available
-via HTTP</a> and a database available as part of the package.</li>
-
-<li>If a package is mapped to the hardware in question, the package
-isn't installed yet and this is the first time the hardware was
-plugged in, show a desktop notification suggesting to install the
-package or packages.</li>
-
-<li>If the user click on the 'install package now' button, ask
-aptdaemon via the PackageKit API to install the requrired package.</li>
-
-<li>aptdaemon ask for root password or sudo password, and install the
-package while showing progress information in a window.</li>
-
-</ul>
-
-<p>I still need to come up with a better name for the system. Here
-are some screen shots showing the prototype in action. First the
-notification, then the password request, and finally the request to
-approve all the dependencies. Sorry for the Norwegian Bokmål GUI.</p>
-
-<p><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-1-notification.png">
-<br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-2-password.png">
-<br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-3-dependencies.png">
-<br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-4-installing.png">
-<br><img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2013-01-21-hw-support-5-installing-details.png" width="70%"></p>
-
-<p>The prototype still need to be improved with longer timeouts, but
-is already useful. The database of hardware to package mappings also
-need more work. It is currently compatible with the Ubuntu way of
-storing such information in the package control file, but could be
-changed to use other formats instead or in addition to the current
-method. I've dropped the use of discover for this mapping, as the
-modalias approach is more flexible and easier to use on Linux as long
-as the Linux kernel expose its modalias strings directly.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Update 2013-01-21 16:50</strong>: Due to popular demand,
-here is the command required to check out and build the source: Use
-'<tt>svn checkout
-svn://svn.debian.org/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/; cd
-hw-support-handler; debuild</tt>'. If you lack debuild, install the
-devscripts package.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Update 2013-01-23 12:00</strong>: The project is now
-renamed to Isenkram and the source moved from the Debian Edu
-subversion repository to a Debian collab-maint git repository. See
-<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Welcome_to_the_world__Isenkram_.html">build
-instructions</a> for details.</p>
+ <div class="title"><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></div>
+ <div class="date"> 4th July 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>Half a year ago, I reported that I had to find a replacement for my
+trusty old Thinkpad X41. Unfortunately I did not have much time to
+spend on it, but today the replacement finally arrived. I ended up
+picking a <a href="http://www.linlap.com/lenovo_thinkpad_x230">Thinkpad
+X230</a> with SSD disk (NZDAJMN). I first test installed Debian Edu
+Wheezy as a roaming workstation, and it worked flawlessly. As I write
+this, it is installing what I hope will be a more final installation,
+with a encrypted hard drive to ensure any dope head stealing it end up
+with an expencive door stop.</p>
+
+<p>I had a hard time trying to track down a good laptop, as my most
+important requirements (robust and with a good keyboard) are never
+listed in the feature list. But I did get good help from the search
+feature at <ahref="http://www.prisjakt.no/">Prisjakt</a>, which
+allowed me to limit the list of interesting laptops based on my other
+requirements. A bit surprising that SSD disk are not disks, so I had
+to drop number of disks from my search parameters.</p>
+
+<p>I am not quite convinced about the keyboard, as it is significantly
+wider than my old keyboard, and I have to stretch my hand a lot more
+to reach the edges. But the key response is fairly good and the
+individual key shape is fairly easy to handle, so I hope I will get
+used to it. My old X40 was starting to fail, and I really needed a
+new laptop now. :)</p>
+
+<p>I look forward to figuring out how to turn off the touch pad.</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ 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>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><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></div>
- <div class="date">19th January 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>This Christmas my trusty old laptop died. It died quietly and
-suddenly in bed. With a quiet whimper, it went completely quiet and
-black. The power button was no longer able to turn it on. It was a
-IBM Thinkpad X41, and the best laptop I ever had. Better than both
-Thinkpads X30, X31, X40, X60, X61 and X61S. Far better than the
-Compaq I had before that. Now I need to find a replacement. To keep
-going during Christmas, I moved the one year old SSD disk to my old
-X40 where it fitted (only one I had left that could use it), but it is
-not a durable solution.
-
-<p>My laptop needs are fairly modest. This is my wishlist from when I
-got a new one more than 10 years ago. It still holds true.:)</p>
+ <div class="title"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Fourth_alpha_release_of_Debian_Edu_Skolelinux_based_on_Debian_Wheezy.html">Fourth alpha release of Debian Edu/Skolelinux based on Debian Wheezy</a></div>
+ <div class="date"> 3rd July 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>The fourth wheezy based alpha release of Debian Edu was wrapped up
+today. This is the release announcement:</p>
+
+<p><strong>New features for Debian Edu 7.1+edu0~alpha3 released
+2013-07-03</strong></p>
+
+<p>These are the release notes for for Debian Edu / Skolelinux
+7.1+edu0~alpha3, based on Debian with codename "Wheezy".</p>
+
+<p><strong>About Debian Edu and Skolelinux</strong></p>
+
+<p><a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu, also known as
+Skolelinux</a>, is a Linux distribution based on Debian providing an
+out-of-the box environment of a completely configured school
+network. Immediately after installation a school server running all
+services needed for a school network is set up just waiting for users
+and machines being added via GOsa², a comfortable Web-UI. A netbooting
+environment is prepared using PXE, so after initial installation of
+the main server from CD, DVD or USB stick all other machines can be
+installed via the network. The provided school server provides LDAP
+database and Kerberos authentication service, centralized home
+directories, DHCP server, web proxy and many other services. The
+desktop contains
+<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Educational_applications_included_in_Debian_Edu___Skolelinux__the_screenshot_collection____.html">more
+than 60 educational software packages</a> and more are available from
+the Debian archive, and schools can choose between KDE, Gnome, LXDE
+and Xfce desktop environment.</p>
+
+<p>This is the fourth test release based on Debian Wheezy. Basically
+this is an updated and slightly improved version compared to the
+Squeeze release.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Software updates</strong></p>
+<ul>
+ <li>Dropped ispell dictionaries from our default installation.</li>
+ <li>Dropped menu-xdg from the KDE desktop option, to drop the Debian
+ submenu. It was not included with Gnome, LXDE or Xfce, so this
+ brings KDE in line with the others.</li>
+ <li>Dropped xdrawchem, xjig and xsok from our default installation as
+ they don't have a desktop menu entry and thus won't show up in the
+ menu now that menu-xdg was removed.</li>
+ <li>Removed the killer system to kill left behind processes on
+ multi-user machines, as it was no longer able to understand when a
+ X display was in use and killed the processes of the active users
+ too.</li>
+ <li>Dropped the golearn (from goplay) package as the debtags in wheezy
+ are too few to make the package useful.</li>
+</ul>
+<p><strong>Other changes</strong></p>
+<ul>
+ <li>Updated artwork matching http://wiki.debian.org/DebianArt/Themes/Joy
+ <li>Multi-arch i386/amd64 USB stick ISO available.</li>
+ <li>Got rid of ispell/wordlist related debconf questions that showed
+ up for some language options.</li>
+ <li>Switched to using http.debian.net as APT source by default.</li>
+ <li>Fixed proxy configuration on Main Server installations.</li>
+ <li>Changed LTSP setup to ask dpkg to use force-unsafe-io the same way
+ d-i is doing it.</li>
+ <li>Made sure root and user passwords were not left behind in the
+ debconf database after installation on Main Server installations.</li>
+ <li>Made Roaming Workstation dynamic setup more robust and added draft
+ script setup-ad-client to hook a Roaming Workstation up to a
+ Active Directory server instead of a Debian Edu Main Server.</li>
+ <li>Update system to install needed firmware packages during
+ installation, to work properly in Wheezy.</li>
+ <li>Update system to handle hardware quirks (debian-edu-hwsetup).</li>
+ <li>Corrected PXE installation setup to properly pass selected desktop
+ and keymap settings to PXE installation clients.</li>
+ <li>LTSP diskless workstations use sshfs by default, allowing them to
+ work without adding them to DNS and NIS netgroups for NFS access.</li>
+</ul>
+<p><strong>Known issues</strong></p>
+<ul>
+ <li>No mass import of user account data in GOsa (ldif or csv)
+ available yet (698840).</li>
+ <li>Artwork not enabled for all desktops.</li>
+</ul>
+<p><strong>Where to get it</strong></p>
+<p>To download the multiarch netinstall CD release you can use</p>
<ul>
+ <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso</a></li>
+ <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso</a></li>
+ <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-CD.iso .</li>
+</ul>
-<li>Lightweight (around 1 kg) and small volume (preferably smaller
- than A4).</li>
-<li>Robust, it will be in my backpack every day.</li>
-<li>Three button mouse and a mouse pin instead of touch pad.</li>
-<li>Long battery life time. Preferable a week.</li>
-<li>Internal WIFI network card.</li>
-<li>Internal Twisted Pair network card.</li>
-<li>Some USB slots (2-3 is plenty)</li>
-<li>Good keyboard - similar to the Thinkpad.</li>
-<li>Video resolution at least 1024x768, with size around 12" (A4 paper
-size).</li>
-<li>Hardware supported by Debian Stable, ie the default kernel and
- X.org packages.</li>
-<li>Quiet, preferably fan free (or at least not using the fan most of
- the time).
+<p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 2b161a99d2a848c376d8d04e3854e30c
+<br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 498922e9c508c0a7ee9dbe1dfe5bf830d779c3c8</p>
+<p>To download the multiarch USB stick ISO release you can use</p>
+<ul>
+ <li><a href="ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso">ftp://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso</a></li>
+ <li><a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso">http://ftp.skolelinux.org/skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso</a></li>
+ <li>rsync -avzP ftp.skolelinux.org::skolelinux-cd/wheezy/debian-edu-7.1+edu0~a3-USB.iso .</li>
</ul>
-<p>You will notice that there are no RAM and CPU requirements in the
-list. The reason is simply that the specifications on laptops the
-last 10-15 years have been sufficient for my needs, and I have to look
-at other features to choose my laptop. But are there still made as
-robust laptops as my X41? The Thinkpad X60/X61 proved to be less
-robust, and Thinkpads seem to be heading in the wrong direction since
-Lenovo took over. But I've been told that X220 and X1 Carbon might
-still be useful.</p>
-
-<p>Perhaps I should rethink my needs, and look for a pad with an
-external keyboard? I'll have to check the
-<a href="http://www.linux-laptop.net/">Linux Laptops site</a> for
-well-supported laptops, or perhaps just buy one preinstalled from one
-of the vendors listed on the <a href="http://linuxpreloaded.com/">Linux
-Pre-loaded site</a>.</p>
+<p>The MD5SUM of this image is: 25e808e403a4c15dbef1d13c37d572ac
+<br>The SHA1SUM of this image is: 15ecfc93eb6b4f453b7eb0bc04b6a279262d9721</p>
+
+<p><strong>How to report bugs</strong></p>
+
+<p><a href="http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs">http://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/HowTo/ReportBugs</a></p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian
edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><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></div>
- <div class="date">18th January 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>Some times I try to figure out which Iceweasel browser plugin to
-install to get support for a given MIME type. Thanks to
-<a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Plugins">specifications
-done by Ubuntu</a> and Mozilla, it is possible to do this in Debian.
-Unfortunately, not very many packages provide the needed meta
-information, Anyway, here is a small script to look up all browser
-plugin packages announcing ther MIME support using this specification:</p>
-
-<pre>
-#!/usr/bin/python
-import sys
-import apt
-def pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
- cache = apt.Cache()
- cache.open(None)
- thepkgs = []
- for pkg in cache:
- version = pkg.candidate
- if version is None:
- version = pkg.installed
- if version is None:
- continue
- record = version.record
- if not record.has_key('Npp-MimeType'):
- continue
- mime_types = record['Npp-MimeType'].split(',')
- for t in mime_types:
- t = t.rstrip().strip()
- if t == mimetype:
- thepkgs.append(pkg.name)
- return thepkgs
-mimetype = "audio/ogg"
-if 1 < len(sys.argv):
- mimetype = sys.argv[1]
-print "Browser plugin packages supporting %s:" % mimetype
-for pkg in pkgs_handling_mimetype(mimetype):
- print " %s" %pkg
-</pre>
-
-<p>It can be used like this to look up a given MIME type:</p>
-
-<pre>
-% ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype
-Browser plugin packages supporting audio/ogg:
- gecko-mediaplayer
-% ./apt-find-browserplug-for-mimetype application/x-shockwave-flash
-Browser plugin packages supporting application/x-shockwave-flash:
- browser-plugin-gnash
-%
-</pre>
-
-<p>In Ubuntu this mechanism is combined with support in the browser
-itself to query for plugins and propose to install the needed
-packages. It would be great if Debian supported such feature too. Is
-anyone working on adding it?</p>
-
-<p><strong>Update 2013-01-18 14:20</strong>: The Debian BTS
-request for icweasel support for this feature is
-<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/484010">#484010</a> from 2008 (and
-<a href="http://bugs.debian.org/698426">#698426</a> from today). Lack
-of manpower and wish for a different design is the reason thus feature
-is not yet in iceweasel from Debian.</p>
+ <div class="title"><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></div>
+ <div class="date">25th June 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
+perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
+working. One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
+needed to get the hardware on my computer working. Most often this
+affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
+controller or the ethernet card. Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
+<a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
+including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
+process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
+they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
+debian packages. Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
+
+<p><pre>
+# isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
+info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
+info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
+info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
+info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
+info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
+firmware-ipw2x00
+firmware-ipw2x00
+Preconfiguring packages ...
+Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
+(Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
+Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
+Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
+#
+</pre></p>
+
+<p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
+printed instead:</p>
+
+<p><pre>
+# isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
+info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules. exiting
+#
+</pre></p>
+
+<p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
+me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
+
+<p>So, how does it work? It look at the set of currently loaded
+kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
+the firmware files listed in the module meta-information. Next, it
+download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
+the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
+requested firmware file. If the package is in the non-free section, a
+non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
+<tt>apt-get install</tt>. The end result is a slightly better working
+machine.</p>
+
+<p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
+this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
+finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
+#655507</a>. There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
+firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
+from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ 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>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><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></div>
- <div class="date">16th January 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>The <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/AppStreamDebianProposal">DEP-11
-proposal to add AppStream information to the Debian archive</a>, is a
-proposal to make it possible for a Desktop application to propose to
-the user some package to install to gain support for a given MIME
-type, font, library etc. that is currently missing. With such
-mechanism in place, it would be possible for the desktop to
-automatically propose and install leocad if some LDraw file is
-downloaded by the browser.</p>
-
-<p>To get some idea about the current content of the archive, I decided
-to write a simple program to extract all .desktop files from the
-Debian archive and look up the claimed MIME support there. The result
-can be found on the
-<a href="http://ftp.skolelinux.org/pub/AppStreamTest">Skolelinux FTP
-site</a>. Using the collected information, it become possible to
-answer the question in the title. Here are the 20 most supported MIME
-types in Debian stable (Squeeze), testing (Wheezy) and unstable (Sid).
-The complete list is available from the link above.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Debian Stable:</strong></p>
-
-<pre>
- count MIME type
- ----- -----------------------
- 32 text/plain
- 30 audio/mpeg
- 29 image/png
- 28 image/jpeg
- 27 application/ogg
- 26 audio/x-mp3
- 25 image/tiff
- 25 image/gif
- 22 image/bmp
- 22 audio/x-wav
- 20 audio/x-flac
- 19 audio/x-mpegurl
- 18 video/x-ms-asf
- 18 audio/x-musepack
- 18 audio/x-mpeg
- 18 application/x-ogg
- 17 video/mpeg
- 17 audio/x-scpls
- 17 audio/ogg
- 16 video/x-ms-wmv
-</pre>
-
-<p><strong>Debian Testing:</strong></p>
-
-<pre>
- count MIME type
- ----- -----------------------
- 33 text/plain
- 32 image/png
- 32 image/jpeg
- 29 audio/mpeg
- 27 image/gif
- 26 image/tiff
- 26 application/ogg
- 25 audio/x-mp3
- 22 image/bmp
- 21 audio/x-wav
- 19 audio/x-mpegurl
- 19 audio/x-mpeg
- 18 video/mpeg
- 18 audio/x-scpls
- 18 audio/x-flac
- 18 application/x-ogg
- 17 video/x-ms-asf
- 17 text/html
- 17 audio/x-musepack
- 16 image/x-xbitmap
-</pre>
-
-<p><strong>Debian Unstable:</strong></p>
-
-<pre>
- count MIME type
- ----- -----------------------
- 31 text/plain
- 31 image/png
- 31 image/jpeg
- 29 audio/mpeg
- 28 application/ogg
- 27 image/gif
- 26 image/tiff
- 26 audio/x-mp3
- 23 audio/x-wav
- 22 image/bmp
- 21 audio/x-flac
- 20 audio/x-mpegurl
- 19 audio/x-mpeg
- 18 video/x-ms-asf
- 18 video/mpeg
- 18 audio/x-scpls
- 18 application/x-ogg
- 17 audio/x-musepack
- 16 video/x-ms-wmv
- 16 video/x-msvideo
-</pre>
-
-<p>I am told that PackageKit can provide an API to access the kind of
-information mentioned in DEP-11. I have not yet had time to look at
-it, but hope the PackageKit people in Debian are on top of these
-issues.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Update 2013-01-16 13:35</strong>: Updated numbers after
-discovering a typo in my script.</p>
+ <div class="title"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/The_value_of_a_good_distro_wide_test_suite___.html">The value of a good distro wide test suite...</a></div>
+ <div class="date">22nd June 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>In the <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu /
+Skolelinux</a> project, we include a post-installation test suite,
+which check that services are running, working, and return the
+expected results. It runs automatically just after the first boot on
+test installations (using test ISOs), but not on production
+installations (using non-test ISOs). It test that the LDAP service is
+operating, Kerberos is responding, DNS is replying, file systems are
+online resizable, etc, etc. And it check that the PXE service is
+configured, which is the topic of this post.</p>
+
+<p>The last week I've fixed the DVD and USB stick ISOs for our Debian
+Edu Wheezy release. These ISOs are supposed to be able to install a
+complete system without any Internet connection, but for that to
+happen all the needed packages need to be on them. Thanks to our test
+suite, I discovered that we had forgotten to adjust our PXE setup to
+cope with the new names and paths used by the netboot d-i packages.
+When Internet connectivity was available, the installer fall back to
+using wget to fetch d-i boot images, but when offline it require
+working packages to get it working. And ad the packages changed name
+from debian-installer-6.0-netboot-$arch to
+debian-installer-7.0-netboot-$arch, we no longer pulled in the
+packages during installation. Without our test suite, I suspect we
+would never have discovered this before release. Now it is fixed
+right after we got the ISOs operational.</p>
+
+<p>Another by-product of the test suite is that we can ask system
+administrators with problems getting Debian Edu to work, to run the
+test suite using <tt>/usr/sbin/debian-edu-test-install</tt> and see if
+any errors are detected. This usually pinpoint the subsystem causing
+the problem.</p>
+
+<p>If you want to help us help kids learn how to share and create,
+please join us on
+<a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">#debian-edu on
+irc.debian.org</a> and the
+<a href="http://lists.debian.org/debian-edu/">debian-edu@</a> mailing
+list.</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian
edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><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></div>
- <div class="date">15th January 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>Yesterday, I wrote about the
-<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Modalias_strings___a_practical_way_to_map__stuff__to_hardware.html">modalias
-values provided by the Linux kernel</a> following my hope for
-<a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Lets_make_hardware_dongles_easier_to_use_in_Debian.html">better
-dongle support in Debian</a>. Using this knowledge, I have tested how
-modalias values attached to package names can be used to map packages
-to hardware. This allow the system to look up and suggest relevant
-packages when I plug in some new hardware into my machine, and replace
-discover and discover-data as the database used to map hardware to
-packages.</p>
-
-<p>I create a modaliases file with entries like the following,
-containing package name, kernel module name (if relevant, otherwise
-the package name) and globs matching the relevant hardware
-modalias.</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-Package: package-name
-<br>Modaliases: module(modaliasglob, modaliasglob, modaliasglob)</p>
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>It is fairly trivial to write code to find the relevant packages
-for a given modalias value using this file.</p>
-
-<p>An entry like this would suggest the video and picture application
-cheese for many USB web cameras (interface bus class 0E01):</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-Package: cheese
-<br>Modaliases: cheese(usb:v*p*d*dc*dsc*dp*ic0Eisc01ip*)</p>
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>An entry like this would suggest the pcmciautils package when a
-CardBus bridge (bus class 0607) PCI device is present:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-Package: pcmciautils
-<br>Modaliases: pcmciautils(pci:v*d*sv*sd*bc06sc07i*)
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>An entry like this would suggest the package colorhug-client when
-plugging in a ColorHug with USB IDs 04D8:F8DA:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-Package: colorhug-client
-<br>Modaliases: colorhug-client(usb:v04D8pF8DAd*)</p>
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>I believe the format is compatible with the format of the Packages
-file in the Debian archive. Ubuntu already uses their Packages file
-to store their mappings from packages to hardware.</p>
-
-<p>By adding a XB-Modaliases: header in debian/control, any .deb can
-announce the hardware it support in a way my prototype understand.
-This allow those publishing packages in an APT source outside the
-Debian archive as well as those backporting packages to make sure the
-hardware mapping are included in the package meta information. I've
-tested such header in the pymissile package, and its modalias mapping
-is working as it should with my prototype. It even made it to Ubuntu
-Raring.</p>
-
-<p>To test if it was possible to look up supported hardware using only
-the shell tools available in the Debian installer, I wrote a shell
-implementation of the lookup code. The idea is to create files for
-each modalias and let the shell do the matching. Please check out and
-try the
-<a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/hw-support-lookup?view=co">hw-support-lookup</a>
-shell script. It run without any extra dependencies and fetch the
-hardware mappings from the Debian archive and the subversion
-repository where I currently work on my prototype.</p>
-
-<p>When I use it on a machine with a yubikey inserted, it suggest to
-install yubikey-personalization:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-% ./hw-support-lookup
-<br>yubikey-personalization
-<br>%
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>When I run it on my Thinkpad X40 with a PCMCIA/CardBus slot, it
-propose to install the pcmciautils package:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-% ./hw-support-lookup
-<br>pcmciautils
-<br>%
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>If you know of any hardware-package mapping that should be added to
-<a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/modaliases?view=co">my
-database</a>, please tell me about it.</p>
-
-<p>It could be possible to generate several of the mappings between
-packages and hardware. One source would be to look at packages with
-kernel modules, ie packages with *.ko files in /lib/modules/, and
-extract their modalias information. Another would be to look at
-packages with udev rules, ie packages with files in
-/lib/udev/rules.d/, and extract their vendor/model information to
-generate a modalias matching rule. I have not tested any of these to
-see if it work.</p>
-
-<p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
-packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
-machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
-<a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
+ <div class="title"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Victor_Ni_u.html">Debian Edu interview: Victor Nițu</a></div>
+ <div class="date">17th June 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>The <a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu and
+Skolelinux</a> distribution have users and contributors all around the
+globe. And a while back, an enterprising young man showed up on
+<a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-edu">our IRC channel
+#debian-edu</a> and started asking questions about how Debian Edu
+worked. We answered as good as we could, and even convinced him to
+help us with translations. And today I managed to get an interview
+with him, to learn more about him.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
+
+<p>I'm a 25 year old free software enthusiast, living in Romania,
+which is also my country of origin. Back in 2009, at a New Year's Eve
+party, I had a very nice <strike>beer</strike> discussion with a
+friend, when we realized we have no organised Debian community in our
+country. A few days later, we put together the infrastructure for such
+community and even gathered a nice Debian-ish crowd. Since then, I
+began my quest as a free software hacker and activist and I am
+constantly trying to cover as much ground as possible on that
+field.</p>
+
+<p>A few years ago I founded a small web development company, which
+provided me the flexible schedule I needed so much for my
+activities. For the last 13 months, I have been the Technical Director
+of <a href="http://ceata.org/">Fundația Ceata</a>, which is a free
+software activist organisation endorsed by the FSF and the FSFE, and
+the only one we have in our country.</p>
+
+<p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
+project?</strong></p>
+
+<p>The idea of participating in the Debian Edu project was a surprise
+even to me, since I never used it before I began getting involved in
+it. This year I had a great opportunity to deliver a talk on
+educational software, and I knew immediately where to look. It was a
+love at first sight, since I was previously involved with some of the
+technologies the project incorporates, and I rapidly found a lot of
+ways to contribute.</p>
+
+<p>My first contributions consisted in translating the installer and
+configuration dialogs, then I found some bugs to squash (I still
+haven't fixed them yet though), and I even got my eyes on some other
+areas where I can prove myself helpful. Since the appetite for free
+software in my country is pretty low, I'll be happy to be the first
+one around here advocating for the project's adoption in educational
+environments, and maybe even get my hands dirty in creating a flavour
+for our own needs. I am not used to make very advanced plannings, so
+from now on, time will tell what I'll be doing next, but I think I
+have a pretty consistent starting point.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux/Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Not a long time ago, I was in the position of configuring and
+maintaining a LDAP server on some Debian derivative, and I must say it
+took me a while. A long time ago, I was maintaining a bigger
+Samba-powered infrastructure, and I must say I spent quite a lot of
+time on it. I have similar stories about many of the services included
+with Skolelinux, and the main advantage I see about it is the
+out-of-the box availability of them, making it quite competitive when
+it comes to managing a school's network, for example.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, there is more to say about Skolelinux than the
+availability of the software included, its flexibility in various
+scenarios is something I can't wait to experiment "into the wild" (I
+only played with virtual machines so far). And I am sure there is a
+lot more I haven't discovered yet about it, being so new within the
+project.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>As usual, when it comes to Debian Blends, I see as the biggest
+disadvantage the lack of a numerous team dedicated to the
+project. Every day I see the same names in the changelogs, and I have
+a constantly fear of the bus factor in this story. I'd like to see
+Debian Edu advertised more as an entry point into the Debian
+ecosystem, especially amongst newcomers and students. IMHO there are a
+lot low-hanging fruits in terms of bug squashing, and enough
+opportunities to get the feeling of the Debian Project's dynamics. Not
+to mention it's a very fun blend to work on!</p>
+
+<p>Derived from the previous statement, is the delay in catching up
+with the main Debian release and documentation. This is common though
+to all blends and derivatives, but it's an issue we can all work
+on.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
+
+<p>I can hardly imagine myself spending a day without Vim, since my
+daily routine covers writing code and hacking configuration files. I
+am a fan of the Awesome window manager (but I also like the
+Enlightenment project a lot!),
+<a href="http://www.claws-mail.org/">Claws Mail</a> due to its ease of
+use and very configurable behaviour. Recently I fell in love with
+<a href="https://launchpad.net/redshift">Redshift</a>, which helps me
+get through the night without headaches. Of course, there is much more
+stuff in this bag, but I'll need a blog on my own for doing this!</p>
+
+<p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
+get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Well, on this field, I cannot do much more than experiment right
+now. So, being far from having a recipe for success, I can only assume
+that:</p>
+
+<ul>
+
+<li>schools would like to get rid of proprietary software</li>
+
+<li>students will love the openness of the system, and will want to
+ experiment with it - maybe we need to harvest the native curiosity
+ of teenagers more?</li>
+
+<li>there is no "right one" when it comes to strategies, but it would
+ be useful to have some success stories published somewhere, so
+ other can get some inspiration from them (I know I'd promote
+ them!)</li>
+
+<li>more active promotion - talks, conferences, even small school
+ lectures can do magical things if they encounter at least one
+ person interested. Who knows who that person might be? ;-)</li>
+
+</ul>
+
+<p>I also see some problems in getting Skolelinux into schools; for
+example, in our country we have a great deal of corruption issues, so
+it might be hard(er) to fight against proprietary solutions. Also,
+people who relied on commercial software for all their lives, would be
+very hard to convert against their will.</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
</div>
<div class="padding"></div>
<div class="entry">
- <div class="title"><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></div>
- <div class="date">14th January 2013</div>
- <div class="body"><p>While looking into how to look up Debian packages based on hardware
-information, to find the packages that support a given piece of
-hardware, I refreshed my memory regarding modalias values, and decided
-to document the details. Here are my findings so far, also available
-in
-<a href="http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/debian-edu/trunk/src/hw-support-handler/">the
-Debian Edu subversion repository</a>:
-
-<p><strong>Modalias decoded</strong></p>
-
-<p>This document try to explain what the different types of modalias
-values stands for. It is in part based on information from
-<URL: <a href="https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias">https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Modalias</a> >,
-<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> >,
-<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> > and
-<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> >.
-
-<p>The modalias entries for a given Linux machine can be found using
-this shell script:</p>
-
-<pre>
-find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u
-</pre>
-
-<p>The supported modalias globs for a given kernel module can be found
-using modinfo:</p>
-
-<pre>
-% /sbin/modinfo psmouse | grep alias:
-alias: serio:ty05pr*id*ex*
-alias: serio:ty01pr*id*ex*
-%
-</pre>
-
-<p><strong>PCI subtype</strong></p>
-
-<p>A typical PCI entry can look like this. This is an Intel Host
-Bridge memory controller:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-pci:v00008086d00002770sv00001028sd000001ADbc06sc00i00
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>This represent these values:</p>
-
-<pre>
- v 00008086 (vendor)
- d 00002770 (device)
- sv 00001028 (subvendor)
- sd 000001AD (subdevice)
- bc 06 (bus class)
- sc 00 (bus subclass)
- i 00 (interface)
-</pre>
-
-<p>The vendor/device values are the same values outputted from 'lspci
--n' as 8086:2770. The bus class/subclass is also shown by lspci as
-0600. The 0600 class is a host bridge. Other useful bus values are
-0300 (VGA compatible card) and 0200 (Ethernet controller).</p>
-
-<p>Not sure how to figure out the interface value, nor what it
-means.</p>
-
-<p><strong>USB subtype</strong></p>
-
-<p>Some typical USB entries can look like this. This is an internal
-USB hub in a laptop:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-usb:v1D6Bp0001d0206dc09dsc00dp00ic09isc00ip00
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>Here is the values included in this alias:</p>
-
-<pre>
- v 1D6B (device vendor)
- p 0001 (device product)
- d 0206 (bcddevice)
- dc 09 (device class)
- dsc 00 (device subclass)
- dp 00 (device protocol)
- ic 09 (interface class)
- isc 00 (interface subclass)
- ip 00 (interface protocol)
-</pre>
-
-<p>The 0900 device class/subclass means hub. Some times the relevant
-class is in the interface class section. For a simple USB web camera,
-these alias entries show up:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc01ip00
-<br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic01isc02ip00
-<br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc01ip00
-<br>usb:v0AC8p3420d5000dcEFdsc02dp01ic0Eisc02ip00
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>Interface class 0E01 is video control, 0E02 is video streaming (aka
-camera), 0101 is audio control device and 0102 is audio streaming (aka
-microphone). Thus this is a camera with microphone included.</p>
-
-<p><strong>ACPI subtype</strong></p>
-
-<p>The ACPI type is used for several non-PCI/USB stuff. This is an IR
-receiver in a Thinkpad X40:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>The values between the colons are IDs.</p>
-
-<p><strong>DMI subtype</strong></p>
-
-<p>The DMI table contain lots of information about the computer case
-and model. This is an entry for a IBM Thinkpad X40, fetched from
-/sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/modalias:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-dmi:bvnIBM:bvr1UETB6WW(1.66):bd06/15/2005:svnIBM:pn2371H4G:pvrThinkPadX40:rvnIBM:rn2371H4G:rvrNotAvailable:cvnIBM:ct10:cvrNotAvailable:
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>The values present are</p>
-
-<pre>
- bvn IBM (BIOS vendor)
- bvr 1UETB6WW(1.66) (BIOS version)
- bd 06/15/2005 (BIOS date)
- svn IBM (system vendor)
- pn 2371H4G (product name)
- pvr ThinkPadX40 (product version)
- rvn IBM (board vendor)
- rn 2371H4G (board name)
- rvr NotAvailable (board version)
- cvn IBM (chassis vendor)
- ct 10 (chassis type)
- cvr NotAvailable (chassis version)
-</pre>
-
-<p>The chassis type 10 is Notebook. Other interesting values can be
-found in the dmidecode source:</p>
-
-<pre>
- 3 Desktop
- 4 Low Profile Desktop
- 5 Pizza Box
- 6 Mini Tower
- 7 Tower
- 8 Portable
- 9 Laptop
- 10 Notebook
- 11 Hand Held
- 12 Docking Station
- 13 All In One
- 14 Sub Notebook
- 15 Space-saving
- 16 Lunch Box
- 17 Main Server Chassis
- 18 Expansion Chassis
- 19 Sub Chassis
- 20 Bus Expansion Chassis
- 21 Peripheral Chassis
- 22 RAID Chassis
- 23 Rack Mount Chassis
- 24 Sealed-case PC
- 25 Multi-system
- 26 CompactPCI
- 27 AdvancedTCA
- 28 Blade
- 29 Blade Enclosing
-</pre>
-
-<p>The chassis type values are not always accurately set in the DMI
-table. For example my home server is a tower, but the DMI modalias
-claim it is a desktop.</p>
-
-<p><strong>SerIO subtype</strong></p>
-
-<p>This type is used for PS/2 mouse plugs. One example is from my
-test machine:</p>
-
-<p><blockquote>
-serio:ty01pr00id00ex00
-</blockquote></p>
-
-<p>The values present are</p>
-
-<pre>
- ty 01 (type)
- pr 00 (prototype)
- id 00 (id)
- ex 00 (extra)
-</pre>
-
-<p>This type is supported by the psmouse driver. I am not sure what
-the valid values are.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Other subtypes</strong></p>
-
-<p>There are heaps of other modalias subtypes according to
-file2alias.c. There is the rest of the list from that source: amba,
-ap, bcma, ccw, css, eisa, hid, i2c, ieee1394, input, ipack, isapnp,
-mdio, of, parisc, pcmcia, platform, scsi, sdio, spi, ssb, vio, virtio,
-vmbus, x86cpu and zorro. I did not spend time documenting all of
-these, as they do not seem relevant for my intended use with mapping
-hardware to packages when new stuff is inserted during run time.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Looking up kernel modules using modalias values</strong></p>
-
-<p>To check which kernel modules provide support for a given modalias,
-one can use the following shell script:</p>
-
-<pre>
- for id in $(find /sys -name modalias -print0 | xargs -0 cat | sort -u); do \
- echo "$id" ; \
- /sbin/modprobe --show-depends "$id"|sed 's/^/ /' ; \
- done
-</pre>
-
-<p>The output can look like this (only the first few entries as the
-list is very long on my test machine):</p>
-
-<pre>
- acpi:ACPI0003:
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/acpi/ac.ko
- acpi:device:
- FATAL: Module acpi:device: not found.
- acpi:IBM0068:
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/char/nvram.ko
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/leds/led-class.ko
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/rfkill/rfkill.ko
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/platform/x86/thinkpad_acpi.ko
- acpi:IBM0071:PNP0511:
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/lib/crc-ccitt.ko
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/net/irda/irda.ko
- insmod /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-686/kernel/drivers/net/irda/nsc-ircc.ko
- [...]
-</pre>
-
-<p>If you want to help implementing a system to let us propose what
-packages to install when new hardware is plugged into a Debian
-machine, please send me an email or talk to me on
-<a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-devel">#debian-devel</a>.</p>
-
-<p><strong>Update 2013-01-15:</strong> Rewrite "cat $(find ...)" to
-"find ... -print0 | xargs -0 cat" to make sure it handle directories
-in /sys/ with space in them.</p>
+ <div class="title"><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Debian_Edu_interview__Jonathan_Carter.html">Debian Edu interview: Jonathan Carter</a></div>
+ <div class="date">12th June 2013</div>
+ <div class="body"><p>There is a certain cross-over between the
+<a href="http://www.skolelinux.org/">Debian Edu / Skolelinux
+project</a> and <a href="http://www.edubuntu.org/">the Edubuntu
+project</a>, and for example the LTSP packages in Debian are a joint
+effort between the projects. One person with a foot in both camps is
+Jonathan Carter, which I am now happy to present to you.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Who are you, and how do you spend your days?</strong></p>
+
+<p>I'm a South-African free software geek who lives in Cape Town. My
+days vary quite a bit since I'm involved in too many things. As I'm
+getting older I'm learning how to focus a bit more :)</p>
+
+<p>I'm also an Edubuntu contributor and I love when there are
+opportunities for the Edubuntu and Debian Edu projects to benefit from
+each other.</p>
+
+<p><strong>How did you get in contact with the Skolelinux / Debian Edu
+project?</strong></p>
+
+<p>I've been somewhat familiar with the project before, but I think my
+first direct exposure to the project was when I met Petter
+[Reinholdtsen] and Knut [Yrvin] at the Edubuntu summit in 2005 in
+London. They provided great feedback that helped the bootstrapping of
+Edubuntu. Back then Edubuntu (and even Ubuntu) was still very new and
+it was great getting input from people who have been around longer. I
+was also still very excitable and said yes to everything and to this
+day I have a big todo list backlog that I'm catching up with. I think
+over the years the relationship between Edubuntu and Debian-Edu has
+been gradually improving, although I think there's a lot that we could
+still improve on in terms of working together on packages. I'm sure
+we'll get there one day.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the advantages of Skolelinux / Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>Debian itself already has so many advantages. I could go on about
+it for pages, but in essence I love that it's a very honest project
+that puts its users first with no hidden agendas and also produces
+very high quality work.</p>
+
+<p>I think the advantage of Debian Edu is that it makes many common
+set-up tasks simpler so that administrators can get up and running
+with a lot less effort and frustration. At the same time I think it
+helps to standardise installations in schools so that it's easier for
+community members and commercial suppliers to support.</p>
+
+<p><strong>What do you see as the disadvantages of Skolelinux / Debian
+Edu?</strong></p>
+
+<p>I had to re-type this one a few times because I'm trying to
+separate "disadvantages" from "areas that need improvement" (which is
+what I originally rambled on about)</p>
+
+<p>The biggest disadvantage I can think of is lack of manpower. The
+project could do so much more if there were more good contributors. I
+think some of the problems are external too. Free software and free
+content in education is a no-brainer but it takes some time to catch
+on. When you've been working with the same proprietary eco-system for
+years and have gotten used to it, it can be hard to adjust to some
+concepts in the free software world. It would be nice if there were
+more Debian Edu consultants across the world. I'd love to be one
+myself but I'm already so over-committed that it's just not possible
+currently.</p>
+
+<p>I think the best short-term solution to that large-scale problem is
+for schools to be pro-active and share their experiences and grow
+their skills in-house. I'm often saddened to see how much money
+educational institutions spend on 3rd party solutions that they don't
+have access to after the service has ended and they could've gotten so
+much more value otherwise by being more self-sustainable and
+autonomous.</p>
+
+<p><strong>Which free software do you use daily?</strong></p>
+
+<p>My main laptop dual-boots between Debian and Windows 7. I was
+Windows free for years but started dual-booting again last year for
+some games which help me focus and relax (Starcraft II in
+particular). Gaming support on Linux is improving in leaps and bounds
+so I suppose I'll soon be able to regain that disk space :)</p>
+
+<p>Besides that I rely on Icedove, Chromium, Terminator, Byobu, irssi,
+git, Tomboy, KVM, VLC and LibreOffice. Recently I've been torn on
+which desktop environment I like and I'm taking some refuge in Xfce
+while I figure that out. I like tools that keep things simple. I enjoy
+Python and shell scripting. I went to an Arduino workshop recently and
+it was awesome seeing how easy and simple the IDE software was to get
+up and running in Debian compared to the users running Windows and OS
+X.</p>
+
+<p>I also use mc which some people frown upon slightly. I got used to
+using Norton Commander in the early 90's and it stuck (I think the
+people who sneer at it is just jealous that they don't know how to use
+it :p)
+
+<p><strong>Which strategy do you believe is the right one to use to
+get schools to use free software?</strong></p>
+
+<p>I think trying to force it is unproductive. I also think that in
+many cases it's appropriate for schools to use non-free systems and I
+don't think that there's any particular moral or ethical problem with
+that.</p>
+
+<p>I do think though that free software can already solve so so many
+problems in educational institutions and it's just a shame not taking
+advantage of that.</p>
+
+<p>I also think that some curricula need serious review. For example,
+some areas of the world rely heavily on very specific versions of MS
+Office, teaching students to parrot menu items instead of learning the
+general concepts. I think that's very unproductive because firstly, MS
+Office's interface changes drastically every few years and on top of
+that it also locks in a generation to a product that might not be the
+best solution for them.</p>
+
+<p>To answer your question, I believe that the right strategy is to
+educate and inform, giving someone the information they require to
+make a decision that would work for them.</p>
</div>
<div class="tags">
- 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>.
+ Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju</a>.
</div>
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+
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+ <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (38)</a></li>
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